The Holy Spirit &.

I've been traveling and speaking at other churches and places. I preached 10 times in 14 days, so it was a lot. But I'm excited to be back. I always listen to Pastor Ned Melice's messages, and this week I listened to her message a second time because it was so good. I was taking notes the second time as well.

I had the honor of speaking at a youth camp as a speaker. I was really nervous to speak to teenagers because I'm like, I'm not cool and I'm not really funny. But it went well, and God did some cool things. One really cool moment was this girl that came up to me. Her whole family had left the camp, but she was driving back an hour by herself every single morning to hear me speak because she told me that before that, God had called her to be a pastor and to be in ministry. But that she hadn't seen any women do that. And coming to camp, she felt like it was God confirming to her that she could do this and that she could be a pastor.

What is prophecy?

So we are continuing and talking about the Holy Spirit and prophecy today. This is one of those where, when we talk about the Holy Spirit in church, we really get a little anxious. And when you talk about prophecy, it's like a whole other level of what is about to go down here. I think it's because it's probably one of the most abused spiritual gifts that we see in scripture. When I was a student at camp, I had someone have a word for me that they were supposed to marry me. I can tell you it was not the Lord. But all these different words, right. We get on behalf of the Lord, and we're like, this is from him. Thus saith the Lord. And you're always like, okay, what is that?

So we're going to talk about, like, what is prophecy? What does it look like? What is it not? What does the Bible tell us? We're going to start with reading from the passage where it talks about gifts of the Spirit in 1 Corinthians 14.

Follow the way of love and eagerly desire the gifts of the Spirit, especially prophecy. For anyone who speaks in a tongue does not speak to people but to God. Indeed, no one understands them. They utter mysteries by the Spirit, but the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouragement, and comfort. Anyone who speaks in a tongue edifies themselves, but the one who prophesies edifies the church. I would like every one of you to speak in tongues, but I would rather you prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues unless someone interprets so that the church may be edified.

1 Corinthians 14:1-5

This scripture I love in 1 Corinthians 14, because before we see in 1 Corinthians 12, it's talking about the gifts of the Spirit, and then 1 Corinthians 13 is the love chapter, where it's talking about love. And I think that's so intentional to notice the order of that. Then when it goes into tongues and prophecy, it's setting the stage to remind us that everything must be done in love. And it's very specifically saying in verse 3, the one who prophesies speaks to people for their strengthening, encouragement, and comfort. For their strengthening, encouragement, and comfort.

So we're seeing here that the primary purpose of the prophetic is not to necessarily even give us direction. It's not to correct us or condemn us or do any of those things. Rather, it's to encourage the church. We see this all throughout scripture.

The big so what for the week is that the prophetic is calling us back to who God created us to be and calling us towards where God is leading. So essentially it's calling us back to our identity. Created in the image of God, created to be holy, created to be whole. And it is giving us a glimpse of his kingdom. It's supposed to encourage us and empower us and comfort us. That is the gift of the prophetic.

Now, like all gifts of the Spirit, these gifts are good things from God. And I want us to remember that as we walk through this. That at the end of the day, what we're talking about in the prophetic is the fact that the God who created the heavens and the earth wants to speak to you, and he wants to speak through you. That he wants to speak to you in intimate and powerful ways. And there are going to be moments that he's going to use other people in community to speak to you. Not because he doesn't trust you to speak directly to you, but he might give someone a prophetic word to give to you to remind you that you're not alone. That this is not just this one-on-one thing that you're doing with Jesus for all of eternity, but that we are invited into a community of believers. And so that is one of the beauties in operating in the gifts of the Spirit and the prophetic. We're reminded we're not alone. God wants to speak to us and through us.

Old Testament and New Testament prophecy

In the Old Testament, the prophetic was all about calling a people back, again, to who God had called them to be. God's presence would come upon one person, usually a priest or a prophet, and he would have a word from them. The prophetic office originated with Moses and the events on Mount Sinai where God came and he spoke to him. That was really the first time that we saw the prophetic.

But really, all throughout the Old Testament, they were never speaking on their own authority or their own words. And a lot of times there were these warnings to Israel of what was to come. But everything was calling them back to who God created them to be. Saying, "Don't go do this stupid thing that's going to lead you into being taken captive again, but come, turn back to me. Turn back to who I created you to be." That's what the prophetic was all about.

