Let’s talk about change for a minute…
I have come a long way in the past couple of years.
I have peace, joy, happiness, and a lot more patience than I have in a very long time!
Are my circumstances different? Not really… but I see them differently!
My life has purpose!
My trials are lessons, my sufferings are strengthening, and I am having so many growth moments! Every day there is a reason to smile, a lesson to learn, and so many chances to pray!
Now, are my experiences different? YES! I do NOT make the same mistakes I did in the past!
One of the amazing things about forgiveness of God is that I have been able to bury it all, just as He did! I am LIBERATED!
I used to use the “turn your stumbling blocks into steppingstones” phrase a lot in years past, but recently I adopted another one… “turn your stumbling blocks into tombstones.”
And this is where God stepped in!
I went to all my pain. All the hurts, the wrongs, the mistakes, the choices made, people I allowed to influence my mind and heart, words I said, the things done to me, said to me, and all the weapons I allowed to hurt me… and I buried them.
Every. Single. One.
And upon each of those graves, I erected a tombstone. There is nothing on that tombstone, just a smooth face, reflecting the light of God shining down on my life. They need no name. My mind will carry the memories of them well enough on its own, so I don’t need the extra reminder of what and who they were.
Only Grace.
“…But where sin abounded, Grace did much more abound.” – Romans 5:20(b)
It’s glorious!
I am changed! I am a walking testament of Romans 12:1-2 where Paul speaks to the church, beseeching them to present themselves as living sacrifices, acceptable to God… and that they be not conformed to this world, but TRANSFORMED by the renewing of the mind.
Y’all… let me tell you!
When you open your mind to Grace, you open your world up to a whole new level of Joy!
I spent so long being angry and bitter, my face froze that way! I remember people constantly asking me “You ok? Something wrong? Are you mad?” and I wasn’t! I was just minding my own business!
Today that face no longer exists! I smile, I laugh, I giggle, and I sing all over the place! In my house, my car, the yard, waking the kids up in the morning, playing with the babies, doing the laundry, or driving down the road!
Because God!
Not me!
I tried making it on my own!
I tried healing my own wounds. I tried getting over my own hurts, and backtracking from my own mistakes. I didn’t want anyone’s help, and I most definitely didn’t want to prove some people right and have to rely on a church family for anything! Why would I go back to my first hurt?!
But this is where God stepped in!
Listen…
I am a child of God. I am beloved of Him, and I am His!
Even when I walked away, He stayed with me. He walked with me through it all. And even though I felt like all was lost, broken, and gone, He held my doubting heart and carried it through the worst of it all!
One passage changed my world, sitting all by myself in my bed one day, reading and trying to find SOMETHING that would lift me up…
Isaiah 43:1-2 “But now, thus says the Lord, who created you, O Jacob, and He who formed you, O Israel: ‘Fear not, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by your name; You are Mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, nor shall the flame scorch you.’”
After all this time! I never was alone, at all! YES!
And then… I knew I would have to face my greatest fear eventually: Going to church.
Why did I need this? Because we cannot survive on our own. Yes, God is enough! Yes, God has us! But God also instructs us to forsake NOT the assembling of ourselves… because this is necessary for so many reasons!
Why did I not want to go? Because it was the people there who hurt me first, and the place where my mind would convince me was the blame for my choices as I walked farther and farther away.
But go, I did. And I am happy to say I am quite alive after that experience. Ha!
No, really though. I am happy in the place where God has set me for now, and I am learning. I am growing. And I am excited that I have this freedom, this joy, and the genuine smile I thought I would never get back!
Change is good, my friends. And as more changes come, they will also be good! I do not fear the unknown as I used to. I look forward to it with excitement and anticipation!
*Happy Dance*
