Day 35 Tuesday 11-2-10
Romans 8:1-2
There is therefore now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Jesus Christ from the law of sin and death.
"You're my great reward
You're who I'm longing for.
My beautiful inheritance Jesus"
Condemnation: To judge or pronounce unfit for use
Today was crazy! I'll start at the beginning. We had our "Harp and Bowl" class today (basically we are put on worship teams so we get to lead worship. Revelation 5:8 says why it's called Harp and Bowl. Basically it's worship and prayer together). For the first 45 minutes we have a teaching on the principles of worship etc, then we have a break and for the last hour we just enjoy worship from the team that is leading that week (my team leads worship on December 7th….I'm on the piano!). During the teaching, about 20 minutes before the break, I was randomly flooded with thoughts and feelings from my past, specifically this last year. I felt a heaviness and I literally was hunched over in my chair. I felt like I was about to have an anxiety attack, or something. I really didn’t know what was going on, but I remember thinking, "Nothings wrong with you. You are fine, you just want attention." But our break came and I grabbed my friends Cait and Kendall. We went outside and as I started to tell them what I was feeling, I started to cry. Kendall grabbed me in a hug and started to pray over me. A couple other people gathered around, laid their hands on me and were praying too. After a minute or so Kendall told me to look at her. Now, I've never had issues making and keeping eye contact with anyone (unless I'm distracted) but I simply could not keep eye contact with Kendall . I started to cry harder and every time I tried to look her in the eye it literally felt like I was looking at Jesus. His light was shining so powerfully through her eyes and I had to look away. I sank to the ground as she kept saying, "Katie, look at me!" She finally had to just grab my face and hold it up. I shut my eyes for a second but as I did, Kendall said, "Katie, you no longer walk in condemnation!" Immediately the weight lifted and I was able to look her in the eyes without wavering. She finished praying for me and soon our break was over. We went back inside, began to worship, and I felt on top of the world! My heart was so light! For the past couple weeks, I have been asking God to pour His love out on me. I know He loves me, but I haven't felt it on my heart for at least 3 years. Anyway, a little later we had our Life of David class. About 10 minutes of the class went by and my teacher goes "Whoa! I just felt the presence of God! Let's just pray and wait" (that's one thing I love about classes here. The notes aren't as important as what God really wants to do in the class!) God began to touch people all around to room. Some were laughing, some were crying. A guy started to play a little music on the keyboard. I was just standing still, worshipping and one of the leaders came and started to pray for me. He said a lot of stuff before he said, "God, unlock her heart, release emotion." I began to cry a little bit. Then Eddie B (my teacher who was still up front with the microphone) said, "I really feel like God wants to unlock hearts and release emotion." Crazy! I started to weep. Before I knew it, there were about 5 people around me, praying for and comforting me. I sat down in my chair and I could feel my heart being touched. I could feel God's love toward me, but at the same time, pain from my past randomly kept popping up. I had very mixed emotions. This went on for about 35 or 40 minutes, just me weeping and weeping. By the time I had calmed down, I was on the floor scrunched into a ball, snot and tears everywhere. I asked, "God, what was that?!" He gave me a picture of a hard boiled egg. I love hard boiled eggs but I hate the yellow middle. It's gross! In this picture, I saw the egg being cracked, the shell taken off, and thrown away. The egg was then split in half and all the gross yellow stuff was taken out and tossed. That was my heart. The condemnation (the shell) had been taken off and all the gross pain was thrown away. Amazing, right?! But wait, there's more! Each week, a different apartment is in charge of cleaning the prayer room. I was assigned cleaning the glass doors of the little side rooms within the prayer room. As I was cleaning, I heard the sound of my cloth squeaking and I could see my reflection in the glass. God told me something else. "That, is your heart. I have wiped it down, it is squeaky clean, and now people will see me through your heart even more than before." Wow. Now God just needs to fill me with more of Him, and that is a lifetime process!
Day 36 Wednesday 11-3-10
Luke 10:34-35
Then a despised Samaritan came along and when he saw the man, he fell into deep pity. Kneeling beside him, the Samaritan soothed his wounds with medicine and bandaged them. Then he put the man on his own donkey and took him to an inn, where he took care of him. The next day he handed to innkeeper two pieces of silver and told him to take care of the man. "If his bill runs higher than that," he said, "I'll pay the difference next time I am here.
In our apartment burn team tonight (a 30 minute meeting we have as an apartment with our leaders before going into the prayer room), we were asked the question, "What does a true, godly friendship look like?" This story of the Good Samaritan is very well known, at least to me, but I never related it to friendship. Let's take it apart!
Earlier in the story we are told that man is beaten, robbed of his clothes and money and left for dead on the road. Then the Samaritan comes to bandage him and give him medicine.
Step 1: We need to vulnerable in friendships. This isn't going to happen right away, but true friends should be able to stand before each other with nothing to hide. That way, we can help the other person with "bandages and medicine."
Step 2: So, he just gave him medicine and bandaged him up (which I'm sure took a bit longer than 5 minutes). Bow the Samaritan puts the beat up guy on his own donkey! Not only is he sharing his stuff, but he's using energy…'cause I'm sure that wasn't easy. Then he took him to an inn to take care of him. Again, I'm pretty sure the inn wasn't just a few blocks away. So, #2 - Time and energy.
Step 3: Money. The Samaritan paid to pieces of silver. Some translations say 2 denarii. Back then, a denarii was worth one days work. So this guy paid 2 days work for a complete stranger and still offered to pay the difference! I don't know if I would be able to do that.
