my treehouse

EEEEEE!!! I am just OVERWHELMED, BLOWN AWAY, BRAIN-FRIED-SQUISHED-MELTED at the GOODNESS and FAITHFULNESS and CHEEKINESS of God.

Exactly three years ago, I returned home from almost two months away in Hawaii- severely depressed, suicidal and absolutely shattered. I remember writing for the first time, the day I landed back in Sydney how I really needed to get help in whatever form it may be. That was when I let go of almost 7 years of blind pride and denial of my pain and starting seeking help from professionals, my family and from God.

I was 42kgs, addicted to everything, hating myself, in the worst relationships with people and had no idea how to relate to people if I wasn’t in an environment where people weren’t high or wasted. I remember not even speaking a word to the people at YWAM Honolulu because I was just so paranoid and focussed on avoiding meal-times and looking for a good hiding place to drink.

I thought it was actually a random ‘mistake’ for me to be there.

I came home one day sometime in early September, during a time where no-one was usually home and was so suprised to find my dad standing in the kitchen, looking so drained and helpless.

My heart was so cold towards everyone at that time, I felt no remorse for the pain and anxiety I must have caused my parents through my frequent disappearing acts which lasted months at a time.

He just greeted me and so sadly reached for a pile of paper on the table. He looked so meekly and sincerely at me and begged for me to sign the papers.

It was an application for YWAM.

I remember having absolutely no desire to sign any of it and actually was quite appalled at the idea of leaving my world behind and going to live in a place filled with Christians. 

After skimming through, I was so relieved to tell him that the application dates were already closed and that it was too late. He begged anyway. I had never seen my dad look so desperate and so unscary before. It scared me.

Out of a desire to relieve myself of guilt and an obligation to ‘repay’ them for not coming home in the last few months, and missing his birthday I filled it out. Then I left the house as quickly as I could.

Within a freaking week, I get a text from my mum asking me to come home to organise the flights for Hawaii. I was in such shock. I was actually high when I got the text and it just freaked me out even more. I could feel something WAAAAY bigger than me, calling me and I didn’t know how to respond. It was impossible. It was not POSSIBLE for me to get accepted by the school. The dates were already overdue and a friend who had applied for it two months before me still had not been accepted yet. This was a mistake! what the hell is going on?

Within two weeks I was on the plane to Honolulu. 

It was the worst way to leave. Smashed all the weeks leading up to it, not even at home- it was the worst goodbye to my family. I met them at the airport and they brought my luggage for me to take that morning. I think the last thing I said to them was I hate you. 

It was such a war in Hawaii for me. I could feel the pull of self-hatred and self- destruction intensify as I landed there. But there was also such a small hope and yearning for life and for freedom.

It was weak but it was enough for me to stay even a few days at the base.

The night before I had a dream of an avocado tree.. the first thing that I saw when I was exploring the base was the same avocado tree. and they even had a mango tree!! (I knew that was just for me) It made me so so scared though.

I knew it was exactly where I needed to be and I knew my life would never be the same if I stayed. I received a letter from a girl and it had my name on it with a prophetic word. I had no idea what that was but it freaked me out.

I hardly went to any of the services and I would just disappear to the city centre during the day. But there was one moment I remember and it was an activity to sit for 15 minutes anywhere on the base and allow God to speak to you and you would write what you heard. 

Within a few minutes, I was crazily scribbling pages and pages of his heart towards me.

I slapped the book shut and left the site.

I could not handle His love. I felt so so so suspicious of God. I felt like He was trying to lure me to change me and then to control my life. Like He was manipulating me by being kind. I think what scared me more was that there was nothing for me to hide behind.

There was nothing I could run to to conceal my feelings or to numb myself anymore.

I felt like I was on the verge of tears all the time and I hated it so much. I felt such a pressure to stay though and there was such a fear of failing.. knowing that this was my last chance and the last and only thing my family wanted and needed me to do for them.

The fear of failure, the fear of life, the fear of man, the fear of feeling 

-was what drove me to run away.

That was it. I left the site, had caused so much problems at the base and had the freaking police trying to find me to make sure I wasn’t dead.

It was crazy. I was in the lowest place ever in my life at that time. 

It has always always been a dream to go back there. I love the place. I love the islands. I feel like I was born to live on the hawaiian islands. God had always promised me that I will go back very soon. Even when I was writing about how seriously I needed to get help the day I arrived, I wrote that I will go back there one day.

AND IN 12 DAYS I WILL BE THERE!!!! Talk about restoration! It is so much more than a holiday, it is so much more than an adventure. It is actually a manifestation of a promise, of His faithfulness, of His kindness and His desire for me to enjoy victory in everything that I’ve ever gone through and that has been robbed from me.

I am blown away at how God has restored and is restoring every single area of my life. every single memory. every single emotion. every single relationship!

