June 13, 2011
As of July, I will have officially been in Kansas City a year! Does that seem crazy to anyone else? It’s been a while since I wrote on here so let me do a quick update on my life for ya’ll. My roommate and I moved out of the basement and upstairs into the regular part of the house in April. It has been such a dramatic change! I wasn’t like depressed or anything in the basement, but since moving upstairs, I have noticed a huge change in my attitude and general well-being. It’s amazing what a little sunshine and fresh air can do for a person. I am officially on my summer break, but honestly there’s not a whole lot that has changed in my schedule. The dude that leads the nightwatch students put a lot of things in place that will help us stay focused and help our hearts to stay burning over the summer, instead of becoming dull and losing ground. I have found the spiritual principle to be true that if you are not moving forward, you are losing ground. There is no standing still, and given the time we are living in, quite honestly we just don’t have time to lose ground. I am super grateful for his leadership and how it is keeping me focused. I am still on nights and I am in the process of trying to find a summer job. I have put in many applications and have as of yet been pretty unfruitful. It’s hard to find a job that will work with the nightwatch schedule. So prayers for that would be awesome. I have started working in the nightwatch children’s equipping center (CEC)! It is so much fun and it’s nice to be putting my gift of teaching in use again. I started last month and I do it twice a week. One night I work with 1s and 2s and the other night I do the 3-5 year olds. I am definitely being stretched in the babies room because I just don’t have a lot of experience with babies, but it is definitely a good stretching. I don’t care what age. I just love to teach kids about Jesus! As the school year ended, I prayed and sought the Lord about next year and what it looked like and I feel like it looks like doing another year at FSM so as of right now that is my plan. I am absolutely loving school and I know that I know that I know that I am where I am supposed to be and doing exactly what the Lord wants me to do for this season of my life.
OK so on to the important stuff. What is God teaching me? This quarter I had 2 classes: Song of Solomon with Shelley Hundley and Eternal Glory of an Intercessor with Corey Russell. I was the most excited about Eternal Glory because everyone that has taken it has said it rocked their world. My world was absolutely rocked!
I didn’t really know how I felt about Song of Solomon because quite frankly I kinda think of myself as an expert on the book. Going into the class I was very prideful and kinda had an attitude of I know it all already, what else can I possibly learn? And honestly I do know a lot about Song of Solomon. I have read all Mike’s notes and listened to the teachings, I have read books about it, and basically anything I could get my hands on related to us as the church being the Bride of Christ I was all over it. I mean my friends know me as the Song of Solomon girl. The beginning of class was honestly pretty boring because she really just went over Mike’s notes again, which I had studied on my own before, during, as well as after Fire in the night. I can tell you all the breakdowns of the 8 chapters and what’s going on with the bride in each season and what she is doing or not doing and what God is doing or not doing. But when it really comes down to it, none of that matters if it’s just head knowledge. I want heart knowledge, experiential knowledge! One of my teachers has a saying that goes somewhat to the effect of you may know the Bible, but does the Bible know you? I know Song of Solomon, but sadly I’ve realized, it just doesn’t know me yet. We had to do several assignments where we actually had to go really deep into the book and I came out with one conclusion. I did not know near as much as I thought I did. In fact, after this class I feel like I know less than I did going in. Which of course has left me very frustrated. I see growth in so many areas of my life and in my walk with God, but there are still things that I have been crying out for for years and for whatever reason He is just choosing not to answer just yet. You know how when people pass you in the hall and ask you how are you? I feel like I never know how to answer that question. Circumstantially my life is great and I love my friends and school and the prayer room and Kansas City. But at the same time I am just not ok. I keep trying to put into words exactly what it is that I want from God and I just don’t know if I can articulate it. I want Him to make it real to my heart. I want to believe that everything I’m learning and what I am reading about in the Bible is actually true for me today. I want to know that He actually wants me as much as I want Him. Now you all know that I want a hug from God and I want Him to hold me until I believe He loves me, but at the same time I don’t want to control Him and He can manifest Himself to me in whatever way He wants…just so long as He comes! I want Him to manifest His presence on my heart. If you pray only one thing for me, make it that. So I’m good but at the same time until Jesus makes Himself real to my heart, I am just not ok. My hunger and longing has only multiplied this semester and when people have prayed for me they say it’s a season where God is enlarging my capacity to receive His love. That’s great and all I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, but how much longer? Isn’t my capacity large enough yet? What is He waiting for? One poor unsuspecting guy prayed for more hunger for me and I actually yelled at him and then told God not to give me anymore if He wasn’t going to answer it. Of course I later apologized to the guy and he was really understanding. Several months back one of the students got a word for me and she said that the Lord was getting ready to take me into a season where He wanted to tell me that I am His beloved and He wanted me to feel His love on my heart. At first I got so excited and had a huge expectation that it was coming soon, but that was months ago. I’m still clinging to the promise but I am so weary of believing it may happen and then being let down when it doesn’t. I mean I am asking God for the same thing I was asking Him for before I even moved here. Granted I know in comparison to some people who have been interceding for way longer that seems like nothing but to me 3 or 4 years is an eternity. A couple weeks back I went up for an alter call and the girl asked me what I wanted prayer for and I told her and as I was talking I just burst into tears and couldn’t contain them. She was so sweet and sincere and filled with compassion and all she said was Oh, you’re lovesick! To which I just burst out into more tears. Not that I needed to be validated but sometimes I wonder what is this that I feel and she basically put it into words for me. So that’s what it comes down to. I am lovesick. Nothing will satisfy me until He comes and I am not ok until He comes. I need Jesus.
On a super encouraging note, this semester it has also been interesting to actually see how God has been answering my prayers and actually experience personal change and growth in myself. I have loved being a nightwatch student. I daily wrestle with the constant nagging fear of “missing out” by being on nights, but when it comes down to it, the positives far outweigh the negatives. Anyway we had about 60 students total on nightwatch this year and about a third of those were first years like me. Every morning from 3-4 AM we would gather in a side room and we would pray together for IHOPU. Praying together really does bind your hearts and bring you together in unity. We have really become like a little family and it has been so awesome. We have also done a lot of group hang-outs outside of the prayer room that were non-school related. On top of that, I am getting connected to other nightwatchers through some of my other friends on nights. Basically I am finally meeting people outside of the prayer room and hanging out in group settings. Now to some of you this probably doesn’t seem like a huge deal, but the other day I was thinking about it and I realized how big of a deal it actually is. I got to thinking about growing up, even in high school and college and how I would hate to be in new situations where I didn’t really know anyone. If I was placed in those situations, I would pretty much just stay off to the side and hope someone would talk to me or cling to the few people I may know there. The other night I was at a game night where I actually only knew 2 girls. Over the course of the night I met several new people, mostly guys, and really had a lot of fun. That night when I got home I was thinking back over the night and analyzing myself (still working on this…baby steps) but I think it was a good analyzing because I came to the conclusion that I am actually starting to have confidence in who I am and I am able to be myself in a new context with strangers without worrying what they are thinking about me and I feel like that in itself is huge breakthrough. I’m starting to see that maybe I am actually catching on to some of this identity stuff I keep asking the Lord to tell me about. It appears that He actually is answering my prayers to root me and ground me in my identity in Him. Turns out sitting in a gray chair 6 hours a night singing and talking to Jesus really is making a difference. Prayer really is working!
