SPEAKING

Looks can be deceiving can’t they? We can often appear fine from the outside, but we all have hidden hurts. It could be the loss of a spouse or child, a broken or difficult relationship, a prodigal child, a disappointment or aching in your soul that  can’t even be fully identified or expressed. 

Just because a wound is life-threatening doesn’t mean it isn’t life-altering. 

In this talk, Melinda shares her own story of hidden wounds and identifies the common feelings and fears that we all experience regardless of the source of our wounds. 

Melinda relates some key choices and principles that the Bible gives us that lead us to life and healing. There are not a “formula” for restoration. God is not a God of formula. He works in each person’s life uniquely. But they are a guide — rooted in God’s Word — that leads us closer to the Healer. Because it is impossible to truly seek and get closer to the Healer without experiencing some form of healing.

So many of us believe lies about God. We don’t fully trust Him because we don’t really know Him. When we begin to more deeply understand His amazing character, what will overwhelm us more than anything is His great and incredibly personal love for us. We trust people who we know have great love for us. When we understand more fully GOD’s love for us, trust becomes easier.

But how do we do this — know GOD in our hearts not just our heads? That is going to look differently for each one of us, but it starts with an act of the will. In this talk, Melinda explores three key principles that dispel the lies and help us to see God in a whole and healthy new way. 

Have ever been watching a superhero movie and thought, “How can’t Lois Lane see that Clark is Superman? Or, what’s wrong with Mary Jane? She’s been living next to Peter Parker her whole life… doesn’t she recognize his voice when he talks to her as Spider-man? Come on! How clueless can they be?

In fact, they have preconceived ideas about who Clark and Peter are, so they miss the true hero that lies beneath.

We often do the same thing with God! God becoming human in our heads causes us to instinctively put up walls in our heart.  It keeps God small. Angry and unapproachable. We put God in our “box” and it prevents us from knowing in our hearts how loving, sweet, holy and powerful God truly is.

In this talk, Melinda explores some of the ways we make God human and how we can begin to open our minds and hearts to His life-changing love and power. 

The joy of the Lord is our strength. So is it any wonder that the enemy looks for any and every opportunity to steal it? He knows when he can get us to believe lies about who God is and about who He made us to be, it drains our passion, strength and joy. 

In this talk, Melinda will explore three of the most important questions we can ever answer. The more we answer these questions correctly and fully, the more we come into alignment with God’s heart and mind and His blessing over our identity and purpose can flow most freely in our lives.  

The Bible tells us to “fear not” or “do not be afraid” 365 times. We are given the command to “not give in to fear” more than 100 times in Scripture.

Why did God put so much emphasis on fear? Because the root of this kind of fear is a lack of trust, which leads to unbelief. And it cripples us and our intimacy with God. 

In Mark 9, a father brings his demon-possessed son to Jesus and pleads, “Have mercy on us and help us, if you can.”

Jesus replies, “What do you mean, ‘If I can’?’ Anything is possible if a person believes.”

The father instantly cried out, “I do believe, but help me overcome my unbelief!”

That father’s prayer is one that God longs to answer for each one of us!

Overcoming our fear, our lack of trust is possible. In this talk, Melinda explores three very important choices that can help us find freedom in spite of our fear.

Life is messy. We try our best, but one thing after another happens that seems to continually mess up the picture. We don’t understand why things are happening. They don’t make sense.  

Our lives are a lot like a dot-to-dot picture. The dots are different key experiences along our journey. Those experiences often seem scattered, messy and random. We lose perspective because we can’t see the big picture. We can’t see how all the dots connect. The more we try to make the picture beautiful in our own strength and wisdom, the more messed up it becomes and the more frustrated we become.

Thankfully, we don’t have to figure it all out. We just have to follow the Master Artist. In this talk, Melinda shares how knowing more of the good, kind and loving character of God can help us rest in knowing He is working for our good. 

There is no denying our world is an increasingly dark and broken place. We carry wounds and past baggage that increasingly crowds out the light of God’s very personal love for us. But no matter how broken your story feels like right now, you can have Hope. Because Hope is a Person. And when we open our eyes and our hearts to Him, He can always be seen and experienced in the midst of our murky, difficult circumstances. 

In this talk, Melinda shares some characteristics of Hope and how we can cling to and experience the transforming power of Hope in the middle of the darkness.