Billboard for God

Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah! As I have been preparing for Christmas, I remembered I never finished and published this blog post from my birthday, and I felt it would be in order to release it before we celebrate Christmas Day and launch into the New Year.

I hope this happy little video entertains you and this write-up blesses you!

When I asked God on my birthday morning, August 11, 2022 (the day after my "Glendale Girls" party), if He had a “verse of the day” for me, He gave me Ephesians 4:8 —

“He led captivity captive and gave good gifts unto men.”

Is that not a perfect birthday verse!? A few things I’d like to say about it:

First, “He led captivity captive.” That is so powerful. He chained what chained me. He

defeated death — essentially putting death to death! He makes fear run away. He takes hold of what is wrongfully taking hold of me and brings me freedom. Hallelujah!

And then to expound upon the part about God giving good gifts, I must share the verse (and especially its Aramaic translation) that the Lord showed me before I went to my party:

3 John 6, according to the Aramaic commentary in The Passion Translation:

“You outfitted them like a ... billboard for God”

and

“The gifts you gave them made them an advertisement for God.”

That second translation especially — wow! I literally underlined it in my Bible and wrote next

to it, “wow!!”

“The gifts you gave them made them an advertisement for God.”

Do you ever read a particular Bible verse and feel super connected to it, even if you don’t know why? When I read that verse, I immediately felt very connected to it.

As it turns out, that verse was about to come true in my life.

At my party (and as I look back and tell the stories!) I feel like I get to be that billboard for God, with my “dresstimony” about my birthday dress from Christi Given, founder of The Holywood Network, and also with these other gifts that were direct responses from God to my prayer requests and the recent desires of my heart.

And it was a special treat for me because it tends to be a struggle for me to not write “no gifts” on an invitation, let alone think of things to say I want when people ask what to give me for any occasion! I never want people to feel pressured or obligated.

But Kelry Kirschenmann, program director for Hollywood Prayer Network, gently nudged me

out of that shell and encouraged me to allow people to give to me for my birthday, and it

turned out to be such a blessing — not just because “new stuff” but because I believe these

girls were being led by the Lord as they picked out these gifts for me.

Of course, their presence was their biggest “present,” as well as the way they prayed over me and worshipped God with me! But these gifts, I just have to share, because the stories behind them are too good!

I pray that the gifts God has given me — for my birthday and beyond — make me a billboard for His goodness and a walking, real-life advertisement for the Lord!

I remember praying in early 2019 that my life could be a display of God‘s goodness, and I see Him often bringing that answered prayer to fruition.

Really the only time that it isn’t made reality in my life is when I disobey (sorry!) and thereby fail to receive something He’s trying to give me, but the more I get to know God, the more I

see that at His core, who He is, is a giver. The more I recognize and remember that, the more open and even excited I am to do what He says, even if it sounds nonsensical or like it would

make me lose something I want.