I Shouldn't Be Surprised When God Answers My Questions (But I always am)

I just finished my first year of teaching.
If you've read my blogs or talked to me in real life then you'll know that this year was both great and tragic.
The year was God constantly challenging me and my definitions of love and ministry.
I was blessed to see Him move, and challenged to just exist in His love and not worry about seeing Him move but having faith He did.
I really do feel lucky at my jobs and everyday thankful I get to do what I do. However, at the end of each day I just came home mentally and emotionally drained. It felt like all of me was being spent at work everyday and when I got home, there was nothing left.
I know that first year teaching is always the hardest but the level of emptiness I was feeling at the end of each day didn't feel right.
Before coming to Cornerstone I sought the Lord with questions of why I was feeling so empty. I had very specific questions I asked and as Cornerstone progressed, each question (word for word at times) was answered.

The first day of the fest I spent just wandering around, overwhelmed by being surrounded by so many Christians. A few months ago the Lord gave me a dream about reconnecting with a church and has been pressuring me ever since to join a church.
This was like 3 months ago and.....I never did anything about it. I wanted to, but also didn't want to at all. I have some distrust for the church that I am working through and while I know God is calling me back into organized church, I didn't want to do it. So I haven't......
Cornerstone however is different and has church much like what I am looking for so I felt safe walking into a service there.
The first service I went to was a spirit-filled group and during the worship God showed me something very cool. In John 4:24 the Bible talks about worshipers who worship in Spirit and in truth. I saw this happening in a vision. I saw the body worshiping, but as people began to enter into spirit worship, I saw their own Spirit manifest and connect with the Holy Spirit. In the vision, people all over the tent were manifesting their spirit, connecting to the Holy Spirit, and the other people, so it was this massive, outer body, supernatural worship through the Holy Spirit.
It was quite possibly the coolest thing I have ever seen. My words don't describe it accurately and I tried drawing both a literal and abstract interpretation of it but it fails in awesomeness as to what I really saw.

I have always felt the difference between worship/singing compared to worshiping in the Spirit (John 4:24- "God is Spirit and those who worship Him must worship in Spirit and truth.') but until now had no visual reference or solid way to explain it.
So that was awesome, being reminded that corporate worship is a supernatural experience and though God meets us when we worship alone, worshiping with a group like that can literally be an out of body experience.

When the speaker began, I had to choke down my immediate expectations of disagreement. (why do I react this way?) He started talking about church and how God is teaching Him to do church not from a place of "we know better then you" but a place of love and humility.
His attitudes and thoughts on the church are very similar to mine, though he was speaking from a place just beyond where I am now.
He gave a fantastic analogy about why we as Christians need to church. He compared the church to the show "Biggest Loser". I have never seen the show, but his metaphor made perfect sense and was something like this:
The show is designed to help severely overweight people not only lose weight, but develop disciplined and healthy lifestyles. When people join the show, they are admitting that they need help, that they essentially cannot do it on their own.  The people on the show are there to support and help, and step in with discipline  accountability and rules. Though its difficult at first and the rules feel restricting, as they progress, an inner discipline comes out and the rules become a natural part of them. He likened this to Christians and why we need the church. When we get spiritually out of shape we need to turn to the church and admit we need them. (this is a hard part eh?) Like being retrained physically, getting back into church is a discipline that may feel odd and unpleasant at first (maybe thats just me?) but as we get back into God's heart our Spirit is strengthened and we no longer feel restricted but free. The "rules" of the church no longer seem to be annoying but a natural extension of our Spiritual attitude.
To be honest, I have been very out of shape Spiritually. For real. I am admitting it now and seeking a church as the Lord continues to pressure me haha. (which what a sweet friend we have in the Lord, He pressures us to do things not for His benefit but our own)
The second part of my answer came through a word I have heard many times, but apparently not enough. It was about placing our identity in Christ rather then in what we do. How often have I heard this? (oh so many times) Yeeeeeeeet, I had been doing it.....Everyday.
I had been completely placing my identity in my job, which is why I felt like nothing at the end of the day! (that sentence needed an "!" as it is a fresh revelation to me every time I say it) If I put all my worth in my job, then no freakin wonder I felt nothing when I wasn't there because I was no longer doing the thing I let define me. Unlike work or anything or person God is constant and when our identity is in Him, we can NEVER come up empty.
A couple of blogs back I wrote about the Lord returning me the money I lost when my rear windshield was shattered. I thought it was awesome just getting my money back, but the Lord showed another layer of prophetic as I was writing. It was the rear window, and it cost $500 to repair. The Lord was prophetically saying He was using grace (the #5 is Biblically symbolic of grace) to restore hurts from the past. The short version of that word is He is using grace to restore past hurts from the church (I have a lot more on this but I'd rather talk about it in real life) That money was a prophetic sign and also gave me the provisions to go to Cornerstone.



Also I had a vision for what I would like my next tattoo to be. I have been wanting to get a tree tattoo but couldn't visualize how I wanted it to go. In the vision The Lord reminded me that He is the Tree and we are the branches (John 15:5) so I want to get a branch on my back shoulder with something like this:

It is two doves (the tattoo will be a solid black silhouette of the birds and branch) symbolizes peace, and how doves mate for life, that we are bonded together with peace in Christ. 

....That was a lot of words :)