Having a moment to finally catch my breath, I figured I should lay out some background information for those who are following but don't know my whole story.
I am currently living in Bayside California with 12 other men. I moved out here from Big Rock, Illinois in August to attend a school called Bethel School of Supernatural Discipleship (bssdcoast.org). They are the best kept secret out here. They are a branch school of Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry (bethelredding.com). The coast website is a tad light on info but if you navigate over to the Redding or the Lifehouse website, you'll get a bigger picture.
The purpose of the school is to create disciples. They focus on three things in this pursuit. God encounters, authentic community and culture shift. I'm not going to go any further on those points in this post. There is some information on the aforementioned sites.
Back to my story.
I have grown up within the christian culture and am quite familiar with cold, unmoving structure of legalism within it. It is a plain reflection of our culture in America. Everything bends to intellectualism. Problems are solved through the power of our own reasoning and anything that strays from that path is either brow-beaten into submission or removed altogether. Church leaders are praised for their false humility and size (results) of their church. Might makes right. This is the result of the culture overtaking the church, rather then the church overtaking the culture.
My childhood wasn't good.
Having gone through molestation at a young age and continuous bullying coming from multiple sources up until just before my teenage years, I arrived at those teenage years with a terrible self image and a deep depression.
Looking back, I'm not entirely sure how I survived those years. One thing I know with certainty is that God brought basketball into my life to help me cope. I played for a small home school team that had some amazing years. While they were dark years, having an outlet for my energy and having something to fight for saved my life. God in His kindness provided a basketball team that formed the same year I came out to the area. I can absolutely say that God created the team just for me. He is so good.
So! Having walked through these things I found myself coming out of my teenage years and at a crossroads. The battle in basketball had kept me in check but I was out of highschool. I had no idea what I would go to college for, much less have a desire to go. So college basketball was out of the picture. Combine my lack of knowing myself with a need for a battle to fight (without being violent) and I found myself in a confusing place where I hurt people and hurt myself.
After a few years of battling this and the culture of legalism within the church I was at the end of myself. So I made a deal with God. I told Him that if He wanted me to follow Him, He would have to let me know He was real and that He wanted me. I wanted to feel His presence. To know in the deepest parts of me that He loved me. I wanted more then mere head knowledge and the ability to repeat what my authorities told me was true about God.
Talk about a setup.
Shortly after this I found myself traveling to Toronto with family and a group of friends from my church to attend a Father's Love conference at Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship. On the way I made a decision in my heart. If He didn't show up here, I wanted nothing to do with Him.
From the moment I walked in I knew something was up. As soon as I stepped inside the sanctuary it felt as if Gods presence was tangible, as if I could reach out and grab a hold of it. The only word I could think of at the time to describe it was "thick". From the moment I arrived, God poured love into me. From the love of His presence to the love of His people, I couldn't get away from it and I didn't want to. I found myself addicted.
I arrived back home from that trip a changed man. The following ten years were a journey of discovery, forgiveness of self and others, restoration and growing in many other ways. A key part of that journey was the realization that I had allowed fear to be a controlling factor in the majority of my decisions. I could look back and see where each decision based on fear had brought me, and I could see that even though I hadn't allowed God authority in those decisions, His passion for me was so great that His mercy over-ruled my failures.
I began to realize that I could trust Him. I no longer wanted to agree with fear. It was over rated. What He had for me was so much better then anything I could do on my own. So finally, I sold out to Him. I felt God calling me to discipleship and that has led me to where I am now at this school.
There is a best that God has for us!
I wanted it but I couldn't get it allowing fear to make my choices for me. I've had to tell it no. I still hear it sometimes. It comes in many forms and sometimes it appears larger then what I know how to deal with. But if I take my focus off the problem and turn it onto God, if I begin to tell God how good He is, how kind He is. If I begin to worship Him, then suddenly my problem is not only manageable, it's laughable.
Do you know what someone who hates you can't stand? When you laugh at them. Their power over you disappears because all they had was intimidation and now even that is gone. The enemy of our souls can't deal with it.
Laughter comes from joy. Joy comes from God. It comes from when you look at Him in passionate love and He looks back in joy and suddenly, it's your joy because you see yourself through His eyes.
And what He see at that moment is His deepest desire.
You.
