Huge revelation- God led me to eat with a person at a restaurant and I realized this- friendship isn’t always about agreeing on everything but accepting each other’s differences. God told me to ask him to pay for my meal. A person I just met. He said he’d be willing to pay for part of it. Then later God said to ask for a donation, and he said no. Then God said ask for $5, he said no. Then God said ask for $10, he said no. It was so liberating!
In case you’re wondering how I met him. I saw him at a restaurant and asked if I could sit with him.
I realized in my past friendships I often suppressed how I actually felt out of fear that I would lose them. I got into debt because I was afraid to ask for help, I pretended I was okay when I wasn’t. If I lived the way I do now I would have asked friends to pay instead getting into debt pretending to be okay. And if they said no I would have been honest and said I can’t eat out, etc.
I was rejected and felt abandoned from childhood and because of that in my friendships I was fearful of rejection and became a people pleaser helping everyone else but not knowing how to ask for help.
I felt burdened by other peoples’ problems as I kept listening to them but didn’t know how to voice my own problems.
This journey of following Jesus has helped me to see my worth. I’ve learned to complain when there are tv noises next door, I’ve learned to speak up when I’m not happy with something or can’t sleepy because of a disturbance. Now I check out all the rooms before I choose to stay somewhere. I speak up about everything.
And yes! People have responded in anger at times! They got offended because I spoke up because they thought I was attacking them when in fact I was only speaking my mind. When people have a lense of rejection they think everyone is rejecting them!
People did not like me at times because of my standards. They would say “well it’s loud at hostels or hotels here, just compromise and bear with it”. One time in china I woke up to someone watching porn on their phone! Then many times people leave their notification sound on all night so now I tell people please keep your phone on silent mode.
When you’ve been rejected all your life you feel that you want acceptance from people but when you are accepted by God already, you don’t need anyone’s acceptance.
So now God has me asking people for things so that I won’t ever be afraid to ask. He often says “don’t be afraid to ask, you are enough”.
When I finally ask, and even if they say no, I feel a relief, like I’m not afraid of rejection and I’m not afraid of what people think.
Because sometimes the questions are strange. Like asking someone for $10, then another $10. Or asking someone to buy me a drink or meal. And they might be offended, but part of that is having them confront the fact that maybe they don’t know how to ask for help and maybe they need to learn how to do it without fear of rejection.
Because I am not a burden, I am a gift. I felt that I didn’t ask friends for help because I didn’t want to be a burden- which I felt I was growing up with a single mother. I suppressed my desires to take care of her emotionally. I felt that I couldn’t express how I actually felt because my negative emotions may impact her negatively.
Today I saw three men I saw the other day. God told me to talk to them. I walked up to their table and introduced myself. I told them what I was doing- I said I was a missionary and they said “we are scientists”.
I prayed for each one of them and gave them prophetic words which were accurate. One I said he was in a season of love- he said he just got married!
God then said “ask for a donation” and they said no they didn’t have cash on them.
I walked back to my friend. I could’ve thought, okay I’m not going to talk to these people because I’m here talking to a new friend but that was also breaking off the fear of what the new friend thought.
It was really an incredible night where God revealed all this to me! Amazing!
Sow a seed and give to your breakthrough!
Rebekka Lien 