I, Kortnee Barnes, will not promise BUT will try to be a more consistent blogger! I really want to talk about India and all that the Lord is revealing to me but first I'm going to let you into some struggle and growth I've been going through. So, in the last post I told you that God had answered some HUGE prayers, and He did...I, however, did not use His answers to their full capability and have since been struggling with my role, my relationships, my reality, my faith that God is still near to me..and that was a struggle that has left my heart in a very fragile place with Jesus. Thankfully, I am still with Jesus and no longer wandering about trying to fix myself.
What the Lord is teaching me, Part 1
I am capable of all that He has asked me to do. That faith is not only believing He will but also that only because of Him, I can.
God requires all of who I am.
And He can have it.
I am so tired of even attempting what others want me to be because it's such a filthy, cheap version of what I'm supposed to be in Christ. Any time we try to become other than what God has said we are, we're jilting ourselves, and we're telling God "I'll do this my way because the way you made me isn't good enough."
Thank you, Father...for being sufficient.
The definition of sufficient is enough. That means we don't need anything or anyone else to tell us what we are supposed to be in Christ, we only need Him to define us. Part of that is "daily dying" to ourselves. Not just weekly, or on trips, or at camp...but daily saying to God, "It's not about me, it's about you. I lay down my desires, dreams, gifts at the foot of your throne and pick up my cross to follow you." Daily.
"What is true of Christ, is true of us." (I Would Die For You, 190)
What the Lord is teaching me, Part 2
In high school, I was a loud, rambunctious, life of the party, didn't care what anyone thought girl. I wasn't living for Christ, but I was fun.
When I began my DTS, and ultimately began to pursue a life fully following Christ, I associated those attributes with my former un-Christlike life, and it wasn't until a speaker prophesied over me that "God created you to be the things of your former, but He wants you to be those things for His glory," that I understood I needed to find the balance.
I can be a loud, life of the party, unmoved by others judgement girl who loves Christ and desires attention, not for herself, but for the glory of God. I'm not out to impress others, but for them to be impressed with Christ. I'm not out to please others, but to please my Father in Heaven. My "performance" is for an audience of One. Everyone else is watching and I pray that they'd be blessed by what they see, but my desire is for Him alone and no one else.
"Eldredge points out something I had been struggling with without even knowing it. He says that rather than hiding your strength (passion, wisdom, God-given knowledge, maturity, and authority) because the world has no room for it and people can't handle it, let it loose, and let them deal with it and stare on in wonder at the incredible things that God has done and is doing." (I Would Die For You, 191-2)
To be ashamed of "not fitting in" is to discredit the Lord for how He's made me.
Yeah...no more of that.
What the Lord is teaching me, Part 3
God has a plan. My faith really gets to prove itself when things get crazy and it looks like there is no way anything can be done and then of course God provides a way. He's very good to me. He showed me (in March 2012) that my next step of faith with Him would be to go to India in 2014...and He left it at that.
I describe my faith using Psalm 119.105, "Your word is a lamp to guide my feet and a light for my path." I imagine myself standing in the woods surrounded by darkness so dense that I can't tell which way is up, but I have this little lamp and it shows me just enough light to take one step forward...that's how I see this passage. My faith is taking that step when God asks me to; once I've done that all I do is listen for God to tell me when to take another one. I just trust Him. I trust Him enough to know He has a plan. Our plans unfold like a story...stories are ruined if someone tells you how they end.
So God said India, I said yes...well first I said no, but then I said yes...because God is God and He has something good and way beyond me planned! A few days later, my outreach team met up with 50+ other students in Paris and a few of them had hearts for India! After a week with them, my Outreach team left to work with a ministry called Megacities in London (they outreach to cities of 1 million or more for an entire year); I loved my time with them. I tried to figure out why God had me partner with YWAM and not some other organization and now, a year later as I've begun planning I found out a few weeks ago that Megacities will work in India in 2014...not only have they welcomed me, but so have two other YWAM bases in India.
Oh sweet blessings from the Lord.
It's nice to know that there's a plan that is better than I could ever have imagined waiting for me.
May God be glorified!