Life

Ok. I want to write through some thoughts I've been having, and also invite you into my life a little more.

One of my dearest friends called me this morning. We had hung out previously the night before for dinner, which is a common thing for us. We have known each other about 2 1/2 years and our friendship has been life-giving in every way.

Seeing her call me this early in the morning can either mean 1 of 3 things usually. She had a dream or thought she wanted to share or pray through, 2, something to share to make me laugh so hard I would pee my pants, or 3, something was 'amiss'.  Needless to say, I answered quickly.

What she shared with me I have to admit, caught me completely off guard.

I mentioned we had hung out the night before. During some 'banter', teasing, and laughing, I had unknowingly spoke something that did not settle. I had truly meant for it to be a joke, but instead, my words had caused her hurt. She, being the woman she is, had tried to forget and pray through it through out the night. She knows me. She knows I don't intentionally hurt people and she knows our relationship is built with life and our Father in the middle. So for her to feel unsettled that long caused her to dial me this morning and tearfully share her heart with me.

My words had hurt. She wanted to be sure there wasn't a 'root' as we call them. You know, when someone says they are joking, but actually is a sneaky way of telling the truth about how you really feel to someone you don't have the guts to say to their face.

I have to be honest. At first, I was a little upset. Why would she ever think I would ever say something to hurt her? Couldn't she tell it was a joke? Then the Holy Spirit kicked me in the butt and I stopped thinking and started listening. As soon as I put my own dumb self aside, I could 'hear' her. My words were stupid. I shouldn't have said them. I got caught up in the moment and wanted to be funny. In the process, I had fired little arrows.

I'm sharing this because this is a part of life and its something we all do so easily.

I also want to share this as how to 'walk' with friends and the correct way to walk in life with conflict. She put herself on the line and called me the second she woke this morning so it would not linger. She didn't call another friend to 'talk' through it and smear my character and name through the mud. She talked it through with her Father first. Then she called me right away, before the day got away and bitterness started to settle in with her. This is one of things I admire most about her and our friendship. We go to the source first. I never have to worry about gossip or slander. I know what is spoken between us always stays with us.

This is how friendship should be with each other. If you have a problem or thought of a problem, even a doubt, talk to your Father first. He will tell you if its you or something you need to discuss with that person. Please stop 'asking prayer' with a friend as a way to gossip in Christianese. That does not spark growth for anyone. It is a disease that spreads quickly and effectively like wild fire in the Christian Community, especially amongst women.

This leads me to ask this question.

Why do we as women do this to each other? As if life isn't hard enough with kids, husbands, work, family, ect. We need community. Safe community. We need life. We need safety with each other. Stop hopping around between friends for the one to give you the advice you 'want to hear' and start seeking wise and safe council.

Prov.11:14 (msg) 'Without good direction, people lose their way; the more wise counsel you follow, the better your chances.' 12. 'Mean-spirited slander is heartless; quiet discretion accompanies good sense.'

Sadly, I myself have been involved far too many times with people that do not spark life and growth and I am far from being perfect on this matter. Gossip in any form is fun for a while, and it can make you feel better about yourself and that your life is somehow better than that poor unfortunate soul. Trust me when I say this. Its not worth it.

Life is too short. Stay rooted in your Father and speak life to one another. We are all fighting hard battles everyday. We need all the help we can get. We are on the same team. Lets act like it and start focusing on the things the devil doesn't want us to see.

Sounds way more fun to me.

I apologized right away and asked forgiveness for my dumb words. She was quick to forgive and always is because we know each other and where our identity lies. Now we move on. We don't linger in 'the yucky place'.

We accept forgiveness, we learn from our mistakes, and we enjoy the rest of our day.

Strong

Eph. 6:10 'And that about wraps it up, God is strong and He wants You strong.'(msg)


This is where He had me camp out this morning. Another simple, yet very powerful statement from our Father. He is strong and wants us strong. He doesn't want us weak, guilty, judging, condemned. Just strong in HIM!

I began thinking and praying through this. God, if your desire for me is strength, You are going to take me through situations in life to strengthen me. You don't get strong by 'coasting' through life. You get strong by eating good food, fighting, praying, maybe being in unknown situations that cause us to rely on no one but our Father. This idea I used to have that when something was hard must mean that I was doing something wrong, does not ad up.

