on my tail

if i didn't believe in a God before this week, i certainly would now. every time i've turned around this week God's presence is there. every time i've sat down to listen to a sermon, music, read, or just spend time with friends, God has shown up.

i've been on a quest to find truth in my life. truth about what i believe. truth about relationships. truth about myself. God has made himself known to me in ways that I've never seen before. I've struggled with the truths about what God says about me. how He loves me. how He accepts me. and i came to a point that i couldn't move forward until i let this truth soak into the depth of who i am. i've often overlooked the simple truths about God in order to move on to the next task. i can be task driven at times.

God's taking me to this place of just simple truth. Last Sunday at church I was standing in the service and something happened. i can't explain it fully but someting clicked. it was like a switch was flipped. the sermon was about forgiveness but it wasn't the typical forgiveness sermon. instead of talking about forgiving others and the 3 step process to doing that, the sermon most often given when talking about forgiveness, this pastor talked about how we are a forgiven people. i am forgiven. i am a forgiveable person. something about that kinda took my breath away. and God began to whisper to my heart, you are forgiven. you are loved. you are accepted. you belong with me. and i sat there and just began to let those simple truths invade my heart. invade my mind. invade my soul. and as i did, i felt like something was lifted. i felt more free than i have in a long time.

Fast forward to Tuesday night. So I'm headed to small group and I'm having just one of those days. The kind that satan uses to whisper things to you because you're down and not up for the fight. As I said before, I've been asking God to reveal truth to me. He began to do that and this time it was truth that hurt. It was truth I needed but it still hurt. But it led me to believe things about myself that aren't true. That I'm alone. That I'm not good or cool or nice or whatever enough to have people who want to be in relationship with me.

We are sitting there getting ready to watch a podcast and the word truth pops onto the screen. the entire message was about what do we see when we look in the mirror? Do we have words like alone, unwanted, unloved written on our mirrors? I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. God cared enough to show up again. In a very real way for me. The pastor went on to talk about how i was created in God's image. I am a child of God. I am a saint. I am all these absolutely wonderful things in Him. At the end of the message, on the mirror were the words alone, unwanted, unloved. He picked up a hammer and said we all needed to break the mirrors in our lives that were lying to us. that were hindering us from believeing the truth. Behind the mirror was the word grace. Wow.

So as I'm slowly processing this, I'm wondering if I have the courage to break my mirror. I know deep down that I do. I'm finding my hammer and putting on my gloves... because I want to experience the grace that is waiting for me behind the mirror.