The hills are alive...but am I?

I used to think that I was special.

I used to think that I was different than everybody else. And I so liked that.

I used to think that my very presence just changed things.

I don't know why I thought that really...except, maybe I thought I had something to offer.

Now, there are things that are cool. I can prophesy to somebody and blow their minds. I can pray over someone and see them healed. I can assert my value and see people bend to my assertion. I can speak my mind and hear it heard. I can speak from experience and see someone actually take notes on a piece of paper. I can hear people thanking me for wisdom.

Yet, I don't feel special anymore.

I feel like I'm waiting for something amazing to happen, and I'm wondering if it ever will. Because until something amazing happens, I'm stuck at Walgreens. Stuck without my bachelor's degree. Stuck unmarried. Stuck. Stuck. Stuck.

And, I'm not sure I really feel like I matter. And this is scary.

And I want to hole up in my apartment and turn off my phone and just sleep.

...well, also watch "The Sound of Music"...

Your love...never gives up on me.

I like who I am becoming...and, yet I feel like something's missing.

Since July, I have become immersed in understanding my own value. It's such a new step. It's something that feels selfish but necessary. The past two years of my life have been learning, sacrifice, and amazement. But, I do know that to fully comprehend and accept God's love, I have to love and value myself and live out of that.

I met someone recently that just blew my mind with freedom. Just being around them, I had this new understanding of exactly what freedom looks like..what grace looks like. Not to devalue holiness in any way, I have found out that I could do horrible, knock-down, drag out awful things and still feel God and still know Him. Not that I have done those things, mind you... I just live my life a bit differently since like August.

Now, I will now not allow people to talk to me in certain ways under any circumstance -- this includes friends and even customers at work...even parents. I look them in the eye and say, "Hey, you don't get to talk to me like that. That's not ok." Usually these sentences are followed by some sort of choice..."When you are ready to be a good friend, I am ready to talk." Of course...these are all Danny Silk principles. And, it feels really good...even as foreign as it is to me to assert my value.

I've looked at people very well knowing they could never speak to me again and say, "What do you think you're doing? I'm worth way more than how you're treating me."

But, at the same time, valuing myself has seemed to equal valuing other people less. Many of my friends now, I could never talk to them again and be fine. I'm no longer tied to this NEED to have them in my life. This also feels good. But, because it's so foreign, I wonder if it's wrong. Or is it just good to not need anyone? ...I've had people talk to me these past few months about an independent spirit...Is this fruit of that or is this just healthy living like I've never encountered before? I still value relationships. I still cultivate them... But, I no longer feel like I need people in my life to exist.

I've always gotten such life from people.

In this asserting value, I've pissed people off (especially customers at work HAHA). In this learning freedom, I have surprised people around me. I've surprised myself. I feel a bit more closed off. I feel more at a standstill. I think, in me feeling like I don't need other people, I also feel like they don't need me. That's kind of a crappy feeling.

I've also been thinking about "oh, forever keep me burning"....

Why don't I feel like I burn anymore? I run on auto pilot with this new lifestyle. That is both good and bad. I now live out of a lifestyle of identity. But, those things I spent so much time striving for and leaning to grasp...I have now at my disposal. I think now I don't know what to grasp for. It seems ...not good enough... to say that I just want "MORE"... Is that really what I want? Or do I want NEW? Or BOTH? Am I wasting my time trying to figure it out instead of just living life? Is there harm in just living out a lifestyle of identity...must we always be grasping for something else? ...I kind of think we should be...Auto pilot is kind of scary.

I feel like a failure if people have bad things to say about me. I feel like a failure that I'm always in a bad mood at my job...because I hate it and I'm exhausted. I feel like a failure that nothing awesome has happened at my job because of me. I feel like a failure when my friends don't feel loved. I feel like a failure when I don't want to talk to my family. I feel like a failure when I don't spend hardly any alone time with God but spout off how my love language is quality time.

And....yet, I don't feel like a failure. I feel like I SHOULD feel like a failure. But, this new concept of grace and freedom has given me leeway that I just don't know what to do with. Those rigid lines I held myself in seemed to give me purpose because it was easy for me to stay within those lines...I guess Bethel would call them Core Values. But, I saw some of them were pointless. Some of them didn't allow change or growth or LIFE. But, I feel like I'm pushing the limit. I'm caught in this tension... I'm seeing how far I can go, basically.

Is that bad?

Chapter Two: Spiritual Senses

The School of the Seers by Jonathan Welton

The gift of discerning of spirits is a communication gift through which the Holy Spirit makes us aware of our spiritual atmosphere and environment around us.

SMELL ::: 2 Corinthians 2:14 "But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us, spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of Him."

Matthew 5:8 "Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall see God." For us to have a "pure" heart, our heart must be focused. If we are to "see God," then the one element our heart contains must be a focus on the Lord.

When we focus our hearts on the Lord, we are aimed to come into the experience of seeing God. The verse is clearer if we read it this way, "Happy are those who focus their heart on God, for they will actually see God."

Quotable Quotes

...then the Almighty will be your gold...

...The Kingdom of Heaven is like treasure hidden...

The Lord will only give you the measure of His presence that you are willing to jealously guard.

Bring the Lamb the reward of His suffering.

If we love with our whole being, nothing is lacking where everything is given. -- Bernard Clairvaux

Catch on fire with enthusiasm and people will come for miles to watch you burn. -- John Wesley

The secret to revival is this: "A satisfied soul loathes the honeycomb. But to a hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet." Proverbs 27:7

Chapter One: The Mantle of Fire and Water -- Where It All Began

The School of the Seers by Jonathan Welton

We can't run away from the real just because there is a counterfeit.

