God's amazing love...

You know, sometimes God just touches us when we least expected it. Ok, that’s too soft of a word. Sometimes He blindsides us with something we thought we’d long ago let go of and dealt with. That happened to me today, in a big way.

This is a little more transparent than I sometimes can be when I write knowing others will read it. I usually save this stuff for my journal. However, I forgot to bring my journal and decided this is worth sharing. I love the ways God finds us and meets us in ways we could never expect.

I am at the Youth Specialties National Youth Worker Convention in Sacramento. It’s been a phenomenal two days, and I’m not even halfway through the convention yet. I spent all day yesterday and all morning today (16 hours total) in an Intro to Youth Ministries class here at the convention through Fuller Seminary. I could have taken it for credit (I started in the Masters of Divinity Program at Fuller this quarter). But I’m already taking Greek and Systematic Theology 1. So, I’m auditing the class instead. It’s awesome, but I’ll save that for another time.

Basically, my brain was on overload after that. So today, after the first general session and an awesome time of worship led by Chris Tomlin, I decided not to attend a seminar and spent some time with my Lord.

They have this thing here called the Labyrinth. Most of you know what a labyrinth looks like - kind of like a maze. This one is life-size, and they set it up with prayer stations throughout. When you walk in they hand you an MP3 player with a soundtrack to lead you through the labyrinth.

Now, I wasn’t a huge fan of the music on the soundtrack, or the soothing voice walking me through the stations. But God definitely met me there. I was at a station, sitting on the floor in front of a mirror. The topic at that particular station was self, and it was about seeing yourself as God sees you. It was so amazing. I had a really hard time with that task. The soundtrack talked about how God loves me, sees me as beautiful, etc. What I didn’t realize was how much I’ve been struggling with how I look lately. It said to stare at yourself in the mirror until you saw yourself as God sees you. I don’t think I really reached that point, but God still spoke to me there in making me aware of my weakness.

I moved on, and there was the station called "Holy Place". There were pillows all around, and bread and wine (or juice, to appease all denominations) so you could commune with God. There were also Bibles, so I picked one up. I opened it to 1 Corinthians 13. Yup, the love chapter.
I savored every word, letting God speak through them. The phrase that God really spoke through was "Love never fails". It’s in verse 4. I thought about that, pondered it, and God said, "That is true. Love never fails. My love for you never fails. Neither will your love for others ever fail. Love is the way to reach people. Love them. Love your friends in new ways. Love your students like you haven’t yet. Love yourself, too." I’m glad I skipped the breakout session.

That’s what I needed today.

I reflected on what God had revealed to me, and realized that although I had once beat the self-esteem issue with my appearance, I happen to have moved to a very superficial and appearance-driven town. Danville is full of upper class people, mostly tan and thin, with perfectly highlighted and styled hair and all the latest clothes. I can’t compete with that, nor do I really want to. Yet it soaked in and I started to think less of myself.

Back to today’s story. Because God loves us He often tells us the same message in multiple ways to make sure we hear Him. I went to a dinner for women in youth ministry. As a gift for coming to the dinner, we were each given a brand new "True Identity" TNIV Bible. And there was this little description on the front of the Bible’s packaging that said, "The Bible that helps you see yourself as God sees you".

I guess God wanted to make sure I was hearing Him loud and clear. I told this story to Lisa, one of our jr high volunteers who’s with us at the convention. Then we headed into General Session #2. At the beginning, a singer named Kendall Payne got up to share her talent with us. Her second song she introduced with a story about her and a friend who had been struggling with her appearance and not feeling up to "supermodel" caliber. Huh. There it was again. And she proceeded to sing a song of hers called "Supermodel" in which she talks about being tired of being compared to supermodels. I looked at Lisa, and we exchanged a knowing smile.

Yeah, and it still didn’t end there. If you go back in my posts to February of this year, you’ll find one titled "The healing that could only come from God". In there I talk about an amazing experience at the Grace Women’s Prayer Summit, where God healed me of something I didn’t know I’d been carrying around and could let go of. The old hymn "It Is Well With My Soul" became a favorite that weekend because I could sing it and really mean it now. And that Sunday at Fresh Encounter, a slide show was played of pictures from the Summit, and the song they put it to was Chris Tomlin’s "How Great Is Our God". Those two songs always remind me of that weekend and God’s healing power in my life.

Chris Tomlin tonight during worship at the very end of the session started singing "It Is Well With My Soul". And he transitioned right from it into "How Great Is Our God". Yes, he really did do both those songs like that. What a gift from God. God is so amazing to me. He loves me so much, and He showed me today in all those ways. Wow. That’s the best I can do to describe my amazement. I'm totally speechless at God's amazing love.