Holiness vs. Marriage Part 2: My response

So here's the deal.

For most of my life end-all dream, its seemed, was marriage. 
But marriage isn't an end-all dream.  In fact - its just one desire of many, that will have to be waited upon to be fulfilled.

Here's the thought:  Its not about our desires being fulfilled.  Its about God's desires being fulfilled.

Its not about self-centered view of ourselves and how holiness plays into it, its about a Kingdom-based, God-invested heart where holiness is the very atmosphere that it thrives in.


Paul poses the idea that it is better not to marry if you can.  He also said that it wasn't wrong to marry.

Wait.

Not to marry, if you can?

I'm So Bored With Little Gods... 2 thoughts

When we tap our foot and our fingers and watch our clock while we wait on God... And when we subconsciously say and think towards Him, "whats taking so long? I don't have time for this! JUST TELL ME what I need to know and SHOW ME, NOW!" - and when we give up in impatience and think, "I guess I'm just going through a dry season...." - what if its then, that it becomes apparent we've set 'our' time as god over the Father who is neither bound by our man-made measures, nor must make a defense for His own perfect timing. How arrogant we are! How foolish, I am. I am at least a breath and at best a delusion! GRASS. That is what I am. BUT the Word of the Lord stands forever. The Word became flesh and is Truth to all who hear. He who has an ear, let him hear! [Psalm 62] & [Isaiah 40:3-8]

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God INVENTED time.  His timing is perfect.  And yet I am measuring out my time with Him - counting the minutes - counting the cost.  What if time measured, was completely removed and thus, could not be considered currency to be spent, sacrificed or counted?
What if all we HAD in life was time - and we never knew how much we had banked and only God worried about our portions; and when 'time' finally ran out, THAT is we became free to never worry about rationing out this precious entity again? 
What if our 'time spent' before the Lord was the only  place where cost never mattered?
Five minutes - five years.  Same difference in the Kingdom.  The point IS - you forget there even IS time.
And we live in the future, and we live in the past - ALL measured by time past, and time future in relation to time NOW.
One of the devil's greatest deceptions: that the time allotted to us is first OURS - and second, that the "could'ves", "would'ves" and "should'ves" coupled with the "what-if's" of the future, can be somehow recaptured or precaptured in the "Now".  In vain we believe this, and in that vanity, if we don't allow our paradigm to be completely changed by God, we will waste our lives.  We doom ourselves to never capture the divine moment of the "Now" of the Lord, where He is.  "Be still and know that I am God." (Psalm 46:10) - This phrase becomes then, the very cry and the very profound reaching of a God who knows the frailty of man.  We really are just dust. (Psalm 103:14)

To know this, I am thus responsible to change.  I MUST be changed forever.  God is NOW.  So am I.  When we say we will be ruined in the glory of God and that we will waste our time to search Him out - truthfully, it is to offend the world's definitions and even our flesh's self-professed rights.  God's time is so different than ours, anyway.   I'm not sure I can really allow myself to wish I were doing anything else than what God has commissioned me to do right NOW, ever again. 

Man - I'm being completely ruined in this thought.  - in this new thing God has revealed in my heart.
Such a heart of man.
Mercy, Mercy, Mercy.
He raised His scepter of mercy and did not bestow on me the wrath that I deserve, and THEN - He clothed me in grace - favoring me and blessing me in all I put my hands to do to bring Him glory.
I need think for a while again.

Until I come up for air,
Sarah Faith

Mercy, Mercy, Mercy

What a month this has been.
My heart has a lot being tossed around in it right now but there's a few things I've decided:

Well-meaning people  can tell me all they want what they think is best for me, or they can tell me that I should be careful about what I'm thinking or deciding is "for me" or "not for me", but it really comes down to one very simple fact: No one knows better what God is guiding me to do than I do.  And no one knows better then I do, the way He speaks to me.

With that understanding in my heart, I feel liberated to fully pursue what I must to bring glory to God.
I'd like to share an excerpt from one of my most recent journal entries about an epiphany I had that will change my mind-view forever.  Now that I'm thinking about it, I don't believe I've ever written any of my personal journal entries in here before!  So making new history in this blog which is seven years and running, here goes.

"This has to be my view - my attitude.  Regardless of how I benefit, Jesus is deserving of all glory, all honor and all praise.  Who do I think I am, expecting to somehow know every reason for why things don't always go my way?  Who cares, besides me?  My point exactly.  I'm so self-centered and I somehow think its my RIGHT to know what and why God lets things play out the way they do.  But here's ONE thing I can rest in: Whatever is happened  whether fair or not, whether just or not, whether explainable or not, whether logical or not, God is a very deliberate God.  EVERY thing will bow a knee to His voice.  He absolutely WILL get the glory in every situation, and He will do everything it takes to get the glory that is due to Him because in MY life, I owe it to Him.  He has been my salvation.  Therefore, it is not a sacrifice but a PLEASURE to suffer whatever affliction comes my way FOR the cause of the glory of God."

