the spillover

I’m going to tell you all a little story about how God wrecked my world this weekend. Four days and I was torn down to my core and built up again in a way only the creator of the universe can do.

See I’ve been transforming my life. No. God has been transforming my life. Little by little over the last three years. Anyone and everyone I know will tell you they’ve seen this happen. It’s no secret. And it’s been great. It’s been full of ups and downs and terrible betrayals on my part and wonderful revelations and everything in between. But recently I’ve been growing in a new way. I’ve genuinely surrendered my life and my actions to God and He’s called me to a more radical lifestyle. One that involves stepping out of my comfort zone in HUGE ways. He’s called me to outreach and to the possibility of ministry and all kinds of radical changes. That freaked me out. Don’t get me wrong I was all excited at first but I won’t lie to you and tell you it stayed as excitement. It quickly turned to dread, quickly turned to gut wrenching fear. I couldn’t help sit down and go “what the heck am I doing?! This isn’t me!!!” (I realize it now… It isn’t me lol it’s God haha but I didn’t catch that in the moment…) so I, without realizing it, started to pull away. Not so much outwardly, I was still committed to the things I’d planned but I fell back, slowly at first then more rapidly, into my bread and butter sin. I don’t know if anyone else has this but it’s like the one thing that I constantly struggle with, the one addiction that I can’t ever lose sight of because it’s so easy to slip back into. I started slow and before I knew it I was a raging addict again. I had stopped talking to God. I had backed out of commitments. I had lied to those close to me. I was a mess. I quite literally holed up in my room and wallowed in guilt. I knew I was wrong. I knew I should go to God instead of constantly doing the things I was but I felt too wrapped up in it to stop now. I figured what the heck I’ve already messed this up why stop now. I really can’t describe the amount of hurt and guilt I was feeling. I was beyond ashamed of myself but I couldn’t stop.

Sunday. Too ashamed to even go to church, I sat in my room and cried all morning. I had plans to attend PURE’s unplugged night of worship that evening but I wasn’t sure I was going to make it. I mean I had already blown off the retreat Saturday why not do the same here. I can’t tell you how it happened cause I don’t know but somehow I ended up dressed and walking out the door at 5:15. The event didn’t start until 6:30 so I needed to kill time and I knew that I couldn’t walk into that room with all my church family and friends in the state that I was. I know church is for the broken, as a hospital for the sick but I felt like I didn’t deserve to be anywhere near it. Anywhere near people who were passionately pursuing God. I was a fraud. I was a failure. I was someone who was in love with my God and yet actively choosing to disobey Him and pursue the temptations the devil offered me. Who does that?!?? Who knows right from wrong and actively chooses something that would break the heart of the most important person in the world?!? Like I said I don’t think I will ever be able to convey the guilt I felt. So I grabbed my Bible, journal and iPod and drove to the top of a dead end street, walked over to a rock and sat staring at the mountains. I turned my iPod up and sang along to worship songs trying to find the words to say to my Father. Trying to find a way to apologize for the idiocy. Trying to release the baggage I was dragging around. I don’t remember it exactly. I don’t remember what I said, I don’t remember how I felt but I know I sat there on that rock sobbing and confessing and unraveling for what seemed like days. I spoke aloud the sins and baggage I’d been carry all week and begged my Father to heal me. Let me say this: there is nothing quite like a tear soaked Bible haha. Again I can’t quite tell you what went down on that rock in the middle of that field because it was strange and I really just don’t have words for it. For those of you who know God and have felt Him move, heard Him speak you’ll probably get an idea of what happened but I can’t describe it. For those of you who don’t know God like that you wouldn’t believe it. I left that field having had my heart stopped and jump started again. I left having given new breath and lighter heart, but He wasn’t done with me. The unplugged event wasn’t anything like I expected. I’d been to one before and it was a pleasant song filled hour or two filled with smiles as I happily worshipped my God. This one was not. This one was a heavy experience. This one had me struggling to allow myself to sing the words of these songs because I still didn’t feel worthy, I still felt like I didn’t deserve to be next to these people. Brenda, one of the PURE leaders and kind of a spiritual mom to a lot of us, got up and prayed for us. She mentioned that she felt like in the room there was someone struggling, someone with a “clogged artery” as she called it. She spoke about how when there is a clog blood can’t be pumped through freely and how the life giving fluid cant reach it’s full power. It was me. I’m sure there were others too but that was me. I spent the rest of the evening caught between prayer and worship and being on my face surrendering it all to God and just listening to Him speak. Wow does God speak when needed. I generally make it a point to write down anything I hear from God and I filled up three whole pages that night. Mind you I’ve heard paragraphs from God a handful of times but nothing like this. He was there and He made sure I knew it. I, by the grace of God alone, left church that night renewed and refreshed. Revived and alive. I gave everything I’d been carrying and gained life. Again I don’t have words to explain the feeling of elation He gifted me with but I know my sin was washed clean. When people at church talk about second chances and being forgiven not once but every time… Wow. It’s not just words. Our God is so full of mercy and grace and just love. Completely undeserved love. I will never be able to understand that kind of love. Ever. I know what I did, I know how I hurt Him and yet He embraced me and said “I still love you. I don’t even see that anymore. All I see is you and you’re beautiful.” that… That is incredible.

Monday. I spent the day in Big Bear. My best friend and I drove around all day, tried to get lost, played in the snow, took pictures, just spent the day adventuring. You know how people say they see God in different things? Some see Him in a sunset, some a sunrise, some in a newborn baby’s face, some in a tears, etc. whatever it is for each person. I see God in a lot of different things but let me tell you about today. Today I saw God in my best friend. I saw Him when He’d guide Jacob’s hand to play that one song at the perfect time. I saw Him in the way Jacob smiled at me. I saw God in the snow. The perfectly white, undisturbed glorious snow. I saw Him in the sunlight dancing down through the trees. I saw Him in the vastness of the mountain range. (it honestly shocks me how we can look around at these huge, beautifully crafted mountains and think it all happened by accident, by chance.) I saw Him in the sunset sinking behind trees and mountain tops. I can honestly tell you that I feel like I spent an entire day hanging out and playing with my Father. Yes it was actually a whole day with Jacob and I love spending time with him but it was more than that today. It was with God.

Driving down the mountain reflecting on my week and on the incredible day I mentioned something to Jake that was kind of an eye opener to me. A lot of people look at the ocean or at mountains and say they feel small. I get that. It’s easy to do, being up in the hills, high above the city lights, thousands of people below you that have no idea you even exist. But I don’t feel small when I look at the mountains. I don’t feel small when I look at the ocean. I feel bigger than I am because I know that the creator of the universe, the same God who built these mountains, the same God that formed this world is living in me. I know that the same God who was and is and is yet to come is here. Now. With me. In everything I do. And I don’t feel small.