My Heart Belongs to a Stranger

It has been over a month since I have written anything not work or school related and it is hard to know where to start. My mind has been in overdrive the past couple of weeks and has caused me to be extremely exhausted about 85% of the time. Not fun, let me tell you! However, God has laid some things on my heart and putting pen to paper is a bit slower than typing. Currently my brain cannot handle slow; like I said it is in overdrive. The Lord has reminded me today that although I have not been spending as much time alone with Him as I would like, my heart still belongs to Him.

The Lord
My heart belongs to the Lord, first and foremost, yet it is the relationship I seem to be working at the least. The Lord is sadly becoming a stranger to me because I am slowly but surely lusting after the world (material things I don't need, laziness, etc.). He has given me a heart to work with women from other countries and share the Gospel with them, but in order to be useful I need to be spending time with Him. I have allowed myself to be extremely bogged down with school and work. Rather than take things at a slow pace I am rushing through to finish faster in order to be on a foreign mission field (tell you more about that in the next little segment). I have put my wants and desires ahead of those of the Lover of my soul. The one who paid a price so high I could never repay, He is the one I have neglected. My heart belongs to a stranger named Christ. He holds my heart no matter how close to Him or how far away from Him I make myself. He continues to show love and grace and mercy everyday, even though I do not deserve a single serving. He also reminds me of His love and promises in His own unique way; whether it be waking up to a much needed encouraging text from a sweet girl friend or through the rain (I <3 rain ... I really do).

I heard lyrics from a country song once that say, "she wants to love a stranger, but not the one at home." This song really has nothing to do with anything other than illustrating my point. My heart, I claim, belongs to Christ first; however, I have not been doing a very good job tending to this relationship. The relationship with the Lord is growing distant and cold, which is of no fault of my Lord. It is of my own fault that I have allowed this to happen. I have to fight my selfish desire to be lazy or do what I want to do (which currently means eating, sleeping, or completely vegging out in front of American Idol). If this were a relationship with a physical man of even a normal amount of patience ... I would be out of a relationship really fast! God has been merciful with me and is pulling me back into sweet fellowship with Him. This is not an easy road but definitely one worth taking. My prayer is to fall back into love/fellowship with the Stranger I call Lord, Savior, and Father.


The Mission Field
There is something about the unknown that allures my heart and deepens my desires. Working in another country with women from non-Christian, non-westernized backgrounds has been my desire since coming to know Christ in 2007. Almost instantly after coming to know the Lord, He made it very clear to me that this is what He wants me to do with the time He has alloted. Foreign missions is just that to me, foreign. Working with internationals all day Monday through Friday for the past 3 to 3 1/2 years has fed into the passion and desire I have to see them come to know the Lord. Yet, working with internationals in America is far different than that of working with them in their home countries. My heart belongs to a stranger I call Lord and to that of the mission field. I know and understand not what it takes to work day-in and day-out in another country loving and serving them and learning new ways to die to self (also learning I am not good at dying to self).

Since I love this and day dream of this and often look at jobs in which I can do this, I have put my education in rush mode. I have also increased the amount of debt I have by taking on more loans to pay for this rushed education.  Along with the Lord telling me to do foreign missions, He also let me know He wants me to go overseas debt free. This came a year or two after coming to know Christ. When I was spending TAWG (Time Alone With God ... cheesy but it works, just saying) I came across a couple of passages that basically put me in pause mode for quite sometime (Proverbs 22:26-27 and Romans 13:8). After reading these I did not feel the least bit comfortable with going overseas with debt. The Lord has been kind enough to give me a job that allows me to "put my money where my mouth is" and labor daily with the students until He calls me abroad. My heart belongs to a stranger ... the mission field (this I day dream and wish for about as much as young girls dream and wish for husbands and weddings).


These are the two largest areas built up in my heart. There are others but time does not allow to write about them this evening. My goal or wish or whatever for 2012 is to travel as much as I can. Which, as I see it, is traveling outside the US at least twice. In March, I will be going to Rome, Italy and I am almost certain everyone and "they mama" in my life knows I am going. Excited much? Why heck yes I am! A few other goals include growing closer to the Lord (spending TAWG daily), graduating (currently looks like December), and learning how to use chopsticks (this is silly but true ... ask my friend Nakeli, she tried to teach me and it is harder than it looks).

A Gift of Love

One night after a big event at our university’s Student Union, a sweet friend leaned over and asked me if I thought true love could really exist. She told me she thought she could never be loved by a man the way our friend Sam* loves Brenda*. She went on to mention how Sam looks at Brenda and the way he talks to her and the way he treats her. This is just not something my friend had seen lived out by others.  This made me really sad for her. Then I realized, sadly I too feel that way and I have seen this lived out in the lives of those that are near and dear to me.

As of late I have been reading a book called A Man Worth Waiting For: How to Avoid a Bozo by Jackie Kendall. It seems to be written for girls that are in junior high, high school, or maybe even at the oldest their freshman year in college. None-the-less I am reading it and sticking it out. It is good and has great things spread through out the book. I came across the following in one of the chapters.

“A very successful hairstylist [told] me that over the years he has seen the saddest thing in the lives of most of his clients: ‘Women no longer marry for love, because they don’t believe true love exists. They assume it is an extinct reality. Instead of love, women now marry for money and power.’”

Jackie Kendall, A Man Worth Waiting For: How to Avoid a Bozo

Reading this made stop and think about how the young women I am around, as well as myself, view love and marriage. The sad truth is that we may crave love but we are willing to settle. We sadly think that God is not going to come through for us or that we have to choose our own fate so we take whatever looks good at the time. Ok, so I know someone who is reading this or will eventually read this is going to think, “I know God can provide and can provide a man worth marrying.” Do you really believe that? Look at your actions … Do you flirt with your guy friends for the sake of flirting? Do you feel like you just have to be in a relationship or you have to be liked by someone?

Your actions say more about what you believe than you think they do. A couple of Sunday’s ago our pastor was preaching on Knowing Who Really Matters and said, “What you are believing is what you are being.” That completely applies here. What you believe is shown through your actions. For example, if I believed that I would get hit by a train if I drove over the train tracks when the bars were down it would be stupid for me to drive over the blasted train tracks. So if I believed I would get hit and either be ridiculously injured or dead it would not be something I gave my life to doing. So if my continuous actions were dating anyone that asked me on a date or doing anything I could (within reason) to get a boyfriend, you can derive from that my beliefs that God will provide are pretty much non-existent.

It is not sinful to want to be pursued/courted or married, but if it is all you think about all day everyday … you might have a problem. If it is the thing that dominates your thoughts and actions you might do have a problem. I am a young woman, I think about marriage and having a family and being the mistress of my own home and blah blah blah. But I am also learning what it means to take every thought captive, to not dwell on those thoughts and the crazy day dreams and what not. God has made us to desire such things but He wants us to seek Him about them all. He wants to fill those desires with Himself.  To better explain this I will use a quote from a Mary Kassian sermon I listened to the other night.

“You see when God created male and female He created an object lesson a parable, as it where, of His entire redemptive plan. Manhood and womanhood, gender, sex, marriage all of those are mini lessons that proclaim the gospel. And when we talk about seeing Christ in the Old Testament we see Christ even in His creation of who He created us to be as male and female. The reason history started with God creating a man and a woman and a marriage is because it is going to end with a man, a woman, and a marriage. That’s why! It will end when Christ, the bridegroom, is united with His bride, the church, and the two become one. This marriage will be consummated throughout eternity. That’s why we have male and female, it’s not about me, it’s not about my husband, and it’s not about you as men and women. It’s about displaying a story. We tell a story by virtue of how we live our lives as men and women.” 

- Mary Kassian, the Gospel Coalition, the Feminist Mistake.

John McArthur said (in a sermon about God’s word), “The gospel is not a feel good message, it is about abandoning your life.” Far too often we think the gospel is supposed to benefit us and give us the warm fuzzies. The thing is, the gospel is not about us and it never was about us. God, in His mercy, allows us to have part in taking the gospel to others. He gave us the gifts of singleness and marriage as a picture of the gospel. Both singleness and marriage are extraordinary pictures of the gospel. With singleness we see God using us in total abandonment to Him. Having no spouse or children or other people to provide for other than the physical needs for self, we get to learn to be self-less and have the choice to live radically abandoned to Christ. Spending our time, money, energy, and efforts on taking the gospel to the lost community around us. We get to have uninterrupted fellowship with God. With marriage we see the example of Christ and the church working alongside each other to spread the gospel. Having fellowship with one-another and with God. Both singleness and marriage are hard work. “It ain’t going to be easy, but nothing worth it ever is,” quote from a television show (have a whole article about this one quote … well coming soon anyway).

God has you where you are for a reason. Know this, I am writing this more for myself than for others, simply because I know my own heart. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it,” (Jeremiah 17:9, KJV). God knows us better than we know ourselves (hello, read Psalm 139). He knows exactly what we need. If we are in Him, He hears our prayers. You would not believe the crazy things I have prayed for and God has answered [ask me and I will tell you … trust me, some of them are plain crazy]. We do not have, because we do not ask (James 4:2). Keep this in mind, God is not your personal genie in a bottle either (James 1:6-8). There are many things I have prayed and God’s answer has been silence. Not going to lie to you here, I have prayed for marriage quite a bit and guess what, still single as they come. Does that make God any less good? NO!! God knows what I need. He knows I would not be able to do what He has me doing right now if I was in a relationship. He has me in a unique little spot and I do not understand at times I am learning what it means to be obedient and how to have an obedient heart. He is not oblivious to my desires; He has put them in me. Just as He has put a desire in your heart for marriage or missions or a particular ministry and so-on and so-forth. He has a reason for that desire to be there. God says, “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for wholeness and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope,” (Jeremiah 29:11). In Jeremiah 32:27 He says, “Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh. Is anything too hard for Me?” Jeremiah, in Chapter 32, is praying for understanding and that is how the Lord answered his prayer … “is anything too hard for Me?”

