Lay It Down

Laying down your rights. I’m talking about lifting up or surrendering everything of your will over to God and His will for you as a follower of Christ. I’m talking about giving up your right to being right, angry, vindictive, and so many other things that we, as humans, believe we have a right to do or have in our lives.

But what we sometimes don’t realize, is that once we choose to follow God, our priorities have to change if we want to be changed for the good and if we want to have the very best that God has for each of us. When I first arrived here to YWAM, I knew that I would have to surrender certain rights fairly immediately in order to survive the first couple weeks adjusting to the community living, alone.

As time went forward, it was becoming clearer that it was more than just the basic discomforts of community living that I would have to lay down. It meant me laying down my right to have a say in certain things and laying down my right to be married again. It also meant me laying down my right to correct others in their behaviour and my right to enforce certain rules of the base.

All of the things that have and will annoy me about being here must be lifted up to a higher source, God. For God had been speaking to my heart on several occasions about bringing ALL things to Him and leaving them there, no matter how big or how small they might be. Essentially, God would be my drop off point, the one I would vent to. God’s urging really was put into action a couple weeks ago when I found myself in a situation of being fully prepared to go postal on several people and then quickly change my plane ticket home. All the essential elements of a meltdown were present; I was tired, fed up and every ounce of patience I had (which is very little to begin with) was gone. But, and it’s only by the grace of God, I managed to hold off exploding until I was out of the situation and by myself.

I quickly made my way to my room, grabbed my Bible and headed to the prayer room. It was there that I fully put into practice, God’s earlier command to me. Oh boy, did I ever VENT! There was no holding back, I was feeling stuff I had not felt in a long time....that I really didn’t want to feel. So, there in the prayer room, I offloaded every single thought and emotion that had boiled up in me. Once everything flowed from my lips, I felt the weight lighten and then I was left with nothing but peace, God’s peace for me for obeying Him in this difficult task.

I had told no one of what was bothering me. I only made my way to a quiet place where I could freely let go of all the things I knew I had to let go of. That included my right to making a big deal about the injustice of the situation I had just left. And to tell you the truth? It felt pretty darn good to give it all to God and just leave it with Him to sort out. I left the prayer room feeling elated and at peace. I had found a new addiction in God.

Ever since that first offload, it has now come naturally for me to offload on God each time I am confronted with a person or situation that is frustrating or hurtful and I have come to love God even more for working in my heart that way! I actually feel extremely free when I do that!!! It’s pretty incredible, I have to admit! And as an added bonus, all of this has strengthened my prayer life! For instead of trying to convince another person to change their ways, I engage in wholehearted intercession for the person or persons and I pray that God would place a desire in their heart to want to change, to become more like Christ.

So, it is with this new found freedom that I can keep offloading to God AND lay down my rights in various things. Does laying down my rights still hurt??? HECK YEAH!! It sucks being hurt and in pain but at the end of the day, I want something more in my life. I want to be the woman that God intended me to be from before I was born! I want to be the woman that God wants me to be for my family, my son and my future husband and his family. With that comes sacrifice and the obedience and submission to allow God to do exactly what it is He wants to do in me so that I CAN be that woman I desire to be for God and for those around me.

So if you are like me, struggling with wanting to say something, try saying nothing and try taking it all to God and offloading on Him. I can guarantee that you will feel better when you vent to only Him and you will feel better for it as a person who is trying to win the heart of God.