just an update...

so last time i blogged, i was quite in a haze. i shall update you on my current life and what's been motivating me to keep going. last week, our fellowship had a corporate fast. it's true, not everyone fasted but many people did. myself included. it's been a while since i fasted and i realize, it's what i need the most. i had two major things that i wanted to fast about (which i shall not share here, only in person). but i think i had really uplifting times of prayer... although i'm still learning to rely on God, there was so much more REQUIRED reliance b/c i know i wouldn't be able to make it throughout the day. i think i'm slightly hypoglycemic so it's always difficult for me to go without food...

anyways, for the past three weeks, i've been reading a book called, Captivating: Unveiling the Mystery of a Woman's Soul by John and Stasi Eldredge (John being the best-selling author of Wild at Heart). I've never been the feminine type to read into girly books or novels about feminism or empowerment... but I thought I'd buy this one b/c it was on sale at Mitchell's. And I needed something to "captivate" me. Surprisingly, it is by far one of the books that speaks both to my heart and my soul and something that I can relate to. And definitely, something that I need (as you can read in my last post). I will quote things from the book that parallel my life and what I'm struggling with now... but more so about the things in this book that have liberated me.

The book explains how the relationship between Adam and Eve is reciprocated into the lives of men and women today. That the desires of a woman's heart and the desires of a man's heart were meant to fit together. "A woman in the presence of a good man, a real man, loves being a woman. His strength allows her feminine heart to flourish. His pursuit draws out her beauty. And a man in the presence of a real woman loves being a man. Her beauty arouses him to play the man, it draws out his strength. She inspires him to be a hero." It also talks about Satan's jealousy of Eve because of her beauty. Satan was Lucifer, the most beautiful angel out there, and yet God made Eve beautiful... so Satan is out to get Eve (and all women for that matter)...

I had on my MSN name: "Beauty is the essence of God." and that was a quote from this book. Where they say that Eve was the last creation that God made, the final piece, meant to reflect beauty. "... it is God who longs for Romance; it is God who longs to be our ezer (sustainer); it is God who reveals beauty as essential to life. You are the image bearer of this God. That is why you long for those things too." I long for Romance, an ezer/sustainer and to reveal beauty. It's true... if you think about it, that's what many women long for.

But along with the fall of man, there was a curse. In the Bible, this is what it says:
To the woman he said, "I will greatly incrase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."
To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,' Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you. " (Gen. 3:16-18)
John and Stasi describe the curses as this: "Man is cursed with futility and failure. Life is going to be hard for a man now in the place he will feel it most. Failure is man's worst fear... Woman is cursed with loneliness (relational heartache), with the urge to control (especially her man), and with the dominance of men (which is not how things were meant to be, and we are not saying it is a good thing -- it is the fruit of the Fall and a sad fact of history."

This part is what relates most to how I felt in my last blog: "Every woman knows now that she is not what she was meant to be. And she fears that soon it will be known -- if it hasn't already been discovered -- and that she will be abandoned. Left alone to die a death of the heart. That is a woman's worst fear -- abandonment. (Isn't it?) Rather than turning back to God, reversing the posture that brought about our crisis in the first place (which Eve set in motion and we have repeated ad nauseum), we continue down that path by doing what we can to secure ourselves in a dangerous and unpredictable world..... When we were younge, we knew nothing about Eve and what she did and how it affected us all. We do not first bring our heart's Question to God, and too often, before we can, we are given answers in a very painful way. We are wounded into believing horrid things about ourselves. And so every woman comes into the world set up for a terrible heartbreak."

WOW, so I know I wrote a lot there. But when I read this passage, I was pushed into tears. I read it after I blogged. I read it realizing that the feeling I had most was abandonment and it was one of the most uncomfortable feelings ever -- I felt useless, unwanted, hated, despised, worthless, desolate, lonely... and this was all the feeling of abandonment. I felt bitter on why people wanted me to feel this way, how could they let me feel this way? What did I do wrong? What could I have done better?

A few chapters down in the book this is what it says... I read this during fasting and after I read this, I was crying and asking for repentance. "This is the way of the Evil One towards you. He plays upon a woman's worst fear: Abandonment. He arranges for her to be abandoned, and he puts his spin on every event he can to make it seem like abandonment.... The Evil One had a hand in all that has happened to you. If he didn't arrange for the assault directly -- and certainly human sin has a large enough role to play -- then he made sure he drove the message of your wounds home into your heart. he is the one who has dogged her heels with shame and self-doubt and accusation. He is the one who offers the false comforters to you in order to deepen your bondage. He is the one who has done these things in order to prevent your restoration. For that is what he fears. He fears who you are; what you are; what you might become. He fears your beauty and your life-giving heart. Now listen to the voice of your King.... it is time for your restoration. For there is One greater than your Enemy. One who has sought you out from the beginning of time. He has come to heal your broken heart and restore your feminine soul. Let us now turn to him."

So I read this and cried. And now, I feel truly free. I can no longer be tricked into this feeling of abandonment. I am NOT abandoned. It is all the evil plan of Satan. For I have One who is greater than he... and I am not going to be bound by my ideas of "worthlessness" anymore. YAY!

Sorry for the long post.