Experiment in trust & obedience

In Februrary of this year I attended IF:Gathering in Austin, TX. It was two days of seeking God and beginning to discern how he wanted me to take the land as Joshua had. It the end of weekend we made our own ebeneezer, our own reminder of how God moved...and did he move.

IF exists to gather, equip and unleash women to the local church and communities. 

 

When I received my stone, I wrote IF:Coffee on it. Somewhat like IF:Table, I had started to invite the women of my neighborhood over for coffee. My intention was for us to get to know each other better and to create space for the Lord to move. I also thought I was supposed to host an IF:Local the following year. 
 

Oh me of little faith and puny plans.

While I was on the right path, I had no idea what God was going to do next.
 

In March, it was time again for Set Apart. This year I had the privilege to host one of our Keynote Speakers. She and a team had put together a travelling conference for women. You book them and they do the rest. As I was telling a friend at my church about the travelling conference, she asked if we were going to bring it to our church. I looked into having them come, but felt led in another direction. 

Why bring someone in? There are women at our church who can teach, who have stories to share, who can lead worship. I spent time in God's presence. If he was leading me to do an event like this, I wanted to be sure I heard right. My desire was for him to lead, for him to prompt each step. I thought I would make it an experiment in obedience and trust.

Gather the women from both campuses together.

My church has two campuses, but we are "one church". This is all kinds of complicated. Not only are there two campuses, but even more cultures. The Lord was leading me to an event where we would bring women from both campuses, from the different cultures together.

I decided to step out in faith.

To test the waters, I started to explain the vision for the event to friends at church. That I was feeling led to bring all the women together, to make space for the Holy Spirit to move, to kick-off our year.

Women caught the vision.

Next thing I knew we had a team of women who wanted to serve, who wanted to help make the vision a reality. IF had made such an impact on me. It was done so well and every piece was intentional. We decided to adopt the format of IF:Gathering for our gathering.

At our first meeting we talked about what our focus was going to be at the event. It quickly came and was agreed that we would focus on our identity in Christ.

In Christ, I am quickly became our focus. We decided to focus on Jesus Sees You (Luke 13:10-17) and You Have Value (Mark 5:21-43) for each session of the event.

In keeping with IF's format, we wanted to find women to teach, lead worship and share their stories of how God has moved in their lives. Finding teachers and worship leaders was a cinch. Finding women who don't usually find themselves speaking, much less sharing about themselves, in front of a large group of women proved to be more difficult. It wasn't until days before the event (literally three days) before we had all the women placed.

As you know, Attempting to Lose Control has been an anthem for me for the last few years. In this I really desired to walk by faith, to let the Holy Spirit lead. As we got closer to the event and still didn't have our story sharing women placed, I kept thinking of a woman from the Set Apart conference. She coordinates volunteers and as we get close to the event, she always says, "Lord, this is your problem. I've done all I can do. You know where the holes are, you need to bring the women to fill them." It became my prayer.

Lord, you know where our holes are. You know who you want to have share. I put it in your hands.

To be honest, there were several times during the last few weeks that I thought I was going to throw up because of nerves. I kept clinging, kept turning back to the Lord, but still very often felt a bit nauseous. The day of the event finally came.

I was at peace.

I WAS AT PEACE!

It was almost an unsettling peace. I wasn't worried or fretting about anything, which made me feel like I should worry and fret.

Go figure.

Finally the evening came. I'm not sure if I can even yet put it into words. He showed up.

He showed up!

The Lord came. There was a beautiful hum of conversation and laughter.

Then came the holy.

I wanted to take off my shoes. 

I thought of Mary. Don't get me wrong, I know I did not just give birth to the savior, but I couldn't help but think of Mary in the stable.

Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart. Luke 2:19

The Lord had just allowed her to play a part in His plan, in what He was doing. She did her part, then she sat back and watch the Lord move again.

That's what I did. I had done my part (which mostly consisted of getting out of the way) and sat back and watched the Lord move again. 

He let me play a part. He let this controlling, striving woman play a part in what he was doing. 

The more I gave up control. 

The more I gave up striving. 

The more I stepped aside.

The more the Lord stepped in.

The experiment worked.

The Play is the Thing

The play is the thing. I don't know how many times I heard my theater director say that. Our focus, everything we do should be about the play because the play is the thing. When we're on stage and become self-conscience, we are no longer about the play. We are about ourselves. Everything needs to work toward the telling of the story of the play. The textures and cuts of the fabric are only important when they point toward the play. The mood set by the lighting should contribute to the telling of the story. The set should not distract from the story, but help tell the story because

the play is the thing

This all came back to me a few months ago. I was preparing to speak in front of a large group, of women. As I stood in front of the mirror that morning, I became increasingly insecure. I couldn't figure out why I felt that way. The day before I was speaking in front of these women. Why was I struggling today? It reminded me of a story Staci Eldridge told in her book Captivating. She and her husband, John, were on their way to an event. Staci found herself pulling down the visor, checking her lipstick and the applying more. She did this over and over. "What was I doing?" she asked herself. "I was afraid. At least if my makeup looks good, something deep inside me reasoned, maybe I won't be exposed. Found out. Seen." That was my fear. I was afraid of being exposed. That the shortcomings I try to keep hidden deep inside would be seen.

The play is the thing.

The Kingdom of God is the thing.

My focus was all on me. How I looked. What people would think of me. I wasn't about the Kingdom of God. I was about me.

There came a familiar prompting deep within my soul. Tell the women about your fear.

I'm sorry, what now Lord? Surely you don't mean I should stand in front of those women and actually tell them I'm afraid?!

Tell the women about your fear.

Obedience is something I've been attempting to practice lately. When God prompts, I (try to) obey.

Yes, Lord.

Tell the women about your fear. Tell them My kingdom is the thing.

Yes Lord.

So there I stood on stage doing my thing. In the end I could not not obey.

I told the women things were about to get real (I'm such a dork. things are about to get real? Who says that?!)

There I stood on stage in front of all 600 of them. 

I told them about getting ready.

I told them the play is the thing, the Kingdom of God is the thing.

Then I confesses that I was afraid. 

I confessed that I was making it about me. 

I confessed it needed to be about God.

Set yourself aside today. Let God draw close and show you what he has for you.

Obedence. It was my way of getting out of the way and letting 

the play be the thing, better yet letting

the Kingdom of God be the thing.

Mundane to Marvelous

Tonight I had the privilege of celebrating the coming of a new life. As the mother and father to be opened gifts, the giver of the gift would give a word of advice or a story of experience.

Don't feel bad to let the baby cry

Train the baby up in the ways of the Lord

Cherish the day to day

Take care of yourself so you can take care of the baby.

It was a beautiful night for celebrating a beautiful new family.


As I drove home, I thought about being a parent. If you know my story, you know that we worked and fought to bare our own children. For some reason, the Lord trusted two beautiful boys to us. Though they are years away from the baby stage, I let my mind drift back to the memories of them when they were born.

Both six weeks early

Both times I had to leave the hospital empty

Both spent time in the NICU

Both are now healthy...you'd never know they were preemies.

It was when our first was just over one. We were playing in the backyard when he got a curious look on his face.

He looked left.

He looked right.

Then he looked up.

A plane was flying overhead, leaving a streak across the sky. He raised his chubby little finger and began to grunt. He marveled at the plane flying overhead.

To me the sound of the plane engines were white noise. I'd seen and heard thousands of planes. It was mundane. In that moment I realized I get to rediscover the whole world through the eyes of my child, my children. What had grown to be mundane in my life suddenly because amazing and marvelous. That is one of the best gifts about raising a child.

It can turn the mundane to marvelous