Category: Journal

Posted in Journal

Distractions

Posted on by Melissa Lynne
Pastor Sammy’s sermon today reminded me of the following. I have this written in my Bible (don’t remember where I heard so I can’t document author/speaker):

“One of the hardest tests that we must pass if we are going to fulfill our ultimate calling is to not get distracted by all the other things that God is doing. God is doing many wonderful things today, but it is not possible for us to be involved in all of them. It is often difficult to resist joining another successful move of God, especially when well-meaning people often make others think that they are missing God if they do not join that movement. We must learn to give ourselves only to what God has called us to do.”

I am blessed to have women in my life that value accountability. Very, very often they remind me to avoid distractions, which come in many forms. To keep my eyes on the vision He gave me…not to look to either side, but just straight ahead.

Posted in Journal

The Glory and the Burden of God

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

Saturday during my weekly prayer walk I was blown away by the Glory of GOD!! After a time of difficult prayer and pressing in as best as I know how -I asked God, as Moses asked, to show me His glory. I found myself remembering the Lord’s response to Moses’ request, “I will make all my goodness pass before you.” God summed up His glory with one word – goodness. God’s glory and goodness the same?? hmmmm. As I continued walking, I began thinking about the account in Genesis of how God with each creation declared “it is good” and with the creation of man declared “it is very good.” I heard God say in my spirit, “My glory, my goodness is all around if you see with open eyes.” I could say I opened my eyes but I believe actually God opened them because the praise that was birthed in me and what I saw in and through that praise for the remainder of the walk was like nothing I have ever experienced…an intense mixture of song and sorrow. Each flower, smell, sound, each person I passed or prayed for seemed to just shine through the eyes and ears, well– really all the senses of my spirit with a different kind of beauty. I found myself praising like never before for even the rocks and the weeds. But then each thing that I praised God for, the very same creations that shone with such glory, I saw also reflected a burden that almost ripped my heart to shreds. I knew it as a burden that could only have been His.

This was Saturday morning. It was July 4th and as I walked I was able to see those I considered the best of the best as I watched people giving up a holiday morning to joyfully work behind the scenes for the Lord. I saw the glory as if it were clothing them and it brought rejoicing to my heart. Almost immediately though my thoughts and prayers were taken to one of God’s creations that at that same moment in time was only known to me as a serial killer…terrorizing a neighborhood, and my own family- killing their friends. I considered this man probably the worst of the worst and yet right there I was faced with the truth that God had declared him at creation as good. God loved and died for him just as much as for the one I labeled “best.” I had to lay aside my need for understanding and declare in unison with God that what He had created in each was equally good. I found myself begging for his life to be spared and for the salvation of his soul more than I was even asking God for an end to the violence. The Glory of God and the burdens of God are not exclusive. The Glory of God is GOOD but it also carries a weight that is offensive to my natural mind and so it was easier to try to separate them.

I have been fasting and praying for months, asking for a burden for souls and here it was quite suddenly and unexpectedly intermingled with God’s glory like the blackberry bushes next to the pond…you can see the berries from a distance so you know they are beautiful and you know that they are probably sweet but you have to get through the thorns of the same bush to experience them in all the ways God intends…even the thorns are His creation with a purpose and GOOD, a burden necessary for the Glory.

Still blown away : )

Posted in Journal

It’s not about me

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

While I was reading the latest blogpost by Evangelist Daniel Kolenda he quoted something that just struck me and I really liked it and I wanted to share with you guys:

Francis Schaeffer said, “Each generation of the church in each setting has the responsibility of communicating the gospel in understandable terms, considering the language and thought-forms of that setting.”

Reminded me of the fight we sometimes give our church leadership because we resist change and want things our way (control) and the way that is in our particular comfort zone instead of looking at those that are coming in and in need of salvation and saying preach the gospel any way the Lord leads, use any type of music that will stir their souls, use any format that will help bring them to Christ because truly “it is not about me.”

Posted in Journal

picking and choosing

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

part of what I have been mulling over and blogging about today…

…In Mark 16:17-18 besides tongues, it also speaks of believers casting out demons and healing the sick (yeah I know, it talks about snakes and poison too : ) Says that they WILL cast out demons and they WILL heal the sick. These were the words of Jesus right before He was taken up to heaven. That alone makes me want to really get them into my heart. So it makes me wonder why I (and can only speak for myself here) having such great confidence in the gift of tongues have not started walking with that same measure of faith regarding healing and deliverance? There I go picking and choosing again…

Posted in Journal

The Blessing of Prayer

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

As I reflect on the changes that have occurred in my life since I came into this season of prayer I find myself weeping out of gratitude and amazement.  I could never have imagined all that has happened and I find it hard to give it language.   The woman here today is not the person that said “yes, Lord” ten months ago.  God has been busy.