Also in the Old Testament, we see these prophecies foretelling of Jesus coming. Saying, "But don't worry, because I know on your own that you cannot live free and whole like you were created to. I am sending you a Savior, a Messiah who is Jesus." So the Old Testament, that's kind of where we see the prophetic.

Much of the Old Testament prophecy was predicted. It wasn't necessarily foretelling in that type of way, but it was declaring what couldn't have been known by just natural means. So it needed the presence of God to come upon people because they were being told things that they couldn't just know on their own.

And then we see, fast forward to the New Testament. Jesus is here with us, and he starts to model how we can live out our calling, right. He's giving us a glimpse of what that looks like. And then now we're in that place where we are empowered by the Holy Spirit to live out our calling and to operate in the prophetic. Which again, according to 1 Corinthians 14, is to encourage each other. It's to empower each other, to bring comfort, and to edify each other.

The spirit of prophecy

The next thing is when we're talking about the prophetic, we have to remember that the prophetic is all about relationship, and it's all about releasing life.

At this I fell at his feet to worship him. But he said to me, "Don't do that. I am a fellow servant with you and with your brothers and sisters who hold to the testimony of Jesus. Worship God for it is the spirit of prophecy who bears testimony to Jesus."

Revelation 19:10

The spirit of prophecy bears testimony to Jesus. What is testimony? It's a story. Testimony is a story.

So essentially it's saying the testimony of Jesus. That is prophecy. Prophecy is testifying, telling the story of who Jesus is, of who he was, who he's now in this moment, and who he's going to be. So that is the essence of it. So when it's saying the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus, the spirit is the essence, like the wholeness of it, all of that. So the essence of prophecy at the end of the day is to tell the story of Jesus in that type of way.

So what is then the story of Jesus? Well, we know all throughout scripture, we can read that he came to set the captives free, that he came to change lives, to transform lives, to bring healing, to bring wholeness, to give hope. And here's what Jesus did with that: he removed shame, he conquered condemnation, and again he gives us hope and offers something new for us to step into. And so this is where prophecy gets tricky, and this is where often I see it misused within the church.

Sometimes we get to this spot where we want to start operating in the prophetic and use this gift that the Spirit has given to us. Which I do believe based on what we see in scripture, that as we are empowered by the Spirit, that all of us can be used in a prophetic way and should pursue to be used in prophetic ways. However, what we have to realize is that everything has to testify to Jesus.

And so sometimes we can find ourselves in moments where we are focused more on the condemnation and we're focused more on the sin than the fact that Jesus wants to set people free. And so what this can do is look like we ourselves, through our words, are not being used to help release life, but instead keep people captive and just release more shame.

And so that's the next part. It's all about relationship. It's all about we're looking to find God's heart for people or a place and connect them to that. The second is that the prophetic is all about releasing life and realizing that as sons and daughters, that we have authority to release the life of Jesus and to call people back to their God-given identity. But it's not about just seeing their sin, but about calling them back to life.

Don't be lazy with the prophetic

So this is what the prophetic is never meant to be. It's never meant to have a moment where maybe you're praying and you're looking at someone and God starts to speak to you about them and reveal to you things about their lives. And maybe you're starting to notice and recognize that this person struggles with addiction. Now, a lazy way to be prophetic and often where it's misused is to just look at them and say, "Man, God just told me you're an addict."

Now, how is that helpful to that person, right? They probably know they're an addict if they're an addict. And so a lot of times we start to sense that God's telling us about someone and we get lazy or we misuse it because we think, "Man, God wants to condemn this person. Like God wants them to know how awful it is what they're doing." But that's not Jesus. Jesus didn't just come to tell us about our sins. He came to set us free.

So then when operating the prophetic, we have to take the time to do the same. To not just like see one thing, but say, okay, God, ask him questions and say, "So now what are you trying to say to this person?"

So rather than just saying, "You're an addict, God just told me that you're an addict," it's like, "Great, that's awesome. But instead, to look at them and say, God wants you to know that he has set you free. God wants you to know that you are created and you are a new creation. That he has come to transform your life, to change your life, and give you more than you could ever ask, think, or imagine." That is taking the time to discern and to listen to God's voice and speak prophetically in people's lives. To not just be lazy and just start to listen and just call out sin, but call out what God created them to be, calling them back to their God-given identity.

