I feel like lately life has been so full of highs and lows. I like to post here about my highs mostly and how God has taken care of me. But this post is going to be a little bit of a different kind for me. Actually, I’m making this a series and this is the first installment.
I have realized this year, more than ever, that I am indeed a bad person. But truth be told, if I wasn’t God wouldn’t use me. If I didn’t think this, God wouldn’t have any branches to prune from my life. He couldn’t shape me into what he wants me for. God doesn’t wait for us to be perfect. He meets us right where we are in all the mess we have created and uses what is around.
To start this series off my first branch that God started to trim was my pride and vanity. I would fuss and make a big deal about looking just right, presenting myself just how I wanted to, and how would literally destroy myself to achieve this. I would stand in the mirror and hurt myself because I couldn’t look just how I envisioned. Whether that be my makeup wasn’t just right, my hair wasn’t cooperating, my nails weren’t done, my clothes wrinkly, or realizing that I had gained weight and my clothes no longer fit how I remembered. I would cry and scream and loathe myself.
God sees us here in these moments. He grieves because this is not what he calls us to do. If we grieve seeing our friends or family going through this. Imagine the sadness he must feel being the one who knows our hearts closest. We must fight these feelings of insecurity and find out where they hold root in our hearts. Why do I care at all about matching the aesthetic my mind has chosen? Because that’s what I have defined myself in. I have not rooted myself in God, but in the hearts of man.
I have to be perfect so that others will like me. I seek the approval of man because I have been heavily rejected by man. I am so afraid of that rejection. It does hurt, there’s no denying that. But this is not what we are called to do. This is wrong. God calls us to seek him, not the approval of man. Galatians 1:10.
Now that I know the truth what can be done to change myself to look more like a servant of Christ? First, I asked God to heal my mind and my heart. Our minds and hearts can be renewed through Jesus, and this self hatred is truly a sickness of the mind and heart. We can’t go through this alone, there is no need to punish ourselves any further. We need to let God guide us through it. Let God have the control and power.
Next, I do my best to replace my thoughts with what God actually says about me. Instead of letting the world define me. The world is suffocating. Especially as a woman. We have to be so pretty and elegant and sexy. But we can’t be too forward or too shy. We can’t be too fat or too skinny. We can’t wear makeup or we are catfishing, but we also need to wear makeup because good grief who let her out of the house looking like that. Doesn’t she know how to clean up? Oh she’s so put together she must be stuck up and rude.
These are all contradicting, unattainable, and confusing. Satan is the father of confusion and lies. God’s word never contradicts itself, nor does he ever lie to us. God made us in his image. In Genesis God made both man and woman in his image. God created us in private, with dignity, and purpose. He made us not to writhe against the fires of our minds, but to love ourselves from within. 1 Peter 3:3-4
If God resides in us, shouldn’t we learn to love ourselves for his sake? We have to die to our flesh. Die to who we want to be, and step into God’s will for us.
The last thing that I do is give myself grace. I can’t say I am perfect. I haven’t fully overcome this and it’s ok if I never do. One day I’ll be in a new body with Jesus. The best I can do it take care of the body God gifted me with to use while I am here, and to use it to glorify him as much as I can. To glorify God with my body I can take care of it, feed it well, pray over myself for healing and renewal, worship God with it, and keep it safe. Sometimes I decorate it but I don’t let those decorations define how I present myself as often anymore. I am letting myself heal.
Our bodies are temples to the Holy Spirit. We need to stop chipping the stones off and start fortifying it instead. For God loves us, so should we.
“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3:5-6 NIV
Learning to trust God this past year and a half has been extremely difficult for me. I’m not anywhere I thought I would be and I’m all the more grateful for it. My journey isn’t complete or perfect but that’s where God wants me to be for now.
A year and a half ago I found myself still living with my parents (which is totally good, follow where God leads you not where the world says you have to be), working somewhere I thought to be immoral, and with all this renewed found faith for God.
