Goodbye's Suck

If you had 'a penny for my thoughts' you'd be on your way to material wealth. Because my mind has been racing with thoughts and a huge mix of emotions. I'm working on gathering those thoughts and identifying my emotions from Christ's. But I'm still working, and I believe it will take time to make sense of what is going on up there in my 'ole noggin. Don't expect eloquence or a well-written post. I'm far from poise, and far from a well collection of thoughts, ideas, stories...bear with me, if you will.

Goodbyes suck. In fact I don’t believe in them, only ‘see you later’s’. I feel like I’ve dealt with a fair share of goodbyes this time. Yes, I know with some, these goodbyes are only temporary and a great dobrodošli (welcome!) awaits me and my temporary goodbyes in Heaven. I do find comfort in that, but even as I write this, tears are filling my eyes (tears have been a close accomplice of mine lately. I see it as God’s humbling touch upon such a prideful human as myself. Simply because I hate to cry). It’s not the idea of possibly never seeing them again. But rather, it’s the realization of how precious those who hold a ‘temporary goodbye’ have become. I do my absolute best to try and avoid attachments, because I know that ‘see you later’s’ are inevitable. But sometimes it just happens. And when it does, it’s with the most Christ centered people I’ve come across. Those who’ve invested in my molding to become more like Christ. That’s why it sucks. I know that I’m guaranteed to see them again, but having to think and then actually separate from the most revolutionary people in my life…it just hurts. I know it’s only a physical separation, but it’s still tough. That’s why the ‘goodbye’ or even, the ‘see you later’ is hard no matter what; because it’s leaving the security of someone who has so quickly engulfed me in the refining love of Christ. It’s not as simple or emotionless as it may seem. How do I even begin to explain to someone their significance in my life? I wouldn’t change the opportunity of meeting and serving alongside some of the most Kingdom provoking individuals I’ve been privileged enough to encounter. Except for my ‘see you later’s’ and ‘goodbyes’, they would become absent from my vocabulary.

"Tell them you are well."

The sun was just waking up at 6:00 o’clock in the morning. I, however, was far from awake. I began making my rounds and as I sluggishly approached the next hospital door it was covered in a large sign saying, “BLIND”-although someone had crossed through that and instead put, “but now can see because of JESUS.” I knocked on her door, walked in and said good morning. She joyfully replied with “Good morning mam!” [Had she known my age, I’m sure she would have called me something along the lines of ‘honey’ or ‘darling’]. I can’t explain it to you but she radiantly exuded Truth.
I finished checking on her and told her I would be back to see how she was doing in a little bit. So I went to my other patients. I couldn’t help but feel strongly propelled to go back to that sweet old lady’s room. After I finished up with the other patients, I secretly made my way back to her room. I can’t tell you why exactly, but I just felt God wanted me to tell her that she is glorifying Him. So I did. I then told her that I if I don’t see her ever again, that I cannot wait to see her in Heaven. I watched as tears began to form in her glassed-over eyes. She asked what my name was and said, “Sit down.”
I found myself sobbing as I held the gentle hand of an 80-something child of God. I sat there and listened to a precious daughter of the King joyfully tell me how she met Jesus.
She told me how she lost her vision. She thought she was having a stroke and the doctors at a different hospital had given her a pain medication that ended up causing her to have a severe allergic reaction.
She said, “I blinked twice and it was gone”.

I didn’t know what to say. All I could do was squeeze her hand in hopes that it would be a sign of the love that had so quickly overwhelmed my heart for this lady.

She told me of stories leading up to her blindness.She said, “A couple of days before this happened…as clear as day I lay in my bed and on one side of me I saw the green trees blowing in the wind. On the other side, I couldn’t make out any shapes but only saw pink and gold and white. I wasn’t dreaming. I was awake. I wasn’t hallucinating. I know it was a vision from God”. I don’t want to say disbelief came over me but rather, I found myself awestruck.
She continued, “You have to love the children."
I then told her where I felt like God was leading me. As I attempted to explain myself, she cried and said, “Isn’t He good? He gives us everything we need. The least we can do is give him everything we have.”
I’ve never found myself for such a loss of words.
Though it had only been twenty minutes, it felt like I had been listening to her for two hours (which I would love to do).
I told her that I have to get back to work. Before I stood up, I squeezed her hand with a prayer that she felt God in this time. She said to me, “Lauren, I ask God for my vision back. I know I will get it back when I see Him in heaven, and I can’t wait. I ask for it back now, not just because I want it back, but because I want to tell people what He’s done for me. There’s too much work to do here.” I was speechless. How beautifully had the Spirit spoken through her?
She asked for some contact information and I felt like I frantically yanked out my paper and pen in utter excitement that I would see or hear from her again.
I told her that I would never forget her and through empty words tried to explain my thankfulness for this divine appointment. God is good.
The last thing she said to me was, “Keep after Him. His plans are great! And when people ask you how you are doing…tell them you are well. Because you are always doing well when you are following the Lord.”
I have no idea what happened to this sweet lady. Selfishly I asked God for her to give me a call. I wonder if she can see, I wonder if she is with Him. But I don’t anxiously wonder these things. Instead, I rejoice in the privilege of our twenty minute conversation. I rejoice because God was the center of it and he was totally glorified in our words. I rejoice because I received the wisdom of a woman of the Lord. I rejoice because I know she is His and I will see her again.

i can't explain myself to you through a well-written post. it's just impossible. this is a piece of my journal-whom no one reads except me. it's just between me and Him. but i had to attempt to show you where i am and what He is doing.

