Rejection, Forgiveness and Words of Life

Rejection. It was something I was and am very familiar with. I've struggled with it since I was a little girl, only six years old... and I let it stay with me until I finally had enough of it. Though sometimes I still struggle with thoughts of rejection, I now, immediately rebuke it and go on living, not giving the negativity another thought. Now I know the truth, but I didn't until I did one of the hardest things I've ever done, I confessed to my whole team that I was feeling rejected by them.
Now, I say this and maybe you're thinking, "Why would she had felt that?!" Well, I'll tell you why, because the enemy was feeding me lies about myself and I was listening to him! I sat down with two of my leaders and told them I was feeling rejected. They immediately told me to tell them about it, knowing that it was healthy for me to talk it out, and boy did I talk. I went fourteen years back. I cried and cried, my heart was still hurt over several little and big things that had happened to me over my life. After I was finally done ranting, my leaders lead me in a prayer of repentance and forgiveness.
Forgiving someone is hard to do. When you forgive someone you're saying "I am taking all offenses I have held against you, out of my heart, and I'm putting them at the feet of the cross, NEVER to be brought up or looked at again." Forgiving someone is one of the most wonderful and freeing things you will ever do in your life. That day, I forgave a lot of people. People I never thought I needed to forgive, people I had forgotten about. I forgave them all and let them go forever.
After we prayed my leaders suggested I tell my team about the way I had been feeling and suggested I share the testimony on how I was freed from rejection, I agreed. There I stood, in front of all of my team members, there were nineteen of us. I stood there and when I was ready, I stepped forward and shared about what had happened that day. After I shared, something very unexpected happened. I heard "Micah, come stand in the middle, we want to encourage you. We want you to know that we would never want you to feel that way because we love you." and I didn't know what to think. I started to tear up... I slowly made my way to the middle of my team, they all surrounded me... Nineteen of the most wonderful, loving, kindhearted people I had ever met. When I made it to the middle of our little (ish) circle each person on my team looked me straight in the eye and told me how I was a blessing to them, or what they liked about me. I began to cry because no one had ever said any of those things to me. I cried because I knew that these people were my true friends and they would never do anything to hurt me. I cried because finally, my heart was free of the bondage that rejection brought me and I could move on with my life never worrying about what others thought about me.... I cried because life was being spoken to my heart and to my soul.

The Week of February 25th Part 2

Thursday February 28th, 2013 was another eventful day in my life. It was the day my mom arrived in Kona to visit me! It was the very slowest day of my entire life but when the moment to pick her up from the airport finally arrived, time seemed to fly by. She was coming with a close family friend who had two sons (Matthew and David) in my same DTS. It all worked out splendidly and we all planned to tour the whole island that weekend.
Matt, David and I arrived at the airport and waited for our moms to arrive. I was looking around for them when I heard "MICAH!" I whirled around and there was my momma, running towards me, we collided in a huge hug, both crying, hardly believing she was actually there. That weekend was one of the most eventful weekends of my entire life. We explored almost every inch of that island and made some memories I will never forget. We jumped off the southern most point of the United States, swam with huge schools of fish, gazed at thousands of stars hovering over the mouth of an active and glowing volcano, climbed the heights of beautiful banyan trees, ate at an awesome 50s style cafe and looked over the 200 foot edge of Rainbow Falls. We all felt like we were in Jurassic Park when we hiked Waipio Valley, through a river, over boulders and all the way back to a glorious and towering waterfall... Well half of the time, the other half I felt like I was going to die when we hiked down and back up the steepest road in America and possibly the world.. But, at the end, when it was all said and done, we had more than a few sore muscles, a couple memorable "battle scars" and and abundance of laughs. To top off their visit our moms made a delicious trash can dinner for Team India and Team LA at the gypsy farm where they stayed which was an incredible night of fun, fellowship and worship.
To my dismay, the time came for my mom to leave, we said a difficult and teary goodbye... not knowing that in just a few weeks I would be returning home.

The Week of February 25th Part 1

Oh the fateful day of February 25th, 2013. It was the week Adam Cox came to speak on the life of Christ. Never have I heard someone describe Jesus' life and ministry in such amazing detail with such a deep understanding of His love. It was only his first day to speak and we were all wrecked by the love of Jesus, by the realization of just how much He LOVED (loves) us!! But that wasn't the only thing that wrecked our hearts that day, we also received news that one of our Team India leaders had gotten in a bad moped accident that day. She was in the hospital with many broken bones, we all began to pray and continued to pray all day. The doctors rushed her in for surgery but by the time she got there, all the broken bones were healed and she just needed the gashes in her leg to be stitched up. It was a miracle. We were all rejoicing and praising Jesus for her healing! 
Though there we no more broken bones, she could no longer go on outreach with our team because she had to have physical therapy due to the trauma her body had experienced. When I got this news my heart broke. She was one of the first people I met when I first arrived at DTS, she was my bud... "God!" I thought "WHY?" I found her in the prayer room later that week, I went with a few other girls from my team and we all just sat down by her are cried our eyes out. I could hardly look at her, my heart hurt so bad.
Though we were all upset about the accident, the week went on, we continued to be blown away by the words Adam spoke about our Savior. I was falling in love. I was falling in love with Jesus in ways I had never thought were possible. "What comes into your mind when you first think about God is the most important thing about you because it defines your identity." Now, let me stop my story right here and give you a little side note. 