There is now, therefore, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Romans 8:1

So the prophetic is not something that we're just supposed to be walking around as Christians and calling people out for the things that they're doing wrong. But instead looking at them and saying, "God, who did you create them to be? How do I need to remind them of that and to give them a glimpse of the kingdom that he has created them to live in for all of eternity?"

So again, we're going through and we're saying the Old Testament is all about God directing people. He was leading them and he was telling them, "Jesus is coming to set you free." And then in the New Testament, they got to physically experience the greatest relationship of all time with Jesus. But he knew it's going to be better for him to go away so his Holy Spirit can come and empower them and be with them. And now we can receive that relationship, encounter Jesus, be empowered by his Spirit to continue to encourage one another.

How to operate in the prophetic

So now what do we do as a next step? How do we prepare to operate in the prophetic? Well, there's a few simple steps and the first is to pray, prepare, and practice.

This might seem a little funny to think, how do I practice this? Well, the reason that practice is so important is like those examples that I gave. If we don't practice and if we're not intentional about learning how we hear from God and discerning what he's asking of us, then we're going to find ourselves in those moments where we're not releasing life but we're releasing shame because we don't know how to hear and interpret God's voice because we're not practicing that discipline or working that muscle. So we're walking around just saying like, "You're a sinner, you're a sinner, you're a sinner," which we're never supposed to do.

And so us finding safe places to practice the prophetic and prepare for it is going to lead us to helping people experience life change through Jesus. So first, to pray. Spend time praying and asking God questions. Practice listening to his voice in private times, in spaces like even our prayer and worship nights. Because remember, as we've been talking about the baptism of the Holy Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit, we're talking about how every single gift is to help evangelize and lead people to Jesus. So even the prophetic, the end goal is that we are going to be so comfortable with hearing God's voice. We are going to be so in tune to his Spirit that it's not just going to be in these types of settings where we're able to hear him and respond, but we're going to be sitting out at dinner with friends and we're just going to know that we know that this waitress needs to be encouraged right now. And maybe we know nothing about her, but God's just going to drop in our heart like she needs to know right now that she's loved. And you're going to be able to look in her eyes and tell her those things. But in order for us to do that, we're going to have to find ways to practice that. And in the church with each other is a great way to do that, to practice hearing God's voice and responding to that.

And then to continue to prepare by learning God's word. The more that we're in his word and we know his word, the better we're going to be able to speak on his behalf to other people.

The RITA framework

So there's a practical framework to practice the prophetic in a more tangible way called RITA. So you can remember it there. Receive it, interpret, test, and apply. So when we're operating in the prophetic and we're receiving prophetic words, these are some simple steps and things that we can do to kind of check it.

So I'm going to kind of break these down. What do I do if I'm receiving a word for someone else? How do I walk through this? And if I'm sitting here and I am receiving a prophetic word from someone else?

First, when it comes to receive, Joel 2:28-29 says:

And it shall come to pass afterward that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh. Your sons and your daughters shall prophesy. Your old men shall dream dreams and your young men shall see visions. Even on the male and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit.

Joel 2:28-29

So we see here that we will receive the prophetic. That God will come and speak to us. He's going to continue to call us back to who we were. He's going to continue to give us a glimpse of what is to come. We are going to see dreams and we're going to have visions and we're going to prophesy.

So when you're receiving a gift for someone else, often God is going to speak to you through pictures, through visions. Sometimes it might be emotions. It might be thoughts. It could be different words or phrases that come to mind. Sometimes it could even be a certain scent. People have literally smelled different things that are telling them like God's trying to say something here. It could be a song that comes to mind.

Some of the ones that I've experienced are through visions and dreams. There have been different dreams that I've had that I knew were prophetic from God. So these are some common ways.

What I always love about this is when we talk about even Moses meeting God at the burning bush and encountering him there, at that time in Israel in the desert it would be so hot. And if you know, even we look at how wildfires happen when it's so hot, things start on fire. It wasn't uncommon that a bush would be on fire. But Moses had to slow down enough and look and pay attention to hear God's voice in the burning bush. And I want us to think about this. When sometimes you might have these emotions and it might be a common emotion, are we spending time and are we taking time to say, "God, is this normal that I'm just like all of a sudden happy about something? Or are you trying to clue me in on something that's happening?" Or even there are moments where all of a sudden I'm like, I'm feeling really sad. I don't have anything to be sad about. Is there something that I need to listen to that your Holy Spirit's speaking to me through this emotion, right?

