Okay I get it now. I surrender. I am done running and so tired of hiding behind my mental illness. These past few weeks, I have been wrestling with God. And you know that is not an easy feat. God always wins all his battles. God has placed certain people in my life who have not allowed me to continue to run.
I really thought that I could continue to hide and slowly (very slowly) re-start my ministry, WHEN I was ready. You see, I have not been actively active in my church, since I was diagnosed as being Bipolar Disorder. I felt that I was not able or worthy of speaking about anything regarding my faith in God. I felt that God had let me down in some ways. I guess in a lot of ways I was angry and disappointed that God would allow this to happen to me. I was supposed to be this strong women and my mind was not reliable. It didn’t help that my father said that this was just a demonic spirit that was in me.
But you know what, if God can use a donkey to speak to Balaam as in the book of Numbers 22, than surely the Lord can use me. I had to re-learn that God is love and that God loved me just the way that I am. I had to learn I have to humble myself, and allow the Lord to use me according to his ways. And always remember that our ways are not God’s ways. What we see as imperfection, God sees as a blessing.
This past week the following verses have truly spoken to me:
2 Chronicles 7: 14 (NIV) “if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”
Jonah 1:3 (NIV) ”But Jonah ran away from the LORD and headed for Tarshish. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went aboard and sailed for Tarshish to flee from the LORD.”
Psalm 139:7 (NIV) “Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?”
After meditating on these verses and reading the book of Job, who am I to say is imperfect. God made me, just as God made you.
John 16:27 (NLT) “for the Father himself loves you dearly because you love me believe that I came from God.
So effective immediately, as the old hymn says “All to Jesus, I surrender, I surrender all.” And all means all.
