who am I that a king chose me?

Most my life, the lie of never feeling worthy enough screamed louder than this truth:

a King chose me for a purpose.

I knew that God loved me, and always felt I was uniquely created. In fact, He tells us that we are all “fearfully and wonderfully made” (Psalm 139:14) and there is absolutely “nothing that can separate us from His love.” (Romans 8:38-39) But I never quite felt worthy enough to be chosen to help God advance His Kingdom in a mighty way. I never felt good enough to be given a purpose that could change the lives of others. Afterall, who was I to be used by God in big ways when I felt so inadequate myself? I felt too broken to be destined with a purpose. I had too much of a mess from my past to ever be used in a powerful way. I always lived with these lies that I wasn’t worthy enough, let alone worthy enough to be chosen for a purpose, let alone from a King.

Therefore, who am I that a King would choose me?

Not just any King, but the Highest King. God Himself. The Maker of this Universe, the Prince of Peace, Lord of Lords, King of Kings, the Alpha and Omega — He CHOSE me and has a purpose for ME…Alisha?

God’s Relentless Pursuit of Me

The fact is this: I am unworthy. And so are you. This is what makes the love story between us and God so beautiful. We are all unworthy of His grace and forgiveness as we all fall short living in a fallen world. BUT He loves us anyways. He chose us anyways. He has big plans for us anyways. His purpose prevails anyways.

The Lord had been pursuing ME my entire life and didn’t stop until I gave Him all my heart, all of me. What a love He has for us to never stop chasing us! While I had been running into the arms of lesser loves, He never gave up as He was relentless chasing after me.  I was broken, desperately craving attention and acceptance in misplaced affections. I searched the world for my purpose. I sought out empty treasures that quenched my thirst temporarily, but that left me still thirsty for more….

and then God stepped in.

The day I surrendered my life to Him is that day He began to put the broken pieces back together. Every crack filled. Every shattered piece molded more like Him. Every thirst satisfied.

Despite any mess in my life, He still calls me daughter. He still chooses me. He saw my weaknesses. He still loves me. He healed me. He gave me BEAUTY for the ASHES of my life. He turned my shame into His glory. He has turned my weakness and mess into my greatest message that I’m committed to spending the rest of my life sharing with the world. He has a plan and purpose for me, as He does you.

God’s Purpose Is To Use All That You Are

When I accepted the truth that God has a plan and purpose for my life, the Holy Spirit revealed to me that the calling ahead of you is far greater than all the experiences behind you. So it doesn’t matter how broken you are, how imperfect, or what you’ve done in your past. His purpose is to use all that you are. What you see as a mistake, He sees as an opportunity. What you see as pain, He sees as a purpose. What you see as scarred, He sees as a beautiful masterpiece.

He promises to use EVERY experience for good. Romans 8:28 says “all things work together for good to those who love God, to those are called, according to His purpose”.

Hear this ladies – God is the ONLY one that can fill those broken cracks in your life. Those shattered pieces He can put back together. The ONLY one that will accept your weakness and your brokenness for you. ALL OF YOU! And He will use every ounce of your life for His purpose. It doesn’t matter how weak or broken you are or anything that you’ve done in your life. He will redeem them for His good.

Do you know the GREATEST heroes of the Bible all had major weaknesses and brokenness too? They too, felt unworthy of a purpose. Yet, God chose them anyways.

  • Abraham was old (Genesis 17:17)
  • Elijah was suicidal (1 King 19:4)
  • Joseph was abusive (Genesis 37:12-36)
  • Job went bankrupt (Job 1:13-22)
  • Moses has a speech impediment (Exodus 4:10)
  • Gideon was afraid (Judges 6:11-27)
  • Sampson was a womanizer (Judges 14-16)
  • Rahab was a prostitute (Joshua 2)
  • The Samaritan women was divorced 5 times (John 4:17-18)
  • Noah was a drunk (Genesis 9:21)
  • Jeremiah was young (Jeremiah 1:7)
  • Jacob was a cheater (Genesis 27:1-35)
  • David was an adulterer and murderer (2 Samuel 11)
  • Jonah ran from God (Jonah 1:3-17)
  • Naomi was a widow (Ruth 1-4)
  • Peter denied Christ 3 times (Luke 22:54-62)
  • Martha worried about everything (Luke 10:41)
  • Zacchaeus was money hungry (Luke 19:1-10)
  • The disciples fell asleep while praying with Jesus (Luke 14:37)
  • Paul was a Pharisee who murdered Christians before he became one (Acts 22:1-21)
  • [Insert your story here]

God will use YOUR story! Don’t let the enemy fool you into thinking anything less. Friends – the GRACE of God covers you so stop covering up your weaknesses and instead expose them as you allow God to USE them. I John 4:4 says “Greater is the ONE who lives and moves in your than the one who prowls around you [the devil], the one who seeks to destroy the perfect plan that the greater ONE has for you.”

