Actively Pursuing God

Do you have a group of friends you can sit around with and talk about the things of the Lord? If not, start praying for that, because it’s amazing how much you can learn from each other and support each other just by doing life together. Until then, enjoy this wise and insightful conversation between CeCe Winans and a group of her friends. 

Family drama has got to be the worst. These are the people you’re supposed to trust…that’s why the wounds are so deep and so painful. Your mom is supposed to be there to protect you, your dad is supposed to be there to protect you. That’s why so many times when you come into a relationship with Jesus, if your earthly father wasn’t close to the picture of what a father should be, it’s hard for you to trust your Heavenly Father. You have to really get to get to know Him to understand what a Father really is. Drama, to me, always takes you away from God, because God is not about drama; He’s the God of peace even in the midst of the storm. He’ll give you the peace you need. Difficulties should take you to Him…you should run to Him, He’s your refuge. I think drama keeps you from receiving the wholeness and the healing that you need. Even when you decide to focus on your pain more than healing, then a lot of times you create more drama in your own situation. There have been times when I’ve been hurt and it’s almost like the Holy Spirit says, “Ok, do you want to focus on your hurt or do you want to focus on the healing?” To me, when the Holy Spirit talks to me, He comes with no drama at all; very clear and direct because the thing is you really can’t play with it because if you decide to hang around and mope and nurse your hurt, it’s gonna get worse. I mean, I’ve had the Holy Spirit say, “What’s more important: My will or your feelings?” And when you run to Him, He’s never going to reject you, He’s going to give you exactly what you need so you can make it to the next step. It doesn’t all happen at one time. We’re impatient and we want the healing to happen right now; the reconciliation to happen right now; but God has an order. He has a strategy. He has a plan. But we have to run to Him. 

Remembering is such an active thing. When I’m actively pursuing God- I’m getting my little behind up, getting my journal out in the morning, oh, conviction comes. A holy and righteous conviction. And I love what you said, we find ourselves in these drama cycles, but if we are actively pursuing our Heavenly Father day by day, moment by moment. I ask a question every morning, “Lord, I want to repent. Show me some areas in my life that I need to be refined in. He’s like, “Remember that time last night, when you all were texting and you got a little crazy?
When you blocked your own mama? Remember that? That’s what you need to work on right now.” I just feel like, we’re going to make the mistakes; we’re going to get mad; we’re going to have a little road rage; we’re probably going to get mad and block somebody for a second, but if we’re in constant communication with our Father, and we’re remembering, and we’re being active in that, He shows us and refines us and we can press the reset button. “Come on back, this is not the way” and that blocks the way of the enemy who just comes for that discourse and just wants division and disunity, for sure. 

I love what you said, CeCe, when you know it’s His voice because He speaks very directly to you. So, His voice over your life could only be discerned in the hidden place where you communed with Him, where you heard from Him, and then recognized that still, small voice in a sea of voices, and opinions, and chaos. So for me, it’s centered so much in the intimate place with God and discovering in His Word and in His Presence His character and His heart and the way He speaks to me. In that, I began to pray, “Holy Spirit, I want Your gift of the discerning of spirits. I’m hungering and asking You to grow that gift in me.” When that became my prayer, then in moments of drama or moments of conflict, I was able to step back and say, “let me discern the spirit sourcing their words. Let me discern the spirit sourcing their opinions, or their feelings.” This is very important when it comes to spiritual manipulation- when it comes to conflict in the faith, that’s even a little wilder. When I was in worldly conflict…talk about conflict when you’re all believers. But when I pray, “God, I want the gift of discernment of spirits…” I know what the Holy Spirit sounds like. I know what the Holy Spirit working through someone, I can discern that and respond. So sometimes someone can come with something that could cause drama, but it’s actually imparted from the Lord for our good and I can understand and my spirit resonates with that. But other times, if someone’s coming with other things, sourced from other spirits, I’m able to say, “That’s not the Holy Spirit sourcing that, and so I don’t have to receive that.” I don’t have to take offense, I don’t have to be manipulated by that. Maybe even the wisdom in this moment is that I separate myself from them because that’s coming to cause chaos, to tear me down, to come with accusation. That’s not of my God, even if they claim they’re another believer, that’s where all that manipulation comes in. And they can be another believer, just coming from a place of brokenness, not even recognizing their own motives are impure. When that lack of healing is what is sourcing something, we have to say, “Lord, give me discernment of spirits that I might respond when I know it’s of You, and I might not get dragged and drawn in and destroyed when it is not of You.”

When you choose to forgive, or when you choose to walk in obedience, it doesn’t mean that you’re always going to feel like you’ve achieved something. It doesn’t mean that you haven’t, but God continues to purify us, He continues to heal us. It’s a process. Our nature is to say, “I forgive you, but you’re going to get yours.” That’s our nature. That’s everybody’s nature. Nobody has to teach us how to feel that way, but it’s an opportunity for you to grow and to become more like Him. But it’s a process…so don’t abort the process.

“I thought those were really wise words they were sharing with each other, so we can grow and learn. I’ve had people in my life say things to me and I’m like, ‘that is not of God.’ And I just store it away in my heart because I know- because it’s negative or it’s just something I know isn’t right. So, the Lord will show you and it is important that we put a guard over our heart. We can love the whole wide world when our inner circle is pure. We’re just learning these things as we go through life.”

Lauren 

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