And always thinking that God is speaking to us and through us. And so how do we pay attention and to look intentionally enough to understand what he's doing and to take time to discern that?

So if you are in a church service like this, you might want to stop and ask, okay, God, is this for one person? Are you giving me a prophetic word for just one person or is this for everyone? Because you might see that happen in a space like this where someone is saying, "I think we're all supposed to hear this right now, so I want to share this with you." If you're out in public, like with your friends or at work, you might have to again be intentional about your language. Because here's the thing about the prophetic: when we're talking about a message in tongues, it needs interpretation. But the prophetic, it doesn't need interpretation. So what does that mean? We have to give a clear message. So that means before you deliver that prophetic word for someone, you're probably going to have to take time to sift through it and clarify what you're saying. Because it's supposed to be easily understood in that type of way.

And then again in private, if you're just praying and you're spending time with God, or you're praying on your way to work and he starts to speak to you about something or someone, ask him. Ask God questions. Like, he wants to engage. Then if you are receiving a word from someone else. So if someone's coming to you and saying, "Hey, I have this word for you," listen. Be present. It might sometimes even be helpful right afterwards to take notes to jot it down. I have often even gotten out a voice recorder on my phone. And so I'll say, "Hang on just a second," and I'll record it. And so I have several saved like prophetic messages from different people throughout the years that are saved on my phone because I'm like, "Okay, if this is from God, I want to be able to go back to it later."

So if you're receiving it, you can just sit there and you can just listen. And then the next thing after receiving is to interpret. 2 Peter 1:20 says:

Knowing this first of all, that no prophecy of scripture comes from someone's own interpretation.

2 Peter 1:20

And in Luke 24:27, we read:

And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

Luke 24:27

So what we want to be careful to do is that as we are interpreting these things, although we should be speaking clearly, we still have to think, okay, what does this mean? How does this line up with scripture? All of those different things.

So if you're interpreting and you're receiving for other people, after you receive this, start to think of any scriptures that come to mind that are going to line up with what you're feeling or you're sensing. Think of what life-giving, life-releasing message that the scripture could have. And then if you're receiving it from somebody else, if you're receiving it, you don't have as much interpreting to do in this moment, but just to pay attention. Does this line up with things that God has said to me in the past? Does this line up with other scriptures?

And then that goes into the testing part of it, right? So we're receiving it, we're starting to interpret, like, okay, what does this mean? Where does this line up? And then we're really going to test it with scripture.

Test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.

1 John 4:1

A frequently asked question with the prophetic is: is there error? Absolutely. There's a lot of error with the prophetic. Why? Because God is speaking through human flesh. Now, I am one of those people where sometimes I'm so scared to speak because it's going to be wrong. But so much of that is going to be how are you delivering it, right?

Are you saying, "I have a prophetic word, thus saith the Lord, you know, live by this after this moment, word for word, was straight from God." Like that's a little much. But if you're sitting there and you're like, "Hey, I don't know if this means anything, but I just have this sensing. I could be wrong, give me grace. Here's what I'm sensing God's saying right now." Like, those are two totally different things.

And so I had a friend one time who somebody came up to her at a church service and said, "Hey, I'm just really sensing that the Lord wants to restore your broken relationship with your father." And she said, "Okay, thank you." Her dad's like her best friend. They're so close. And so, you know, were like, maybe it was the girl next to her like, and she missed it. Like, that's sad, right? But it happens where sometimes things. Or we're all kind of laughing, we're like, "Oh no, what's about to happen between you and your dad?" And as far as I know, they're still good. But she didn't really have a broken relationship with her dad. But someone was speaking into it.

And so just having grace as you receive prophetic words from people. And knowing that you don't have to receive them all. But test it with scripture though. Test it with scripture of remembering that everything's supposed to call us back to our God-given identity, who God created us to be, and give us a glimpse of what's to come. But what's to come is not going to be something that doesn't align with scripture.

