God's call on my life

I've touched on this before through explaining the meaning behind the title of this blog, but I'd like to go into a little more detail for the moment.

I spent last weekend at a leadership training conference for Precepts Ministries International. God has been calling, leading and at times pushing me to work with this Ministry for the past year. I'm thrilled at the idea of supporting them and partnering with them, but working with them? It's not something I would naturally sign up for. But trying to be obedient, I registered for the training workshop. By the time I arrived, I was actually feeling very excited! I was spending 4 days with just God, and I was jazzed up for whatever He was going to teach me through the two days of classes.

The first day we dove into the Koine Greek in order to better understand the writings of the New Testament. You lose so much in the Greek to English translations, and doing some specific word studies can open your eyes to just what the author what trying to get across. The class was a blast! I learned so much, my peers were a delight, and the instructor was possibly the kindest person I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. I went back to my hotel that night feeling fresh, edified, and encouraged! I woke up the next morning bouncing out the door ready for another day at a Spirit-filled desk.

I returned to the hotel that night in a rather different state from the night before. I was tired. Overwhelmed. Numb. But underneath the numbness, I uncovered a thick layer of fear.

Because as I sat there in that class, my eyes were opened to a fraction of the calling that God has placed on my life. I know very little about what He wants me to do, I have only been given pits and pieces, only the parts that I need to know right now. But what I have seen, to be honest, leaves me shaking in my flip-flops. I have been on the verge of tears for 5 days now, and I'm slowly beginning to understand why.

I'm afraid. No, I'm terrified. And I'm embarrassed. Ashamed, rather. I am not the girl for the job. I am not the one that He should call to do anything. If I am going to be candidly honest, which is something I'm committed to doing, no matter how difficult, I am the absolute worst person for the job. Please do not misunderstand me. I am not pretending to be humble. I am severely annoyed by hearing people claim to be less than they are in order to be viewed as humble or worse, to force compliments out of those around them. So please, do not misunderstand me for having that sort of a spirit.

God's calling on my life is scandalous. Do you hear me? SCANDALOUS. I have absolutely dragged His name through the mud in the pit of my sin. No one on this earth knows the complete truth about where my heart, my mind, and my person have been. I have been trapped in a pit of sin that was so overwhelming, I eventually stopped trying to claw my way out and finally admitted defeat and resigned myself to die there in that mud pit. It was at THAT point, the point where I threw up my hands in surrender and plopped myself down for the duration, the point where I stopped begging for freedom, stopped crying out for relief; the point where I thought I was giving myself over to sin, I was in fact surrendering my spirit, my essence to the hands of God. He reached down, took me from the pit and set me on a rock, looked me in my face and said "Good. Now we can get somewhere."

He had to get His hands muddy by touching me. The God of Creation, the King of all kings, the very One to which every knee will bow...is willing to risk His name on me. I am not pleased by that. I am not excited by that. I am not humbled by that. I am terrified by that.

Because I know what all He has rescued me from. Yes, He's rescued me. No, I'm not living with the mind I used to have. I face people every day that look at me, thinking they know the dirt on my life. You. Have. No. Idea. The little that you may know, the little that you may have witnessed or even experienced with me if you shared my pit for any moment in time -- that was simply a touch of an outward manifestation of the WRECK that was my mind. I was at any point in time at a combination of self-righteousness and self-hatred. Combine that with the fact that I had no idea what was truth and what was a lie, either told to me by others around me or told to me by my own heart, my own mind. Every time I thought I had fallen as far as there was to go, the ground would give way beneath me just one more time.

No human being will ever understand the depth of the hell that He saved me from.

And knowing that, knowing the good, the ugly, and the hideous of who I have been, what I have done, and what has been done to me, He looked through all of it, found Anna inside all of that garbage, and called me out to Him. You see, He saved me, He delivered me. But I had to choose, have to daily choose, to answer His call.

I'm afraid to at times. Now would be one of those times. I don't want to cause Him more pain. I don't want to be a bad representative for Him any longer. I'm afraid of Him looking at me one day and being sorry.

And more honesty -- I'm also afraid of the reaction of people when they find out that God has called me. There are those out there that would just love to kick up more mud onto me. And yes, I'd deserve it. But that's another decision that I have to make daily -- Am I following God or man? Will I let my shame rule me, or will I allow myself to be convicted of my righteousness.

I hope and pray that people will look at me and will look through the garbage in my past and be able to see not Anna, but a mighty God who can save any sinner, of which I am the worst! I pray that they will see me and they will not see my face, but they will see the face of redemption and restoration! I pray they will look at me, knowing the depth of the pit I was brought from and thank God that just as He has forgiven them for the sins in their past, He had enough to pass it on to me!

I'm not sure what all God wants for me or from me in my future. But I know this: even if He does nothing else for me for the rest of eternity, I will owe Him my life for what He has done in the past. I love Him more than I fear myself or others, so I will continue to choose to say "Yes" to His call and to step out into whatever He may put my way.

Please, if you are a supporter, pray for me; and if you are in disagreement, just keep going on your way and trust that God is just and will give me any treatment He knows I deserve, no matter what you or I may say. Thank you to both sides, and I truly love you all!