convictin/confirmation

So this is what has happened, I started this blog because the Lord told me too. If you reference my very first post it says so. I though, in my busyness and craziness of life haven't been very good at updating but little tibbits here and there. I felt the need for me to outlet all the inlet that the Lord gives me(that makes sense to me, not so much sure it will to anyone else) I find that I am too busy with me 3 young charges that sometimes I forget or don't have time to update about the Lord. Wow..saying that out loud is really gutwrenching to me. 
Ok so the other night I had a dear brother to us come to me and tell me that the Lord told him that if I hadn't already that i needed to start a blog. Wow, confirmation but with that came some conviction. So i wanted to give a little update right now. I am going to start trying to post some more about what the Lord is doing along with the usual post. A lot of times these might come in letter form. I, a lot of the time will email friends or family in the body of Christ as i feel led and since i am pressed for time and want to be the best and wisest with what I have.. I might just be copying and pasting some. So they might be in odd form but heck it'll still be what the Lord has been doing in my life and well it's my blog and the Lord is the one that told me to do it so......yup that is all i needed to really say. It might get a little hairy but i love you all and MUAH!!! That was a brotherly/sisterly kiss!!

Here is a series of the most recent letters, keep in mind that i know that i am nothing apart from Him and i am just being obedient to what He is telling me...

-letter#1
Good day, ladies!  I have had a great week. Seems like the more I give the Lord my days the more He seems to fill them. I am praying for wisdom on when to say no and when to say yes to appointments. I believe the Lord is teaching me a lot through it all. I love my reclusiveness and I believe that the Lord is breaking me of this and calling me to be more of the “church” to his people. This week has been boo-coos better than the previous week when I was seeking to give every day to Him and would just get frustrated about people messing up MY day that I had given to the Lord.  lol. The Lord has most definitely been patient with me.

-Also I had some revelation and discipline from the Lord this weekend; I was getting frustrated and didn’t know why. The Lord revealed to me that I have given the Lord myself and am practicing and learning being a disciple but I was trying to hang on to all my leisure time or my “unwind” time to myself. My flesh was fighting me big time on this and I just couldn’t figure out why I felt “off” on Saturday. I realize this is sin and I need to give ALL my time to him, even if I am hanging out with friends, watching TV, or just dating my husband. I find that I let my guard down or sensors to the Sprit down when I am around people I feel safe with or am not being mission minded toward. I want to learn to ALWAYS walk in the Spirit, even if I am being goofy or retarded but to still learn to be in Him. I know there is a time for everything, time to laugh, morn, weep or have joy; but I still want to learn to be in Him rather than doing these things in my flesh.

I am praying that I will continue to grow in this and not be satisfied walking in the flesh EVER but only be satisfied in Him!

-letter #2

 Ryan and I just got back from our Christmas rounds. We traveled from Kansas to Oklahoma to Arkansas (Ryan said not Arkansas but his family could spit and it be in Arkansas , pretty much) and back. I just want to say boy is it good to be back.  We love our family but there is nothing like being in the body and family of Christ where we are called to be.

This trip was a special one, in that we went in purposely praying and asking the Lord for favor in “Looking for opportunities with co-workers, friends, family and others that are lost or not walking close with the Lord to introduce the supernatural presence of the Lord into their experience”

So we had prayed into this and truly in our heart wanted to do this. On the way down we were praying and I had a vision that we were following a truck filled with loose hay and a really imminent sense of DANGER. I told Ryan about it but in my mind I just thought, ok, well let’s watch out for hay trucks and not follow too close behind. Lol. Such a small little mind sometimes…

So we went on to go be the Spirit in the Holidays with our families, and it sucked. We bomb shelled. The warfare was so strong that we struggled the whole time just keeping our heads above water. We came in ready and willing to let the Spirit use us and show great things in His name but we didn’t come prepared to fight. We were blind sided by the enemy’s attacks. We knew there was tons of warfare but it wasn’t until we were on our way home and feeling that we had wasted time that we begun to see what exactly it was that happened. We had come to do God’s work and follow Him but we had not come with our “boxing gloves up” as Ryan said. The enemy knew we were purposing to go after the Kingdom (even on our holiday) and he was waiting for us. When we were praying on the way home the Lord revealed that that vision of the truck with hay was a warning to us to beware. Beware of the danger ahead, not of the truck being an eminent danger but of the enemy coming to attack and snare us in his net of this world and the cares of it. The “hay” that this world holds burns away and dies.

