11 Dec Lots o’ Beauty
Y’all…I have to tell you something. Last week I wrote about the beautiful problem of pain. I meant every word I said (…or wrote) and I need to just let you in on something that has been bubbling and brimming out of me all week. I told you that God has been so sweet to meet me right where I am at and that has been no minor statement.
I told you in September my thought about life being a cold-hearted bitch. Although, I censored myself a little better then. And, again, I meant every word. She truly is. However, God is bigger and greater. He has brought people out of the wood works–strangers, friends, acquaintances–to shower me with encouragement and courage during this challenging season.
A used to be “frien-nemy” from college emailed me a couple of months ago completely out of the blue. She wrote about struggle and hope in Christ. She quoted verses from Hosea that rang true the very day I read her message. She wrote to me…(B, I hope you don’t mind my sharing.):
“This is God speaking:
Hosea 2:6-7: ‘Therefore I will block her path with thornbushes;
I will wall her in so that she cannot find her way.
She will chase after her lovers but not catch them;
she will look for them but not find them.
Then she will say,
‘I will go back to my husband as at first,
for then I was better off than now.’’
God is literally saying out loud that he put obstacles up for her. She is chasing a man/men and coming up empty handed. Finally she says I will go back to my husband (God).
Then skip down to verse 14 (my favorite): “Therefore I am now going to allure her;
I will lead her into the wilderness
and speak tenderly to her.”
God is saying he will lead us into the wilderness. Emily, you are in the wilderness right now. Nothing is familiar or the same. Nothing feels like home or is welcoming to you. But God is starting/going to start to speak tenderly to you. To heal you. To make you feel beautiful, valued, loved & cherished because you are exactly that to him.
Jeremiah 31:3-4:
“I have loved you with an everlasting love;
I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.
I will build you up again,
and you will be rebuilt.”
Oh, if you could have felt the burden taken off my heart that day. That was the day that I felt God begin to speak tenderly to me.
And He hasn’t stopped. He is faithful to make His presence known most assuredly. And I can’t help but allow my heart to cry out, “OH MY GOD! YOU are so ASTOUNDINGLY AMAZING!”
Words cannot capture the love, peace, and joy overwhelming is He, the One who breaks chains and does, indeed, bring beauty from ashes.
This week was no exception to His display of goodness. A couple of nights ago I received a message from a friend (who was not even positive I knew who she was) with a devotional from Beth Moore. Y’all I cried tears of joy and lifted my hands in praise in the middle of my little office between clients last night as, again, I was overwhelmed by the way God works, moves, and coordinates the revealing of His tender love and care for us, His precious sons and daughters. (Note: my [very lacking] southern twang apparently comes out when I’m excited in writing to. Please forgive my overabundance of the use of “y’all.”)
She shared this devotional that is about 15 mins. long. I urge you to watch it, but, alas, I know some of you will pass up this delectable goodness so I shall summarize. She begins by acknowledging the incredibly painful year 2013 has been to so many around our nation and our world. She says that she decided she did not want to give the enemy the satisfaction of having the whole year of 2013 be labeled “dreadful” and wanted to find some redemption in this last month. I can certainly say…as I so boldly professed…that this year can GO away. I am most definitely over 2013. However, she looked up everywhere that the “twelfth month” is mentioned in the bible…and my goodness! What God has done in the twelfth month in the past is astounding. [I am not going to share with you–you’ll have to watch he video to get all the juiciness.]
She challenges us to pray boldly for an end to the year that is redeemed, to pray for an awakening, a restoration, etc. that is worthy of trumping all of the disgusting-ness of the other eleven months of this year.
Friends…if 2013 has been as big of an ass to you as he has to me…then I ask that you pray this confidently with me as I will for you!
I can already tell you that God wins. He is victorious. He is King of my 2013. Though the year has royally blown…His constant presence and peace is not a lesson I would soon give up. He has already, in this season, this twelfth month, begun to overwhelmingly show me how much he is healing me and making me, “feel beautiful, valued, loved & cherished because [I am] exactly that to him.”
Wow! Not the lesson I thought I would be getting out of such a traumatic situation that left me feeling damaged, like garbage, discarded, ugly, useless, worthless, and irreconcilably ruined. Wow. God is already doing a miracle in the “nation” of Emily.
So…as we continue in this advent season with only 15 more days until the celebration of the birth of our Savior and 21 days until the end of this year…will you look forward with me to the ways He has, and is actively, and will continue to bring beauty and restoration to this year!?
I am so excited for the next 21 days! (Not something I thought I would hear myself think within this year.) God is stirring and moving and redeeming these awful, ugly, and stupidly sad eleven months that have passed.
I encourage you to join in on my Operation Restore Christmas Spirit 2013! [Have we talked about this?] I want to know what you’re doing to put the [Christmas] spirit, the [Holy] Spirit, the joy, and awesomeness of this season back into a time that can be a real depressant with grief and loss. Tag #ORCS2013…let’s rock 2013 out with a bang, you beautiful people!
XO
‘
“People are creators. But I doubt that many realize this. We are not meant to go out into the world and find flawless things, we are not meant to sit down and have flawless things fall into our laps. But we are creators. We can create a beautiful thing out of what we have. The problem with idealistic people is that they see themselves as receivers instead of creators, they end up hunting for the flaw in everything in order to measure it up to their ideals. Now, when you see yourself as a creator, you can look at a chunk of marble and see the angel within it. Then you carve until you have set that angel free. ”
{C. JoyBell C.}
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