I won’t lie.  This has not always been a fun season of life.  I’ve never cried so much, nor felt so lonely, nor felt so much like my very life was being sucked out of me with each passing moment in prayer.  I know that sounds negative, but it is truth.  I should have anticipated a breaking of sorts and the Lord knows I needed it but I didn’t understand the entirety of what I signed up for.

I came to the prayer room thinking I had it somewhat together.  I came healed of extreme fears.  After years of having none, I came with lots of friends.   I thrived on knowing and being known.  God had healed me and given me what I thought was the desire of my heart but then God asked me if I loved Him enough to give it all back and allow Him to show me true desire.  In asking me into the prayer room, He took me out of the excitement and comfort of the social bonding that happened for me in the sanctuary setting and that had honestly become a distraction to my worship.

Clearly God was not impressed by my need for many friends.  During these months, He has wanted me mostly to Himself.  God has shown me where I created idols out of friendships and leadership.  One by one false idols have been stripped away and I found myself in a place that was lonely and barren.  It was there though that God showed me that my greatest issue was that I still had a deep fear of rejection by Him and that I had incredible animosity against Him.  I didn’t really trust God.  Actually most things I struggle with have roots in this distrust.  Is God really who He says He is?  Will He really do everything He has promised?  Can He really restore, even what has died?  Can I really give Him my whole life?  That God loves me enough to ask me to change has transformed my life.  God has proven faithful time and again to encourage me, answer my many questions and to show me how much He really likes the ME that He created.

In saying yes…I signed up for a life that is different and wholly other than what the world thinks of as a successful life.  I didn’t know that my life would be “ruined.”  I didn’t know that I would have, for the remainder of my days, an unsatisfied ache.  I didn’t know that I was preparing for the last days and the return of my Savior (which was one of my biggest shocks).  I didn’t know that to say yes meant that I could be blessed with the deeper things of God during this life and the one to come and to say no and lock myself behind my safe religious traditions meant risking my heart growing cold to those deeper things.  (Not that I would be separated from God’s love but that I would close the door to greater awakening and deeper revelations that He has prepared for me.  I don’t know about you but I want the deep…same old, same old doesn’t work anymore.)  I didn’t know that this radical, fasted lifestyle would sometimes be messy; that it meant eating less, spending less, sleeping less so I could get up or stay up for prayer.  I didn’t realize that my pursuits would disrupt the lives of those around me.   I didn’t know that some would be so offended by my prayer life and or that they might think I had gone crazy.  That my credibility would be challenged.   Jesus said that we would be reviled because He was reviled but in return we would have what can’t be taken away…I didn’t understand what couldn’t be taken away was knowledge of this beautiful Man.  I didn’t know that it would be possible to walk in power and authority or that even the smallest efforts of giving, fasting and praying could unlock my heart.   I didn’t know that the cost would be great but the reward far, far greater.

Here I go weeping again…

It has been hard to give adequate language to everything I feel but it boils down to this…I have fallen in love with Jesus Christ and He’s bid me come and die so that I may actually live.  I said yes and embarked on a journey to spend eternity experiencing Him and His love and seeking out a comprehension of God and His Glory.  What can be greater?

What do you say when God asks to take you to a place of death to self only to realize that what will rise from the ashes is a hunger that can never be satisfied by anything less than the presence of the Lord?  What if He asks you to persevere?  What if He asks you, as He did me… “If you have to contend for the next twenty years before seeing your ministry fulfilled…will you still contend?  Will you still go for it?”  or, “If I send one hundred people into the prayer room next week, will you pray less?”  Wow…like the disciples so long ago the words that came out of my own mouth put the last ten months into perspective, if just for me.… “This is who I am and it is all I know anymore.”

Even though I have often been in barren and lonely places, God has shown me that I am most definitely not alone.  There are groups of hungry people coming together in this church and all over the world. They are people God has awakened and He is working in their hearts and lives. I find myself in an army on fire and desperate for the things of God and an army willing to pay the price to see it all come to pass.  This is not something we invented.   God gave this call and this desire and I believe He is calling each of us…He really is.

