Noelle Kilgore's Blog

Lately Ben and I have been dealing with the whole “waiting game” of life.  I think all of us have and still find ourselves in this position…of waiting.  We keep asking ourselves when things will change, have our pity parties, and then find contentment in where God has us…all to do it over again the next week 🙂

I was listening to Shane and Shane’s song “Waiting Room” this morning and found such truth in the lyrics.

“i will run when i cannot walk
i will sing when there is no song
i will pray when there is no prayer
i will listen when i cannot hear

sitting in the waiting room of silence
waiting for that still soft voice i know
offering my words up to the rooftop to Your heart
trusting that this closet’s where You are

Lord i know if i change my mind
You will change my heart in time
Sovereign Lord this time’s from You
so i sit in the waiting room of silence
cause its all about You

i will fight when i cannot feel
i will trust when You dont seem real
i will tell when i cannot speak
i will step when i cannot see”

The chorus “Lord i know if i change my mind, You will change my heart in time. Sovereign Lord this time’s from You, so i sit in the waiting room of silence, cause its all about You” puts things in perspective for me.  Our pastor, Ed Gungor, not too long ago spoke to Ben and I about God using the time of waiting, to really pay attention to what God is trying to show us about ourselves.  He used the example of a baby chick about to hatch.  The chick pecks on the shell until they crack it open.  If you try to help the chick with breaking the egg, they will die.  It’s in the struggle that you get stronger and ready for that time of so-called new birth. This was encouragement for us, but then again, after the encouragement wore off a little, we found ourselves in that same exact place of just wondering when we would receive breakthrough.  You hear people saying that they are just waiting for God to answer their prayer…there’s always an answer…just sometimes we don’t want to hear it.  Mark Gungor spoke on it this past Sunday…”NO” is an answer.  That’s when trust comes into play.

Not admitting weakness has gotten me in a lot of trouble in the past.  It’s a pride thing.  This is me admitting I’m not as strong as I would like.  I’m tired and weary at times.  I see the dreams of my sweet husband’s heart being at a standstill and we  can’t do anything about it.  It’s out of our hands.  That place of desperation is great, but oh, so hard, especially to watch someone you love in the struggle.  I also see the dreams of my heart and Ben’s heart of a having a child, taking longer than we would like…but it’s out of our control.  So what do you do in the meantime?  I know to be still and wait, but I also know that God has put many wonderful things in front of me to be involved in and to not sit around doing nothing waiting for my turn.  I think sometimes during the waiting period, we become selfish. I know I have…I think we all have.

Waiting isn’t punishment.  God doesn’t punish us.  He loves us and longs to give us the desire’s of our hearts. I’m learning to lean into Him. When you lean on something, you depend on whatever you are leaning against to hold you…He’s holding me and in those arms, I find a home, a secure place to tell him all about it. It’s a place of trust and safety.

Lean into Him today…trust His timing and put your hands to what God’s put before you now…every dream has a journey.

This whole blog site thingy is new to me, but I know I love to write, and feel it’s my best outlet.  There will many times you will read this blog and it’s purely for me…sorry about that.  My hope and prayer is that when you read these blogs, you’ll feel loved and encouraged.

Just to give you a little history and background of myself, I grew up in a wonderful, loving family, centered in a belief in God.  My family was known in our little town and I carried many identities.  Most of them were natural…like a daughter, friend, sister, leader, singer…the ones we all carry from the time of birth.  Naturally, because of my love for music and creative outlets, performing was very natural for me.  I think there is such a thing as healthy performance that comes in the package of accountability.  It was my privilege and honor to bless my parents with the decisions I made.  There was an expectation on my behavior, and it was a good thing.  Many expectations were put on me, some healthy, some not so healthy…at no fault of anyone, but my own.  It’s who I became.  I became this girl who loved people and loved God and just longed to be accepted by everyone.  I think all of us feel that way sometime or another.  I hated feeling that someone was disappointed in me.  I hated knowing that I had let someone down, so I ran around just trying to make everyone happy with me.

When I moved to Tulsa to go to ORU, I came to the realization that nobody knew me.  Nobody knew my family, or what I was good at…it was a fresh and clean start.  I remember just begging God to make me something new…something He would be proud of and someone I could be proud of.  So I did a lot of things.  I made a lot of good decisions, which was great, but it quickly became an identity and this offering I would give to God…like, “here you go, I’ve done what I’m supposed to do, please be proud of me.”  That’s how the world works, right?  We do what were supposed to and then there is reward.  I did it right.  I did the right things, so naturally I felt God’s love and acceptance…like He was proud of me.  I found satisfaction in doing the things of God, behaving in all the right ways.  It made me feel validated and worthy of God’s love.

But what happens when you don’t do the right thing, and you aren’t proud of yourself? All the guilt and condemnation from the enemy and people who are hurt, become this identity you strap on.  The shame, the doubt in yourself and most importantly in the love of God.  All I believed of God came to a screeching hault when I had nothing to offer Him, but me…no good thing, no right decision, nothing but little ole me, totally ripped apart.  It was there that I found God.  I was stripped of everything, good and bad, that I had accepted as myself, all of it was gone.  I was left staring at this God I had claimed as the love of my life, hanging my head in shame, begging Him to love me again…to be proud of me again.  All the while, He never loved me for what I did or what I had to offer, He just loved me.  I’m moved to tears every time I think about His love that has no conditions.

I’ve slowly moved back into a place of leadership and singing again, and the desire’s of my heart have changed.  It’s not longer about me, in fact I’m scared to death to think about me…all I want to stay in tact is my identity of being HIS.  That may sound cliche, but think of who you are and what your represent and if EVERYTHING was stripped away from you, could you cling on and survive with the simple, precious gift of being His.  That’s all that matters.  It’s taken me a while, but I’m proud of who I am…but none of it compares to His love.  He pointed me out and still claimed me as His, when many couldn’t and shouldn’t have.

I guess I just want you to feel encouraged and even challenged, to simply get to know your God.  He longs to love on you, for you and nothing you have to offer.  He’ll slowly start building your identity up in healthy, wonderful ways.  It’s so easy to grasp for dear life for the things that make us feel good, that help us escape, that feed those gross parts of our flesh.  Let those things go…rejoice in the fact that you’re HIS and that’s all that matters.