BREAKTHROUGH SPIRITUAL SLUMBER

Millie Angeron | 01.17.2022

When I was asked to share testimony of Jesus, I didn’t hesitate. “YES! Ok, when?” He’s been so good to me! Of course I’ll testify!

And then I begin to think of all of the times that I can look back and so clearly see His mercy and grace in my life. Honestly,  it made me a bit ashamed for a second but I shook that off real quick and turned it into praise for what He has done in me! 

I recently told someone I feel  as though I’d been wandering in the wilderness for the past couple of DOZEN years.  It was an exhausting cycle. God would direct me, I would be content for a minute, grumbling the next. I’d have an experience…for example in 1999, He supernaturally healed my gallbladder, AND cleared the debt from the unnecessary surgery that proved He’d healed me! You would think that would be enough to make me surrender all, right?

Nope.

I rode the spiritual high of that miracle  for a while and slowly Jesus became a secondary thought again. He was always on my mind… in the back of my mind, never on the forefront. I neglected spending time in prayer and reading His word. I’d run to  everyone one else for their opinion but not to Him until I was absolutely desperate. He’d move on my behalf again and yep…I’d get comfortable again.  You get the picture. 

I wondered why I wasn’t seeing true breakthrough in my life, why I always felt stuck. I said all of the churchy things. I sang all of the songs (seriously not even understanding some of the things I was agreeing with. Lol!)

I wouldn’t harden my heart to God’s voice, I was scared if that…but I was definitely a hearer and not a doer of His word. Not consistently anyway. I’d do what I had to do to keep up my church lady image. Sin wasn’t hard to slip back into. I’d get convicted and do ok for a bit and slip right back into my spiritual slumber after hearing a message or two.  I was a big ole spoiled baby! I was completely satisfied going to church and getting spoon fed and taking a nap. In case you aren’t seeing it, I was lukewarm. I’d go from hot to cold back to hot again, then I just became stagnant.

I didn’t even have a clue.  I really thought I was ok. 

There was a shift at some point and I truly began to want more of Him. I was hungry and wasn’t being satisfied. Haha, so then I became critical.  Wow!

At the end of 2009 He told me to do something specific for New Year 2010. I couldn’t make it exactly fit into what I had going on in my life so I molded it to fit my situation. And… for the next 10 years I continued to wander…wanting change, complaining and comparing, trying to make His will fit my comfortability. All the while becoming more and more uncomfortable. I truly had a desire for more, but couldn’t breakthrough. 

That all changed one night laying in my daughters bed. It was the end of 2019, in Nashville ,Tennessee. Jesus made it clear that I had a choice to make! Was I going to keep putting everything else ahead of Him or was I truly going to follow Him? Game time was over. 

What was I willing to let go of? 

He pointed out a specific sin in my life that was the reason I kept tripping. I wasn’t truly forgiving one person in particular. I knew it was true.

I’d say things like; I forgive them BUT  I don’t have to subject myself to the person. I can love them from a distance. I have every right to protect my heart! They are toxic to me. Can you see the trend there?  Me, my, I.

I knew it was true. 

I wasn’t forgiving, I was white-knuckling. Holding on, gritting my teeth, suppressing all

of the hurt until I couldn’t take it anymore and then when I couldn’t hold on anymore all it took was one wrong word and it would be like opening a floodgate of hurt. Like a dagger to my heart, all the old wounds were bleeding all over everything again.  I cried myself to sleep that night asking for forgiveness. 

I woke up and went to church the next morning and wouldn’t you know, the whole message was about forgiving others.  

The minister that day said something that I will never forget, “If you can’t forgive them it’s because you’re looking at their sin and not at them as an image bearer of God.”

When Jesus was on that cross broken bleeding and dying, He was looking at you, not your sin. God looks at you through the lens of Jesus blood and sees one who is made in His image and He freely forgives us when we truly look back into His face. 

Until we can see JESUS when we look at others, we can’t truly love and  forgive them. 

That was the  day I truly forgave that person.  I know it was the day I was truly forgiven.  It was the end of my desert season and when I got home, I entered  into a fast. I needed to hear God’s voice and know where He was leading me, because where ever it was,I was following!

From that point the Lord began exposing lies, breaking chains of bondage and revealing to me the things that I’d elevated in my life and made into idols. 

Hint: Idol worship isn’t blatantly obvious! I was heartbroken over what He showed to  me and immediately laid everything down at His feet.  

His word has become life to me. Time spent with Him is never enough. I adore my Savior. I am a bondservant to the one who died for me, the lover of my soul, Jesus Christ. 

As I read over this I pray that Holy Spirit translates His message to hearts and that whoever needs to hear this would receive revelation of how much Jesus loves you and that you would see the cross for it’s true value.   All glory to the LORD,  the one true GOD ALMIGHTY, maker of heaven and earth.