Don’t Agree With A False Positive

During the pandemic, fear became so powerful that even the smallest symptom could make people assume the worst. A sneeze in church could turn every head. A simple runny nose could make people wonder if you were carrying the virus. Before you knew it, you were isolating, staying home, and removing yourself from community because of something that might not even have been what you feared.

Sometimes the enemy works the same way spiritually.

He tries to run us through a kind of internal diagnostic testing until we agree with a false positive:

You’re rejected.

You’re unloved.

You’re a failure.

You’re not enough.

You’re bringing everyone else down.

You should probably just stay home.

And if we allow our feelings to speak louder than God’s voice, circumstances can begin to interpret our identity for us.

That is when we have to stop and listen again.

Sometimes God reconnects us to truth through His Word, through His Spirit, and through the people He has placed around us who love us enough to remind us of what is true.

“You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” — John 8:32

In recent months, I realized I had started sliding into a false narrative of my own.

I began believing lies: You’re just not loved enough. You’re failing. You’re not enough. You’re pulling people down. Just stay home. Focus on God alone and forget about the body.

And what made the lie so convincing was that part of it sounded spiritual.

Of course I should spend time alone with God. Of course I should seek His presence, pray, worship, listen, and learn to depend deeply upon Him.

Jesus did that constantly.

“Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.” — Luke 5:16

But Jesus never used intimacy with the Father as an excuse to disconnect permanently from people. He would withdraw to pray, and then He would return to His disciples. He poured into them what He had received from the Father.

I began to realize that I had allowed something good—being alone with God—to become a justification for pulling away from the body of Christ.

And Scripture does not give us that option.

“Let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together… but encouraging one another.” — Hebrews 10:24–25

There is a dangerous place we can reach when we begin saying with great confidence, “I don’t need those leaders. I don’t need those people. I’m better when it’s just God and me.”

Sometimes what we are really saying is, “I can’t handle other people in this equation anymore.”

Maybe we have been hurt.

Maybe we have been offended.

Maybe we feel rejected.

Maybe people did not love us the way we hoped they would.

Maybe relationships became exhausting.

But isolation can begin to sound like holiness when we are hurting.

And all the while, God may be asking us to remain on the Potter’s wheel.

“Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in My hand.” — Jeremiah 18:6

As I have been processing my husband’s sickness and everything our family has walked through, I realized something painful: sometimes I wasn’t letting people come close enough to love me.

It hurt when I felt as though others expected me to somehow make everything better.

There were moments when people would tell me to have faith, and I heard condemnation.

But now I can see that sometimes what God was really saying through them was:

We love you.

We are here.

We are standing in faith with you.

You do not have to carry this alone.

“Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.” — Galatians 6:2

God has humbled me many times.

He humbled me when I gave up my job to become a stay-at-home mom.

He humbled me when I went through three years of ministry school and felt like an olive being pressed—my flesh being crushed until there was very little left of what I once relied upon.

And after that season, I came out feeling refined.

I felt like I could run through walls.

My faith was high. I felt primed for the end-time harvest and equipped to contend for revival. At times I was probably overly confident—not because I believed in my own strength, but because I had become so convinced of the incredible power and strength of God.

I prophesied from mountaintops.

I journeyed to Ghana on sabbatical and encountered God in ways that marked me forever. On Atwea Mountain, as I prayed in the Spirit, I saw in my spirit an angel moving with incredible speed. It was profound.

I came away believing more deeply than ever that nothing is impossible with God.

“For nothing will be impossible with God.” — Luke 1:37

In dreams, I traveled to Israel. I stood on His holy mountain, and His Spirit gave me words to speak over the nation.

I felt like a chosen vessel, ordained for mighty movements.

We traveled across the United States, visiting 36 states, and I watched what felt like the needle of the Lord sewing together the tapestry of our destiny according to His purposes. Loving his people to help them know him was so beautiful.

I felt invincible with God.

After all, He had shown me such great favor through His Spirit and through people. I wrote my first book, which felt like it would be a great accomplishment

Then, just as it felt like our family was preparing to launch into ministry in other nations, Canada and beyond—the last three years came like a flood.

The enemy raged.

There were attacks against our family, against my husband’s health, against our dreams, our hope, our faith, our future, our destiny.

It felt as though everything was being threatened.

But what the enemy did not understand is that we have been built in the fire.

“When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.” — Isaiah 43:2

We are not destroyed by the fire.

We are refined by it.

We are not intimidated by the crushing because we have learned something about the Potter. When clay is marred in His hands, He does not throw it away.

