Find Your Voice

When I first started blogging the name of my blog was "Looking For My Words". If I go back and read my early posts it's like I'm reading the words of another person, a sad and frightened little girl hiding in a corner. A person who was hyper-sensitive to criticism and condemnation either spoken or insinuated, sometimes just plain imagined. I had voices in my head and I listened to them, but they were not my voice, they were not God's voice. I thought they were my voice and God's voice...I thought my voice was speaking everything dirty and sinful, I thought the voice that then accused and condemned me was God's. I was wrong!

All day long I listened to the voices saying "you should, you shouldn't, you should, you shouldn't, you must, you must not, you will, you will not" followed by "you did, you're a sinner, you didn't, you're a sinner, you should have, you're a failure, you should not have, you failed again...try harder, if you love God you would try harder..." And then the other voices "run away you'll never get it right, you're a terrible wife, a lazy selfish mother, maybe you should end it all and then Aaron would be able to marry a godly woman and mother for his children". I lived in a constant state of confusion, I thought I was my own worst enemy. I thought God's main objective in my life was to convict me of sin every day every day and whip me into shape. I was wrong!

I was a broken and weary soul. I was starving for love, the kind of love that would not shatter and crumble when I made a mistake. I had faith that I would escape the flames of hell, but only just escape. I didn't know Jesus loved me because I couldn't hear him! He was shouting and waving his arms wildly but I had grown deaf and the veil of the law covered my eyes thickly. I was wandering hopelessly, my only hope was in death, heaven, so I could finally see Jesus and be changed. Others thought I was so holy because I longed for heaven so much, but it was not a sign of my 'holiness', it was a sign of my utter desperation, of my utter failure to grasp the Jesus of hope by faith, to live in him HERE and NOW.

Then everything changed. It didn't change all at once but the SON began to dawn and light slowly washed over my face, pale and cold first, then brighter and warmer, then, warmer and brighter! Then I heard a whisper, it was my Father, his voice was so much kinder and more compassionate than I remembered. I felt his strong but gentle hands begin to release me from the veil that covered my eyes, then he began to remove chains and I felt healing power begin to flow into my whole person. I realized he wasn't whispering, his voice was strong and clear now that my ears were open. Suddenly I could hear the other voices much more clearly and I realized that they were ugly, evil, and sinister. They were not my voice, they were not my Father's voice, they were evil demonic voices. And I realized they held no power over me unless I chose to listen and believe.

I looked up to see Jesus seated on the throne and he told me it was TIME. Time to crush Satan under my feet, to claim the victory that Jesus won for me by his resurrection, his triumph over and utter humiliation of the enemy. I began to join in with his church and declare the great battle cry of these last days:

I AM THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD IN CHRIST JESUS, THIS IS NOT OF MYSELF IT IS THE GIFT OF GOD FOR ALL WHO BELIEVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The enemy trembles and his resolve begins to melt away. The fear in his eyes is palpable, he is confused about his next step. Oh, there are other people and other places where he feels his power is strong, but what of this growing revolution, this rising of GRACE, this restoration of the GOSPEL??????????? The power of God for salvation, the GOOD NEWS, it is ringing louder and louder all across the earth! Soon everyone will hear, and many many more will believe! And the faith of the sons of God will swell and grow and overcome evil and the kingdom of the Almighty God will conquer darkness, disease, sickness, sin, fear, pain, depression, insanity, and EVERY OTHER WORK OF THE DEVIL WILL BE DESTROYED!!!!! And the sound of murmuring will grow to the sound of loud shouting in joyful unison, "Look up, look to the sky, Jesus is coming back!"

Many of us are finding our voices, aren't we? And we are using them to spread the Good News that dead people can live, that sinful people can be made righteous, that hungry people can be filled, that thirsty people can drink. This is what we were made for! How amazing that we live in God's eternal exhilarating love! How wonderful that by union with the One who made us and saved, by finding ourselves in Him, we finally begin to know who we really are...and we have something to say, something eternally valuable and transforming!