This week is quickly drawing to a close. It has been a week filled with joy and laughter, some heartache and tears, too.
My friend, Jan, and I didn’t do much sight seeing (on purpose anyhow…we certainly got lost a lot) while we have been here. We did go to Cafe Dumonde, however, so she could enjoy the treats there. (I am not a big coffee and pastry person…but I enjoyed people watching and looking at the mules and the carriages they were pulling–and because I have a thing for equine feet, I noticed their hoofs, too! LOL!)
This is the Breaking Free set that we have enjoyed as the backdrop all week at the church. The lady up front is Michelle Hicks. What a joy she has been! She is SO wonderful at “MC”ing these taping sessions–making all of us feel so right at home, like we are connected to one another. Below, Jan and I pose in front of the set:
Today has been intense. Emotionally charged. First delightful, as we have heard about Baptist Friendship House ministering to many here in New Orleans and story upon story of God’s blessing and confirmation and directing of the ministry there.
Then heart-wrenching as we prayer-drove through the Lower 9th Ward of New Orleans–just next to where the levee broke after Katrina. I wanted to share a couple of images from this prayer-drive that we went on, praying as we went and getting out to pray as well.
The image immediately above is a close up of the house above…devastation inside and all around it. The house is a shell…still stands and scrawled in spray paint on the outside, a testimonial… “This was home…” Oh, how my heart aches!
So much of the land has been flattened…the homes bull-dozed. Deposits of hope, anticipating return, some parcels are well manicured and lovingly cared for despite the lack of a house present on the site.
Others, were gutted, ruined…and no indication of anyone with any hope to return.
At times all I *could* do was pray. My heart was heavy imagining those who had lost so very much…not just physically, but so many other things. Such devastation. Such ruin. Yet without a doubt, we know that our God can do amazing things! He trades ashes for a crown of beauty! I believe He will bring something wonderful up out of this devastation.
We got out of our van and prayed for the people that have been hit by the devastation. This particular spot in the photo above is the home site of a lady we met who asked us if we would please stop by her home and pray that she might be able to return there.
I can’t help but think that the passage found in Isaiah 58 has a real-live, modern-day application now.
Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins, and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings. Isaiah 58:12
I believe God IS doing a new thing. It is springing up and we must beg him to help us see it and to pray for it and participate in it! I don’t know what shape it will take…and He is about the business of the eternal first and foremost. I anticipate that it will be a light that will be evident across our land…I think he can use this to bring revival to our country.
I know this…the people I have encountered in New Orleans have been amazing. Just tenacious, polite (except when driving…LOL!) and so kind–ready to tell their story to any listening ear. I simply must come back and participate in some of the relief work…it is on my heart and I hope to investigate that.
I think so much of this has to do with experiencing freedom in our lives from strongholds. At least if the Word of God is true (and it is!) it does. From Isaiah 58:9-11:
Then you will call, and the LORD will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I. “If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday. The LORD will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.
It is sad to say, but by the time Beth did this message, my head was really congested and I wasn’t following much of what was going on, but I know it was GOOD! 🙂
One of the things I appreciated about this was the way Beth spoke the truth about how we often hide our authenticity behind one thing and another. In fact, we may have disappointment in the choices God has made in our lives…and this can cause a stronghold in our lives. This is precisely what I mean when I have shared that we need to forgive God! Not in the sense that God does wrong, because he doesn’t. But in the sense that I perceive he has done me wrong and I feel resentment…I need to be authentic with him. When my theology (that good Christian girls don’t get upset with God) gets in the way of my authenticity (“God, I don’t understand that if you are good all the time, why you have allowed this, or ordained it?”) I believe we are out of God’s will. In fact, God doesn’t care as much about our right theology as he does that we are his and humble before him, bringing him all our broken pieces, our empty places and our lack of understanding as to why he has allowed what he has. Bring it to him. He can take it. In fact, he records numerous times that the psalmists did precisely that in the psalms. He can take our true feelings. Why pretend?
Sorry…that stuff was my own rambling. Don’t blame Beth for that.
Some important things that came of this session:
* Even the most faithful believers will be entrusted with trials.
* Even when our own actions have brought painful trials on us, God is working it for our good.
* The only discipline he puts us through is that which will heal.
My head cold that I thought I had chased off returned tonight with a vengance! So I am a bit incoherent, but wanted to take the time to jot some thoughts down about what Beth covered. I can’t possibly begin to do justice with my words. In all the series that I have seen her teach, I believe none have been with such authority and power as these sessions. I know the Lord is using her mightily. Praise His Name!
