Thoughts/feelings HEAVY on my heart today. I pray it’s a word for someone!
2014 - A New Year – prayerfully to be, not a NEW You - but REAL you!
Tired of just going through the motions? Sitting in church week after week but feeling no different? (Of course you’d never tell anyone you feel that way because they must NEVER know that you’re not super spiritual and right with God!) Serving but never feeling the JOY in doing it? Exhausted inside from trying to please the “Christian folk” around you? Ever want to walk through the doors of your church on a Sunday morning as the masses are chatting, socializing, smiling perfect smiles before service and scream as loud as you can PLEASE JUST SEE “ME/THE REAL ME”!!!! - because you’re tired of trying to be someone else for everyone. However, you’re scared, worried, and wonder to yourself: “what would they think of me….if they knew the real me?”
People often wonder why they can’t “connect or feel” God in their lives. Not always, but in many cases it’s a matter of how we try to come to him. Ask yourself this question… “Who am I offering to Him? My true self or a deceptive/unrealistic/phony/2ndrate version of me; someone pretending to be good enough for God?” Am I offering Him that same “not so real” person that walks through the doors of church or the one who makes the perfect spiritual FB post every day so they must be Holy, or shares the most scriptures from their Bible app each month, or reads the MOST in their Bible each day so I must be perfect (but it truly is like reading a foreign language because you don’t know the author)? Am I just gliding through the motions of Christianity and giving Him what/who I think He wants?? Am I honoring Him with WHO I AM-HIS CREATION or am I attempting to deceive Him by being WHO I’M NOT & NO WHERE NEAR WHO HE CREATED? (psst…by the way, He can’t be deceived, He knows-after all, He made you)
God’s not looking to work with “facades”. Stop trying to come to Him as the man or woman YOU THINK He would accept and simply come to Him authentically, honestly, transparently as who YOU are! He wants YOU…..not an imitation, not a fake version, not the one who pretends to be all cleaned up and perfect (because news flash..none of us are or ever will be)! He simply wants to embrace the broken, jacked up, true “US”; the US that will make mistakes, that will NEVER be perfect or even come close to touching the glory of God! Take the pressed suit, phony smile, worked up perfection, ideal post, big red bow OFF and lay it ALL down; ALL of the REAL YOU. Come to Him, JUST AS YOU ARE! That is all He has ever wanted and ever will want.
Think in your own life about friendships/relationships where people put up fronts, refused to be who they truly were in order to fit the mold of what they THOUGHT the other person wanted. Ever done that or had that done to you? Didn’t work out so great did it? Outcome was likely painful, lonely, leaving you unfulfilled and empty. (Unless at some point in that relationship everyone involved “GOT REAL”!) Our heavenly Father is NO different. He wants US, the REAL us. No matter what shape we are in. Let go of all you’ve THOUGHT you needed to be in order to feel the love of God. Just give Him all of who you are, truly are. He’ll never ask you for more or to be someone you’re not just so He can love you. Never……HE loves “YOU”. Drop the chains and pressures of “fitting the mold”. Your individual mold was made just for you and any perfecting that may be needed, GOD himself will do FOR YOU after you give Him who you are, where you are.
PLEASE trust me…I have been there. I praise God and thank Him that today I can truly be who I am, and not care WHAT the world thinks about it. I love my God with all my heart and serve Him because I love Him, I love people because HE does. I now KNOW Him, can FEEL Him, have a broken heart for what breaks His! There’s not greater, passionate way to live! By finally getting real with myself and God years ago, I’ve seen INCREDIBLE works done in and through my life. ALL to the glory of God! But this wasn’t always the case…..I can humbly admit I used to succumb to the pressures; to not only “people please”, but to “God please” in an unauthentic way. NOW, none of that matters to me! I love and serve my God wherever He plants me, with ALL my heart. THAT fulfills me, sustains me, gives me joy, unexplainable joy even when my life isn’t perfect! Who can create that kind of life???? GOD, THAT’S WHO! To those who disagree or think I’m crazy….it truly doesn’t matter to me. I am being who I was created to be and bringing all I am to the ONE who truly matters. And TRUST ME, I came to Him COMPLETELY jacked up! Had major issues! The bible tells us in the book of Peter that we are to humble ourselves before the Lord, that HE will exalt us at the proper time; to cast all our anxieties on Him because He cares for us! It doesn’t tell us to get right and perfect THEN come to Him so we are perfect and ready for Him to just simply exalt us. NO…..He wants US, all our cares, woes, imperfections…because He cares. He wants to dig into the pains, hurts and ugliness of our lives to bring us to health, restoration and freedom! He doesn’t’ need or want us to do HIS job for Him. Come as you are, be who you are, allow Him to penetrate your heart, change your life……THEN He will exalt you at the proper time. YOU don’t have to work to please people or receive praise. Just concentrate on loving and pleasing the Lord, then HE will exalt you and find favor for you with man. Again…He doesn’t want us to do His job for Him. Playing the role of someone you were never meant to be is exhausting and a dead end, but Christ made UTURNS totally legal to us ALL! If this is you…….just simply turn around. Don’t be afraid of what anyone will think of the “REAL you”……because your freedom is priceless and it will be worth it! I pray this frees somebody today. I truly, truly do…….
With love in Christ,
Dena
