Well, anyone who knows me knows that I am very much OCD. Me OCD with 5 non OCD children. I struggled for many years with things being undone or not completed the way "I" would do it. Don't get me wrong I am still OCD but I had really asked God to give me a word on how to not freak out so bad. So during my conversation in church, He did and He said "BE still and know that I am God........WOW, God really, I know that but the dishes were not done right and the sink did not get dried out....again He said Be still and know that I am GOD......I pondered on that thought....mind you this conversation was going on during the New Years eve service that Kirk Franklin was presenting in.......God Ok really look you don't understand, I cannot have things not in order........I guess God said ok look I have to really "go hard" on her with the scriptures and He said to me......Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell ME what you need, and thank ME for all I have done, Phillipians 4:6....changed for my one on one with HIM
What shame I felt. I knew what the scripture said but yet and still prior to this conversation I continued for many years having anxiety attacks about the smallest things.....and I mean small. But in that moment God smacked me upside my head and in an instant I heard it so clear. I was ok being the way I was but It was not ok to be so consumed with it and that He was not glorified in my neat freak mentality or flipping out because the sink was not dry. He is God and He made me who I am and each of my children who they are. Will they ever do it just like me? NO! I was given great clarity sitting in that pew on New Years eve. I can be delivered from the anxiety that I have, I can live an abundant life even if the sink is a little wet. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.........With that said God took me to the place where my anxiety was allowed to consume me.......
I have always been very scheduled. However since the move it had been hard to re-organize my life. Schools worked differently, game schedules and travel was so much different from what I knew, settling in to a new town was not the easiest thing. I was anxiety ridden for months. I know some people are like well that is not of God.....I know that....but I felt so helpless. It was a season of horrfic trial for me. I was having 2-3 anxiety attacks a day. It was a horrible feeling. I kept crying out to God to please help me, Please GOD remove this from me. I kept wondering why he wouldn't. For months this has gone on and on......so I stopped praying for GOD to remove it....I started praying for GOD to help me understand me and to find HIS PEACE! I prayed this prayer for 3 months, 12 weeks until the day before New Year's eve. Every Night for 12 weeks I would wake up at 3:33 am. I could not go back to sleep. I finally picked up my bible.........Jerimiah 33:3 ‘Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.’ .......
WOW God, you hear me.......I had changed my prayer and began to ask for undertanding for something I did not know. He began to open my heart to many things during this period of great anxiety for me. I began to understand that prior to this move, I was not listening to HIM. I was worried about anything and every thing because I was so planned. Did I ever include GOD is the moving process? I had to be so so planned out. I began to understand that the anxiety I was feeling was allowed to be in my life, so that God to allow me to finally come to him and include him in how all of this was supposed to go.
It didn't matter how many bible studies I taught or how many scriptures I knew. I was flat out not listening to GOD! So on New Years eve, it was over. The anxiety was gone. I told God if it wasn't His way, I was not going to move left or right.
I am feeling more peace and joy than I have felt in a long time. I am meal planning again and scheduling but with a new perspective. God's perspective. I am allowing what and who is bringing value to my life be in my life. My children bring value, I love to watch them hunger for the victory in their given sport. I wipe their tears in a time of defeat. I bake for track meets and spend countless hours in the snack bar. To my life that is value. Nothing I can ever buy will bring value, just more anxiety and more problems. I will not allow my need for order to counteract my need for living a life abundantly. The word says seek first the kingdom of heaven and these things will be added, things? Joy, peace, a roof, a job, food, everything I need and want will be added as long as I seek him first and in 2011, I read my bible and studied but my focus was on a major life change that God had ordained but I had removed Him from the equation. Well I thank Him for allowing me to go through it because now I see and understand that he is the one true and living God and only through him and giving him my first of everything will make my latter part of 2012 as joyful as the beginning.