Oh yeah, as I mentioned about the Honolulu police, I was so mad and felt so betrayed by the woman who called them, Racquel (who was the head of the honolulu base and she was ‘conspiring’ with my mum, or at least thats what I thought at the time) I actually really hated her because of it.

I emailed YWAM just last night because I had a such a strong desire to visit them and was curious about Racquel. I emailed the hospitality department to enquire about housing and  freaking RACQUEL emails me back today, saying the woman who usually is in charge is gone this week so she is taking care all housing enquiries and how she remembers me and WHAT THE FREAK! what are the chances. hahaha! it was so good to speak to her too.  God is so so good at restoring.

He is so cool.

I just love how I get to experience and witness God turning every place of pain into joy and pleasure. I love watching every barren part turn into life and every parched ground, seeping and overflowing with fresh, life-giving water!!!

I love how no matter how many times I ran and how strongly everyone felt the only chance I had was to stay at YWAM, God always makes a way to free us and to reveal Himself to us. Really. None of our mistakes are mistakes with Him. He actually CAN AND DOES AND WILL work all things for our good.

AMAAAAAAAZZZZINNNG JESUS!!

I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LIFE WITH YOU!

Holy craap!! I just looked up the word Waikiki and it means SPROUTING WATER

:O 

AAAAAGH!!! God Your goodness ALWAYS catches me off guard every time!!

I can’t believe how much You care about all the little things that matter to me.. and how You make Your heart known to me:’) You are such a good BIG daddy. Wow.

This week is the beginning of my FIRST uni exams; well it isn’t actually the first - its around the 8th first time, but this will be the ACTUAL first time I have ever turned up to the exams (and I intend to til the end! yay!)

So, as you could imagine, the last week has been a bit of an emotional whirlwind, filled with peace one moment..tearing up at the reality of God’s presence in my life- to hours of silence being brainwashed by lectures on statistics- then back having a good cry in Daddy’s love and in the joy that there is more to life than what I had been staring at…then back to gawking at pages upon pages of excruciating numbers and statistics. 

Today was my first exam. It was traumatising to say the least. I had a massive clock on the very table I was sitting on, propped up against the wall. I have never seen such a large clock so close up in all my life- the second hand was ticking mercilessly; it actually resembled a stick. I felt myself experience time in a way I have never experienced before.

Gosh test conditions are stressful. 

But happily ever after, it ended. So much life and joy began bubbling me over the further I got from the building.. the test felt worth it.

On the way home after a phone call with a friend, I felt God’s delight over me and I looked up to see two lines in the sky. I smiled as it looked like two jet planes soaring side by side but then realised it was a skyscraper.

hahaha! I stood there, watching, the little plane swirling, dancing, playing across the sky and it hit me again, like it was the first time I ever thought it.

I LOVE SKY SCRAPERS! I love how we can write messages in the sky. It really made me feel how BIG the world is, How BIG God is and I felt sooo many possibilities stirring in the atmosphere! It’s so cute, that God writes in the sky with clouds and we write with little planes. hehe

anyway, after a good ten minutes of watching the little messenger scribble the note.. this is what I saw.

(pretty much what I guessed at H anyway :P)

HOPE

hahahaha!! CHRIST IN ME, THE HOPE OF GLORY!

He always give me so much hope in the things that overwhelm me. He is a father that desires to lift off the burdens and weight that the world, others or we, put on ourselves.

Suddenly my study load got a little lighter :)

eeeeee!! LET HOPE ARISE xx

I was just thinking about the pastor in America that a friend told me about yesterday who was killed by a rattle snake.

The pastor brought out a rattlesnake to a service, inspired by the verse Mark 16:18 “they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

He got bitten by the snake and died.

It left me with such a sense of sadness. When I said how I didn’t know what to think of it my friend said, ‘Do not test the Lord your God.’

I totally agree however I cant help but feel there is more to this.

When I think of testing God, the first thought that comes to mind is the kind of testing that happens when you need proof for something or you have the intention of exposing weakness. This is a kind of testing that comes from a heart of rebellion or disbelief.

However, there is also another aspect of our hearts in testing.

Immaturity. We could be testing God without even knowing it and through our mistakes, we learn and grow.

The story about the pastor could not just have been about not testing God because I feel I accidently test God (in my immaturity) sometimes and He teaches me from it and gently reveals to me my heart. He always reveals to me his goodness and patience when I test him unknowingly in my zeal and impatience to see His word come to pass.

I think (however misguided) it was such an act of faith for that pastor to trust God for his protection, even though this situation was manufactured and manipulated by himself (by bringing the snake) and so it changes the dynamic (as to if he were in a jungle and he came across a rattlesnake.)

I feel like what the pastor heard was actually the enemy that deceived him and was imitating to be a prompting of the Holy Spirit.