"God I so desire to do whatever you want. I so desire to be with You. God, I long to be Home. God, I long to see your face. But you keep me here. And you give me physical pain for the depravity of my neighbors.

Jesus, please intensify that pain. God, as I write across this paper, my hand is shaking. Father storm my spirit with Yours. Father, I beg of you, God please, I am begging for your will. God if I dare to desire anything more than You, God would you please, oh my goodness God, please please rid me of that. Show me how useless, meaningless, temporary, unfulfillable these worldly, these fleshly desires are. And God, they can't amount to You! So Father, I am pleading with you to please make this desire a raging rapid. Make it rush, make it rage, make it crash against rocks (the rocks being all my human desires) with force. Drowning them so that their once protruding surfaces are now unseen. God I beg you to do this. I'm shaking God. I know this is You; Christ in me. Oh Jesus please.

God keep me occupied with your joy (Ecc 5).

And as I experience Your joy: full, complete, flawless, I am also experiencing immense sorrow. Because I know I'm safe while others are not; some who are my best friends, family, and others I don't even know what they look like. Jesus, continue to break my heart. It's only a fraction of how you feel and God what a privilege to feel Your heart. Please pour it on me.

Whatever You want, whoever you want me to talk to. God yes! And God as there will be times I don't see the fruit, God graciously give me perseverance.

Jesus-all for Your Name's sake. God, take me where you want me, do with me what you want, speak to me what you want. I desire You. Nothing, but You!"

though it is not in this particular page from my journal: i am singing praises

i didn't ask for it, but He came anyways..

It would be a shame, selfish, and disobedient if I chose to not share my yesterday with you. I believe that I experienced a taste of revival.

I woke up yesterday feeling sick, tired, and honestly did not want to go to church. I sat through worship, barely sung because my throat was hurting so bad. I sat through my pastor’s sermon. I listened, but I just felt like I was so attacked by the enemy yesterday morning. My ill body, my weary soul was becoming a huge distraction. I was missing the Spirit of the Lord. I was missing a divine appointment. Though I had done things to quench the Spirit, I believe that God had something but bigger than one appointment. He met with his people.

Yesterday, I witnessed the love of God the Father drown the souls of thirsty followers. For the hopeless, the afraid, the broken, redemption fell upon their shoulders. Like a light had drawn out of the darkest place known to man, the Spirit ignited the hearts of His people.

A simple hour and a half church service exceeded the typical ending time of 12:30. Instead of individuals, families, and friends leaving, they stayed.

Voices roared across the body of Christ. Voices crying for help, crying for forgiveness, begging for the Spirit of God to indwell in their lives, in this place, across this city, in this world. Instead of the altar being an intimidating place to approach, people swarmed to it. To find refuge, acceptance, and love.

We did not pray yesterday. We did not worship yesterday. We cried, with our everything to God, in what I can only describe as the most pure and humbling plead for God to intercede in our lives. It was the heart cry of every person in there, it was the heart cry of the body of Christ. I say that, not in disbelief that God supernaturally swept over his people yesterday. I say that in confidence that He is REAL, he is MOVING, and he is CONSTANT. And that is what I desire. This is what He desires.

I cannot express to you how much my heart longs to serve him. Even know as these words appear, my heart flutters, my body begins to shake, at the thought of what He can do. And how I simply have to give him everything. Because “All that I have is Yours, and all that You have is mine” (John 17:10). I desire to be a part of that, God “Here am I! Send me” Isaiah 6:8

I believe God was fully delighted yesterday. In our depravity, our surrender, our acknowledgement of His glory, He danced. Because His people came together and desired for the Father to be known. Known to the ends of the earth, as the unconditionally loving, forgiving, wholly perfect, wholly sufficient, sovereign One. And how do we let that be known? We allow the Spirit to ignite our hearts in confident faith that it will catch. That the Fire of God will consume this earth, His people.

I believe I saw a bit of revival yesterday. I didn’t ask for it (though now I am). But He came anyways. To image what revival across a city, a nation, across the world could look like..my heart pounds.

So I ask, from here on out, with all that I am. God, bring me to places of Your awestruck beauty, you endless and abundant love. Bring me to places where I am stripped of all that I am, and left only by your grace. Redeem Your people. Consume us with your Spirit.

