Bunk Beds and Bathroom Chapels

So let me, for a few minutes, paint the picture for you. I live in a big room with 4 bunk beds, so the room holds up to 8 women. We each have our own space, an area that I consider sacred because it’s where I go to battle. I used to believe it was my peace zone because it’s where I sleep, rest, pray, talk to friends and family, study, write, worship, take communion and encounter the Holy Spirit. However it has been brought to my attention that it’s way more than all those things. I am a “stand in the victory” kind of person, but I have learned that in order to actually stand in the victory of the Lord, there has to be a battle. I’m not alone; I have come to find out, in this thinking or living. I have been graciously placed into a fold of women who have their own “war rooms” and one has her battleground in a tiny little bathroom. From the photos she has shared with me, it’s a tiny little box that barely fits the chair she has in her bathroom, where she spends her time in prayer, communion, worship and encounters with the Lord. It has been in these places we can both attest to the power of revelation, breakthroughs and insight come. It doesn’t get any more sacred than an encounter with Yeshua. Is it ideal? No. Not anymore than a closet surrounded by clutter is ideal, but it worked in the movie “War Room.” And it has been working for me and my friend. My husband and I have now turned the church nursery and playroom into our personal chapel too.

I never thought when I fell down to my knees during the songs “Oceans” and “I Surrender” this is the deeper in faith God would allow me to encounter and I kind of surrender that is so sweet I can't even put it into words. I thought deeper was going to look like a place of our own, away from the hustle and bustle of everyday life, but nope. Once again God has saw fit to take me into a deeper relationship with Him right here on a top bunk in a room full of other women. He has called me to an intimacy that has no borders or box. That is sustained amidst noise that I’d rather not hear. He has called me to press into Him at night when I’d rather be laying down next to my husband hearing him tell me he loves me instead of having to read it on a text on my phone. He’s called me to give up my wind down time in my bed and sit on a floor with my husband in a playroom and share our revelations and insights ending our nights with prayer and worship a couple hours later than we would both prefer. Is it ideal? Not at all. Is it what the other women in my intimate circle have? Not at all. Is it enough? YES! It is more than enough, because no matter where I am, God is right there with me. And I am reminded that when I surrendered my life to Jesus, I signed up for whatever, wherever, and however long He saw fit for me to live.  

Let’s recall the passage in Matthew 8:18-22. "The cost of discipleship" is how this passage is titled in my Bible. Have you ever stopped to really count the cost of discipleship? Would you be willing to be totally uncomfortable in the natural, leaving behind all the comforts of life that you now experience and have to be guaranteed trouble? It’s kind of crazy when you stop and think about it, right? I mean who in their right mind would choose trouble? I already know trouble living the life I lived for 25 years. I already know pain and loss and grief and still I am going to choose another life where the only thing I am promised in the natural is another life of trouble. But oh how sweet that life has become on this top bunk bed of encounters that I never thought I’d have. It’s not what I can grasp or that which is tangible, but it is only that which I can experience. God’s love have penetrated me on a cellular level, do you really comprehend what that means, a cellular level? I have had a spiritual stem-cell transplant with the cells of Jesus Christ Himself and a blood transfusion with the Blood of Christ. Seems strange to actually write this down and share with others, seems kind of out there and crazy to even see in words on this screen. But it’s just the way I can explain what has happened in these not so ideal places to encounter God. Even “the Son of Man had nowhere to lay His head,” according to Jesus in Matthew 8:20. Well it doesn’t get more real than that. Jesus did world changing things in 3 years with no place to call “home,” not a bunk bed, bathroom, playroom or nursery; yet He changed the world! He didn’t need any place to share love, give grace and perform miracles. He did all that right where His feet were planted. He was victorious in the same places He endured battles. He overcame death on the very cross He gave His life!

I’m going to leave you with some honest, open and transparent truth. I do desire more for my husband and I. I desire a home for him and me to share together, where we can pray, study, write, worship, and commune with the Lord together. I desire a place of our own that we can share it with friends and family. I desire to be out evangelizing in a larger city where thousands of people can be reached. Yes I have dreams of being on a huge platform where thousands of people are raising their hands to receive the free gift of Salvation. I desire not to have things on this earth, but to have a platform where my husband and I can be of maximum usefulness to God. I have this kind of urgency that sits in the center of my being to reach the lost and broken people who have no idea that the trouble they are experiencing without the Lord is in no comparison to the trouble they will have in choosing Jesus. Yes in the natural, my life doesn’t look that appealing to the eye, but the peace and comfort I get to experience every moment of every day is far beyond what the world ever could offer me. I have the assurance of eternal life and I want the rest of the world to have the exact assurance. And from the bunk bed, to the bathroom, to the nursery or to the playroom or to a huge platform and mansion my heart will always want one thing – to save souls for the furthering of the kingdom of God.

I'm calling on the Holy Spirit to break down the barriers of our mind and the Jericho walls we build up around us. Just like Jabez prayed his prayer (1 Chronicles 4:10), in the spirit of Jabez I ask you all to join me in my personal prayer: Lord God of Israel, oh that You bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil, that I may not cause pain. Lord God of Israel, equip me where I am not equipped and qualify me where I am not qualified. I surrender my will to You Lord and I am Yours to do with me as You see fit for the betterment of humanity and that all those who do not know You may be lead to Your loving arms and be offered the free gift of Salvation. Lord grant me strength each day to continue to do Your bidding as You see fit for me to do so. But I ask only Lord that you enlarge my territory! So be it. Amen.