Posted in Journal

Lone Goose

Posted on by Melissa Lynne

There is a lone goose on the Life Church property. I noticed it in our field during our prayer walk last Saturday. I told Linda, my prayer partner, that we needed to pray for someone that was grieving the loss of their mate, although I didn’t know who. I knew though that geese mate for life so you usually see them in pairs. Even if one is left behind because of injury the other will stay instead of moving on with the flock. This goose was just standing there. Didn’t move or anything. So we prayed. It was still there yesterday.

Several years ago Busch Gardens in Williamsburg invited Fabio to attend the opening of a new roller coaster called Apollo’s Chariot. Fabio was dressed up as Apollo with a coaster full of goddesses dressed in white. During that first ride Fabio was hit in the face by a goose (or Fabio hit a goose). It sent him to the hospital…it killed the goose. National news. What probably didn’t hit the national news though was that in the next days another goose started exhibiting odd behavior just outside the park. Park officials had to have it removed to assure the safety of the guests. They tried putting it elsewhere. It died shortly after. It was widely held belief that this goose was the mate grieving it’s loss.

This lone goose makes me sad and touches my heart. This morning I was thinking of the goose but this time in a little different way. I saw the goose and I saw Jesus standing out in that field all alone grieving and waiting for us (His church, His bride) to return to Him.

Posted in Journal

My Baptism Testimony

Posted on by Melissa Lynne
Psalm 30:11-12   11 You have turned my mourning into joyful dancing.   You have taken away my clothes of mourning and clothed me with joy,   12 that I might sing praises to you and not be silent.  O LORD my God, I will give you thanks forever!
 

When I was eight years old I walked down the aisle of our church and professed my faith in Jesus, and I was baptized three weeks later. It was an incredibly significant day in the life of my family but for most of my life, I silently questioned whether either of these experiences was authentic.

Then a little over a year ago an old friend sent me an email that contained a testimony and one question -so what has God been doing in your life?  I couldn’t answer it.  I was baffled and it made me angry.  At the time I couldn’t see that He had been doing anything. Some things had happened in my life that left me feeling betrayed and abandoned by God.  And at a time when I should have run toward Him, I ran away and lived a life ruled by fear.  Therapy, medications… nothing worked.  I was afraid of everything.  People, new places, and new experiences.  I could not have walked in the door of Life Church. I couldn’t even walk out to my mailbox or open the door to a knocking neighbor.  I hid in my home and went nowhere outside my home alone.  I thought I had tried everything and there was no hope for me. However, that morning while sitting in my dining room floor, I began feeling such intense loneliness that I was pretty sure I was dying, I finally became desperate.  Clinging to the testimony sent from an old friend, as the only hope I could see for me…I said a prayer and reached out to God.  I asked for help and I asked for Him. Jesus helped me alright.  On that day God set into motion what He had already started and things came together in a way that I would never be able to deny and can only describe as a miracle.  Jesus rescued and saved me.  I can say that I know it. On that day, He grabbed my outstretched hand and pulled me into His arms.  Then the Holy Spirit took hold of me and began to speak to me, and we had an encounter that broke me and then changed me and healed me.

This past year God has changed me so much….but even after all He has done for me, I was still filled with so much pride that I wouldn’t even think about baptism. I didn’t want to put myself out there and do something so public and outside my comfort zone. So I put His command in my hand, and I closed it.  And God has been incredibly loving and patient with me.  However, the Holy Spirit started speaking to me a couple of months ago when I walked up to this altar, and I said “More God, I want more”….and you know what He said?  “Me too- Open your hands.”  And He started using the Wednesday night Bible study and the service of a few weeks ago. On that day, I didn’t go to the altar but not because I didn’t need the Holy Spirit to do a work in me.  I didn’t go because I was ashamed that I was still hesitating.  Pastor Sammy and others were talking about revival and repentance.  I was scared and just wanted to run and hide- because I knew I was part of the problem. God had told me specifically what to do, and I hadn’t.  But instead of running something in me once again asked for help.  And He said “open your hands or you are just pretending to serve me.”  That hit me hard and I felt incredible sorrow. I mean He died for me and I say I love Him. I have to thank God for that sorrow because although it was excruciating at times, I again found myself changed and opening my closed hand became not just the fulfillment of a command but a way that I could show Jesus that do give Him back my love and my life.  It is something I now want to do.

So today I stand here and I can say with all my heart that I trust Christ and put my faith in Him alone.  To me faith is believing that God is here right now and that everything comes from His hands, even sorrow- not by anger but by mercy and love and in fulfillment of His will.  And no matter what He ever asks me to do or allows me to go through; I never again need to live in fear because He will never abandon me to go through it alone. And today I will follow the example and command of Jesus, and I will be baptized.