Hola Mi Amor!

Hola Mi Amor y HMA Familia!

Happy Thursday to each of you. I pray you are well, that you are safe and that you know Jesus as your Lord and Savior! 🙌🏽🙏🏽❤️🥰🕊

This morning during my prayer time before my workout I was crying out to God. As I was prophesing my love for Him and how never again will I (it’s both my intention and desire) put anyone or anything above Him, memories and connecting scriptures flooded me. I see myself in the Word. I see how He has never given up on me despite me running away or being disobedient!

The story of Jonah which you may have already read or be familiar with, I encourage you to visit the book of Jonah and after you read it go to my favorite Bible study tool by clicking here and read this incredible study. When I get in the Word I feel like I want to know about every aspect of a story. I love doing research and taking a deep dive into the meanings of what I am studying.

I ended up doing a whole lot of whale research today lol 😆 But hey some of my research prompted by something that my Pastor was teaching on helped me score double points in our Christian Horse Show Association Kahoot tonight praise God!!! 🙌🏽💪🏽😂 If you didn’t already know I may be a tad bit competitive LOL! And even Jonah already being in my spirit was from Pastor’s Facebook post the day before. So I wasn’t really surprised about the connection, but all that Holy Spirit brought up in me was truly an overwhelming blessing! Hallelujah!

I realized that I was like the children of Israel wondering in the wilderness for 40 years and didn’t even know it! I was going ’round in circles. Out here “thinking I was following and serving God” when I really didn’t even have a Moses or a Joshua leading me. Most of the time I was serving myself and every selfish desire and bandaid that I constructed that would mend my broken wounds! I was chasing “love” and pleasure instead of the One that is love. God created positive pleasure for me because of His agape love!

I have been like Jonah being disobedient and running from God and things He has told me to do or not do- even after I had been warned…BUT God!!! And I ended up in the whale’s belly. Oh but it wasn’t 3 days it was more like 3 years! All of my past traumas created a monster that fed off of pain and was a glutton for punishment- so much so that much of which I suffered was self-induced.

In his belly I cried out. At first it was mostly because of my child’s disposition, the physical pain and agony I was witnessing my daughter endure and as a mother co-enduring the trials with her.

God why is this happening to my baby girl?! Why can’t the doctors see or find any root cause or solutions to ease her torment? Can’t You show me the answers? I can figure this out on my own because it’s as all of these doctors are blinded and aren’t hearing us God. God I need You to show up now! God I know You can save her and I expect You to do it!

So in the belly of this whale I am isolated, isolated to the point that it was killing me. I have followed the protocols and researched to find my own answers to stay safe, yet somehow an invisible demon found it’s way into me. It planted spores of fear, anxiety and doubt inside of every part of me. It saturated my thoughts and every cell of my body and speck of my nervous system.

God why is this happening to me? What have I done to deserve this? I’m imprisoned in my own home in the solitary cell of my body! God heal me and protect my family! God we need answers. Send relief of every form.

OH! You’re asking God why?! In my drive and ambition to “make it” and finally “live my dream” professionally I didn’t even put in perspective although I prayed and watched church online how far from God and outside of Truth I had positioned myself, how much injury I caused my children by my hustle mentality and how fractured they viewed love through relationships.

• My babies were in the wilderness with me & my daughter the longest and she was also “within my whale” but on her own journey
• The thickest and most dangerous part of my wilderness journey was a span of almost 10 years. My son with me only for 4 and daughter through it all.
• “Your choices affect everyone.” That is a phrase I always instilled in my children- AND in my running and hustling I was blind or had “selective vision” to my own daily decisions impacting everyone around me!!!

Amidst the chaos I still had favor yes, but I also had pride, co-dependencies, a striving spirit, entangled with a narcissistic partner, I was uncovered spiritually, chasing a man and my dreams far more than I was chasing God, I was “living the dream” while my dreams of living were slowly paralyzing me. Idolatry and the desire for marriage and always making a way and fixing everything in my own power consumed me.

I couldn’t even see the depth of brokenness that I had piled up to become as I forced what never should’ve been to become something it never could. I made excuses for my choices and the actions I was accepting. I was a glutton for validation and punishment it would seem.

I was starving for affection and to be acknowledged for who I was and for all that I was accomplishing. I was easily manipulated while entrenched in the wild weeds of the wilderness. I was serving and catering to everyone but the Lord and His Kingdom. I was blinded by the lights, camera and the action I was surrounded by.

My sex drive and sexual sins saturated my life and empowered me to try to gain control of forcing a man to stay home that had already left me mentally. The emotional attachment, strongholds of our soul ties and my inability to only serve as his “girl” vs. constantly serving as wife demolished my peace and unlocked PTSD from yesteryears.  