I had just decided a couple months prior that I would no longer attend college. That I no longer wanted to pursue becoming a dietitian. I had no license, no car, very little money, and no direction or independence. I was 21 but felt very little like the adult I was, or who I thought I was supposed to be.
The world and social media teaches us that we need to be as “adult” as possible. We need to move into luxury apartments, vacation while we are still young with no kids, work desk jobs so we can look pretty at work and have high positions, party, drink, sleep with anyone and everyone to figure out who we are. Find aesthetic cores and fit into this very small niche box so that you can be acceptable, cool, an adult.
God does not call us to this.
Here I was, lost in all this confusion and lies I had let the world feed me because I refused to open up my Bible and actually read it. I was so unhappy with where I was in life. I was caught up in who I thought I was, who I thought I should be, and who I currently was. I was thinking too much of me to be honest.
I prayed to God to move me. I told God I would go wherever he told me to go no matter how uncomfortable I was. I was anxious that my whole world was about to be flipped upside down, but I also knew that, that was exactly what I needed.
Days later my parents told me they wanted to move out to Wilcox Arizona and that they wanted to become homesteaders. Right then and there I felt God let me know I wasn’t going to go. I was unsure if this was me being upset or if this was God’s voice so I went into my room and prayed.
I had my own reasoning for not wanting to move so far but I wanted to hear God’s answers. I wasn’t going to be able to come visit my friends because I had no way to get down to them for I had no car, I wasn’t going to be able to visit my boyfriend for the same reason and he wasn’t going to be willing to move out there with me, and while I didn’t particularly like my job God was telling me to stay.
I didn’t know where I was going to go. I called my boyfriend and cried. I didn’t know what to do. He offered for me to come move in with him and his family since I was there more than I wasn’t anyway. I told my parents and the date was set. I would move out before they listed the house on Zillow.
This time in my life was devastating for me. I was wrongfully angry and felt so abandoned. Don’t get me wrong I was happy for my parents, that they would live out their dreams if it was God’s will, but I couldn’t help feeling lonely. The day I moved out was extremely difficult as I had badly burned myself at work the day before.
I had to give up the lovely safe space I had built my room to be, move it half to a storage unit and half into my boyfriends room, give up every routine I ever had, release my pride and let my boyfriends family drive me to and from work everyday, deal with this bad burn that I should’ve gotten medical help with in retrospect, move my cats in and get them acclimated, and face the depression that had grown in my heart. I felt the heaviest I had since senior year of highschool.
My whole life indeed was flipped upside down by this move. It was one of the hardest things I have ever emotionally gone through. But then things started to look better. The owner at work was selling the other location to my boss and my boyfriend and I were offered positions with them there. I knew the steps I would have to take to be able to make this possible and prayed about it.
I would need to buckle down and get a car and my license so that I could even get there everyday. And I would need to endure the couple months to follow where I waited for everything to fall into place. Work at the current location I was working at was miserable and so toxic. But I knew I had to keep going in to get to the next place.
My neighbor was selling a red 2002 Honda Odyssey for only $2,000 dollars. I was close to getting my license. I quickly bought it with my boyfriend. I learned to drive on the cute little junker and was able to get my license. In this time I had officially moved to the other location and my Dad had been so kind as to take me to work everyday. (this was a big ordeal because as a baker I need to be at work at 3am)
At the new location I was able to make more money, I was able to go everywhere I needed because of my new car, and I was finally beginning to feel like God was letting me provide for myself more efficiently. The only thing I wanted now was to move out with my boyfriend and begin our own life.
So I prayed. I prayed that God would prepare us a place to move into and that he would prepare us for our move. He had moved me before and I was now learning to trust God. I knew that a hard period would be coming up. A period where God was going to begin to prune my branches so that I could produce better fruit.
