Being tailor-made (continued)

Previously I wrote a post about being tailor-made, but I still feel like there is so much in my heart relating to the subject, so I have decided to elaborate bit on the growing process.

I feel that sometimes God needs to break us a bit in order for Him to put us back together again. It is not a process that we should be scared of, but it can be painful at times. As I mentioned in my previous post, we grow into our spiritual skin over the years and sometimes God needs to alter our understanding or beliefs, because they were formed by tradition or culture and not by Him. So sometimes we need to be broken in order for God to sift through the pieces. Like when making a quilt, He selects the correct pieces (revelations and truth) and discards the incorrect pieces (understanding formed by culture) and weaves together a new skin for us to grow into.

As you can imagine, being broken is a very vulnerable process. It might feel like everything is stripped away and you can't figure out what is new and what is old, what is truth and what is a lie. As I have mentioned before, it is a process. Don't try and do too much, too fast. Give yourself time to adjust to your new understanding and thinking patterns and embrace this time to rest in them. In times of confusion, don't try and figure things out with theological discussions, rather focus on the revelations and truth which you do know and which God has given you. Focus on the basics. God is love. No one can argue with that one. ;) know that God is in control of the entire process and He will complete it. God never forms anything that is not good and thus you can be sure that all things will work together for your good and according to His purpose. You are safe in His hands. Listen for His voice and follow His lead boldly.

Picture credit: Strawberry threads

Being tailor-made

Sometimes explaining an abstract concept can by quite tricky, so I'll start with an illustration. Our skin stretched with us as we grew from children into adults. Spiritual growth on the other hand is a little different in my experience. It is almost as if your spiritual skin doesn't stretch and as you can imagine, this could be problematic when growth occurs. You would literally have to grow out of your skin and in my experience this is how it feels.

Your spiritual skin is made up of your revelations, beliefs and understanding of God and His word and these shape and grow constantly as we grow closer to God. We go through different stages, sometimes we are comfortable with what we understand and believe and sometimes we feel challenged by God or others. We need to be challenged, because there is no growth without challenge.

When we feel comfortable with our revelations, beliefs and understanding of God, we feel comfortable in our spiritual skin and super confident, but when God starts challenging our understanding or increasing our revelations, we become uncomfortable. Something needs to give way, somewhere the skin needs to tear and new skin (new revelation) needs to grow, and sometimes old skin (incorrect understanding) needs to be cut out and thrown away. The only way that this can occur is when we tear the skin and make the adjustment. This process can be confusing and vulnerable. We all like feeling confident, but when we have a tear in our skin and a new revelation needs to grow, we might feel vulnerable in certain spots and maybe a bit unconfident and not so sure of ourselves.

But not to worry, as we grow into the new skin our confidence will grow again and our new revelations will inspire us forward. The old skin being cut away will allow space for God to pour new understanding into our hearts.

It reminds me of this verse: "Neither is new wine put into old wineskins. If it is, the skins burst and the wine is spilled and the skins are destroyed. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.” (Matthew 9:17 ESV)

Never become an old wineskin, God cannot put new understanding into old thinking, it will be too much for you to handle. We must rather keep our wineskins fresh, flexible, ready to be tailored and ready to grow. If you find yourself in the middle of a growth spurt, take heart, even though it feels like you are moving backwards, you are in actual fact moving forwards. God is taking you from glory to glory as He tailors you to receive more of His wonderful love and wisdom.

Picture credit: www.f-stopeight.com

Warning lights

Often, too often, we allow emotions to cripple us. Emotions should warn us, but not control us. Too often our emotions become the problem because we don't ask the correct questions: "where does the emotion come from? Or why do I feel this way?"

I have heard the expression many times that an emotion is like a warning light on the dashboard of your car. It goes on when something internal is wrong. In that moment we have two choices, break the light and ignore the problem or investigate the problem. The thing is, that sometimes the little light is scary, especially if we don't know where the problem lies, how deep it is, how long it is going to take to sort out or how much it will cost you.

Let's say that your "dashboard" shows a light of irritation, you may stop to think and realise that you are just hungry and it's pretty easy to solve or you might realise that it's something about someone else that irritates you and you might need to dig a bit deeper to find out where the irritation is coming from and why it is affecting you so much. Or you might notice your irritation, but have absolutely no idea what the underlying problem is. Don't worry! If God has revealed an emotion to you, then you are totally capable of dealing with it. Take some time out, even if it is just 10 minutes and just sit with Him and ask Him where the emotion is coming from. Sometimes something as simple as irritation can be underlying fear or sadness which can easily turn into frustration or anger if not acknowledged and dealt with.

