Fall Afresh On Me
Fall Afresh On Me10.46 p.m., 20 October 2005
I’m going to be out of a job. Again. Twice in the space of ten months.
Perhaps some of you have experienced worse. I don’t know.
Strangely enough, this time it didn’t affect me the way it did when I resigned from my position at SQ last year.
And it’s weird because this time round, I didn’t want to go. My present company didn’t want me, so to speak. I don’t mince my words, despite all the words they use to dress up the fact that they don’t find you suitable. The bottomline was that they didn’t think I fitted the bill.
I have all the reasons to feel sad actually. But I’m not.
All the conditions are so good at my current company. The dressing is casual, the colleagues are nice, the boss is a friendly and personable dude.
I remembered the excitement that gripped me six months ago when I was told that this company wanted me.
I felt God’s grace in every single area of influence that led to me being hired, from the first and second interview, the things we talked about during the interview, the instant rapport I seemed to have established with my interviewer (which is my boss of course), and subsequently my colleagues.
I thought, there and then, this is like a dream job. And I made no attempts to hide my delight, gleefully sharing with any friend from church who was willing to listen.
And I even wrote a super long testimonial and shared it in front of the entire choir during one of our practices. Frankly, I hesitated to pen down this entry because of this.
I think the reason I hesitated to share this is because I felt like a failure. I mean there I was sharing a wonderful testimony just six months earlier, and here I am, failing to carry through that testimony, not to mention carving out a glorious career in this company.
After I shared that testimonial, many brothers and sisters-in-Christ actually came up to me after the choir practice and told me they felt so encouraged by my testimony.And even for months after that, those in the choir who don’t know me (our choir is pretty big, just for your information) remembered the testimony I shared.
Initially, upon hearing that my boss decided not to retain me, I sort of took it with a feeling of resignation. Because there were actually a series of events that led to this untenable state I’m in.
I shall not go into detail but suffice to say, it boiled down to my inability to manage clients’ expectations and letting my emotions rule my head. Of course, they were pretty nasty clients. My boss gave me a chance although he did admit that I had improved tremendously since then.
But it was perhaps too little too late.
I guess I couldn’t really blame him. It was almost inevitable and it was just a matter of time. But quietly, I was still hoping he would change his mind, and clung on to every wee bit of hope there might be. Just counting the days I suppose.
And so it was, the week before last, my boss called me into the conference room and broke the news to me. And I was treated to the “golden handshake” for the second time.
I felt a sense of injustice. I asked Abba: why Lord? Why a second time like this in the space of such a short time? Am I really that lousy?
But strangely, I wasn’t feeling the "sad" kind of sad. It was more like injustice to me. I felt that I haven’t been vindicated, and I felt vulnerable.
I can’t explain why I didn’t shed a tear because normally, things like this do cause sadness. Perhaps it was an inner belief that though I don’t know what lies ahead of me, I know my Heavenly Father who clothes the lilies of the field and feeds the birds in the air, will surely take care of me.
Is that something I used to comfort myself, or really something that has been so ingrained in me from how I was brought up in church?
So I was saying I ought to be sad about it. But I was not.
The last time something of a similar magnitude happened, it was when the senior pastor from my previous church said very hurtful words to me when I told her I wanted to leave that church for my present one.
She told me about how disappointed she was that I never realised the potential she saw in me as a cell group leader, and how she thought I had lost my hunger for Christ and the Word.
Those words cut deep into my heart when they came forth from her mouth. But I kept a straight face, and I thought I did a pretty good job at controlling my emotions.
Because it was only a day later when I was in the shower, and everything that was said hit me like a lightning bolt. And I just cried my heart out in the shower.
I haven’t cried so much for a long time, and I was genuinely very very hurt.
You know the best part about crying in the shower? You don’t know whether the water comes from the shower head or from your eyes. And the slushing sound of the shower just drowns out your sobbing.
I may sound very melodramatic here but it’s all true, and you know what, it’s a pretty liberating feeling.
Okay, back to my job. What I’m trying to say is that I wondered if my absence of emotion, or to be precise, sadness, was some sort of a delayed reaction that would hit me like it did in my shower the last time round.
I think deep down, I have started questioning if I am a failure.
You know what, this precious sister, whom I shared the news with, texted me an SMS about more than a week later. She always has this knack of sending me the right messages at the right time. Of course, not all of them registered in my super-fast mind on first reading.
So it was, in her message, she wrote: “Your failures are your qualifications for God’s favour. The favour that astonished not only in that particular area but double in all other needs. Boast in your weaknesses and failures! For they are being manifested. The best results are not yet to be seen…It is still being restored and more abundantly!”
When I first saw it, the message just zoomed past me. I was like…ermm…come again? And I replied her SMS, joking that she must have been zapped big time by the anointing of the Holy Spirit. I also asked her what she meant in her message.
And she replied with a subsequent verbose string of words:” You are free to fail. Whether it’s in career, family or relationship. You have the favour of God when you fail coz it’s when you can’t, God can. There is simply no real definition of ‘best result’ coz the following blessing is always always better than the previous one. It is always renewed and restored!”
Again, my super-fast mind just stared at the words and yes, I felt very encouraged but that's about it. And truth be told, the magnitude and impact of what she had written didn’t really struck me until this evening.
I was sharing with a friend about my favourite song from our church album “You Gave”. It is called “Fall Afresh On Me” and it never fails to bring a stirring in my heart and sometimes, wonderful tears. Some of my favourite lyrics in that song goes like this:
“Fall afresh on me,
Move within my heart.
Let Your tenderness consume me.
Pour Your love on me,
Like rain upon my face,
Till everything I am,
Is lost in Your embrace,
Fall afresh on me.”
I badly needed a fresh anointing of God’s love for me, and I needed His comfort and big hands so desperately. I needed Him to fall afresh on me because I was feeling so lousy and helpless…like a failure.
And every word in those two messages sent by this sister just made sense to me at that very juncture.
Subconsciously, I have begun questioning myself as a failure, and thinking how badly I sucked.
But those words, it all made sense to me now. God’s favour will exceedingly abundantly exceed me failures. And it is when I can’t do it, that I know He can.
Thank you sister for bringing His Word to me in the season! I’m going to just let His love fall afresh on me, and rest in His exceeding abundant favour that will be restored and renewed seven times over!
Whatever that comes, whatever that lies ahead, I shall choose to rest and trust in His loving hands, that surely, he makes me lie down in green pastures and leads me beside the still waters!
Hallelujah!!! Praise the Lord!!! Praise Jesus!!!
posted by weiwen @ 10:56 PM
1 Comments:
Weiwen
I am going back to blogs I have saved, after being in Louisiana and having little opportun ity for using wireless internet.
I have just read about your situation. Your friend sounds wonderful.
I have written - "Why Isn't God Enough?" about this struggle. I bet you haven't been tried in this area as I have. Remember - when God tests you He's really just testing His own work - like you test a new product you ahve made to see if it works. If you fail to pass the test, that is just a way of knowing you need to go get back on the potter's wheel and have more molding done.
His tests are a way to measure your progress.
I will be praying for you.
Gabrielle
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