I'm being pretty transparent by sharing this thought with all of you - but I am not called to hide the human in me - I'm called to let God's glory shine through my weakness.

Here's the deal:  My desire is to walk in a way that is worthy of my calling.
However God chooses to make me holy as He is holy, I choose THAT way as well.
I'd be an idiot to think that God would allow me to feel comfortable all the time on this path with Him.

Coming back from my trip to IHOP-KC, I was met with 3 conflicts immediately.  3 conflicts that required 3 confrontations which - if ONE is uncomfortable for me, TRY 3 within a 24 hour period.
I'm not actually bad with confrontation, I just hate it, that's all.
As uncomfortable as it was however, the situations were taken care of in a matter of minutes or at the very most, a half an hour.  Why do I worry and get so uptight?
I just need to tackle each thing as they come.

There's so many things I need to process right now - but one thing I CAN say:  If there was ever a time where going somewhere else completely confirmed that where God HAS placed me is exactly where I'm supposed to be, its now.  And I'm so very glad that I have something to go by.

One other thing I know is going on right now:  I'm clearly in a place of waiting and in the waiting, watching.  It is so apparent to me at this point in my life that I would be ridiculous if I try to deny it.  People have said that MAYBE God has other dreams for me than what has been placed in my heart right now.  However, I am a firm believer that if that were the case, He would share a few of them with me so I could at least have a vision and run with it.
But He hasn't given me any other dreams.  He's only expounded on what has already been in my heart and added to that, has given me assignments for this present time.  Those assignments include all the components that make up my working life and so I fully intend on fulfilling God's desires for me in all of it.

But waiting - AH waiting!!  What a time of patience and humility.  What a time of the Spirit silently destroying the very way my mind has been resourcing my heart in expanding my knowledge of God.
The thought is overwhelming: I've been all wrong.  And not on a surface level, either.  My entire make-up - my entire human being is completely backwards in relating to the uncontainable God; and, in order to continue on the Journey I so deeply long to finish and to finish well,  everything I thought I knew and everything I believe I've learned must be undone.
Woe is me for I am RUINED! Because I am a man of unclean (impure) lips  and have a heart completely consumed with my own ambitions. (Isaiah 6:5)
All of it, in vain.  My eyes are just beginning to see the Lord of Hosts.  And every time I see Him better, all I've know prior, is undone.
Praise God for extending mercy to my heart and - (unbelievably added to that!), has also adorning me with grace to safely be changed into a person who reflects His Son, Christ Jesus.

This waiting thing is changing the paradigm of my very breathing existence.

While I watch my watch, could it be an idol?

And He came to the disciples and found them sleeping, and said to Peter, "So, you men could not keep watch with Me for one hour? Keep watching and praying that you may not enter into temptation; the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak." - Matt. 26:40-41

What if what I call "waiting" is really an invitation to see.
I sing, "Open the eyes of my heart, Lord.  Open the eyes of my heart..." but then I complain because in my arrogant assumptions and inability to listen,  I've mistaking God's invitation to WATCH and wait with an invitation to  ONLY wait and then somehow feeling like I've been left behind.

I have been proudly marching around and demanding God's blessing and favor with the kind of ignorance of a workman on strike who hasn't done his research or talked to his boss to know what the real issues are - looking like a fool and exposed to the world when the legitimate truth is revealed that actually, the CEO has been silently at work on benefits and raises the workman couldn't of even dreamed of.  Instead of talking to the Boss and watch what He will do, I've been openly making God out to be small and opposite of all He has promised, and of all I have preached to others.  Double-minded and two-faced.

And yet - though I have been a fool, God still clumps me back together and begins molding me on the wheel again.
I have been softened some more.
What mercy.

Woe to me, for I have been undone.

I'm so glad God is undoing me in every part of my life, in every season of my life, and that He is faithful to complete and perfect me until the day of Christ's return (Philip 1:6) - where I will finally look like Him because I will see Him for all of who He is (1 John 3:2).

Maranatha! Amen!!!

Going Up In Rank

In the last month or so, the Lord has been doing some deep, deep things and I'm not even sure how to explain it.

He's building a contentedness to wait on Him. He's building steadfastness amidst emotions and stress. He's building His character in me. And I'm beginning to notice that my hope is no longer in things that will disappoint me, but it is in Him.

This weekend, some things hit me and I know I THOUGHT I should have been more effected by them but... What a freedom that God is what I put my hope in, and I trust Him in all His sovereignty! Its so awesome to realize that I'm not the way even I expected I would be because God has been working underneath the scenes in my life.

I have no clue how to explain it, but the hours of sitting before the Lord in prayer or just... BEING with Him, are transforming my entire person. I have never known the kind of growth I'm experiencing right now. I want silence and not distraction. I can't help worshiping Him the more I know of Him. I can't help desiring to serve. It is out of the overflow of my love with the Lord that I desire to do everything I am called to in ministering the His people and the people that aren't His yet.

