Healing the heart - Kona week 3
Lovely ones,
Aloha! Hello! Thank you for all your messages - I am overwhelmed by the amount of you who responded to my last post with such encouraging words and for all of you who have told me you're trying 2-way journaling and who are telling me about your dreams. This is AMAZING :-) I am so thrilled. One of my biggest prayers in terms of this wild adventure that God has me on, is that you all would be able to come with me and encounter Him in a new way for yourselves through some of the things that He is teaching me here. So this is an "update" blog but it is also a "here is what I'm learning - have-a-go" blog! I want to bless you. I want to encourage you. I want to journey with you. And I want to help equip you and push you closer to Jesus. So please keep messaging me with stories of how God is meeting with you - it is making my heart burst with joy! Here are a couple of examples of 2-way journaling as I responded to the teaching from last week, just in case any of you are wanting to try it but can't picture it!
This week has been quite an emotional one as we've been looking at issues/ungodly beliefs that we have allowed to take root in our hearts and shape the way we think and act. The whole idea is to get free, stay free and help others get free. So often we just allow ourselves to live in brokenness and react in ways that are not honouring to God, ourselves or others because there are heart issues that we have not dealt with. I've done bits of inner healing stuff before, but never in this way - within community, staying with the process and allowing the Holy Spirit to strip layers away that have been kept hidden/buried! I think that in the past I have assumed that "deep, inner healing" is mostly for those who have been through trauma, something to be done with a professional, or maybe something that is more typically "American"!! (haha!), rather than something that brings freedom to everyone, whatever your story is and whichever culture you're from. No one walks around in complete freedom, we are all works in progress.. so don't write yourselves out of this - you might be surprised at what God brings to your attention if you ask Him!
Heart issues that we explored as a class included things like fear, unforgiveness, annoyance, rejection, pride, unbelief, anger etc...
Here are the steps that we went through. Stay with me: the amount of freedom that I experienced personally and that we experienced as a class this week has been incredible! Every day, people have shared testimonies of what has happened on the inside of them as they have gone through this process.
1. Breaking generational sins and curses
2. Severing ungodly soul ties (you can break the ungodly soul tie to someone while still keeping all of the good, honouring parts of your friendship/relationship!)
3. Repenting of negative expectations and inner vows you have made with yourself.
4. Replacing them with God's voice (what does He say about you? What does the Bible say about this issue?) and a new purpose in the Holy Spirit.
5. Replacing raw scenes/memories with scenes with Jesus in (ask Him where He was at that time - He will show you - this was really significant for me!)
6. Breaking word curses that you have spoken over yourself and others have spoken over you. Repenting, forgiving, releasing.
7. Getting rid of anything lurking that is not of God....
......FREEDOM!!
Basically - we're meant to be fully alive and fully free! I think deep down we all know that, whatever we believe. We're not supposed to live in a place of brokenness with things weighing us down and preventing us from being the people of joy, peace, life, hope and freedom that we were created to be. Obviously, it is a process and I'm certainly not saying that I am totally free and healed and like Jesus right now! But identifying the things that have held me captive in my mind and heart and knowing how to break their hold on me has been extremely helpful!
I apologise that this has been heavier than normal - there is no other way to truthfully talk about what God has been doing this week! If you have questions or would like to hear more detail about how I have walked through this personally this week, I'm so happy to chat to you about it and share more. Just message or call me (WhatsApp, Facebook and email are the best ways to get in touch).
Here are a few fun things to lighten the tone and make you
smile at my Father's incredible kindness and goodness to me.
- I have the best roommates in the world! I am grateful for them every day.
- I saw a turtle last weekend! It stayed for about half an hour. See picture. My heart did a cartwheel!
- My small group is also just a dream. There is a picture of us below. We are going to get to go on outreach together too. I love them! Colleen, our leader, is also the dream. Please keep praying for her and upholding her as she upholds all of us.
- I am doing some dance and worship bits just whenever I feel prompted at the back of worship nights etc. One night I was dancing at the end of a ministry night and 4 other random people gradually came and joined me. It was awesome - I feel like God can use me to give permission for others to be as expressively and wildly worshipful as they want to be. I don't mind making a fool of myself - and I love to see the freedom it brings others!
- We're having a 24 hour Burn in the prayer room tonight (non-stop prayer and worship)! I'm super excited!
PRAYER
- Protection over me: my back flared up and down again this week (again, when I fasted.. very unsubtle, I know! But it's still a pain)
- That God would continue to speak to me, change me and use me in this place to encourage others.
- Our room and my roommates, blessing and protection.
- Our school - good conversations, depth of relationship with God and with others. Protection from sickness. Please pray particularly for the children - we have about 30 of them aged 2-18 and they are incredible!
- The University of the Nations as a whole - that angels would surround and protect this sacred place where hundreds of thousands of people have been, are currently, and will be in order to be loved, discipled, equipped and sent to all nations.
Please keep messaging me - I love waking up to messages from you all! Remember to let me know of how I can be praying or interceding for you on a Wednesday as I fast and seek God's face.
Have a wonderful weekend!
Very much love to all of you,
Hannah xx
"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery." Galatians 5:1