*There are many people who have a tainted view of who God is. They have a warped view of God thanks to the world and to the enemy. I was one of those people not too long ago. You see, when someone gets hurt in this life or something bad happens to them, they somehow automatically think that God wanted it or God caused it... When the truth is that it hurt Jesus just as much as it hurt the person. He LOVES you. HE LOVES YOU A LOT. And when we get distracted by the lies of the enemy, lies like "God wanted that to happen to you" then it becomes so easy to look past the truth (Jesus would NEVER want something bad to happen to you) and believe the lies. In short, when we believe lies about God, we distance ourself from God because we stop believing that He is good and start believing that He isn't.... Which is exactly where Satan wants us to be. Satan's worst fear is that we will find out who we are in Christ, and become it.

Anyway, that statement struck me, it struck me because I had SO fallen into the trap of believing falsehoods about God. I had believed that He didn't want me when the truth was I was all He ever wanted. YOU are ALL HE EVER WANTED. "Jesus says 'I have loved you more that you love yourself. YOU are no longer the standard for love, I AM!'"-Adam Cox. God loved us so much that HE DIED for US so that He could live in us... "God Hated the distance, can you get any closer than IN?"-Adam. I sobbed and sobbed... Thankful for the love of a King, who died for me... because He couldn't stand the thought of living without me. 

Rest it off and Rethink the Deep Stuff

The seventh week was the week we learned about other worldviews and dove deeper into our own. It was a difficult week for me because I like to think deep (you may not guess this at first glance but yes, I do) but it was hard for me at the same time to think deeper and reevaluate what I knew and why I believed it all. I love to think about different dividing issues and I love deep theological discussion so naturally, I loved week seven... Though I had already heard and made up my mind about a lot of it, it was still good to rehear and rethink everything because it had been such a long time since I had done that.
Class was mostly all I participated in that week... I tried my best to sit through the lectures and take part in the other activities but some of the days I couldn't. I began to feel more sick than normal. I was used to a day or two of nausea, occasional dizziness (I've had fluid in my ears in the past and was blaming it on that) but this time it was lasting much longer than usual. I also had sharp pains in my chest with more consistent heart murmurs (or that's what it felt like), but I convinced myself that I was just breathing wired and pushing myself too hard and needed to rest it all off.
All that resting and laying miserably in bed gave me a lot of time to think and pray about the things I had heard in lecture... "It's so important to know WHY I believe certain things. It's so important to know what I believe" I reminded my self... and believe me, I thought and thought and by the end of the week I had pretty much thought over all the deep stuff and now that my body was feeling better... my mind was a little tired from all the thinking. I welcomed the weekend with open arms.

Changing the Atmosphere

Week six arrived in no time... It seemed crazy to me how quickly the weeks were passing. This was one of those weeks we thought would never get here. It was the week Lou Engle and Brian Kim spoke to us. We were all expectant and ready to hear what they had to teach us. That monday we all piled into the Fire and Fragrance tent and sat close together, waiting for Lou to enter. We were all so giddy and ready to fall more in love with Jesus. Then, Lou entered the tent, instantly two-hundred young people were on their feet, cheering, standing on chairs, clapping and jumping up and down. The deafening sound of our joined voices filled the small space. This was no special greeting, it was how we greeted all of our speakers, but somehow, that day I knew the atmosphere changed.
Before this adventure, I had no hope for revival in America. But during week six, God changed that. He restored the way I looked at America and gave me hope for the nation I thought was hopeless. Lou and Brian spoke about night and day prayer and worship and really knowing who we are in Christ. It is so important that we keep a constant atmosphere of prayer and worship all around us every day. Intersession is so important because the bottom line is that we are changing the atmosphere EVERY time we pray. God HEARS prayers. Heaven's angel armies are waiting to be sent out with every single word that crosses the lips of people everywhere. Prayer is powerful and when we know who we are and the power we really do have to change lives with the power of Christ living within us, think of how the world will change. "Revival is coming, Ekballo!! Ekballo is the word that Jesus used when he said pray the Lord of the harvest to send forth laborers. He didn't use the normal word for send, he used the word Ekballo which is the same word he used when he said 'I cast out demons by the finger of God.' I Ekballo demons. When Jesus Ekballos demons, demons HAVE TO GO. How many of you know that when Jesus Ekballos laborers, laborers HAVE TO GO?!" Lou said. My heart stirred... Lou was right.... "It's time for war." I thought, "the enemy has messed with this girl long enough and now, now it's time to war."
Later that week we signed up for "Moravian Hours" where we each took one hour during the night that week to fast and pray. It was the first time I had ever sacrificed sleep to pray and war for something I believed in... Revival.  "You pray and shockwaves hit the enemy, changing eternity. History belongs to the intercessor." -Lou. "Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven"-Matthew 18:18. At the end of that week, I knew who I was, I knew I was a world changer, I knew I was a nation shaker, I now knew that I could change the atmosphere.