I wasn’t going to post today, but I felt like the Lord wanted me to post the following and everything kind of came together about things He’s been telling me during the week.
Meeting with Esther
I couldn’t believe that it had only been a week since I met with Esther. It felt like a year. I was telling her about the week. When I told her how amazing Friday was, she said – ah HA! I knew it would be great! She said that at the time, she’d felt in her spirit that my day was going to be great. I had asked her to pray for my presentation that morning through text and she had texted back that she knew it was already done.
I suddenly realized the obvious – that Friday had been the Lord’s blessing to me. For some reason, I’m continuously surprised to see how much the He cares. He really is always watching over me.
God Speaking Into My Life Through Pastor Jeff’s sermon
The Lord really spoke to me through the pastor’s message today. It was about King Saul, David and Jonathan, and the friendship David and Jonathan had. Here are a few key things that stuck out to me:
Jesus poured himself into twelve individuals and mentored three leaders – that’s a Biblical picture of what it looks like to be in the body of Christ.
1 Samuel 18:1 and 10-12, “After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself. […]The next day an evil[a] spirit from God came forcefully on Saul. He was prophesying in his house, while David was playing the lyre, as he usually did. Saul had a spear in his hand 11 and he hurled it, saying to himself, ‘I’ll pin David to the wall.’ But David eluded him twice.
12 Saul was afraid of David, because the Lord was with David but had departed from Saul. 13 So he sent David away from him and gave him command over a thousand men, and David led the troops in their campaigns. 14 In everything he did he had great success, because the Lord was with him. 15 When Saul saw how successful he was, he was afraid of him. 16 But all Israel and Judah loved David, because he led them in their campaigns.”
1 Samuel 19:1-2, “Saul told his son Jonathan and all the attendants to kill David. But Jonathan had taken a great liking to David 2 and warned him, ‘My father Saul is looking for a chance to kill you. Be on your guard tomorrow morning; go into hiding and stay there.’”
And look at what Jonathan told David!
1 Samuel 23:17-18, “’Don’t be afraid,’ he said. ‘My father Saul will not lay a hand on you. You will be king over Israel, and I will be second to you. Even my father Saul knows this.’ 18 The two of them made a covenant before the Lord. Then Jonathan went home, but David remained at Horesh.”
We speak into others’ lives a prophecy, if you will, of what God is doing. God has a redemptive purpose in our relationships. He divinely navigates people into our lives or navigates us into their lives.
God links our lives together for the best interest of each other. We need those who see God’s hand at work in us and speak truth into our lives.
Paul invested in the life of Timothy through mentorship. 2 Timothy 1:3-7 We are relationally connected with just a few.
2 Timothy 1:3-7, “ I thank God, whom I serve, as my ancestors did, with a clear conscience, as night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers. 4 Recalling your tears, I long to see you, so that I may be filled with joy. 5 I am reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also.
6 For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. 7 For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.”
I recalled today that about 2-3 weeks ago, I met and talked with Pastor Jeff one Thursday morning about some of the weird things that God was doing in my life and how I didn’t really understand it. I had felt from the Lord that I was supposed to talk to him, so eventually, I did. I forgot to mention that here at the time, but I feel God wants me to mention it now.
I wasn’t sure what he would say. When I told him about how, on that memorable Monday, the Lord had practically taken me over when I submitted to Him and I felt that I was watching myself, he told me the following story:
On Easter Sunday of this year, he had studied and wrote out a thorough sermon about Mary Magdalene meeting Jesus at the tomb. However, ten minutes before he was about to speak, the Lord said to him, “That’s not what you’re going to preach.” He was taken aback and said, “…. What? You see all my notes? I prepared this all week!” And he said that the Lord told him, “You can do that, but I won’t bless it.”
So, a few minutes before the sermon, he flipped through his Bible and a few key words jumped out at him from different passages, which he promptly circled. He stepped up to the lectern literally having no idea what he was going to preach about and it was terribly scary and uncomfortable. He just had to blindly trust God, which is exactly what I had felt like on that Monday – either the Lord worked or I fell off a cliff. Jeff said he was kind of like … *looks at watch* “Ok God … you’ve got 10 seconds and counting to show up here …”
And the Lord came down on him powerfully – he just started talking about whatever he felt like God wanted him to say, out of Scripture. He said that it was like he wasn’t doing it – he was watching himself – and he just prayed constantly the whole time, sweating, “Oh Lord, don’t let me get in the way!”
And it turned out that that was the day that Jacob, the husband of the Romanian family I know, chose to believe in Jesus. So, the pastor said, he knew exactly what I meant.
The most amazing, inspiring and wonderful thing in the world, he said, was to sit down with someone (Jacob) who had just become a believer in their thirties and was reading the Scripture for the first time, and getting to talk through it in all its wonder. There was nothing like it. I can’t even imagine how wonderful that would be.
FIN: a few other random comments
I told mom that Dr. Salaita really liked the tomatoes and said they were better than the farmer’s market kind. She raised her eyebrows and said that he was just being nice! There was no way that could be true. I said maybe, but that’s what he said, and I didn’t think he was lying. Neither of us like tomatoes, so it’s hard for us to imagine anyone liking them that much.
I sent notes to some of my Star Wars Old Republic online friends yesterday with links to my costume post, telling them I missed them and how awesome they are. I had a few notes waiting for me saying that they missed me too. Morella linked me her latest stories on her character Kali – an amazingly funny character – a “light-side” Sith apprentice that acts like Jacque Clouseau in the Pink Panther movies. Oh my – so many laughs! I love her character.
Connor, Keela, Zato’tsu, Six, Nure, Vivek, Krek, Gefseabemon, long lost Shinoa – I miss them all! I discovered that Connor and Keela just recently got married (they had been engaged when I signed off) – Keela is actually a psychology professor in real life.
I have some of these gamer friends friended on Facebook and they occasionally throw funny comments at me. We were a close knit group. I can recognize each of them by tone of voice, from all the chat we had and I still pray for them all frequently. I hope to appear back online someday, though it’ll never be as often as before.
And that, is all I feel I am supposed to say tonight. <3 May the Lord bless you all.
~ Jessica