Beauty for Ashes

This entry is inspired by the end of my last entry, which was my testimony in its shortest possible format.
Specifically based on this section:
"God has called me to take his joy into the nations and to restore the daughter’s heart, he took me through all of this and carried me into my destiny to free His daughters from the grips of the enemy. Praise God my mourning has turned into dancing my ashes into beauty."


Beauty for ashes, I can't think of two more opposite things, I don't think I've ever seen beautiful ashes because I'm pretty sure they don't exist. This is exactly what makes God so amazing though, He literally takes the ugliest most terrible things in our lives and turns them into beautiful things for His Kingdom. He takes the very least and makes them the greatest, God just loves to make our impossible happen.  When we feel our lowest is when we need Him most, He loves for us to need Him; the goal is to need Him when you are at your highest points too. He doesn't only want us when we are in our low moments that just tends to be when we cry out to Him. I want to cry out to him on a constant and consistent basis, I want to consciously need Him every moment of my life. 


God accepts us for exactly what we are in this very moment, He never tells anyone to go clean up their life get righteous and then come to Him. He wants us to humbly admit that we need Him, we love Him, we not only can't but don't want to live without Him. God really enjoys taking the things that we used to be ashamed of or the things that we were powerless to and use them for His good. For me my sexual immorality was something I struggled with for years and years and it was something the enemy really used to separate me from God by making me feel dirty, inadequate, and unlovable. God took that past sin and completely turned it into a passion for the heart of His daughters, to see his daughters restored to the destiny He has for them. He turned my darkest moments into the ability to relate to His daughters being held captive by the enemy, because I have been there, because I know what those demons look like, I know what it feels like to be chained to that evil, I know what it feels like to have your soul tied. Now I look back at those moments and I can see that I was never alone, I was never abandoned, He was always right there with me just waiting for me to cry out to Him. It is so completely amazing to me how God can literally use ANYTHING and everything for His good and the good of the Kingdom.


We are all sinners and we all have terrible pasts, I don't care who you are you have sin and you aren't perfect. In God's eyes sin is sin and the world's standards of which sins are worse than others doesn't matter to Him, all of it is equally terrible in His eyes. I brought God a huge pile of ashes, some of the ugliest most terrible ashes you've ever seen and now He planted an entire garden of daisies and more and more keep sprouting up every day. God's goodness doesn't even make sense to me sometimes; it is so amazing I just feel like how could it even be real?? The real crazy part is that it is so much more than just real, it is eternal. I don't look back on the things I did in the past and think how awesome those things were, I look back now though and see God's hand in all of it, I see His love for me in every moment of my life. I can look back now and see that even when it looked like something truly terrible was happening to me that God was still there and He was protecting me from horrible things the entire way. 


To describe how truly amazing it is to take ashes and turn them into beauty, imagine that your house burnt down to the ground, there is absolutely nothing left except for the ashes of what used to be your comfort and shelter, your refuge and hiding place. Then imagine if someone took those ashes and used them to rebuild a brand new house, one that was far better than the one that previously stood in the same place. When you look at this new house you can't even hardly remember what the old one ever looked like, this one is so much more comfortable, its shelter is far more secure, it is not just a refuge but a fortress; it's everything you ever thought you had, and now realize you didn't have, in the old house. If you could have ever dreamed of your perfect house this house would still be so much more amazing, your every need is always met. This is what God does with our lives, he takes that old burnt down house that is only a pile of ashes now and builds us a brand new beautiful house in its place.
We just have to quit trying to rebuild our own houses; we spend much of our lives watching sections of ourselves burn down, we try to take the ashes and rebuild these sections. We never succeed at getting anything more than temporary structures in place before the next storm or fire tears it all down again. If we just decide to be obedient to Him and allow Him to be in control of our lives instead of us then He can take those ashes and begin to create something beautiful and new. Now when storms come I can sing and dance in the beauty He gave me, I don't have anything to fear because my Father protects His daughter, He will use all things for His good, He will always love me.  He will not allow me to be reduced to ashes ever again; He only wants to expand upon my beauty in Him. 


Praise the Lord I have beauty for ashes; I pray I will always reflect His love and beauty.