I’ve been feeling pressed (gently) to go back to writing. I’ve been a lot more insular and private over the last few years. That’s a nice safe place to be but I sense it’s time to move into a new space... not totally new because I’m actually returning to things I did before.
Let’s just be blunt. This is super vulnerable. It can feel really icky. Afterwards it makes me want to hide under the covers and pretend I didn’t share anything. But it also feels like my calling. And in the end it’s not about my comfort (I probably won’t agree with that in a few days 😅.)
I do have many stories to share.
This post is about hearing God. It’s taken YEARS to learn to hear God’s will more clearly and I still mess it up 😖. We were going to apply for a rental last week. But we didn’t. And what changed our mind was some outside prayer and me rehashing some past memories of hearing God wrong.
I knew to look for the peace.
I’d even said earlier that day, “I just haven’t had ANY peace about this all week.”
God’s will brings peace.
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My husband forwarded me a link, “Check this one out!” I turned my attention to my “discernment/gut/God” as I opened it and saw the red brick house, lit by sunlight, not too high a price and in an amazing location. I’ve always wanted to live near the beach! Is this good for us God? A rush of excitement went through my middle as I felt a positive feeling like maybe it was the one. I scrolled the photos and it seemed even more likely!
The house had jumped out at both my husband and I. He said he didn’t know why it had jumped out at him. I really liked it. Maybe it jumped out because it was the house for us? We requested an inspection. We waited.
One day I had a very strong sensation that I’m going to find hard to describe. It is so strong it’s almost physical? And is unshakable for many seconds. It comes from outside myself and presses inward with screaming intensity of the house being for us, as if we will be rewarded with it. But it is a glorification. I knew that feeling. I felt it about a house we applied for in the past. It was not God.
I wanted it to be God.
I hardly looked at the house photos for days. I tried to keep it out of my mind to avoid disappointment. I hesitated in telling anyone about it. I was frustrated when my husband told someone. I like to do these things quietly!
God’s will doesn’t press you to keep it a secret.
Finally an inspection was looming and I fell down the hole of analysis hard. I spent hours pouring over the photos of the rooms, figuring out the layout of the house. Something in me told me to stop but I kept going. I placed everything in our current home into those rooms in my imagination. We discussed it all. We made decisions. I wrote a list of the things we wanted in a house. I wrote a list of pros and cons for this house to try to decide because I couldn’t decide... I was still super anxious, overwhelmed and in a spin.
God’s will doesn’t bring total confusion.
Our conversations were decorated with “if we move house next month” and “when we have two living areas” etc. Our current house felt so wrong and frustrating. But the timing was awful. How could we move right now?
I wanted a clearer answer from God. Should we look? Is this right? I couldn’t lose my stress and restlessness. But as much as I’d tried to, I’d never looked at the photos and heard/felt a no.
We did a drive by. There was a rainbow right above the house. I took a photo. When I looked at the rainbow I sensed in the spirit that God had a great house for us somewhere. He had a plan.
I wanted the rainbow to mean THIS house was for us. (Not that I think every rainbow is a sign from God! Let’s be realistic here 😅.)
I said to my husband one day, “Let’s just forget about it and not go to the inspection.” I felt peace about not going to the inspection. But I wanted to go to the inspection. I couldn’t get that rainbow out of my mind.
“I just want to decide we’re not going to look ‘cause I want this to all be over.”
He wanted to look (he’s an options open kind of guy 😉). I couldn’t decide if I was being tricked into thinking it was the house for us or tricked into not looking because it was the house for us! Confused. Exhausted. Anxious. Hopeful. Longing.
Every day I surrendered it up in prayer.
The inspection was squished between our kids’ gym classes and my appointment in town. I was so stressed all morning about looking through that house. As we drove toward it one of us asked,
“Why are we both so stressed?!”
God’s will brings peace.
Finally we would look and it would be over! The agents arrived casually. One of them put the key in the lock. It was the wrong key.
“We could just look around outside?”
“Okay...”
“Oh the gate is padlocked. We’ll have to come back later...”
We rushed off to our appointment and made it just in time.
“Wow, we wouldn’t have had time to go through the house properly! Good thing they messed up with the key.”
We waited longer...
Finally we went through the house. We wanted it to be clearly bad or clearly great. We prayed for it to be clearly bad or clearly great! It was neither. It ticked so many boxes. It didn’t tick all of the boxes. It didn’t FEEL right inside. But it ticked so many boxes!
We would be giving up a few things but gaining some amazing things. Were we being perfectionists? Were we settling? Why did it feel wrong when we went inside? Where would I put my homeschool shelves?!
We decided to apply and then decide.
Financially it was an awful time to do this. Schedule-wise it was an awful time to do this. We weren’t even sure we could break our lease so many months in advance.
(Just saying - this doesn’t sound like God’s timing 😅.)
I put a call out for prayer. (Note to self: do this earlier.) I wanted God to have his way no matter what.
That night we lay in a bed together and talked. It was like our discernment finally switched on.
“It just doesn’t... feel right.”
“It doesn’t feel right to me either. Do you have peace about not applying?”
“Yeah. I do.”
And that was it. I went to bed and slept well for the first time in ages. I felt like I’d come out of a nightmare. The peace!! There was SO much peace to my core. Everything had clarity and I felt urged to the things of God.
The next day my husband looked up real estate reviews and the agency for that house had one star reviews. We would have been in big trouble.
I stopped thinking about the house. It was strangely flushed from my mind once I knew it was wrong.
In retrospect it’s obvious. Sometimes my discernment had said it was right and other times i had felt it was wrong. I was hearing conflicting voices in the spiritual world as I often do. I was being taken for a ride.
It reminded me of being pregnant with my second son and the wrestle over hearing and wanting him to be a girl. The confusion, the desperation, the anxiety, the secrets.
Since the house drama I’ve been discerning differently. I’ve been looking internally. Does this feel right? Do I have peace inside? Yes. Then I’ll do it in faith. No? Then it’s probably not God.
Can there be anxiety in doing God’s will? Absolutely! I’m an enneagram six 😂. But there is an inner peace that I won’t describe but when you’ve experienced it enough times you know how to look for it. And your discernment sharpens to know when you’ve lost it.
Did I mention I was devastated by the thought of leaving our lovely home and moving into that other house? Yet we were going to apply for it?! Thank God for his protection.
I can’t wait to see what he has for us 🌈.
If you’re new here, have a read of some older posts! I’ve been really enjoying them 😆.
