CAN YOU FEEL THE BREEZE?

A Conversation with a Homeless Lady- Our Identification In Christ- Merry Monday! By Parris Bailey
“Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are new.” 2 Cor. 5:16
When we meet the Lord we have to drop our identity. Its the great exchange! It is an amazing journey to drop everything that we hold onto in exchange for His glory and name. A few months ago I had the ministers move out of the Glory House so we can make room for interns. We were able to squeeze everyone into their own personal space all around the building. I decided to move into the Research Library and use that for my office in order to grab a book and study in between my meetings. It was a great idea but I had to throw out so much memorabilia for there was no place in the library. My office, that I have known for years, had evaporated right before me. I didn’t realize how weird I would feel sitting in a room that “wasn’t my own”. In January I decided to put my house up for sale and in 5 days it sold. The act of sale is upon me and we find ourselves moving into a house half the size! We have talked of this for years and embrace this new adventure but I cried giving up my “precious Versailles”.
Last Thursday I packed up and left for the women’s retreat. It had been a unusually rough week, filled with bad news, stress over inspections and mortgage hassle jargon. In Slidell I stopped to fill up my tank and pulled out onto Gauze Blvd, and realized that my wallet was gone. The events of the week began spilling into my present predicament, instead of making a U-turn to go back I found myself on the I-10 heading east into Mississippi. Eventually I returned to the station and found no sign of my wallet that was filled with credit cards, driver’s license, bank deposit slips, etc. My whole identity was suddenly gone! Out of the corner of my eye I saw a homeless women sitting with a grocery cart of stuff. I approached her and ask her if by chance she had seen a wallet and she answered that she had not. I quickly prayed for her, and she simply replied “you know it is such a beautiful day outside, can’t you just feel the breeze today”? I flew to my car shut the door bursting into tears. On the drive to the retreat I felt 1,000 lbs had come off.
That night at the retreat I heard Him say to me “give Me your identity”. First the office, then my Versailles and last my identity. I was to become “untraceable” like the homeless woman who was lost in the moment of the beautiful day. In Hebrews 11 it says, “They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented; (Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth. And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided something better for us, that they should not be made perfect apart from us.” It’s a beautiful day all right, can’t you just feel the breeze?