Part 4 of Lisa’s Testimony……
—————————————————
During the last part of my recovery I had been walking every day , I had a route in Edon that I took every day and had taken on a habit of praying for the people I knew as I passed by their homes. This one particular day God had put a young mother on my heart in my walking path that I heard had been sick, I wasn’t sure what was wrong with her, but as passing by her home I believe God put it on my heart to stop and see her, my first thought was “oh please, don’t ask me to do this Lord.” (We have this conversation a lot) but I found my self going up the drive of this home to knock on the door and try to explain who I was and what my reasoning was for visiting, I to this day don’t really remember what I said, but several months maybe even a year later, this young lady wrote me a note I received in the mail.
She confessed to me that she had been in the middle of a nervous breakdown and at that moment when I stopped to see her she was praying, begging God to send her comfort, and I arrived at the door. WOW, don’t ever think that you can’t be used in a situation when you feel weak and helpless. God uses the small in mighty ways.
At around the same time I also became one of five young women to start a woman’s ministry in the community; it became the beginning of a “mountain top experience” for me. Young women growing up their families in the Lord together, we supported each other through thick and thin, reached out to others, experienced Women of Faith conferences, the love of God as I had never done before as a “family” unit in fellowship with Him.
At the same time I learned the coolest thing….I learned to love God’s word, I actually started reading the Bible, and liking it, not just doing it out of obligation but I liked it. Then something else happened, I started to memorize scripture. A wonderful young lady taught me about how satan sets up tents in our minds “strongholds of deceit” and that we have the power to overcome them by building our own towers of truth over the top of the tents, I started searching out scripture for those areas where I lacked, worry, anxiety, God’s love for me, trust, my life was changing as I had known it. God’s word….hmmmm……..Oh the mountain top you think it will never end.
Then came the change in the church, or maybe it was the change in me. The Loss of what I knew church to be, a place to go to make myself feel better, to sing the songs I liked, to socialize with the people I so enjoyed, to do what I thought I was supposed to do, to fit into the conformity of what church or “religion” had always meant to me, and I realized in the midst of it all, I had been making it all about myself.
Then “God how”, no not somehow I mean “God how”, I was introduced to grace once more, as it is supposed to be, a gift, not something I could earn, I don’t think I intentionally tried to earn it, I think it was something that was taught to me even in church, another deceit of sorts I suppose.
I learned about legalism, and tradition, mans rules verses God’s grace.
My eyes were open to something that I had never seen before. It was once again freeing…truth vs. deceit, religion vs. a relationship with Christ, just another step to what my friend in Parkview had taught me; here I was still striving, just at a different level. We began experiencing worship in a different way, making it about God, instead of ourselves, unfortunately many people didn’t appreciate the change brought about in the church, and for the first time in my life, I found myself in a church with much turmoil where the traditions of man and a building became more important than God’s word.
——————————————-
TO BE CONCLUDED
A Voice Crying in the Desert 