Just Let Me Speak...

There were so many more things that happened at Urbana and I just don't have enough space or time to write them all out. But, something incredible did come out of one of the many things that God laid on my heart during that conference.

After my encounter with the Holy Spirit (see previous posts for more on that story) I felt like God was continually putting it on my heart to speak. I didn't know how...or where...or when. But, I just had this constant feeling that He was going to be asking me to speak.

As I studied Acts I began to realize how many times it talks about people speaking boldly for Christ after being filled with the Holy Spirit and I continued to feel God laying that on my heart, "You will do that, too."
"Okay. Mhm. Whatever you say, God."

Maybe I shouldn't have been so sarcastic...

I was driving home several weeks ago to surprise my family. I love my two hour drives because it gives me uninterrupted time to just spend in God's presence. I was chatting with God about the upcoming conference being held at my church (Grace Christian Fellowship) and I was telling Him that I didn't think I would go this year.
I felt like it was going to be at a bad time.
It was more for a younger age demographic.
Eh, just not for me this year.

And when I got done telling God my plans, He let me in on His,
"You're going to go and you are going to speak in a revolving door session." (revolving door sessions are where four speakers each get seven minutes to speak before an air horn goes off and the next person comes up to speak.)

I chuckled and chalked that thought up to a miscommunication between God and I.
Surely that was just a passing thought.
Surely they had already planned out who their speakers were going to be since the conference was only a few weeks away.
Maybe God meant next year....

A few hours later I got online, only to find a message asking me to speak in a revolving door session for the upcoming conference.
Welp, I guess God knew what He was talking about after all!

So, obviously, I agreed.
And then I began preparing.

Little factoid about me: I love to write, and I've been told time and time again that I do well at it. I can write speeches that have you in tears or in stitches, or, on a good day, both. I say that not to boast, but just to give you some background in the fact that writing and delivering speeches has been a gifting of mine.

So, I began preparing.
I sat down to write out an incredibly well put together speech that would captivate the audience.
But, every time I went to put my pen to paper I was taken back to Acts and all the stories in which people were filled with the Holy Spirit and spoke boldly without any preparation or forethought.
This nagging feeling started to creep up into my heart, but I tried to brush it aside.

"God, I could do a really good job with this if You'd just let me prepare!"
"But, then who's power would you be relying on? Yours or Mine?"

Phooey.
This wasn't going as planned.
I sat down a few more times throughout the next few weeks, trying to plan out what I was going to say...but every time I did I heard God tell me simply, "Just let Me speak."

I wrestled with Him a little longer before finally relenting.
"God, I won't plan. You can speak. But, please...just give me words so I don't stand up there like a fool with nothing to say."

And that He did.

It came to the morning I was supposed to speak and I looked at my empty journal.
"God, I don't doubt you...BUT, I'm just going to jot a few thoughts down on this page in case I get up there and don't have anything to say."
So I wrote down a few notes and tried to piece together what I was going to say.
I was a little nervous to say the least.
Going into something like this unprepared was just not me...but I think that was the point.

Just before the revolving door session began, we worshipped to the song Whom Shall I Fear by Chris Tomlin.
Incredible song!
If you haven't heard it...you need to! Click here to enjoy it.

The lyrics started to resonate in my heart:
I know who goes before me. 
I know who stands behind. 
The God of angel armies is always by my side. 
The one who reigns forever. 
He is a friend of mine. 
The God of angel armies is always by my side...

In that moment God flooded my mind with a vision of angels pouring down the walkway to the stage and then covering the stage with their light. To my left stood General God who looked at me and said, "I've already claimed this stage for you. You have all you need and nothing to fear."

Okay, God. Let's do this.
My turn came, and I took the mic with nothing in my head and a few words scratched out in my notebook.
I took the stage, sat my things down....and I silently shot God a prayer, "Okay. I'm ready for your words."
And I began to speak...and speak...and speak some more.
I'm pretty sure I could have gone on for hours.
At one point, I looked at my notebook to see if I was saying anything I had written down and it was simply gibberish.
So, I just kept moving my mouth and praying that God would keep talking.

I prayed.
And I left the stage.
And I couldn't believe God's goodness.

