Beautiful Disaster

Here is an honorary blog to my one dear friend Lindsey Marie Fischer.  She is in love and she knew it the moment it happened. 

Jaime! I’m in love and you don’t even care!

I know LF.  Where is our car?

That is about how it went.  

She’s a lover.  She also knew she loved me the moment it happened, but then she hated me right after.  She loved me and hated me in the matter of 2 hours when we met.  Love first.  Then deep despise.  All these secrets come out only as of late, but i love learning new things she thought of me. 

She’s a world changer.  Haiti, Thailand, Austin, Detroit… She’s been many places and she has left many marks on the lives of people who live in those places and then some.  Her influence goes beyond that which she sees.  Lindsey is the type of person who will change the lives of NATIONS.  

She is a person of audacity.  In many ways than just one way.  She isn’t afraid to teach crossfit to new people in class even though its only her fourth class ever.  

She does indeed go down that street.  And she does turn where she isn’t suppose to.  And that my friends, has made all the difference.  You don’t go somewhere different by following the same path as everyone else.  She doesn’t follow, she leads.  

Thank you MF and JF for finding this gem.  

She is my most wonderful Friend and Sister.  

Ruth 1:17

Take my tunic and my sword.  Take as much as you need.  

Too often I hear, “Lord, if it is your will _______”  

Heal my mom.

Help me get a better job.

Let my kid live.  

Help me find a new car.  

Give me a raise.

Get me on the soccer team.  

And too often i hear, “Lord, I know it was your will for _____”

For my mom to stay sick.  

That I didn’t get a better job.  

That my kid died.  

That I haven’t found a new car.  

That I didn’t get that raise.  

That I didn’t get on the soccer team.  

Who has taught us to pray this way? And why do we do it? The only teaching on prayer that Jesus himself gives us is:

Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.  

Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.  

Give us this day our daily bread.  

And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.  

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.

But it says, “Your will be done…” 

On Earth as it is in Heaven.  What’s in Heaven? Perfection.  No sickness.  No poverty.  No nothing of anything but Jesus, Joy, Peace, Love, more love, endless amounts of love, Worship, laughter.  

It is much easier to walk through life with “if it’s your will” prayers than it is to be bold and ask for the impossible… or seemingly impossible.  We can’t ever be disappointed when we aren’t expecting anything.  

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than we can ask or think according to the power at work within us.  I think God wants us to ask for the crazy prayers.  I think God wants us to have the revelation of what his will is.  

One of the main “if its your will” arguments is : we cannot know what God’s will is.  I disagree.  His will is to have heaven invade earth.  And even though we “cannot” know, we claim to know many times when something bad happens and the first words out of the, “If it’s your will” is, “It was your will.”  Clear.  Defined.  How can we be so sure.  This war is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, the principalities… We fight an unseen battle.  Yes God is sovereign but there is a WAR going on around you.  Right now.  The end is the same, we are VICTORIOUS, but right now you cannot tell me God causes sickness or poverty because it is his will when God’s name is literally HEALER and he has abundance of riches to give us.  

Look into the names of God and then line it up with what you are praying.  Do your prayers stand along side his constant name and characteristics, or do they differ?  Do your “this is God’s Will” statements line up as well?  God will never change, so if you would like something different to happen, I would consider you to change.  

“He was the 54th person I knew that has died in 12 years. I’m not talking Facebook friends, I am talking 54 close - inner circle - friends of mine that have died in the last 12 years.”

My heart broke as one of the girls on the streets shared this story with us. Most of us will probably never see 54 close friends die, let alone have the opportunity to have 54 close friends. In a world where you see another friend die due to overdoses or murders as fast as you change your nailpolish, you have nothing left to do but find a new friend and wait for them to die. At least that is how it seems.

She continued on to talk about her 12 year old daughter and how if she died her daughter would never see her again. Her words, “if I die, I’m a nobody, Detroit isn’t going to contact my family, I’m just another dead girl” and as they came out of her mouth my heart sank even further. I come from the background where my brother was a nobody and Detroit couldn’t even tell my family he was dead until 2 weeks after the fact. The only person to see my brother again was my dad when a Detroit morgue vehicle pulled in our driveway and showed my dad his dead face for identification.

We never saw him again. No open casket. We literally never saw him again. And everyone deserves that.

And I told her that. I told her I never got to see my brother again and he died alone In a field in Detroit and nobody cared. And her daughter deserves to see her again. And she cried.

This was the first time ever she has expressed interest in leaving the streets. And for that we are hopeful because if we don’t have hope we have nothing. We will never lose hope for these girls. What we see seems impossible but we belong to a God who is the God of Impossible.

A guy walks into an office and says in a very even keeled tone, “I’m in remission”

My lack of knowledge of who this man is or what he is in remission from doesn’t keep my insides from leaping with joy knowing this man just got healed.

“The doctors did blood work and can’t find anything,” very nonchalant again.

My pastor exclaims how this is the work of God and explains it was multiple myeloma he had and they prayed two weeks ago.

Drew says, “multiple myeloma doesn’t go away”
The man says, “so they told me”

Bye bye cancer. Hello Jesus. Praise God!

Here is my cliché blog about the new year. Happy 2013.

I walk away from the hardest year of my life. Which is odd because one would think the year before would merit this title. I walk away from it gladly, yet sad, knowing this was the best year of my life.

January of 2012 elicited the onset of healing. And if you have ever healed you will know it hurts. It’s hard. It’s not easy. I walked through this process very alone and I believe it took me through things that I never needed to experience. I did not know how to heal. I did not know I needed someone. I had many hurts in my heart from the year before.

I walked into the summer without a care in the world. I walked into the summer as I was, very much so, sprinting away from my life, My Jesus, My passions, My desires, My standards. I literally ran the other way.

