Deliverance: Swords for Stones

This word gets talked about a lot in charismatic Christian circles, but I've never really stopped to understand it.

The dictionary definition of it is: to be set free, rescued.

But what I'm realizing is that it's more than that.

Deliverance means not just to be set free, but to receive a delivery of Jesus more deeply and more fully.

So being delivered is not just about things being let go, but actually about receiving more.

This is the season I'm in. I believe Jesus desires to set me free from deep fear, but this freedom actually has more to do with me more fully receiving Him, than just the chains of fear being broken. They are two sides of the same coin.

So how do I fully receive my beautiful, powerful and wondrous Jesus in this season where so many of my fears are flaring and most hours are filled with worry, doubt and anxiety?

The battle is real, intense, and easily discourages me. But the answer is simple. When fear rears its ugly head, when the worry flares, when the doubts arise:

pray and praise. 

That's it.

PRAY AND PRAISE, SHANNON.

When Nuru's nose starts to bleed, when I get insecure about my calling or leading, when I think about being a parent, when I worry about work or Ash:

pray and praise.

It seems super simple, but it's actually not. Everything in my humanity says not to pray and praise, but instead to control, worry, overthink, and turn inward.

But God is teaching me to pray and praise into giant-hood in the season. See, we talk so much about David and Goliath. David being the small shepherd boy with a slingshot and stone and the enemy being a huge giant, more strong, more ferocious, more courageous.

But Jesus is calling me to be a giant in enemy territory. To be a giant in praise, to be a giant in prayer. That in the Spirit, He is making me a giant IN HIM, not out of my own power, holiness or might. No. He is making me a giant because of His anointing, His promise, His presence, the delivery of His presence. Him setting me free so I no longer have a small stone, but a giant sword of the Spirit.

His deliverance = giant-hood. 

When we pray and praise in the midst of the battle, in the face of our fears, surrounded by insecurities and doubts, God trades our small stone for a sword. He makes us into fierce warriors, giants in the Spirit who can hunt down the enemy, take back His land, rebuke evil.

His deliverance = overcoming

This season is this: swords for stones. 

Jesus is teaching me to be a giant in the midst of my enemies so that when in battle, His Spirit within me rises up in strength, in resilience, in power to tear down strongholds, rebuke illness, push back worry, defeat lies.

His deliverance bears fruit.

I'm realizing I'm desperate to be fruitful for Jesus. I want Him to use me powerfully to bring His kingdom on earth. Not later, but now. In an immediate way.

N., you are part of that fruit. I fully believe that. I long for you, but I also know this season of deliverance is so necessary before you begin to grow in my womb. My womb, physical and spiritual, are being made new, being delivered in such a way so that you will grow perfectly, without any residue of generational fear or anxiety. So I surrender to this season of deliverance. I receive fully my Jesus as He sets me free. I want my womb to be made adequate for you N.

And to C. The beloved woman I cared for on Thursday whose eye was fully eroded so much so that only a cavity remained -- thank you for allowing me to know you. I know not how long you will live or survive. But I know that meeting you reminded me of why I do what I do every day. To fight for you. To advocate for you. To heal you even in a small way. I don't want to forget you so I write about you here. When you're in heaven, fully restored, may the light in both your eyes shine so bright. May you know the fullness of joy that comes when every giant in your life is defeated and you stand tall before our God.

I will never forget you.

Fear and the Seed

God didn't have to tell me 11 months ago that I would get pregnant and bear a son. It's not really the norm that you hear. 

So 11 months in, not pregnant, I have to ask myself: why did He tell me ahead of time?

It might have been easier to just leave it vague right? And then one day, I would just miss a period and be pregnant and that's that. 

So why did God choose to bring me on this journey? 

He gave me the seed of desire and this seed of knowledge. And so I began to pray over this seed, praying for fruition of it to a child. 

But the problem is, this seed was SO much more than that. 

What I'm realizing is that this seed wasn't just a desire for a child or knowledge that I would have a child.

This seed is this:

God forming me into a mother. 

So every month that I don't conceive, it's not because God lied or is withholding or making me wait in vain. Every month I don't conceive, it's further formation of this:

God's desire is to make us whole, set us free and make us like Him in every way --single, married, with children, without children.

See, I don't think I fully realize how much fear and anxiety govern my life. I live within a constant state of avoiding harm, controlling everything and waiting for the bottom to give out. 

