Anthem of My Life

"But when they arrest you, do not worry about what to say or how to say it.  At that time, you will be given what to say, for it will not be you speaking, but the Spirit of you Father speaking through you" (Matthew 10:19-20).

These past few weeks I have really been struggling with fear.  Public speaking and singing in front of large groups of people greatly frightens me.  I feel so weak and unqualified.  God has a strong call on my life for missions and worship leading, and public speaking and singing in front of large groups of people are the epitome of those two things.  At the prospect of that, I begin to doubt my calling and the fear of failure and not being good enough saturates my mind.  

Last week I heard a sermon on the topic of God qualifying the called, not calling the qualified.  God was gently whispering to me that He is strong in my weakness.  If I am strong, God will be weak in my life because I will get in the way.  I am greatly comforted in the fact that God uses the most unqualified and least likely of people.  God used Moses as essentially the spokesperson for the Israelites, and he literally had a speech impediment.  The verse in the beginning is the cry of my heart, and the anthem of my life.  When trying to explain the love of God and the grace-filled Gospel, I am at a loss of words.  I stutter and trip over my words, desperately wanting the person to understand the depth of the love of Christ, but I end up just turning them off even more.  I feel defeated and unworthy.  Every time I try to completely surrender myself to the Holy Spirit and have Him speak through me I immediately become afraid and shy, crying out inside for the Holy Spirit to make me move because I can't do it by myself.  I cry out in desperation for the Holy Spirit to fill me with His power and boldness, but I have never claimed the promise that Jesus already made to us: "And I will be with you always, even to the very end of the age" and "in the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness.  We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express."  I have such a strong conviction and longing to bring souls to the realization of Christ but how can I even begin to do that when I am so fearful? I surrender and devote my life to Christ everyday, when I wake up, and maybe it is because I don't see the fruits of my labor, but I feel as though He isn't using me.  I don't want to have wasted the last 18 years of my life just having fun with friends and studying for hours on end.  I want to be used for the Kingdom and for the glory of God.  I am so incompetent and I am constantly reminded of that whenever I try to do anything on my own.  Jesus literally is my everything.  Without Him, I have absolutely nothing.  

This past week I have been listening to "Healing is in Your Hands" by Christy Nockels.  This song has constantly been playing through my mind and I have been tightly gripping the words of this song.  It says:

No mountain, no valley, no gain or loss we know
could keep us from Your love
No sickness, no secret, no chain is strong enough
to keep us from Your love
to keep us from Your love

How high, how wide
No matter where I am, healing is in Your hands
How deep, How strong,
And now by Your grace I stand, healing is in Your hands

Our present, our future, our past is in Your hands
We're covered by Your blood
We're covered by Your blood

How high, How wide
no matter where I am, healing is in Your hands
How deep, How strong
And now by Your grace I stand, healing is in Your hands

In all things, we know that.
We are more than conquerors.
You keep us by your love.You keep us by your love. 

This song was sung in chapel this morning.  I completely broke down once again at the beautiful words that reflect the promises of God to us.  As soon as the worship band started playing this song, I immediately felt the love of God pour into me and I knew without a doubt that He is more than enough.  I need to stop looking for fulfillment in other things and other people.  I have been struggling with being single at the moment and I was reminded that I am single in this moment for a specific purpose.  God is using me in ways that if I was courting a man, it would get in the way.  I find solace in the fact that God wants to know me so much that He will hold back the man that He has for me so that He and I can have such an intimate relationship.  After I experience this, God will bring that perfect man into my life and I can live in peace (peace does not mean staying static in one place!) that I will only look to God for fulfillment, but I will have a "soon to be husband" who will strengthen my relationship with Jesus even more and who will be my life partner, just as Jesus ordained in the Garden of Eden.  My husband and I will serve the Lord forever, and with all of ourselves.  I find myself not being able to stop thinking about that fact, and I have loved my future husband since the day I was born and will continue to love him until I die.  I already love my adopted children.  I can go on a million tangents about how much God has spoken to me through this song, but the main thing is that healing is in His hands, and we are held in His hands.  He is constantly renewing and refreshing us.  He is beyond human comprehension and by trying to explain Him in human terms, I have found that it is impossible and it is essentially limiting God.  

So, when I am asked about God, I say: 

He fills the deep ache and longing in my heart, the ache and longing to be loved forever and ever, to be caught up in an eternal embrace.  Because He was beaten, ridiculed, bloodied, and murdered for my sake, His love for me knows no bounds.  He has taken away my brokenness and restored me to Himself.  I am one with Him and He saved me and uses me in order to bring glory and praise to His incomprehensible and unfathomable name, so that I may give my testimony of His grace and unfailing love and reveal His light to the nations, by Him speaking and moving through me.

I pray that if anyone is struggling with these same things, that you would go to the Father and earnestly seek Him, because He will come to you.