Consecrated Ones

Every morning, here in Cyprus, we begin our day with worship. We believe that every moment should be lived in worship to our God; nevertheless, there is something special and powerful when we come together with the specific purpose of praising our King and seeking His face. The amazing part is that when we seek Him, He comes! Daily we are drawn into His presence and our lives are being changed. There are so many aspects of God and of His love that you can never have enough. His love is wider and deeper and stronger and purer and lovelier than we could ever fully know. The more we gaze at Him in worship, the more of Himself He pours out and we are daily growing more and more hungry for more of Him. Could I use the word “more” anymore? Yes! I want More! I have been in Cyprus now for over 3 weeks, and there is so much I could write about. Already, God has spoken so much to me and kissed me with His presence again and again. Since I cannot possibly tell everything, especially when I am still processing most of it, I will just write a little bit about some special revelation the Lord has been walking me through.
Before worship begins each day, all of the staff and the interns meet in the office for a time of communication and prayer. Most of the time before we even go down to worship we have already had an encounter with the Lord in our staff meeting. Last week, Mrs. Rudolph shared with the staff an exhortation reminding us that we are “consecrated ones.” She said that those of us who are not married do not need to think of our identity as “single” but rather as consecrated ones. As she was sharing, my heart was lit with an excitement deep within. It is not that we are taking any vow of singleness, but it is the fact that we realize what a special time this is that we are able to fully devote ourselves to the One we love—singleness of heart. And this does not apply only to the unmarried, but the married as well can be consecrated to the Lord as ones with singleness of heart towards the Lord. Since I am not married, however, I will write about what this means to me in my state. What a privilege I have to be able to put all of my focus and zeal towards the Lord. I have more time to be filled with His love and healed in His presence so that when the day does come if the Lord should bring to me a partner in this adventure of life, I will be a whole person whose identity is rooted and grounded in God’s love. I am going to give it my all to let my roots go down deep. It is so easy to allow ourselves to be unaware of the days in which we are living. But we must awake! This is not a time to sleep or a time to get comfortable and make our lives nice and cozy. If you have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, then you are part of the Family of God. Your life cannot be lived in isolation from the rest of the Church and God’s plans in this earth. You may be satisfied to know that you are going to Heaven, but God gave us His Holy Spirit and the great commission so that we might play a greater role in this amazing redemption story. God has not made you to be an extra taking up space on the stage of life—He has created you to play an irreplaceable role with deeper significance than it may at first appear. It does not matter where you were born or what your background is, He is ready to fill your life with more meaning and purpose than you could ever hope for yourself. With this in mind, my excitement continues to grow as I begin to see myself as a consecrated one. We are so close to Yeshua’s (Jesus’) return. I am locking my gaze on Him and not looking around to try to find things to fill my life. My life is not my own. I lay it down gladly for the One who laid His life down for me. I am marching to the rhythm of His love wherever it leads. I am choosing to lay myself down on His table and ask Him to do surgery on my heart. He may cut away anything and everything that is not from Him. All of the hopes, dreams, and plans I have for my life, I present to Him as a gift. Because of His amazing love, I know I can FULLY trust Him with my all. I lay down all expectations and choose to follow Him. I pray that I would be found willing even unto death. I love Jesus. I love Abba, Father God. And I know that He loves me and His plans for me are good. I am part of the Jacob generation who will seek His face.