As I watched it back a few days later I couldn't help but think,
Man, that was good...but I could have said it better and more powerfully had I prepared.

And then God spoke to me through scripture.
1 Corinthians 2:1-5 says:

When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God's power. 

So, I'm learning to lean on the power of the Spirit and not on my own gifts and abilities.
I think there will come a time in which God is going to use my gifts to enhance the work of the Spirit, but I've relied solely on myself for too long and it's time to be completely dependent on Him for a change.

So, I'm learning to get out of the way.
I'm learning to let Him work, speak, and do as He pleases...and, unfortunately, it's not always the most comfortable route.
But, I guess God never promised that dying to oneself would be easy or pain free.
He did, however, promise that it would be worth it.

So, each day I die to myself a little more.
And, let me tell you, it's a painful process.

But, it ends in a beautiful victory of a Spirit filled daughter of God.

The Holy Spirit and....me? (Part III)

God had my attention.
I was His.

And I wanted more.
I wanted so much more!

As I sat there continuing to pray with this lady...(sorry for continually referring to her as "lady". I don't remember her name, but to make her more personal we can call her Janice.)
So, Janice and I are continuing to pray together when I start to see something.

Red...
Orange...
A fire, maybe?
It was getting closer...
Yep! Definitely a fire.

Almost as if on cue, Janice says, "Lauren do you see anything?"
"Fire. I see fire."
Even though our eyes were still closed in prayer, I could almost hear her smile as she said, "Yea! That's the Holy Spirit! Let's keep praying."

So we did.
We prayed.
And the fire came down.
It swept over my head and the burning came with it.
Every part of me was burning.
Janice's hand was on my shoulder and I think I mumbled something along the lines of, "Your hand! It's burning me!"
She laughed and moved it higher...but nothing could stop the burning. Every where her hand went the burning went.

It wasn't painful, but it was consuming.
It was cleansing.
It was renewing.
It was God like I'd never experienced Him before.

I could barely catch my breath as I clung to a little wooden cross that Janice had placed in my hands earlier.
My lungs could hardly keep up.
I could barely hold myself upright.
Tears were flowing and my nose was running. (Sidenote: at some point, I'm pretty sure I felt someone wipe my nose- Hey! I never said this Holy Spirit thing was pretty!)

My mind left me and my spirit began to speak for itself in a way that I had never heard before. Syllables spilled from my mouth in a language only God could understand.
And I wanted more.
Oh, how I wanted more!

I can't tell you how long I was there for.
Minutes?
Hours?
I truly have no clue.
There was no concept of the outside world.
In those moments it was just Janice, Me, and God.

At some point the visions of fire died down and I sat up in my chair and looked at Janice with a look of pure amazement plastered across my face.
She sat there smiling back at me, and said, "Well it looks like you're not doing this on your own anymore! You were just baptized in the Holy Spirit!"

I wasn't even entirely sure what that meant, but I smiled- that was about all I could do at this point.
A guy came over and sat and talked with me for a while about what it meant to be baptized in the Holy Spirit. He explained to me all the things that the Holy Spirit does, and then he said to me, "Do you know how to hear the voice of God?"
"Umm..well, I've practiced journaling His voice and, ummm...."
"No," he said, "that's good, but if you asked God a question right now would He answer you?"
"No, I guess not."
"Okay, I want you to close your eyes."
I shot him a skeptical glance, but did as he said.
"Now, I want you to ask God out loud what He thinks of you?"
I opened my eyes and looked him over with a questioning glare, but he just smiled and told me to do it.
Okay.
"God....what do you-" before the words even finished leaving my mouth an image of a rose came into my head and God began speaking so plainly through that single little flower. His words began flowing out of my mouth, bypassing my mind until my ears heard what I was saying. For several minutes God spoke and I sat there in awe of His power and love.
Then they explained to me what it meant to have a prophetic gift, and told me that God would be putting it into action.

And then they anointed me with oil.

Okay! So, to sum it all up we have...
Burning via an all consuming and imaginary fire: check!
Speaking in tongues: check!
Seeing prophetic visions: check!
Anointed with oil: check!
New revelation of God: check!

As I got up to leave the prayer room that day, I finally understood the words "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!"

Yea, this was definitely a new me.
And God wasn't done yet...

