Some progress.

There have been a few times in the past week that I have tried to post, but just felt a little incomplete in what I wanted to share.  Last night and this morning, God has been speaking to me, so I want to share with you the journey. 

12-12-10
Everlasting God.  You never change, you stay the same, you are the everlasting God.  What a beautiful reminder. 
There is something in me that yearns to be affirmed that there is something out there that is consistent, dependable, faithful and true.  Every time I read about Jesus in John 1 (being with God in the beginning and creating all things and holding all things together) a deep place in my heart is comforted, a place that makes me weep and sob in gratitude.  This kind of gratitude shows that there has obviously been a HUGE lack of this consistency in my life, but praise God, in Him ALL my needs are met.  I just pray that I am grounded in His love and faithfulness, so that I can enter into His rest.  I feel like that's what I'm doing right now, except I am struggling to attain it.  I am struggling into rest and peace of the soul.

Later that day...

When someone disapproves of me or misunderstands me or misjudges me, it hits that place in my heart.   I start the familiar cycle of proving myself (the same cycle that pushed me to succeed socially and academically in high school).  I try to reframe myself, to say the "right" things, and do the "best things" so that "that" person can understand that I am indeed, worth it.


God never intended for it to be this way.  God sent his son so that this kind of striving would cease.  I have nothing to prove to anyone.  If someone is the voice of the accuser in my life, perhaps I should stop giving them a voice in my life.

I am learning to become my own friend, and to trust my advocate- JESUS CHRIST!
Rather than internalizing the messages of someone who doesn't know me or understand me, I am internalizing the messages of truth that God has been graciously speaking over my life since I was 11 years old.
When someone criticizes your character without love or a willingness to standby you in your change process, that person is not worthy of having an opinion in your life.
Friends are honest and are willing to love you even in your weakness.  Those are the people who get to have a word in your life.
Those that accuse and judge are only exposing their own emotional and mental frailty.
Those messages say nothing about who you are,
they are only a revelation about who the messenger is- and believe that what the messenger is saying about themselves is true. 

Is there a loss? yes.
That's why we stay in these relationships.
We have a hope that things will change and the friendship will be beautiful.  So we work towards that hope, completely ignoring what the other person is telling us.  At least that's what I do.

And now, I'm working towards letting go.  And it's hard, because it's not just letting go of a hurtful relationship with an emotionally unhealthy person.  It's letting go of the "vision" I have for what this relationship could have been.

12-14-10

I feel like I am so severely letting go.  And I feel the tension of not having what I want.  Sometimes standing up for your values means sacrifice.  It is better to make these sacrifices and forfeit a relationship, then lose your integrity.  And I am comforted by the beatitudes as I move forward in this process of letting go.  There is an anxiety in my soul that is related to forgetting about or letting go of this relationship.  It reminds me of that scripture in Hebrews about struggling to enter the rest of God (4:11).

But I sense the Holy Spirit reminding me that HE is all that matters.  That being poor here in this world, owning nothing and being ready to let go of whatever it is that is not honorable or right or from God, that then we inherit the kingdom.

Lord, as difficult as it is for me to stop owning this relationship, I prefer your kingdom. 

Each of the be-attitudes has a sense of loss:

Be poor

Be mournful

Be gentle – Not powerful and self asserting, declaring your rights and opinions

Be hungry and thirsty

Be merciful-when you are wronged, when people offend you, give them mercy and not justice. 

Be pure

Be a peacemaker – Lord knows this is hard! Sometimes we would rather be right then make peace.

Be persecuted because of righteousness

Be insulted and slandered

It’s those who embrace these losses that receive a far greater reward.  THE KINGDOM. 

Who is willing to receive the Kingdom? 

I have been truly encouraged, I feel God’s kindness in my loss, I am experiencing his promise that He is gifting me the Kingdom.  Thank you Jesus.

Whom have I in heaven, but you?
And earth has NOTHING (not justice, not revenge, not self exaltation, not “rightness”) that I desire besides you.
My heart and my flesh may fail, but YOU ARE the strength of my life and my portion forever.