Ask, Hope, Believe.

Often times, when I am most silent is when God is speaking loudest.

Hence my blogging absence these past couple weeks.

I'll start off by being completely real, open, and honest.

Sometimes, the hardest parts of my walk with the Lord are those that are considered most "basic" to most Christians. 

Or maybe, they're really the areas that we mask and pretend to have a handle on, when really we are desperate for the Lord's transformation.

Either way, I struggle.

I struggle to pray without ceasing, to live in an environment of prayer, to have faith that moves mountains, to delve into the Word with vigor, and so on.

Each of these areas have been under intense transformation this summer.

So much so that sometimes I want to ask God for a pause button so that I can catch my breath.

But He knows best and He knows my limits

 (which are limitless when I'm relying on His strength and not my own).

I want to crave God.

So at the beginning of the summer, I began asking Him to search my heart.

Search it and transform it, so that these "weak" areas become aspects of my walk with Him that are progressing.

Because as a wise friend once told me, you are always either moving closer to or farther from God --- there is no in between.

And boy, did He answer.

My prayer life is something He has turned right side up, for sure!

Immediately after I prayed that initial prayer, crying out to God to truly search my heart, all my longings and motives, I got a text from a friend asking me to come watch a sermon on DVR with her that she thought I might enjoy.

Good ole Andy Stanley brought it in that sermon.

God so spoke to me through that message on DVR I rode the entire ride home with tears pouring out of my eyes.

What was the sermon topic?

None other than how to approach God and what we receive when we do.

I needed that. I needed a reassurance that when I pour my heart out to God, He hears me, He listens, He cares. 

I shouldn't require a constant reminder of that, but sometimes I do.

Ask, Hope, Believe.

This became my motto for this season after the sermon, and goodness I cannot wait to share what has come since these events began to unfold.

That night I was reminded of what communion and conversation with God is, and ever since I have been  witnessing what it does.

As Andy stated in his sermon,

 tonight, and every other night, 

God is saying to you, "I know."

Whatever you lay at His feet, "He knows," He has been there, done that, faced it, conquered it. 

Roll into Him and press through, beloved.