The Holy Spirit and....me? (Part II)

Is it possible?
All these years, had I been worshipping myself instead of God?

Lets evaluate.

Did I kill myself trying to fit pieces of my life together?
Yes. 
Did I think that the things I did or didn't do would determine God's love for me?
In my head, no....but my life reflected a clear yes. 
Was I a victim of severe anxiety whenever I wasn't enough for a situation?
Yea.... 
Did I secretly pride myself on who I was, where I'd come from, and what I'd done?
Unfortunately, yes....
Did I try endlessly to solve problems in my life and other people's lives in order to receive the glory instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to work in the problems and solve them for God's glory?
Ugh...definitely guilty.

Drat.
This lady was on to something.

All of sudden the reality of this unrecognized sin I had been living in became all too clear and I doubled over in repentance before God.
How dare I.
All my life I'd been trying to make God look like me, when what I claimed to be doing was passionately seeking to look more like Him.

Tears came, my wind was gone, and all I could do was sit before God in absolute repentance.
God was so much more than I had ever even realized....or cared to realize, for that matter.
In that moment, and in these weeks that have followed, I realize how little I really know about God and how much I've made Him to look a lot like me.

One of the most sobering moments since that day at Urbana was when I was reading through Romans and came to Romans 9.  I know it's a little long, but read it. Its good stuff!

15 For he says to Moses, "I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion." 16 It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. 17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: "I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth." 18Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden. 19 One of you will say to me: "Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?" 20 But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? "Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, 'Why did you make me like this?' " 21 Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use? 22 What if God, choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath--prepared for destruction? 23 What if he did this to make the riches of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in advance for glory-- 

This doesn't sound like the God I used to know.
What happened to, "God loves each of His children the same"?
Would God- sweet, loving, Daddy God- really create men and intentionally harden their hearts just so that he could display His wrath??

I would have just skimmed over this verse before, but now...now, I reread it. I study it. I can't get enough of it.
Finally, God doesn't fit in my box.
Finally, I can't answer a question about Him.
Finally, I can't speak for Him.
And finally, I'm letting Him speak for Himself.

And the answer I feel like He's sharing with me is definitely not the one I would have chosen.
I hear God say,
"Yes.
Yes, I could do that.
I'm God.
I'm perfect in all my ways.
I am Almighty and Sovereign
and what I choose to do is perfect.
I could create objects just to display my wrath,
and I can and will do as I please.
And while you're on this earth,
you will never understand my ways."

Box? What box?
This God is one that just blew the box to shreds and is preparing to reveal Himself to me in a new way.
And. I. Can't. Wait.

So, back to the prayer room at Urbana....
I now realized that all these years I had been my own god,
and that I knew nothing about who God really was.
I had repented and emptied myself before God.
And now that I had died to myself, I needed something else to fill me.

And fill me, He did.



Stay tuned! The cliff hanger continues...

The Holy Spirit and....me? (Part I)

I believe in the Trinity.

Father. 

Son. 

Holy Ghost.

And, while I'm a big fan of two of the key players of that triangle, I've never known-or, for that matter, really cared to know- much about numero tres in that equation: the Holy Spirit.  

I guess that just goes to show that God's plans are not always the ones that I would choose...

A little bit of background:
A few months ago I decided to go to this little conference called Urbana. If you haven't heard of it...look it up here.
17,000 college students and recent grads.
One week.
Break out sessions.
Multiple incredible speakers.
Worship in languages from around the world.
God.

It all adds up to an incredible experience.
But, I didn't know all this...and when I decided to go I was a little less than excited. To be honest, I'm not entirely sure why I decided to...
I'm not a big fan of big conferences.
I had to pay quite a bit of money.
I had to leave the day after Christmas.
I just wasn't that excited, I guess.
But, again, that just goes to show that God's plans are not always the ones that I would choose.

After driving through an incredibly rough winter storm one night and driving for seven hours the next day, I was sick and even less thrilled to be there than I had been before. I was with six other INCREDIBLE women (see the picture at the bottom for an accurate display of their incredibleness), and we went that night to the first session where the M.C. offered the disclaimer, "You will not leave this conference unchanged. The person you came in as is not the person you'll be when you leave."