Do you have to have God at the center of your friendships to complete these 3 tasks? Of course not. One of my roommates said that she was still a really good friend to those around her in her 3 years of rebellion against God. But this is just one Biblical example we can follow. So what does make a good Godly friendship, apart from these principles?
Proverbs 27:17
As iron sharpens iron, a friend sharpens a friend.
When God is the center of your friendship, then He is the "common denominator". You are both reaching for Him and you can push each other in that, helping one another when you struggle.
John 15:15
I no longer call you servants, because a master doesn't confide in his servants. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me.
Yeah, Jesus said that. And he wasn't kidding when He said it either. He genuinely wants to be your friend!
Day 37 Thursday 11-4-10
1 Corinthians 13:13
There are three things that will endure - faith, hope, and love - and the greatest of these is love.
We talked about love in class today. Ruth, our teacher gave us a diagram about love and I will draw a picture to post. The points on this diagram were this:
A) We need to receive God's love,
B) Then return the love to God,
C) Which will result in the ability to love ourselves,
D) And therefore we can genuinely love others.
Our love is broken, because we are human. But it's ok. God loves our broken love. He loves us in our weakness. We don't have to be whole for Him to love us. He loves us just the way we are.
During the 4am-6am set tonight I was just sitting in my chair holding my bible. I really didn't know what to read but I felt God leading me to Jeremiah 29:11 ("For I know the plans I have for you," says the Lord. "They are plans for good and not to harm you, to give you hope and a future"). I was like, "God, really? I know that verse! It was the verse on my graduation party cake!" But He told me to keep reading. This is what it said:
Jeremiah 29:12-14
"In those days when you pray, I will listen. If you look for Me in earnest, you will find Me when you seek Me.
Whoa. That's like my past, present, and future right there! I have always loved verse 11. Made me look forward to what was up ahead. Now, I am in a season, for at least the next 5 months, where my main focus is prayer and seeking God. I'm not sure what the last part means but I'm excited to find out!
Day 38 Friday 11-5-10
Genesis 24:2,4
One day Abraham said to the man in charge of his household, who was his oldest servant…"Go instead to my homeland, to my relatives and find a wife there for my son Isaac."
We had EGS again today and the sermon was phenomenal! Mike Bickle taught on the entire chapter of Genesis 24 and how it relates to Jesus and the church (kind of like last weeks Adam and Eve sermon. I think it's a series he's doing.). I don't want to write out the entire chapter so I will just tell you the basic story and encourage you to read it for yourself (you can find a video of the teaching and the notes on ihop.org).
So Abraham asks his oldest servant to find a wife in Nahor (Abraham's homeland) for his son Isaac. The servant swore to do this and took 10 camels filled with gifts of gold and silver. He stopped by the well outside of Nahor and he asked God to show him which girl who came to the well he should bring back to Isaac. In verse 14 he says
"This is my request. I will ask one of them for a drink. If she says 'Yes, certainly, and I will water your camels too!' let her be the one You have appointed as Isaacs wife."
Sure enough, the first girl he sees, named Rebekah says that very thing. She proceeds to water his 10 camels. He then asks if her father would have a place for him to stay. He gives her expensive gifts for her help. To make a long story short, he goes home with her, meets her family, asks her to come back to be Isaacs wife (because that family all knew Abraham so it wasn't like they were total strangers), she accepts and goes with him. So! There's a lot here. Abraham is a picture of the heart of God the Father to find a wife for His Son. Isaac is a picture of Jesus, the Son waiting for a bride. Abraham's servant is a picture of the Holy Spirit. Rebekah is a picture of believers in Christ. God sent us His most trusted servant, the Holy Spirit, on a mission to prepare a Bride for His Son Jesus. Make sense so far? Good.
The servant said to him, "Perhaps the woman is unwilling to follow me to this land…" Abraham said to him, "…if the woman is not willing to follow you, then you will be released from this oath." (verses 5 and 8)
Notice that Abraham is not forcing any woman to do something she doesn't want. That's like God with our free will. God loves us, and wants us to be with Him, so He will put up road blocks, close doors in our lives etc etc but He will never, under any circumstance, touch our free will. He wants us to love him on our own accord.
The servant heads out to Nahor with 10 camels and lots and lots of stuff. First of all, the city of Nahor was about a two week journey from where Abraham lived in Hebron
In verse 16, it says that Rebekah was very beautiful and was a virgin. This is Jesus' view of His Bride. All believers are beautiful to God. He gave us beauty in exchange for our ashes (Isaiah 61:3). We stand before God as a virgin no matter what our past was because of Jesus' righteousness (2 Corinthians 5:21). The next verse, it says that the servant ran to her, illustrating the Holy Spirit's excitement and zeal to help the Bride. In verse 22, Rebekah receives expensive gifts from the servant in return for her help. This is the evidence that we receive the grace of God, and the gifts and anointing of the Holy Spirit.
This next point is my favorite. The servant asks her if they have a place for him to stay. She says yes. When we say yes to the Holy Spirit, He will ask for more and more abandonment. The Spirit's call increases as we have more encounters with Him. First, Rebekah received gold (verse 22). Next, he asked to say at her house (verse 23). She ten receives more gold and silver (verse 53). Finally, he called her to come marry Isaac (verse 58). Will you invite the Spirit to your home? Or are you content to meet Him occasionally at "the well"?
Remember how the trip to Nahor was two weeks long? Yeah, Rebekah had to go through the desert, unknown territory before she got to her man. We, as believers have a long journey of unknown territory to go through before the end result. But it is so worth it.
Genesis 24:63,67
And Isaac went out t meditatein the fields toward evening. And helifted up his eyes and say the camls coing. Then Rebekah became his wife and he loved her.
No comments:
Post a Comment