Let me go ahead and apologize if this ends up being long. I don't really know how much I'll write; it could be a lot, or it might be a little.
This weekend was AMAZING. I don't think I realized how long it's been since I've truly let God speak to me and reveal Himself to me in new ways until this weekend. First, try to picture 19,000 women in one place together....worshipping our Heavenly Father with raised hands and raised voices. That was pretty powerful in itself. Then you add in the three Godly women that spoke and it really left me in awe of God.
Friday night, I had the honor of listening to a woman named Priscilla Shirer for the first time. She was so funny....yet so serious.....all at once. Her whole talk was focused on chapters in Exodus (even though she talked about other scriptures as well) and about God taking His people into the wilderness. The wilderness is just times in our lives of trials and tribulations while God tests us and refines us. For some reason, lately, I've kind of been overwhelmed by feelings of fear of something going "wrong" in my life. I've always kind of struggled with worrying too much about things that I can't control, but ever since I became a mom it has been really hard on me. I find myself constantly in fear of something going wrong with one of my kids. We all know that the mind can be a pretty dark place if we let it and there have definitely been times in the last 2 years that I have let it. I find myself talking to God and saying that I want to do whatever it takes to praise Him and live my life for Him and for Him to do whatever in my life that needs to be done to bring refining. However, right behind that, I immediately think "But please don't let it involve Joey.....or my kids....or my parents....or Trey and his fiance." See what I'm doing? I constantly put stipulations on what I want God to do. The problem is that I'm not completely trusting God with every area of my life. I want to hold onto to certain things because I don't have the faith that come with knowing that I know that I know that God is COMPLETELY in control of EVERYTHING no matter what the circumstance. Priscilla said that sometimes it's during the times that we are the furthest from external blessings that God is bringing us to the top of His mountain.
On Saturday, Beth Moore said something that kind of coincided with Priscialla's talk from Friday night that absolutely stopped me in my tracks and made me think, "wow". She too was talking about struggles and hardships in life. She said that NO MAN has ever seen God's face because scripture says that no man can see His face and live. His glory is just too all consuming and too powerful for us to see with our "naked eye". So, she said that when we are in the darkest moments of our life, we need to realize that God has His hands over our eyes so that we can't see His glory. I loved that! I love the thought that although I may go through extremely dark times in the future that God is still with me and He might just be shielding me from His glory for a moment....but in time He will reveal Himself to me again and deliver me from the hard time. For someone that seems to struggle with feelings of fear over the future, this was such a huge comfort to me. Right now life is going along very smoothly. I guess that's what makes me live in fear the most.....the fact that things are going so well that I think the "other shoe needs to drop" so to speak. One of the biggest things I learned this weekend is that when/if the other shoe does drop, God will be there to pick it up and place it back on my foot! I have to remember that I am more protected in the "wilderness" with God that I am outside of the wilderness without Him. So, when I go through times of wilderness in my life, I should pitch a tent, camp out, and see what God has planned.
I was going to write more about Kay Arthur and Beth Moore but I'll have to save it for my next post. Just reliving Friday night with Priscilla for a few moments on here is enough for now. Not only that, the truths that both of these other women shared deserve their own posts!
For those of you that prayed for this weekend for me....THANK YOU! I could definitely feel them and God answered them in big ways. Makinley did AWESOME for Joey and his mom and she took the bottle fine. So, it was awesome!!!!!
1 comment:
It was my first time hearing Priscilla speak too and I loved her. She did such a wonderful job with her story illustrations that I think will help me remember her message in the weeks and months to come. One of my friends did her study "He speaks to me" and said it was really great. I think I may do it eventually...I could not get over how funny the three of them were together. I loved it!
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