Contempt, Part 2

As a quick recap of Contempt, Part 1, (if haven’t read it yet, this post will make a lot more sense if you do) I was in worship mode, and God revealed to me that I had been harboring a very strong spirit of contempt, specifically, self-contempt. I was also advised to pray against said spirit.

So, as I was praying, God spoke to me, and this is where we left off at in Part 1.

What God spoke to me, has a lot to with a couple of previous conversations he and I had, back around the same time as the weird prayer meeting. This was all during a time when I felt God calling me to drop all the crazy worthless messes I was chasing in life and follow him. I did, and it sucked. My world crumbled BUT, I knew God was with me, and I knew it had to get worse before anything would ever get better. Courtesy of my terrible life choices.

My salvation was a 4 month-long process filled with a lot of repenting, a lot of crying, a lot of peace, more crying, and a whole ‘lotta love. During this time I didn’t have a clue what I supposed to do next. I broke up with the boyfriend who I was in a co-dependent relationship with, I quit the job that proved to be a negative environment with too many temptations, I tried to find a church where I wasn’t looked down upon, but all these changes were leaving me feeling really overwhelmed. On top of that, I was like, desperately on fire for God, I wanted to do anything and everything I could to please him.

I used to smoke and I would go sit on my back stoop and pray and cry and smoke until I felt nauseous. And during several of these really unhealthy cigarette binges, I prayed that God would show me what he wanted me to do. And every single time, I heard the same whisper. Feed the hungry.

What that meant, I didn’t know, I just tried to feed anyone who would even look at me. I would have all the neighborhood kids at my house, stuffing them with all kinds of snacks. I tried my hardest to come up with a feasible way to start a soup kitchen. One that fed patrons awesome food, not watery soup and thin sandwiches. And treated them like paying guests. As a single mom, it was not in the cards.

I talked to my mom about it and she told me maybe God didn’t mean feeding the hungry with actual food. Maybe he meant I was to feed the spiritually hungry. So I started Holy Lemonade, my first attempt at a Christian blog. Again, it failed, because the next year when fees were due (I had started it self-hosted) guess who couldn’t pay. Yup.

But I diligently studied my Bible and devoted myself to God, despite the hurdles. I got on my knees one day and just bowed silently to him. No words. No song. Just reverence. I remember feeling this urge to pick up my Bible, and I just read where it opened.

I wish I could give you chapter and verse of what I read, but I honestly just can’t remember. What I do remember, is that it had something to do with prophesying, and that specifically, I felt it was being tasked to me. I even remember calling my mom to tell her and making some lame joke about being God’s Yoda. It wasn’t funny, but I give her props for laughing anyway.

I had no idea what that meant, I just felt like God would lead me there when I was ready. I also thought it meant predicting the future. As if.

So now that you know way too much about me, let’s bring it back to the present. God is speaking to me again. I just have to say, either God is doing some insanely awesome things in my life, or I am absolutely, 100% crazy.

Anyhoo. I am praying hard against this spirit, the spirit of self-contempt. And I don’t know, this has never happened to me before, but it’s like everything just got really quiet in my heart and I saw everything really clearly.

I had all these memories come flooding back to me, these very specific words and verses that God had laid on my heart years ago. I felt an impulse to look up what it meant to prophesy, and here’s what I found out. Prophesying has nothing to do with predicting future events or having random knowledge about people you’ve never met. It’s actually encouraging, comforting, and exhorting the Church.

As I read this, I felt God saying to me,

Alecia, you’re not lost. You’re not broken. You’re not failing your family. You’re not failing me. You’ve given your heart to me, you’ve done all that your human heart and mind will let you to follow me. You are doing exactly what I asked, and you were so blinded by the lies of the Enemy, you didn’t even realize that you are on the path I destined for you.

When you do your nightly devotions with your family, reading and explaining my Word to them, you are feeding the hungry, you are prophesying in my name. When you hear from me, and you can’t think of anything else until you tell someone, or write about it, you are prophesying in my name. This blog, the community you are building around it, this is the Church, as much as any brick and mortar building, and the words you write are encouraging, comforting, edifying, and exhorting my sheep who read them. Your desires for the future, they are always centered around feeding the spiritually hungry. And isn’t it ironic that I have placed you in a position literally feeding hungry children every day? Do you think it is coincidence that when your own children were on the verge of spiritual starvation, I provided the means for you to work without missing a single weekend, holiday, summer or evening with them? You are not a failure child….far from it.

You have been experiencing my glory and power in your life in trickles. You remain undisciplined in your obedience and in your faith because you have believed the spirit of self-contempt. No more! You are free from the false weight of lack. It is time for you to advance, time for you to watch me flow through your life like rushing water.

So go, continue to feed the hungry, continue to prophesy. I will make your paths straight.

Wow.

That’s all I can say, even now. I was bawling like a baby after all that. And I went back and forth on sharing any of this because I feel like I’m just talking about myself a lot and it’s like really dramatic and really crazy…but God told me to. So here it is.

I don’t know what this testimony will speak to any of you, if anything at all. I can only guess that some of you might be thinking that you are also failures. That you disappoint everyone around you, including God. You might be focusing on all of things you don’t have that you think you should, or on things you think you’re not doing, or at least not doing right.

I’m here to tell you that if you truly love the Lord, and commit yourself to obeying him and trusting him, he will lead you to exactly where you are supposed to be. You may even be living out your destiny as we speak, and not even realize it.

So take a look around, and if you feel lost despite the knowledge that you are saved, ask God to reveal any fear, mentality, or spirit that might be hindering you from seeing the truth.

And remember, God is faithful. Stop worrying, you’re ok.