October 10, 2019  (Post #13)

(Journal #1:  February 5, 2005)

Last night I woke at 4:00 a.m. and God gave me a revelation about myself, but it applies to all.  The Holy Spirit asked me what my name meant and I said pearl.

Then He asked, “How are pearls made?”  As I thought about how the ugly oyster shell gets a piece of sand inside, I thought about how God is inside us through the Holy Spirit.  The sand is constantly irritating the oyster – sin is always irritating and causing us grief.  But just as the oyster “quarantines” the invader and begins to cover it with layer after layer of nacre, the Holy Spirit quarantines our old self and begins layering us with Himself.  Over time, the nacre produces a beautiful luminous, iridescent pearl.  Long known as the “Queen of Gems” a natural pearl necklace has been considered a treasure beyond compare.

I felt like God was telling me that all the trials of the past and walking through this health situation are just grains of sand from the enemy to irritate me and even kill me – to make me fall away.  But Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, keeps putting more and more layers of Himself over it all and making a pearl out of me.  And I’m valuable and precious to Him, an original, a one-of-a-kind.  Each of us is a pearl to God!  

Jesus, thank You so much for your precious gift to me in revealing this.  Everything I’ve gone through with You by my side is making me stronger and hopefully Your light will radiate through me as a witness to Your grace, mercy and love.  The outer shell of the oyster is not pretty. But the inside over time becomes lined with mother-of-pearl and is beautiful.  That’s what Jesus does to our hearts.

Ezekiel 36:26:  I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.

Psalm 51:10:  Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.

Matthew 5:8:  “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”

Matthew 6:21:  “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”