Freedom

Today was a good day. I'm not entirely sure why I'm writing this post right now, other than the fact that I know I should write and that God kind of wants me to write right now, so here I am, writing at midnight when I have a paper I really should be working on and morning classes tomorrow. I hope this is good.

I went to a conference tonight with my really good friend (and awesome DL) Lacey, and two of her friends that I met tonight. I don't know why I went. I just said yes when she asked and on the way there, I was kind of freaking out about my paper and regretting choosing to go, because I'm a crazy perfectionist and need to have everything done like two weeks before it's actually due and I swear, it's not very healthy. But anyways, I went. And I'm so glad I did.

Jim Anderson was speaking. Lacey had told me about a lot of the things he's preached about before and I was excited to finally get the chance to hear him for myself, because from what Lacey said, he sounded like a really great guy. And he is. His message was all about God's heart for his daughters and how culture has warped it into a lot of things it's not. He talked about sexual purity and the way men have not been good brothers in Christ for His daughters.

It touched me a lot. During his message, I noted a few things that I just want to share with you guys, things that I think are really great and that we can learn from.

• Feelings are fickle.
• Let's get back to the great romance - where Jesus chose us.
• "Hooking up" doesn't work when God's original design for a daughter is to be loved for who she is as a person, not in her sexuality.
• God gives us boundaries on sexuality because He loves us and knows how we will get hurt.
• Your value has nothing to do with your sexuality.
• You don't have to apologize for wanting to be loved - God designed you for appropriate attention.
• We're made to do what's right instead of what's easy.
• When we allow a demonic message about a girl's worth and value to enter a generation, things like human trafficking happen.
• Culture says "Don't you dare talk about your past or your pain." God says the opposite.
• God will separate your heart from your history.

So after this really awesome message, we had a time of prayer. And I was just talking to God like, "Well that was really great, what do You want me to hear from You through this?" And then Jim Anderson started talking about how the mistakes we've made in our past don't have to define us anymore and how God can shut the doors we opened out of sin and how we need to forgive the people that brought us there. And I just started bawling my eyes out and I don't know, I don't really think I need to write about any of this right now, but I made a lot of decisions and forgave someone who's hurt me a whole lot and I don't know - I just think that the freedom that is in Christ is such a beautiful thing, ya know? Like, you can walk away from something. You can walk away from it for years and get to the point where you don't even think about it anymore, but it's always there. There's always going to be hatred and pain whenever someone brings it up. And unforgiveness, it has this way of destroying you. It tears apart at you and turns you into a very bitter person that doesn't love the way Christ intended you to. And when you finally let go of that, when you finally forgive and allow God to shut that door and just walk away, you kind of walk away like the weight of the world was just lifted off your shoulders and you just feel different. Like everything is going to be okay and like you just got rid of something really poisonous that has been living inside of you.

And it's not easy - forgiving someone you've hated for years, someone you've tried a million times before to forgive. It's not easy to say their name out loud and to say that you've forgiven them. It was probably the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. But tonight was the most freeing night of my life, and even as I just sit here and type this at 12:16 on a Thursday night, I know that I will never forget this night and the way that God changed me.

I'm sorry, this is so not like me. This is so raw. I know there's a million grammar mistakes in here. Forgive me. But I just feel like there's someone out there that needs to read this - that needs to know that God can take that unforgiveness and help you walk through it. He can free you. He can shut those doors that have been open so long, and you can walk in complete freedom. I hope someone out there needs to hear that - because if not, this is probably just one really horribly written blog post.

Anyways. God is good. 

Goodnight.