So if you are receiving a word for someone, to make sure: is this edifying for the body or for this person? Is it encouraging? Is it comforting to them? Is it lifting them up? Is it a testimony of Jesus? Like, those are the questions we have to ask. And the same thing, if you're receiving it from someone, does it line up with God's word?

And then finally, apply.

We know in part and we prophesy in part.

1 Corinthians 13:9

As for me, this is my covenant with them. My Spirit which is upon you and my words which I have put in your mouth shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your offspring, nor from the mouth of your offspring's offspring, says the Lord. From now and forever.

Isaiah 59:21

God wants to continue to speak to us. That's why he left his Holy Spirit to dwell inside of us. And he wants to use us to speak to each other and remind us of who he created us to be.

So if you now are at the spot of you have a word and you're going, okay, I received it. I interpreted it. I tested it. Now I think I'm ready to like deliver it and apply it to someone and give this message. To again, don't use phrases like "thus says the Lord." And sometimes you don't even have to say, like, "This is a prophetic word." Especially it's going to depend on your relationship with that person, right? Like, if it's someone that goes to church and you know that they understand that, you can say, "Hey, I think I have a prophetic word." But if you're out in public and you're meeting a stranger and God tells you about something about the guy in the red shirt and it's like, "That guy's an addict," like, you probably shouldn't say, "I got a prophetic word, you're an addict." Like, he's like, "What is that? Like, what are you talking about?"

So just like, again, like, don't be weird about it. Like, we don't have to get the supernatural to be weird enough. We don't have to make it weirder. And everybody can say amen to that, right? Like, we don't have to make it weirder than it already is. And so just knowing, like, when you're ready to apply a word and to deliver it to someone, to have the grace and the humility to, you know, even think of in your own way? Like what's a natural way that you could say, "Hey, I was just in the car today and this song came to mind and I felt like the Lord just told me I should share it with you. I don't know, take it or leave it." Because also what does that do? That takes the responsibility off of you and it puts it on them to say you have choice in whether you're going to receive it. And that's the heart of God too. He's not forceful. He's saying, "Here I am, I'm giving you everything and now you have choice of whether or not you want to receive."

And so we don't have to force people to receive these words or these things, but we can offer it with grace and humility. And they have the choice of whether or not they will receive.

Some good things is, again, don't use the phrases like "thus saith the Lord." Give them the power of responsibility. And remember that we all are going to hear from God in different ways. And so just continue to lean into how he speaks to you and through you. And remembering that everything is supposed to be about relationship, about telling them the story of Jesus and releasing life. And so to think about how now am I going to apply and share this with someone in a way of knowing like I received this word, as strange as it may have been. I took the time to interpret it and say, "Okay, God, who is this for? What exactly are you saying? How can I clearly explain this?" Which takes time on our end. I took time to test it with scripture to make sure it lines up with the heart of God. And now I'm ready to deliver this with grace and humility and release life to someone. Which is pretty incredible that we get to do as God's children. That he wants us to be part of releasing life.

And then if you are receiving a prophetic word from someone, here are some kinds of tips. You don't have to receive every word. So knowing that, sometimes you are going to hear things that you like, "This doesn't make any sense," and that's okay. And that you too have responsibilities to pray, to interpret it, to test it, to spend time asking God questions, to seek counsel and spiritual leadership, especially depending on what it's about, right? Like if it's like some huge life change. If somebody comes up to you on the street and says like, "You're supposed to move to Canada tomorrow," I would probably take some time to discern before you're like, "Thank you, stranger, I will do that because you said it was prophetic," right? You have some responsibility in that.

And then the third thing is that you can always save it for later. Like you can always write it down, remember it, and save it for later. Because a lot of times when God speaks one time in a prophetic way, he's going to confirm it time and time again because he's working in a community of believers. It's not that God just speaks to one person, but he speaks to all of us who call upon the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, right? So we all have access to hear from God. So more times than not, it's not going to be this one-off word that you get, but it's going to be multiple people confirming.

The vision for New Culture Church

There's kind of this story of even our church that came to mind when I think about the prophetic. In 2019, my beautiful sister-in-law, Elena, and I, had a moment where we sat in our parents' living room. If you've been around, you've heard this story. We started to share that God had at different times given us like these visions of what would it look like to have a church where people could come in and it felt intimate and it felt like a homey place. It felt like that you could just come and you could be seen and you could be known and like how do we create this environment?