I found this session intriguing. God revisted some themes again with me…even those that I have written about here. Tonights focus was the woman at the well–I wrote about her a few days ago as I shared some notes on TLT.
So I ask the Lord…what do you have for me by reminding me yet again of the emptiness of the woman at the well and all the ways in which she strives to fill that void? Don’t let me miss it, Lord.
Some Beth-isms from this session: “Desperation that is unsanctified makes us STUPID.” “Desperation can be a gift, but only when it is sanctified.” — which reminded me of the woman who grabbed at the hem of Jesus’ robe. Her desperation caused her to “cross the border” (as Beth mentioned)…to go after her healing.
I want my desperation to be sanctified, to be a good thing…causing me to go after what the Lord alone can give.
Another series of “Beth-isms:” “We uncover to excuse. “Satan uncovers to accuse. “Christ uncovers to diffuse.”
A profound thought Beth shared has to do with if I refuse to get still, if I fill all my potentially silent times with doing, with text messaging, with email, with whatever it may be, how can I be still? And if I can’t be still, how will I know HE is God? To know Him, I must allow myself to be still. Why do I run from the silence and stillness?
This session was on courage…having the courage to seek and pursue freedom no matter what our family does. They may even persecute, ridicule and play on our false guilt to get us to quit. We must have the courage to press on.
Likewise, we must realize we can’t drag others to freedom. They have to want it.
I can’t tell you what an incredible privilege it is for me to be at these sessions. The Lord used Breaking Free so much in my life when I was coming out of Weigh Down…truly used it to do an important work that had to be done. While I didn’t experience freedom right away (I was eating the seed instead of sowing it…), it was an investment in the future work that God would do and has now done and continues to do.
I am so pleased to be a part of this.
Here are thoughts in brief about what is my favorite session so far.
If you have visited the blog or the TW forums, you know that I love to share the importance of the moment in experiencing victory. I was so encouraged to hear this session was a powerful lesson on the moment! Thank you, Lord, for that confirmation. But Beth put meat on the bones of what this means to me.
She began by sharing the valid point that prayerless lives are powerless lives. Conversely, prayerful lives are powerful lives.
She pointed out that we will never get to our “milestone” of freedom if we don’t get through our moment. To grab a hold of this moment, this choice, this decision in the NOW, when I face the temptation RIGHT NOW, I can pray out to God… “Jesus! Deliver me! HELP ME!”
She further pointed out that, in that moment, there are a couple of reasons we may not choose to pray…one, is that we don’t really *want* to. If we can make it a prayer of our lives that, in that moment of temptation, our “want to” will be different, we may find ourselves able to call out to the Lord. The second reason we may not pray in that moment is because we don’t feel like we deserve to be free or deserve to talk to God about it.
LIES!
This was definitely my favorite session so far and I wrote notes all over my listening guide–not just in the blanks.
I love this: “God’s Word was meant to apply to the ugly life and make it beautiful.” Yes, Lord!
She pointed out that we will never remain free based on doing what we think we ought to. Sure, it is a good motivation for starting. But we will ultimately fall back on doing what we want. That is why we need to keep asking God to change our “want to.” Ask him to help you to want to change when that moment that the temptation hits. Ask him in *advance* for that…and then make the choice in that moment. Like she said numerous times, until we can get through our moment of temptation, we won’t get to our milestone. One moment after another is how it is done. It is how the territory is won for the Lord.
Some of us are in a hurry and wonder why this has to be such a long process. Beth pointed out that the Lord Jesus is all about relationship. Certainly, sometimes he does choose to deliver instantaneously. He can. But if that doesn’t happen, he allows a long process so that He becomes dearer to me than my deliverance. He is more interested in my getting to know the Healer than just experiencing the Healing. He doesn’t want me to miss it.
This session was absolutely incredible…(well, they all are…)
In this session Beth Moore talked about how crucial lies are to remaining in captivity and how vital truth is to breaking free. (There is that renewing of the mind theme again…)
No matter what my personal truth may be–my behavior, my experiences, my history, and my “genetics,” IT IS NOT ABLE TO OVER-RIDE GOD’s TRUTH.
I must reject lies. No more denial or self-delusion–as long as we keep pretending, we will remain in our captivity.
The fact is GOD’s TRUTH SETS ME FREE. God’s truth is more powerful to free me than my truth is to keep me in bondage!
At times all I *could* do was pray. My heart was heavy imagining those who had lost so very much…not just physically, but so many other things. Such devastation. Such ruin. Yet without a doubt, we know that our God can do amazing things! He trades ashes for a crown of beauty! I believe He will bring something wonderful up out of this devastation.
