A New Season

Uruguay.

What I have noticed since being in this country is that the more satan tries so hard to come against our team the more God blesses us. I love that. The team moves into an amazing house where we can be all together, Owned by a beautiful couple from Texas. There is hot water, heat, internet, and a nice kitchen all for a reasonable price! Things like these seem so simple, but when you go without them and live out of a suit case you realize how much you have taken these simple things for granted. After 9 months of living like this I still get amazed at the ways God shows up, but now the only difference is I expect Him to show up. Opposed to wondering if He will. Lately God has been speaking to me about fasting and intersession. Before this journey my views on both of these topics were... Well you could just say not favored. However, it is not about me it is about sacrifice and teaching my body and soul that my spirit is in charge. I am, willingly, giving up something that brings me comfort in a day as well as using the time I would normally spend thinking about my problem and praying into things that are very much on God's heart. I mean does the Bible not say Jesus intercedes for us? And if He is supposed to be our role model in life does that not mean we should be interceding for each other as He dos for us? Well needless to say I figured if God is trying to teach me something I should just go with it. So I have been working my way up to a 21 day fast. Our first week in Uruguay I felt I was supposed to fast again putting me at now at a 5 day fast. By the time we moved into the house I was in the middle my third day of no food and actually feeling great. By my fourth day once again struggling and having trouble actually functioning in everyday tasks. One of my sisters on the team who knew I had been fasting asked if she could pray for me. Of course I excepted the offer. While she was praying I was being totally distracted from what she was saying by some nagging words going off in my head saying “read the book of Joshua!” Over and over again it replayed like a song on loop. Finally she finished praying and me having very little of a clue of what she said in the prayer I thanked her and walked away a little frustrated. I was frustrated because I was in the middle of the gospel John and I wanted to finish it before starting a new book, but I knew it would just keep playing in my head if I didn't just read it. So I went outside found a sunny spot and started to read the book of Joshua. Now If I were to be honest, which I try very hard to be in these blogs, I could honestly say I had never actually read through the book of Joshua. I just never seemed to get to it. As I sat and read not even the entire first chapter through yet, I began to weep. It was as if while I was reading God was reading it over me telling me this is just a small part of my calling and destiny. Unraveling some part of my DNA that I hadn't yet discovered. While back in Mozambique in 2010 at my Harvest School David Wagner prophesied over me saying “I was called to be like a man in the Bible from Exodus 11:33 where it says “and Moses got up to leave the tent of Meeting and Joshua the Son of Nun refused to leave the presence.” Now to my knowledge I thought that was the only scripture in the Bible that actually talked about Joshua the Son of Nun. I never having read the book of Joshua, never put those to people together! Never realizing they were actually the same person and that there was an entire book about this amazing man. I had taken what had been an incredible word about my identity and watered it down so much that I honestly thought my whole purpose in life would be to just to sit in the presence of God and never do anything with it. Settling for not even half of my destiny. Now hear me right. I am not saying there is anything wrong with just sitting in the Presence of God, in fact it is one of my favorite things to do, but that is not all we are meant to do with it. We are meant to Live out of the presence not merely sit in it and be content. We are meant to be so full of Jesus all the time that we over flow with Love on to the people around us. Not just hide in our prayer closets for a few hours to get enough presence to make it through the day. God said himself, on several occasions, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” So why walk away from Him once we think we have had enough for the day. That is not what a true relationship is. We have all heard the saying “You were born for such a time as this” What does it look like to live that out. If we live out of the presence opposed to just sitting in it when we feel down or need a boost. We could be walking in our true Identities as sons of the God who created the universe. Do you know what Kind of Dad you have? In Joshua 10:13 God literally stops time in order for Israel to avenge its enemies! Time stopped for an entire day. Account after account God leads Joshua and the Israelites through impossible victories. Joshua started out from the presence, but he learned that in order to do the things he was “born for such a time for” he had to carry the presence from the Tent of meeting out to the people and except the mantel of Moses God was giving him. Living from a place of knowing God lives inside of us so much s that wherever we go the presence goes.

From that point on God has been carrying me through a new season. The last season I was in He was stripping me of my flesh. This new season He is walking me through is Him replacing all the flesh that was previously ripped off and replacing it with true identity in Him. Who I was created to be. A Son (even though I am am daughter I am receiving the inheritance of the son, thus I say son). Not only seeing myself as a son, but actually, finally receiving the once “head knowledge” to “heart knowledge” that He is my Father! When I excepted Him into my heart I switched blood lines and I am no longer under any influence of my earthly father or mother Not the fear I learned, the generational curses, or the, once truth to me, that I have to take care of myself. So no matter what happened to me in the past I have a new Father and a new provider. Thus giving up my rights to be angry or hurt by them. Making only love for them come out not rebellion, but pure love knowing they did the best they could with what they had. My relationship with God can now become Him showing me what a true daughter is and what “all authority that has been given to me” really is. This was all just a bit of what all God has been doing in my spirit just in the past few months! I promise I will update you soon on what all the team has been to doing and the amazing blessings w have received through the German Mennonite church here in Uruguay! Miss and Love you all. Many blessings to all of you who have stayed with me and prayed with me and supported me financially. -Rachael Michelle