Keep Saying Yes

Well here we are. Feb. 24th! Foster Care training starts tonight! Something has happened in my heart over these past couple months, and I'm actually not dreading this training! Dare I say I'm actually kind of "excited" shhh don't tell anyone. ;)
Isn't it funny though, how we can go through something thinking its for someone else, but all the while God is revealing more and more that it was for you? I have lead high school girls through a study called Made for More, and its about learning and discovering what a life lived in His freedom really looks. The more I walk girls through this study the more I'm convinced its for me. Currently I'm walking the Middle School Leaders of my church through this study, and I just love the truths God has revealed. It has drastically changed me….and is still changing me. This past week in group we learned tools to help us combat lies that the enemy tries to trick us with. I love watching the truth that we have the power (Gods word) to combat the lies that the enemy throws at us. If Christ is in us, we are His dwelling place, and we have divine power through him. Then as the night goes on, I see it.
The struggle.
A conversation in ones head could go like this:
"Yes, I have my broken place I currently reside in. I do life here, its messy at times, and it is broken, but I reside here. I operate here. I am comfortable here. I KNOW here.  So you're telling me I have a way out? You're telling me I don't have to live in these chains anymore? (then it hits) That might take some work….That might lead me to some uncomfortable places….I don't like the unknown…..I don't think I want a way out."

Then we read Ephesians 4:22-24msg
"Since then we do not have the excuse of ignorance, everything -and I do mean everything - connected with that old way of life has to go. It is rotten through and through. Get rid of it!! And then take on an entirely new way of life - a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside out working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you."

And that is where I apologize to them. :)
After going through this study, we/I/they do not have the excuse of ignorance any more. We don't get the option to stay where we are! We must keep saying yes.
That has become my anthem over the past year or so…"Keep saying yes." Whatever you ask of me Lord, I will just keep saying yes to you. No doubt its going to lead me to some more terrifying places that I've never been. That has proven itself true already! But in all of this life, as I've been walking with Him; He has never. Not once. Ever. failed me. He has never left me. He has never said "Janna, jump off this huge cliff I will catch you" then ran away as I was jumping so I fall flat on my face. He is there. He is with me. And I TRUST him.
This is the new place my heart is in toward Foster Care. Once just putting one foot in front of the other but slightly still dragging it, hoping He was really wasn't asking this of us. To a place of freedom. Another area where I'm standing on that cliff looking down at the unbelievably high canyon below me and he says, "Jump I will catch you."
Each time I say yes, and each time I jump, I trust Him so much more.
Funny how that works.