My car officially broke for the first time. It was a horrible time finding a mechanic and paying for everything but my boyfriend helped and we got through it together. Then my cat Bubbie got a urinary blockage and that was another huge chunk of our savings gone. It was looking like we might not have the funds we were going to have to move out. Then it finally happened, my engine block fell off the car and we realized the car wasn’t going to be worth fixing. That we would need to find a new car.
This was not a journey I was prepared for. God helped me through it but it was the most miserable two weeks ever. I had cried every time we failed with the dealerships and finally we found one that would work with us. That wasn’t trying to scam us. We met a lovely kind woman named Isis who helped us tirelessly to help us get a car. She made herself available to us at all times and went above and beyond to help us. Through the grace of God she found exactly the perfect car for us.
This was one thing God prepared for us. Then we found the apartment we wanted to move into. It was small but perfect space for what we had and we were going to be able to afford the rent there. I began to pray on it to make sure it was what God wanted and I prayed for him to continue preparing us.
Then the worst thing happened. My boyfriend and I went through the roughest patch we had ever been through. I’ll spare the details out of respect for my partner. “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs” Ephesians 4:29 NIV. We had to come to terms that we were going to choose to love each other no matter how we felt about certain things.
The Bible says feelings are fleeting. I would show up for my partner even if I was anxious or if we were hurt. We would work through our differences and make it work because we did at the end of the day love each other.
This was the last thing God prepared for us. We decided our move in date and I prayed for God’s guidance. I prayed that if this wasn’t the place for us, if this wasn’t the path he wanted me to go down, that God wouldn’t allow the apartment to get approved. We scheduled a tour as well to see the place in person. The very day we toured, that evening, we got the approval email with the next steps we’d need to take.
I will get to move in this July and I feel so blessed that God is moving me still. I don’t know how this season of my life is going to go but I have God with me. I have days where I struggle to trust God, but that’s because I’m not perfect and that’s ok. I know in the end it will go exactly as God plans it to go.
My life is in God’s hands. No matter how much I want to take control, I’m learning to let God have control. For he makes things good where I can’t see hope.
“The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures” Psalms 23:1-2 KJV
“Though anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.” Psalms 23:5 KJV
Earlier this year I had one of the most funny interactions with God.
There I was, sweaty and shaking with fatigue and hunger. I had gotten off of an extra long shift at the bakery and didn’t get a chance to eat up until that point. All I could think about was food and how I was so unwell I wasn’t going to be able to prepare a meal for myself.
To try and combat this I was sat on my bed, shoveling fist fulls of goldfish down my gullet like a starving peasant and gulping water. And then it hit me. I hadn’t read the verse of the day yet like I usually do. So I opened the app mid shovel-gulp. And low and behold this was the verse of the day.
“Then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” (John 6:35 NIV, Bible App)
God is so funny. Of course he is though, he is the creator of humor. God is always willing to come down onto our level, to meet us right where we are. He sees us. He sees us when we are worshipping him, teaching his word, praying at night, and even when we are choking down goldfish like a seagull. Keep faith and know that God sees us in every aspect of our life. He is the only one to truly know our hearts and love us anyway.
I grew up in church my whole life. I’ve always had some sort of relationship with God. Whether that be lukewarm or on fire for Christ, it’s always been there. I accepted Jesus as my savior when I was just a little girl.
I remember asking my Daddy to save me and he did immediately. Right there at the foot of his bed, in my little purple nightgown on my knees, he led me to the Lord. I don’t remember the prayer itself but I remember the peace of the Holy Spirit filling me. I remember hugging my Dad after and rejoicing with him.
I don’t remember much about my baptism but there are pictures. I remember the white dress shirt my pastor was wearing. Remember how it felt scratchy and strange. I can picture it clearly while he taught me the nose-hand grab situation we would do during the baptism. I remember the clean smell of his office. And I remember the hot tub i’d be baptized in. I saw it often when I would play on the playground there.
But I don’t remember going under.
The rest of my life in this church was full of high’s and lows. I’d learn all the stories we were supposed to learn, see the good and bad of my peers, go through hardships together, and see my church rise and fall. Love God and love the world.
