Category: surrender

Several years I finally gave up.

I was coming out of a long season of demanding my way with God in most every aspect of my life – my relationships, my job, my money, my service in the church, my entire life.  I had dug my heals in so deeply that I was beginning to feel the consequences of shame and regret. Nothing satisfied me. I was depressed. And most of all I was tired.

I was living around the presence of God but not truly living in the presence of God.  He was like an accessory in my life, but I was not surrendered to His will, His plan, His desires – even if it meant forfeiting my own. I was not consumed by His presence.

And neither were my prayers.

They were the typical prayers you would expect – please bless my family, please keep me safe, please bring me a husband. But they weren’t prayers that made me risk anything. That asked for my world to be turned upside down. That threatened my identity.

Until the day that I gave up.

On that day these words came from my mouth:

“God, I want to be used big by you. Really big. Do whatever you have to do within me. Make me as uncomfortable as you need to. But no more am I going to run from your presence. Instead I am going to sit in it with the faith that you know what is best for me always. Please use me for something big.”

Fast forward three years and there I sat in an ICU room at three o’clock in the morning, my head rested on the side of the bed where my new husband laid.

We found out about six months earlier that he would need a heart transplant, but never did I know that the road would look like this. Heart transplants in the hospital we were at are almost everyday procedures. But not for John. This night he laid there days before being put on life support after catching a staph infection. Our road was already long and now was going to be longer.

The words I prayed a few years earlier, before I was even married, flashed through my mind.

And this is how I responded to God:

“Lord, I never thought this is how you would do it – using me to care for a dying husband after all the years I prayed for you to bring him to me. But I remember my prayer to you, and I know you are answering it for me in this moment. Please give me strength.”

It is humbling to even attempt to understand the workings of our Creator – the reasons He does what He does or allows what He allows (Isaiah 55:8). But I can’t help but wonder if my prayer “to be used big” three years earlier showed God that I was finally ready to experience all He is capable of doing within me.

During that time not only did John have a wife to be his helper, but it was an opportunity to give God every ounce of glory to all who were watching. I made it publicly clear from the start that whether John lived or died I would not turn my back on God. And people watched and listened. I would receive email after email about how John’s story was affecting people’s lives.

Was this how God was using me big? I like to think so.

The blessing became mine because for the first time in a long time I was not just surrounded by His presence, but I was in His presence.

It was glorious.

Today I continue to pray to be used big. Yes, I pray the other prayers, too, for health and safety and blessings. But I want more of what will rock my world in such a way that I have to cling to the Cross. I am fully aware that a bold prayer such as this asks God to allow things that may be uncomfortable, unpleasant, and scary. But how else will I know the power of Cross without taking up my own cross and following only after His purposes (Matthew 10: 37-39)?

Today pray to be used big for God. As uncertain as those words may seem or whatever comes to your mind that you need to first lay at His feet, He will meet you there. And trust me, the blessing of sitting in your Lord’s presence will be yours.

What comes to your mind when you think of praying a bold prayer such as this? Do you feel invigorated atthe possibilities or fearful? Please share with us. We’d love to hear your thoughts!

The next week I published a follow-up to this post entitled “Pray to Be Used Big? Or Pray to Be Faithful?” Please read it here.

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“A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.”

Ecclesiastes 4:12

Over the past few years since I began writing here at Triple Braided, this blog has metamorphosed and become more refined as I process experiences in my life. I write out out of my experiences, and those experiences have mostly been John’s sickness and then later my years as a single woman. From my season of singleness comes my passion for single women, and what I believe to be one of the reasons God allowed me to experience those years, so that I can encourage and minister to other women in their season of singleness. For this I consider those years a blessing, and I honestly would not change them if it means that they can be used to show others a glimmer of Jesus in their lives.

However, my life has changed since then. Even though I still feel like that single girl now embodying a married woman’s body, the reality is that I am married, and now I am going to have a baby. My thoughts swarm with questions and ideas and wonderings about these seasons of my life, too, and I need a space to lay down all of this fullest in my mind. That place is Triple Braided.

There is a common theme in my life, which I first recognized at the end of my years as a single woman. Regardless of what season I have been in or am in now, I still struggle with surrendering my life to Jesus. I struggle with keeping Him as the Third Braid in my life. I struggle with laying my life down for a bigger purpose that I know nothing of yet. For me, it’s the everyday where I struggle with surrender the most. It is easier for me to surrender my husband being on life support or my mom dying of cancer. It is easier for me to have courage and hope in the experiences that I literally cannot control. But everyday I struggle with surrendering the little things that lead me to bondage and eventually will no longer be little but will become strongholds that are harder to mend. The mission of Triple Braided comes from my struggle with surrender.

