BEHIND THE FRAMES
How Did We Get Here?
While attending Focus Church, West Campus in Apex, NC, I found myself working towards restoration of many emotions, historical marks on my heart, while working to rid myself of shame, guilt and fear of my past. Matters of the heart that I felt were secured deep enough that if left unmentioned, would stay buried in the corners of my history.
In January of 2024, my wife, Nancy and I made the decision to get closer to God and work with whatever He gave us to do. In fact, this was a New Year's resolution that we made with God. We were later invited by leaders within our church to what I believed to be a leadership meeting on Wednesday, January 31st, 2024. We were going to pray a bit and talk about leadership. Sounded good to me, so we attended.
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A bit of transparency, that Monday, I texted back and forth with my wife and shared how I just felt where I was spiritually, just wasn't it any longer. I went to the extent of sharing that work was not cutting it for me and I felt like I wanted to do more. The next day, I pulled out my external hard drive and began sifting through old sermons. One jumped out immediately, I preached it on June 20, 2014, for a graduation ceremony and spoke on the topic of identity and used Shadrach, Meshach and Abednigo as our main points.
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My own sermon spoke to me.... How funny is that? And I left it open on my laptop through Wednesday as I headed out to our meeting. Nancy and I are now in what we grew to learn was a Prayer Room that immediately shook my core. The couple who invited us had been called to prepare a prayer room in their home and they were obedient. We sat in this beautifully decorated room and began praying and worshiping and IMMEDIATELY I began to weep.
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I had an experience in that room like never before where I felt the love and conviction simultaneously and God used Ace Yates to speak upon a word specifically about IDENTITY and Champions of Faith like.... Shadrach, Meshach and Abednigo!!! Like really God?!?! I was floored and began spilling words uncontrollably. That prayer room literally changed my outlook on so many things and I carry that experience near my heart with how it marked me. (Those who were there understand EXACTLY what it felt like.)
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The next day, I wept and prayed asking God for guidance. Have you ever tried setting up calls for work through tears ? I repeatedly heard, "Surrender!" and it became so overbearing that in a bit of frustration, I asked God, "What else do you want? I am going to give you it all. My life, my finances, my family...what else?" And I distinctly heard, "SURRENDER EVERYTHING!"
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I continued praying and He revealed to me a brown storage trunk, locked away and in the corner of a dark room. Sparing some details, it seemed to have been forgotten and abandoned. I asked God for clarification, and he took me to Psalms 139. This whole chapter does a number on me and correlates with my story but there was a revelation this time like never before.
Verse 5 - My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
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The Lord was never clearer to me. He said the trunks represents your darkest, unsettled, deepest and shameful pieces of your story. The items you felt you could deal with on your own and left them abandoned. The things you thought you could keep hidden from me in a secret place that has been untouched and left unexposed. Trauma, pain, deception.... sin, all locked away and untreated. Left alone and without surrender.
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He brought me back to the verse and said, "How naive to think that if your frame was not hidden in your most vulnerable secret place, how would I not be present when you filled your trunk in the darkest places? How would I not know what has been stored there for years and how could you believe that I was not ready to work through those things even when you felt you were not?"
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He began revealing how the church suffers the same fate in shame, guilt and deception while not realizing that true repentance and confrontation of those topics allows for a greater story to be told. Many have been called to shed light on their stories and share the testimony of His grace, mercy, and healing love through them. But we leave those items untouched, and our fear of vulnerability remains a driving force in leaving the arrow in its quiver.
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We allow the very weapon God has meant for you to utilize in boldness to be held in silence and in secret. I held back pieces of my story in fear of judgement, humiliation, or embarrassment not realizing that it was the very story that was meant to break the enemies back. It was a revelation of true freedom in Christ and part of a full surrender that God had been calling me to for years.
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And so...my task was clear, a weekly blog that will help embolden people confidently expose those dark areas in their lives and overcome their...
HFSP - Hidden Frames, Secret Places!
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