Because He Loves Me

Time to write. So many beautiful earth-shattering and Heaven-invading events have happened lately. And as I write that very phrase, I realize "Isn't that a normal thing, now?" To see Heaven invade earth is what the one thing I am living and breathing for. My heart has been gripped by the One whose eyes know me and are full of the purest, truest, most beautiful love that I have ever known.I am changed. I can feel it in my heart, a sense it in my thoughts, I hear it in my words. Change.

I am letting the Fire out of the fireplace. I am letting go and letting God. I am beginning to understand what it means to utterly surrender, and in that, be taken violently captive by the Love of Jesus. And in that captivity, to have no other desire and delight than to love Him in return by letting my heartstrings be tuned to His heartstrings, and to have my heartbeat in rhythm with His.

From my journal today: "I am learning just how easy it is to love people when God's love lives inside of me. It's not about "getting' someone to understand something about God and do something about it, and it's not about talking someone into saying a prayer that they didn't mean. It's about having a real conversation, being real, being you, and letting Holy Spirit be Himself. I have always wanted the boldness -- to feel the burn from the aching and longing in my heart -- to see miracles and to pray for people and introduce them to Jesus. In the past, I have had the boldness to pray for people but have always been discouraged about myself during or after my attempt to offer an encounter to someone with Jesus..."

The reason why I was discouraged was because I was believing a lie. To preface this "lie," I would first like to say, lies always rob you of something. This lie was robbing me of walking in the supernatural, and the supernatural boldness to love people as Jesus did.

The lie was this: Lauren, you're not doing or saying that good enough. You just can't do anything right. You're always just doing so-so, and even when you think you give your all, you're only giving half, and still that isn't good enough. God's unsatisfied and expects so much more of you. So you're setting yourself up for failure, displeasure, disappointment, because frankly, you just can't do anything right.

I know that I am not the only one who has lived under the shadow of that kind of lie before. It's called the "You're-not-good-enough lie." Even reading those words.... it's pretty disgusting, isn't it? It's so complicated and gross! The subtle but murderous lie basically tells people that they are always missing the mark and that something is slightly wrong with them - always. What I found that lie caused me to wear was the unfitting blankets of Insignificance and Self-doubt, which is basically lack of confidence in who I am as a unique person. 


On Wednesday night, God rocked me and told me, guess what, that's a lie, And guess what, that means it's not reality! Then He showed me reality: I am standing in a wide open field in front of a tree, and Jesus is there next to that tree. I see His eyes, I can see right up close into them, even though we are standing a few feet away. His eyes pierce my soul. It's as if His eyes say 'I know about everything - all the pain, all the hurt, all the struggles.' At the same time, His eyes say, 'Lauren you are my beautiful bride and I am madly in love with who you are...come away with me and be mine!' His eyes also flood with tenderness and mercy. His eyes are full of liquid love, full of compassion, full of answers, full of hope.
There is a coat on my shoulders, and it's brown. That coat is called Insignificance. I stand before Jesus, he says, its time for that coat to be off of you. So in the vision I take off the coat and put it down next to the tree. Then I see something amazing. Jesus looks down at the coat, picks it up, and with one hand, throws it into the sky in the opposite direction - like a boomerang that can't ever come back. Jesus looks back at me and smiles. It was that easy. Then He comes up to me and starts dancing around me and sing this love song. I stand there and Jesus is rejoicing...over me.
There is another coat, he says. This coat is called Self-Doubt. And it's time for that coat to come off too. Again, I take it off, put it by the tree, and Jesus picks it up and flings it into oblivion. Then He rejoices over me. I see myself without those coats on, and I am wearing a pure white dress. I feel light and I feel free. I am free.  

So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. - John 8:36

I have never felt this free before: Free to live, free to give, free to be, and free to love Jesus and love people. Oh, to be ever aware of His heart beat for his people! And so I will stay there with Jesus, in the wide open field, wearing my white dress, and leaning against the tree with Him who loves me for who I am - not for what I have done. He loves me because He Is Love.

And the rest of the story could be told like this:
Because He loves me I do what I do; 

And I do what I do because He loves me.