I don't know what that is playing in the background, just a second.
That's what I realized.
Oh, there.
It's your voice.
You're muted now.
We're back.
Yeah, something was playing from my Dropbox anyway.
I don't know even know what it was it's probably one of the other one of the teachings we did the other day. Sorry that it took me a while to jump on I was.
I didn't realize how far I've gone to walk. And I didn't realize how far away I was.
So I need to hear that. So I'm heading back and awesome.
This is taking a long time.
I did, but then I get all set up so sorry about that. No problem.
So how are you doing.
I'm, I'm doing okay. I doing okay. I feel like, um, I feel like I've been in crisis mode for a while, and I'm just trying to get out of it so I can create the other day I was asking the Lord I'm like, what do you need.
What do you need and I just like I just need space, I need space to just apply some of this stuff to just slow things down and I don't I'm like how do I buy space like I don't have a television, I don't want to be I don't.
I'm consumed by a bunch of random stuff, and so I didn't just struggling where do I buy buy time to find space to to walk this out and so it's been this like pressing thing of like oh my gosh you need to make some decisions or some changes and when
you're in crisis mode you feel like how do I make those decisions.
And do it in my hearing from the Lord am I doing this on my own like everything just feels so high stakes.
Yeah, that does. Yeah. And you say that when you're, when you're trying to make space for it. What do you are in you're trying to find time for it. What do you mean do you mean like you're just full of solid with like work, or is it just kind of like
is filled up with all of this noise of crisis mode of like fears that are just bubbling up or what. Yeah, it's like my internal mind is just moving so fast, and I probably, I'll give you a short recap of just things that might be helpful and you're
understanding my history until now.
I think, well, when I was 16 I struggled with a heroin addiction until I was 24, just in constant state of trauma for almost 10 years.
And a lot of the trauma that happened during those years came out of that moved across the country from Vermont to California, and continued on the cycle of addiction, but then I got radically saved which was obviously beautiful.
And then, can, when I got saved and got off of drugs, all these health problems started to surface, some just due to the trauma but all these things that had probably been suppressed and was managed by lots of drugs and medication and all of that stuff.
And so then I went on this health journey. Well first I went into binge eating and gained 40 pounds as well, because I hadn't dealt with any of the underlying traumas didn't know how to.
Then I jumped into serving in the church, earning the father trying to earn the father's love building outreach ministry going into these dark places and helping all these people and the ministry exploded and it was beautiful but I was working full time.
So this whole time this like stress driven life.
And meanwhile, I'm just dying on the inside and my health is just flaring up I'd worked in healthcare for so long. I was in hospice and palliative care for a long time.
I saw what the drug companies did it been around in my whole life like I knew that this that's not the answer dove into the natural health world like taking every supplement you can think of on the market spending over $60,000 going to these natural path.
Doctors trying to find answers.
And again more stress and just trauma, even just from the health issues and everything I would eat, I would be allergic to.
left everything and came to Reading to attend ministry school, and like surely this is a
deliverance issue, like go after deliverance, go after all of these things, again just working,
trying to fix this, and it's been so stressful.
And I know that I'm, I know this is the answer, I know that the inner world, like the thoughts,
the stress is at the root of all of it, but I don't know how to, I am being tormented
with symptoms, so it's like hard for me to find rest while working that out, while the
demands, my current job, I'm working for a mega church, flying around the country, meeting
with major donors, we're a hundred million dollar fundraising campaign right now, and
I just, I don't know how to get a handle on things to get out of this crisis mode, so
I don't sleep at night, I'm up every two hours, I eat a very restricted diet, part of my
travel I'm like, I go out to restaurants, right, and meet with high-level donors, and
so that presents some stress, but when I'm not sleeping at night, that just wears on
you mentally, emotionally, and I don't know, I'm not willing to take the medication to
sleep at night, I've tried the supplements, like it's just not the answer, and so I have
just been thinking, like, a lot of times I'll fall into a deep sleep if I can from
like 6 a.m. to 8 a.m., but when I work and have to go into the office, like that just
doesn't work, so then day after day I'm, so I'm having to spend 10, sometimes 11 hours
in bed just resting in order to make up for the time that I'm not sleeping, and I just
feel like, like a very delicate and like overwhelmed with everything, and I don't know,
I don't know how to stop it, so I'm like, I have a meeting with my boss tomorrow morning,
and I'm like, do I have to be able to work from home more often when I'm not traveling
so at least I can stay focused and I'm not overwhelmed by all the distractions of the
office and spending an hour in the morning getting ready, that's an hour I get back of
my day, so that's kind of where it is, it feels messy.
Yeah, yeah, no, I mean everything that you're talking about, I mean that's just, it comes
out of that, that belief that we have to, we have to do everything, everything is required
of us, we have to protect ourselves, we have to provide ourselves, we have to find a solution,
we have to fix it, in other, in short, we have to make it happen, everything, including
our relationship with God, including Him being okay with us, including, you know, or any
hope that we can have that He would even give us an answer requires something of us prior
to that, but when we're expending ourselves, you know, in every single area, there's nothing
left to, to go a little bit more to get the help that we need, and the wonderful thing,
and that's what just, that's what I just eventually, you know, got to the point where I just told
the Lord, I'm like, Lord, I don't, I, I, I'm in so much internal turmoil and pain, and
I can't bear the thought, I can't just bear the possibility, and what it seems like it
is that you're requiring that in order to overcome this, in order to, I don't know,
find the solution, or please you, or do the thing that you're asking me to do, whatever
that obscure, vague thing is that I can't figure out, whatever that is, it's going to
require just a bit more, and, and I just finally told the Lord, Lord, I can't handle that,
and, and so what happened is that I just, I just completely, I, now I did it from a,
a, a place that I didn't know how to not go here, it wasn't that the Lord necessarily
led me there, so I don't recommend it to people, but what happened to me is that I gave up,
and I recommended people that they don't give up, and they don't give in, but they
just simply let go, and that there's actually another place other than giving up, but because
I didn't know that at the time, I just gave up, so my whole point is that I finally got
to the point where I told God, for the first time in my life, and I, and I'm not exaggerating
when I say that, I was 34 years old, and for the first time in my life, I told God, no,
I will not.
And I'm, and so imagine you saying that to a ward, because I can tell with everything
it is that you do, you've got a very high pain threshold, like emotionally, spiritually,
whatever.
And then you're constantly pushing.
And so imagine, because no matter what's been required of you, that you felt required of
you, that someone asked of you, that God asked of you, you would always give that and a bit
more, you know.
And so it's always to the nth degree, and what's kept you going is just being able to
shave off the edge just enough so that you can endure it enough to get up and keep going
and to do the next step.
So all you're doing is just shaving off the edge of it.
And it's not actually dealing with anything.
It's just shaving off the intensity of the sharpness, just a little bit.
It's so intense, just shaving off all of that.
And the wonderful thing is, and this is what I discovered.
Now I did it the wrong way.
And the fact that I gave up, and I just told God, no.
But what I finally did and why that, why, what I finally did gave me release is because
I finally stopped.
In other words, and I don't mean stop, jog, stop, whatever.
It meant that what it is that internally, the exertion and the effort that I was putting
towards everything, I just, in that pleasure, I was trying to give the Lord, I just stopped.
And basically, I refused, I'm not saying that that's a good posture, the attitude towards
the Lord, but he hadn't taught me yet how to surrender and let go.
So all I knew is that when you're sweating and toiling, and you are exerting so much
effort, the only thing in that kingdom, you know, the kingdom of this world that we can
understand is in order to stop that is to give up.
Now in the kingdom of heaven, what that looks like is simply letting go.
So anyway, and the reason that we don't, that there's reasons why, you know, the kingdom
of heaven does not work according to giving up.
But anyway, the point is that it was that the good thing that I realized is that it
actually, in order to push through, so to speak, in order to get healing, in order to
actually get, you know, the results that we want in order to actually achieve the result,
the lack of better phrase, is you simply stop.
You don't push a little more and do a little more, and it's just going to require just
a little bit more of you.
And there's one little piece that you're missing, no, it's just like, just stop.
And if you stop, your defaults will come up, the default that always loves your father
knows he's loved by his father, you know, and very effortlessly interacts with his father
and very effortlessly lives with his father just lives out into the world that will naturally
rise to the top.
So because that's who you naturally are, and what it is that we're doing is we are hiding
that we are squelching it, we're covering it, like with all of these veils.
And and what all we have to do is just take them all off.
In other words, and the only reason that they're staying there is because we're holding them.
I'm trying to balance the thing on my pillow and it keeps sliding is that we're holding
on to them.
So if we simply let them go, they'll rise to the top.
And there's an example for you.
We're going to talk more in depth about this in I think session five, but you have already
watched some of these right a while ago.
So you watched where I talked about the spirit, soul and body where the red balloon Okay,
so remember that the red balloons floating very effortlessly on top of the water.
It's very easy for a balloon to be a balloon.
It doesn't have to try hard.
It's just existing.
And what's in it is so imagine that the air is spirit.
So this the air that it is surrounded by and that it is filled with is of the same substance
just like you are of the same DNA, the same substance, the same essence of the being that
you exist in, as opposed to being this thing, or this object that God saved.
Yes, God did say you or whatever, but you are actually God's just restoring you back
to your actual DNA.
Because you were created before the creation of the world.
So if you didn't even, in a manner of speaking, you didn't even become something new.
You re-restored back to it.
So you have, my point is, if we remember that we can remember that, okay, we can claim it.
We can claim that that is naturally who I am.
That's not something I have to.
try hard to be, or that I have to learn how to become. You can count on the fact, okay,
this is actually, and this is a default to who I am. I'm just not familiar with living like it.
I'm just not used to, used to, I'm just not familiar with it. With that, so that's it.
You've already had the victory. You already are that. We're just not familiar with it. So in
other words, all the work has already been done. So you're not having to become something or do
something or whatever. So the whole point is all we have to do is stop. So with the balloon,
remember it's floating very effortlessly on the water, very effortless for it to be the thing,
right? But all that it has to do, I mean, but what it has to do in order to, in order to fall
down into the ocean, in order to be pulled down, is it actually has to grab a hold of the weight
outside of itself. So in other words, an unbelief against God, an accusation against God,
God, oh, I'm not who God says that I am, or he's not fully who he says that he is to the degree
he says he is that whatever. It's not you. It's something outside of you, you know, that you've
grabbed a hold of, and that's just weighing you down. So you are not your enemy. You are not
something that quote, unquote, you're having to overcome. Now, yes, we are our spirit, and we're
in our body and all of that. So there is that aspect of flesh, obviously. And so the flesh
obviously operates in an unbelief in so many ways, but who you are is spirit. And it's important to
always focus on who you are, not on the fact that you have a soul and that you're in a body.
It's so if you're struggling, it's important to always remember the truth, and always remember
the positive of who you are, not everything that you're trying to overcome. Yes, you are trying to
overcome it. But it's, it's a lot easier, faster, more powerful to transition and to move out of,
you know, your struggles and all of that by remembering the positive of who you are,
then, oh, my word, yeah, this sin. Yeah, let's focus on that. Let's focus on that. Oh, I need to
overcome this. I've got this unbelief and whatever, I find that I actually shift into rest faster.
I believe God faster. And I knew I increase in spiritual maturity, faster, the more that I focus
on the positive and the spirit and who it is that I am, as opposed to all of the troubling things
that I keep doing, and that keep coming up. Because the positive has the power to neutralize and to
overcome the negative. And it's because it's a lot, it's a lot more effective to combat and
overcome evil, not by battling it, you know, in the negative, not by battling it, but actually by
neutralizing it. And that's what it is that we want to do, because whatever it is that we focus
on, we're going to feed. So if you focus on the negative, it actually makes the monster that
you're trying to run from stronger, because you've turned him to face him. And when you turn to him
to face him and to fight him, then it's actually giving him strength, because that's what's got
your attention. So it actually makes it harder to escape. Can you escape? Yes, but it's a lot harder.
