2007 was really a year of resting in His grace in my life. It was my busiest year ever, with more stuff to do in church and my last and impossible year in NUS. On top of that, there was the longstanding problem of my family’s finances. For the preceding years, my daddy had been experiencing some financial difficulties and nothing seemed to be going right for him.
During that time, he began to be very depressed and started staying at home more. He would seem like he is going to cry when I leave the house to go out and he would sleep a lot. There would be this air of worry at home about the finances and even though our lifestyles weren’t dramatically changed, I felt that suddenly money was becoming an issue.
At that time, I had my own car and when I came back from a holiday in the States, it started giving me problems. My daddy suggested selling the car since it was being such a hazard but I knew it was because he wanted to use the money from the sale to repay some credit card debts.
On top of that, we were even considering moving to a smaller apartment. It was really painful to give up something that I had been so accustomed to having. As I saw all these happening in the family- the depression, the worry, the giving up of some material comforts - but being well trained in the workings of grace, I believed and trusted (yet not without questioning) God.
One night, God told me that I was, as Charles Capps said, getting defeated silently. I started speaking out and claiming my victories from time to time.
At the start of the year, my daddy went to visit a psychiatrist at the recommendation of our family doctor. He would be depressed without the medicine prescribed by the doctor and he would take it with regularity, almost as if he were addicted to it.
One night, I was so disturbed by all that was happening around me that I took communion at home, pleading the blood of Jesus on my family.
Right at that instance, I felt God telling me that it would be the last time I’ll take communion at home. Being extremely faithful, I just thought that that meant that I just wouldn’t take communion unless there was someone with me and I had no idea what was going to happen next.
At that time, it was the first time I was allocated to serve communion. Under the pretext that it was really important to me, I got my whole family to come to church to see me serve communion. It was at that service when my parents accepted Christ. Not just that, in the same week, my aunt and my grandmother received Christ as well!
We began to come regularly every week, and it was one message that Pastor Prince preached about peace in the mind that really set my daddy free. He stayed for two services that week. After that, he stopped taking his pills. Subsequently, my daddy began to experience a lot of favour at work.
We are even going to get a new and better second car. Instead of downgrading, we are thinking of upgrading. But what is most amazing is not the restoration in the area of finances. My mummy learnt to trust God to take away her worry, her troubles and even her fats. Now instead of a spirit of worry at home, there is new joy.
But my Abba doesn’t know when to stop blessing me. Recently, my parents and my sister received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and they have been speaking out in tongues. Not just that, they are also thinking of tithing!
On top of that, I haven’t been very faithful in my school work and so my grades were not good enough for honours. I went ahead to do honours anyway, with the terrible thought at the back of my head all the time that I would not get honours and waste a year of my life.
But my heavenly Dad is so amazing. It was the busiest year in church, yet I managed to get the best grades I have ever gotten in my entire four years in school to jump from a GPA of 2.83 to 3.2 to obtain third class honours.
It may not be first class honours but when I look back at this journey, I know God has brought me through in rest. Fears popped up now and then, but the effectiveness of God’s Word in my life never changes. His infinite grace can never be limited by the finiteness of my mind and my feelings.
Truly, the greatest gift of all is salvation. When that happens, everything else is just added unto you. Honestly, I haven’t been most faithful in proclaiming how good God is. It’s so much easier sharing it in church with likeminded people knowing and acknowledging what you share.
All I know is that my family is interested in knowing about my life and my life cannot be apart from Jesus. So I shared with them snippets of my life without restraint and through that, Jesus was shared. I really don’t know what more to expect from God this year of manifested blessings.
My whole family has received the greatest blessing of all, in such an environment where they sit under preaching of pure grace!
Selene
