For those of you who don't know, my church participates in a world wide 24/7 prayer week. In which, we fill every hour of each day for an entire week with continuous prayer. Tonight, I have the honour of spending the night in our designated prayer room with one of my newer but best friends worshiping, praying to, and praising our amazing saviour.
Being Christian comes with it's criticisms, so if you must - go ahead: your words will only provoke further exploration into who God is, because we've all got questions: it's what you do with the answers that really matter..but I digress...
Tonight as we have fought to stay awake, I told Erin more of my story and filled in the gaps that have left her curious as to how I've gotten to where and who I am now (...and am becoming). While retelling the events of my life that have more than challenged me, the events that have broken me down, stolen my joy, rendered me helpless and hopeless, the events that have forever changed how I see the world and life within it. But to tell you the truth, there's not a whole lot I would change or even take back.
You see, in the bible, all the trials and hard times, all the plagues, droughts, deaths, sickness, frogs, all the brothers that tried to kill the others, the lepers, the prostitutes and harlots, all the big fish and floods, the blind, the deaf, and the crippled...God used all of them for good, as teaching moments, so much so that they're recorded in the oldest, and longest survived work of literature in the history of this world.
Looking back over my life, I can't help but hope that it is made more than evident that there's something different about how I've "made it out" of the life that I was born into.
God has shown so much grace, endless devotion, and the purest of committed love.
Now if you'd like, you're more than welcome to go on believing that the events and circumstances in my life are nothing more than a sequence of serendipity, but all the timing, the feelings, and the triumphs, all the ways that the bad has been used for good - if you want to believe that that was all a matter of karma and chance, be my guest. But I refuse.
If I were to choose one verse and one verse alone to represent this post and my thoughts tonight, it would be Romans 8:28, And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
People who know my story, even just bits and pieces, including people that have watched me go through life, they have a hard time understanding how I've managed to "not fall with the wrong crowd", "graduate high school much less get to university", "not have a baby and drop out", and a quite a few more... But it comes down to hope.
Even when I didn't know that God was much more than what comes after 'Oh my' or before 'damnit', He was watching over me and filling my needs and hearts desires. He's had my back all along.
Now, bear with me here, I'm not about to write out my entire life story, but if you ever want to know: ask me. My story is no longer something that brings me shame, but is now something I can just take and proudly say, this is who I am, and this is where I've been and this how I've gotten to where I am now.
Call him what you want, but to me, God is my redeemer, my hope, my strength, my grace, and my provider... and I am SO thankful for all the ways He has and continues to prove all those attributes of his character. If I could articulate the magnitude of my gratefulness, believe me, I would.
My life is a testament of bad circumstances made beautiful through an unfailing love of a perfect Saviour. Nothing more, nothing less.
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