Sunday night.. or Monday morning

I'm sitting at work right.. it's usually quiet for 4 hours after midnight, barring any crazy, poopy, dying, attention-seeking, or just very sick patients. I'm writing for the third time today because I'm on the verge of making a decision I've been trying to make for months. Friday night, I went to my first baseball game with a friend. It was so fun! The weather was crisp, but clear, and the whole experience was new and exciting... even if the Mariner's did lose...pitifully (sorry Shane) :)~.

I wrote previously about how God told me very directly to come to Tacoma. I have been waiting on Him to tell me where to go next ever since I moved here. I am going to DC to be with my sister for the month of July to welcome Elijah James, my beautiful nephew, into the world. I have been believing that God would clearly tell me where He wants me to go in August. I think God totally spoke to me about this through a friend on Friday. A friend told me about his experience in which the Lord had told him to go overseas very clearly, but when he was trying to decide whether to come back, he didn't hear anything from God. Eventually, God just told him he needed to make a decision and have faith that He would bless it. My friend, by way of explanation, imagined that God had a sort of "faith checklist." He says, "what will chelsea do when I tell her to go? She goes.. check. Now what will she do when I don't tell her anything? Will she trust me?" This totally spoke to me as I realized my great fear has been that I will make the "wrong" decision. Some people have said it took great faith for me to come here on God's command.. honestly, it was really easy and didn't even feel like faith because God told me to go so clearly, so it wasn't scary or uncertain at all. It makes so much sense to me that God would seek to grow my faith by asking me to make my own choice and trusting that He will be with me in whatever decision I make and will not let me stray from His will since I am earnestly seeking to obey Him. God gave me a brain and His Spirit which gives me wisdom, so I can make this decision. It pleases the Lord for me to inquire after His will, but after asking Him about it this weekend, I believe my step of obedience will come in weighing my options, making a decision, and trusting the Lord in His silence. I think I have decided what to do in August, and I feel peaceful about it... which I think is a way God confirms His will.. but I am still waiting to work out the particulars, so I won't tell you what I'm thinking just yet. I was absolutely set on God doing one thing, and He graciously let me know that He's doing another.. even in His silence, He speaks. :) Ok.. so I think that's enough for a while.. thanks for caring about what's going on with me and for reading this so I don't have to tell the same story over and over again. Love, me. :)

My week...

Last Friday night, a team from the International House of Prayer (IHOP) came to Newsong and led a two-day conference. Worship was incredible, and the Holy Spirit's presence was undeniable as the packed-out sanctuary entered the Lord's throne room and sang to Jesus. Okay, so this might sound cheesy, but you're my friend, so I'll be vulnerable. Sometimes when I worship and the Spirit quiets every distraction and fills my heart and focuses my eyes solely on Jesus, I feel like I'm worshipping with the saints. I see this picture of the Lord on His throne, and I am surrounded by the multitudes of believers in Heaven worshipping our King. And though I only feel like this when my focus is solely on Christ, it is in these times when I feel closest to dad. Anyway, one of the speakers spoke on the Song of Songs. I have never studied this book, and I have only read it a few times and not in years. She spoke of the bride as the church and the believer and the lover as Christ. The story tells of the bride's journey from immature love that is self-focused to a mature love that focuses on her lover. Christ calls His bride beautiful and says that He can hardly stand her gaze because it so overwhelms Him. Christ's heart is moved deeply and passionately by His beloved's voice, her gaze, and even her immature love. The Lord pierced my heart! The heart of Christ is passionately moved by my weak love! The Jesus that I nailed to the cross hushes all of Heaven and leans in when I pray just waiting to hear what His beloved will ask because He longs to grant my request. My Lord's heart melts when I turn my ever-roaming eyes towards Him. He calls me His sister and His bride. He knows all that I am.. all the darkness and falseness and infidelity that lurks within my heart... and He loves me to death! I wrote earlier that I thought the Lord brought me here to teach me about who I am and my worth.... I now know He brought me here to continue this great lesson about His overwhelming love for me.. and my identity and worth flows naturally from this truth that digs down deep into my heart and spreads out into every dark space. Before Africa, God said, "She must know how deeply and desperately I love her." My Jesus is revealing His love by layers.. I wonder if He only takes me by steps so as not to overwhelm my weak heart. I love my sweet God, but the breathless, crazy, too wonderful for words truth is that my God loves me! Read and study Song of Songs... and if you dare, simply ask Jesus, "Do you love me?" He will answer you! :) K... going to work... love you friends and family!

