The first time I heard God’s voice, I was 14.

During a season of incredible brokenness, loss and loneliness, He silenced my world, took away my vision for a few mere moments, and simply said, “Everything is going to be OK.”

There was no fear in that moment, only complete calm and trust.

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While I grew up in world saturated with the lessons of God, it was in that moment I knew He was for me. For this reason I feel I have always been blessed to know a relational God, not an obtrusive or ritualistic one. It is probably for this reason I struggle with the Old Testament God. I was born in an age of Jesus and His gentle love is what I know today.

There was a season when I shoved God off. I literally CHOSE to cut Him off. While I loved Him, I hated the world I had been subjected to. I hated the hurt that I had been victim too and the only way I knew how to take back my life was to say, “if You forgive and I know You are real, then I am going to do the wrong thing for awhile because all I have ever done was the right thing and it hasn’t saved me the heartache.”

It was a wreckless and immature decision I made when I was 19. Relatively fresh to college and learning my independence for the first time I wanted to show everyone who had taken their love from me that it didn’t matter. Since I clearly hadn’t earned any favor by following their rules, I would do what I wanted to.

When I was 22, I returned home with a piece of paper that said I meant something; a degree that promised professionalism and independence from everyone. That paper promise failed me too. I found myself living in my mom’s living room and working at a hotel front desk. While the beach view was beautiful, my soul ached for more but I believed I had walked to far away to go back to Him. I had hurt Him and I couldn’t face that. I had hurt myself and now the finger I had been pointing at everyone else showed me three more pointing right back at me.

I have a dear friend who came up along side me in this season. She invited me to church. I had nowhere else to go and I said yes. I remember writing my first tithe check for $10 and feeling the freedom in the sacrifice (after all, I was making $8.75 an hour as a college grad with $90k in student debt and a car payment). God found me again through the presence and pursuing of that dear friend. I heard him speak again on December 23, 2005 and I was home again. For good.

On December 30, 2012 my husband I heard God together. It’s a moment that would change the course of our life and our immediate direction. We visited a church far from home and at the same moment we both looked at each other and KNEW. He had spoken to us both with the same message: that church was supposed to be our home. And we said YES. We leveraged our worldly-all for the heavenly GO.

It’s had me thinking lately about two vastly different things:

1. Why don’t some people hear Him?

2. I want to know more about those who say YES when He asks for something.

In our new church home, I had the opportunity to hear an incredible story of a woman who heard God’s prompting and she said YES. Today, she is giving her kidney to a once-upon-a-time stranger but member of our church family. It’s an incredible story of what God can do when we don’t silence Him. When we don’t shrug the words we hear off telling ourselves we’re crazy. When we keep pushing on the prompting. If you have time, read about Courney and Jana here

I guess what I know more in this season of life than I ever have before is how much better my life is with Him in it. This last year has grown me so much in genuine joy and the freedom of smiling for no reason that I can’t let it go. I can’t let Him go….