Hey y'all, Finals is next week and I have been busy out of my mind with all the homework over the last month or so. I am really enjoying my classes and loving that I'm back at the Junior College, but as this semester draws to a close, my mind has been contemplating what's next. What do I want to do with my summer? What do I want to do next semester? What degree do I want to get? Some aspects of these questions are easy to answer, but others are proving difficult. I struggled at first with being at peace about being home. I still miss YWAM very much and pray for my friends there constantly, but God has not yet released me to go back to be with them. I know I am here for a reason. This has been a desert season of finding out who I am and equipping me to carry that with me into different places. Desert seasons can be excruciating, but they are so so necessary. In fact, God gave me a picture to paint of this desert I'm in right now. A desert that holds a long path that must be traversed, but that is also bordered by flowers and all sorts of vibrant life. Beauty and life in the midst of the trials. Once I had come to have peace about staying home for an indefinite amount of time, the next round came at me like a tidal wave. My desire is to do my best at whatever I do and, while that is a strength, the weakness it brings is a lot of stress. I've begun looking at transferring to a university to get a degree and began to feel overwhelmed by the weight of that decision. As I let my heart open up the idea of dreaming big about my future in a new way, it became heavy with stress instead of His peace. The stress came in where I looked at working hard to get into a good school or where I saw the cost and didn't know if I would be able to get all the scholarships I'd need. Above that, though, it came in seeking God's direction and not feeling it. I am so used to hearing His voice and running in that direction that when I can't hear Him I tend to panic. My greatest trials are in quieting my mind to keep listening even after I've been trying and drawing a blank. My heart is to obey Him in everything and to know what He wants to do in/through my life so I can partner with that, which makes silence the most unnerving sound in the entire world. As I made an effort to take a deep breath and calm down internally, my mother said something really wise that has helped more and more as I've chewed on it. She pointed out the distinction between looking for God's plan for my life and looking for His purpose in my life. So many times, we can get obsessed with the idea of finding out what His plan is; what steps He wants me to take next. Sometimes, though, He wants us to be content with being who He has made us to be wherever we are. I may not know what college He thinks I should go to or whether or not I should get my degree at all, but I know what the giftings are that He has given me and I know that every day of my life, my purpose is to point towards Him and continue to become like Him. That is something I have heard before and even that He has spoken directly to me, but being reminded of it really was a deep revelation. It can be nerve wracking, but I don't need to know what's next. I just need to know who I am today in the here and now. I was reading in my Bible this morning and a certain passage in 2 Timothy got highlighted to me. 2 Timothy 3:12 In my entire life, though I've experienced a lot, I have never once been physically abused, verbally slandered, or even ignored because of the gospel or my living out of it. I have shared my faith with people of many different walks in multiple countries around the world including America and not once have I had a person respond in such a way, even if I made them comfortable by it. I know that persecution of these and other kinds are very real even here in my home town, but I have been protected from it my whole life. Does that mean I'm not living for God? Of course not.
At first I read over it, but then I came back to it because something about it still stuck out to me. The truth is, I haven't been persecuted in that way. I have had an extremely comfortable life in my church, my school, my town, and on all of the missions trips I have been on. (OK, comfortable is a relative term) I looked up the original words used in the Greek and found that the word translated as "persecuted" - dioko - literally means "to pursue (in a hostile manner)...to run after, follow after." Like I said, no man or woman has ever responded to me like this, but I have been plagued by the lies of the enemy. I have been surrounded by doubts and jabbed at by shame. I have been chased to the edge of my mental and spiritual energy and had to fall again and again on my rock, Jesus. I realized that I haven't been prepared to respond to this kind of bullying. I know that persecution can come around any corner in any form, and I have been prepared to receive any backlash that my faith would bring from the people I have ministered to, but I did not have my shield up as high to what might be a more sneaky attack. It is important to be able to brace yourself for a wave before it hits you, but this one had hit me from behind. I am used to spiritual attacks, but I'd never thought of it as a form of persecution. It's like I've been cyber-bullied and didn't even know it. The truth is, the enemy is going to do everything He can to interfere with the children of God in whatever form he can. Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. (Eph 6:12) We know that we who are living for Yeshua the Messiah will be persecuted, but not by the people living in darkness. It is Satan and those in his dominion that oppose us, whether through a whispered lie, a dirty glance we can feel, or an actual fist. Those who live in that darkness may be the ones to wield the fist, but it is not they who we must be vigilant against. Our job is to love the person inside the way Jesus did. To love them with the love He first showed us. So just because I have never faced a physical bully like so many of my brothers and sisters have, does not mean that I can stop being vigilant. Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds. (James 1:2) The fact that the enemy is coming against us is proof that the Holy Spirit is at work in our lives and that he feels threatened by that. I don't know what I'm doing right, honestly, but if the enemy is going to such lengths to keep me down, I know that whatever it is I'm learning in this desert, it is the best thing I could possibly be gaining.
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ErikaJeremiah 29:11 Archives
March 2023
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