Emptied

I have never understood the verse in the bible where it says one day with the Lord is like a thousand elsewhere….well now I do!
Most of the time believers go through “seasons” with Jesus. A season of desert, a season of blessing, a season of growth etc. I am not putting God in a box but I have noticed with most people these seasons last a few months, just like the natural seasons. Since I have started the Supernatural School of Ministry (also known as BSSM) four weeks ago, I have gone through FOUR seasons. Ha. Yes I have aged about a hundred times faster in my spiritual life then I ever expected and I have seen this happen in the mirror each week. God has been rocking my world and catapulting me in my faith. I am sure you are thinking, “oh good for you Danielle, that’s wonderful!” And you are right, but I am exhausted!! Can you imagine aging 4 year in 4 weeks?! It is spiritually, mentally, and physically draining and yet God keeps refilling me to overflow. Allow me to start with my first season, week one of school.
We have school Tuesday-Friday from 12:45-5:30, with a small group, home group, and two church services to attend on the weekends. It is quite a tiring schedule when you’re thinking of encountering the Holy Spirit for most of that time, being completely changed, having your foundation shaken then rebuilt, meeting new people every day, and trying to keep up with all the homework which right now includes reading 6 books, writing reports, and answer questioners.
The first week was pretty much hell for me. I realized how much I don’t know and how much gunk God needed to get out of me. I came from a place (and this is where my identity was placed) where I was the leader at all times, pastor’s daughter, feeling like I was hot stuff on the spiritual spectrum, pretty special if you know what I mean……and then I came here. I was in a room of 1,000 other spiritually special people. In fact they were “better” than me! I wasn’t even on the totem pole with these people. I was not noticed, I didn’t have as many prophetic words as everyone else, I was not called out to lead or asked for advice, I didn’t impress anyone. I felt invisible, my identity was stripped away.
The Lord gave me a dream where he tipped my head to the right and sand started falling out of my ear. It was coming in pounds and making a huge pile on the floor. I would tilt my head back up, shake it a bit and still feel the sand in my head, it blurred my eyesight and hindered some of my hearing, so I would tilt my head and dump more sand out. This dream was a perfect picture of what was happening to me the first week of school; I was being dumped out making a perfectly empty person for the Lord to work with. Wonderful…but really painful. I bawled my eyes out after school on the first Friday wondering if it was going to get any better. It was so humbling to see what was inside of me that I had no idea existed. I didn’t want to share God’s love, I didn’t want anyone to be better than I was, I would not celebrate other’s successes…these realizations broke my heart. So I would tilt my head and let Jesus dump more sand out of me. Seriously in worship I would sing with my head tilted to the right prophetically dumping sand out of my head! Every time a thought came into my mind that was not Christ I would just dump it out of my ear. (I would say I looked funny but most people here at BSSM manifest the Holy Spirit in pretty crazy ways so I was quite tame.J)
The first week was a week of deflating Danielle Beacham so the Holy Spirit could breath Himself in to expand me. I had to be broken before I was build back up. Once I realized that I asked Jesus to do His worst. Take anything out and pour more of Himself in. It worked. The next week was a whole different very sweet season that I will share later.
I hope this is encouraging some way somehow. I pray anyone who reads this that the Lord will touch in a new way and new revelation of what is Him or what isn’t Him in any of our thoughts or beliefs.
Love to all,
~dani b.