Are you living in a manner that shows you trust God with your whole life? I know for me this is an area of my life I try to hold on to and occasionally tell God that this is my territory. God continues to show me that because I am His I am to live radically abandoned to Him. Even with my “love life,” or what I refer to as the lack there of, it is all His. God is teaching me when those tiny little thoughts pop up about how badly I want to be married or how nice it would be to wake up with someone next to me (especially as the weather gets colder and it is cold in my room), He is teaching me to look to Him. He is mighty to save (Zephaniah 3:17), He is continually saving me from my thoughts … from myself. He has paid the ultimate sacrifice and I am dead to sin and alive to God, in Christ Jesus (Romans 6:11-12). I choose to be alive in Christ and dead to sin. The price has been paid, I need not pay more.

Going back to the beginning of this post where I shared about my friend, if we are in Christ we are loved far beyond our own imagination. The God of the universe chooses to love us although He knows everything about us. No man could ever love you the way God loves you. God did, however, make men that are worth the wait. He continually raises up godly men who love the Lord and pursue Him. God writes good stories, let Him be the one to write your love story. This comes like a ton of bricks in the face to me, because I, at times, am on the look out for whatever love story He may be writing for me. Which is probably why I am still single, God wants me to trust Him and submit my life fully to Him rather than be on the lookout for a man. It is possible to marry a man like Boaz (from the book of Ruth) who loves God and loves his wife. Love still exists, don’t settle anyone less than a man walking with the Lord.

*names were changed

Articles of Reference:

Mr. Right or Mr. Right in Front of You by Gabrielle Pickle

The Playground of Your Mind by Katie McCoy

A Heart Like Hannah

A couple of months ago I read "Twelve Extraordinary Women" by John MacArthur. It really made me think about who I am as a woman in God's eyes and who I want to be before Him. One of the women that really impacted me and whom I desire to be like is Hannah.

Hannah's backstory:
She was married to Elkanah. Elkanah had two wives, Hannah and Peninnah. He married Hannah first and loved her more than Peninnah, yet Hannah could not have children so he married Peninnah. It was evident that he loved Hanah more. He gave her double portions when it came time to sacrifice and feast. Peninnah would constantly remind Hannah that she could not have children and that she wasn't worth anything. She treated her awful as if she was insignificant. Elkanah tried to comfort her but Hannah wanted to bare children. She wanted to use everything she had to raise a son in the name of the Lord.

This is what makes her stick out to me, when the family went up to the house of the Lord Hannah went and prayed to the Lord. She wept bitterly and begged God for a son. She laid everything at His feet. But as I read about her and pick up on things from her life I noticed that not only did she lay everything at the feet of the Lord but she left it there. She walked away and had a burden no more. She trusted that God would be faithful to answer her prayer. Eli, the priest, mis-took her for a drunk. As she prayed her mouth moved but she prayed in her heart. When she told him what she was doing he said to her, "Go in peace, and the God of Israel grant your petition that you have made to him." Although Eli had no idea what he was telling her, God was still faithful. She had the faith to lay it before the throne of God and leave it there. She walked away at peace with the situation.

God has been showing me what it means to take things to the foot of the cross. He is also teaching me what it means to leave it there. One of the hardest things to do is to leave things with God. Which is silly, because God is constantly showing me that He is the ultimate caretaker. I keep praying that God will give me a heart like Hannah. Even when Peninnah was being rude and crude and had an attitude (yes it rhymes on purpose) Hannah did not react in the same way. She acted gracefully. She was still respectful and laid it all at the feet of Jesus. It really makes me think about child-like faith. She trusted that God would take care of her, all her needs and wants and desires. She made an oath (or promise) to God. She would commit her son to the Lord if she was allowed to have a son. God heard her prayer and answered it. He not only answered it, but He continued to answer it. Hannah had other sons and daughters. She had unwaivering faith.

As a woman, I read stories like Hannah's and want to be a woman like her. She truly displays Christ-likeness, even though Christ was not yet made manifest in the flesh. She was a woman of faith, humility, prayer, peace, patience, worship, sacrifice, devotion, and she trusted God completely. Often I pray about becoming Christ-like and exhibiting the characteristics of Hannah. God poured Himself into her and made her like Himself in so many ways. That is my desire, to be made like Him.

Hannah sacrificially gave her first born son to the Lord. She bore him, nurtered him, and placed him in the hands of the Lord. She visited him and loved him. God blessed her for her devotion to Him. She was incredibly feminine and displayed a heart for God. Our purpose being here is to know God and make Him known. Hannah did this, she got to know God and she made Him known to her son. Often as I pray I ask God to give me a heart like Hannah.