I loved my church then. I loved God. Everyday was awesome. We had a fantastic kids ministry. So many friends, fun competitions for cool prizes, trivia, amazing goofy songs, bible camp, otter pops, veggie tales, potlucks, and so much more. I knew so much about God and how he protected me and kept me safe.
And then our kids class got smaller. In fact our class got so small we got absorbed into main service for Wednesday service. The kids club ministry for Wednesday was ended and we now only had Sundays together. The playground got sold.
I outgrew Sunday school and became apart of the main service permanently. Normal service was ok. The pastor of our church would preach sermons that were decent. But when my Dad would step up to preach it was as if the world stopped to listen. It was as if God was speaking directly through him. Later i’d find out he was. The Holy Spirit was speaking through my Dad, using him as a vessel.
Every service my pastor preached was more of a history lesson. Which I am grateful for as I now have great groundwork for theology. But when my Dad preached, it was like my soul was being filled.
I deeply miss those days. To sit and listen to my Dad preach was such a blessing I unfortunately overlooked at this time.
I began to feel on fire for God. Singing church hymns became another thing that filled me. I read my Bible everyday without fail. I kept a prayer journal with my nightly prayers. Everything was right and I felt so full. I was excited and comforted that Jesus was coming back for me.
And we were losing church members.
My pastor had begun to preach politics from the pulpit. Our rights to discernment were stripped from us as this man wrongfully commanded us to vote a certain way; for certain people. At this time I wasn’t even old enough to vote yet. But it sat wrongfully in my heart.
I knew nothing about politics at this time. I was 14-15. I hadn’t done research into these people he was blindly telling us to follow. But I still knew being told to vote like this was wrong. That it wasn’t necessarily the people or ideals, but that the principle of being forced into something was indeed wrong and controlling. This church would go on to be all about control.
It became a topic my family often discussed. We wished he wouldn’t “preach” politics from the pulpit. It felt wrong to be guilted and forced instead of guided.
I grew deep fear in my heart towards these topics. I couldn’t hear of it; good or bad. I felt deeply sickened. I wouldn’t put my first vote towards anything until I was about 20. I was so lost.
Even though we were tithing it was never enough. Guilt sermons began frequently about how every member of the church needed to tithe. Our church was made up of about 20-25 members at this time. Projects were being started that we were expected to pay for. We were a voting church. We usually voted to start things. But he stripped us of that as well. We were simply told that we were doing these projects and that we had to give the money in certain increments by a certain date.
It felt exhausting. We were being guilted about our tithes more than we held the Lords Table. Even though we all gave as much as we could, myself included once I began working, it was never enough.
And we were still losing members.
I began to see more kids added to our church and was invited to help. I’d be a teachers assistant in hopes that I would take over the class.
This class became my refuge. I diligently followed a long with the lesson plans, learned the cool felt displays, prepared snack for the children, prayed with them & sang songs with them. The very songs I sang when I was their age.
I was quickly given the class as well as my own helper. I was given lesson plans to follow and it was my joy to serve the Lord in this way. To prepare class and clean up afterward felt so rewarding. I felt like I was obeying God, that his was what he called me to do.
The lesson plans stopped coming. So I made my own. Directly teaching from the Bible. Whatever God laid on my heart is what I would teach them. I gave it my all and it felt so fulfilling. Things were looking up.
And then there were no kids to teach.
My heart felt truly broken as I closed up the classroom for the last time. I returned to the main service full of fear and sadness. I felt bitter. The pastor would preach nothing but how to tithe, politics, and the end of the world.
He was afraid deeply and as a result scared us to try to bring anyone to church. Just one more person for Christ. He guided us into deep fear that we weren’t doing enough. Told us proudly that we had only one baptism that year and that it was our fault for not bearing fruit.