And so it's a lot easier to more effortlessly just shift out of that by neutralizing the power,
by focusing on the positive, because the positive is choosing and, you know,
declaring it and by the positive, I'm talking about like the truths that God has spoken,
remembering who you are. And remember, it's remembering who you are isn't going to work.
My point is like, you have to remember it and then choose it. Choose of your own free will.
You know what? I'm making a decision today. This is going to, this is my reality. Not like, well,
God said, and I need to remember that I've got to remind myself, you're not trying to convince
yourself. You're making a declaration as a king, but that is just how it is. And it feels weird
because we're taught that that's not that, that you're not ever supposed to do that about anything.
But I discovered cuts just like I am waiting for my sons to take up the authority that I gave them.
Now, we only take up the authority that not only he's given us, but that he spoke first. We're not
just making up whatever we want and just deciding whatever it is that we want to be or that we wish
were true.
we wish we had. We're only declaring what it is that God has said, but we have to choose that it
is real in order for it to have permission to become effective and have power in our lives.
So anyway, it's that kind of a choice by choosing that instead of focusing on everything we're
trying to battle and to overcome, we'll overcome it for you and we'll overcome it faster because
it's more powerful and anything that we choose of the kingdom of heaven, it always, always,
always, always, always supersedes in power and effectiveness and its rules will reign in the
situation if it's the thing that we give the authority to. If the son of God is bringing in
the kingdom of heaven into a place that is operating according to the kingdom of the world
and it's giving the, and the son of God chooses that, that it will, um, that chooses to give the
authority to the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of heaven will overcome the kingdom of the world
whenever they exist in the same place, because it always supersedes it. So anyway, there's all of
that, that to explain what I'm talking about here with the balloon, grabbing a hold of like some
unbelief or whatever, it's just weighing us down. And then we think that, and what it does
is it shifts our sense of our identity. We believe that our identity is down in our soul where it's
down further into our body and that that is who we are. And we start to focus on it and think,
oh my goodness, something's, you know, I am wrong. I am bad. I am this, I am that. And, um, it, but
the, the fascinating thing is the balloon still hasn't changed, but where it's operating from
has changed. It's no longer floating on top of the water. It is now down into the ocean to a
particular depth in the soul, or it's down even further into the body where there's more pressure.
You know, the deeper you go into the ocean, the more pressure that there is same thing. You know,
the deeper that we go, the more pressure that there is more pressure we experience, right?
But the, but the balloon still hasn't changed its nature. It keeps trying to want to float.
The only thing that's holding it down is not itself. It's this weight that it's holding
onto. So all it has to do to get back to the top is to let go of the weight. That is it.
What does that look like? Practically though, like letting go, like,
I don't know, like, how do I, how do I walk that out?
Well, there's a few different, several different tools that, um, that people can use. And the first
one, um, the first one is that, uh, even though I don't list this in like the practical tools,
because I use it in the foundations that, um, I don't mention it, but the first and the first,
the two most important things are that we have to shift our choice that God loves us to the degree
that he says he loves us. And sure, that's a journey of continual discovery. But my point
is that we really do have to make a very serious choice about that and continue to continue to
choose it, continue to seek it. Um, and I continue to believe it and have faith in it.
And also that we are, that who we are is, is, you know, is the, is our spirit unified with him.
That's who we are. So I believe that our identity is the point at which our spirit
connects with his spirit. Um, I mean, I could be wrong about that, but, but the sense that I get
is that our spirit isn't our, that our identity is not our spirit. Our identity is actually the
point at which our spirit unifies with Christ spirit. No, I haven't found that in the Bible.
It's just something that just, I don't know, just kind of like putting a whole thing,
a whole bunch of things together. That's what, that's the sense that I get. It's like this,
this, this, um, I didn't know I was going to say this knowing that I have to take it with a grain
of salt, but it's that kind of an idea that are, that who you are is the point at which you're
united. So you don't never have to worry or think or focus on the fact of is God pleased with me
as if you're some separate entity that, that exists or is identified apart from him. And you
just hope that you can stay connected. Your identity depends on and can't change from
the connection point with God. So it seems like you're thinking about things, but
before I go on, what, what, do you have anything that you needed to say? No, I think I just like.
I think also it just keeps coming to that place of like, I don't know how to,
I don't know how to walk this out.
like the temptation is not to quit but to time to rest like in my mind I'm like oh is it
if I had two months off to just rest and let my body bounce back so I'm not physically being
tormented with these systems because naturally that's going to eliminate some of the stress
in my life even though it's in the physical but it's enough to like create space and
and like is that what I need to do or can I do this while working while not sleeping
while simultaneously being tormented with these symptoms right now because that's my reality
yeah and you're right I'll keep pushing I will push myself for years I a year ago when I started
this talk I was like if I'm still in this situation a year from now we need to have a
serious talk like how many years am I going to keep pushing myself to do this yeah so when I'm
talking about all of these things when um it's not that the thing you even though I talk about
choice even though we talk about talk about oh remembering this and choosing this and whatever
we do it one of the things that I have to do is explain to people how to choose without effort
because it feels like okay now a little bit more is required now I have to believe now I have to
remember now I have to choose but here's the thing what you do is you just kind of let um
how do I explain this you you choose by actually letting go of all the reasons why it's not true
there's all these yeah but what about and yeah I don't feel and yeah but I don't see and yeah
but how about and yeah but is it to that extent or is this or even you know okay in my case is this
god is this godly am I raising my relationship with him you know all of these reasons why not
honestly that is what makes the choice hard the choice it what the struggle that we make
into faith is actually the fact that we have to let something go that we don't want to let go
and that struggle of of you know what we can say that oh well you know I want to let go I just
need to know how to let go and therefore but the problem is that when it gets to letting go we have
a hard time because it feels like work what are my words see there's something else I have to do
and god's just like no no that's like what you stop what you're doing you stop the you stop the
push against god you stop the as weird as this sounds you stop the desperation it feels we're
so used to feeling like if we stop the desperation it means we're giving up or we're giving in and
we are so used to being in survival mode you know like oh my goodness you know I have to survive
that I can't give up or and I can't give in because if I do I'm just going to die I'm going
to succumb to it I'm going to be run over or whatever but there's this third option called
letting go which is basically you find this place in you and I explained it to I explained it to
was it Casey or Sicily one of them explained that I think it was Sicily where you kind of find this
place within you kind of like this heaviness and this is one of the ways that I help people
understand how to let go is you just kind of in that you you find that place in you that stress
that's anxious that's tight and it could be in your throat it could be in your chest it could
be in your stomach it could be in your shoulders it could be wherever where you sense where are
you carrying the anxiety or the stress or the hurt or the pain or the torment or the fear or the
or the desperation or whatever it is where does it feel like there's not life where does it feel in
your body like there's death and then you imagine it as like this entity separate from you that
you're holding on to and then I'll walk you through a few things but uh but when you're
walking through those things what you do is you basically just unclench your fists and you choose
to release it out of your life and the way that you can do that is to understand that everything
that's in your life that's not the default way that God made you as the new man and the son of
and instead of God the only way that it's staying there is we're holding on to it so the way we can
get it out is to let it go but we have a tendency to think
no it's here and I didn't ask for it. Now I don't mean by any of this that I am blaming people or
you know blaming any of us if we've been like abused or you know you know we we have um and
then therefore there are particular demons that people are being oppressed by because
because things have happened to them things have come against them you know viruses have come
against them they're they're suffering like physical problems. I'm not saying that we ask
for these things okay because just like a car crash or whatever we live in a fallen world and
we experience and are brought against by the effects of sin existing in the world right
and so these things come against us and come upon us so that's not what I'm talking about
I'm just I'm just talking about in in a general sense this aspect that we think okay how do I
let something go that I don't even want you know I'm not holding on to it because I don't want this
you know so obviously I'm not holding on to it but actually there's a way in which we are what's
what's kind of anchoring it to us is the unbelief so if we let go of it at the place in which it
has an it has an opportunity to have a strong hold on us which is some unbelief that we're holding
against the lord or it could be this thing that came down on us and now we've like anchored it
because we've come oh because it created unbelief in us we're holding on to it so here's the very
very very important thing and I'm telling you this I live this thing so it's not I'm not just
telling you theory and what sounds nice I literally experience this and this is how this is
um this is how I do it is that I have to remember that those things that I have to let go of
are not part of me there and I have to fight them to get them out I just have to choose
to let them go and again and what it is really that I'm letting go is I'm letting go of an aspect
of unbelief it may not be the thing itself like say for instance physical healing or whatever
you know if there's some like physical problem you're not letting that thing go that thing is
anchored or or you know you know weighted down or whatever by some measure of unbelief
and so we have to ask the lord lord help this thing to come up and out but but in and lord
my part in that is coming into agreement with you that it's not saying anything about you
that the fact that I have this isn't saying something is saying some lie about you I'm now
coming out of agreement with that that's what you're letting go of you're letting go of unbelief
you're not letting go of a virus or letting go or whatever you're letting go of some aspect
in which we are holding god accountable to us for something that's going on whether it's physical
emotional you know whatever so and then as far as like the letting go one of it there's uh several
different um uh tools that that I that I recommend people use first and foremost you have to approach
it from the perspective of choosing that you are unconditionally loved and fully accepted and that
you're unified with christ and that is who you are then from that that gives you the basis for
to implement these um these tools and one of the things that worked for me that works for me
sometimes is um if no shame and no condemnation and that is choosing okay if god says that I don't
have any reason to be condemned that there's nothing separating he and I that even though
I've just done something or even though I'm feeling that I have this like health attack or
I have this negative uh internal feeling within me towards somebody or someone's done something to me
or whatever whatever thing that has triggered our our um our feeling of stress or anxiety
that we choose with the lord okay lord you know um if you say that I am not condemned
even while I'm sinning I'm not condemned because remember who we are is spirit not our flesh that's
sinning meaning unbelief you know it's acting unbelief if you say even while I am sinning
I am not condemned my sin does not condemn me in my identity then that's what I choose
and what I do is I release myself of the weight and the obligation to account for
or pay for in my identity for that sin or you know
someone's come against us and said something, and we feel like, oh my goodness, did I deserve that?
Am I that kind of a person? Or am I so, I don't know, you know, am I not worth God protecting?
Am I not worth so-and-so protecting me from that, you know, or whatever? Whatever it is,
we have to choose. No, there's nothing wrong with us. And that's really what,
that's really kind of like the layman's praise for the no shame in condemnation,
that there is absolutely nothing wrong with you, that you really are, you really are perfect,
you're enough, and we can look at anything outside of us anymore to be trying to communicate
anything to us about whether or not we are. I mean, we're all very aware of, well,
obviously we're not supposed to look at anything and tell us that we're not okay,
but you know what? We're also not supposed to look at anything to affirm to us that we are
nothing outside of God. So just let the things be what they are. They have nothing whatsoever to do
with who you are, not what happens to you, not how you feel, not your unbelief.
Your unbelief does not change your identity. If you, in your unbelief does not make you less
of a son, does not suddenly make your identity, not no longer in your spirit,
there's nothing wrong with you. Even if you're an unbelief, even if you're sinning, even when
you were heroin addict, there is nothing wrong with you, with who you are. You are making choices
based off of the fact that you thought you were alone. And God has sympathy for that.
He has compassion. Do you remember? I mean, you think even about yourself,
God provided for you in the drugs. He, you know, uh, he gives people a how, why it works. I just,
I don't know. He, in order to take care of his children, he provides for them in such a way
that it gives them the opportunity that they to then choose to take in order to get more drugs.
He provides the, for the money, and then they choose to take it and use it for drugs.
Like it is. I mean, and that's just one example. I mean, God, isn't afraid,
not afraid of our choices because there's nothing wrong with you. Yes. You make choices. Yes. You
may. I mean, in unbelief sometimes, you know, and all of this other stuff that we have really,
truly got to disassociate our identity with who, with what did it, with what choices that we make
and whether or not we believe in God, because he died for you and found you worth dying for.
