Day 66 – Are you Pioneer? #30dreamdays

The flip-side of the Origami Owl tag says “Let your heart not be troubled” – a timely gift from my friend Tina Chamness.

God is so so good.  I’ve been spinning for months.  In my spirit I feel a call toward a BIG BIG vision and I feel so small.  Too small to even see the whole picture and too small to do the job.

However, I am a person who knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am most ALIVE when I am doing NEW things all the time.

I’ve had to defend this to people many times who think this is just a restlessness…a searching.

And I love to be challenged…really, I do.  I know that sounds crazy to a lot of people.  I prefer to have people question and challenge me on things like this and then I can test my heart and find out if what they are saying is possibly true.  Sometimes they are.  But not when it comes to this one!

I was born for change.  Its in my DNA.  Without it, my spirit has been slowly dying.

This world is not lacking in change.  It is lacking in people who thrive during radical change.  There are legions of people who are not only uncomfortable with change but they live in fear of it.   I will not elaborate on fear at this time because I could literally write for days about that one point but I will pass along the word that God gave me last week:

God did not give us a spirit that makes us afraid but a spirit of power and love and self-control. ~ 2 Timothy 1:7

I had an amazing opportunity to go to the 1st Annual Call to Destiny Summit presented by Princess Bola Adelani last Friday & Saturday.  Barbara Stomprud, of Vessel of Honor Ministry from Oklahoma, walked us through her Training for Reigning program.  WOW!!!  I am so grateful for Barbara’s ministry and for the revelation that I received through that experience.

I wish I could say I left with total clarity on my purpose and destiny but I didn’t.

Not because the program wasn’t AWESOME.   What has become clear to me, through some soul searching with my friend Katynia Speight, is that I need to get on my face and in the Word seeking further revelation.  I know that God has been with me throughout my life; I can clearly see the evidence.  It is awesome to feel KNOWN in the way He knows me.

Selfishly, I have not spent much time getting to know Him.  

I’ve been on a 4 year self-awareness journey that involved very little God-awareness.   I never doubted His presence and thanked Him regularly for what He has done in my life but I never bothered to really get to know Him.   And that became very clear at Barbara’s Training for Reigning.

So I am very excited about what lies ahead and I will write throughout my journey because God has told me to live my faith out loud, especially the deficiencies and struggles.

So as I continue to wrestle with my destiny, I will wait on God for instructions.  I will grab hold of the signs he sends me because I know He is always trying to show us the way.

For example, last Sunday (the day after the training ended) my friend Tina Chamness pulled me aside after church and explained that earlier in the week she was listening to a song by The Band Perry and I kept coming to mind.  Tina and I are not extremely close (yet) so for me to come to mind WAS FROM GOD.  She felt she needed to make me a CD with that song (and others) and give me the song along with the Origami Owl tag that was developed from the lyrics (see above).

I am extremely grateful for her obedience to do what God placed on her heart.  Even though I left the training without clarity on my destiny, I had already shared with Katynia on Friday night that I know I need to deal with the things that would keep me immovable.  I said I believe I am supposed to be able to GO on a moment’s notice.  I was talking about making changes in my businesses, my housing, my possessions etc so that I could be nimble and GO when God says so.  I explained that I’m not sure where or when but I believe I have to start getting ready.

The song Tina was listening to is called “Pioneer” by The Band Perry.  Her gift of sharing this song with me and also giving me a necklace that I could wear daily to remind me is one of the greatest gifts anyone has ever given me.  I thank Tina and I thank God for using her to confirm me as a Pioneer.

I believe when you have been given a gift, you should give what you can so I will include Tina’s Facebook Page and her website if you are interested in learning more about Origami Owl’s beautiful living lockets.

As I continue to get to know God, I realize that my comfort with change, my desire for new and my willingness to GO are the makings of a Pioneer.  I have tremendous faith and an incomplete puzzle-like vision so I will need to lean on God for understanding as he leads me to new frontiers.

This was another song on the CD.   The lyrics are amazing, especially as I come to grips with my calling to be a Pioneer.

Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever You would call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger
In the presence of my Savior

The video includes all the lyrics but I have seen different lyrics where the line reads “My SOUL will rest in your embrace”…either way is awesome…just wanted to share the alternative lyrics. ENJOY!!!

If you’ve read to the bottom, please share your response and comments.  I appreciate your support.

Are you a fellow Pioneer?  Where is God calling you?

If not, do you know WHO YOU ARE?

Related articles

• pioneer (loveslongears.wordpress.com)

Advertisement

Day 35 – All I Need Is You #30dreamdays

Sitting down dreaming of being so surrounded by His presence that I have no hunger for anything else.  I’ve been a “Christian” for more than 10 years but I have not been hungry for His presence.  I’ve settled for less than God’s best because I didn’t do my part and seek Him.

