On Our Behalf
This past year has been one of refining. One of searching for answers. One of seeking out truth and guidance and community. One that has stretched me, challenged me, and grown me. A year that has been paramount in my understanding of the character of God.
As we choose to walk in the Kingdom, we have the opportunity to see all the attributes of the Father working on our behalf.
Over the past year, God has been my Redeemer. He has been my Provider. He has been my Healer. He has been my Prince of Peace.
For those of you that don't know, when I went into college at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, I was undecided for the first semester. The second semester, I felt a calling to study Spanish, and I decided to add a minor in education to it, in order to pursue teaching. So I did what I needed to do: I took the classes, and passed them. I made the lesson plans. I did the stuff that I felt like I had to do. Needed to do. Was supposed to do. And, at the time, was feeling called to.
Over the past year, I've seen a lot change in my life: a relationship ended. My career path changed. All the things in my life that I had come to identify myself with and had used to be a marker of my identity, was, in a flash, changing before my very eyes.
I'm learning that life in the Kingdom of God is cyclical in the sense that He's always renewing our places of questioning. Our places of pain. He's always in the business of the fresh and new. He will always show us an old spot with a fresh perspective so we can see the evidence of His goodness, and we can see that His heart is redemption.
I shed a lot of tears over this past year. I've hurt. Even in the midst of the growing pains, God was (is) faithful. He has shown Himself faithful. He has shown Himself to be good.
Because that's who He is. That's His character. It is His good pleasure to be for us what we don't even know we need.
There's been a pivotal shift in my heart and mind over the past year: I am recognizing all the attributes of the Father actively working on my behalf. Healer. Redeemer. Provider. Comforter... All His names are revelations of pillars of His character.
In the question of, God, what do You want to be for me right now, that You couldn't be for me then? We can see that the answer is always to give us a deeper download of His heart. Of His character. There is such power in testimony. In declaring His goodness.
One of the Bible verses that I've claimed for my life is Psalm 113:7-8. "He raises the poor from the dust and lifts the needy from the trash heap in order to seat them with nobles- the nobles of His people." That is what I feel that God has placed on my life... In His power, and with His heart leading mine, I am following the glorious call He has given me.
Between the Shadow and the Soul: Blogging through the journey.