When not only did you not believe him, you were the one killing him.
So there's literally nothing that you can do to make it, to make it worse or better. He,
he does, he does it all. We have to choose that. It's that reckless,
that there's no conditions. And that doesn't make sense to us because we think, well,
then why would we follow him or, or meaning like, why would not, why would we follow him? But
I mean, why would we, why would we, why wouldn't that give us a license to just send to just do
whatever we want? Well, that's why Paul had to talk about it because the gospel is this recklessly
free. That's why Paul says, don't use your freedom as a license to sin. Why did he have to
say that? Because it's this extreme, there's no caveats and there's no condition. So truly
the fact that you're even struggling right now, there's still nothing wrong with you.
You are fine between you and the Lord. God doesn't have an issue with you. He's not mad at you. He's
not, not talking to you. You know, he desires to communicate, you know, and all of that. And he is
still communicating, et cetera. You can't do something to make him not talk to you anymore.
You can't struggle with him. You can't want him bad enough. You can't not want him bad enough.
It's that, it's that reckless to the point where Paul even had to say, Hey, look, this doesn't mean
that you can live like the world just because you're free to, because he did say everything
is permissible. There were no conditions on that. He said, everything is permissible,
but not everything is edifying. Why? Everything is permissible, but not everything reflects the
character of the Lord. And God wants to teach us what his character's like so that we can work
and act like him. But it doesn't make us different by, you know, different than being different and
not being a sinner.
of God or something, you know, because we don't do those things.
He said, everything's permissible.
But not everything is reflective of, of who he is and who we are.
And he wants us to be like that because, you know, that's, that's how we made us.
It's who we are, not because it's going to separate you because it can't.
He may get separated out of, he's like, okay, we can't ever have that happen again.
So I'm literally going to foolproof it so that it can't ever happen again.
He did.
And it, it talks about this in Romans, uh, not Romans, uh, Hebrews and Hebrew
six talks about the fact that God didn't even allow man to be part of this
covenant, that when he made covenant with Adam, uh, Abraham, he put Abraham to
sleep and it says that it says in Hebrew six, that God made covenant with himself,
that God put Abraham to sleep.
God made covenant with himself because it said he wanted to make
sure that it couldn't be broken.
Because if a man was involved, it could be broken.
There was risk guys like, okay, wait, this is too important.
We can't risk this.
So I will make covenant with myself.
Abraham will just benefit.
We'll be the third party beneficiary beneficiary.
God did the same thing with Jesus on the cross.
He put Jesus to sleep.
That's the third time, at least that I remember that I'm sure that there's
other times where God made covenant in scripture, but in putting the person
that was going to benefit from the covenant to sleep, one was Adam.
One was Abraham and one was Jesus.
And there's probably others, other examples, but those are the ones I point out.
So even Jesus, God himself, when God wanted to make covenant and
wanted to unite us with him.
He wanted to make sure it literally couldn't, couldn't be broken because he
was the only parties involved in making the decision and the covenant.
And the promise he promised from himself to himself with an oath that this is how
it was going to be, because he didn't want to allow there to be a possibility
for it to be broken.
So it literally can't be no conditions, no exceptions, period.
Even if you sin, et cetera.
So it's literally impossible.
So we really can rest.
You're not, you're not trying to arrive somewhere, not trying to go anywhere.
You're not trying to arrive at a particular destination.
You just now exist in this connection and this union with Christ.
And so obviously what does that make us want to do?
Like, oh, wow.
If, if now I'm, I can completely rest and there's literally nothing left to do.
I can't break it.
I can't, you know, I can't make it better because it's already the ultimate, you
know, there's, there's literally nothing I can do now.
All we do is, is we can just enjoy it, continue to focus on the development of
that relationship, just in the enjoyment of it, while God does everything we get
to be, we get to actually be part, but God's the one who's actually
accomplishing everything.
So basically what it is that we're wanting to transition into is that
everything it is that you're doing with your, um, with your health in order to
try to find solutions, you know, in order to get relief, uh, in order to, uh, get
relief in your job so that you can work and that you can make money and you can
interact with other people, but without the stress and anxiety, what we're trying
to transition now into is living life in a perspective of, okay, you know, from
this understanding, what is hard to describe, it's different than an
understanding it's benefiting from God finally being the one to create the
outcomes because right now, if we're in unrest, we have to create the outcomes.
Because we're the one who's, we're the ones who decided that that's
how our kingdom was going to work.
Our world, we decided God abandons us and leaves us alone and we're unprotected
and unprovided for us.
So we have to figure it out.
So sure enough, we have to sweat and strive and all of that.
And then you create results.
What we do is we let go of control.
And now we give God permission to be the one to create the results in a manner
of speaking, God is not creating results unless we allow them to.
So we, in order for God to do it though, we have to, we have to let go.
We have to be hands off.
So we really do have to release the outcome, the consequences of our
actions, et cetera, to God.
Hey God, me being healed or me finding a solution or me getting money, me
pleasing my bosses where they're happy, where I go to dinner and this and this
benefactor ends up giving us all of these, all of this money and all of it.
And, um, you know, continues to donate this really high amount.
on or whatever increases it, et cetera, whatever your goal is when you go into
the, those, um, uh, those meetings, or if it's just to continue to keep up
relationship, whatever it is, God, you're the one who's actually creating the
things to happen and I just get to partner with you to bring spirit into
the situation, just living naturally out of who you and I are and interacting
with that person or learning more about naturopathic ways that you put into
the principles of science and into creation, into medicine that can partner
with me on the healing journey, but God, you're going to be the one to heal me.
I, and so now that the pressure is off of me to figure it out as if I'm only
going to be healed if I find the right answer and I talked to the right person.
And if I don't, I'm screwed.
And I never used that word really.
It's just, I just, you know, I, uh, you know, that I'm not
going to, I'm not going to get it.
Instead of that, we're just like, okay, God, you are going to, you can actually
heal me without me asking, or if you could heal me miraculously tonight,
honestly, so you don't need me to do anything.
So I'm going to choose that even while I'm doing something, it's not because
it's needed, it's in order to create it because you can create it and you're
going to create it, I'm just, it's just you and I, you know, deciding together
through what structure would you like to flow Lord, but it's not the structure
that's going to kill you.
It's not the laws and the principles and the rules and the science and the, whatever
it is that God created out there.
That's one to heal.
It's just an aspect of creation that you're allowing to partner with you
and the Lord while the Lord kills you.
And, um, so anyway, because God doesn't need all of those things.
So he can heal you through them and through Western doctors or through
naturopathic doctors or miraculously.
So apparently none of those is a formula that God needs.
So, so now that there are pressure is often what you're doing.
Now you choose between, you know, okay, Lord, you can do it.
However you want, you know, you can, you can actually make the thing happen.
So what do we want to allow to be part of the process?
Cause here's the point, Lord, how do we show and put on display who you
and I are in our, in the spirit?
How do we actually display that into the physical realm?
That is all you're doing.
You're not.
And by putting the Lord more and more on display and by choosing him instead of
the flesh, it will overcome the kingdom of this world so that we're releasing
creation from frustration.
And so that creation does what happened with Jesus's body.
It becomes transformed so that it's no longer corrupted to
death and will never die.
That is how I believe that the new earth is coming, that the new earth, it says
that it will change itself like a garment.
It doesn't say that it will burst into oblivion and then God's
just going to create a new one.
It says it's going to change over.
In other words, it's going to change from flesh into spirit.
When Jesus's body came back, it still had the wounds, but it was a spiritual
body that came out that was no longer subjected to having to follow all the
rules of creation, like it could walk through walls, you know, and, um, it,
he could translate, you know, from a walk from, um, being into, to, uh, the road
to Emmaus and then from their dinner table to somewhere else, and then
suddenly appear to disciples, et cetera.
But then it could also eat.
So he proved to them who look, you don't think it's really me.
You think it's a ghost.
I'm going to prove to you.
I have substance and that I'm not a ghost.
So he proved that it was a real body and yet it wasn't.
Subjected to the same science and laws that the rest that bodies normally are.
Why?
Because it was a body that was no longer subjected to death
into corruption, to decay.
It was, it was transformed into spirit, but it wasn't a completely new thing.
It still had the wounds that he died with.
It was the body he died in, but it now was transitioned and, um, and, and it
was now spirit and spirit.
Once everything in our flesh transforms to spirit, that's it'll never die.
So when the aspect of the flesh that we overcome, it'll never.
die again. So anything that you overcome in your unbelief, etc.
You will get a death. In other words, a letting go of
something. That's all death is letting go of something. Once
you let go of it, and you choose God instead, now you've replaced
that aspect of flesh mean like something in your soul or
something in your body. You've literally changed it into
spirit, and spirit literally can never die. So you won't be doing
the same death over and over and over again in a certain part of
you. You know, it will now you might go to deeper layers. Yes.
But like, once you die to something, it's gone. I mean,
you know, it's been trans transferred to spirit. That is
what we're doing on the surf. That's what we're doing with
physical healing and trusting him with our jobs and building
businesses and building ministries and whatever. We're
not doing something to please God or to arrive somewhere or to
accomplish God's purpose, for which he created us know the
point for which he created us was to develop a relationship
with him, but he says isn't supposed to ever get anywhere
because he's infinite. And we can't ever get to the end of
them. So the whole point is just to always be developing, it's
always to be interacting, it's always to just be enjoying. And
now he's like, okay, put that into a physical form. You're not
creating anything new into creation, you're taking what
already exists in the spirit, and you're just putting it into
a different form. It's like translating a sentence from
Greek into English, you're not saying a new sentence in
English, you're taking a sentence that was already spoken
in Greek, you're just translating it, you're just
putting it into a different form, kind of like water, you've
got air, you know, liquid, and you know, vapor, liquid and ice.
And if spirit, for instance, is air, all you're doing in order
to change it to ice, you're simply changing it to changing
water into a different form, simply by slowing the molecules
down, the molecules aren't changing from water into orange
juice, they're just slowing down so that they so that you can see
them in a different expression, but it's still water, whether
it's in the form of ice or the form of vapor, it's still the
same substance. And that's what you're doing, you're trying to
put on display in your life, who you already are, you're not
becoming something, you already are the daggum thing. You're
just learn teaching your soul and your body to be safe with
who you are, so that who you are can finally be expressed into a
different form in your soul and your body. But it already exists,
you're not making something new, you're not having to overcome to
the point where you're trying to like create something out of
nothing. It already exists, you're already that there's
already the victory. But how do you translate it? How do you get
yourself to choose and to risk yourself that much on God, that
he is more real than than the pain that you're experiencing
in your body, and that the fear you're experiencing in your
soul. That is what we're overcoming. We're having to
choose this thing that we can't see. We're having to choose that
over what we can see and what we're feeling. And we have to
choose that as a higher reality in order to overcome this. So I
know that I just gave you a lot. But so you don't have to
remember all of these details. And we can keep talking about
all this. But I wanted to just talk and just like paint this
picture of what's going on to start relieving this pressure
that there's something you're supposed to be doing. And
here's, here's why. Because ultimately, deep down, all of
this torment is coming from this feeling that there's somewhere
you're supposed to be someplace that one way it's supposed to be
different. And the fact that God must not love me, if, and this
must not be right, or I must not be right. If I'm in pain, if I
can't find the answers, if God isn't helping, you know, hasn't
shown me the answers yet, if there's a delay, there must be
something wrong, there must be something I'm missing. So in
order to get it, I must just work harder. And you can't work
harder to get it. God will just give it. So we have to choose
that it's that easy. We have to choose that we're already there.
And so what you do in those times where you're in physical
pain is I know that this is really, really hard. But if
there's a pain or fear, or whatever, is to stop fighting
and to choose God instead of pain.
So, and to choose God instead of the fear or whatever.
For instance, you may have read this comment that I wrote
that I was in Venice one time,
and oh, by the way, are you okay on time or no?
Okay, that I was in Venice one time and God,
last year, and God was taking me to different places
around the world.
