The Lord is my song! This post is going to be a testimony of the Lord's faithfulness in my life. I do not know how many people read this blog, but I want to proclaim to all of you that today I discovered that I am deeply in love with someone. That someone is my Jesus! I have been a Christian for as long as I can remember, but for most of my life I have treated the one who made and loves me as if he were a member of my family. Let me explain that statement. I love my family, but, sadly, because I know that they will always be there for me and love me unconditionally, I often think about myself before them. I live for myself, and my love for them does not impact the way I live towards or treat them. That is how I treated God.
I had a hard day today. (As a side note, I want you all to realize that this is somewhat monumental because I have always, until this point in my life, hated being vulnerable and telling people when I am having a hard day. This too has changed) I had a hard night last night. I had a hard semester honestly, but it came to a crucial point over the last two days. I had been depending on something other than God to make me happy. My hopes and dreams were based around this thing. Boy, did I have a lesson to learn!
Last night when I was struggling, God knew the thing I needed most was to be able to sleep in peace. It says somewhere in the Bible that he grants sleep to the ones that he loves. I went home, got in bed, and within ten minutes I was asleep. For those of you who do not know my strange sleep patterns, I am going to tell you that this was a small miracle because I never can fall asleep in such a short amount of time. But God knew that if I did not get to sleep soon, I would stay up all night dwelling on my misery. This morning, I woke up in the same mood, and still aching inside myself. I pretended that I was the usual happy me, but then more miseries happened, and there could be no more pretending.
As a general rule, I do not cry in front of people. I do not tell my heart or say, "I am struggling with such and such." I had so much pride. After the last hard thing happened, my friend, who has been a god-send to me, called me. We have both been struggling with similar things, and she had gotten an answer to prayer today. I was genuinely happy for her, but, like any good friend would, she saw right through my smiles and said, "Girl, we need to talk." Yes, we did. (Can just take another side note, and say that friends like that are the best things in life!)
So we talked. Oh, the advice I got! And, the funny thing is that even while we were talking about the peace that comes from loving God before anything else, I was still loving this thing more. We prayed, and then I felt this amazing peace and joy come over my heart, when, from no earthly perspective, should I have felt any. The facts in the situation had not changed, except perhaps for the worse, but the Lord did a major love transfer for me. And, it was none of my doing!
Let this post also be a testimony for the controversial truth of predestination. I have faced trials and temptations throughout my life. By any human standard, I ought to have been well along on the road to Hell by now because of the horrible habits I developed as a child and teenager. Had I been the one who was running my life, making my own life-changing decisions, and ultimately choosing to follow God and become a Christian (or not), I would have picked the worst course possible. There is NO way I would have made any good choice. But throughout my life, I have seen the hand of God drawing my heart and affections to himself. I have wanted to rebel, I have come along kicking and screaming, but he saved my soul! Even now, as a Christian, I continually choose the wrong path. This past semester, and up until today, was the worst it has ever been. I am telling all of you, I was well on my way to becoming a useless tool for God - a Christian who makes it to Heaven with no life of faith to show on the Day of Judgement. I would be crying on my bed tonight, not writing this and doing my homework. God has plans for his precious child. I can say that with no pride in my heart - I do not deserve a second chance of living my life for Jesus, but I got one. And when I say "through no merit of my own," I mean it with all of my heart!
So, yes, I am in love with my Savior, Redeemer, Bridegroom, and Best Friend - Jesus! By the grace of God, I will always love him more than I will ever love anything else in the world! By the way, he is the best and most selfless kind of lover. You think you have something to boast about your lover? Well, my lover died for me! Yeah, he DIED! You think I want to do anything for him? You bet I do! I never want to drift back into the kind of shallow Christian life I was living. Any hurt that has been caused me is more than forgiven, because I realized that it gave me the best gift I could ask for - a closer walk with my Jesus. Any misery through which I suffered, I am thankful for.
As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, the Lord is my song! That phrase has a whole new meaning for me. I am a voice major, and even before tonight I loved to sing worship music to my Lord, but now I do not just sing to him, he is the one who validates and causes the words I sing. My mouth and words belong to him. Speaking of that, I hope that this wordy post shows you the way the Lord has worked in my life, and can be of some benefit to anyone who may be struggling with letting God be first in his or her life. And I hope that you can see that this is not me pridefully saying, "I am so wonderful that I learned to love God first. You can be as wonderful as me if you just listen to me." I am saying nothing of the kind! I am proclaiming the love and grace of my Savior and telling you that he is the solution to every problem. Please pray for me to always love my Lord first!
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