I tried to imitate the behaviors that were plaguing me and God wouldn’t allow me to go through with any of it. He allowed me to go so far and would  pull me back before I could consummate what wasn’t for me in the first place. 

I had been walking, jogging then really began running away since 2013 and didn’t even know that I had been swallowed up! Hindsight is 20/20 and that is the year I entered his belly.

The whale seemed to spit everything and everyone else that was connected to me back out that wasn’t on his list of desired consumption, yet somehow I bypassed a space that shouldn’t even be physically possible and I stayed trapped in the belly of the whale. He vomited up all those things with disgust and I had to watch them be driven away from me. It was answers, relationships, loved ones, partnerships, work, my car, money, opportunities, our health, my peace- and nearly my entire sanity. I saw myself being robbed right before my very eyes. BUT God!!!

Interestingly enough I learned that the whale is a warm-blooded mammal. Yo, it isn’t even a fish! 😳 It has lungs and is actually carnivorous! That blowhole (if I knew I was in his belly) I thought I would maybe one day fly out of. Yeah, that is his nostril lol! It’s his hot air, mucus etc. that when forced out by a breath causes a condensation like mist in the air. It isn’t blowing water out of its blowhole and if I’m in his belly how would I come out of his nostril anyway?! Well, God has made stranger things happen I suppose. 🤷🏽‍♀️

As I stood behind the stained glass windows of my mind I watched the world passing me by, moving forward without me. My prayers were mostly for healing, relief, answers, help. I wasn’t actively “doing wrong” so I don’t recall praying for a changed mind or heart. I was though asking for wisdom and creative ideas. I apologized and prayed for both my children and family more than ever before. My heart grew closer to God and I became hungry for Him as my appetite for food and life decreased in waves.

One day God flipped the script on me. It was my praying 15 year old daughter who He drew in to lift me up. She drew me even closer to God and He brought us nearer to one another strengthening and healing years of shared trauma I imposed on our family by running from God!

Through therapy layer after layer of my past was being pulled up from the roots: self righteousness and a victim mentality to name a few. The acceptance and forgiveness work that we collaborated in began to heal me deeply. This healing work reeled me in closer to the Healer! It stirred up my hunger for the presence of the Lord.

Through repentance I came closer to Jesus, my family and to God’s original intent for my life. He allowed me to come to a place in that belly where I had to restart my life! Learning how to crawl before I could walk, sign before I could talk, be dependent on Him and the support of others and find joy in the little things was my new reality. But I began to get comfortable!

God had to shake things up! He knows me and sometimes has to move by force with me. When the whale was trying to spit me back out I was hanging on to this new space in fear of what was outside of him. God sent a prayer warrior to pull me out of the “great fish” and into His house. There He took the reins and orchestrated a miraculous move of God that to this day keeps people in awe of Him when shared!

Something that absolutely was illuminated to me and blew my mind was how God can appoint ANYONE and literally ANYTHING that He so chooses! In this story of Jonah God appoints a whale, a plant, a worm and a scorching east wind. God doesn’t just appoint people! There is NOTHING too hard or impossible for our God!!!

Who or what did God appoint to get your attention back on Him and teach you about who He truly is and His character- that we should also be striving to have?

God sent for me so that I may be sent to The Advancing Church and further in to His arms to reach my destiny and destiny helpers. Hallelujah Glory to God!!!! 😭🙌🏽😭🙏🏽😭❤️ Now like Solomon – everything is meaningless! I ask, seek, knock and chase wisdom now. I can’t get enough of God’s presence and His Word. I don’t want to do anything unless God is in it and leading me through it. My desire in everything I do is to please God and bring Him glory! And because of my obedience He has spoken to me about what He’s entrusting me to carry forward. My life is not my own and to Him I belong! He has and continues to work ALL things together for my good because I love Him and am called according to His purpose!

A song that just dropped in my spirit is “God is in this story.” He’s not just in my story. God is in your story and even in the details! See Him. Seek Him. Draw nearer to Him and find the greatest freedom you can’t ever even imagine! He is the prize! Go forth and let your light SHINE!!!

This weekend I celebrate 2 two year anniversaries praise God! The tandem blessings that God used to clearly transform my life. Equine-Assisted Therapy and The Advancing Church! This Gamble hit God’s lottery with these two Hallelujah!!! I am forever grateful is an understatement.

Health is wealth and Jesus is King. It’s all about His Will, His Word, His Way. This life is not a game! For me it will always be- God over everything!!!

Have a blessed day- On Purpose!

Love & Blessings,

Jana M. Gamble

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