And every time I would go to a city
and he would give me enough money to get to the city,
and then I would land with little to no money.
And then right by the time that, you know,
I was supposed to pay for my hotel
or I'd already paid for my hotel and all of that.
And I had to now leave because I had no more money
and I had to leave to go to the next city.
In enough time, God would give me the money to travel
and go to the next city and get accommodation,
get food and get the train or wherever,
however it is I got there.
And he would do that continually.
He just moved me around.
Until finally I got to Venice and everything stopped
and I couldn't check out of the hotel because no mannequin.
I'm like, okay, Lord, you and I have been doing this
for a while.
I've been living by faith for two and a half years
by this point or however long you've been.
You know, I just had to trust you every month
and just living by, you know, faith that you are
who you say that you are.
And all of a sudden, Lord, you know, it's just gone.
What I feel, and this is what I told him,
I said, Lord, I feel like I have this very precious thing
that I loved and was very fragile and I broke it
and I don't know how I broke it.
And I just lay there on the bed,
not being able to check out of the hotel, crying
because I'm like, Lord, where are you?
And I felt his presence.
I didn't feel that he abandoned me,
but I'd felt that he'd emotionally abandoned me.
I'd felt that he provisionally had abandoned me,
that I was just, he was there, but I was on my own.
You know, oh, well, you know, hard to be you, you know,
or kind of looking at me like,
gosh, so what are you going to do?
And going, Lord, I don't know.
I'm still trying to figure all of this out.
And now I'm in this difficult position
and now you're asking me what it is that I should know
or do or whatever.
And he wasn't asking me,
but that's what I was thinking he was doing.
Now he wants more of me.
What am I, what bit more, bit extra
do I now have to exert of myself
in order to get out of this situation?
And then what I wrote in that comment was that,
you know, what the Lord then asked me is,
he said, Ashley, who do you say that I am?
And he said, quote in scripture at me, Ashley,
and tell me who I've told you that I am
is not going to work.
You actually have to make an intentional choice
in your world, who do you choose for yourself?
Not tell me, not tell me what I want to hear.
Who do you make a decision for yourself
that I am going to be to you?
And that I, and I have to be at right at this moment.
Who am I to you?
And I said, God, I choose that you were provider
over you ever giving me the money.
Even if you never give me the money
and I have to somehow wash dishes
to get out of my situation for the next several days,
I have to embarrassingly prostrate myself
in front of someone to ask for their grace.
And I don't know how to get out of this foreign country,
Lord, you know, Lord, whatever it is
that I have to do, that's fine, Lord.
But I choose that you are who you say that you are
more than I, the more than I choose
that my circumstances be changed
and that I not have to bear the consequences
in this world of these worldly actions.
I choose you over that.
And that began to break everything.
Now, yes, now, I mean, God didn't give me money right then.
You know, I still had to walk through it for the next,
in fact, I tried to check out of the hotel,
I think three times over a period of multiple dates.
And I'm telling you what, that was hard,
it was confusing, it was embarrassing.
I was, if I wasn't careful,
it was very frightening at times.
I was like, no, and even over my fear,
I have to choose that, God, this is who you are.
And I want you to be who you are
regardless of what that makes my life look like.
That is who I choose.
So that's when I say we have to choose God
over whatever we're experiencing
because that's what he wants us to do.
That will enable and give him the authority.
That's how we give him the authority and the power
to be responsible for our circumstances
or in our situation is because we stop...
controlling it and determining that we still do all of the actions, but we no
longer consider our, our, consider what we do as being the thing that's
responsible for and the, and what determines the outcome, I release my
actions or my knowledge and my speaking knowledge and all of that.
And the answers that I find or that I don't find, I released myself, uh,
release myself as, and release the actions from determining the outcome.
I say, no, God, you determine the outcome.
I'm just, I'm just enjoying you and interacting with the world that you
created to operate the way that it does.
It operates for in certain principles and certain and certain science, you know,
et cetera, you can use the science forward or you can not.
So you and I determine, okay, are we going to go the naturopathic route?
Are we going to go Western medicine route?
Are we going to do something else?
What, what do we do?
But the thing is that it's a lot freer to be made, having those discussions
forward, if God's outcome of your healing or, or being free of, you know,
this Turk or man, or you being able to sleep or whatever is not dependent
on what you do or don't do.
And only you can release yourself from that.
And when you release yourself and your actions from determining and the
outcome and from the outcome, being dependent on what you do, if you
release it from that, then in a manner of speaking, it's what you're doing
is you're surrendering it to the Lord.
And you truly are giving it to him to take care of because she's released
as holding on to it and controlling it where God doesn't have an, I have an
opportunity to get at it and just like, okay, God, you can come in and you can
fix it anytime you want to.
But in the meantime, I'm one doing it.
He's like, no, no, no.
Then you haven't given it to me.
We really do have to release it.
Trust that God is a good God and allow him to do it and to manifest and to
create whatever dadgum outcome he wants to, and he doesn't answer to us for the
outcome that he chooses and how the outcome comes about and what the outcome
requires of us to journey through before we get there, that's what I mean.
We choose God over the thing.
It's that reckless.
It's, it's what I refer to as an absolute reckless abandon.
It's scary.
That's a really nice word to use.
It's absolutely terrifying.
You will feel internally like you're dying or that you will die.
If you make that choice.
Okay.
And I've actually felt this.
There was a point at which, and I don't even remember what it was
that I was holding it for, and I'd have to stop and think about it.
But many years ago, I was driving down the highway and I literally thought I was
going to die because I knew that I was holding accusation against the Lord, even
though I didn't know the word that phrase at the time.
I was so mad at him that he had made my life the way that it was, that it wasn't
better than it was out of everything that I'd given to him and how I was continuing
to live, to sacrifice myself for him.
And I was doing this and doing that and everything was hard and it was like the
older son, you know, I work really hard for you and you haven't given me so much
of the goat and, uh, and, and God basically was saying, Ashley, let all of that go.
Cause it was like holding it against the Lord is like, Ashley, let it go.
And I literally not figuratively, literally.
I thought, okay, okay.
If I let this go, I'm going to die.
My body literally began to react like it was going to die.
And immediately I began to think, I mean, like, you know, how I wish I knew how to
describe it, but it started to go into panic mode because my body thought it was
going to die, not just my soul.
My body started manifesting what it is that my soul believed because when we
surrender ourselves to the Lord, it's such a very deep soul level or our whole,
all three aspects of it, feel it.
So my body, I thought I'm going to die.
And I found, and the reason I figured that out is because I realized that
suddenly my mind went to all of these weird places, like, Oh my goodness,
I'm driving down the highway.
Well, when I die, I'm going to lose control of the car.
And oh my goodness, how many other people are going to be affected?
And are they going to die?
Am I going to run into the guardrail before someone else is able to, you
know, before someone else, you know, runs into me and hits me and therefore
there won't be any other casualties other than me.
And Oh, it's a good thing.
It's early in the morning because shopping and people on the highway.
I don't even, I wasn't intentionally trying to think.
those thoughts. I caught myself thinking like that, because it
will, it can feel it hits us at such a root level. And so what I
did is I'm like, fine, Lord, I don't know what's going to
happen. But I gave it up. And I gave it up at such a root level.
And I and this is before I knew about letting go and all this is
like, I don't know, years before I knew this. Anyway, but I let
it I let it go. And I gave it to God. And I said, Okay, God, I'm
gonna stop accusing you. You can let my life look however you
want. And as soon as I did that, everything within me stills. And
I thought, I was holding on to all of this, all of the stuff
that I thought had come against me all of the torment, all of
the challenges, all of the attacks, all of the spiritual
warfare, whatever, oh, my word, I was the one holding on to it.
I didn't know that all I had to do in order to be free in order
to have peace was to let it go. Anyway, so that was very, very
transformative for me. And then later, and this is a really big
thing that, and that I like, want to mention that is that the
root of all of this is that I and I've really been saying it
already. But what changed everything for me, literally the
point at which everything changed, you know, kind of like
a like a focal point, you know, kind of like, where, where
something balances on something else. And this thing right here
is the point on which everything changes, that focal point on
which everything shifted for me, and God began to move me into
freedom and rest and all of that was when I told the Lord, I said,
God, I no longer require of you that my life looked in a
particular way. And I told him that when I had when all of my
businesses were failing, and had been for months, when my I was
struggling with my reputation, like people were thinking bad
things about me, because I didn't know, they thought that
I, I don't know, just various reasons. I'd gotten burned out.
And then people were thinking that I was off on some crazy,
that I wasn't being a responsible adult at 3435 years
old, whatever that was, my most important relationships in the
world to me were on the rocks. And I had no money, I was
literally having to trust the Lord for my food. And nobody
not my parents. I had nothing. And nothing was working. And
nothing had been working for a long time. And I had health
issues as well. But I was used to just managing them and didn't
know how to like, you know, not manage them as not have any,
like, even more healing than I already had. I didn't know how
to get it. So anyway. And, and I was just, I was completely
alone. I was living alone. I spent, you know, I was COVID
before there was COVID. You know, however, when you know,
when in lockdown, and especially single people couldn't see
anybody and be around anybody because they everyone had to be
locked in their own homes. I was me before COVID ever happened.
And so anyway, it was from that time where I told God, God, my
whole the whole rest of my life can look like this, where I have
nothing. And I'm having to trust you for food. And I'm just
hoping that I get it. And I'm hoping that it comes tomorrow,
or, you know, just whatever. You can keep my whole life like
this, if you want, if this is what you want it to look like,
I no longer require of you that my life look any particular way.
All that I ask is that you be who you are. And I don't know
who that is. I just ask that you be who you are. And you
manifest who that is, into my life, regardless of what that
makes my life look like. And I saw what that made Jesus's life
look like. I saw the pain and the death and the torture that
he went through. And, and the suffering and all of that. And
you loved him. And he was in breath that all kinds of stuff.
And God, I choose you over my over any any lifestyle. That is
total, complete, unconditional surrender to the ultimate
degree that we can possibly go is God, I choose you without
knowing who that is. And I ask that you be that to create my
life, to create the existence that I experience on this earth.
And I have no idea what that is going to mean. I have no idea
what your love looks like. When you're being loving to me, I
don't know if it's going to look like pain or comfort, because it
looks like both. And you can have it look like whatever you
want. Everything changed, because I start releasing God,
I start releasing in all of these accusations, etc. And then
from there, I began to choose, okay, I'm going to choose very
very recklessly because, Hey, that was a reckless statement that I'd gotten to.
And I was like, finally, I am done.
And this is what I choose.
And then from that, I then chose very recklessly that God loved me.
No matter what, no matter what I did, even while I was sinning, I would choose
without apologizing to him without repenting God, I, you know, you say
that you love me unconditionally.
Okay.
So I'm going to put my money, my money, where my mouth is.
And I'm going to ask you for something.
I started asking him for big things, you know, and, and whatever.
And he began to answer them.
And then I would apologize because obviously once I determined for myself
that I wasn't giving God an apology and repenting to him for payment, I could
apologize because I have a relationship with him, but I refused to give him
a repentance out of payment.
In other words that I thought I was trying to reconnect with him.
I'm like, uh, I don't need to do something to reconnect with them.
I have to choose that.
I've never lost the connection because that's what he said.
And that's what I'm going to do.
I'm not going to work for the connection, work for his pleasure, work for his love.
I'm going to choose that.
That's so, um, anyway, and then I just kind of built it from there.
Then I began to learn about my union with him and began to
choose that that's who I am, et cetera.
Um, but so when we talk about letting things go, the deepest point at which we
can let things go is completely let go of our right to ourselves or our right
to hold God accountable to us for, um, for fulfilling promises that he's made
to us, fulfilling his word, even his word in scripture, I really think that
and I just said, God, I just ask that you exist as you truly are.
And that you put who you are in spirit.
You put that into a physical form and that creates my life.
And I don't know what that's in my life.
I mean, how do you like make day to day decisions in this transition process?
And I think it's just like how it's like if you're releasing everything and you're
so used to being like, Lord guide me, guide my steps.
