Archives for February 2020

You Are Celebrated!

02.25.2020 by Nikki Laureano //

Welcome back friends! I (Megan) am glad you are here! We are wrapping up our adventures in the “Do You Know You Are…?” series with a dear friend of mine, Nikki! If you want to check out the rest of the series, we have touched on being “cherished“, “honored“, and “beloved” in the past weeks. This week, Nikki has graciously shared some of her story, and how God has affirmed that He celebrates her! I pray that you find encouragement through her words.

I am probably one of the most nostalgic people you’ll ever meet. I can romanticize the past like it’s nobody’s business. The ‘90s era is one of my favorites, especially when it comes to movies. Because of that, I am a huge fan of all things Disney from that decade. One of my favorites is Aladdin. The danger, the treasure and adventure, the betrayal, the tales of friendships, and the love story… I just love everything about it.

Reality or Perception?

One of my favorite scenes is when Prince Ali comes busting through the gates of Agrabah. His grand entrance certainly doesn’t disappoint. He is preceded by his giant caravan, marching along and singing his praises. Bells are ringing. Drums are banging. People are cheering. The entire bazaar lines up to greet him, and grovel at his feet, looking up to him on his giant elephant with respect and reverence.

From the local “street rat”, to a celebrated prince. It almost leaves you with a feeling of magic and wonderment, until you realize Aladdin is only getting his chance to shine as the impostor Prince Ali Ababwa. Aladdin’s perception was that he needed to come before the town’s sovereignty as a cleaned-up prince before he could receive any accolades, acknowledgement, or praise.

If you’re anything like me, maybe you can relate.

I grew up in church, but I had no idea that the enemy had a voice. When certain thoughts came to mind, I processed them as if they were my own. I can look back and hear myself saying things like “you aren’t good enough; you aren’t worthy enough”, followed by a big “BUT IF….”

If I cut my hair…
If I wear this…
If I stop doing that…
…. then I will be celebrated.

For years I lived with this perception. There were times when I questioned my own life because I had lost myself inside so many masks trying to please the world. I felt pinned to the bottom of a hole and I couldn’t stop digging. Isn’t that exactly where the enemy wants us? Striving to feel celebrated by people rather than deeply knowing our God has been celebrating who we are from the very start?

Identifying Reality

It reminds me of the woman with the issue of blood. For 12 years, she bled. For 12 years, she was deemed legally unclean. But where the world failed her, God prevailed. He saw and celebrated His daughter.

Then a woman who had suffered from a hemorrhage for twelve years came up behind Him and touched the [tassel] fringe of His outer robe; for she had been saying to herself, ‘If I only touch His outer robe, I will be healed.’ But Jesus turning and seeing her said, ‘Take courage, daughter; your [personal trust and confident] faith [in Me] has made you well.’ And at once the woman was [completely] healed.” Matthew 9:20-22 (emphasis added)

With one touch of Jesus’ hem, she was healed immediately. And not only was she healed, but Jesus looked right at her, acknowledged her, and celebrated her. She didn’t have to show up clean or perfect. She didn’t have to change anything about herself. She needed not do anything more than to trust.

I found myself in a similar situation in 2016. Tormented by crippling anxiety for years prior because of shame and guilt over my past, I felt too dirty to be celebrated. I am so grateful that we have a God who doesn’t let us stay in that space. He makes a way, and He did for me.

Freedom in Truth

One weekend, I found myself in a small group of strangers confessing all the reasons why God couldn’t celebrate someone like me. Immediately following that confession, I felt the heartbeat of Heaven fall upon me in a way I can still feel to this day. I felt deeply seen and acknowledged. Although there were trembling lips and tears, there was much celebration from my Father. The Lord looked at me through the eyes of His children and said “I am so proud of you. I rejoice and dance over you, and I have been this whole time.” I knew how celebrated I was, am, and always will be.

Aren’t you glad we serve a God that doesn’t make us rub any sort of magic lamp or perform a dance routine perfectly in order to experience His sovereign celebration? With God, you don’t have to earn belonging, significance, or His celebration. You already have it. You won His heart before you were born! He has delighted in you, and celebrated you from the very beginning.

The Lord your God is in your midst, a Warrior who saves. He will rejoice over you with joy; He will be quiet in His love [making no mention of your past sins], He will rejoice over you with shouts of joy.” Zephaniah 3:17 AMP

The eyes of the Father are looking right at you with total delight all the time! My prayer is for you to feel celebrated today and everyday going forward. Wrap your arms around yourself, and become insanely aware of his presence all around you right now singing “you are my CELEBRATED child!”