With all of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, we have a role in activating them. Sometimes the Holy Spirit will move sovereignly and heal someone, but most of the time faith must be activated. When we read the Gospels, we often see Jesus telling people to take an action -- to show themselves to a priest, to wash the mud from their eyes, or to pick up their bed and walk. These were each acts of faith that, when activated, released the gift of healing.

If the Holy Spirit tells me to give a prophetic word, then I must take part in cooperating with the Spirit and deliver the word. When you activate faith, then you have stepped over into the things of the Kingdom realm: healing, prophecy, miracles, discerning of spirits, and so on.

Being a Bride -- Bill Johnson

Genesis 2

"It's not good that man should live alone."

Word Study of HELPMATE::((azar, conedgo)) HelpmEEt. referring to God's own effort to rescue and sustain His people. AZAR - power, strength, rescue, [[authority]]. Instead of help, it means AZAR.

Deut 32/33 -- Blessed are you, Oh, Israel, who is like you? A people saved by the Lord. He is your shield, an AZAR, and your glorious reward.

Psalms 121 -- I lift my eyes to the hills. Where does my AZAR come from? My AZAR comes from the Lord, the maker of Heaven and Earth.

The profound definition of the assignment and privilege that she has in ministering to the husband she is joined with.

CONEDGO-- to face, to be opposite of. "It is not good that man should live alone, so I will make him a power facing him." I will make him a strength opposite to him. I will make him a rescue that looks at him in the face. The position (face to face) makes you so complete that you bring something to the table that the other person has a tremendous need in.

To Men::Your wife has been created as one who has all the equipment necessary to face you and they are a power that faces you. They are a strength that is opposite you. They are a rescue that looks at you in the face. They are there in a positive, strength-supporting way.

Ephesians 5

(31) two shall become one flesh. this is a great mystery but i'm speaking concerning Christ and the Church.

One fulfills what the other is lacking.

The wife ALSO has been anointed to bring safety. But the mystery is not what God has made the wife for. The real mystery is the Church and the Husband who is Christ Jesus.

God has created the Church to stand face to face to bring what is necessary to see His will fulfilled on the earth.

The real subject is the type and shadow of how God has created you as a people designed for purpose. You can do the unusual. You are fully equipped to stand before the King of Glory as the wife, one who is completely prepared and ready to carry on the posture that will have impact on the course of history for the Church and the nations of the world.

This is how you were created for JESUS:
I will make Him a strength opposite of Him. I will make Him a rescue that looks Him in the face.

Inheritance:

Even if your forefathers were messed up, Jesus showed up to use what was turned for tragedy and destruction and reverse the effect of that thing so that you could stand as though you were prepared for good things by having to inherit bad things. Watch how the Lord reverses the effect of something that was set up to destroy your family line but because you said yes your family line was covered by protection so that what you inherit is reversed.

I have a unique place before Him that nobody else will ever fulfill. I am after this one thing: I want to represent Jesus well. I want to do it in such a way that entire cities are captured with this theme: that you are THAT precious in the eyes of God.

Until we see clearly what He says about us, all we can do is mimic and copy what He did in the earth....He actually DESIGNED us, in grace, to be a part of a company of people who are qualified to stand before Someone we consider One who needs no help...but, for some reason, what He wants done in the earth can't be done until we look Him face to face.

We don't strive hard to work for God. It's the fact that we realize in our pursuit of knowing Him, He actually positions us for a place in the course of history because He equipped us to be as one with Him to make up for what's missing.......

what's missing??? you.

He's made Himself vulnerable to the desires of His people.

"Whatever you ask for will be done..." John 14/15....

I won't be there to break your sweet heart.

Sometimes i fancy myself in my own movie. It is always set in a little place like, oh, New York City. Yet, I've been to NYC and would never want to live there. I was in Manhattan...I much preferred SoHo...and, then whatever little area was around the MET. Anyways, sometimes when I'm just walking around, I know exactly what song would be playing if I was being filmed. Inevitably, each day the song could be different...and, sometimes, depending on the song, my steps are lighter and faster....or slower and more calculated.

This all being said, a lot of times, I look at myself and my situations as if I were an outsider. I look at them as if I were watching a movie. I feel emotions as I am swayed by each look at the movie. I can shut off my emotions if I don't watch the movie.

I find myself having those moments where somewhere voices were overdubbed as the main character reminisces through memories of words past spoken by a lover or friend. I look back at the movie and touch my necklace absentmindedly remembering him notice it, comment, and proceed to tell me just why I would pick it... As I watch that particular movie, I am overwhelmed by familiarity lost. The song playing would be "Title Withheld" by Resident Hero.

Right now, I am learning that love is a choice. I am learning that contentedness is a choice. If I looked too hard at the movie...too hard at circumstances I can't control or can't get back again, I could cry because that girl, Candace, is so sad and deserves more out of life.

But, really, the song playing now is "You Are My Joy" by the Reindeer Section. No, not a cover of David Crowder...
A song that speaks simple truth, simple wonder....but a catchy little happy tune. That's how I feel right now. Speaking simple, hard things...things that hurt. Things that make you wonder.
But, a happy tune. Because I am happy. I am happy right now. I can't deny it. Don't want to.

I have some things I have to do. But I'm happy.

And I see that girl in NYC....really, everyone is watching her stroll down the street...they wonder at her quiet contented happiness. They double take as she lightly takes each step at a time. They can't decide what song is playing in the headphones in her ears. It would be fall/winter. Leaves that have changed would be falling and she'd be wearing a brilliant peacoat with some kind of matching hat and scarf. There would probably be a skirt and some embellished stockings...and, let's face it, there'd be converse tennis shoes.

And, she'd peek out from under those impossibly long, curly eyelashes and then the camera would see it: sparkling, innocent eyes.

All is well here.