I hoped in the wrong things for so long that I was being defined by those hopes. And I was controlled by the hope of something God never intended on me hoping for. And when my hope was killed, it was an awful feeling.
I made an idol of things that aren’t God. I held on to things that were never in His plan for me to seek, and because of it, I did things in my power to get what I wanted. I sacrificed truth, integrity, honesty, holiness, purity. I brought shame to His name.
I made my own plans and didn't trust that God's plans are best.
I lived like sin had mastered me, but it had not. I fed the desires of my flesh and starved the desires of the Spirit in me.
I held on so tightly that it took a miracle to pry me away.
He rescued me from myself, from my sin.
He freed me from what I could not free myself from.
He has reminded me of his sovereignty and that He alone is good. I have no control over what goes on. He gives and takes away. Nothing is mine, and I have no rights.
I am made for Him alone and my heart will be safe in Him alone.
He is reminding me that I am not worthy of anything good or deserving of anything he gives me.
He reminds me that although I cannot see what will happen next, that He will take care of me, He will provide for me, and His plans are much better than the plans I was holding on to for myself.
He has surrounded me with people who care about me and through that I am overwhelmed by how much I need others.
He has shown me that when everyone and everything else fails, when no one knows exactly what to say or do, that He knows. He is truth.
He healed me of emotional pain and is healing me of bitterness. He reminds me that the pain I experience is nothing compared to the pain that Christ experiences when I seek after all my “lovers”
I am learning to trust in what I cannot see, in the plans He has for me. I have no other option. For real, I don't have much faith or trust, but those things have increased a lot in the last month of my life - and it's been rough, confusing, and painful.
Instead of getting frustrated over what He has not given me and comparing my life to the lives of others, I am thanking Him for the way He did make me, the path He has led me down, and the one He will continue to guide me down. And I'm learning to thank Him for continually saving me. And to focus on the good He has done rather than what I think God should do in my life.
I'm learning to seek Him and His word rather than the advice of others, because only He really knows...realizing I cannot put my complete trust in anyone but Him.
Lack of faith and trust are two things God has been laying on my heart for months, and I tried to achieve these things…it just didn’t happen. But now I see that through Him bringing me out of sin, that he is teaching me those two things through this. And it’s not how I would have wanted it to happen at all, but that’s usually how it is. I prayed to have more faith and trust…and I guess he is doing that in my life. I guess he gave me such circumstances to where those two things would increase.
I wanted all these things, to be more faithful and have more trust, and to be traveling the “narrow road” I blogged about those things a few times last fall, and still longed for those things this spring. But I couldn’t do that on my own…God had to do it. It's just crazy to me to think that what's going on in my life is actually an answer to things that I had prayed for.