This has been even more apparent as I have watched my dog deal with a possible chronic illness vs malignancy vs a self-limiting skin issue. It's revealed to me my deep, deep fear of the unknown. 

I don't know fully know what this is and apparently even a biopsy cannot definitively tell us. But God gave me a very clear and surprising word...the only word in the Bible that basically states that as we triumph over our enemies, even our dogs triumph as well (Psalm 68:23). 

And yet I am filled with worry and anxiety each day. I incessantly check her skin. I look all over for a mass. I'm waiting for bad news. I'm waiting for something to form. Even though God has spoken. 

It's exhausting. 

So in this current state, what kind of mother will I be? What kind of life will my child have if I can't trust God? If I'm fearful of the unknown. 

I don't want to parent from fear. In Jesus name, I don't. 

My whole life was governed by fear. Abused as a child, I grew up with fear as my norm. My beautiful mother, although amazing, raised me from a place of fear, trying to protect me and her at all times. Not knowing what the day would bring.

When I got married, I remember asking God to break any generational curses in my new family. I didn't want any remnant, not one. 

And in this season, that breaking is happening. That loosening is happening. That fear is being unearthed and it feels like it's going to destroy me. I feel the weight of it every second of every day. 

Every day I look at my dog, every day I get scared of having an unhealthy child. Every day I'm scared I'm going to be a crappy parent. 

So really the seed that God gave me about conceiving is so much more than just being fertile, having a child and giving birth. The seed is about:

being set free from chronic and pervasive fear. 

So as with any seed, it has to die to bear fruit. And in this season, this "death" has to do with dying to my need to control or even fully understand. This death means I die to my timeline and my need to know. This death also means that Jesus puts an end, a finishing, a death to fear in my life. It also means I have to die to my entitlement to being disappointed or angry with God. I have to die to my second guessing everything God has spoken. I have to die to my need to obsess over the seed and instead obsess over being God's.

I am His. and He is mine.

So how do I let go of this seed and its timeline, but be fully present to God and allow Him to form me and set me free?

I don't really know yet. But I know it has to do with  praise, with prayer, with worship, with pressing in and not giving up, with being near to Jesus, with reaching out for help, with staying present and not dwelling in "what if" lands. It has to do with loving God even when I don't fully see or understand His ways. It has to do with having resilience and perseverance even when I don't feel like it. And it has to do with:

letting go of me, getting out of God's way, and allowing Him to make me.

N., this is probably the roughest season I've had since you were first revealed to me. Fear has overrun my life and you feel so far off. I no longer have any idea when I will meet you and when your appointed time is. I don't know if you will get to meet the dog I love so much. I just don't know anything. But what I do know is that the God that formed the universe has promised to form you and gift you to me. What I do know is that I need Him more than ever and that my need for Him is only going to make me even more ready and more able to love and parent you. I pray that each day you are kept in heaven, that each day I wait for you, that me and your father only grow stronger and more deeply rooted in Jesus. Because ultimately, being rooted in Jesus is the only thing that matters in our lives and in your future life. 

Dear Jesus,

I officially let go of this seed to you, knowing that in my letting go, I give you more weight than I give it. I let it go not because I don't trust it or want it or believe it will happen, but because I want more than just the seed. I want the deeper and even more precious thing you have for me as the seed grows. I want to finally trust you in all things, be set free from fear and know that you will never harm me or forsake me. 

You are only Good. 

Resilience, Rescue and Time

So many things have happened since I last wrote here. All hard.

I'm realizing each day I walk with Jesus that so much of this walk is characterized by this:

growing in resilience. 

Resilience - the art of bouncing back. the ability to be stretched, but not destroyed. the willingness to be refined, pruned, disciplined and stripped away without resulting in bitterness or anger. The courage to believe that this too shall end in praise.

Resilience is willing to die to our own needs, agenda or expectation and in the midst of this, continue to be a true worshiper. Continue to praise even in prison.

Resilience means I choose God above all else -- emotions, circumstances, rights, what I think I deserve, what I thought I heard.

Choose God. This has become our theme in this season.

Also this:

the battle belongs to the Lord.

