It is crazy how much God can do in a week or so when we surrender ourselves to His will. I finally see the reality of not being able to write down all of His goodness with a scroll as big as the sky and ink as deep as the ocean. I have been avoiding posting a blog because I can't even pick what to say! Once again God has done immeasurably more than I could have asked for, or even could have imagined. Funny how verses from the Bible really are true! I read them, but when I see them in my life it is a whole other story. In the past few weeks I have been spending more of my day actually seeking God and sitting in His presence to hear what He has to say. I think at first I was putting the time in thinking I was being faithful or obedient as I knew God was challenging me to get up and spend time with Him each morning. I quickly realized that the morning times were not a duty to Him, but a massive gift from Him. With just an hour God seems to change and rearrange my heart in the freshness of each morning enough to keep me focused on Him throughout the day. How amazing and how crazy that He changed my flesh and mind and actually makes me want to get up early with Him! I certainly wouldn't have thought.
God has taken my morning time with Him and renewed my strength and my trust in Him, He has given me a fresh faith in His will, and He has laid things on my heart to pray for only to then answer the prayers! It has just been so insane to see Him working so fast and so faithfully but also just day by day and moment by moment. He has been showing me the life that exists in Him when we abide as a vine connected to Christ. In the abiding life comes every good thing that existed in Christ! The faith Christ had, the love Christ had, the confidence in His Father, the joy, the obedience, the fruit, wisdom, righteousness and all peace. All the good things I could never obtain by myself are found as I abide in Him each day starting each morning afresh.
The faith that comes from His Spirit is so much stronger than any faith I could conjure up on my own. I am finding I am able to truly believe He can do bigger and tangible things in me, and once I believe them, they begin to happen! When I actually believe what He tells me I am even more excited because I know it is only through His grace that I can even understand Him and believe! Crazy. God has opened my eyes and my heart to the sound of His voice and has began to be a very real guide. I pray that every believer would experience the comfort that comes in knowing we can actually have the God of all things guide our each and every move!
One evening I was praying before bed, my routine prayers, and I honestly was starting to fall asleep while praying. I felt God prompt me to pray for a new name. I thought to myself, "How weird! What does that even mean? A new name? That certainly didn't come from me". I started praying that God would reveal to me a new name and a meaning. I thought of Abram/Abraham, and Sarai/Sarah, I thought maybe that is kind of what He meant. Like a new name and a new identity or prophetic meaning with it. I prayed just briefly still thinking the whole thing was a little bizarre! I had that feeling like when you forget a person's name and you know you know it and you are sounding it out trying to think of it! I felt like I heard God say the name and then I lost it, like it was at the tip of my tongue. I guessed names for a few minutes and then realized guessing was probably pointless and I should just sleep. I went to bed and didn't really think too much of it.
A few evenings later I came home from Bible study and went to sleep at 1030. I usually don't wake up at all in the middle of the night, but at midnight I sat up straight in my bed, wide awake. I didn't even have to pee! I was sort of startled. I checked the time and just sat for a few minutes. My phone buzzed and I was like "Ah! Random! Who is talking to me now, and why am I awake!" I checked my phone and a friend texted me asking if they could declare a new name over me! I died. They said they were cooking and it randomly came to them from the Lord, they were kind of hesitant hoping I didn't think they were crazy. I more so thought it was weird they were cooking at midnight. Once I told them how excited I was and how just a few days earlier I had prayed for this very thing they told me my new name! With the name came so many crazy meanings. The story of the name and the meaning of Martina actually match up and basically the name tied together any words that have been spoken over my life over the past year. Things people said to me a year ago came out in this name. I was blown away. The whole name and meaning would just take pages!
So of course I thought this was all really cool, but that person could have possibly just liked that name, or they could have just saw the name and thought of me. So it is really cool, but there is a chance it could just be from their minds. Silly me. I received a message on facebook two days later and a different friend called me by the name! Such confirmation! They hadn't even known each other at that point!
Long story short God can do way more than we think to ask for. And He also makes us new over and over again. God is doing new things in this city, He is raising us up and calling us to step forward. I want to encourage you to seek Him with your whole heart and ask Him to do new things in your heart. Trust Him fully and you will see His work. He will completely surprise you and I pray that my testimony will be small compared to what He does in this city. I pray that my new name, as crazy of a story as it is to me, would just be the beginning. I pray that for every testimony God gives me, He will do the same thing again and again in the hearts of all His children.
I encourage you to set time aside each day for God, give Him the first fruits of your 24 hour day and then brace yourself because He can make new things grow all around you. Let go of anything that entangles you or holds you down and then be ready because God will sweep you off your feet. The best part about it all, and the part I have grown to love about my life, is that God continues to prove to me that nothing about our lives before, or our mistakes, can stop Him. The new move God is doing is not conditional on our past mistakes or our past lives.
So, sons and daughters of the Great Father, heirs with Christ, beloved children, shake off the dust from the old life, tear off the old clothes, the old banner over your head forget about what you have done and don't let any thought of your iniquity hold you back. God is doing a new thing, don't you see it? He is making us each new and raising us as an army to bring His children home. Your old robe was covered in failure, in heartbreak, in stains and dirt. But your new robe is white! It was clean the moment He washed it in the blood of Jesus. And now, beloved, you are clothed in righteousness and peace. You are marked with His blood and He has started a new work. Commit yourselves to it, devote yourselves to His heart. Let Him fill you and make everything new.
One thing is certain, when the Living God stirs in this city, in our homes, in our workplaces, and in our schools; we want to be clothed in white robes with a lamp burning as we await His presence. Don't let a move of God come when you are out of town or asleep in sin, ready yourself, simply by coming to Jesus and letting Him cover everything that was old. God has big plans, plans that might be crazy, and intense, and hard to believe. But the plans are full of Him, surely we long for that in the depths of our hearts.
Let us be made new by the blood of the Lamb. Let us throw of anything that distracts us and fight the good fight. Let us be marked with a new name and a new life, let any remnant of the old be blown away. Then let us stand together confident in our position in Him, and let us raise our hands as an army of His children and then we shall call out "Come Lord Jesus, Come!"
And He will come, with healing in His wings, salvation in His voice, and fire in His breath. He will come on clouds of glory and His love will rain down and wash over this island. He will be like a wave coming up over our shores, and His glory will be seen by all!
Martina Sobey
No comments:
Post a Comment