A Sunday in May

So it's Sunday afternoon, and I am enjoying some daylight before shutting myself up in a hospital just in time to miss the sunset. I do, however, usually find some excuse to tend to a patient on the west side of the unit just at sunrise. The rooms have large, clear windows looking out onto a veritable forest of evergreens in the parking lot. As the sun peeks over the tree-line, a chain of mountains becomes visible in the distance... the view is breath-taking! This glorious picture of the Lord's handiwork has encouraged me after several hard nights, and seldom fails to bring a smile to my poor patients. Thursday night before last, the Lord blessed me with a spontaneous and magnificent view of His sunrise. A fellow night nurse from Newsong called me up at 10pm and invited me to make the 3 hour drive to Mt. St. Helen with her to spend the night and watch the sunrise. What a wonderful surprise! It reminded me of some nights at FSU when we would randomly decide to go spend the night at St. Augustine beach... good memories. My friend and I drove up and up until the snow encroached so on the road that we could drive no farther. In the dark, we could only make out shadows of the trees partially buried in the glowing white snow. We talked and huddled under our blankets and watched as the stars shone just enough light so that we could make out the towering volcano in front of us. As the sun rose, the mountain came into full view. The horizon in all its brilliant colors reflected against the snow-white mountain with its hollowed-out center where the volcano blew its top off in the 80's. We watched the pink glow upon the white on the silent mountain, and we were awed and still. Driving down the mountain, we saw elk amidst trees of every hue of green and heard their clumsy song.  What a glorious experience.. the Lord knows my heart and how to make it happy. :)

Erika and I in Seattle
Brynna, Erika, and I after church in Tacoma
The University of Washington campus in Seattle
Posing in front of the Seattle gum wall with a honey stick in my mouth. :)

The Tacoma Waterfront
The bridge to the glass museum
The glass display on the bridge
Melisa, Brynna, and I the first day I arrived to Tacoma
Seattle!

Sunday

It's Sunday night, and I'm back in the same cozy little coffee shop I was in the last time I wrote... I am sitting in the same chair, and even the dreary sky is raining down the same weather, but I do not feel the same. Alright, so what do I feel like telling you about tonight? I've had a strange week... but I think I'll start with something that happened two weeks ago. So you know that the Lord brought me to Tacoma. I don't remember if I have told you why I think that is yet. In Capetown, He revealed and destroyed lies I had been believing about myself, and He started to speak to me about who I was in Him. I think He has brought me here to continue that conversation and lead me to live in the fullness of who I am. Does that make any sense? The Lord has given this community at Newsong a passionate ministry for helping people to discover and live in who God made them to be... how He originally designed them before sin or this dark world influenced them to be something different. One way they help people to walk into who they were originally created to be is by simply asking God to tell them how He created the person. Now this part may sound weird (or maybe all of it does, but bear with me)... when they pray and ask God questions, He answers them. Now I have heard God speak to me at different times throughout my life, and really on a daily basis while I was in Capetown, but I have never asked God to speak to me about someone else. If you've read my previous posts, you know that God gave Elizabeth Clack a message to give to me that eventually led me on a journey to Africa and Tacoma, so you wouldn't think I would be surprised by God speaking through other people, but I was. I am taking a class at church on the freedom and authority we have in Christ. During one class, prayer teams came in and prayed for each of us individually. A husband and wife I had never met sat down with me and asked God to speak about who He made me to be. They asked, "Lord, how many things do you want to tell us about Chelsea tonight?" They heard Him say five. then they asked, "what is the first thing." He spoke, and they told me what they heard. They listed five different ways the Lord has uniquely created me. It was kind of mind blowing. I had never met these people before, and they were speaking things about my heart that were true and deeply personal. The Lord confirmed that He was speaking through them in my spirit, and what He said was healing and so sweetly personal. Are you freaked out yet? :) If you have questions, I would love to dialogue with you about this and fill you in on the details, but for now let me just say that the Lord is good and is teaching me a lot here. 

This week had been rough because I have been physically and spiritually tired. Last Sunday or Monday night, I had a busy, stressful night at work. I sat down for a moment to hide in the Word and bring my weary heart before my Lord, but as soon as I opened my Bible, a coworker approached me and proceeded to aggressively mock the gospel.. actually laughing at the idea that someone would be stupid enough to believe such a thing. He didn't mean to personally offend me... he likes me and even apologized for offending me later on, but I don't know that I have ever experienced that before in all my spiritual conversations with non-believers... a very public, scornful, mocking of the gospel. It hurt my heart for him, and it hurt to hear my savior slandered. My heart was just heavy with it for a few days until my mom pointed out that was a form of persecution. However mild it may be in comparison with the horrors believers suffer worldwide, it is still an honor to suffer in any small way for the sake of the gospel, and I wonder how the Lord will use my friend's vehement denial of the gospel for His own glory. Anyway, if you think about it, you can pray with me for my lost friend. The Word says that the gospel is foolishness to those to whom the Lord has not revealed the truth. I find frustration, but mostly comfort in the fact that my words and arguments are powerless to convince anyone of spiritual truth. I find myself utterly dependent on my Father once again. :)

Oh, I also went to the chiropractor and found out that my left leg is longer than my right and my hips and shoulders are all messed up... so either he'll fix me or I'm going to start walking in circles soon... I'll keep you updated on that. ;) I miss you friends and family... I'll write more later.

thoughts on a rainy day...

