There is no better loss than to lose myself in you.
In a parachute to glide, I am captive in your sky.
Surrender has somehow become so beautiful.
In a parachute to glide, I am captive in your sky.
Surrender has somehow become so beautiful.
Control by Mute Math
I still remember the moment that I gave my life over to the Lord...and I don't mean that I prayed a light prayer, and went up to the front of some little church, and went on with my life. I mean the moment that God's presence collided with mine and I was overcome by the awareness that I didn't belong to me, but that I belonged to a greater He. There was no going back. There was no more being little. There was no more of being ashamed and afraid. I had a Lord, a Master, a King...and before that moment there was only me.
When the will of God crosses the will of man,
somebody has to die.
somebody has to die.
-Elisabeth Eliott-
I've always been curious. There were a lot of things that my parents didn't tell me, so I became pretty good at finding out anything and everything I wanted to know...and this is before Google. When you are young you are supposed to believe and do what you're told, but I was always wanting to experience life...see it, sniff it, get scratched up by it, and be amazed by it. I was the kid who didn't have the money for a playhouse, but took everything from the garage and made a two-story fort out of it. I had many safaris in my backyard. I was obsessed with making the most of what I had and delighting in it. That was childhood. I loved it.
But becoming a young adult was completely different. I wanted to hide...because suddenly when you turn into a teenager people start telling you things that they expect you to understand and have an opinion about. But experiencing the knowledge of adulthood is a lot like falling out of your bed. Your supposed to land on your feet, but instead you hit your head and open your eyes to make sense of the upside down world you've awakened to. Responsibility, worth, sex, jobs, education, being beautiful....it was all a bit too much. I failed terribly at it. I never had the courage to be "somebody"...and I had no clue of who "somebody" was.
Summer of 2002 I was dragged to a camp at Dallas Baptist University. It was anything but normal. We did everything backwards...in fact we spent most of the week serving everybody else instead of ourselves. Cleaning bathrooms. Playing with orphans. Giving snocones to construction workers. And the rest of the time reading the Bible, processing it, and learning more and more. The most impactful thing was when they washed my feet. Eww gross! but actually, it was powerful. Because I remember thinking that nothing I or my leaders had done there was about me or them. It was all about Jesus. For them he was utterly worth the sweat, awkwardness, money and time of giving their lives away. And they were sincerely fulfilled by Him. Because he had given them everything He had- His life.
That is when God's presence collided with mine.
The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become-because he made us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be...It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own.
The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become-because he made us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be...It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own.
-C.S. Lewis-
I didn't just need a Savior for my weird, nobody life...I wanted to give my life away...I wanted to serve a King. Meeting the real Jesus gave me a purpose ....not just a job or step or plan. He also gave me identity. I am a life breathing woman with eternal capabilities of transforming the lives around me with His incredible passion. Most of all-He gave me hope. I am no longer a weak child fumbling for direction...I actually have a true light ahead leading me to glory. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!
The aftermath from that collision hasn't stopped and I know it never will, because I've never been more alive.
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