Attending the Mammoth Lakes School of Supernatural Ministry has probably been the hardest step that I have ever had to take, but by far the best. Our current reading assignment is "Spiritual Slavery to Spiritual Sonship" by Jack Frost.
I hadn't started reading the book until this evening, and I'm somewhat glad that I didn't.
Last week, I got into an accident in the snow. My first time taking on icy roads obviously didn't turn out well. But my friend/fellow student and I were perfectly fine and no other cars were involved.
With that said, it's been a tough week.
I have had car troubles in the past, many times, and every single time it's felt like one of my limbs has been ripped off and I'm left grasping for what the heck I'm going to do.
This week has been difficult in the fact that I've started training in a new job, and I have school every day. It doesn't help that I can't necessarily walk because it's always freezing outside and there's snow everywhere.
Everyday since my car accident last Monday, I have needed to get a ride from someone. Whether it be my roommate, classmate, coworker, etc. But I have had one of the hardest times asking for help.
I grew up feeling somewhat alone a lot so I became kind of dependent on myself. You could probably ask anybody, but I'm just an independent person. I'm the one that likes to volunteer to drive and I never enjoy feeling stuck because I'm waiting on somebody else.
Just this morning I opened up to my boss about the whole situation and how I was chomping at the bit for my car to get fixed and I could drive myself again. I told her that I felt that God was working in my life even when it felt like nothing good could be happening right now. I have never really felt okay asking for help. I've always told myself that I didn't want to be a burden, and because of that I never asked, I try to stay out of the way and I don't draw attention to myself.
So because I have to keep depending on people and asking for rides and even asking for food from my roommates, I feel that insecurity rising up in me. I feel like at any second one of them is going to express annoyance at my not being able to take care of myself. As that insecurity came rising up, I felt God whispering to me "you are a blessing, not a burden."
I made this revelation this morning, and then I cracked open this book.
Jack Frost talks about how all of us are born with "orphan hearts" that reject parental authority and seek to do everything their own way. Sometimes we are raised and our parents unintentionally (sometimes not) hurt or reject us, and because of that we view God's love that way and don't want to see ourselves as His son or daughter.
If I didn't already associate with this, I did when I found this passage (bare with me):
When wanting to cast out an orphan heart, remember that you can displace it only by introducing it to a loving Father. Even then, an orphan heart must choose to embrace the spirit of sonship by willingly becoming interdependent in relationships and embracing God's community of love. This is not a once-and-for-all choice. You choose sonship over and over because orphan thinking doesn't surrender easily, and it often comes back and tries to assert its influence once again. The orphan spirit tries constantly to weaken our families, relationships, and the nations by deceiving us into becoming subject to our own mission rather than living life to experience God's love and to give it away.
We are called to live in interdependent relationships and embrace God's community of love.
I have lived my life independently because it seemed easier. It seemed that if I took care of myself and did my own thing I wouldn't get hurt. I never allowed myself to belong because it was too big of a risk.
"I am a blessing, not a burden."
Here I am, living in a house with another girl and three boys and I feel at home, for probably the first time in my life.
I have a family that doesn't see me as a burden, not that I felt my real family thought that, but this is the place where I finally believe that I'm not.
I am not a burden. I am not an orphan.
God's love has become so real to me in the past month, but even more so in the past ten minutes of reading this book.
I am a daughter of the king. I accept my spiritual "sonship" and I choose God's will instead of my own independent ways.
I was born with an orphan heart.
But now my orphan heart has found its home.