Granted, there will be times when we know we are disobeying, like Jonah, and He will allow things to pan out accordingly.

I want to be very careful and clear. I am not in any way saying that God causes 'bad things to happen to us'. That is not His character. I believe He ultimately wants best for us and wants us to grow. He can, however, and does, take things the devil was hoping to destroy us with and redeem them for His glory. He's just that awesome :)

I am thinking about times when a situation has come around to me where I had the choice to say 'yes' or 'no'. Do I say yes even though its an unknown and very uncomfortable? Or do I say 'no' because I am comfortable and I am 'good' where I'm at.

Conflict is a big spiritual muscle I had to learn. I used to run, never looking back, from conflict. I would do everything in my power to avoid it at all costs. That was not right. I had not allowed God to 'grow' that in me. Over time, I began to realize that there was a lot of conflict starting to happen in my life right about the time I was ready to deal with some things from my past. Instead of running, some friends kindly pointed out that this was a good thing to learn how to do with grace and God's help. It was not comfortable, but it was so necessary. I have come to be 'o.k.' with God's permission, to stand up for what is right and true, establish boundaries if needed, and not run in the other direction. Conflict is going to happen! That is one element of this life we can count on, whether in marriage, family, or friends. Growing that muscle to handle it with God's integrity is a massive life lesson you and I will use time and again.

So, God is strong, and He wants you strong. He is in your corner! He is fighting for your strength in this crazy battle called life. Eph. 6: 12-'This is no afternoon athletic contest that we'll walk away from and forget about in a couple of hours. This is for keeps, a life-or-death fight to the finish against the devil and all his angels'.(msg)

It does God no good to sit there day after day and 'raz' us for what we have done wrong or haven't done. Not saying He will not convict us of sin in our lives, but once you have asked forgiveness, its over! He already took care of it years ago! You are glorifying no one by beating yourself up and feeling guilty for something He already took to the cross. He wants you strong, not guilty and wallowing in self pity over how bad of a person you are. Get up! Make it right with your Father and move on. This life is too short to spend a day on something He already took care of for you. Eat your spiritual food, be intimate with your Father, and get back in there and fight! Remember, He wins.

Perspective...

I was having quiet time the other day and God hit me with a really good nugget. 


He had me read through Mark 7 and 8.  I read through many miracles and how the disciples just 'couldn't' grasp what was going on.  Even after 2 miracles of bread and fish for 5,000 then 4,000 people, they were arguing that they hadn't brought enough food for themselves. I had to imagine how maddening this must have been for Jesus.  'Really guys?  You still don't understand who I am and what I am capable of?' There are 13 of us and I just fed 9,000!

I then came to Mark 8:33.  Jesus was starting to talk about what must happen to Him soon, suffering,  rejection, killed and 3 days later He would rise again. 8:31-32. As he talked about this, Peter took Him aside and began to reprimand Him. (v32) 

'Jesus turned around and looked at his disciples, then reprimanded Peter.  "Get away from me, Satan!" He said. "you are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from God's". 


I stopped here and started realizing how important this truth must be.  If Jesus told Peter to 'get away from me satan', how important for us is it to have kingdom perspective?  How many times have I seen God work, opening doors, miracles, and still find myself worrying or just not trusting because I have let my mind go from Kingdom, to earthly perspective? 


 This is what I journaled that morning...



'Daughter, this is a simple, yet powerful truth you need to grasp and hold on to..In this life, you must have My perspective, not earthly or self.  Pray for this daily, for your family and for others. Always stop and ask Me if you are seeing things from my view, or yours. Remember what I am capable of.  Never forget.  I am God! I can do anything! Don't you see? Nothing and no one is in my way. I am God, your Father, your Daddy, your best friend, your lover, your protector. Do not doubt me. Listen carefully for my voice. I alone am worthy. Do not be afraid. Do not loose hope. Life gets hard, but you are my daughter. Rachelle, you are a daughter of the King! Do not ever forget that. You have the freedom to carry out kingdom orders from Me! You have an 'in' with Me! I am never too busy for you. I know everything. Stay in Me-Root yourself in only Me. Do not look to the right or to the left, keep your eyes on Me!' 



