freedomfound:

”..We are treated as impostors, and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, yet possessing everything.” -2 Corinthians 6:8-10

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1 month ago

We were never meant to live outside of continual communion with our Father.
Matthew 4:4

life  God  relationship  truth  Bible  Holy Spirit  Christian  Christianity  

1 month ago

Getting Rid of Our Lists

Ok, y’all, it’s about to get real. I haven’t written in a while, and I have a feeling it’s about to pour out.

I posted a few weeks ago that if the Lord looks at the heart first and foremost, then shouldn’t we? This has been a stirring of my heart for a while now, because ever since I was old enough to start noticing guys and being interested in them, I was only seeing them with my natural eyes, and I was only looking at their physical appearance. Then of course, personality and getting along well would seal the deal. That’s how it works, right? Wrong.

I’m going to be honest and raw here for a moment. I have three older brothers and always have had mostly guy friends. Growing up and even today, I have always heard what those guys wanted and preferred in a girl. “He” wants tall, athletic, skinny, and blonde, while “he” prefers short, petite, brunette, curly hair, and maybe a little foreign-looking wouldn’t hurt. But “he” likes short, athletic brunettes, straight hair, while skinny and yet curvy, too. “He” isn’t scared to admit “he” truly wants to marry Taylor Swift. The list goes on and on. Chances are, if I’m close with a guy, I could tell you what I’ve heard him paint as his ideal girl. And you know what? At first, it just put a lot of pressure on me, not knowing how I could fit into a dream image of even just one guy one day. Would “he” be disappointed that I don’t look like what “he’s” always imagined? Then, it started to disgust me, because I realized these guys, including my own brothers at times, were being attracted to girls without even knowing them at all. That just didn’t sit right with me. 

And here’s some more honesty for you: then, I realized I had my own list. The guy I would picture in my mind when I thought about the future looked like this: Tall, much taller than me actually. The taller, the better. But, he couldn’t be too skinny. He would be very muscular and athletic. He had dark hair and dark features. Preferably blue eyes. He could get really tan, and could wear scruff well. I loved that. He could also pull off a full grown beard. He was a man’s man, an outdoorsy guy. It would just be icing on the cake if he could play some sort of instrument and sing well, and be good with his hands so he could help me build and work on projects.

How was it any different than the lists that disgusted me? That made me feel like I couldn’t fit in somewhere? That showed me we could be attracted to someone without even knowing them? It wasn’t different at all. I was just as guilty as the rest of them.  

The Lord gave me a dream about 4 years ago that has stuck with me. I had been set up by family members to meet this ‘perfect’ guy. Everyone loved him and wanted us together. He was all of the things on The List, but more. His family was even extremely wealthy. They lived on a beautiful southern plantation estate, perfect for the ‘wedding of my dreams’. In the dream, his family was planning a ball to introduce me to the rest of their family and friends. I had a conversation with the guy, and I asked him if he thought us being together was what God wanted for us. He told me he believed God would honor it. But that wasn’t what I asked. Then, in the dream, I was outside beneath the beautiful oak trees that I so enjoy, and I was talking to God. I told Him, “I have to hear from You. If you say ‘yes’, then I’ll do it. But if You don’t say anything at all, that’s as good as a ‘no’ to me. I have to hear You say ‘yes’ or I can’t go through with this (the ball and soon-to-come marriage).” I woke up.

Since then, the Lord has been watering the seeds that the dream gave me. The seeds of:
Perhaps what I’ve always imagined I wanted, isn’t what I actually want at all.
Maybe the outside appearances don’t matter as much as I used to think they did.
Maybe something is entirely wrong when the way we as Christians go about relationships looks too much like the way the world goes about relationships. 
Do I want to join a man that is tall, dark, and handsome & with whom I get along with super well that loves God and lives a good life, or a man that has an unshakable relationship with God and brings heaven to earth with every step he takes, no matter what he physically looks like as long as his heart looks just like God’s?
I know I want to end up with God’s best, but maybe my desire of what that is needs to change.
Maybe The List needs to be altered.
Maybe The List needs to be wiped away completely.
Maybe I don’t need any of that to satisfy me. 
Maybe He is really enough for me, and gives gifts better than I could imagine.
Maybe I should trust Him to help me to be able to receive His gifts no matter what they look like, and stop putting limitations on Him by wanting the gifts to look a certain way.

These seeds have been growing in me for some time. Don’t get me wrong though, for a long time I would still see certain men and immediately be drawn to them and want to know them, solely based on my reaction to their physical appearance, while knowing little to nothing about them. Maybe I knew they were a Christian, too, or maybe I didn’t. Yet still I had a bias or preference. And then there would be His still, small voice, showing me that something just wasn’t right about that.

Because, y’all, something just isn’t right about that.

