for the People God Created

My passion since the day I became a Jesus follower was to help equip his people to live in the abundant, fulfilling life Jesus died to give us.  I kept going back over and over in the early days of my faith the passage in John 8:32 where Jesus tells us "You shall know the truth and the truth shall set you free."

But, I looked around and I saw people unhappy and dissatisfied, and still very much struggling with the same challenges and issues as those who didn't know Jesus.  I kept going back to Jesus in prayer and through studying the Scriptures, asking him to show me the pathway to peace and freedom, so I could live it first and then equip others to do the same.

I began to recognize some things.  The first is that we often focus on the "external doing,"  the laundry list of what defines a good Christian.  You know, going to church, having a daily quiet time, serving in the nursery.  The list.  We all have enough lists, we don't need to do's, we need a relationship with a loving Father that we KNOW wants the best for us.

It has to go in...past our doing, into the place of our longings.  We all long to know we are loved and cherished.  We all long to know we are the most important person in the world to someone.  We all long to be known in the place of our deepest dreams and biggest secrets.  We long to be accepted for who we are, even in the midst of the world's worst bad day!

It has to go deep.  Several years ago in ministry I realized we had been busy conveying information to God's people about how to know him, but what we needed first was healing.  As I began to lead with creation of recovery and healing prayer ministries, people began to get healed.  As they healed, they woke up. . . to their dreams, once in ashes, now beginning to stir with life.  As they healed, they got up. . .to discover and move in their created purpose for life on earth.  As they healed, they moved out. . . to share their lives with others; inviting them into a life that mattered.

It has to go up.  I don't know about you, but I long to leave an imprint in this world. I went to a memorial service once where they made an invitation to come up and speak about the woman who had died.  Children, a husband, friends all sat in the audience, and yet not one person came to speak about her. Not one.  I went away from the service knowing I wanted to leave a legacy in the world; something that touched people deep in their core and brought them to the freedom Jesus invites us to experience.

It has to go out.  I find something sticks for me when I share it with another person.  I learn a lesson fully when I share it with a friend.  I find the satisfaction in my own painful lesson when I can help my husband avoid the same lesson.  I find the joy of sharing my own interactions with God multiplying to others as I see their face light up with hope, could they dare to have a similar experience?  Our breakthroughs are always meant for more than our individual lives; they are meant to be shared with those receptive to our message. 

I believe God has answered my desire.  He has given me a message, which comes out of my experience with the Scriptures and interactions with my loving Heavenly Father, of our identity.  The real thing.  Not what we think about ourselves.  Not what the media taunts to us follow.  Not what the superstars tell us is important.  These identities become wastelands that make our lives futile; we must reclaim our identity and become the person we were created by our loving Heavenly Father to become.

The message speaks deep into the depths of our core.  The place untouched by the battles of daily living.  The desires poured into us by our Creator.  The place where our DNA is the same as our Heavenly Father's DNA.  Our true god-given Identity.

One of my vehicles for conveying my message of our true identity is this blog.  I invite you to journey with me as together we discover what our loving Father has to say to us about what he thinks is important.

Just a warning: if you accept this mission, you will find your life will never be the same!