Sanctification

This morning I read an amazing devotional about sanctification. It reminded me of the process that I went through not too long ago... the process of "dying to self"... and how it wasn't a pleasant process. It was the process of releasing all the things that I thought were important.  Quite frankly, I didn't even know it was happening...if I "leaned on my own understanding"- which I did - I thought that my life was over.

In December 2009 I sat in front of my sister and told her that there was nothing worth living for anymore. As we sat on our parents' couch I was essentially saying "goodbye" to her because I didn't think I would be on earth much longer. I thought I was preparing to commit suicide.  

[pause for clarification]

Recently I told someone about how I was "suicidal" in December and they asked me if I had "planned on how I was going to do it". Hmmmmm.... Interesting. I guess not.... It was then that I realized that I had absolutely NOT planned anything- I wasn't going to commit suicide.

*GONG*

Whoa!  So today it all comes together!!! Now I see that I WAS BEING SANCTIFIED!!!... I was being purified and pruned... all the infirmities in me were being burned out! You see, I was finally (for the first time in my life) at a place where I didn't care about other PEOPLE's expectations- I didn't care about "succeeding by doing __X__" or "having __X__" or "being __X__".  I just WAS. I was living in a state where NOTHING mattered.

In retrospect, I remember that there was one thing that mattered. There was one thing I DID care about -  one thing that I enjoyed - and that was being with God. I LOVED praising Him... I loved going to church.  Being in His presence was the one place where I felt I belonged - where I was "connected" <-- and not to people, but to GOD. When the lights came on at the end of the church service, all my insecurities and my "me" flooded back.

Said "me" was poison flowing through my veins all week until I "let go" again and took my focus off me and put it on God (which only happened at church when I was in the presence of God.)  That's why "doing life" with a community of believers is SO important! We can't just live in the light of God for an hour and 15 minutes a week and expect to be fulfilled. "Community" is a mindset and a group of people who encourage one another to think about Jesus throughout the whole week! 

[steps off soapbox]

* Note to self * Check out how all this is being revealed to me in chunks throughout the year. I could never have understood how the pieces fit together when I was initially trying to understand how and why all this was happening to me (and I tried. Trust me- control freak me wanted to know the ins and outs of all of it). :)

In October or November-ish, I remember telling Janice in the Journey Church bathroom that I felt crazy - that "God was allllll around me."  --> It felt kind of like what it would feel like if a swarm of bats were diving at your head... God was dive-bombing me with His presence and LOVE and I (who am the chief of sinners along with Paul) was in such darkness! But the SAVING GOD OF THE UNIVERSE was pulling me out - BREAKING me out! It was the craziest feeling!

Dear God, thank you for revealing Yourself to me- layer after layer, you peel the scales off my eyes. Thank you for choosing me. Lord, please KEEP refining me. Please keep "dive-bombing" my head and heart with Your love. Keep breaking me. Keep showing me me. I want to be completely dead-as-a-doornail to self.... but I keep finding Satan's earthly CPR machine to "revive" my sin-nature life... Lord, I want to live only for you. I don't want anything else to matter. I don't want to do anything for me- but everything for YOU. Sanctify me. Please. In Your holy name, I pray - Amen.

__________________________ 

I can't help myself, I'm gonna put the whole daily devotional up here... it's SO good! Frankly, I'm putting it up here more for me than for you- so I can come back and reference it if I want to. :)

Without further ado, here is Oswald Chamber's July 22nd "My Utmost for His Highest" devotional:

SANCTIFICATION
This is the will of God, even your sanctification. - 1 Thessalonians 4:3

The Death Side. In sanctification God has to deal with us on the
death side as well as on the life side. Many of us spend so much time
in the place of death that we get sepulchral. There is always a
battle royal before sanctification, always something that tugs with
resentment against the demands of Jesus Christ. Immediately the
Spirit of God begins to show us what sanctification means, the
struggle begins. "If any man come to Me and hate not . . his own
life, he cannot be My disciple."

The Spirit of God in the process of sanctification will strip me
until I am nothing but "myself," that is the place of death. Am I
willing to be "myself," and nothing more - no friends, no father, no
brother, no self-interest - simply ready for death? That is the
condition of sanctification. No wonder Jesus said: "I came not to
send peace, but a sword." This is where the battle comes, and where
so many of us faint. We refuse to be identified with the death of
Jesus on this point. "But it is so stern," we say; "He cannot wish me
to do that." Our Lord is stern; and He does wish us to do that.

Am I willing to reduce myself simply to "me," determinedly to strip
myself of all my friends think of me, of all I think of myself, and
to hand that simple naked self over to God? Immediately I am, He will
sanctify me wholly, and my life will be free from earnestness in
connection with every thing but God.

When I pray - "Lord, show me what sanctification means for me," He
will show me. It means being made one with Jesus. Sanctification is
not something Jesus Christ puts into me: it is Himself in me. (1 Cor.
1:30.)