And then fast forward to COVID and we find ourselves where we have no space to meet and we don't know what's happening. And God had then spoke to me in a prayer time with him and he said, "Abbie, it's time. I'm calling you home." And I'm like, okay, what terminal cancer do I have? Like, this is the end. But everything was good. And instead it was like, "No, your church, like it's time to find a more, you know, set in stone space." And then when we came here and we saw the door and it says 219, which was my home area code, and I knew that the Lord had gone before and said this space is your home. That was that confirmation. And so he spoke and these visions and these dreams came started to come to life. We knew we had to be here. And then we saw the space downstairs, which is now called the Living Room, and there were other people on our team at the time that God had also been speaking to them about how do we create this space in a city like Madison where people are coming and going and moving that it could feel like a living room where you can be yourself, where you can be home.

And so all of these things came, but it was like, oh, we've never seen anything like this before. And what does this look like? And we still feel like there's so many things where we're like, "God, like what's next? Like we have these little pieces of what you're doing, but we don't know the whole picture yet." And we're just trying to listen and obey.

I was looking back, I said, I save a lot of prophetic words. And I was reminded I was preparing for this that there was a woman at a church. This is back in October of 2020. Remember, November 2019, me and Elena are sitting around and we're sharing visions that God has given us for this church and the future. And then 2020 hits, and it's 2021, and God gives me a very specific word. He gives me this idea of "you're coming home." Now, the number 219 represents the phrase in the Bible, the rooster's crow. And the rooster's crow, what does that do? When the rooster crows, it ushers in a new day. And so that was confirmation that God was saying, "You are here to usher in a new day. I'm doing a new thing."

And I was reminded of this prophetic word that a woman gave me as I was speaking at a church in October of 2020. And I wrote it down, and this is what that word was.

She didn't know that I pastored a church, but she said, "Do you pastor a church?" And I said, "Yes." And she said, "Okay, God gave me this word. Your church is building something new that no one has seen. I saw a picture of a machine with different parts and God was giving you the parts one at a time. The machine was hard to build because it was nothing ever seen, but would be capable of doing things that had never been done. But it would be hard. But she encouraged me to have hope and to get excited."

And it's crazy looking back where I'm like, wow, so God, like you were speaking this vision of this church and what's happening to so many different people in different places in different times. And with that word, I was like, I don't know what this means. And there's pieces of it. I share this like kind of vulnerably because there's pieces where I'm like, I still don't really know what that means or what that looks like, but I'm holding it, right? Because I'm trusting that God is speaking to not just me, but other people, because it's not just about me. But in him speaking to me, but through me, that we are all a part of something so much greater than we could ever comprehend.

And so I want you guys to be encouraged today, and I'm going to invite you to stand as we're just going to close in prayer. The prophetic is a beautiful gift. We can not only receive these special intimate words from God, but that we can go and we can speak on his behalf to other people. And so I want you to leave today knowing that God wants to speak to you and through you. And then it starts with encountering Jesus and saying yes to surrendering your life to him. And then inviting his Holy Spirit to come and to empower you so that you could go and you can encourage other people.

Prophetic words from Scripture

I'm going to pray for you guys, and I'm just going to encourage you to come out Tuesday night as we continue to lean into this and ask the Lord to show us what it looks like to step into this calling. But as I do this, I wanted to just read over some prophetic truth that we see in Scripture. Because all throughout Scripture is God's voice speaking to us and reminding us of who we are and giving us a glimpse of who he's called us to be. And so if you're comfortable, if you just want to take a minute and just close your eyes and just receive these truths that we see in scripture.

We see all over the gospels that God reminds us that he loves us. In Psalms and Isaiah, we see scriptures that not only does he love us, but God likes you and he wants to set you free. Jesus wants you to know him. God wants you to know the true hope that he has. God has a destiny for your life. In all of the darkest and most difficult moments of your life, God has been with you even when you are unaware.

In all of the pain that you've experienced, Jesus has always been filled with love and compassion for you. God is taking your pain, brokenness, discouragement, and he is writing a restorative story. God created you with a desire for greatness. God has been pursuing you. You are not a mistake or an accident, but God wants friendship with you. He wants health for you. He wants wholeness for you. Jesus has always loved you. And he's continuing to invite us into a new thing.