I typed this up to share with Mia for the book she's writing and she encouraged me to post it here too...So, here's just one story of how Jesus has shown his love for me.... I grew up a pastor's kid and always believed and knew that Jesus was the answer, but I didn't really know the depth of his love for me until tradgedy struck and my dad, who was a pastor and an amazingly gifted musician, left our family. My dad and I shared a love for worship through music and when he left I really struggled with not wanting to fall into the same traps he did. I'd never known such betrayal and hurt. It literally left me almost emotionless as it was too painful to deal with. A year or so later we had a praise and prayer night at our church one evening and I was leading worship and was not in a very worshipful state :) A man in our church cornered me and said he had a dream about my feet and asked me if he could pray for me...I was thinking "oh, oh", because I knew that God wanted to meet with me and I wasn't sure I was up to it. I agreed and a few very lovely people started to pray for me... As they prayed the Holy Spirit came over me and out of the deepest most painful areas of my heart came a crying whail that I will never forget. It was like Jesus was inside my body and because I didn't know how, he wept for me. All the pain, all the anger, all the hurt came billowing out of my mouth as Jesus took over and loved me inside and out. The man prayed over my feet and through the Holy Spirit another woman received the message that I can be free to move forward in what God would have for me, that I didn't have to follow in my dad's footsteps that I didn't need to be a certain something to have the love of my heavenly father. Even as I type this now I am crying... I was so thankful that man from our church stepped out and responded to God's leading with his dream about my feet...this experience sparked a deep hunger in me to want to be able to do this for other people as well. So, up to that point I had dreamt quite a bit, but it was after this experience that I began to realize that God wanted a living breathing relationship with me....one where I could ask him something and he would answer. One where he would ask me to be a part of what he was doing. I had a few dreams then that came to fruition that really blew my mind and built belief in me that this dreaming was the real deal. It was a year or so after all this began that I had a dream within a dream and it was about my dad. This dream poked at the resentment in my heart towards my dad and allowed me to see a side of my dad's situation that caused me to have compassion for him. It was that dream that led me to contacting my dad. I hadn't heard from him in 4 years. He remarried and moved away and was unrepentant that he'd done anything wrong. But through Jesus I was able to write my dad a letter of forgiveness, which as I found out later was more for me than my dad. God knew that I needed to forgive my dad so I could continue to heal... I am learning that I've only scratched the surface of His beauty, wisdom and truth. I am so thankful for this website and the burden that the administrators feel to keep it real and true all while continuing to seek the wisdom and love of Jesus. So thankful for the Body of Christ! Nal.
I typed this up to share with Mia for the book she's writing and she encouraged me to post it here too...So, here's just one story of how Jesus has shown his love for me.... I grew up a pastor's kid and always believed and knew that Jesus was the answer, but I didn't really know the depth of his love for me until tradgedy struck and my dad, who was a pastor and an amazingly gifted musician, left our family. My dad and I shared a love for worship through music and when he left I really struggled with not wanting to fall into the same traps he did. I'd never known such betrayal and hurt. It literally left me almost emotionless as it was too painful to deal with. A year or so later we had a praise and prayer night at our church one evening and I was leading worship and was not in a very worshipful state :) A man in our church cornered me and said he had a dream about my feet and asked me if he could pray for me...I was thinking "oh, oh", because I knew that God wanted to meet with me and I wasn't sure I was up to it. I agreed and a few very lovely people started to pray for me... As they prayed the Holy Spirit came over me and out of the deepest most painful areas of my heart came a crying whail that I will never forget. It was like Jesus was inside my body and because I didn't know how, he wept for me. All the pain, all the anger, all the hurt came billowing out of my mouth as Jesus took over and loved me inside and out. The man prayed over my feet and through the Holy Spirit another woman received the message that I can be free to move forward in what God would have for me, that I didn't have to follow in my dad's footsteps that I didn't need to be a certain something to have the love of my heavenly father. Even as I type this now I am crying... I was so thankful that man from our church stepped out and responded to God's leading with his dream about my feet...this experience sparked a deep hunger in me to want to be able to do this for other people as well. So, up to that point I had dreamt quite a bit, but it was after this experience that I began to realize that God wanted a living breathing relationship with me....one where I could ask him something and he would answer. One where he would ask me to be a part of what he was doing. I had a few dreams then that came to fruition that really blew my mind and built belief in me that this dreaming was the real deal. It was a year or so after all this began that I had a dream within a dream and it was about my dad. This dream poked at the resentment in my heart towards my dad and allowed me to see a side of my dad's situation that caused me to have compassion for him. It was that dream that led me to contacting my dad. I hadn't heard from him in 4 years. He remarried and moved away and was unrepentant that he'd done anything wrong. But through Jesus I was able to write my dad a letter of forgiveness, which as I found out later was more for me than my dad. God knew that I needed to forgive my dad so I could continue to heal... I am learning that I've only scratched the surface of His beauty, wisdom and truth. I am so thankful for this website and the burden that the administrators feel to keep it real and true all while continuing to seek the wisdom and love of Jesus. So thankful for the Body of Christ! Nal.