Occupied, Obsessed...I have no idea

I am 44 years old.  I met my husband when I was 15 in high school.  From there on out he became everything to me.  I was literally a mess. I am not going to go into it right now but I was a complete mess trying to fill my life with something to make the pain and hurt go away.

We married a little over a month after I graduated high school.  I was 18.  He was 19.  That was 1988.

A year and a half later we had our first child, Allison, on January 10, 1990.
Then came Cody- November 13, 1992
And then Johnie completed our family on August 21, 1994.

By this time we had moved 325 miles from ALL of our family.  From Kentucky to South Carolina.

I'll be honest, years 2-10 our marriage was extremely tough.  Maybe someday I will share some of it.  We were two broken kids that got married then brought children into our brokenness.

In year 12 (2000) I 'got saved'.  Then all three of our children made 'professions of faith'.  Then to end the year Nick 'got saved'.

I spent the next 8 years trying to be a VERY good Christian.  I never really experienced that 'amazing grace' that people talked about.  I didn't even know what it was.  It was never really taught.  I became good at masking all my hurt and pain in front of people by being a good Christian.  But I really did have a desire to know the Lord.  To know the Scriptures.  I dug as deep as I could into the knowledge.

Now, here's the thing.  I am just high school graduate.  From a very small town in Kentucky.  When your teachers and guidance counselors see you are more interested in a boy- that you don't have a complete family (and everybody knows everybody)- that you are just a C student- well, they kind of write you off.  Kind of, get you through.  They know you are going to get married, have babies and work in a factory all your life.  They know you are not going to college.  They really don't think you have the intellect for it.

What they don't know (or care) is you are so backward and so timid.  You are consumed with fears within and fears without.  You have nobody in your life that will sit down and 'mother' you.  Nobody to teach you.  But LIFE will teach you.  So most things you learn is the wrong/bad way to deal with life.  You are so deeply broken inside and you try any way you can to fix yourself.  To fill the void.  To find relief.

Mine was Nick.  And he failed me.  I was Nick's.  And I failed him.

When I was 30 and I received Christ- knowledge about Him (through Scripture) became my focus- my mind did begin to learn and expand.  I realized that I wasn't dumb.  I wasn't unable to learn things.  I just wasn't really encouraged to do so.  And, none of those subjects interested me, like Jesus did!

The thing was, all this knowledge didn't help me or heal me with all the chaos I still dealt with on the inside.

Then in 2007-2008 my kids youth pastor, Will Gunter, began teaching 'the exchanged life'.

And THEN God!  Oh my....then Jesus became so REAL!  He became my Focus.  My Life.  My Healer.

I adore Him.  He is everything to me.  He is very intimate and loving and funny and joy-filled.  He 'completes' me.  I know, some people will think that's weird, but I don't care.  He just IS my...all-in-all.

So, I can't understand why people are SO preoccupied...obsessed....with other things.  Like this blood moon thing.  Or predestination.  Or end times.  But then again, yes I can.  They are just filling up head knowledge.  Trying to fit things together.  To me it was trying to get closer to God.  The more I knew about Him the closer I was to Him.  But that wasn't true.  I am as close as I am ever going to be to Him.

It was an emotional awareness I desired-  I didn't know this until I read Sidetracked in the Wilderness by Michael Wells.  God used Mike and that book in my life like no other.  All the pieces of the puzzle that I was trying to fit in, He began to place them together (course, He is the only one that can put the puzzle together since He is the Designer!).

When I see all the stuff of facebook from 'good' Christians.  Devout Christians.  All they talk about is Old Testament prophecies.  Or their preferred subject.  Or their blood moons and trying to make God do something RIGHT NOW to show people that HE IS GOD.  I just want to say:

Just Give Me JESUS!!!!!

Just speak Jesus to me.  Just speak Jesus!

Now He is worthy of being preoccupied and obsessed with!

I want intimacy with Him.  I want filled to overflowing with Him.  I want everything of Himself He will give me!

I want to live in Love, in Joy, in Peace, in Patience, in Kindness, in Goodness, in Faithfulness, in Gentleness, in Self-Control.  I want to live, experience, abide in Love that NEVER FAILS.  Peace that passes ALL UNDERSTANDING.   None of the knowledge took away- HEALED- the pain, the hurt, the brokenness, the anger, the fear, the manipulation, the control!

Only my dear dear Jesus.  My dear Jesus who never acts unbecomingly but always guides me in paths righteousness.  My Jesus who doesn't seek His own, nor is He is easily provoked, nor does He take into account a wrong suffered- He restores my soul!  This Jesus, He LIVES in me!

This Jesus, I live in Him!

How can I not be preoccupied and obsessed with this wonderful wonderful Lord?

I don't care one flit about the other stuff.  I just don't.  He fills me, all of me, enough that I don't have enough time to dwell on those things anymore.

Just give me-

Jesus.