Everyday since, I have been asking God to constantly renew my mind.  Every time I come to a situation and my mind starts going down 'that road', I stop and ask to see things from His perspective.  Big picture.  What does this look like on Your timeline, not mine?  I can honestly say, it is very encouraging.  We have problems and this life is so hard, but He already knew this very minute the problems we would be having.  He already knew and made a way for that problem. It might not be our solution, but He does know best.
I love that He is never afraid of our problems. So many times I would think, no God, I got this, this is too ugly and messy, 
You don't want to know what I'm really thinking right now. 
So He smiles and says, 'Try Me'. 
He already knew! Some of my favorite times with Him are me whining at Him and He just sits and listens until I'm done.  Then He scoops me up, smiles, and says, 'My Turn?'. 
His peace washes over me and I am reminded of His undying, crazy, love for ME. He is always ready and excited to hear how we 'really feel'. That is true relationship. Its ugly, imperfect, unpredictable, and so worth it. If we came to Him with perfect problems and things we already 'took care of', where would His miracles be in our life?


I challenge everyone to go to their Dad with something real. Trust me, He can take it. In fact, He wants to take it. See what happens and ask Him for His 'Big Picture'.

Just another day...

It started out like any other day really, waking up groggy, pulling myself out of bed and stumbling down the stairs to my anything other than quiet, children. Breakfast, cartoons, my much needed drug, coffee, and my day was rolling. I was climbing up the stairs for probably the 10th time that morning, who needs gyms anyway, when a thought hit me. "Are you gonna journal today?" This needs a little explanation.

Last night, at my girls bible study, we started a new study on 'How to Hear God's Voice'. So cool. I will never tire of this subject since it is one of the sole reasons I am a Christian. I have a relationship with God, and how is that possible if I can't hear His voice and have conversations like a normal relationship? During this first lesson, he, Mark Virkler, gave 4 keys that he has found helpful for hearing God's voice.

1. Stillness 2. Vision 3. Spontaneity 4. Journaling.

Now, these all require a bit of explaining and biblical references, so for time's, and space sake, I will touch on them briefly. More can be found online at www.cwgministries.org. Anyway, stillness, quieting yourself down, heart, mind and thoughts. Easier said than done right? This is my biggest obstacle. It is so hard for me to turn off the music and sit with my Father. Every time I do, I am rewarded. I have found the car a great sanctuary, when I don't have the kids, to turn off the stereo and just listen and talk with my Father. Which brings us into the next key, using our vision, or hearts' eye to picture our Father. Take a bible story and place yourself there with the Lord. He used an example of John 4 with the woman at the well. Instead of the woman, he put himself there and read the story. This is where it gets really interesting and brings us to the next part, spontaneity. Have you ever been driving, or thinking, and had a random thought pop into your mind? Something like, Oh, I need to pray for so and so. Or, wow, I wonder how my Mom is doing, I should call her. How many of us ever thought that that could be our Father? Certainly not me, His voice should be booming and loud, not my random thoughts...

I decided to keep listening. How many times have I heard in scripture that its the 'still, small voice'? And yet, I never really put two and two together that my thoughts and feelings were a huge part of that. No wonder people have a hard time defining God's voice. Now, the most important part of all of this is to have accountability. You can't go waiving your new found thoughts on people declaring them God's. We all know how that ends, not well, especially for those kool-aid drinkers...just sayin.

This brings me to the last part, journaling. As he pictured himself in the story, he began to journal what he thought God would be saying to him. What he discovered were pages and pages of material that he thought could maybe be God speaking to him. He took it immediately to his wife to hear her thoughts and she said, 'yes, that sounds like God to me'. So he kept going. Pages and pages of him interacting w/ his Father. Why? There was not time to say in the middle, 'was that me or God'? Instead, you can write all you want, finish, then go back through, compare w/ scripture and pray if it was in fact something God would say.

Needless to say as I left last night I thought to myself, I need to do this tomorrow and see what happens. So, as I was climbing the stairs I felt that familiar 'tug' on my spirit say, 'Are you gonna journal?' Of course I had my reasons not to. I was busy, I was tired, I needed to shower, I needed to get dressed, I needed to play w/ my son, and on and on I went. Finally, I told myself to 'shut up' and I put my butt in my chair and sat down w/ my coffee and my Father. I myself have been reading through John recently so I went back to the woman at the well story myself to see if that vision could maybe work for me. As it turns out, it did.

