I know.
Ya'll are just dying to hear me eat my words.
As I said earlier,
I'm glad I was forced to go went.
Bev Bradley is a great speaker.
She's funny,
she looks fabulous,
she loves Jesus,
knows her Bible,
and was pretty transparent.
Two things she said that I really need to remember are
"Conviction comes from God, and points me to Him;
condemnation comes from Satan, and points me towards myself."
and
"When we obey Jesus, people will be blessed.
When we are overextended
[taking on work that He doesn't have for us to do]
people around us will suffer."
I'd have to say that the biggest thing I went home with though,
was not something that Bev said,
but rather something I wrote down
while we were just having a few minutes of silent prayer
after the last session Friday evening.
As a family,
for years we have prayed that we would 'grow in love'
or that we'd 'be more loving'.
What I wrote was
"We pray that God would help us to grow in love.
I think, what we need instead - what I need instead,
is to grow in the knowledge of His love."
I think Tyler tried to tell me this once,
but I didn't get it.
I suppose I was still trying to do things in my own power..
Until I really grasp
Christ's love is for me,
I can't really grow in love.
About a year or so ago,
I sorta quit believing that God loved me.
Me.
Yes, I still believed He was my Savior,
that He loved 'the world' and all,
but I was really struggling with the idea of Him loving
me, personally.
I figured there must be a loophole somewhere.
(Being sick can do strange things to you - I see that now)
Sometimes in church
I couldn't even sing some of the songs;
they just felt like lies.
Two weeks ago on Sunday,
we sang the song How He Loves Us
and I couldn't sing it.
Not because I didn't believe it,
but because I did.
Finally.
I usually read the Bible to see what I need to do,
how I need to live.
But I think that,
for awhile anyways,
I'm going to try to read with the mindset of
increasing my knowledge of God - and His love for me
which,
I think will naturally result in an increasing love for him
and others.
Bev says 1 Corinthians 13 is not an assignment;
it's an invitation.
So, yeah.
I'm kinda glad I went to the retreat.
This is so similar to what I am trying to "get". I catch glimpses but I allow myself to be thrown back into the flurry of life and it fades away again.
ReplyDeleteSo often I find myself looking for a todo list instead of for a He is picture.
inspiring - a revelation !!
ReplyDelete