Take a minute to leave Nikki a comment below, or continue the conversation on the FACETS Facebook page.

Did You Know You Are Beloved?

02.18.2020 by Megan Abbott //

Happy February friends! This month we have been really digging into words that are a part of our identity in Christ, and I (Megan) have really been loving the “Did You Know You Are…?” series. We prayed together and selected words that are beautiful and sometimes challenging to accept. In the past couple weeks, Tracy shared about being “Cherished” and Jen “Honored“. This week,as you read the words below, I pray you hear God reminding you that you are His beloved.

Whew… so this topic, huh? Here I am, an unmarried woman in her 30s, that has struggled with feeling lovable the majority of her adult life, in the month of Valentine’s Day, writing about love. Did you know you are beloved? I guess before I ask you that question, I have to think about my answer. In the past, it has been a challenge for me to claim this truth — God calls us beloved.

Face to Face with My Thoughts

So I have this book, a journal really, that is filled with only God’s truth. It came out of a season where I struggled to even look in the mirror. I felt unlovable. Honestly, that is even a bit of an understatement. I was challenged by a friend to just keep speaking the truths out loud to myself in front of a mirror until I could actually say them with confidence. The first time I stood in my room looking in the mirror, I opened my mouth to speak the words, and just cried. The second day, something similar. Eventually there were days I could speak truth over myself, and other days that I might even believe what I was saying. It feels silly in hindsight to think I couldn’t speak simple words into a mirror. But the reality of the power and strength of truth, while looking myself in the eyes knowing I didn’t believe it, it was halting. I was face to face with the reality that I didn’t believe God made me without mistake. That He made me lovable. That if He had made me lovable, I hadn’t somehow destroyed that in the previous 25+ years.

The “Truth” in My Heart

Have you ever been there? Face to face with the reality of what your heart believes? I did not believe I was beloved. I would speak truth over any of my friends, strangers even, knowing the value God knit into their being, but never could have said the same words about me. My truth had departed from the real truth. I’m not sure why. Lack of confidence? A conditioning from past experiences? Who knows. I knew it needed to change, though.

Fast forward several years. I found myself in a spot again where experiences led my heart back to “you are not lovable”. This time, I felt convicted by the Spirit to write a letter to myself from God’s perspective. I knew it was needed, but simultaneously thought it was silly. I mean, can God really have me write a letter to me, and it not just be my words? After some wise counseling, I sat down with a stack of note cards and prayed through scripture, writing thoughts and scriptures out on cards and lining them up until I saw where God was leading. I wrote a letter that brought a little healing to my heart. Calling out pains that I didn’t completely know were there, and the loving, gentle, healing truth that God gave us in scripture.

Beloved,

I am your heavenly Father. I created your entire being thoughtfully, uniquely, and without mistake.¹

I do not see you as you do — your flaws, your failures, and days of unfaithfulness. No, I see my priceless, redeemed, and beloved daughter. While you were in that pit of self-hatred and rejection, I CHOSE YOU. I have picked you up from the pit and crowned you with my grace and compassion.

Beloved, I love you exactly where you are today, and I will continue to love you each day no matter where you are. No more, no less.²

I will walk hand in hand with you as your heart is softened and your stubbornness is replaced with my love and compassion.³ When your heart is overwhelmed, I will be there patiently and gently calling you back to my freedom ⁴. The walk will have painful stretches, but I see you on the other side, victorious⁵.

-Your Loving Father

What Does It Take To Believe The Truth?

I think God could write a letter like this to each of us. One that reminds us how precious we are. That we are chosen. That he created us with care, with intention, and with purpose. We are HIS beloved.

I don’t remember at this point where I heard it, but I remember hearing a message where beloved was intentionally pronounced be-loved. Be loved. Live as though you believe you are loved. When you don’t feel lovable, or loved, look back at scripture and read the truth to yourself over and over again until you believe you are the beloved daughter of the mighty God. There is nothing we can do (or not do) to change the reality of this truth.

Join the conversation here or on our Facebook page.

Psalm 139:13-14
Romans 8:38-39, Ephesians 2:4-5
Ezekial 36:26 (NLT)
Psalm 61
1 Corinthians 10:13, Ephesians 6:13

You Are…Honored!

02.11.2020 by Jennifer Howe //

Welcome to FACETS, friend. Take a look around in February, and you’ll see we’re at play and doing things a little differently. We are leaning into a “Did you know you are…” set, and we hope you’ll enjoy it. Each Facet is writing from her heart. Take a peek at Tracy’s post that reminds us that we are cherished. You are honored, beloved, and celebrated, too.

Do you know you are…honored?

