free & unhindered.

Thanks to Kate Harlan the whole India team looked up their name meanings. If you don't know your name meaning, you should look it up! God named you what he named you with purpose because he created each of us with beautiful and significant purpose. I absolutely love mine.

My name is so prophetic! I love being the daughter of the King, free to sit in his lap and dance with him. And I do this all with a crown on my head. I am the Beloved. I am loved and pursued by God because of the Beloved Son. He doesn't see my mess-ups or my sin. He sees me as he sees Jesus. I got deep revelation of this listening to Graham Cooke's Becoming the Beloved series. We listened to this as a team too. Everyone got rocked. GET IT. And the last one is what he hit me with in India: free and unhindered. 

So in the sea of grace, God taught me to rest, like I said in my last post. However, I didn't paint a picture of how bad I am at resting. My flesh tends to strive and perform for God's love and approval. If I am not doing something "for God," I feel like I'm failing.  Sometimes, I want the quick fix to be where I think I should be, all healed, all matured, and all ready to go. BUT God, he has me where he has me because he is God of the process. He loves and accepts me where I am, brokenness and all. He also has a plan to see me become more and more like Jesus. I always knew that in my head, but it had a hard time sinking to my heart. Therefore, I continued to respond to God as a failure and behind my walls of self-protection. In other words, I never rested.

Rest is a manifestation of the Spirit. Rest is a commandment. Also, I am remembering my one-liner for the semester: "Obedience is better than sacrifice, and relationship is better than obedience." I rest not only to obey but to relate to God, who rested on the 7th day. In rest, God meets me and squeezes out the flesh that wants to "earn" his unconditional love.

In India, God healed my heart, and I haven't dove into all the healing I received. But, he healed me, and I felt this holy contentment erupt in my spirit. I am supernaturally content in every place that God has me: family, life, relationship, etc. And the contentment stems from a deep trust in God to protect and love. Who I was when I arrived in India and who I am leaving India are drastically different because of the way I trust God and rest in his promise to be who he is. In trusting God, I align myself with who I am called to be: free and unhindered. I am free because I trust. I am unhindered because I trust. When I am not wrapped up in getting what's "mine," I am free and unhindered to swim and play in the sea of grace. 

I can confidently say that even if I had never shared the gospel or prayed for anyone, flying to India to have a bedroom view of Bangalore, India (see below) would have been worth it. What God did in me is just as valuable! And in the words of Graham Cooke,"we are not working towards victory; we are working from it." Everything from hereon out is a bonus. God flew me thousands of miles to see me undone before him, receive healing, learn to rest, and operate as a free and unhindered child of God.