Excuse me while I laugh in disagreement and mockery...
Ha.

They were funny.
Apparently they didn't know my circumstances.
Did I want God to show up and do dramatic and incredible things in my life?
Yep!
But He had never done so in the past, so God and I were on a strictly stationary basis in which neither of us did anything wild and crazy.
I worked really hard to be a good person for Him.
And we just loved each other...a lot.
That's it.

But, by day two things started to change.
I felt like I needed to take the afternoon off and not go to any breakout sessions, but instead spend some time in the prayer room.
I spent some time in the worship prayer room by myself, just praying and working through a lot of struggles that I've been facing for...well....pretty much my whole life.
And then I felt Him pushing me to the intercessory prayer room to pray through these issues with someone.

God was starting to get a little wild and crazy and I wasn't too thrilled about it, but I decided that I should probably do as He said. He had yet to lead me down any dimly lit back alleys, so I figured I'd be safe.

I went into the prayer room and sat down with a wonderfully sweet lady who helped me pray through a lot of struggles.
When it came down to the end of things I said something along the lines of,
"I know God is gracious.
  I know God is loving.
  I know God is here.
  But, that's the problem!
  I know all these things in my head,
  but that's where they stop.
  I don't feel God's love, grace, and presence.
  I will never reach what God wants me to be.
  I could give up everything and move to Africa to save God's suffering
  children,
  and still I wouldn't be enough.
  Nothing I do is ever going to be enough!"

This wonderfully patient and soft-spoken woman I had just unloaded on looked at me and said a few words that I will never, ever in my life forget,
"Lauren, I think maybe you need to repent of trying to be your own god."

Game changer.
Those few words struck a cord, and I felt the air leave my lungs as I marinated on what she had just said.

Stay tuned....this story is just getting good. :)

Today I Am Thankful...

A few days ago I was pretty thirsty, but I didn't have any bottled water.
I'm not a fan of the taste of the water from the sink, so I grumbled a little and then made some tea.
I got my tea and sat down to work on some homework, when an image flashed in my mind. It looked a little something like this:

All of a sudden I began remembering the tiny little hands at Jireh Orphanage that filled up these yellow jugs of water for everyone in their "house" (I'm not entirely sure that I would consider their tiny little cement buildings a house, but they did, so we will call it that). The cistern that collects rain water had gone dry and this was all they had to get fresh water. Each jug took about forty five minutes to an hour to fill, and there were over 200 children that needed water to drink, bathe, and cook. 

Since when did I become so spoiled that I can't even drink a glass of tap water? 

And then...

Yesterday morning I was eating a piece of bread that had gone slightly stale, and in my typical picky way I made a look of disgust and got ready to throw it in the trash. 

Just as the slice was about to meet its doom, another image flashed through my head. 

I don't have a picture, but I can tell you the story and I think it will be just as good: 

While still in Uganda last April, we had spent the entire day walking at Bethany Village. When we made it back to the mainland, we grabbed our sandwiches that we had packed and we devoured them. 

In the bottom of the bag were two pieces of bread. We hadn't had enough meat for another sandwich so we had simply put mayonnaise and mustard on it, incase someone got really hungry. 

The kids from the village played around us as we ate, but one little boy sat a few feet away just staring. 

As we finished our meal, my friend got ready to throw things away and I grabbed the extra pieces of bread with mayonnaise and mustard and I motioned to the boy. 

His eyes lit up and he came flying towards us. 

He'd been waiting for a bite, and now all I had to offer him was two pieces of bread with no meat. 

I kicked myself for not offering him my sandwich, but he didn't seem the least bit upset. In fact, he grabbed the bread, bowed his head, and ran off. 

I thought he'd run off and scarf the bread down, but what I saw, instead, is something I will never forget. 

The little boy ran over to his friends and starting dividing up the bread so that they could each have a piece. 

They all jumped and giggled with joy and looked over at us, smiling and waving and thankful for a few pieces of bread. 

Since when did I become so spoiled that I need to throw away a slightly stale piece of bread? 

Today, I'm choosing to be thankful for the incredible blessings that have been laid in my lap. How can you not be thankful when you remember the tiny little faces like these that were thankful for so little:

Lessons From a PT Cruiser

Earlier this year in May, I developed a need.
I needed a car.
Bad.

