SOW A SEED

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“I am the vine, and you are the branches. Those who remain in Me, and I in them, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without Me.” (John 15:5).

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I took a break from my social media after the last journal entry because I wanted my mind to be still. Sometimes, there’s so much noise I listen to that could affect my ability to discern the voice of God clearly, and so I knew the social media retreat was what I needed. But I longed to go on a full personal retreat, the kind that My Dee got me as a birthday present this year 😊 (I might write about this someday in this journal). I just wanted to be still, alone, and go somewhere private with God. Even though that couldn’t happen at this moment, I am glad for all I learned during my retreat from social media last week.

I reflected a lot on my life so far and spent more time with God to gain clarity about my future and all He has been saying concerning this present season. Through it all, He began to reveal layers and layers of my heart to me, hidden things I didn’t know were still in me. But He didn’t take me there to leave me helpless. Bit by bit, like a potter moulding clay, He squashed and crushed to mould me into a beautiful vessel to behold. But the jar he was making did not turn out as he had hoped, so the potter squashed the jar into a lump of clay and started again. Jeremiah 18:4. But I had questioned myself, “Nancy, aren’t we done with this phase?” because I thought I had overcome certain things, but seeing God reveal them again was so humbling that through the crushing and pressing, I really desired that He makes new wine out of me. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the skins burst, the wine spills out, and the skins are ruined. No, they put new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved.” Matthew 9:17.

Amidst everything, I had moments of doubt. “If God still had to discipline me on these things, am I worthy of the things He has been instructing me to do?” “Am I unlearning anything if I still have to go back to where He delivered me from?”

I ended my retreat on Sunday because I had tasks to do online, and I wish I could write that I felt better, but I didn’t. I still felt an aura of heaviness. Although I was glad that God was revealing these things about the state of my heart to help me become more like Christ yet, I was hard on myself because I felt the need to have attained an optimum level of growth to be worthy of God’s promises or even receiving certain instructions from Him. I felt I wasn’t proving my love for Him as much as I should. But when I came online, it was as though God planned to remind me again that He isn’t seeking my perfection and that His discipline is for those He loves. The Lord corrects the people He loves and disciplines those He calls His own. Hebrews 12:6.

First, I got a WhatsApp message from a lady who had reached out to me last month because she desired to grow intimately with God and needed me to mentor talk to her. I had thought to myself then; mentoring someone is a big responsibility. I was just going to say a few words of encouragement to her, but God had instructed me to be intentional—taking off the title. When I came online and saw the messages she had sent to me while I was away, I became so teary that I began to scream. Her testimonies so far have made me relearn that when God instructs me to sow a seed, He just needs me to yield as a vessel because He will be the one to nurture it. Sometimes, I forget that I am not the Holy Spirit, and I want to become the Holy Spirit in people’s lives. But I am learning to let Him do His work and partner with Him in the dimensions He leads me to.

Secondly, I received a couple of testimonies with regards to this (journal) blog.

These messages made me think back to a particular week when I was battling feelings of inadequacy and two ladies in school had randomly approached me on different days to ask if I had a blog, and when I responded affirmatively, they became excited and spoke about how they had been blessed by reading my journal, but something was very peculiar about my encounter with both of them—they left me with encouraging words. I knew this was God sending help to me through people.

There are times I have sown seeds, taken a step of faith to carry out certain instructions from God, evangelized to people, followed-up and prayed, hoping that these seeds yield the expected result based on what God had promised. But I become impatient and sometimes do certain things against God’s instructions because I want “quick results.” What I am learning is that; there is a law of process. The little I know about agriculture from elementary school helps me remember that when a seed is sown, there are processes it undergoes before it germinates. Right? So what I don’t often see with my physical eyes are these processes. As I write this, I think back to my encounter with God. I didn’t accept God the first time I heard about Him; I struggled and resisted, but I am certain there were loved ones who prayed relentlessly for me behind closed doors—sowing seeds.

As God reveals the state of my heart to me and disciplines me, I am learning that He isn’t indicating my seeds are corrupt or barren (as long as I am in alignment with Him); I wasn’t a saint when He called me chosen, nor can I even attain perfection by myself but through the Holy Spirit, who constantly reveals the state of my heart and brings me to genuine repentance.

(sighs)

I am learning to sow a seed and let the Holy Spirit be the Gardener.

Until next time.