He is the one who fights, rescues, protects, redeems and vindicates. We only do this: Take our position, stand firm and see. (2 Chronicles 20: 15-17)

I experienced this firsthand on 8/21. Our street team was walking in Skid Row and a shooting happened steps away from where we were. If not for another patient in distress that we began to follow, we would have been in that park, caught up in the first mass shooting in Skid Row's history.

See we thought we were only helping out another patient, but God was actually rescuing us, protecting us, shielding us.

Rescue.

I wonder how often we are rescued in this way and we don't know it. We don't thank God for it. He's always battling for us. Always fighting on our behalf.

The other thing I'm realizing in this season is this: my sense of time is not and will never be God's sense of time. Ultimately I won't ever know the exact timing of things or when promises will come to pass. All I need to know is this:

stay near to Jesus. Always. 

Wherever He is, go to Him. When I'm trouble, draw near to Him.

Nearness to Jesus is life in this season.

When we are near to Jesus, we may not know the exact timeline for fruition of promises, but we can know the way of the season we are in. We can know what this season is about, its theme, its focus, its timbre.

Know your season. 

This season for me and Ash is best summed up in Psalm 66:

Bless our God, O peoples;
    let the sound of his praise be heard,
9 who has kept our soul among the living
    and has not let our feet slip.
10 For you, O God, have tested us;
    you have tried us as silver is tried.
11 You brought us into the net;
    you laid a crushing burden on our backs;
12 you let men ride over our heads;
    we went through fire and through water;
yet you have brought us out to a place of abundance.


The end of the story is this: abundance. But it's so important to know our season. To know this is a season of being refined, of being tried, of being led through and in front of trouble. Of being brought face-to-face with giants, not because of punishment, but because God's infinite love compels Him to drain out every particle in our bodies that is bent toward unbelief, bent toward destruction, bent toward mistrusting His goodness. 

In every season, God's ultimate desire isn't to just fulfill His promises to us. That's a byproduct of something greater:

relationship. 

God's desire always is to give us Jesus. Fully, wholly and unconditionally. 

N., may you know this each day as you grow. May you seek Jesus above what He can give or promise. May you seek Jesus for Jesus. May you choose Him above all else, in every decision, in every thought, in every action, in every season. May you develop in your spirit a deep resilience, a bouncing back that enables you to withstand refining and testing so that you can take up your position, stand firm and see that the end of every story is always this:

the abundant presence of Christ Jesus. 

N, your time is near

It's true. I can say it with full assurance without striving because this declaration is full of God.

It's a strange sensation to just know that something is about to happen or something is just right.

The last time this happened it was when I knew I was going to marry Ash. No one had to tell me. It was a precious secret between me, God and Ash. It didn't matter if others understood it or if it was logical, rational or fit some generic formula. I knew in my gut, in the recesses of my being that he was the man God intended for me. 7 years later, it's even more true. It's more true each and every day.

And today, I have this same knowledge. So much so that I don't need to even pray to conceive anymore because I would be repeating to God what He already intends, what He already has prepared, what He has already spoken into existence.

In it's time I will hasten it, says the Lord.

I also know this is soon to happen because the battle is fierce. Nuru still isn't well. I've had conflict w/ dear friends. Ash is struggling. Anxiety reigns most of my days. And it's only when I pause to peer deeply into the eyes of Jesus that I feel relief and respite. Even as I write this, anxiety rises up...what if im wrong? what if i've heard wrong or sensed wrong again?

How do we hold on to what God has said when our reality wars against it?

God has said I would be a mother. That I would have a son. That it would happen this year. I sense that it may happen soon, perhaps this month. But I've also sensed this before and been totally wrong.

But perhaps this isn't about being right or wrong. Perhaps it's just about being close to God and being ALL in. Believing even without seeing. Trusting without fully knowing. Hurling a stone at the giant with the assurance that either God will slay the giant or you will die having taken a chance on God. Either way being totally ok.

So I believe. I'm going to trust the spirit of God within me that says the time is near. That the battle rages because fruition is about to happen.

In the midst of all this, N, I believe God has given me a glimpse of who you will be as you grow. Of what you will impact, a seed of what you will be about.