It reveals that sometimes, in self-centred passion we can be blinded to do things that we do not see the Father doing or doing things that He isn’t asking us to follow Him into – and we get hurt, leaving a congregation and the world confused once more at the nature and character of God.

It angers me so much how the enemy abuses and twists our passion and our hunger to see moves of God to bring death and confusion.

The pastor was definitely under deception and the danger was allowing his ‘plan’ or idea to be before God’s plan.

I wonder how long he spent in prayer and fellowship with the Holy Spirit before he executed this idea. I’m so sure that even a second with the Spirit he would have heard a warning or an alarm. God is always loving us and protecting us, no matter how immature we are. 

It is far too simple-minded and unwise to think that merely having  ‘passionate faith’ and a line of scripture will back us up to make things work out the way we want and expect them to – even with the best intentions. Yes, even an intention to glorify God.

It was a plan that the pastor had made, without God asking him to. It was not even a plan that the pastor had to fulfil.

It is pride to think of an idea that we made, then think of scripture or even a word we received and expect God to back us up. (like Ischmaals, using a promise to make a way for us to fulfil it ourselves)

It is us aligning ourselves to what God’s plan is and backing it up. (backing it up as in agreement and yielding)

I am more concerned at how the congregation must be in such a state of confusion and fear at what happened and how discouraged some may be in the confidence of Gods love for them after seeing such a traumatic event. The pastor wasn’t protecting the sheep and his death would have left many in confusion instead leading them in hope as he was called to do.

No matter what is it we see though, I believe that whatever had happened was unquestionably out of God’s love for this man.

This story has got me thinking about the difference of testing God and responding in faith in everyday situations and the immense need for wisdom and humility.

The action may look the same outwardly, but the difference is hearing and discerning the Spirit lead you into it.

It makes me think of how important it is discern through intimacy with the Father and grow in love and obedience to the actual voice of God rather than our own ideas and aspirations ‘for God.’

How saddening it would be to see your childs’ eyes scornfully scrutinise every part of their being each time they walked past a reflection.

To watch them putting themselves down with comparisons and desiring to be everybody other than themselves.

To hear every murmur of dissatisfaction about their character and personality or how much they don’t believe you actually want to hear their desires or dreams.

To perceive their underlying belief that there are not good enough – and will never be good enough to just receive your love.

To watch your child continually striving, with a history of achievements and accolades which only deepens their insecurity and comparison. How saddening.. to see a child that doesn’t know how they feel about anything – because they fear being wrong.

To watch your child being tossed between waves of pride to insecurity to defend themselves from their fear of intimacy and abandonment.

I NEED A REVELATION OF YOUR LOVE EVERY MOMENT OF THE DAY FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE!

We are all Dad’s kids! It’s all good! No more to agreement with introspection (death)

“Set your minds on things above not on the things that are on earth.’ Colossians 3:2

“Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Philippians 4:8

No one can see what’s going on inside you but it’s time for FULLNESS.

Time to get comfortable with being loved.

Time to get comfortable with peace.

Time to get comfortable with joy! It’s the Kingdom.

We have no choice but to be comfortable with the kingdom because Jesus said ‘It is finished’ already. Hehehehe!

I surrender to you again God

I desire you

I want to yield to you

I want to abide in you

Teach me to discern my thoughts

To hear your voice and to be swift to obey

Even when my way looks best,

Or my ideas more desirable..

Show me your heart

Renew my mind – transform the way I perceive myself

The way I view others

The way I view time

The way I view life

Restore your kingdom reality

Brand it upon my heart

That an awareness of Your presence in every place

Will become as natural to me as breathing..

LOVE NEVER ENDS. as for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, they will pass away.

For we know in part and we prophesy in part but when the perfect comes the partial will pass away.

I haven’t written a note in a very long while but I have something burning on my heart that it’s impossible for me to sleep.

This has been on my heart for a while now but haven’t had anything set me off to start to verbalise what I know the Spirits been pressing on my heart. Until now.

I just want to firstly say and I pray that as I write this my heart would be filled with and overflowing with love. I sincerely write this with nothing but love in my heart and the last thing I want to do is offend or hurt people. Just be honest with yourselves and truthful with what you have seen and experienced. Also, in no way or form am I saying this as a person who has it altogether because this honestly began as God speaking to my heart about my own issues. 

The concept we have been taught since we were able to speak, hear or read anything in this world is that there is not enough.

If Matthew gets the jelly bean, there is one less jelly bean in the jar for you, and a decreased chance of you getting picked to eat a jelly bean.

That everyone you see around you, is secretly and will eventually become your competitor for something there will only be one left of.

That there are only certain number of people that will be chosen for a selective school, a certain number of people who will win the free mars bar, a certain number of people who can get that car.