Like you there's, there's a left or right in every little thing I do.
Like what time do I leave the house?
Do I not leave the house today?
Do I, you know, and, or what decision do I make about my work or what do I,
whatever, like, and he needs decisions with him, like how, or, and, and feeling
like actually can't, I don't even know if I hear from you anymore.
I don't even, I don't even, and then, and then that causes stress and unrest
because you're paralyzed to do anything.
And then you're like, I'm going to make the wrong decision.
I'm going to get myself in a worse situation than I'm already
in, and I can't afford to do that.
Like, so how do we even wake up tomorrow?
What do I do tomorrow?
Like, that's what I'm at.
I don't even know what I do tomorrow.
Yeah.
So we're, um, see if I can explain this in a way that'll make sense.
We're so used to thinking, okay, so therefore now, what do I do?
How do I make a decision?
We're very decision accomplishment.
Again, outcome focused of like, Lord, how do I get where you want,
where do you want me to get?
And then how do I get there?
And how do I know from you how to get there?
It's all of this stuff that we're including God, will you talk to
me and just tell me what you want?
Yes, that creates a box that that's based off of as weird as it sounds.
That's based off of performance.
That's based off of this.
Um, this feeling like there are this, um, this, uh, feeling starting
from a place of lack and feeling like we need something that we don't
have, including direction from God.
And that we're in a sense of, of unknown unprotection, uh, you know,
lack of protection, a lack of provision, unless we know what God is
saying and that he wants us to do.
And what I had to do is I had to give up in a manner, manner speaking.
Oh, how did, how do I read this?
It had to give up the requirement of hearing from God, what I had to do.
And instead I had to choose at a very root level.
First of all, that I, that he was who he says that he is and that I am.
He says that I am in other words, that I am unconditionally love.
I am a hundred percent perfect.
I've already arrived.
I'm already a hundred percent integrated with him.
And I can, from that place, I, he now set me up into existence.
to just be, and that that's enough, not, okay, well, that's all well and good.
Now, what about this?
And then, you know, if, if I'm like, if I'm going into this, if I'm concerned about this,
okay, yeah, but God, what are you telling me to do?
It means I'm not stable in this.
If I, if this brings me stress and anxiety, it means that there's something deep down
that I believe depends on me having this, and that I, and I'm terrified of what will
happen and what it means if I don't have this, and I have to choose that I don't need this.
I know that that sounds great.
I know all of the, all of the phrases that I'm using are very extreme because I'm trying
to break this idea off of us that we need, you know, uh, this dependency that we have
built on things, including hearing from God, I'm not saying that, that God doesn't want
us to hear from and all of that.
It's that we don't know how to disconnect our, um, disconnect our dependence on it from
just simply the fact that we can expect that that's going to be part of our relationship.
And so if we, if I couldn't break my dependence of it off and my, somehow my connection to
my identity and God's pleasure with me from this thing, I abandoned the thing altogether.
I was that reckless.
And I am telling you, I promise God will not, um, he won't, uh, abandon you and get, and,
what's the word and, and just, um, for having done that, that is like, oh my word.
Well, you weren't supposed to let go of that because what you're doing is you're choosing
the better thing.
You're choosing the deeper truth that he's asked you to choose, which he says, choose me,
choose me and choose that.
You choose me and our relationship, our union.
I ask you to choose that from that.
Everything else will happen.
You'll know, you know, you, you and I will develop, will, um, uh, you'll know what it
is, but I'm telling you, you'll have more clarity.
You know, when I speak to you, it'll be, it'll be more obvious.
You'll, you'll feel more confident in your decisions without me.
I'm going to tell you every little thing.
Should I leave the house?
Should I not leave the house?
Should I stay at home?
Is it okay?
Is it not okay?
And so one of the things that I began to do is I began to, um, make, I began to think
okay, if I am who God says that I am, and if he says that I am enough and that I am
that, that deep down, that as the new man, that I'm perfect.
And then I'm good.
Then apparently in God, I make perfect decisions.
Now, what terrified me was I'm like, what, how do I know if I'm making decisions out
of my spirit or out of my soul?
And one of the things that I had to choose is I had to realize, okay, well, my default
is my, is my spirit, whether or not I'm used to acting up, but you know, my default is
my spirit.
So what I choose before I make a decision is I remember who does God say that I am?
And I rest in that.
It's like, Hey, nothing's required of me.
There's nothing I have to do.
I can make the wrong decision.
And it would be fun, you know, because it doesn't change anything.
I mean, seriously, I mean, is God going to punish me because I make the wrong decision?
No, that's under that old belief that I had to perform in order for things to be okay.
That I had to provide for and protect myself.
And God's just always looking at me, giving me lessons and giving me tips.
And God says that that's not how I relate to him.
God says that I relate to him out of relationship.
So, okay.
So apparently I'm okay ultimately.
And that if I make a quote unquote, like if I make a, a decision, like say for instance,
you know, he thinks that going right is a wiser decision, but I don't recognize that
he's saying that I didn't hear him say that.
And I just thought, well, I think that the left is the right decision.
I think that that's where, from what I know about God, I think that that's where we're
headed.
You know, I think that that's what he is.
I'm going to make, and what I would do is I made the decision off of the fact that I
was a fully loved son of God.
I chose that over the decision.
I chose, I chose to believe that I was so, um, I was so settled in and unshakable by
God in my position with him, that I was, um,
That, that I was willing to risk making a wrong decision.
Because even if I made the wrong decision, because that was the only
phrase that I knew in my mind, and to use at the time was right decision
or wrong decision.
Then God would still.
Me and me and God would still be fine.
He wouldn't stop talking to me.
In fact, all I do is just show me.
Let's not do that. And let's do, let's do this instead.
And he's like, Oh, you're learning, you know, whatever.
But I, but regardless of that, basically, here's the thing.
I chose to believe him.
Over.
Choosing to avoid the consequences of a potential.
Long decision.
That's what I chose.
And I thought, okay,
If I'm willing to step out and risk,
I'm willing to step out and risk the consequences of a potential
long decision.
And I'm willing to step out and risk.
The consequences that this is a long decision.
But.
I'm also making a decision.
Off of the.
Off of the off of choosing.
To exist in the comfort.
And assurance and complete 100% faith that I'm willing to step out
and risk on.
That God is who he says that he is.
And if I believe that, how would I act?
What would I do? And what decision would I make?
And then I make that.
I based the decision off of this.
In order to choose my faith in this.
As a more powerful motivator.
Then my avoidance, my fear of avoiding.
Making the wrong decision or bearing any consequences.
I was willing to bear a negative consequence.
In order to choose first.
And I chose to do this thing that God asked me for.
Believing him.
Believing in, in faith and acting on.
So I chose that.
Over.
Over my fear of getting it wrong.
And I chose that.
You wanted me to believe.
That he was, he says he was, but I am, he says that I am.
And that that was more important to him.
Then what I did.
And so that's the choice that I made.
I chose to do that.
And by experiencing that.
Because it's terrifying to do.
But by experiencing it.
I discovered that it was true.
Why? Because I loved it.
I actually lived it with God.
Where.
He was so pleased because he's like, you are living.
As if you really, you were living out of faith.
You're not actually putting your money where your mouth is.
You really are.
And again,
I began to learn how to make decisions with the board where, you know,
I would, I would.
Where obviously I asked the Lord.
What is it that I should, that I should do?
But the majority of the time, I don't even have to ask God point blank,
what it is that I should do.
And again, I don't even have to ask the Lord.
What it is that I should do.
Because if I choose that he loves me.
And I'm unconditionally accepted.
And I don't need to use in my head. I mean, I have to like,
Submit myself 100% to it.
I do that in my meeting with him and I choose that I am.
Who does this.
From that place of belief.
And assurance and trust in that deep faith in the Lord.
And I feel that.
I feel that.
I feel that assurance from that place.
And I feel the Holy spirit.
And I feel that movement and I feel freedom towards particular
decisions.
So much more clearly.
So that I don't even have to ask God because I know.
It's like, I've chosen to be that intimate with him,
that I can just feel.
That he's pleased or that he's okay with it.
I know it without me having to ask him point blank about every little
thing.
I know it without having to ask.
Then there are other things.
This is a little less clear. You know, I'm learning how to be your son.
I'm learning how to look like you.
What is.
Does this decision look like you or is this one wiser? You know,
which one.
Reflects the kingdom more in which one brings.
You know, the kingdom of heaven and power more.
Now, which one.
I don't hear from God.
Meaning like if I don't hear from God, what to do?
I just go towards whichever one I believe is reflecting his character.
Not based off of scripture.
But off of who I am connected with.
And that being that I'm connected with.
That being that I know.
What decision seems to be reflecting who he is.
And again, I make, I tell him, okay, Lord, I'm making this decision.
Not for my own protection.
and preservation. I'm actually making it because I believe that is what you look like. I believe
that's what that this is reflecting your character, not that this is going to accomplish something
for them. No, I believe that this looks like you. I believe me making this decision looks
like you look when you're interacting with your kingdom and you're bringing your love
and your kindness. I believe that that's what I'm exuding by making this decision, whether
it's staying at home that day, or, you know, after Boston, you can do that, or it's traveling,
or it's, you know, you know, asking to not travel and stay at home or whatever. And it's
I had to, I had to realize that God chooses me over my decisions. You. And so I think
I need to tell you that, okay, you are more important than your decisions. Who you are
is more important than the choice that you make, even more important than whether or
not you choose God, because you've already chosen, right? You're already with them. You're
more important, even than your choice for God, because he chose you before you chose
him. He chose you while you were flat out rejecting him to the point that he had to
die as a, as an outcome of the intensity of the rejection. He chose you when you didn't
even have to choose him. You are more important than your choices. And he chooses that. So
you risk your life and your decisions on the fact that you are more important to God than
your choice and then what you decide. So, yeah, obviously we ask the word or what do you want,
but if he, but the torment comes because we can't hear him. The torment comes when we've
got too much white noise or too much fear or too much, whatever, just let it go. It's just like,
okay, okay. Forget the decision. I do not care how important this decision is. I really, you know,
I have done this in shocking, but I traveled around the world as a single woman alone,
making healthy decisions. I got sick overseas and had to go to an ER hospital for one of the few
times in my entire life. And, um, in a foreign country, you know, I mean, I just had to risk
everything on God. You were my parent. And by the way, I did not have enough money to pay.
I thought that I did, but on my way there, I realized I hadn't eaten all day. And so I bought
a sandwich and that sandwich, that little cheap, and I bought the cheapest thing on the menu,
that cheap sandwich cut into my budget just enough so that by the time I went to the hospital,
I barely didn't have enough money to cover the bill. I hear you. So anyway, you just risk
everything on the fact that he is, who he says that he is to the jury. He says that he is that,
and that you are, who he says that you are, not that you're supposed to do something or
choose something or decide something or be something or act like something. Those will
all come later, but you choose first that you are not, and that you are more important.
And then from that place, you'll more effortlessly just know what to do.
And sure. Will there still be kind of like this unknown of them? I don't know if this feels right,
but I don't know if it's right. Absolutely. Absolutely. But a baby always falls down as he's
walking and the parent doesn't get onto the child or falling down. In fact, God gave the babies more
fat knowing they were going to fall down in order for their protection. So when we're learning to
do this, when we're learning to make these decisions, he protects us like a parent protects
the child so that we don't have to suffer the consequence, the severity of the consequences
of having made a decision that we're still learning how to make decisions,
you know, and that, that goes, you know, all throughout childhood, you know, where,
where a parent is always trying to like, kind of like shave the, you know, shave the intensity
of the consequences off of the child's, you know, messing up and the decisions and, you know,
whatever, if the child falls out of there, out of the tree and breaks his arm, it's the parents who
have to do all the work. I'm sure the kid has to have his arm outside of the shower and has to do
all of this and can't play soccer and whatever, but the parents, the one who paid for everything,
the parents, the one that drove them, the parents, the one that took the time, the parents, one,
you know, all the medications stay on top of the medication and do all the work.