I pray your life will be characterized by this:

The wolf will live with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the goat, the calf and the lion and the yearling together; and a little child will lead them. The cow will feed with the bear, their young will lie down together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox. The infant will play near the hole of the cobra, and the young child put his hand into the viper's nest. They will neither harm nor destory on all my holy moutain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. - Isaiah 11: 6-9

N, I pray your spirit will be of this caliber. A spirit that tears down division, that cuts through fear, that brings justice. I pray that your spirit will bring reversal to destruction. That your spirit will bring courage even in your youth. That even as a child you will dwell in seeming dangerous places with boldness because God has called you there. That your spirit will cause unexpected change. That your spirit will cause enemies to unite, harmony to reign, righteousness to flow.

That you will NOT fear.

That you will live a FEARLESS life. That generational fear would be broken in you in Jesus name.

That gentleness and firmness would co-exist in you. That quietness and boldness would shine in you simultaneously. That even we would be in awe of how so many opposite things can co-exist in you and through you. That your spirit would encompass the same Spirit of Jesus that causes walls to be torn down, not just unto freedom, but unto shalom, a true peace.

May your hands know the viper's nest and when you seek it out, would your hands know how to bring the healing of God there.

May you be full of knowledge.

I can't wait to meet you very soon. Mama, loves you.

Peace will be your Governor

Nuru got sick a few days ago. This somewhat rare skin infection on her nose emerged and it has surprisingly thrust me into a state of utter fear and worry.

I know she's just a dog...but she's my dog...my dog child. The other living being I've been living with for these last 5 years, raised her from age 2 months.

She's the closest thing to a child that I have.

I'm grappling with intense uncertainty as to if she's going to be ok.

Is it just an infection or worse? The vet was super unhelpful so now I'm thrust into further anxiety.

How do we hold onto peace in the midst of uncertainty?

Isaiah 26: He will keep in perfect peace those who's hearts are steadfastly upon Him (paraphrased)

Isaiah 60: I will make peace your governor

I will make peace your governor.

What a beautiful phrase. That God's promise is that we will be GOVERNED by peace. Not anxiety, not worry, not fear.

I don't want to be a fearful mother. To a dog or to a human child.

I'm realizing I've been governed by anxiety and fear my whole life. From the day I was born, I was thrust into anxiety.

I live each day with an underlying stream of anxiety, of subconsciously waiting for the bottom to drop out from below. With this lie that if something good happens, it must be balanced and tempered by something bad or a trial of some kind.

Is it possible that I will get pregnant this year but somehow lose Nuru? How is it that I deserve to be so happy that I can have a child, keep my dog, have an amazing marriage, a fulfilling job, healthy parents and a new house?

Do I believe God to be this good?

And yet God's reminder to me in this season is:

Peace will be your governor

I speak peace Jesus says. I can hold all things together. I am not a God who works in balances. I don't balance things out with good and not so good. I know only one mode: to always be good.

God, I want peace in the midst of this uncertain season and most especially, I want to be healed of the daily, persistent and chronic anxiety I live with each and every hour of every day.

I want to trust you completely.

I am scared. Every day I'm scared. I'm scared Nuru will die prematurely. I'm scared I'll have a sick child. I'm scared I'll have a complicated pregnancy. I'm scared my parents won't live long enough to see a grandchild. I'm scared I won't be a good mother.

I'm so scared.

Teach me O God to be steadfast in you. To cling to the rock that is higher than me. To allow peace to govern me.

N., I pray most fervently that you will not inherit this generational anxiety I carry. That somehow as you are knit together within me that my anxiety isn't exacerbated, but actually healed. That as you are knit together within me, a new frame of being and perspective is knit within me simultaneously, one that is immune to chronic anxiety, one that is no longer interlaced with chronic fear. I pray that as you are knit within me that I am knit together in Jesus in a new way that causes me to know courage, to know trust and to know hope and no longer fear and worry. May we both be knit together in hope, where anxiety can never thrive, can never live, where:

peace is our governor. 

Leaves the 99

Today was my 2nd day on our street team in Skid Row. I'm realizing I need to write each day I'm out with my team because being on the streets of Skid Row is pretty much like being in the midst of a war zone. 

War.

It's a war of emotions, of addictions battling one another, of literal and spiritual assaults. The onslaught of smells, the aura of suffering all around at war with one another. It's a war of good against evil. Of incredible community and resilience and simultaneous despair, hopelessness. 

Today, as I began what would end up being a 3.1mile trek around Skid Row, I was struck by this reality:

It's a war that somehow has already been won. 