He reforms it.

“The pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.” — Jeremiah 18:4

When there is lack, we learn that man does not live by bread alone.

When something is stripped away, we discover again that our true provision comes from the Father.

When our strength fails, His strength becomes sufficient.

“My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness.” — 2 Corinthians 12:9

True followers of Jesus eventually learn how to draw strength from the treasuries of the Father.

We learn that everything we ultimately need comes from Him.

We are called to participate in His joy, but Scripture also tells us there is a fellowship with Him in suffering.

“I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of His resurrection and participation in His sufferings.” — Philippians 3:10

We are being taught to rely upon Him more deeply.

But we are also being taught that we are part of something bigger than ourselves.

The Body.

“Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it.” — 1 Corinthians 12:27

Our continual gathering together does something in us.

It fortifies us.

It exposes pride.

It teaches humility.

It gives other people permission to carry what we cannot carry alone.

And as I have allowed my leaders to speak into me, they have brought out gold in ways I could not have accomplished by myself.

“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” — Proverbs 27:17

Jesus did not complete the work of the cross simply to demonstrate what He was capable of.

He did it for a people.

For His Bride.

For His Body.

We are in this together.

And over the last three years of suffering, I realize now that perhaps one of the enemy’s greatest attempts—especially this past year—was to separate us from corporate love.

To convince us that we were forgotten.

To make us believe no one cared.

To persuade us to withdraw.

But God has surrounded us with leaders who truly love Him and truly love people.

They have refused to allow us to suffer alone.

They have refused to let us give up.

And perhaps most importantly, they have loved us enough to tell us truths that we needed to hear.

“Wounds from a friend can be trusted.” — Proverbs 27:6

I am deeply grateful for the leaders God has placed around us—both in our church and within our homeschool community.

There have been moments when I needed them to break through walls I had built for self-protection and remind me how to receive love again.

And we have felt so incredibly loved during this season of walking through the fire.

I have been pressed—but there is still oil.

“We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair.” — 2 Corinthians 4:8

I have been crushed—but I am still pliable in the Potter’s hands.

I am learning to receive every ounce of His love, in every form and through every vessel He chooses to send it.

And I am deeply encouraged by each one of you, my friends.

I am not giving up on church at the very moment when gathering together may matter most.

I am not giving up on healing when healing remains part of the reality of the Kingdom Jesus proclaimed.

“By His wounds we are healed.” — Isaiah 53:5

I am not surrendering my voice as a prophetic contender for revival fire.

I refuse to agree with the lie that suffering has disqualified me from purpose.

The gifts and calling of God are not erased because the road becomes painful.

“For God’s gifts and His call are irrevocable.” — Romans 11:29

During these last few months when we have been unable to attend church services consistently, God has still brought the Body to us.

Church elders.

Pastors.

Apostolic leaders.

Homeschool families.

Friends.

People have come into our home and loved what felt like all the hell right out of us.

It has been rich.

It has been deeply encouraging.

And it has been profoundly humbling.

I am seeing some things more clearly now.

And I am no longer apologizing because I have walked with a bit of a limp lately.

Jacob encountered God and walked away with a limp, but he also walked away with a new name.

“The sun rose above him… and he was limping because of his hip.” — Genesis 32:31

Sometimes the limp is evidence that you have wrestled with God and refused to let go.

So I am crucifying my flesh.

I am trusting God.

I am believing that He is still releasing greater glory in this hour.

And I refuse to agree with a false positive.

I am not rejected.

I am loved.

I am not abandoned.

I am surrounded.

I am not finished.

I am being formed.

I am not disqualified because I have suffered.

I am learning Christ in ways I could never have learned Him from the mountaintop alone.

And I am not leaving the Body.

We need one another.

“The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I don’t need you!’” — 1 Corinthians 12:21

God Himself has placed us together.

So when the enemy hands you a diagnosis of rejection, abandonment, failure, isolation, or worthlessness, do not automatically agree with the test result.

Take it back to the Truth.

Listen again to the Father.

Listen to His Word.

And sometimes, humble yourself enough to listen to the people He has placed around you.

Because the voice reminding you that you are loved may very well be one of the ways the Father Himself is speaking.

I love you all.

Thank you for allowing me to share what has been on my heart today.

And thank you to every person who has stood with our family, prayed with us, loved us, corrected us, encouraged us, and reminded us that we were never meant to walk through the fire alone.

“Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.” — Ecclesiastes 4:12