“In that day the Lord of hosts will be a crown of glory, and a diadem of beauty, to the remnant of his people” Isaiah 28:5

Because He is worthy.

Because He is worthy.

Friday night I stepped back into reality. After spending a week in the thick interior of the Amazon jungle (Suriname, South America), my mind is racing. I wasn’t sure what to expect upon arrival, wasn’t sure how to prepare myself, how to prepare my heart. Honestly, my only form of preparation, of defense, was prayer. I have never found myself woken up so many times throughout the night to simply, pray. This past week I restlessly woke up in the middle of the night. I allowed my body to sink deeper into my hammock when all I could do is pray. Pray for the people I had encountered and would encounter, pray for the people back home, for my heart, for this ministry, pray. I didn’t know what else to do. In those moments of head on collisions with the heart of God, my spirit broke.

It broke because I had narrowed what God has for me. When I found a place and a ministry that I was comfortable in, that I believed God had specifically for me, I stayed just there. That was the problem; that is when my heart broke. I realized that I had chosen to settle. I was active about furthering this ministry; active about seeking after ways to serve in this ministry. But I was stagnant and swiftly passed places where God is allowing me to serve. Because I thought I found my ‘nitch’ and that’s where I was going to stay. I thought He had equipped me for that one ministry, that one place. That’s it.

The Beauty: I found myself attentively and desperately listening to the Spirit softly whisper promises of being fully and perfectly equipped (which in case you weren’t aware, is totally mind-blowing) to be anywhere and to serve anyone. Anywhere, to anyone. To everyone.

My spirit also broke because I so desperately want to serve Him; to the point where the urgency of Christ’s name is now the beating rhythm of my heart.

My heart resonates with praises of the unknown, but my human thinking cries impatiently for answers. Though I do feel like my life has been mountains of uncertainty, one thing that is certain is the sovereignty of God, of His perfect and complete will. It is in that that I submit my entire being. To that, I fully trust. Yes, moments of doubt are inevitable, yes this may seem extreme, but I’ll do it. And I’ll do it with everything that is within me. Because He is worthy.

“Worthy are You, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created” Revelation 4:11

“Every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon I have given to you, just as I promised to Moses.” Joshua 1:3

Am I the only one who struggles to remember this promise? When I doubt, when I’m lonely [which I should look at loneliness with God’s purpose of preparation, then it’s not so lonely; it’s a good struggle], when I’m suffering [though no amount of suffering I endure is even comparable to the amount Christ suffered], when I’m restless, and broken. All of it has been given to me GIVEN. An opportunity to suffer for the name of Christ. Yet, my human flesh becomes weak and burdened and I slip into the world’s acceptable response of, “this is too hard for me”. But because I am HIS, “he will guard the feet of his faithful ones” (1 Samuel 2:9).

I’m in this strange place of emotions. Weeping for the desperation of this world to know a Savior, and hurting because of this world. I can’t stay in the middle. I can’t walk this line. Because when I walk this fine line, I reject so much of His sovereignty. I begin to rely on material things, nuclear friends and family, daily routines. I’m not asking the Father to interrupt my life. And, I believe that I should be praying that; earnestly begging God to the point where my soul groans (Romans 8:26) to do His will. His interruptions are perfect, divine, and priceless. And he is worthy of my response.

Consider interruptions to be trials, sufferings, hardships, fill in the blank. What if I saw and accepted every straining moment of my life to be a divine interruption interceded by the Spirit of God, my Creator? Then, could I praise Him in response? Could I acknowledge His sovereignty more readily? What if life’s interruptions were viewed as a key to heaven? And that key was accessible to me-an insect, a passer-by, a student, a human. Human, having the nature of man. Not of God, not of divinity, not of holiness. Of filth, of superficial ideals, of sin. And I have way in to eternity? It is given to me. Mind blowing.

“I delight to do your will, O my God..” Psalm 40:8

enough

If I were to be remembered for anything, I would want to be remembered for being a lover. An easy lover. I want to relentlessly love my Father. I want to relentlessly love others because of my Father. I want to love with no reservations, because Christ had none on me. Though I am broken, though I am restless, though I am sinful, I am His. How breathtaking is the Father’s love for me? For us. And how dare I try and shorten the arm of God by ‘finding it hard to love someone’.

God, You love for me-a stained creature. An insect to this inadequate world. But You love me. Regardless of my faults, of my sins that I’ve committed, that I’m thinking about committing, and that I am committing. You love me. Jesus, use me. Love your people through me. Teach me how to love in a way that can only be described by You, because God then, You are glorified. Then, You are magnified, You are seen, You are enough. I simply cannot love through You, unless I fully overwhelm myself in Your FREE and ABUNDANT love. You are enough! I need nothing else. I want nothing else, but You. Sweet Jesus, teach me.