Over the last 4 months, God has been putting me through the fire, doing open-heart surgery to remove deep-rooted issues and it has been so painful. It has been difficult to ward off discouragement, and even last night, I felt so much anguish that I am still not where I want to be.

Today I spent the day avoiding God, so ashamed that I keep failing Him over and over. I was so distracted and bothered that nothing could keep my attention until I went hunting through my drawers and found an old journal. It was the journal that I kept during the year that I first received the Lord. As I read it, I couldn't stop weeping as I saw that even in all my struggles and powerlessness, He really saw all the desires in my heart back then and He has more than fulfilled what I once dreamt of.

Now I have new dreams of higher levels and a deeper hunger for intimacy with Him, but I can see that He has been so faithful...that even in the midst of the darkness that I came from, He had been planting seeds in my heart, seeds that have blossoming. I am in another season now where He is weeding and uprooting, and I know that even though I might not understand things, just like in the past, I can have confidence that even in the light of seeing all my weaknesses, He knows what He is doing and that He will never fail me.

I really want to attach to this blog post a copy of a poem that I wrote a month before I was saved. I had been going to church for about 4 months by then, but I was still very much deep into the drugs, drinking and self-destructiveness. I was so moved when I found it because I could see so clearly how far God has taken me.

I am not satisfied with the place that I am in right now, but thank God I am not in the place I used to be!

"Blinded, the darkness floods
the torch in my heart,
Crying, gurgling in despair and pain,
I drown in the River of the Night.

Father, You are faithful and true,
You deliver a glimmer of light,
A spark of hope. A shimmer of sunshine
at the surface of the water guiding me.

I swim upwards, eyes focused on You.
Escaping the corpses in the deep cold,
Shivering, tainted to my bones,
You ignite my spirit, warmth radiating from Your love.

Keep my fire burning, Father,
Extinguish my doubts and fear.
I want to depend on You,
Engulfed in Your magnificent love and joy.

I relinquish control, with You I will never sink.
Purchased at a price, my life is Yours.
How could I have been so faithless,
Destroyed by the disease of the world.

Father, I long to be with You,
Everlasting peace, a stream of joy,
An ocean of eternal love.
Unworthy, and yet I was chosen.

I will take Your hand and trust You,
With You I can soar..."

I am just so amazed...I wrote this at a time when I did not know any Christians, had not said any Sinner's Prayer, NO ONE had even taught me the 'language' to communicate with God...and yet, He took care of me, revealed Himself to me and taught me everything that I know today.

There was no Body of Christ back then to pick up the broken pieces of my heart and minister Christ's love to me. Christians shunned me and wanted nothing to do with me, and yet, He had compassion on me and bent down from heaven to clothe me and comfort me Himself.

I am comforted. I always thought that I 'love' God now, but I didn't back then...but how merciful He is that in my time of discouragement, He would show me my heart, so that I would know that even though my actions didn't match my desires back then, He still saw those budding virtues that He had planted in me. He is my God, my Gardener, the One who made all those seeds grow and I know that He will take me even higher from here.