Economics is built on the scarcity principle which is the belief that there is not ‘enough’ to go around. Everything in our society is built on this. The way we buy and sell - our entire worldview and life on earth is shaped by this paradigm.

But this is not the nature or way of God.

I kept getting led to the time where Jesus multiplied bread and fish to feed 5000. He did this crazy feeding thing two times, and each time there were basketfuls of bread left over after every single person was not only fed but filled. They were so stuffed it was basically a food coma for all of them. I kept wondering why the heck would you leave 12 baskets?

Is Maths not Gods’ forte? Did God shop at Costco? Is God wasteful? Why were there so much food left over if it was just about feeding people?

It is because it is God’s nature. God is a God of abundance. Of MORE THAN ENOUGH.

Look at the heavens. Look at the billions of stars in just one galaxy. Seriously go watch one minute of a Youtube video of the universe.

How much sky do we need?

One little blue ball of earth and God made a freaking load of sky.

Did you know, the reason why scientists are on this crazy expensive, extensive quest to search for other signs of life, is not because they want to believe in aliens – its because of the theory that if earth was the only planet with life the entire universe is way too oversized.

Basically, our sock-drawer-sized house is way too small for our Buckingham Palace universe.

That is the nature of our extravagant, more than enough, everythings-in-my-really-big-hand God.

That’s his nature. Our God is a King. He is a King of more than enough.

He lacks nothing. Nothing is too much for him.

God is love.

LOVE. We have only experienced love for maybe 6 months max, if we are lucky. Maybe a few weeks with our family at best.

But God IS LOVE. Not the feeling we flippantly call love.

LOVE is a being. It is a person. It is God.

And He has enough love to love me, not only for a year, or a decade, or a lifetime but enough love to love me through sin, through death and through eternity.

My God has so much love, that he CAN and WILL and DOES love me forever. FOREVER. Constant. Unchanging. Undying. Forever.

And not only does He have enough love to love me forever, but He made billions of people to love, because that’s how BIG His love really is.

He could make people forever and He could still love each of them and all of them, forever and ever.

Do we KNOW this? Do I KNOW it in my heart, in my mind, in my spirit, with all my strength and soul KNOW it?

Sure, I know it.

Then Bob gets a promotion. Oh? What about me.

Bill gets gold dust. Pfft why Bill?

Susie gets spiritual gifts. Disappoint creeps in.

John gets manifestations all the time. Comparisons creep in.

Jill writes a book. Bitterness rising.

The other church gets heavenly gems. Jealously blinding.

Why do we feel jealously, competition, bitterness and spite towards each other or other churches? Why are we constantly comparing ourselves to other ministries or other leaders or teachers or whatever else?

Why is it that you can’t feel genuinely happy for other people when God blesses them? Or if you do at the beginning, how come that joy gets snatched away? Why does insecurity and pride rob us of truly loving one other and regarding each other higher than ourselves? Why are we always proving ourselves to God, to the pastors, or to the world?

Why do we ‘own’ revelations and gifts God has graciously given us. Why do we fight to be recognised that God ‘told me first’ Or I’ve been to that conference, heard that word, got that book.

There is a massive poverty mindset in the church.

We actually believe there is not enough.

That there is not enough Revelation of God, there is not enough gifts, there is not enough blessing, there is not enough attention, there is not enough love.

All of our pains, and jealousies and bondages stem from a skewed view of the nature and abundance of God.

There is more. God always has more. He loves you. You are ROYALTY. You are his chosen one. His Beloved one.

YOU ARE ROYALTY.

You have everything. He has given you everything. He has given you himself. He has given you His son.

“Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” Romans 12:2

“Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.” Romans 12:2 NLT

We are not fighting and in competition for a scarce resource of Gods’ love and blessing. There is MORE THAN ENOUGH for all of us.

Ask for a mind blowing, heart-changing, paradigm shifting revelation of Gods’ abundant love for you.

When you are filled and overflowing – that’s the only place we can truly rejoice and bless others and get to the place where we will genuinely  want people to ‘surpass’ us.

Gods heart for his church is for a people who honestly cry out from their hearts that He would bless their enemies with thousand-folds more than they have received from the Lord. More love for Bob, more blessings for Jill, more favour in John’s life, more joy in Bill.

To cry out that God would use them more than God would use you. For the heart to truly lay your life down, that we would truly REJOICE that GOD IS BEING GLORFIED and that the truth is known, not fussing about who is being used to do it.

I will GREATLY    r  e   j   o  i   c   e  

in the Lord

my soul shall e x u  l t  in my God

for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation

he has covered me with the robe of righteousness as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels

For as the earth brings forth its sprouts, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to sprout up 

so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to sprout up before all the nations!!!

Isaiah 61:10-11

I am spinning, I am dancing,
Swirling on the palm of Daddys’ big big hand!

lalalalalalaaa