Whats been going on these last couple of months: May-July

So I haven’t been writing. I haven’t had the motivation and I’ve been in a rut for lack of a better word. I've also been throwing myself various pity parties and other one woman affairs along the way.

Between April 2015 and July 2015, my life has been an exciting whirlwind of God’s grace, mercy, love and blessings.

I’ll start from the beginning.

April

I was preparing to graduate. It was supposed to be an exciting time in my life filled with warm memories and deep connections. Not so in my case. I struggled with my feelings of insecurity about my future. I struggled with my less than stellar grades. I struggled with anxiousness about where I was going to live and what I was going to do. I prayed continuously for God to reveal my purpose to me, I asked Him endlessly where I should live and what I should do. It seemed like God remained silent longer than I would have liked. I sought God’s direction about a Job, I literally lived paycheck to paycheck. I needed to pay for a mission’s trip that I had already committed to going on. It seemed to be one thing after the other after the other.

Honestly, April was a season where fasting and prayer were essential in my daily walk, but I prayed less than I would have liked and relied too heavily on the previous day’s bread for nourishment.

Through grace, the lord blessed with all the finances to pay for my missions trips and I began to truly learn that all earthly wealth is from the Lord, and he alone is my source, no one and nothing else.

May

Official graduate of the University of Central Florida

It was important that I represented a unique aspect of me in my graduation pictures. I choose to showcase my heritage

 I graduated, I made it through April. My friends and family surrounded me and supported me. God instructed me to remain in Orlando, to stay faithful to the church he planted me in and to help their ministry grow. I continued to struggle with the HOW. 

Yes God I know I’m supposed to stay in Orlando, but HOW is this going to be possible. I had no job, I had no source of income and my parents desperately wanted me to come home and focus on medical school applications.

I even went on a mission’s trip. God moved mightily in the hearts and minds of many people. I saw the beautiful country of Haiti. I spoke out loud the testimony God had grown in my spirit over the past several months. I spoke about the abusive relationship I endured due to my disobedience to God. I spoke to complete strangers and intimate friends about the beauty of the father’s redemption and how he saved a wretch like me from sure death and destruction at the hands of my own lust and selfish ambition.

I still struggled with the lust of my flesh and the need to fill the God-shaped whole in my heart with the affections of man, especially those of men.

God blessed with a job. The way he did it was almost surreal. I didn’t even apply for the position, I received an invitation to apply, and the job was given to me. Albeit it was the job which I had resigned from, but it was a source of income.

Arriving at Haiti with my missions group

Everyone loves a good selfie, with my sisters in christ: Kesi, Janelle and Noreka

We were advised to wear conservative clothing, so I spent most of the field time wearing long dresses  My brother in Christ Eno!

This is lovely, she loved taking photos on my camera so we had a mini photoshoot

June

 I felt a desire to desire more of God, I had grown lackadaisical in quest for more of God, for his spirit and power, for relationship with him.

I attributed my lack of desire to not attending Sunday service anymore. I also complained about not being able to be as involved with church as much as I would have desired because the job I prayed for required me to work Sunday mornings.

Thus began the groaning process. Why God? Please give me a better job. Lord how can I fulfill your will for my life if I’m broke and can’t even go to church.

I’m sure I did more complaining than praising. But God continued to provide regardless of my murmuring because he is faithful even when my faith is lacking.

The prayer for this season became: LORD, help my unbelief. Help me to trust you even when I can’t see what’s ahead.  Father give me a cheerful heart in this season of my life and let me never forget your goodness.

July

The Lord began to reveal his destiny for my life. I came to the understanding that I have to be okay with how the Lord chooses to reveal his will for my future, and that may be one step at a time.

I’ve come to the understanding that there are tests that need to be passed, that there’s obedience that needs to occur before I can be given anymore responsibility.

I’ve realized, I need to kill my flesh, literally suffocate it until it dies. This process truly has to be daily, regardless of how I feel. I may never feel like waking up and spending quiet time at the feet of Jesus, but it is necessary, my life depends on this, daily.

God blessed with a Job that far exceeds anything I could have asked for, he continues to rain down his favor in the big and the small.

And when I try to slip away from the grasp of his hand , he shocks me into obedience, convicts me accordingly and I repent whole heatedly because the true desire of my heart is to spend all my days abiding in the house of the Lord, forever and ever.

This really wasn’t an encouragement blog, but it’s a true snapshot of what my life has been like for a long stretch of time. I am continuously  in awe of my heavenly father.  I am so honored to be chosen and deemed worthy of his righteous love.

If I could sum up my experiences in these previous months using one passage, it would be:

Psalms 37:23-24 The Lord directs the steps of the godly.

    He delights in every detail of their lives.

²⁴ Though they stumble, they will never fall,

    for the Lord holds them by the hand.

I’m not perfect, but I continue to serve a perfect God.

My lovely mama. That's my prayer warrior friend

As I grow older I appreciate the time I get to spend with my family. 

All my love,

obioma

The reason I love God so much is because...

I’m not the same person I was.

Me circa 2013, septum, contacts. Naive, but I thought I knew it all

  I remember being on the after school activities bus in 8th grade. Some other girls were saying mean things to a younger girl who was sitting in the back of the bus. I had just awoken from my nap, and I wasn’t too aware of what was going on, but that didn’t stop me from joining in the bullying. I teased the girl to the point where she looked like she was about to cry. That’s when one of the three original girls started telling me to calm down. And told me I was being mean. I did it to feel accepted, but deep down...I knew I was wrong. It was one of my cruelest moments to date. 

I remember joining the cheerleading squad in highschool. I had just cut off all my relaxed hair and was newly natural. Noone thought it looked good on me, and I knew people were secretly saying things about my hair behind my back. I logged on facebook one day and in a picture I posted with some other girls on the squad, a boy commented (he was friends with these girls) and said ‘eww, she looks so gross.’ The ‘She’ was me. That was a pretty low moment too. 

Imagine my surprise in college when people started calling me pretty. Everyone now loved my nappy hair, they liked how different I was. I was really different…but It was good. So I lowered my standards at the first taste of belonging. It started out fun. Smoking, and drinking was fun…getting a lot of guys who thought I was attractive was fun. Manipulating men into desiring me for my body, for what I thought I had… was fun.
  Until I started paying for it.

 I became dependent on things that were once choices.

 People liking me meant more to me than what God thought of me.

I got into an abusive relationship looking for the love that I wanted all my life. I wanted someone who thought I was the most beautiful woman in the world, who told me that daily…who knew all my secret sins and who refrained from judging. I wanted a man to finally tell me, “it’s okay to love yourself…you don’t have to put up a front all the time….I’ll be the rock, you can melt.” And I received some of that…but I also got a man who used me as a  deflection for his demons.

 The relationship got worst.
Truthfully, I was really searching for God, not man. I yearned for the acceptance my father never provided and my mother was incapable of…and I was willing to lose my life for it.

But Jesus saves, he saw me. In the middle of my brokenness, my addiction, my pain, my dark thoughts and my twisted reality.
He cleansed me and he reminded me that I was made for so much more than weed, fake smiles, and fake happiness. I was made for more than casual sex, and being hit at someone else’s whim.

 So that’s why I believe in God. Because as messed up of a person as I was…I am, my creator loves me, unconditionally loves me…he sees me when no one else is willing to, he wipes away every tear and he sees every fear.

A relationship with Christ changes you, it betters you, it fixes you.

 On solid ground I stand. I’m never going back to the person I was.

 I can’t.

 John 8:36 So if the Son sets you free, you are truly free. 

 2 Corinthians 5:17 This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun!