How can women strengthen their relationship with God? In an interview with Rock the Word, the Rock Writers Ministry, Debbie Alsdorf, speaker for the Rock Women's Retreat 2009, says to "live wild for God"!
An author, speaker, and Bible teacher, Debbie Alsdorf is director of womens ministries at Cornerstone Fellowship in Livermore, California. She is the founder of Design4Living Ministries and encourages women to live in the reality of Gods Word. She is the author of several books, A Different Kind of Wild, Is Your Faith Too Tame?, Deeper, Living in the Reality of Gods Love, The Design 4 Living Bible Study Series and The Womens Ministry Guide. She and her husband, Ray have a blended family of four adult children and live in Northern California with their three dogs.
Debbie Alsdorf: We are in a season of change; change in every facet of our lives: economic, familial, societal change. It is time for us to get serious. We need to get serious about God. We need to get serious in our faith. It is time to be wild for God. It is time to have a wild, sold-out faith and not worry about offending people by being politically correct.
Women are great influencers. And they have power. They have power over schools, over families, over society. We as women need to make sure that because we have such power, the power to influence, that our heartbeat is aligned with Gods heartbeat, and that our hearts are completely surrendered to Him now.
"We have to get back to basics. We have to follow Jesus instead of following ourselves."
--Debbie Alsdorf
Many times we walk around with masks on, avoiding critical issues in our lives. We walk around sometimes with painted Praise the Lord smiles and as you mentioned, look like The Stepford Wives (based on the movie). How do we get away from that kind of superficiality?
DA: We have to get back to basics. We have to follow Jesus instead of following ourselves following our own desires following our own wills what we want. We have to simply learn how to follow God. That means making a commitment to live our lives for Him, because it really is all about Him.Sometimes weve worn so many masks and worn them for so long we dont even know weve got them on or theyre more comfortable to wear than dealing with our pain, our loneliness, our stuff. How do we identify were even wearing masks?
DA: By identifying patterns in your life what are the patterns you keep experiencing in your relationships? If were honest with ourselves, with our own brokenness, we will be able to tell. Most masks ARE comfortable, because we feel we have to cover up to be perfectly acceptable to people, that we have to create this persona. But we have to learn to deal with our deepest longings, our pride, our insecurities.
How can we learn to hear from God? How do you hear from Him?
DA: First of all, we have to learn to slow down. We have to learn to quiet down. Were so busy busy, busy, busy. But its imperative that we slow down. You have to slow to grow.
We have to learn to quiet our minds. You see, there are many voices. How do we know its God? I will usually ask for confirmation. I repeatedly ask, Lord, is that you? I want to know does this line up with Scripture? Are the thoughts you are entertaining negative, are they ugly about another person? What do those thoughts produce for me, flesh or fruit?
Many women may not see themselves as leaders or influencers of others. How do we break through those feelings of insecurity?
DA: 2 Corinthians 3:4-5 says: And we have such trust through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God Too often we feel like were not enough. We feel like were dont measure up, that were insufficient. But we as women need a Biblical view of ourselves. We need to wrap our minds around a God who can take ordinary pots or ordinary clay and be sufficient in Him. Its not us. Its Him. Because in Him we live, in Him we move and in Him we have our being (Acts 17:28).
How do we get back in the swing of things in our Christian walk, even after weve messed up?
DA: Admit we made a mistake, admit we sinned. It takes courage to admit we made a mistake. We have to humble ourselves. 1 John 1:9-10 tells me, If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And we might have to confess that Scripture many times a day, and continue to confess. I know I do. See, Satan will use that failure, that mistake, that weakness or that sin to condemn us. But we must take responsibility. We must commit to do what we can to change the course of action and not stay in guilt and condemnation. This also has to do with our relationship with God. He will not keep us in guilt and condemnation.
Also, are we loving God in our devotional time? Are we loving Him outside our devotional time? Are we taking Him with us wherever we go? Sometimes we put God in a little box, have our devotional times and leave God in that devotional time. But do we take Him wherever we go? God is not a God to hold us in guilt and condemnation and it takes us to go deeper in our relationship with Him and His Word.
How do we seek our purpose? How do we know what our purpose is?
DA: You know, I get that question a lot. It begins with identifying our strengths, what do we like to do? We all have different gifts and there are times and seasons to exercise certain gifts over others. But we need to ask ourselves, how am I wired? Then we need to develop a plan to exercise those strengths.
How do we gain our strength to fulfill our purpose?
DA: We have to make up our minds to just do it, to overcome our fears and do it anyway. Go in the place God is leading you. Just try and you will be surprised what He will do through you. Hell surpass what you think you can do. Just try.