Maybe you saw your husband or wife and just knew there was something about them that you had to explore, and maybe that worked for you. Maybe God has totally blessed y’alls relationship. Maybe your heart was in a good place when it happened. But for way too many of us, for myself and so many that I encounter, something needs to change. We have to start being moved by The Spirit, and not just what we see.

I’m a strong believer that the Fall didn’t change our beauty, but it did change our perception of it and the value we place on it. & If God is looking at the heart (1 Sam. 16:7), shouldn’t we?

I’m here to propose that there is a better way to go about this relationship business. Again, maybe you did it differently and it has worked for you. I know relationships aren’t going to all look the same, but if you’re single right now, I have a few suggestions that I whole-heartedly believe will help us stay out of wrong relationships, guard our hearts as well as those around us, and end up in an amazing relationship that is completely blessed by the Lord and is a blessing to those around you.

To make this simpler, I’m going to try to put what the Lord has shown me into some helpful keys and ideas that you need to take to the Lord in your private quiet time and let Him mold into you and make your own:

1. Get alone with the Lord and learn to only need Him. Learn how much God loves you, and start letting your heart become satisfied in Him ALONE. If you were to NEVER get married, would you be a little disappointed? If so, then you’re placing your joy and satisfaction in marriage. I know this is a hard, blunt word, but it’s true. That used to be me. But the more I learned how much He loves me and adores me, and the more I learned to enjoy Him, the less I realized I needed anything else. It’s okay to want to get married one day, but it’s NOT okay to NEED to get married one day to be truly happy/fulfilled/satisfied/complete.
2. Get rid of every pre-concieved idea of what you want your future to look like, including the people that will come into it. The more you grow in your relationship with God, the more okay you’ll be with just having Him in your life. Used to, I wanted my life to look a certain way, with family, a ministry, friends, career, circumstances, all of that stuff. Now, I could be a janitor and never get married and be fully and completely so satisfied in JUST knowing the Lord and getting to share Him with people I encounter. We need to stop putting limitations on God, which means we need to get rid of our Lists.
3. Give it all up & just let go. There are a lot of things I could see happening in my life, and things that I believe He is going to give me to do or places to take me, but I’ve learned that I was never meant to hold onto these things or put my focus on them. The more I look at “marrying him” or “writing a book” or “becoming a marriage counselor” or “traveling the world and teaching”, the more I want those things to happen, and the more I will inevitably try to make them happen. I’ve learned this the hard way, but I’m so thankful to know it now: when we really want something to happen, we tend to “find” confirmations for it. When we really want a relationship to form with that guy or girl (you know, the one that fits The List so it MUST be God, right?), we start getting “confirmations” about it being what God wants, when really, we are just seeking something that we want. If you seek a relationship, you’ll find it. If you seek having a platform and ministry, you’ll find it. When you are seeking something aside from God, it allows the enemy to come and play and give you what you’re seeking for (aka the “confirmations”). But it’s not going to be God’s best plan or timing that way, and it’ll probably be a lot harder to handle since God wasn’t the one that made it happen. I would bet that if our eyes would’ve been on God the whole time & satisfied with just having Him, those “signs” could’ve happened still but we wouldn’t have given them a second thought, because we weren’t seeking them, we were just seeking Him.
   When I learned to literally say, “God, these are all things that I believe You want for me in this life, but I don’t want to hold on to them or look to them, I just want my eyes on You, so I’m giving them to You to hold onto and for You to give them to me at the perfect time. I trust You and only need You,” everything got clearer and easier. I no longer “found confirmations/signs” for things I was searching for, but yet He surprised me with things and made it totally clear that it was ALL Him and His doing. Then, He would remind me of things that had happened and showed me how He was working all along. I didn’t need confirmations to be able to know He was taking care of me and my future.
   Sometimes, we ask God for promises so that we can not be afraid of what is to come. These aren’t always going to play out as true in the end, because fear and self-focus is the motivation. But sometimes, God gives us promises when we are solely seeking Him just to show us in the end that He is faithful.
4. Trust God with not knowing. This is pretty simple in concept, but hard to do if we don’t have a good relationship with Him. One thing the Lord has spoken to me over the years is, “I’m a good Father that knows how to give good gifts. If you ask for bread, would I give you a stone?” No, He wouldn’t! But, I think we need to remember to stop desiring white bread, and trust Him to give the best bread for us and help us to know how to appreciate His gift when He gives it. The more we grow with Him, the more okay we are with not knowing what is ahead of us. For me, it used to be scary. But now, I know that He loves me and is going to take care of me, so I have nothing to worry about. Tomorrow hasn’t been given to me yet, so that means it’s still in His hands. I have no right to worry about it or plan how it’s going to happen, it’s still His. I have no idea what my husband will look like one day, but I have a good Dad and know that He will equip me to handle and appreciate and love the gift He chose to give me. There is freedom in trusting Him.