I may be considered an “expert” in singleness only because when you are out of something is suddenly become crystal clear. And like I said, I still feel that single girl trapped inside a married woman’s body. I don’t want that for other single women. I want them to feel freedom in their single years and in their future marriages. Single women are my heart, and Triple Braided will always have a prominent place for you here. I will continue to write for you to hopefully shed some wisdom, love, and encouragement on this season of your life.

And by no means am I an expert in marriage or motherhood. I tend to always feel like whatever stage I’m in it is the “hardest things I’ve ever done”, and I feel that way about marriage right now. Marriage is hard. And I hear motherhood is harder. I know nothing about either of them really. But I want to share what God shows me in these areas of my life, too, so that others may see Him in their lives.

So this is the direction Triple Braided is taking. The mission is to encourage women in a life surrendered to Jesus through every season so that we can experience unbroken lives. 

Jesus said, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their live for me will save it.”

Luke 9:23-24 (NIV)

I pray that God will be glorified though my words and that together, as a community of Christ-followers, we will experience peace through seeking to lead surrendered, Triple Braided lives. I am honored to have you a part of it.

Do you struggle with surrendering each day to Jesus? Is it more in the “big things” or in the “little things” like me? Leave a note in the comments. I would love to hear from you.

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Today I am telling a story that I am living right now – a story of finding God’s true purpose for my life – and there is an awesome giveaway from Jeff Goins to go along with it!  If you’re most interested in the giveaway, just scroll down to enter.  He’s giving away two of his most recent eBooks, and I would love for you to have a copy!  I’ve read them, and they are just like all of his other works – useful, practical, and without fluff! Every aspiring writer’s must haves!

But first my story of becoming a writer and finding purpose . . . wow . . . yes . . . a writer . . .

I think the first time I really wrote about it was when I announced that I was getting off of the ferris wheel.  The ferris wheel started two years after I graduated college, and believe it or not I did get off a few times, only to get back on again.  It’s funny how the familiar, ever how miserable or possibly outside of God’s will, keeps us going around and around and around – feeling hopeless and afraid. 
That was me.  And sometimes it still is me.  But at least now I’m working on getting off for good.
 
But anyway, it was when I was sitting in John’s hospital room before he had his transplant that it came to me.  The missing piece to the puzzle that has left me feeling bound to a career I detested to the point of feeling moral guilt.  I began writing each day in the months that led up to those hospital days about caring for my sick husband and how my soul hurt and how God was faithful.  And with each post I wrote I felt better.  I felt like there was a place for my mind on those pages, and I was able to release it each night there.  Shortly after I began writing it became my mission to write for a purpose.  I did not know if John would die or not, but I was determined that our story would be used for good.  So I wrote it.  Day in and day out.  I wrote it.

And I remembered my little girl self sitting in my room writing a story about a unicorn.  I liked to write, and by school standards I was a good writer.  But I never thought so.  I got frustrated with it, and pushed it down deep, deep inside.   I remember telling myself over and over again that I wasn’t creative.  I was logical and organized and predictable.  I was the first child.  The responsible one.  Not the artist.  But no matter how hard I tried to make my life match these labels, it didn’t.  I was really a dreamer and messy and spontaneous. 

So I began to explore this new need to write that gave me my oxygen each of those days, in and out of the hospital, not knowing what tomorrow would bring.  And I began to really contemplate the effects of the ferris wheel and my purpose for this life I’ve been given. 

After those scary days had passed, I sat in our pastoral counselor’s office at church not knowing which way was right.  I knew I had to get off.  I knew the ride had to come to an end.  Then he said to me, “Brenda, you are a writer.  You are a creative.”

My world opened up.  For once I knew myself and was comfortable there.  It was o.k. to hate the ferris wheel and to be messy and disorganized and dream about unicorns. 

I was meant for something different.  I was meant to write. 

So, I began to study the art and industry of writing.  And, boy, is it vast and hard.  It is a lot of work. 

But there are some great people out there who not only are great writers, but who love writing so much they like to teach us how to do it better.  Jeff Goins is one of them.  His blog is an endless well of information, and he is so gracious that he offers most of it for free.

Most recently he has written two new eBooks: Every Writer’s Dream: How to Never Pitch Your Writing Again and Before Your First Book: 5 Tips to Get Published Now. 
    
I have read both of the eBooks, and this is what I like most about Jeff’s writing:

• He is honest.  He tells it like it is without fluff or dramatized sentimentalism.  But he is also encouraging. 
• His books are practical.  They are easy to understand with one, two, three, . . . steps to take.  
• His books are useful. I am always feel like I have information all in one place that I would have taken hours to find bits and pieces scattered all over the internet.  
• I am left with the feeling that he truly loves writing, so he genuinely wants to help people be successful at writing, too.

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