A Testimony

Have you been a Christian for quite some time already? Then I invite you to read this post.

This was the testimony I had shared at church last Sunday (July 28, 2013). I initially had doubts the day before I was supposed to share this as I do not really think I have that much to share. But after consulting the Lord, He placed on my fingers and on my mouth what He had wanted me to say. "I had chosen you to speak," He was telling me. And after that testimony, I felt wonderfully used by Him who is in control, and I give all the glory and honor to the Lord. I had prayed for Him to move in the church, and He did! I had prayed that He pierce everybody's hearts with His message through me, and He did!

I initially thought my testimony would be something ordinary, but when I finished speaking to the silent congregation, I know He had planted the seed, and I had done my part; the church of ROLF had been shaken by His truth. Hallelujah! Nothing is more overwhelming than knowing the Lord has blessed you by making you His vessel.

Here it is, my friends:

Good morning!

To those who do not know me, I am Aine, and I am currently in the Spiritual Campaign, The Story, and also among the YA Bible Study Leaders.

I had been in ROLF for more than fourteen years now, and some of you might have known that already.

Most of my Sundays were with ROLF and I always had been a Sunday School kid. I knew the stories and their corresponding songs. Growing up as a kid, I thought I was a “capable” Christian. I was church-grown, I was saved on my seventh year, and I was living in a Christian environment. Perfect. I thought I felt safe and…heaven-bound. I thought that was all in the Christian life. I THOUGHT.

I felt like Saul, before being Paul, who thought he knew everything and did everything that was required to do. HE THOUGHT.

It was on my fifteenth year when I experienced the Lord in a different level, and I renewed my faith. It was at that moment where I was able to open up myself for a real relationship with the Lord. That was when I could say I really grew. That was the part that I really missed for the most of my “Christian” years.

When I entered YA, I was surrounded by people who were filled with passion for God. There I thought I was the older Christian, but it turned out I was only a baby in the faith. I suddenly felt weak when I thought I was strongest, because although I knew much of the text, I experienced too little of the Lord.

Many times I felt like Abraham and Joseph, when I thought the Lord had been too slow with His work in me and my life that sometimes I wonder if He still has a plan for me.

And even after experiencing the Lord’s grace and love, there still were times when I go back to being a complacent Christian and the sermons and passages become all too familiar already that I sometimes feel I do not get anything. These were the moments I thought the Lord has stopped my growth for a while.

I believe every Christian reaches this stage at some point of their lives. After so many years of being “saved”, the joy becomes passive and everything becomes a routine; sermons are no longer “striking”, then we become dormant – the sleep-walkers.

When I was told of this new Spiritual Campaign, I was psyched. The Story. It seems too personalized that I knew nobody could go through this without looking at his own story aligned with God’s! This, I knew, was an opportunity for the Lord to work in us, and to work in us…again.

Ma’am Jenny, before the Campaign started, came up to me and invited me to join her Bible Study group on Thursdays. When the Lord allowed me to go, what I didn’t know was that He had intended me to join, to lead a group for The Story. Of course I wanted to, because that was what I had prayed for over the summer, but then I felt unqualified, and even unworthy to do it. I felt too weak. I love to speak, yes, but when I speak for the Lord, everything changes.

As I entertained my questions though, the Lord answered me through the Campaign and through the lives of Abraham, Joseph, and Moses. For the most of my life, I had looked up to these great men and thought too highly of them. But then the Lord took me to His perspective and showed to me how these men are so much like me. So much like us.

So the next time we think we couldn’t, and the next time we think life had become too familiar, let us remember these men who were far more “unqualified” and “slow-paced” then the rest of us.

Leading a Bible Study group, I also got the privilege to be a part of other people’s lives, and still, the Lord is faithful to open my eyes to see how all of us undergo the same struggles. And being in the group allowed these struggles to be laid down.

You know, we are blessed. We are really blessed, because the Lord always gives us ways out, even when we think everything else is stagnant.

May we also remember that this life that we have now, is a race – a marathon. If you think you aren’t moving as a Christian, think again! If you are still alive, it only means one thing: You are still on the race! Why are you sitting down? Why are you running off the tracks? The Lord has so much to reveal to you! We could go on for eternity and still not comprehend Him. He is infinite. We must never say to ourselves that our Christian life is getting more passive, because we are not supposed to be that way!

Revelation 2:2-4 says, “I  know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. ³ You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary. Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first.”

We may think things are alright and then go on with the things that have become routines. But have we not realized that we may have forsaken our first love? “That” relationship?

Allow the Lord to work in you again, my dear brothers and sisters, as He had worked in me.

You know, The Story. This Spiritual Campaign could be the Lord’s way for you to start all over again.

I pray that the Lord speak to you and that you answer His call. God bless you. :)

END.

P.S. The Story is a Spiritual Campaign hosted by Rivers of Life Fellowship (ROLF), where we go through the whole Bible in 31 weeks, aligning God's upper story with our lower story. There is more to the Bible than just a compilation of what WAS or what WILL come. It is very much alive, even RIGHT NOW, and God wants to be a part of our perspective, to take us to His. We just have to take time to find about it for ourselves. :)