5. Drop the timeline. After you learn you can trust God no matter what, we have to realize that it doesn’t make sense for our lives to be on a timeline. If everyone on earth walked in God’s will and knew how to trust Him, do you really think that everyone would be getting married at the same time (usually in their 20s)? When you really start to think about living a life fully surrendered to God, it doesn’t make sense that everything that happens in my life should happen in your life at the exact same timing as mine. It really just doesn’t make sense! God has different wonderful plans for all of us. Even for the person we will marry one day! Some will be called to go do things before ever entering marriage, some will be called to join to a helpmate younger. But with God, and living a life fully for Him and satisfied in Him, a timeline is just silly. I think we would see a lot less divorces if we took the pressure off of ourselves by no longer comparing our ‘timeline’ to the ‘timelines’ of those around us. We are set apart. Our lives shouldn’t all look the same. And if we really know God and have Him as our one desire, waiting until we are 45 to get married wouldn’t be an issue at all. 
6. Stop looking with natural eyes. Yep, back to The List and the issue of being physically attracted to someone before we even know them. It’s gotta stop. And honestly, I think as we implement the revelations listed earlier and learn to trust God, the Giver of Perfect Gifts, and learn how to let our hearts and desires be molded by His, we will stop seeing in the flesh, and start living by the Spirit.
   We are first and foremost spirits. We ARE spirits, that have souls, that live in bodies. Literally our bodies are just the clothes to our spirits. Our spirits were in Him before the foundations of the world were ever created, but our bodies weren’t. Our bodies came along as completely unique works of art, or clothing you might say. As we grow in knowing Him, I believe we will see how He does and learn to walk in the spirit and by The Holy Spirit. I believe we can grow into a place where we no longer are looking at the clothes of a person, but first and foremost at their spirit. If people did this more today, there would be a lot less heartache, because we would see the state that so many spirits are in, and know they aren’t ready for a relationship, because they don’t know Him well enough yet.
7. Stay in the friend zone, and don’t leave it. To continue off of my last point, I believe we should be looking straight at people’s spirits and become attracted to that before anything else. If we ARE a spirit, shouldn’t that be what we love about the other person? What attracts us to them? But, how do you really know someone’s spirit? God is a spirit, and how do we know Him? Through relationship! But this doesn’t mean we need to jump right into dating. I honestly believe the best way to get to know someone is by forming a friendship and continuing it. You may find that their clothes (bodies) fit your old List, but their spirits need to know Him more. Or, you may find that they have an amazing spirit, but it just isn’t one that is going in the same direction that God wants to take you. Maybe God is going to take that person to Africa in 20 years but He wants to take you to India, though neither of you know it right now. But God does. Maybe that person has an amazing spirit, and you get along well, and they are a trailblazer for the Lord, but maybe God doesn’t want to join you together. That will be a-okay if we truly trust God, and by staying in the friend zone while figuring this out, no one gets hurt, yet each person got built up during the duration of the friendship (which may even last a lifetime!). This is how hearts stay guarded, no one gets hurt, and the Lord gets glorified. By staying here, God will be the one that has to make something happen between the two of you, instead of jumping in and making it happen yourselves or realizing it wasn’t what God wanted after a few months or years.
8. Rest and be free. I’m sure as I continue to learn and grow, I will be able to add onto this list, but for now, I know for a fact that these truths are extremely freeing. My focus is on Him and nothing else, so it’s much easier to hear Him about issues that arise and trust Him in not knowing what lies ahead. I’m not obsessed with thoughts about marriage and the future anymore. I no longer meet guys and wonder if they are going to be “the one”. Less and less, I see guys that would fit my old List and immediately am attracted to them. That rarely happens anymore, and when it does, my awesome Dad shows me that I need to put my eyes back on Him. I no longer need reassurance that despite rarely meeting new people anymore, I’ll still somehow meet the man God has for me. I no longer need God to make promises to me so that I’m happy with where my life is headed. I no longer have to remind myself to stop thinking about any certain guy and if a future could be possible with him. I don’t daydream anymore with a made-up fantasy man. I don’t “find confirmations” about things I’m seeking; I just find Him more and more as I continue to seek relationship with Him everyday. Y’all. It’s SO FREEING!! Now, if I someday get married, I know I can truly say to him: “You’re not at all who I used to expect you to be all those years. In fact, you’re very far from it. But you’re so much better than what I could’ve ever dreamed up. You’re so much better. You’re you. & I choose you.” Not only has this freed me, but it will be freeing to him that he doesn’t have to fit any mold or meet any expectations (which could be a whole other post in itself).

Please, please, please, take these things and get alone with Him and ask Him to reveal to you the Truth in them so you can walk in more freedom, too. I used to just preach the message of not needing to be married to be happy one day, but now I’m actually living it and the fruit is heavenly. If you have questions, let me know. This post could’ve been much longer, but I think it’s quite long enough as it is hahaha. I just want everyone to discover true security and satisfaction in Him ALONE, like I am growing to do everyday. Love y’all!!!! :)

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1 month ago