So here is my thought…let’s be in mission together and go after the Kingdom of God, ready to make disciples of all nations, but and I mean a big BUT, we gotta ‘PUT UP OUR DUKES’ and be ready to fight the enemy and any attacks that come our way. We’re stirring up the hornets nest and it’s gonna be oh so awesomely worth it! Putting up the Dukes in the Vandenberg home

updated letter # 3 

I was thinking about that vision and how i remember thinking that the truck with the hay in it didn't seem like it would be dangerous because it wasn't like tight bound bales that could fall off and cause a wreck.. it was more like loose tide together hay by one string in the middle. Don't know if that makes sense. I just remember in the vision seeing it in the back of the truck and sensing great danger from the loosely hay. The thought as i am typing this right now is that it was so easily accessible. How the enemy places these 'so easily accessible' things in front of us all the time. I am stirred to pray that we would take off the "rose colored glasses" and have eyes in the Spirit so that we would NOT be blindsided by the enemy and the hay that so easily besets us.

-letter #4

Hey wanted to give a quick (maybe not so quick)update ….

1)      I was praying for 2012 early in the morning the other day and I heard “THE DAWN OF A NEW AGE”

And the scripture-

 2Ch 7:14  if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

I know it sounds very evangelistical but it is what I heard. Excited and terrified of things to come! Amen!

2)     Yesterday morning I was praying and asking for leading on where to read and the Lord told me to read Haggai. Haggai? I know, right? But I did and the Lord, you know because he is Lord and King and Awesomeness and all, rocked it and made it perfectly prophetic in my mind and the season we are in.

Ryan could explain it all a lot better but it gave a perfect picture of the call to the church and His return. He especially highlighted Haggai 1:2-11 and also 2:20-23. We are building each other up in Him and we ARE the church. How easy it is for us to “busy” ourselves with our own house while the church of God (The people) lies in ruins.

Hag 1:2-11 "Thus says the LORD of hosts: These people say the time has not yet come to rebuild the house of the LORD." Then the word of the LORD came by the hand of Haggai the prophet, "Is it a time for you yourselves to dwell in your paneled houses, while this house lies in ruins?  Now, therefore, thus says the LORD of hosts: Consider your ways. You have sown much, and harvested little. You eat, but you never have enough; you drink, but you never have your fill. You clothe yourselves, but no one is warm. And he who earns wages does so to put them into a bag with holes. "Thus says the LORD of hosts: Consider your ways. Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, that I may take pleasure in it and that I may be glorified, says the LORD. You looked for much, and behold, it came to little. And when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? declares the LORD of hosts. Because of my house that lies in ruins, while each of you busies himself with his own house. Therefore the heavens above you have withheld the dew, and the earth has withheld its produce. And I have called for a drought on the land and the hills, on the grain, the new wine, the oil, on what the ground brings forth, on man and beast, and on all their labors."

Hag 2:20-23  The word of the LORD came a second time to Haggai on the twenty-fourth day of the month, "Speak to Zerubbabel, governor of Judah , saying, I am about to shake the heavens and the earth, and to overthrow the throne of kingdoms. I am about to destroy the strength of the kingdoms of the nations, and overthrow the chariots and their riders. And the horses and their riders shall go down, every one by the sword of his brother. On that day, declares the LORD of hosts, I will take you, O Zerubbabel my servant, the son of Shealtiel, declares the LORD, and make you like a signet ring, for I have chosen you, declares the LORD of hosts."

Found conviction in our (mine particularly) laziness in the call to discipleship. Even if we are doing a good thing like cleaning house or washing dishes the Lord just spoke to me that all these things are going to burn, that perfectly clean floor or cobweb free corner is literally gonna mean squat to the Kingdom. Can I get a holler!! I wish I could use this as an excuse when I want to be lazy. Ok, just kidding, (kind of) about that last part.

3)     Brace yourself for this one…. This morning I set down to quite myself with Him and the Lord put a song or poem in my heart. I just want to say right here and now that I am telling you this with all with humility and embarrassment because I know that it was the Lord’s putting in my heart and mind. And also because I know you and a couple others have been known to write down things in acronyms and really how dorkier can it get=/.

I am the water, you’re the wine

I am the branches, you are the vine

Pour me out as a drink offering

May my life declare you’re King,

Take me and make me what you’d be,

Root out and pull any weeds

Lord, thy Kingdom come, thy will be done

All the battles and Victories won

Let me walk this earth with you inside

Grace and mercy right beside

I am the water, you are the wine

I am the branches, you are the vine

You are all we really need

Only in you are we complete

I am the water, you are the wine

Move me and place where you please

May I be your hands and feet.

Lord, I am the water and you are the wine

I am the branches you are the vine

I will partner with you my King

Whatever heaven and hell will bring

I am the water, you are the wine.

Yup, that’s it. I know it’s silly but it’s a new song in my heart. It’s ok if you laugh a little, Ryan did. =)