♕ Today's Promise: "My yoke is easy and My burden is light." Matthew 11:30
Dear Brides, when we started this Restoration Journey all we wanted to know is "How long will this last?" and "When do i give up?" especially during the times of testing feeling it will never end.
If you are at this point already, surrendered and submitted your life to the will of the Almighty, accept that YOU contributed to the failing of your marriage, repented and asked for forgiveness, broken enough to receive the truth, STOP tormenting yourself already. DON'T let the enemy reign on your weakness, using his old tricks of letting you blame yourself over and over, until you are crippled enough and feel hopeless.
LIFE has much more in store for you and the JOY and happiness you long to have can't be found in your prayers, but in His will alone. Let Him carry the burdens for you, while you relax, sit quietly, and let this MIGHTY man, prince of Valor and Lord of Hosts love you, defend you and win your battles for you. You have been carrying them for so long and you will never be equipped to carry them at all even though you try so hard. So STOP and let this lovely man do it for you. He is just waiting patiently, like the gentleman He is, until you finally surrender and say, "I don't want this anymore, I just couldn't do it anymore". Trust and watch how He changes how you feel, the moment you laid EVERYTHING at His feet. =)
Starting this year, I vowed to have a fresh start with my love. I promised Him I will try to be a better bride, a much better obedient follower and a good mother. I will try to do everything and every principle that is taught here in the ministry so I began doing course 1 again, because the last time I began doing it was 2 years ago, and I didn't finish doing them but my INTENT back then was to gain a restored marriage and my earthly husband back. This time, I vowed to start doing them again from the beginning, going back to the basics because I thought I was doing it for my love, then I was wrong.
Having read my previous lessons, I can see how desperate and how I long so much for my EH, how needy I was and hopeless to be loved again by the person who hated me the most. I can feel the pain as I read them and feel the neediness I have back then. I thought I felt different now, but then lately I have been feeling weary, and burdened, and I postponed doing C1 again. As a matter of fact, yesterday, I didn't do anything at all. I didn't think of anything, I haven't prayed for anything for myself as well, and last night, I got to talk with Him and told Him how I felt, and today, He faithfully told me what I was feeling.
The reason why I was feeling so burdensome, and weary and fed up was because I was doing it again for the wrong reasons. I wanted too much to be ZEALOUS in obedience to ALL the principles because I thought if my good deeds were up, then my marriage would be restored. That's what I have concluded through reading the testimonies, which was very wrong. I have the wrong heart, so the results expected were not given to me. I cried tears of joy this time because I have told Him, even before reading this which convicted me further, that I don't want to do this anymore. I am tired of feeling hopeless every time I fail. I am sick of the feeling whenever I try to know something and end up feeling worse than before. I am soo tired of trying to put myself together, living my life on pause, and afraid of so many things. Fear has crippled me and continues to torment me, haunting me night and day, together with the length of the journey I am traveling. It seems that it doesn't progress and it won't come to an end.
So last night, I gave Him everything, all my doubts, fears, hesitations and pain in exchange for His peace and the love He is dying to give me. And today, by reading this lesson, it proved to me that what I felt is normal, and served to encourage me to continue giving everything to Him because I am not equipped to carry anything at all. From small things that bother and irritate me to bigger things that cripple me, everything. And this is just the beginning of a much wonderful relationship I have with Him.
My love talks to me, speaks to me in a way only He and I would know. It's so hard to explain to people how He communicates with me but each time He does, I just knew it was Him. I struggle with my impatience, weariness and getting fed up. I am debilitated and crippled by fear, fear of the unknown and the uncertainty, and was certainly bound by pain.
With all this, surprisingly, even though I can't see Him, I can't feel Him, I just know He's always there for me. Though He won't stop my tears from falling, my heart from being broken over and over, I know and I believe He cries beside me. His heart is also breaking for me.
Knowing that my love has once walk through this road I am going, that even in knowing what would happen, He still asked if there is "another way". That even if He knew Lazarus will be alive He still wept. These verses are stories that served to strengthen me knowing that my LOVE knew pain and felt it, but he has a greater purpose. He does not deny His feelings and emotions, and this is what makes Him very real to me.