Everyone I knew I brought to church. I was always met with the same response. “Your pastor makes me uncomfortable. I don’t like him.” I preached to my friends who would listen but they didn’t turn their hearts to God. I felt like the biggest failure, I was indeed bearing no fruit.
The only thing keeping me filled enough to keep hope was singing hymns. I loved it so much. It made my scalp prickle, it felt like God was listening. My voice sounded beautiful to my ears because I was singing to God.
I was asked to sing specials before the congregation with my old Sunday school teacher. I gladly did. No matter how scared I was or how much we messed up I went time and time again. It felt like the only thing I could do to serve. I wasn’t feeling like myself anymore. But it was ok. I had this one thing I could do to serve God. It was enough.
I stopped being asked to sing for God.
My voice became quite in the church. I wasn’t in my word anymore. I was afraid. Nothing mattered to me. I began drawing instead of listening to the fear mongering on Sundays. And on Wednesday, when there was no filter because the was the true people of the church, and he would preach more of his fear and demands. I would put my hoodie on, earbuds in, and sleep in the back row.
I stopped coming to Wednesday service. We had such few members I could count them on my hands. My dad was asked to step up as pastor. I saw ugly, bad sides of that church that was hidden. My heart hardened towards them. I stopped tithing.
The pastor of the church was still pastor even though my Dad was now pastor. He tried to control my Dad. Tried to feed him lies. My Dad found himself having to defend himself and the attacks became personal.
We left the church.
At this point I had isolated myself deeply. I was praying but I was living for the world, not for God. I cut off my friends and leaned into depressions and believed the lies the world was telling me. I leaned into fear and I was controlled by it.
The only person who mattered to me was my boyfriends. I was this sad and anxious person that I had never really been before. The consequences of my sins were catching up to me and I felt like I was drowning.
The shame and guilt finally brought me to my knees. I prayed for deliverance and finally opened my Bible. For the first time that hope was back. I felt deeply moved to reach back out to my two best friends again. To apologize. They immediately accepted me with open arms. I felt more full than ever.
We got close again so fast. Picnics, sleepovers, working on college work together, confiding in each other again, and sharing meals together. My life was so full of light again. I found myself in need of a job and I got the opportunity to work with one of my best friends. We grew close through this terrible job, but she started asking questions about Jesus.
I was sleeping over at her house and we were talking late at night about all the supernatural terrors she has been experiencing. How things tormenter her at night. Grabbed her and disturbed her peaces of mind.
Her twin sister, my other lovely & amazing best friend, was a witch. She was inviting demons into the house. I knew this and still slept in the house. For God would protect me.
The house did indeed feel heavy. It always had. That night I dreamed a dark entity was fighting to get into the room. Black claws ripped at the edged of the door. Desperate to get in. And then a glowing golden light gently shut the door.
I awoke, violently throwing myself forward. At the foot of the door across from me, her cat sat calmly against the door licking it’s paws.
She came to God shortly after. I cried deeply at her baptism in a church I was new to. I was unsure of the church at first, but I kept finding myself back in service. Back with her, worshiping and being filled with God’s light.
The sons weren’t hymns. They were loved and beaten deep into my soul. The pastor preached such hope into me. I was alive again.
but her sister was still a witch. How could we go to the Kingdom of God without her?
We invited her to our Bible study sessions, listened to & and sang worship music in her presence.She seemed upset and closed off but her sister fought battles I didn’t see and won her to Christ.
I feel so blessed to have witnessed her baptism. (I cried real hard) My two best friends were coming to the Kingdom with me. The very two friends I couldn’t previously turn years ago, now shown with the light of Jesus.
Church can hurt you. But God doesn’t. Being in a church that encourages your relationship with Christ is what’s right. Not a church that simply tries to control you.
I didn’t really properly know God until I was 21. Before I just did my duties, prayer whenever, and still lived how my flesh wanted. Now that I know God, he communicates with me often.
Build and grow your relationship with God. He’s quite funny once you get to know him.
Daughtofthehighking 