There have been some truly defining moments that I would like to write out here.

The fact that I've been so financially stressed has been what I would call a "kick-start" into what God has in mind to work in me.

I guess I tend to depend on myself to be ahead of the game when it comes to my finances. So when things happen that are out of my control, I immediately have to go into a mode I need to be more practiced in: trusting God's sovereign way of provision.

It was a movement forward motivated by situations that would most simply just bring me to the end of my own abilities and strengths. Patience. I'm finding the end of my own portion. hehe.

Last Sunday (not yesterday) I had a time in the prayer room where the Lord reaaaaaalllllly did some surgery on my heart.

As my friend put it yesterday, "God knew that it would be too painful for me to reach His hand so deep and remove such a deep rooted lie in my heart. So He put me to sleep." And that's the truth. I sat for 2 hours pouring out my heart to God.... and then, when no words could say anything more, the Lord put me to sleep, where I was still partially aware of the music, but resting. I woke up with a jolt, and I knew I was better.

Then, this last week, God ranked me quite a bit in His army. Wednesday, I had people praying for me while we fasted, and God did a major "enlightening the eyes of my heart" moment. It has to do with Jeremiah 1:9-10.

Then the LORD stretched out His hand and touched my mouth, and the LORD said to me, "Behold, I have put My words in your mouth. See, I have appointed you this day over the nations and over the kingdoms, To pluck up and to break down, To destroy and to overthrow, To build and to plant."

I was reading a book called "Shaping History through fasting and prayer" and it put something in such a way that a little "DING" happened.

When God speaks, things happen. His Word IS happened. But many a time, the Lord, instead of just speaking, He desires His people to come into partnership with Him. So - He puts His words in their mouths and when THEY speak, things happen. But I'm just overcome by the crazy thing that has to do with Christ having all things under His feet by the power that raised Him from the dead and also by His mercy and loving kindness, WE are seated with Christ in glory and therefore, all His authority has been given to us, as we have taken His name. When we bless, it is blessed in heaven and on earth. When we curse, it is cursed in heaven and on earth. MAN. Our words are powerful. And when we tap into the heart of God to JOIN Him and SPEAK His intercessions?! WE MOVE THINGS. And so, THIS verse for Jeremiah the prophet was commissioned to me.

I'm not just a soldier in God's army. I've been ranked in a certain field that is my very specialty - and its speaking the Word that has been put in my mouth to move mountains in the heavenly realms. Overspiritualized? No. Its Supernaturally natural. This IS the normal life of a true believer.... and? I LOVE it.

God is just doing such a good work in my heart. Its just Him and me. There's no one else in the equation. No thing else to worry about.

Its just Him and me, and He is romancing my heart with His love for me. I'm learning how to be free in loving Him back. Its... been the best Valentine's day ALL MONTH. And isn't that how God is? Why wait for Valentine's day when you can have it EVERY day? And? Everyday is not the same. Its always a new adventure. I'm so glad. I'm just... sooo glad. :)

Two songs that really impacted me.

First one is "Here in the Waiting Room" by Misty Edwards. Its the song that played that very defining Sunday a week or so ago.

Here in the Waiting Room
Here in the waiting room
Of unanswered prayer

I feel like sometimes I will explode here
But I can't leave this place of waiting
I can't leave this place of expecting
You've pinned me down
You hedged me in

God I confess that I feel trapped
There is no way out
But God You know that I would never run to You
Until I had to

God I'm so frustrated, a little bit confused and so angry
For I know that You can answer but You don't answer me

Prayer it sounds so romantic
Prayer, it feels miserable
God I hate it, God I admit it

I know You are good, I know You are
But God it seems like You are playing games with me
God, why?
Why all the waiting a thousands times
Now I'm stuck waiting
God, I trust You
But God, I don't get You

Here in the waiting room
of unanswered prayer
Time seems to haunt me
as the hours turn to days
and days turn to weeks
and week to months
and months to years

Here in the waiting room
of unanswered prayer
But God, You know me
I would never sit still
Until I had to

Your ways are so wonderful
But God I'm so miserable

Cause You make all things beautiful just in time
It's just a matter of time, time, time
So into Your hands I throw it -everything-

Here in the waiting room
I'm here in the waiting room
Of unanswered prayer
I will wait on the Lord
Cause I have no option



And Empty Me sung by Jeremy Camp

Empty Me

Holy Fire, come burn away
my desire for anything
that is not of You
and is of me
I want more of You
and less of Me

Empty me, empty me
Fill, wont You fill me
with You with You

Sigh.

I do some risky praying...

"whatever it takes, Lord."
"Empty Me."
"Change me."
"Keep me humble, before You."
"Come quickly, Lord. I don't wanna be here anymore."


yes. This is my life. My novice life of prayer. :)