So did the child have to suffer some? Sure. He had to learn. Okay. Well, that probably wouldn't.
idea, you know, but it was the parent who took over the lion's
share of the work. God does the same thing for us. We are not in
the ever in a state of condemnation with them ever.
We're just learning how to express in a physical form
something that we've already accomplished and something that
we already are. And I have talked a lot, given you a lot,
you don't have to remember everything. For one thing,
you'll have the recording. But I do, I do like to, to really
paint a very big context to kind of like repaint the canvas of
like, what, what kind of a context are we existing in? Are
we living in and having a relationship with the Lord in?
And what on earth is he requiring of us? So anyway,
you're talking about your decisions, but what do you do
whatever? And what I do is I just choose, okay, I don't
choose my decisions. I choose God, we said that he says that
he is, he says that he is, that he is that to that degree, I
choose, he loves me to the degree he says he does, you
know, you know, and whatever. And by choosing, all you're
saying is you're stopping all of the resistance in you that says
why he can't be that, or why he may not be it to that degree, or
why it hasn't been that before, or why it hasn't been obvious
before, or whatever. It's reckless abandon, when you feel
like there is no safety net, because literally, there is
nothing. But the fact that God said, nothing, sometimes you
can't even find it in scripture, it's just it's like, meaning
like, not that it's contradictory to scripture, but
it's like, you don't know where it is, you know, it's just like
nothing. And, and you just recklessly abandon yourself to
it. And I promise you, God will catch you. And that's all that
he wants is like to how where it is that we're going, you have to
choose me over yourself. And then you have to choose
yourself over, you know, over what you do, and how you act and
how you even interact with me, you have to choose that you are
the entity that is unified. It's more important than your how we
interact, because we're going to interact very effortlessly,
naturally, we develop and spiritually mature from how you
choose that we are unified. So choose that first, you know, so
anyway, talking about all of this, you just choose, okay, the
decisions, the decisions are not my priority. That's what I'm
trying to say. You'll still make decisions and you'll still
do so. But your decisions are not your priority. Your
priority is that is is God, and that he is, you choose that he
is the highest and most valuable thing to you, not believing him,
not shifting into rest, not receiving something from him,
not being good enough for nothing, that he is who he is.
It not even that you get to see it, that he is who he is, that
is the most important thing to you. And then from now, okay,
well, part of who he is, is you, because you're unified with him.
And so you have to choose that as well. And then you choose,
you know, obviously, okay, I'm loved unconditionally, and that
and I'm going to operate. In other words, that this is the
core of my existence. And this is the most important thing to
me is that I'm loved. I'm loved, I'm being loved, I'm being
delighted in etc. And that and that obviously, you're unified
with him. And then from that place, now that there's nothing
left to do, because you can't lose it. You can't keep it. I
mean, meaning like you can't do anything to keep it. So it's
just it just is what it is, you can just now exist in that
place, you can do whatever the heck you want to do. You can do
the things that are edifying the things that aren't edifying.
But the fact that you're a son of God, and choosing everything
in faith that God says that, that he wants you to, you're
going to naturally start reflecting his character. And
his character is only going to guide you towards the things
that are edifying. So you're just going to discover what
those are. And so from that place, then you're faced with a
decision. So make the decision in freedom, in peace, and in
love. Let's make a decision. Do not you can ask God what he wants
you to do. But if you don't hear it, it's like, okay, God, I'm
making a decision out of the fact that I that you say that I
am less important to you. I am more important than my decision.
I am more important than what it is that I am. I am more
important than how it ends up affecting me, etc, etc. And this
is me choosing you, Lord, me choosing you more than my
decision, and more than the outcome, more than my
protection.
more than my provision and by me not by me choosing you more than that you're going to
create all of those things because it says in uh hebrews 11 6 that they that without faith it is
impossible to please god and that they that sir that they that something must believe that he
exists and that he rewards those that earnestly seek him not seek how to please him not seek to
righteousness not seek to do the right thing seek god not how to interact with him not even to
believe it seek him it's that core and god says that is the ultimate um uh core of faith that's
what we have faith in we have faith in god not faith that god would do something not faith that
god will fulfill his promise not faith that god's will will manifest his work we have faith that he
is who he says he is those that earnestly seek him not what seek what he said or seek what he
said will happen or seek how we will manifest seek him period and that's enough for god and
then from that everything else will come but that is the core that is literally what will change
everything so for you in order to release yourself from the torment you have to let you have to let
go of making all of that right and figuring all of that out and the outcome you have to completely
release that to god in other words no longer is it has to drop in your value system you choose god
over that as your value system that is how that will get taken care of it's not that you're giving
it up as if oh my word when i give it up it's now no longer going to happen it's the opposite now it
has the there's movement in your life for the spirit to flow so that it finally can happen
but in order for it to happen we have to give it up it ever happened we have to choose this over
this so it's all very extreme but this is what god calls us to and this is why it has to talk
about faith so much it's that reckless so you said what you're recklessly abandoning yourself on
is me not that i'm going to do something but me and then from that i will reward those
that earnestly seek me and then um you know the the what is it uh what's the other verse that
that we know much more familiarly and seek you first the kingdom of god and his righteousness
and all these things will be added into you so everything else comes from anyway you're at a place
where you can like you're now at a place where you can dream again about the future or things
that you want to do with the lord in the future even yeah now that there's like specific things
but you're not tied to the outcome of it but you just continue to dream with him really well i
didn't know that life could be like this because you probably remember from my testimony that i did
not move forward or backward unless god said so i was stuck i was rigid i had my life was small
in that aspect and it didn't move very far and it didn't move very fast in many ways you know it just
it just it just didn't and literally everybody got the laundry list of things that i asked for
everybody around me got all of them and i didn't even get a single one i'm like god this does not
make sense because i'm the one who's sacrificing my life to the ultimate degree for you i can tell
you by looking at all of their lives looking at mine i know we're not supposed to judge the lord
but i'm just saying yeah you know and and because god's just said because it's not about you working
for it it's because i am a good god i give you gifts and i do things because that's who i am
not as a response to what you've done because your outcomes come from my character not from
your performance or your interaction with me i am a good god to the good and to the evil
i rain on what do you say i rain on the just and the unjust and i and i and i do something for the
good and the evil i don't remember what the other thing is but he says he rains on the just and the
unjust and he and that he's kind that's what it is he said and i am kind to the grateful and the
ungrateful into the good and oh my word he's like i rain in the desert when no one knows
he's like if i'm kind you know to the good and the evil and the just and unjust and the grateful
and the ungrateful then i'm doing it because that's who i am but if you're choosing that you're
that the only interaction that you have with me is based off of how you operate then you're limiting me
And you're not letting me be me in your world, because you've chosen because I've given you the authority to choose what happens in your kingdom and what's allowed to rule and reign and have authority in your kingdom.
And you said the authority that's allowed in your kingdom is the principles of the kingdom of this world, which means that everything has to be earned. Everything has to be worked for.
So if that's what you say, I gave you the authority to determine that.
So I don't, I'm not going to come in and assert that authority. I don't want you to have that.
So you have to give me the authority to be the one to be my character into your life.
So, but he says, you know, instead, if you don't want to work for, you know, strive and exert effort for yourself to accomplish all of these things.
He said, you need to let me be me.
You need to allow me to be me without any stipulations, any conditions, without you even knowing who that is and how that would affect your life.
When I start manifesting who I am, and I start telling you who I am, and then I start manifesting.
So anyway, we, and that's something that God requires of us is in faith, we have to choose him before he before he shows up in our life in a particular way or like sometimes manifest this goodness or righteousness or some aspect of his character.
Is that, is that especially the older that we get in the word, the more we, he requires that we choose him and what he is before he even tells us what that is.
So we're used to thinking okay well God you got to give me a word. You got to give me a character, a characteristic, you got to give me a phrase you got to tell me what you're going to do you got to, you got to tell me something to anchor myself on what am I
I am asking that you posture yourself in complete vulnerable submission to me that you see, whoever it is that I present myself as, and you leave yourself completely open and vulnerable.
And then I'll come.
So we don't even know what it is we're exposing ourselves to. He requires that we choose him before he reveals what it is that we've actually chosen.
We said you choose me, not something necessarily, you know, that he's like revealed or whatever, because then again that's putting a limitation on it.
It's well it is it's kind of like putting limitation on but it's like restricting him in some way it's like yeah but God, I will after you.
He's like no no there's no after there's no condition. Just do it.
And then I present myself to be received, you receive me like, so what am I receiving, you know, your goodness, what is it that you're telling me to believe.
Tell me this, you know, what in scripture do you say that you are sometimes guys just like, I will show you who that is, but choose me first, and then I'll show you who I am.
It's very reckless.
This, this literally is like I said the focal point on which you're our entire lives, completely, completely turn around they completely change.
I wish I could explain that. But do you remember what I posted about the Mary Madeline, Mary Magdalene, you know in saying you know when the chosen saying that, you know, I used to be one way, and now I'm completely different and the thing that happened
is that kind of thing. It's like, I don't know what happened, but everything is upside down, and better. And, and I don't even know how to put it into words that I'm experiencing life, and it's like a totally different substance.
Yeah, it's as if we were always existing in orange juice and now we're existing in lemonade it's like I don't I don't understand, you know how to explain this, but it's the way that I approach life, the way that I, the way that I don't know, just just the way that I approach
life, the way that I interact the way that I think the way that the position from which I come at it is just totally different.
are all effortless.
And, but I have to change my operating system. It's not what formula can I learn in order to fix these things.
In order to fill rest in order to have relief in order whatever it's not it's changing the entire operating system will deal with all of this, including dealing with the root issues of the
internal, you know, struggle and, and where we need healing or
whatever, that we didn't even know where they were. It starts
dealing with all of that very effortlessly, because we
completely changed the operating system. And those things were
sustained, and were anchored in the old operating system. So
when you change the operating system, they no longer have an
anchor. And they all just, they'll just fix themselves. No,
yeah, sure. There's still a journey, you know, that the Lord
will take us on, but that usually that's because we're
simply moving into greater and greater measures of rest. So
sometimes, like I said about healing, that sometimes God
uses Western medicine, sometimes uses naturopathic ways,
sometimes he uses miraculous healing. He does all kinds of
things.
Those things are still the Lord's best, like medication and
naturopathic. I mean, I won't take up too much of your time.
But I like, even like you've talked about, there's so many
side effects that come with supplements, like we think we're,
you know, putting a bandaid on this symptom, but then there's
so many and definitely with medication. And it's like, I
don't, I don't know, I feel like they're just a counterfeit of
what is available in Christ.
Well, yes, it's not as powerful, because obviously, yes, it is.
It's the fleshness of the kingdom of this world. And it's
not in the kingdom of this world is currently subject to
correction. It's currently subject to death. So even good
things have some aspect of death in it. So that's where there's
all of those side effects. You can even have side effects to
essential oils. I have a whole book about, you know, and I and
I like essential oils, but I got this whole book that talks about
all of these side effects, these potential side effects in the
whatever. Why? Because as good as wonderful things are as good
as things as good as an apple is, you know, we all know when
apple is very healthy. But oh, my goodness, if you eat too many
of them, or it's got this one ingredient, and it's one
ingredient, if you have too much ever, if you have it on the
wrong day, or if you have it while you're eating this other
thing, then it's not because the things themselves are bad. God
is the one that created the principles by which they were
able to discover and create Tylenol. God is the one who
created the principles to work like that. And so I thank the
Lord and take Tylenol. But I don't, I don't always take
Tylenol. Sometimes I talked to my body and I and I can, you
know, it's command me the headache to go away. Sometimes
it goes away. Sometimes it doesn't. And if it doesn't, I
receive a gift from a good gift from a good father that came in
the form of scientific laws that that people put into Tylenol
there. But because there it is part of creation that is still
subjected to frustration, it's still corrupted and subjected
to death. But Jesus, even though an earthly body was subject to
death, he didn't consider it a bad thing to be born into a
human body. And to live subjected to the pain that it
could that could incur and the tiredness and whatever. He
allowed himself to experience all the limitations because just
because flesh is subjected to death does not mean that God
created a bad thing. It means it needs to be released from its
frustration, because Adam introduced death to flesh. But
God didn't that flesh is not a bad thing. The principles of
science are not a bad thing. But the aspect of them in which is
subject to death, that means that there's going to be side
effects to things, there's going to be side effects,
naturopathic things, you know, etc. So we just what I received
from each thing is a good gift from a good father, God, I
received your goodness in this. Because you don't create bad
things. What do you want me to use? What do you want to be part
of our process? I try to go organic as much as possible. And
yet I discovered I'm allergic to fragrances. I don't like that.