Jesus won it, defeated every single power of evil I see as I walk those streets. Defeated prostitution, defeated domestic violence, defeated drug addiction, defeated mistrust, defeated shame, defeated guilt, defeated generational curses, defeated sin.

We saw so many people today in deep, deep suffering. Suffering so deep that in our humanity, it's impossible to even comprehend or address. 

But there was one particular interaction today I don't want to forget. As we walked through Gladys Park in Skid Row looking for people, a young woman approached us. She was bitten by a dog the day before and wanted help. 

We dressed her wound and she left, a pretty minor interaction. 

However, she came back...as it turns out she was still bleeding on one side of her leg. So my MA went to help her as I was caring for another patient on the sidewalk. 

In the midst of their interaction, the patient shared she had planned to end her life that day. She was going to take pills. She was fed up with life.

And in that moment, the entire world stood still for her. I could sense a turn in the spiritual realm as God's eyes in that moment rested intensely and compassionately upon her. 

I walked up to her and asked her if she could share with me what was going on. She said she wasn't sure, that she didn't want to live this kind of life anymore, she was tired. 

War.

And yet in that moment, Jesus, the God of the universe, left his "99." In the midst of the billions in need, Jesus chose to be present to this precious 1. 

Actually He has been present all along. 

The end of the story is this: she decided to live. She decided to not take her life. To hang on. 

Her parting words to us were: Thank you for making my day. 

God saved her life today. Not because we were present, but because:

He is always present. 

Because Jesus leaves anything and everything to go after just 1, just 1 who may be lost, who may be suffering, who may feel like all hope is lost. 

I don't know exactly what will happen to her, but I know this:

Jesus is with her. He has always been and He always will be. 

So in the midst of the war, we have a God that intentionally, persistently, and against all odds: 

Goes after the 1. 

N., you are God's 1. I am God's 1, your father is God's 1. He will always chase us, pursue us, be with us. May you know always that in the midst of any war you may face, you are not the 99,

You are His 1. 

Perseverance

It's kind of an overused word in some circles, and yet underutilized and underdeveloped in most places.

What does it mean to persevere? To persevere in prayer, to persevere in joy, to persevere in patience, to persevere in waiting, to persevere with people?

Today on 8/3/19, I'm not pregnant. It hasn't happened yet. But oddly, I feel closer to the fruition of God's promise to me of you, N., then ever before...

There is a peace that truly transcends understanding. An assurance that even as I look ahead without any inclination of when this will happen for us, I trust that God is a promise-keeper.

Perseverance.

Perhaps in this season, this is what it means to persevere with God. To walk with Him without a map or spiritual GPS. To persevere, even when I don't understand Him or His ways. To persevere in spending time with Him and communing with Him even when I don't see.

I think perseverance isn't talked about alot because it involves pain. To persevere means to push past our emotions and tap into the invisible, the less-praised thing, the less obvious thing, the treasure in secret, dark and inconvenient places.

Perseverance means so much to me this season because it frames the way of my days. To persevere with my Jesus and praise Him in the not yet places. To persevere as I am being made adequate.

It also means alot to me as I walk with my precious brothers and sisters on the streets of Skid Row.

On 8/1, I started on our street medicine team in Skid Row.

What does it mean to persevere when 4,000 people live in a concentrated area, ridden with evil, ridden with suffering, ridden with hopelessness, drugs, sexual abuse, poverty, sorrow, addiction, mental illness, loneliness, disease?

How does Jesus persevere each and every day with these ones? And how can I do so in my limited capacity to love, hope and be present?

How do I persevere in hope when I see men cooking meth on the ground and injecting themselves in broad daylight? When I see women prostituting in bathrooms for money or drugs?

How do we persevere in the midst of impossibility?

I don't think it means we put aside impossibility and look for what's possible. No. I think we become well-acquainted with impossibility. It becomes home for us. And as we make our home in impossibility, we find God there. We find Jesus in the midst of impossibility and He walks us out into His possibility.

So perseverance means facing impossibility face-to-face, head on, without reserve. Going all into impossibility and finding that God is in the midst of every impossibility. He is well-acquainted with impossibility. Because in Him, in Christ:

Nothing is impossible.

N., may you know this each and every day. May you be a seeker of impossible things. May you hope for the impossible, may you leap into the unknown, knowing that Jesus is more than enough to catch you. May you know that the most exciting thing about following Jesus is this:

In Him, nothing will ever be impossible.