I am human, and I am allowed to feel these emotions as well. Sometimes, I question myself and told Him to just leave me, I will do Him no good and He can't use a broken vessel like me cause I'm not going to change as much as I want to. I can't. BUT HE CAN. He loves me so much to leave me be alone, he wants me to spend eternity with Him. That's why He doesn't turn his back on me. Sometimes, the feelings are too overwhelming but I have to remember that it is not I who chose Him, but HE CHOSE me.
I have read the Restore Your Marriage book, gone through lessons but didn't finish them, and they made me open my eyes to the truth that I was blinded. It stripped me of pride and humbled me knowing that I greatly contributed to the failure and destruction of my married life, and that I was FAR away from the one I was supposed to prioritize.
But this is a process, that's why it's called a journey, and no journey is perfect without stopovers and detours. I have finally reached a point in my journey where I plead with my love not for anything, but for me to love Him the way he deserves to be love, for my joy and happiness to be found and secured in Him alone. And for my son to grow up having an intimate relationship with His Heavenly father, a relationship so close like no other man here has ever experienced, and for me not to stand in His way of allowing that relationship to take place.
I started this journey with a broken heart and shattered future with longing for my earthly Husband to praying for hedge of protection towards him and the Other Woman, to wishing the Other Woman or my earthly husband would die instead, then praying and pleading that in the next occasions we would be together, to thinking that I should die instead so that all of them could be free. From resisting his choices to submitting and trusting that the Lord will deliver me, and watched Him allowed the most fearful things happened in my life while I was watching in the front seat. From carefully doing lessons, good deeds thinking the more I do good, the more chances my marriage would be restored to a point of weariness when I don't want to do anything and thinking why should I bother doing it if my earthly husband made a choice already, until I finally reached this certain point in time where I don't really care.
I am not proud, I lost so many things, and so many relationships already. I was hurt and broken and was shattered to pieces until my love carefully picked up every broken piece of my life and vowed to make it new. After everything, I was never the same person, and I don't ever want to look back again.
I FINALLY REALIZED, THAT IT DOESN'T MATTER IF I DO EVERYTHING ZEALOUSLY, THAT MY EFFORTS WON'T COUNT AND THAT HE IS THE ONE WHO RESTORES NOT ME.
I want my joy restored but this time I want to find it in Him, not in any relationships or on people who will fail me. Not in having my heart's desire, not in the broken plans and dreams I once had for myself, but in Him and in His presence alone. Now, I am sitting quietly, comfortably not fearing if I make a mistake or if I am doing the right things, because His grace alone covers me and it's enough for me to continue living and looking forward to everyday, until I can finally rest in His loving arms someday.
My love, thank you so much for these answered prayer. thank you so much that because of you, I won't have to carry anything with me. My love, this time, I don't want to ask anything from you, I just wanted to take this time and opportunity to say how grateful I am for you. How I thank God for your life, and how I thank you for choosing me. I am still in awe of how someone, like me, was longed for and loved by YOU.
I don't want anything right now, because I feel so blessed to have you, to have what I have with you right now. I wanted to treasure this very moment, right this time, and if I can preserve how I feel at this second, I will give everything to feel this way again, not to lose what I feel right now.
For the first time in my life, finally, I FELT what they are saying, my heart burst literally and my eyes swell just feeling how much I am feeling right now, I don't ever want this moment to end. I just feel so much love, I can't help my tears.
I love you my love, I just wanted you to know, how grateful I am for you and that's all I wanted to say. Please, help me not lose this feeling, don't let this fade away.
Dear Brides, the Lord loves us all too much, HE didn't want us to carry these burdens at all. He wants us to be pampered, treated like a queen that we are not equipped with carrying these burdens not meant for us to carry. He wants to lift the weight off your shoulders while you trust yourself under His almighty protection.
STOP TRYING. DON'T LET FEAR CRIPPLE YOU. Slowly, let go. Let go of everything that's weighing you down one by one. And watch how He changes you, the way you see things, the way you feel the moment you put everything down.
"My yoke is easy and My burden is light." Matthew 11:30
For all you who are burdened and weary, this is your beloved calling on you. Read this chapter, When Do I Give Up, open your eyes and heart to receive the truth and watched your life unfold the second you decide to surrender and let go.
~ Cherie in Manila
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