The One who we will live with in eternity has chose to PARTNER with you, with me, Alisha, to accomplish His Heavenly purposes. He is using ME and MY MESS to help spread His MESSAGE here on this earth. He did it was Moses, David…Peter, Paul, all those mentioned above, and many more. And He wants to do it with YOU too!

Your purpose is about your UNIQUE STORY

Your unique story includes your mess of a life. Your inadequacies. All those things that make you feel unworthy of a purpose is what makes you have a unique story that ONLY YOU can tell. ONLY you have walked the path you have walked. What a unique story to share with others! Let Him into the broken cracked places of your inner most parts and sink in His love molding the brokenness of your story into HIS powerful story.

YOU, my friend, are CHOSEN by the KING Himself. Step into your royal chair girl, as a daughter of a King. And partner with the ONLY one that was meant to satisfy your every thirst, that has already handpicked you and chose you from the very beginning as He says in His word,  “I chose you before I formed you and knit you together in your mother’s womb (Psalm 139:13), I set you apart before you were born, I appointed you, I selected you…” (Jeremiah 1:5)

So who are you that a King chose you?

Nobody. Not deserving. Unworthy. But guess what? He STILL chose you, set you apart, appointed you, selected you, and formed you and only your unique story for a PURPOSE.

XoXo,

Alisha Headley

Join me for Part 2 next month in the “Who Am I” series. Next post –> Who am I in THIS season?

Alisha Headley5 Comments

the lies 2019 taught me

I love looking back on a year and rather than look at how awful (or great) a year was, I look back to reflect on how much I grew and what were the life takeaways.

2019 transformed me in more ways that I could have ever imagined.

In all my 30-something years on this earth, 2019 (next to 2013 when my older brother passed away) was the most difficult year I experienced. AND the craziest part is it had nothing to do with anything outside of me. Thank you, Lord, for a year of good health, no death, no broken friendships, no financial losses, no betrayal, divorce, or major things most of us equate to a bad year.

No, none of these things.

What made this year now my second hardest year of my life was the transformation done INSIDE me, not what was occurring outside of me. But sometimes the internal battles can far outweigh what’s going on around us.

THIS WAS A YEAR OF BATTLE WITHIN MYSELF.

In 2019, Satan tried to flex his power. He showed up. God’s called me to something big, I know that. Just as He has called you as followers of Him to something big. He says in his Word “many are called, but few are chosen.” (Matthew 22:14) What does this mean? Some of us get trampled on by Satan and never step into our GREATEST calling or we try to do it all yourself which is a tactic of the enemy. Just as Saul did in the old testament. Saul was called to be king. King over all of Israel and rather than wait on the instruction of the Lord, he tried to do it himself. (1 Samuel 13:1-15) He therefore was overlooked as future king, and that’s when David took his place on the throne.

I don’t want to be overlooked for my major role in this life – my calling.

Sometimes God allows Satan and his army in our lives just as he did in Job’s story in the Bible. God actually “gave permission” (Job 1:12) to Satan to have his chance with Job. He allows things to happen to us to grow us. To strengthen us. To make us stronger than ever before preparing us for something bigger.

In the battle against the enemy, the key is to get stronger and to grow your faith muscle. Not to let the enemy take you out entirely. And for many of us, going through hardships end up discouraging us and taking us out before we ever had the chance to step into our calling. James 1:2-4 encourages us saying “when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow.”

In order for me to step into something bigger, I needed to go to battle and fight off things from my life that have been hindering me. To RELEASE them from my life. It was torturous. It felt at times very defeating. It felt like my whole world was taking a step back from all that I knew to be my comfort. But sometimes you must take a step back in order to plummet you that much further forward.

THIS WAS THE YEAR I FOUGHT THE LIES HOLDING ME BACK.

Lies from the enemy that I wasn’t good enough. Lies of the unknown. Lies that every time my husband would walk out the door and travel for work, that he might leave for something better and never come back and abandon me. Lies that I needed status clout from others in order to feel loved and purposeful. Lies that in order for my life to be satisfied and complete, I needed things to look a certain way. Lies that I should just go back to the way things were and forgo my calling because the way things were, were safe and known. Lies that just because other gals have found what I deemed as success, that there was no room for me at the table. Lies that I had nothing to offer.

