I am taking a course called Communicating Emotions this semester. For our big assignment of the semester, we are keeping a journal and then elaborating off one specific story for a presentation at the end of the semester. The directions are to pick an emotion, relationship or situation that we are currently involved in as the focus. I thought about how cool it would be to write about my relationship with the Lord.
For one reason, it is easy for me to write about and will feel more like a hobby, or just time to spend with the Lord than an assignment. Another reason I wanted to write about God is that I thought how awesome it would be to have an opportunity to reach someone in my class who maybe knows nothing about the Lord. This is my first journal entry and I as a warning it is a tad long, it had to be 4-6 pages but it was enjoyable to write and got me thinking a lot about my past couple years here at college and how my relationship started and now is growing and flourishing with Christ.
Emotions. They are an interesting phenomenon. They, in my opinion, are what define a relationship. The emotions you feel when learning and growing with someone are vital to keep it going. If you have a special connection with that person, emotions can overwhelm you to the point where whatever you say and however you try to convey your thanks and own feelings never seem to be enough. I’ve been blessed enough to experience this kind of relationship. That is, my relationship with my Lord and Savior.
I didn’t always know the Lord like I do now. I didn’t always have a relationship with Him. I used to use Him as a lifeline when I was in trouble. I use to live my life by worldly desires and standards, getting caught up in situations where I felt like I was drowning and overwhelmed. Only then would God hear a word from me. My life was so blinded; I didn’t feel I had a choice in any matter. When something bad would happen to me I would ask God why He let that happen. In my head I thought I knew exactly what constituted good morals but then would turn around and do the exact opposite and not understand why my life felt so dim. I felt like I was walking in darkness, running into things left and right, not seeing what God was placing right in front of me, and that was salvation.
The Lord started working on my heart through a Bible study I attended called Athletes in Action. Through discussion and dissection of the word I started to realize all the areas of my life that desperately needed the Lord. The Holy Spirit was on point and in tune with tugging at my heart. I’d sometimes ignore those feelings, fooling myself that I was content with the life I was living, but the tugs still came and thank the Lord they did!
The moment that sticks out in my mind where I fully felt the magnitude of God’s grace and love was when I was sitting with my friend and mentor, Allison. She asked me on a scale of 1 to 10 whether I thought I was going to heaven. I said an 8 after much thought and uncertainty. That was when Allison assured me that it is a 10 as long as I ask God into my heart because He has already died for my sins. Holy moly the feeling I had in my heart that day! It felt as light as air; relief and awe at the Lord’s mercy. I felt giddy like a kid on Christmas and couldn’t wipe my smile off my face the rest of the day.
I felt as if I finally understood after years of guessing and wondering. I don’t have to do anything for the Lord but I should want to for that exact reason. I am so unworthy of the Lord’s gift of eternal life that I want to do everything I can to thank Him and bring Him glory while I am here on earth. God equipped me with certain gifts and I want to use each and every one of those to bring Him glory, because He has blessed me with the gift to do so. God designed our hearts to want a relationship with Him, and that is why before I had an intimate relationship with Him, part of my life felt so empty.
Before I knew the Lord, I struggled a lot with confidence and it is still something that through prayer and trust I am trying to get over. I didn’t have confidence in my appearance, in my thoughts, how I acted. I was never sure of myself and always seeking worldly opinions and listening to advice just for the sake of thinking it was better then my own decision. I didn’t like people to be upset with me; therefore, I bought into their ideas and followed along in order to appease them.
In my walk leading up to coming to know the Lord, I had to go through some rough times. I was faced with moments of my past that haunted me and certain people in my life would not let me forget them. In order to feel Christ’s true forgiveness, I had to forgive myself. I remember the moment perfectly when I first truly sensed God’s forgiveness. I was at work and had left to walk outside to talk to the person I was trying to convince I was a new creation in the Lord. This person did not want to hear what I had to say and couldn’t understand how that could be possible. I remember crying trying to convey to them how I felt this and just wished they could see it the same way. I was sitting on the cold ground and all of a sudden a light went off in my head. I felt God enter my thoughts and calm me instantly. I felt His presence and that it said, “I believe you, I know you are a beautiful new creation in my image and I’d love you even if you weren’t”. Those tears of sadness turned quickly into tears of happiness and thanks and I was able to stand firm in God’s truth about myself and not worry about anything else. That was the start of my confidence change. It took a lot of relying on the Lord to see it grow but over the past couple months He has definitely shown my reasons in my life to feel confident and had guided me through some situations that I would have been extremely hard to overcome if it weren’t for my trust in His plan.
The first emotion I feel when I even think of the Lord is love. This type of love feels overwhelming, like there is not enough room in your own heart for so much love. That is why I like to think of God’s love filling me up to the point where that love spills over unto others. To experience the immense power and peace of God’s love can only be described as incredible. Another emotion that comes to mind when I think of the Lord is gratitude. There is no way I’d be where I am today without the Lord. I have come so far in who I am and where I stand for myself. I get goose bumps and am sometimes brought to tears when I think of all the Lord has done for me and how He has turned my life towards a path that leads straight to Him.
Regardless of people’s responses to how I acted, one thing remained constant: they definitely saw a change. Most of my family and friends have been supportive, happy, and proud of my coming to know the Lord and how I now carry myself. It is awesome to get encouragement from them and I can only hope that in some way I do the same for them. Others; however, have said that I have changed for the worst or have now become a “Jesus-freak”. Those people I cannot be angry at, because they are entitled to their opinion I just pray one day that opinion can be changed. Yes I have changed, I cannot deny that, but I would not change it for anything and feel so much better about myself because of it. I feel I have become more in tune with my feelings and feelings of others. I do not worry about how my life will turn out because I trust in the Lord’s plan for me. I do not fear death because I know I will have eternal life in heaven, and am excited for that day to come. I have more confidence in myself and know God loves me for me, flaws included. I know that to Him, they are not even flaws because how I am made is perfectly in His image and He designed me this way for a reason.
Like I started out saying, sometimes in relationships you feel that no matter how hard you try and convey your emotions, they will never be enough to show how you feel. The amazing thing about my relationship with the Lord is that even though I sometimes cannot put into words or actions how I feel, He still knows. He knows every emotion that I have ever felt and am ever going to feel and He feels these along with me. He knows my heart and exactly what makes it flutter, love, or even break. He allows me to feel all these feelings with a guiding hand right next to me the whole time. He does not leave my side for a problem that is “too big” because nothing is too big for the Lord. He allows feelings, situations and instances to come into my life and help me grow in my faith and become the woman He intended me to be.
"So flee youthful passion and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart."
- 2 Timothy 2:22