To give you a very small glimpse, I am very much a dedicated person. I am very much the “I will get married and have kids” type. As I walked into the summer I never wanted a boyfriend again, let alone a husband and dear God I’m never having kids. My whole life did a 180. I said, “God what is even the point, I can’t do this with you anymore.” And so I didn’t do it anymore. I spent all summer not doing it. I knew in my deepest of deeps Jesus was my life and Jesus had the best way. But, at the time all I knew how to do was sit in my sin. Splash my feet around in it. Enjoy it. Let’s all bring your own floatie to my pool of sin.

At my redeeming moment I sat through a sermon after 40 days of 24 hour prayer that told me all I need to do is stand. And I sat there saying, “God. I cannot even stand.” We went to slows and I cried my eyes out on a curb in Detroit to Lindsey telling her how I was ready to walk away and I have no idea how to even stand. I knew I didn’t want to but I just don’t know how. I have no strength to do anything. I cannot even stand. And I just cried and cried.

She set out to pray for me all weekend. And that she did. I was pulled from the darkest time of my life and into the light because God is a God of faithfulness and He is faithful to finish what he started. I cannot tell you what happened but my life changed. There was an immense crazy healing that happened from a very deep religious spirit. And I didn’t even realize it happened until I was sharing part of my story with a friend and I said, “wow - a month ago I would not have been able to sit here and tell you this because my heart was so bitter.” And I began on my journey again.

Every last desire I had before this year came back. Every last desire I had pushed away and sprinted from returned without me doing a thing. My heart filled with the love of God and his purpose for my life like a plug had been pulled from my water source. It flooded me.

I grew deeper with amazing friends. I returned. I’m back. I had amazing prophecy spoken over my life which will forever be a defining moment of me saying, “Yes, God. The cost is my life and my life I will give.”

New church. New friends. New experiences. Life to the full and true freedom in Christ. True freedom.

As I frolic into 2013 The Lord is cementing a spirit of faithfulness in me. A deep gratitude of the faithfulness of God. Deep revelation which I can hardly comprehend. And for that I am forever thankful.

I would never change this year. Hindsight is 20/20 and I know MY running caused a lot of pain in my life but what was intended for evil, God used for good. Impossible amounts of good.

Thank you 2012 for the hardest year of my life. Thank you for taking me deeper than I’ve ever been. Thank you for the freedom that has come.

Thank you Jesus.

The past month or so have been quite a roller coaster ride for me. And I found my self this past week just crying out to God. I told him I don’t want to be miserable anymore. I was sick of it, so lets get this fixed. And for some, you think,” well yea why would you want to be miserable” but for others you may relate to wanting to wallow in a pool of self pity and misery. At that point I was treading water in the deep end of my pool of pitty, holding a 10lb brick above my head with both hands. And well, I was about to go under and this chick don’t play that. So I found myself telling God I needed out of my pool. I didn’t want to be there anymore. There is life to be had.

Last week I walked into church knowing I was going to see someone I hadn’t seen in over a month. And I didn’t know this because any person told me. I knew because I prayed to God and I told Him I don’t want any surprises. NONE. Literally I was like, “God, I don’t care how much I like surprises - in this instance I want absolutely no surprises. You need to tell me everything before hand.” And so I am walking out of my apartment and he told me. And I almost didn’t go to church because of it.

Thursday my friend invited me to the gathering and I had not been in YEARS. I almost didn’t go. But I did and boy am I glad. I was driving and God told me once again, this person will be there. I was like, there is no way. Just no way. And there was. And we sat 5 seats apart.

So I sat through worship and hysterically bawled my eyes out. And if you know me, you know I don’t cry. It was like convulsing body cry. I didn’t understand what God was doing. And I just cried and cried. I cried through the whole sermon (which rocked my socks off) I left and my friend sent me a text of the prophecy she was given that night and I proceeded to cry the entire ride home. Like cried - cried. And it hit me.

God is SO faithful.
He is so faithful to not surprise me two times in a span of days.
He is so faithful to confirm the nonprofit we are starting to my friend.
He is so faithful to warn us of the attacks we will receive because of it.
He is so stinking faithful.
He is faithful to the end.
And all I can do is cry about it.
I repented of my lack of faith and trust in God with this situation.
I repented for receiving a word from Him and STILL worrying about it.
And just like that, I left my poop of pitty. I feel like a human again. A human who wants to live life to the full.

Today at church our pastor prophecied over 4 or 5 different people and I just cried some more because of his faithfulness.

I cannot believe that I serve such a powerful God who loves us so much that he speaks human words through other people to let us know. We never need to question anything he does because He has our best interest in mind. He says something and He does it.

If it seems slow, wait for it; it will surely come, it will not delay.
Habakkuk 2:3

I love you. Subject. Verb. Object/Person.

This is correct.

Love you.
Is not correct.

This might as well be one of my biggest pet peeves. Love is a strong word. And when you look at the one you love and tell them for the first time I can guarantee you say, “I love you.” It’s dramatic. It’s a complete sentence. It’s personal. It’s convicting.
You wouldn’t look at them and say, “love you!” Buddy, thumbs up, wink.

I think a lot of people are afraid of being personal. And all too often I’ve had so many people say, “love you” to me. Friends and family alike. Say it like you mean it people. And if you can’t, don’t say it at all. It’s almost pathetic.

Same thing goes for “miss you” “had a great time” and the likes.

I miss you.

I had a great time.

Everything becomes personal. It’s like you can say that to anyone without the “I” present and never lie, even though you personally don’t miss that person. Hopefully someone does.

Don’t make these things fleeting. Don’t say them in vain. Be real.

That is all.

I love you.