It is a Friday afternoon, and I am sitting in a coffee shop in Tacoma watching a dreary day rain down its misty drops from the comfort of a cozy armchair. Rainy days were made for reading and writing, and so I have given this day to these pursuits. It has been several days since I have really gotten into the Word, and I have felt the loss of it. I speak of spiritual matters daily and even go to Bible studies and spend some time in prayer, but I find my heart grows cold when I neglect the Word and prayer that is led and impassioned by the reading of the Word. I feel the Spirit of God renewing me today. My mind is filled with thoughts and questions and revelations that I want to write. I have found writing is my release. My journal has listened well to my ramblings, but I find that its private pages cannot always contain what pours out of my heart and head. The Lord has been so good to me. As I look back at my life, I see His presence in nooks and crannies I hadn't even thought to search for Him. In the past months, the Lord has stirred my heart to cry out for humility, joy, spiritual power, and deep intimacy with Him. God held me so close in Capetown. He spoke to me and walked with me in such an intimate way, and I have earnestly prayed that He would continue that throughout my life. Many have told me to cherish that time because it is rare that God speaks so clearly and walks so closely in one's life, but I deny that. I claim that my Lord desires to walk closely with me and speak clearly in my heart and mind every moment of my life, and, in His power, I will pursue that intimacy as a lifestyle rather than a unique occurrence. My good Father has turned my mind to my childhood where I used to walk in the gardens of Capetown with Him. I would hold out my hand and know that I was walking with the Lord in our garden, and He has spoken to my heart that He was there with me in my youth. I think of Hosea.. the words with which God began this sweet journey... "Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her... And there she shall answer as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt" Hosea 2:14-15. He brought me to the physical place where I enjoyed such intimacy with Him, and He again restored that intimate relationship that I felt so separated from for a time. As I write now, I feel almost overwhelmed by the spirit. I feel Him melting my heart and I rejoice. In Capetown, God brought me to such a place of contrition and brokenness before Him. I think it must have been what is meant by poverty of spirit. I believe this intimacy with Him came out of the humility of being made aware of my desperate, desperate, desperate need of Him. I have asked the Lord, how can I live in that state? How can I live in joy if I am to live in brokenness? So far, He has answered me that I do not need to pursue joy for it is simply a natural by-product of intimacy with Him. I think that is why He is filling me with His presence this moment.. to impress upon me that this unspeakable joy I feel now is a direct result of Him drawing me close into His presence. I am still working out what it looks like to live a life of contrition. What does it look like to live poor in spirit..for I think this is the means to a lifestyle of intimacy with the Father? 

Since being in Tacoma, and actually before moving here, God has been opening my eyes to so many things and teaching me and dialoguing with me. We have laughed together over my silly, prideful way of thinking. As I am presented with uncomfortable spiritual truths here, I say to God, I must test this and make sure that my theology does not err. God affirms that I must test all that I learn against the scriptures, but He also chuckles and says, "daughter, you will believe and accept what I tell you is true, then it is good and right for you to search out the truth of it in my Word." Many times, He teaches me directly through His Word first, but sometimes He has just said, "this is true and of my spirit... believe, and I will prove it to you." He has gently shown me how much I rely on my own mind to filter truth. It is true that God has given me a mind to reason with and a discerning spirit by which to recognize His truth, but it is also true that my preconceptions would seek to deny what God clearly tells me is His truth. Don't worry, I am earnestly seeking the scriptures, and the things I am speaking of are in no way contradictory to the gospel, rather they are just uncomfortable for me... things such as worship styles, praying with spiritual authority, sermon styles, and praying for healing, etc. God is just in the process of knocking down some of my abundant intellectual pride. Thank goodness! :) 

There is so much more on my mind to write, but it's time for me to go, and I feel bad for you having to read my ramblings for so long. Know that the Lord is blessing me with friendships and revelations of truth about myself and His kingdom on this earth. He is knitting me into this community and revealing His purposes for bringing me here... one being to show me more fully who He made me to be and bring me into the fullness of it. I am taking this wonderful class that I am sure I will have more to say about in a later post. Also, the Lord is teaching me about the power and authority we have in prayer. Today, He brought me to 1 John 5:14-15. "And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us. And if we know that he hears use in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests that we have asked him." What confidence He has given us! I have asked the Lord to give me all of these gifts of humility, joy, etc.., I know it is His desire to give me these good things... and so it is done. Period. What a way to live! Alright, that's all for now. Thanks for reading. Love, me. :)