Emotion should not scare us, it should rather guide us to become more self aware so that we can manage ourselves better and always be filled with joy. Be bold today and don't be scared to look at what is lying under the emotion. Sit with God and ask Him to reveal what you are ready to deal with and allow Him to help you through it. Nothing is impossible for Him!

Picture credit: Hdwallpapersin

And lift off!!

In my last blog I wrote about the worm and the cocoon phase, you might want to read that first for some context before continuing to read this post.

Your challenge, struggle or storm (aka metamorphosis ;) ) takes time, sometimes the whole cycle takes a day or a week, but sometimes it can take a few months or years, all depending on the size and depth of the revelation and change, but there is always a reward after every storm or struggle and therefore I think that the butterfly phase is awesome! You have learnt what you could, applied it as best you could, fought the good fight and now it's time to live and teach. I enjoy this phase as I love teaching and sharing. It's a time to give testimonies and encourage others.

I'm always excited about the butterfly phase, to me it's almost the reward at the end of the cycle of learning. You get perspective as you stick your head out of the cocoon, life makes sense again and as you spread your wings to fly for the first time with your new wisdom, joy is abundant. Your mind is clear and you are completely unstuck. (I always feel a bit stuck in the cocoon) :)
There is still a challenge though…

Did you know that a butterfly uses its wings to break out of the cocoon? It needs to do that in order for the wings to gain strength through the process and ultimately enabling it to fly. If you thus help a butterfly out of its cocoon, you would actually kill it, because it never developed its wings and thus won't be able to fly. I can't explain the entire process, as I'm not a biologist, but i think it's pretty awesome.

The challenge for us would then also be to break out of the cocoon and fly. It's not always easy, because the cocoon process was shaping and vulnerable and we need to gain some courage and boldness to push out of the cocoon. Also, people might not agree with our revelations, might resist our changes or persecute us for them and thus there is always a choice, remain in the cocoon or fly. Stay in the comfort zone or take a leap of faith. If we never leave the cocoon, we'll never experience the reward.

Life was made to share, whether it is a struggle or a victory and we shouldn't be afraid of sharing our struggles and victories, but rather embrace them so that others can be encouraged. Take a leap of faith today and share your testimony, you never know who you might inspire!

“And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death.” Revelation 12:11 ESV

Picture credit: imgfave

The metamorphosis…

And I'm back! It's been a while, but God has taught me wonderful things in the last season and I hope to be pouring them all out soon. :) Sometimes it's necessary to hibernate a bit, to let all the wisdom and lessons learnt sink in, to turn the worm into a butterfly. Well, on that note, let me just comment that I'm not sure if this butterfly is flying yet, but she's definitely peeping out of the cocoon and preparing to fly, all the while thinking "eeeek, this looks seriously scary!"

I'm going to focus on the worm and cocoon phase in this post and then write another one on the butterfly. I think it might be too long for one post. So here goes! Metamorphosis is never easy. Being the worm is the easy part I think, gathering information and munching on every new leaf that God gives you and there are lots. It's green and revelations are everywhere, it's an easy season where you can just stuff yourself full of all the goodness of God. I think that it's important to enjoy yourself in this season and not to push yourself into the cocoon. I can be quite fast paced and I often want to move quicker than I should. Moving too quickly takes the joy out of the now and it makes you miss things and feelings that are important. So relax, enjoy and be content. The growing is inevitable and will happen soon enough.

The point of the "worm" phase is to prepare you for the cocoon, the change, the stretching. The phase builds trust, courage and prepares you for the challenges of change that lie ahead. Without the "worm" phase you wouldn't have enough to sustain you in the cocoon. There's no need to be afraid of the cocoon, it's merely a phase in which you apply the things which you have learnt and really cement new revelations. Plus you have been adequately prepared for anything which lies ahead in the cocoon. God will always provide you with what you need, before you need it. Fear, on the other hand, will always try to discourage you, but it is the time to practice what you've learnt and to stand up against any fear.

It makes sense to me in this way: the worm phase is for learning, the cocoon phase is for applying and the butterfly phase is for teaching and showing others. The cocoon is therefore necessary, because you can only really teach and demonstrate once you have applied the knowledge yourself. This experience builds confidence and boldness and gives you the courage to push out of the cocoon and fly.

So in whichever phase you are, relax, enjoy and push through knowing that the time to fly will surely come!

Photo credit: favim