Because I'm like, okay, God, I know that that's not natural.
And yet at the same time, I'm a son of God. I'm not subject to a
negative experience by some aspect of creation that's
subjected to death. And Lord, I don't like this. And so God's
like, that's an aspect of your flesh will discover. But I in
order to overcome it, it's not that it doesn't exist. It's that
in existence of it, I have to choose a higher power in order
for it to be overcome in order for my body to no longer feel
like it is subjected to this, to what how what interacts with it
for
this world. It can choose to just, you know, just kind of like, I don't know how to describe it,
but just like, you know, there are people that, like John, the apostle John, you know,
how they couldn't kill him because his body refused to die. You know, they boiled him in oil.
If I'm not mistaken, they may even put him in the fire and his body literally refused to die. Why?
Because he had transformed so much that he brought, who it is that he was in the spirit,
down into the body, down into the soul, down into the body, so that it didn't succumb to
the aspects of creation that were trying to bring it to death. It didn't, it was no longer,
it knew that it was in Christ and it was no longer subject to death if it didn't want to be.
This is, you know, and anyway, so there's more that we could say about that. So I believe that
that's, that that's aspects of creation that we're learning to, in the Lord, in having faith with
them to overcome. So we'll be talking more, I think I use a little bit of that, talking a bit
about like health and medicine and all of that as my example, when I talk about the three realms,
the spirit, soul, and the body, that I still believe that all aspects that God has created
are good, but they're subject to corruption or subject to death. And so therefore there's
aspects of it that have side effects that have negative things. I mean, my goodness,
the church and the body of Christ is supposed to be a wonderful thing. And look how much damage
it's doing. So there's horrible side effects even to the body of Christ in the spirit. No,
right. But the aspects of the flesh absolute is causing tremendous damage from it. So
the healing testimony that you posted of that girl that was in our group,
do you remember how long it took before she started experiencing improvements in her health
or like what her journey was like just generally? No, no, I don't. I think it was,
uh, I'm just guessing here. I think it was a year, but remember what she did. She didn't even go to
God about her healing. Like she just thought, Oh, well, this is just how it is. She, she left it,
she let it go. And she focused on the other things, kind of like the same thing that I was
talking about, like the best way to overcome an enemy is by neutralizing, not battling it.
So by neutralize it, so she neutralized it by choosing the spirit instead. And she just focused
on her identity and she focused on, you know, the God's love and choosing faith in the Lord.
I began to heal by inner, uh, from inner wounds that I had without knowing I was healing from
them simply by choosing all of those things I mentioned simply by choosing very basic things
to believe God, if he said it, okay, what does he say about his love? What does he say about himself?
What does he say about me? What does he say about my union? And just, I made everything very,
very simple. And it was amazing that everything in my life, my beliefs, my, my approach to decision
making everything was rooted in those deep foundational things. So once I started,
started focusing on those, everything else started changing and I wasn't even trying.
So I found myself in situations where normally I would be very hurt. And I was, I didn't even
notice that the person said those things. And there was multiple things. I didn't even notice
they said those things later on that day, when I was in this situation, I went back and I thought,
wait a minute, so-and-so so-and-so addressed all of my triggers, all these different triggers.
And I didn't even know this let alone was hurt by him. And I thought, how I haven't been focusing
on it. Just like Susan wasn't focusing on her physical health, but both of us were focusing
on was the root that all of those things had developed from the first place. In other words,
the thing that gave them anchor, the thing that gave them a place to land. I don't mean that we
attracted them to us or that we caused them to happen. I mean, the thing is there's aspects of
our unbelief that gave, when they came along, when the physical issues came along, when the,
the trauma for me came along or whatever, it had a place to get stuck. It had a place that gave it
an authority to stay. So, so anyway, so when that, when that was released without us even thinking
about it, all those things were being healed because the anchor were being removed. But we
had to give them up. We had to not focus on them. We had, because by giving them up, we're no longer
holding them in accusation against God, God, why not? Why haven't you addressed this? When are you
going to, you said that, you know, that's not holding God to his word, like what we.
that is accusation. And God says for us, God doesn't want us to
have faith in his promise. He wants us to have faith in him.
He promised. The promise is simply to reflect back to him to
communicate to us how much he loves us. Because he's trying to
communicate to us his love in a particular way that we're we in
our in our value system, we're going to understand. And the
whole point is to tell us something more about him to
entrench our faith and our relationship in him, not to
focus on things. So we have to let all this go, including
things that he's told us to hope for to expect or whatever. We
expect them to happen. But we don't focus on him. We don't
hold God to them. We just focus on on him and how wonderful he
is. And oh my word, you do this. Oh my goodness, you're going to
do this. It's so exciting. You're absolutely amazing. Not
like, oh my goodness, I can't wait till this happens. Why
hasn't happened? You know, and then those things happen. That's
what gives the spirit it's movement that stops our
resistance, which is what gives God's spirit and God's word and
his promise movement to make the thing happen. We keep standing
in a way because we've got accusation. That's resistance
against allowing the spirit to flow.
Wow. Good. Do you ever listen to Dan Muller? Have you listened
to his teachings?
Um, the name sounds familiar, but where's he at? Is he out of
that book?
No, he's, he's like, I don't know. He led Todd White to the
Lord.
Um, what's on what?
He led Todd White to the Lord. Oh, okay. Years ago. Um, but he
just preaches on the finished work of the cross, and
everything is accomplished in that place. And this
unoffendable trigger free life, because if we are in Christ, and
it's similar, it has similar truths in it, but he like
doesn't market any of his ministry. He doesn't have his
website is hideous. It's like a landing page. It defies
everything you think you need to have a successful ministry. And
he has more itinerant requests all around the world than he can
even take. And he like doesn't. He's, he's famous on YouTube
only because he preaches and people broadcast his stuff from
their church. But so you can get in there. But he's an
incredible teacher. I think you'd really like his stuff.
Well, I think someone mentioned him maybe the other day. I
think so. Okay, maybe that's where I need it. Yeah. But did
you have any other questions before we jump off?
I mean,
a lot. I know. I know.
I know. All I know. I my spirit resonates with this is this
revelation. These revelations are true. And this is what I
need to and want to grab ahold of and not shifting into that
place of like, okay, I gotta I gotta grab hold of these
revelations that I've got to apply it. And I've got to make
it work. And the sooner I can, the sooner I can get out of
this struggle. And I know, and it's just reversing some of the
old patterns. And a lot of what I'm dealing with is just like
trauma responses of thinking I need to protect myself. And I
need to think through every scenario to make sure that I
understand the outcome and know the outcome before it happens.
So that way, we ensure that, you know, I'm safe. And I'm so I've
been out of addiction for 14 years, but it's still crazy how
these things like, and then not being overwhelmed by all these,
these issues that are you're still dealing with, you're like,
how am I still dealing with this after every deliverance, every
so so every encounter I've had with the Lord, how could we
possibly still be here? Like this makes no sense. And feeling
like you're at ground zero, but it's like, just trusting that
it's easier than than what I think it's going to be. And
well, I think that part of it, and a lot of people have told me
that, including my own sister, she's on on the rest intensive.
And, and she's not participating in this round, but she's like,
go look for a planner. Anyway, she mentioned in one of her
testimonies, she said, you know what, and then I've had other
somebody else do it in the testimonies as well saying,
like, you know, I've done everything. I've gone to
counseling sessions, I've gone to deliverance sessions, I've
gone to celebrate recovery, I've done this. And they said, it
finally broke when I discovered rest, because rest is the power
of the gospel. Rest is the fact that we are unified with Christ.
And that happened, because Christ died to unify us. And so
now that we exist in the all sufficient one, who's already
done everything, and there's nothing left to do. And so now
we just live in the existence of our relationship with him,
focusing on developing that focusing on learning more about
him, you know, seek him. And then he'll, and then he and then
the outcomes all flow from that. And so really, it's, it's
because, you know, nothing else works, because
We're not I mean sometimes to the degree that we need it to because it had it all comes
down to the actual root of the freedom and the transformation into from the old man into
the new man that happens at the gospel.
And we have to come back to that power because that is the thing that powers everything else.
So that's why all of those other things didn't work for them.
It's not that they didn't work to some degree and they didn't get some help and they didn't
feel better, but it didn't ultimately deal with the root issue if someone can't hasn't
connected with and identified with the true nature of the gospel and really truly identified
it with it shows that that is that that is who they are because that's who they are.
And when they were able to do that, especially by learning that they didn't have to do anything
to get there that nothing else was required of them as soon as they let go they defaulted
into the natural state of the new man and they're just like, oh, there's so much freedom.
I feel so much more connected with the Lord.
I can hear the Lord more clearly.
I can see him more clearly.
You know, my sister said that as soon as she did that all three parts of the Trinity appeared
to her.
She's like, hello.
It's just like, oh my word.
It's so yeah, which was very exciting was like, oh, that's a really neat experience.
But anyway, and it's not that all of those other things aren't aren't important powerful
powerful like so those are celebrating recovery or whatever, but the problem is sometimes
they can deal as deep as they go.
Sometimes they're just dealing with sentence because there's an aspect of the power of
the gospel that people aren't living haven't identified with and lived and are living out
of the nature of their identity and union with Christ and they're in their life dealing
with all of this stuff that's supposed to naturally flow from it.
And so dealing with those things means that they're not ultimately getting to under root
issue, meaning that the problems keep bubbling up.
So anyway, it's not that those other things aren't good, but that's why certain people,
you know, like you and my sister and other people, they're just like, no matter what
I do, I get a little bit of relief.
It's like I shaved the edge off, but what I'm really dealing with is still what I'm
really facing still isn't being dealt with.
And they find it when they hear about when they find about rest, because all it is the
power of the gospel.
It's what God did.
And it's very simple.
And if we approach it very simply, another thing is the things that I've been telling
you, I don't know how you've been responding to them internally, but I could imagine they
are terrifying and they're reckless because I mean, they feel reckless.
They feel like we're risking our relationship with the Lord.
And it feels like if we do that, that we are going to die or that God's going to reject
this or that he's going to strike us with lightning.
And I, and I, I said, right, I really didn't think that he was going to start a new fighting
and spiritual opposition internally.
You feel like as you're, as you're teaching, it like hangers your soul.
It's like so offensive to your spirit and you're like, I don't know where to, where
to put this.
Like this, it like comes up against everything you thought you knew.
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
And so it's like, and then there's the whole thing of like, who am I, do I know anything?
Is this like a detector from zero, you know, but I, I literally did.
I wiped everything.
And I told God, I'm starting out back at square one.
I said, until you tell me how to have a relationship with you, I'm going to do whatever I want
to do.
Because everything I have done and in this great, beautiful, very, very highly complex
and complicated structure that I created to serve you in.
And I've been living for 34 years at the time, 38 now that I've been living at the time,
you know, up to that time, it isn't working.
So I'm going to go to nothing.
Now I'd already chosen that I was going to continue to follow the Lord, even though it,
whether it was good or evil, I'd already made that decision a long time ago when I've had
a crisis of faith about like seven, 12 years earlier than that.
I don't remember.
I've lost count probably about 12 years earlier than that.
So I, I wasn't saying I wasn't going to follow, but I was going to say, I didn't know how
to.
So I chose him and that's all I said, I said, God, I choose you, but I don't know who that
is.