I (Jennifer) have a unique moment in front of me. The question floats through my mind, to my heart, and back. If we could sit together over a cuppa right now at my caffeinated hidey hole, I’d relish it! We might chat about Chicago’s unpredictable weather, move on to the extraordinary in the very ordinary of our lives—and then something deeper could happen. The question would hang in the air: Do you know you are honored?

I imagine the two of us exploring truth. Are we honored? What does He say? Are we comfortable even speaking the words out loud? I am honored? We do a funny dance around words like that.

Yes? No? Maybe so?

The Christian faith is, first, biblical! And yet, a Moody Founder’s Week speaker reminded me last week, “Some of the worst advice comes from within the church.” What is genuinely true? Do I have “fire insurance” from a prayer I once prayed? If I am saved from my sins, am I saved to something? Am I a sinner halfway dragged from the gutter until heaven? Am I a royal daughter of the King of the universe who has authority over all things and receives a big, ol’ YES! from the heavens in response to every prayer?

I’ve asked all of these questions at some point in over twenty-five years, and the majority of questions like them have been settled in my mind through time reading the Bible, praying to understand the words, and having deep conversations with trusted friends. If you’re still encountering these questions, I want to encourage you—you have the opportunity to silence the slippery tongue that’s trying to confuse you. None of us needs to stay in the place of confused identity when it comes to our relationship with Daddy-God. He will tell us who we are!

Honored? I’m not worthy!

Let’s face it, honored is a big, fat, heavy word for some of us. Can we honor anyone but Jesus? How can I possibly be honored if He is the one worthy of honor and praise:

They said with a loud voice,
Worthy is the Lamb who was slaughtered
to receive power and riches
and wisdom and strength
and honor and glory and blessing! Revelation 5:12 CSB

The truth is plain. He. Is. Worthy!

Honor shared…

But what about li’l, old you and me? What does the Bible say about our honor?

Then the name of our Lord Jesus will be honored because of the way you live, and you will be honored along with him. This is all made possible because of the grace of our God and Lord, Jesus Christ. 2 Thessalonians 1:12 ESV [Emphasis mine.]

When I read that, I feel all the emotions. How about you? There is honor in living honorably. We honor Jesus with our lives; He is honored, and we share in His honor. The honor is not our own, and that’s as it should be!

Honor given…

You know I was searching for “real food” in the Bible, right? I looked at all the appearances of honor because I needed to know I was, for sure, reading what He had to say about our honor without the sauce of pride dripping all over it. This practically leapt off the page:

Believers who are poor have something to boast about, for God has honored them. James 1:9 ESV

I live in a time (in church history) and place (in the world) that is so rich, many of us have forgotten what it means to be genuinely poor. We have a cultural conversation about “the working poor,” American poverty levels, and the wars on all the things. We talk about the difficulty of being a believer in a culture that rejects truth and substitutes it with their own. It’s a shame we can’t talk about God in the workplace or the neighborhood. What would people say?

Let’s get perspective: generations all over the world, places where professing Christianity is a death sentence, hope for the next morsel, the next pittance-paying job, a wedding to reduce the number of mouths to feed, or an orphanage to give a child a better life.

I don’t know this kind of “poor.” It exists, though. What will I do about that? What will we do?

The poor are honored by God because He loves them, because of the frailty of their lives, and because no one else honors them. Our God is loving like that. And we should be the church. We should live a life that honors them and shares in the honor of Christ who loves and honors like that! We give the honor to them because He does.

Sometimes I must write to myself in these posts: Jen, it’s not all about you.

You are…

Our God is loving! That’s what I love so much about Him—He calls every one of us into deep relationship while we are still sinners (Romans 5:8), and He shares His honor with us when we hide our lives in His and live honorably by His power. By extension of our authentic, godly life with Him, we give honor to the weakest—the ones with no voice or wealth or noticeable honor in this world. We are the church when we do that. That’s our calling.

And then there’s this:

…you are precious to me. You are honored, and I love you. Isaiah 43:4 ESV

In His goodness and grace, there’s that. The context of that verse up there offers clarity about God’s preferential treatment toward His beloved (that’s us!). You and I are precious to Him. We are the “loved ones” who bring the light! He desires to draw us close; transform our hearts, minds, and lives; and work in and through us in this dark world.

Jesus’ sacrifice on a rough-hewn cross communicates something deep: He chose to come for us, each of us is loved and honored by His choice, and we share in His honor.

I feel this is how this post wraps up. I pray this for us!

So we keep on praying for you, asking our God to enable you to live a life worthy of his call. May he give you the power to accomplish all the good things your faith prompts you to do. 2 Thessalonians 1:11 ESV

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