Ok, wow - it's been since September since I last blogged. Well, I guess if you look on the bright side, at least I'm not addicted to blogging...
So what have I been up to in the last 9 months? No I didn't have another baby, yet... But I have made some major life changing decisions. I have resigned from my ministry position at Living Word Christian Center to stay home full-time with my daughter, Lily, who is now 15 months old (picture above). Also, I needed to free up more of my time so that I could focus on planning our family's move to Colorado Springs in October. Yep, you heard right. We are leaving good 'ole Chi-town.
It's definately bitter sweet. These last seven years in Chicago have been the best of my life, and we've loved living here. But, it appears that the fire cloud is moving so to speak, and the Lord is leading us to leave our comfort zone once again. It's been an awesome learning experience working with the Lord during this decision. As a matter of fact, now that I think about it, it's been about nine months, since the Lord spoke to us about leaving Chicago. No wonder I wasn't blogging. I was too busy hanging out in the secret place asking the Lord - "Is this really you I'm hearing? This doesn't make any sense? How could you be telling us to leave, when we are so at home here?????"
But, after spending lots and lots of quiet time with the Lord and praying this over with my husband, we feel that yes, in fact, these are God's instructions to us. At the end of the day, of course we have to believe that we've heard God by faith. He didn't come down himself and appear to us nor send an angel, he is just leading us by an inner witness and his still quiet voice.
Ya know, one thing I've learned over the last several years of my walk with the Lord, is how to have confidence that I can hear from him. I remember when I met the first couple of Christians that actually seemed to hear God talking to them. I remember thinking, these people have something that I don't. God doesn't talk to me like that. And honestly I was jealous. I wondered, does God love them more than me? But rather than get upset, I remembered the scripture in Acts 10:34 that says, "God is not a respecter of persons." So, I decided that if he could speak clearly to the people in the Bible and the ordinary Christians that I knew, then surely he could talk to me too.
So I started journaling and talking to the Lord in writing, and waiting to see if I could hear anything. It took a little practice and definately some faith, but after a while I began just trusting that what I was hearing was not my own thoughts. I stood on scriptures like Jer. 33:3 that says "When you call, I will answer, and show you great and mighty things that thou knowest not." and in John 10:4 that says (I paraphrase) "My sheep hear and recognize my voice."
Pretty soon, I began to hear God just as clearly as those other folks. I learned to trust that as long as what I'm hearing is in line with scripture, then there is no reason to fear or doubt that it is from the Lord. And the really cool thing that happened was that the Lord starting showing me things to come as promised in John 16:13. I remember one time, when he told me to get ready to receive a call from Pastor Winston to preach and sure enough the next day I got the call. It was really cool.
Since then, I have learned to rely on this voice more and more and trust that it is truly the voice of the Holy Spirit, my helper, my guide, my teacher and my stand-by. I am so thankful for this voice and for His guidance. So as my family and I venture into this new chapter of our lives and step out into the unknown once again, we are confident that the Good Shepherd is leading us one step at a time into more and more of His goodness for our lives.
Till next time, which I promise will be soon, be blessed and take some time just to hang out and listen to the Lord!
Love,
Schlyce