These lies affected every area of my life.

In recent years, I left my career as a VP finance boss-babe to pursue God’s calling on my life to write and speak to women. A calling I felt on my heart from the time I was young. I’m blessed to have a husband who provides for me financially and supports my dreams and is consistently inspiring me and encouraging me to live them out.

My husband knows what I’m capable of and has believed in me from day 1.

However, Satan knows what I’m capable of too.

Therefore, he was active with distracting me, discouraging me and ultimately attempting to destroy me. He knows that once God’s power takes over me, that I can leave him trembling in fear and damage his plan for destruction. He knows the impact I can have on women and some women are just waiting to hear from me. The enemy knows that I am the kind of woman that when my feet hit the floor each morning, it will leave him saying “oh no, she’s up.”

Because of the calling on my life, the enemy tried taking me out this past year. And as I drew closer to God, Satan drew closer to me too.

This was a year of RELEASE.

But day by day, the more time I spent with God and in the truth of His word, the more confidence and wisdom I gained. Instead of believing the lies and having them dictate my actions, I began replacing those lies with the truth. I began filtering everything that came my way through the filter of truth not the filter of my hurt. And as I began replacing those lies, I began to experience more freedom.

What happens when you become free, is you become everything God has called you to be for Him.

Remember – Satan is already defeated. He is a defeated foe. When all is said and done, and our short life here on earth is over, Satan loses. Not us. This is why Jesus died on the cross for us. To give us the option of salvation. When God comes back one day to grab His followers, Satan will spend eternity in hell. But his mission while he is still roaming this earth is to “kill, steal, and destroy us”. (John 10:10)

He tried to destroy my dreams, my well-being, my relationships, my self-worth, and most importantly my trust in God. He will try every tactic to get me away from the Lord where he knows that with the Lord’s strength in my corner, I will have the most power and can make the most impact.

Do you know you have POWER and authority to break ANYTHING from your life?

Friends – God gave us authority and power to overcome ANY stronghold, anything holding us back. To break them, to master them, and walk in true freedom and victory. He promises us this in Luke 10:19 – “I have given you authority over all the power of the enemy, and you can walk among snakes and scorpions and crush them. Nothing will injure you.”

This year was the most challenging yet most defining. Most painful, yet most overcoming. Most defeating, yet most victorious. Satan is still out there to destroy me, but the wisdom the Lord has bestowed on me – I strive to apply to my life daily. Make no mistake, some days I still lose, but thankfully, God’s “mercies are new every morning” (Lamentations 3:23) and we have the power and authority at our disposal whenever we choose to fight in any battle.

OUR GREATEST WEAPON IS THE BIBLE. BECAUSE THAT’S WHERE THE TRUTH RESIDES.

All the lies that consumed me this year, dictating my actions or reactions, controlled me, and stole so many things from me was because I didn’t know how to fight the lies. But now I do. The only way to fight lies is with TRUTH. The very first temptation in history started with Adam and Eve. And do you know what caused the fall of man and sin to enter our world? A lie. A lie from the serpent, Satan himself.

What lies are you telling yourself? What are you believing from your past? What strongholds do you have that are binding you up “choking out the life of God in you?” (Matthew 13:22)

Let this be a year of RELEASE ladies. Trust me, there is freedom on the other side.

Many of us have been trying to go to the next level and trying to do the next thing, but we are tied down to things the enemy has strategically placed in your way to prevent you from taking off. Things that have grounded us to the ground. But God is trying to launch you higher. Those habits, lies, beliefs, insecurities, fears, unforgiveness, scars from your past…they are holding you back from where God is trying to take you.

God isn’t just calling us to fly up in the air and go from one place to the next place. He is calling us to launch us into a whole new atmosphere.

So, it’s time to release what’s holding you back. It might be painful as you face it, but I encourage you to go THROUGH it, not around it, not ignore it, nor try to manipulate it. Rather go through the pain of releasing what is holding you back. Why did Jesus spread mud all over the blind man’s eyes in order to heal his eyes? (John 9:1-12) His healing was MESSY (literally), just as mine was. Don’t let the method or pain of release prevent you from the miracle and freedom of release.

A year ago, today, I would never have believed the freedom that I feel in this moment. But I had to go to battle. I received some battle wounds and bruises along the way, but came out stronger. Girl, you’ve got this. Don’t let the enemy trip you and rip you to shreds any longer. You’re beautiful. You’re brave. You’re a chosen soldier in this horrific battle with a glorious ending.

XO,

Alisha Headley

Alisha Headley9 Comments