So until, until you tell me how to relationship, if you have a relationship with you, I'm just
going to try to live life.
And I know the things I want to do now, I wanted to have a business, I'm going to make
that business.
And if I want to be friends with them, I'm going to be friends with them.
I'm going to, whatever I want you to tell me what I should do, but until you do, I don't
know what it is because I thought I was doing everything you told me to do.
So my point is, like you said, all of these things, you know, come up against us.
Like, well, my goodness, you know, this kind of like tears at, at the very foundation of
what I thought was true.
So is this, is this true?
Like, you know, we'll, if I, if I, um, if, if I, if I choose to follow the Lord
like this, it's such a basic level, you know, and you scrap everything else.
You know, what's, what's going to happen.
Am I going to actually be a heretic?
Am I choosing the devil?
Am I doing what he wants, but the devil wants me to do, you know, and
I'm succumbing to the deception, you know, so everyone has to make their decision.
I just tell everybody, this is what I believe.
This is how I live.
And it has changed my life and everybody else that actually chooses
this, their life turns upside down.
I mean, they're just like, I didn't know that it was possible to live like this.
And they all say it and they're like, I don't know what happened, but everything
changed, it was like, I know, but anyway, so it can feel like that, but that's what
God, that's what God requires.
He's like, I want you to choose me to that, to that reckless place, to the
place where there's nothing but me.
And you don't even hold as a condition against me, how I'm going to manifest.
I'm going to manifest who it is that I am.
You don't even know who I am.
And I'm telling you to abandon everything, including yourself to choose that.
Then I'll reveal who that is, et cetera.
That, and so that's why a lot of those places don't teach what I teach because
it's terrifying and they don't think people can handle it.
So currently the only people that really, um, here and become attracted to join the
rest that said are people who are desperate enough, because what is required.
Is everything, but then they end up getting everything that everybody else
wants, but can't seem to find.
And all they're doing is they're continuing to push a little
harder and shaving off the edge.
And it's a lot more gracious are speaking for us to be able to have the
experience where, um, where we absolutely come to the end and I didn't understand
what I had to become to the end of such, such desperation and emotional breakdown.
And I'm very hard to break.
I'm I'd be like you and Lindsay, you know, very, very, very, very
you know, very high pain threshold in the spirit and in the motion and mental.
It's a coal, everything drive absolute to the next degree.
If it died, then killed us.
And I got to the end of that and I'm just like, I'm done.
And so, but the thing is, and I'm like, why Lord, why whether our other people
experiencing such horrors in life.
And I am, but what God did is because I experienced it, I realized the
desperateness with which I needed him.
And I was willing to do the absolute, ultimate desperate thing and she's
him in a way that they weren't.
So I got everything.
And so in a way, you know, I'm just, I'm so very, very, very grateful.
Yeah.
Before I leave you though, I wanted to check with you.
So you, you, you know, I know that you're asking and wanting to know.
Yeah, but, but, but what do I do now and how, how do I let go and how do I
choose and how do I like move in my existence tonight and tomorrow morning
where I'm having to make decisions, you know, et cetera, et cetera.
So, I mean, I know that I've addressed all of this, but have I, do you, did
you, um, did it make sense to you?
Do you know what to do now?
I mean, there's more to talk about later, you know, et cetera.
Just something I need you to know enough where you have the answers that you
need to start moving towards something.
Does that make sense?
Yeah.
Yeah, I definitely, you know, when you're in crisis, you're just
like, just tell me what to do.
Can I do this while I'm running this job?
I was actually surprised when you can do it while you're doing it.
Cause every, I mean, you have, when you start opening up for people's
opinions, speaking into it, people have gone to their own journey.
They're like, no, you're going to have to lay this all down.
Dying to everything means quitting your job, doing nothing, laying there and
trusting the Lord for your, for your every whatever, you know, it's like,
especially when you're a highly charged spiritual environment, like Bethlehem
and bless people, they're just running with what they know, right.
And what their experience has been.
But so that felt super overwhelming and like, haven't had a place to process
this of like, who do I trust to even give me advice in this area?
Um, and sometimes God will move us out of things, especially, um, if, uh, but,
but here's the thing God has only ever once moved me out of a.
a, an intense situation, like what you're feeling, what you're living in, but
it's only moved me out of that type of an experience one time without it
getting resolved in it only once.
And that, and the, and the, the reason that he did is because I didn't
know that earlier he'd, he'd wanted me to, but I didn't know he wanted me to.
And so I was waiting for him to tell me, and he finally just
forced me out of the situation.
But all of the other times, no matter how intense they thought, he
always resolved my spiritual issue with him, where everything calmed
down, everything got resolved.
And I was like, okay, so now that we got that out of like, okay, now let's
move, now let's move you out of your job.
Now it's maybe a, you know, out of the relationship or whatever.
I'm not saying that he's going to do with you that with you.
I just only say that to you as an encouragement.
But the thing is that even though he, he, he addressed all of those spiritual
issues with me in the job or in the relationship or whatever, without
being removed from it, the, uh, once I was removed from it, you know, once
he removed me or told me to move or whatever, I did have to heal.
Like I, there's a measure in which I had to be removed.
And I don't know that this is necessarily a tried and true spiritual principle.
I'm just telling you what it is observed.
I've observed.
I don't know that I've ever, I believe that it can happen.
Absolutely.
I mean, my goodness, if somebody goes through a difficulty in a marriage, it's
going to remove them for the marriage where they can heal.
No, we have all of his testimonies.
All these people have gone through very difficult times and yet they came through
the marriage, you know, and they healed in the marriage and all of that.
So does it mean that we always have to abandon everything, but I just wanted to
give you encouragement that God could tell you to do either one.
He could tell you to remove yourself, but removing yourself won't fix it.
That's what I'm trying to say.
You're moving yourself, but you know why?
Because you're still with yourself and you're then going to go to the next job
or you're the one lying there on the sofa with yourself or you're whatever.
The issue is an internal spiritual war.
It's not the outside triggers that can give a bit of reprieve to remove
yourself from all of the triggers.
Sure.
But that's not the issue.
Um, because like I said, you're still going with yourself.
Remember there's nothing wrong with you.
The problem is you think that there is, and that's what's causing the problems.
Well, so as weird as it sounds, it's just like the problems aren't because
you're worse than you think that you are or that you are as bad as you think you
are, the problem is that you are so much better than you were allowing
yourself to be to yourself or to God or to the people around you.
That's creating all of the angst, all of the struggle.
It is your spirit knowing one thing and your flesh fighting it.
No, that's not true.
That is where the struggle is.
And Jesus even struggled to remember that it says, you know, he, he did it first
and he understands, or however I wrote that out, you know, that post where it
says like Jesus, you know, just prostrate on the garden in our, in the garden.
I think I posted that yesterday.
You know, Jesus knows that struggle.
Jesus went through a struggle in the garden of Gethsemane.
And he said this, he wanted the disciples to pray for him because he
said, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.
He was talking about himself.
I don't believe he was talking about the disciples about the
fact that kept falling asleep.
Oh, your spirit is willing, but your budget's weak.
No, he was telling him the urgency of why he needed them to stand in spiritually
in the gap for him because his spirit was willing, but the flesh, which had not
transformed spiritually at that time, it was still subjected to death.
It, he was under so much stress.
He sweated drops of blood, you know, his flesh and his spirit were warring.
Jesus himself, his own spirit, his own flesh was fighting his spirit.
The thing is he never, his spirit never let it in.
He never, uh, you know, he always, he always chose the Lord.
He always chose faith.
He always chose belief.
He only, he only chose to overcome, but in order to overcome, you have to
have something that you're overcoming.
Jesus was born into a fleshly body that was subject to death and to corruption.
But he overcame it, that death and that corruption and that subject and that
subject to a tendency towards unbelief is warring in Christ himself.
The sin is not the struggle.
So you experiencing this struggle is not.
The thing is, what do you choose?
Do you choose that?
We are who God says that we are, or do you say, no, this is who I am?
Well, then this is going to have a power in our life and then we're going to be subjected and
victimized for it. So that's the only, so, so anyways, the struggle that you're experiencing
is there's two aspects of yourself. It's this house divided. It's not supposed to be divided.
It's supposed to be unified, you know, in purpose and an intention and choice and an identity.
And it's at war. And so that's where, that's where the pain is. And that's where the struggle.
And that's why God says that when in heaven, there is no more pain. Why? Because there's
no more war, no more struggle. There's nothing simple about pain though, because even Jesus
experienced pain. So anyway, so I don't know what it is the Lord is going to have you do.
He might have you, you know, lose your job. He might have you have a bit of a free, you know,
whatever the Lord has healed me. And once I left that particular job that I said that that was the
only one that he had me leave. Um, I didn't have a job for three months after that, no matter what
I did, trying so hard to find a new job. And God said, finally told me after three months, he said,
Ashley, you are wasting this time that I gave you the rest. And you were wasting it by being
stressed and anxious that there's something I'm requiring of you that you weren't working hard
enough and accomplishing it for me that you're not being a responsible adult. Actually, I gave
you this time to rest. And as soon as I came into agreement with it that week, after three months,
that week, I was going to call for a job. Boom. And then I, and I worked for, I had a really great
job with a really neat, a high-profile company and everything that that all happened. As soon
as I came into agreement with the Lord, okay, Lord, I let it go. I let go having to be something
for you, having to be a responsible adults in your eyes or whatever it is that, you know,
I condemned myself as, but anyway, so I don't know what he's going to do for you. I just wanted to
give you an encouragement that the issue isn't the triggers and, and God can absolutely do it.
Um, even when you're in the midst of the triggers, that's what he usually does with me.
Because sometimes what he's trying to do is that's how we overcome is in the face of the
triggers, you're believing something different. This is telling you one thing and you're choosing.
No, that is not the authority in, um, that I'm going to allow to be in, uh, to exist in this
particular place. Um, and so often we, in order to choose the higher thing, we actually have to
be in a position where, um, it's being, it's a, it, one is trying to dominate and we have to
actually overcome in order to overcome. We have to overcome, we have to, there has to be something
in which we're overcoming. And that usually happens when we're in the thing. Um, but it
doesn't mean that it can't. And it doesn't mean that God doesn't want to say, Hey, look, you know
what? Just like Elijah, Elijah went into the desert and he's all Tom, the Lord, how sorry it's
for himself and everything just kill me now and goes to sleep. Well, what did the Lord do? He sent
an angel with food and water and you're yeah. Food, bread and water. And he woke him up and he
said, so he supplied everything for Elijah when Elijah's just been crying out to him and having a
pity party, you know, and accusing God. And then, and so God goes to him, sends him an angel. And he
says, get up and eat because the journey is too much for you. So sometimes God's just like, you
know what? It's just too much. You have a lot. And I've done, and I've allowed this and this is built
at, I've allowed it to build up to this point to get your attention, but you don't have to have all
of this going on right now in order for us to start dealing with some stuff. So let's start
removing some of it. You might have you do that. So it's not a formula. I just want to give you
the encouragement that you are not being limited by where it is that you are. All you have to do
is okay, God, what are, what do you and I want to do as you make the decision, do it in rest,
do it, trusted that do it, choosing that you are more valuable to God than the decision that we
made. Yeah, that's good. Okay. It's funny, you're a turnaround business consultant salvaging things
that were falling apart and now he's got you. I hadn't thought about that. I live life in such
extremes. Oh my word, extreme business situations, everything on the verge of collapse.
Yeah, I hadn't thought about that. I just knew I was very extreme person.
So good. Well, thank you. Did this sit with you? Well, we have really gone on a long time and I
hope that you aren't too exhausted and tired. Just don't.
Try to take it all in.
Just try to just, your spirit got it all.
Your spirit got it all.
You don't have to consciously remember the step for it to,
for your soul and your body to start shifting
because they already know what to do.
Amen.
Yeah.
Thank you so much.
You're welcome.
Okay.
You take care.
Okay.
Okay, thank you.
Bye.