I started reading and I imagined myself at the well, coming up to see a man sitting there, looking tired and resting. He asked me for water and I said, "why would you ask me". He then gave me an earful ;o) "Because I love you, I created you and you are special to me. You are wonderful and I created you specifically for this time and place. I love you so much and you are so dear to me and my Father. I revel in you. I have made you for our pleasure. You are amazing and you have things you have not yet discovered. Keep pursuing me and I will find you. You are my joy, my reason for life, the reason I died. I died for you, so you could walk with me. I am always here, even when you doubt. I will never leave, I am here for you always, do not forget this. I love you child and I am so proud of you. Go in peace."

Wow. I ended up writing about 4 pages worth of encouragement from my Father. This is what Christianity is. To be in relationship and living out of the voice of God in our lives. What if everyone did this? How cool would that be? He is so ready to dish out much needed living water into our lives. He is waiting to pour it on us at any moment, all we need is to listen and ask.

Other important references from this study are from Habakkuk 2:1,2, Ps. 46:10, Heb. 12:1,2, Num. 12:6, Acts 2:17, John 7:37-39, Ecc. 5:1,2

Remember that only good comes from our Father. If you question something, which you should, please take it to scripture and another trustworthy person. Happy Hearing!

Just the beginning...

Where to begin. This all started about 3 months ago after I, along with my husband and others, took a class called, 'The Art of Hearing God'. Pretty cool. I had wanted to take this class for over a year, maybe two, and the opportunity finally arrived. The class did not disappoint. I walked away thinking, or 'chewing', over our intense 21 hour course and where I wanted to go from here. You could almost rename this class, 'The Lost Art of Character', because that is what 90% of the material was about. I loved it. Basically, it was all about rebuilding, or just building, your character. The gifts of the Holy Spirit are amazing, but what good are they if we have no character to go with them? In today's society, sadly, character is one of those elements that has been slowly declining in everyday life. Families, schools, jobs, and churches are no exception to the loss of character. Questions like, 'how do you treat your wife or husband? How do you act at work? Are you lazy? Are you on time? Are you honest? Do you listen to people or like me, pretend to listen just waiting to interject your amazing part of their story? Ouch. My friend called the weekend a 'healthy slap in the face'. So, after chewing on all of this information I found myself talking to God, bouncing some ideas back and forth and listening, for once, to His input instead of my own.

As I was listening, I was feeling excited for the next season of life. A season full of possibilities and limitless boundaries. I wanted more. I wanted more 'God stories' and more encounters. More character building and accountability to what really matters in life. The past two years have been amazing years of discovery and new identity in who I am in Christ. I am in 'process' and I hope I always will be. I am ready and excited to experience His love in real ways. To encounter Him in all areas of life, not just the big, life changing decisions. How often do we put Him on the sidelines as our safety, then when we encounter one of life's many hardships we 'tag' Him in, then when its fixed, we put Him back and go on our merry way. I love that He loves us enough to let us do that, but really, I think He's just waiting for the opportunity to really blow our socks off. I myself am no exception. It wasn't until just two years ago that I started encountering God in a whole new way, and I was being prompted to share. This is what this blog is about.

This will be a collection of right now, in your face, God encounters. Some will be mine, a lot will be my dearest and closest friends. All are true, and all, I hope, will encourage you in some way to think differently of our Father. He is waiting. He already loves us, we know that much, but how He wants and longs to show His love for us! Real, intimate, violent love. He might show us through dreams, visions, songs, people, email, newspapers, trees, water, rocks, you name it, He can use it. Thats how good He is. Does He have to? No. But the cool thing is, He does.

"You know me inside and out,

you know every bone in my body;
You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit,
how I was sculpted from nothing into something.
Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth;
all the stages of my life were spread out before you,
The days of my life all prepared
before I'd even lived one day."

Psalms 139:14-16 (The Message translation)

I will be the first to admit I have no idea what I'm doing and I am learning everyday to hear His voice in my life. It is a process, and I am in process. As my friend Rob Mazza says, "God is bigger than previously thought".