If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. 2 Chronicles 7:14

I have not humbled myself.  I have prayed but did I truly seek Him?  I don’t think so.  I’m repenting but I realize that it’s to be expected since I am only really coming to understand what that means.  I could have read my Bible more.  I could have attended more Sunday School classes.  I could have done a lot of things.  Maybe I would have gotten it before now.

Don’t get me wrong.  I have a strong faith.  I believe in God.  I believe that Jesus was God’s son and died on a cross for our sins.  I believe that He was resurrected and now lives inside me.   I BELIEVE I CAN DO ALL THINGS THROUGH CHRIST WHO STRENGTHENS ME.

But I have “believed” that in a way that has barely scratched the surface of what that means for ME…NOW.

I have lived off Fill Me Up by Jesus Culture for over a year now.  As I’ve already stated in a prior blog, I have been asking God to move my heart through new songs.  Quite honestly, listening to worship songs is another one of the things I could have done more of.

God has made it clear to me that I am to live my faith out loud.  I trust Him.  I believe that people reading this in October 2013 and for years to come will need to see how people wrestle with God.  How we chase Him and then get sidetracked by a squirrel right before we catch Him and have no good stories to share other than it was a brown squirrel.

I know people of faith and people who want to believe in something…just not God or Jesus…need to hear that I didn’t want this either.  I was minding my own business living my own life when I fell in love with a licensed minister.  Really?  With 3 young kids too?  Does this sound like I went out looking for this?

Looking back I can see how God pursued me.  I started realizing that a few years ago.  I was so in awe of being pursued by Him.  I was amazed at how perfect this ready made family was for ME that I made an Idol of my life and all that He had blessed me with.

He is showing me all this.  I naturally fall into trying to figure out what to do with all this and then I realize that is me back at it…idolizing the puzzle solving skills that I have been blessed with instead of pressing in and seeking more of Him.  More of His revelation.  Do I not trust Him to continue to reveal this to me and help me work out what to do NOW with this knowledge?  Why do I always resort back to “leaning on my own understanding” when All I Need is YOU, Lord.

Day 30 – God’s Will #30dreamdays

Today is the last official day of my 30 Dream Days Challenge.   It has been an eye opening experience.

I have decided to extend it 10 more days to make it 40 days total but the next 10 will be strictly between me and God.  A lot has come up for me over these 30 days and I know the work that was started will continue long past the 40 days but I need at least the next 10 days to gain clarity on all that God has poured into me through this dreaming process.

I had the pleasure today to meet with Princess Bola Adelani, a powerful woman of God.  We were referred to each other by a common friend and it was obvious to me that this was a God ordained connection.  We’ve been trying to get together for months and set this date up last week.  I did not realize at the time that it would be the last day of my dream challenge but He has a way of working out those details.  It was her words that inspired me to take the next 10 days alone with God to gain greater clarity.

I don’t know what will come of this new connection but Princess Bola is organizing a Call to Destiny Summit in Hartford from Oct 24-26, 2013 and I plan to attend.  Click the link to find out more.  If you are interested in attending with me, please contact me.  I would love to experience this with a group.

At the end of our time together Princess Bola summed up what she heard from me and said “Your heart is crying out to know and do God’s will”.

I know this to be true.  I have known this for awhile.  The hard part for me is clarity on this.  My deep passionate dream is to know clearly the will of God for my life.  When I know that with clarity, I will walk in power and am 100% convinced that I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.  CLARITY is what I seek now.  I will enter into a time of prayer and fasting pressing in to get that clarity. To my purpose and destiny.

About a year ago, I realized I needed more of Him and less of me.  I cried out to God for a worship song.  One that I could sing in the times when I needed encouragement, when I needed to get into His presence.  One where I could remember the lyrics (as music is really not my “thing”).   I love Revelation Song, especially when this amazing woman at my church Katynia sings it.   But it wasn’t “my song”, at least not at that moment in my life.  I also love Hosanna by Hillsong.   It was also not the song for that season.

Then one day, Krista left K-love on in the car and when I got in and started the car, there it was…

Such beautiful, simple lyrics.  I can remember them anywhere at anytime and this has been the cry of my heart for the last year.

Fill Me Up by Jesus Culture

You provide the fire
I’ll provide the sacrifice
You provide the Spirit
And I will open up inside

Fill me up God
Fill me up God
Fill me up God
Fill me up

Love of God
Overflow
Permeate
All my soul

I have certainly felt the fire over the last year or so.  I have opened up inside.  I know that God is filling me up.  The love of God is overflowing in my life.  It permeates ALL my soul.  I can’t contain it.  It’s all consuming…

ALL CONSUMING…

I will always love this song.  But there is a new season starting.  I am looking for a new song.   My friend Katynia sent the song below to me the other day.  I fell in love with it.  The part that resonates the most with me is the “you can’t buy my silence”.  For me this is the inner turmoil in my own head fighting against itself.  I know change is about to come and there is a voice coming out of me from what God has been pouring into me and I don’t know what to do with it yet.  I just know that I can’t still it.  No amount of money can silence it.  AND I WILL BRING THE NOISE…

STAY TUNED!  The time is now…