I was driving my cute, little, green Saturn down the road, on my way to an appointment, when all of a sudden the car began to shake.
I thought I could drive it off.
Apparently, I thought wrong.

The car began to shake worse.
And worse.
And worse.

I pulled over.
It ended up getting towed.
The engine ended up being irreparable.
And I waved goodbye to three grand.

That was a story of forgiveness, trust, and patience, all in of itself.

Flash forward to July.
I was still car shopping... for the second time in less than seven months.
And at just the right moment, in the most unexpected way, I spotted this cute little, silver PT Cruiser for sale.

Long story short, God ended up providing in His wonderful, gracious, and miraculous way, and a few days later I was driving off in my new car, affectionately titled the "Freida-Cruiser", by my wonderfully hilarious brother-in-law.

And God began working out a lesson I will not soon forget.

As soon as I drove off the lot, I began to notice other PT Cruisers on the road.
I know it's common for people to see others with their same car, and I had experienced this a little with my Saturn.
So I brushed off my frequent PT Cruiser sightings as a freak coincidence.

But, it continued...

Literally, every where I went, I saw PT Cruisers.
EVERYWHERE.

I took a 20 minute drive a few weeks ago and I saw EIGHT.
Eight PT Cruisers.
In 20 minutes.
That's roughly one every two and a half minutes.

And in another drive, I was cruising through town, behind another silver PT Cruiser, when it turned to the right.
I looked to my left, and there was another silver PT Cruiser, turning to the left, perfectly in line with me and the other Cruiser.

I'm not really a believer in coincidences.
I think God speaks in the littlest things in life, but this?
This was just weird.

And the more I dug for meaning in it...the more crazy I thought I was.
Rather than be crazy, I thought I would just forget about it and close my eyes whenever another cruiser drove by...or something like that.

But, driving the other day, I was seeing my usual string of PT Cruisers, and God began to speak.

"No matter how many cars are similar,
none are the same.
None are the same as yours.
They may seem better.
They may be silver and similar,
but not one of them has that little dent in the back hatch from a cart rolling into it.
Not one of those cruisers has three mysterious scratches across the roof from its previous owner.
Not one of them has been cleaned out thoroughly three times in one week by it's new owner that cared so much about it.
Not one of those PT cruisers are the same."

And as I look around a college campus in which I feel like I am just one of the masses, God whispers those words to me,

"No matter how many of these people are similar,
 not one of them is the same as you.
No, not even one is the same.
They may be similar.
They may seem better,
but not one of them are you.
Not one of them has your scars.
Not one of them has our relationship.
Not one of them has had me lovingly clean them out like I have with you, over, and over, and over again.
Not one of them is the same."

Oh, how good is my Savior and his encouraging words!
Who knew a PT Cruiser could mean so much?!

In My Daddy's Arms

At this time last week I was packing up the last of my things and saying goodbye to my family, as I prepared for my drive to Huntington University.

I looked out the window to see the garage empty and realized my dad was checking over and cleaning out my car (because he is just an incredible dad like that :) ).

I was crying. 

I was scared. 

I was completely overwhelmed.

And God met me where I was.

As my earthly father wrapped me in his big, strong, safe, and loving arms and whispered all the things I needed to hear in that moment, I was overcome with love and couldn't will myself to let go.

And all of a sudden, God showed up.  In that moment, I heard God's promises ringing in my ears, and I heard his soft and comforting voice say,
"It's my turn to hold you.
My arms are strong and safe.
And my plans for you are great.
Just like your earthly father has made sure your car is ready,
I have made sure that you are ready.
I have cleaned you out.
I have checked you over.
I have prepared you for this.
I will be all that you need, for I am more than enough!"

So I let go of my earthly dad, and fell into my Heavenly Father's arms, surrendering myself completely to Him.

This week has not been easy. 

In fact, that's an understatement. 

This week has been unbearable. 

And, yet...

through crippling anxiety

through overwhelming doubt

through constant skepticism

through all of my unbelief...

God met me where I was and in my darkest moments his voice rings clear,

"I am Alpha,

Omega, 

Jehovah,

King of Kings,

the Redeeming God,

and your loving Father...

and I am MORE than enough."