Wow! What an incredible journey. Publishing my new book has been one of the hardest, yet one of the easiest things I've ever done. It's been an incredible adventure...one that has I guess always been there brewing on the inside yet has equally somehow suddenly just crept up on me. This message of purity has been so pivotal for me. One that I hold dear. One that I have personally lived and conquered and a message that I know is both powerful and liberating. Yet for the longest time I figured it was a truth that radically broke my own chains but one that would possibly never be used to break the chains off others. The reason that I thought this was because my testimony and the message of purity as personal, precious and powerful as it was to me, simply wasn't being used in my life. In fact for the longest seasons it lay dormant.

Years would go by and aside from praying and ministering to my students in the past or having one to one's with people I knew, those around me didn't have a clue about the life I once used to live. I had become such a new creation...transformed...so made new, that people had no idea about my past. No idea about all that God had delivered me from. And though I would ponder if God was ever going to use my testimony to set others free I was having so much fun pursuing God and His kingdom that I just left it in His hands and enjoyed the adventure of all the other discoveries He was leading me into. I genuinely knew in my heart that it was an issue of divine timing and if God wanted me to share my testimony and share the message of empowering purity, at the right time, I would.

I recall Easter 2011, when my pastor asked me to share why the Easter message was so important to me. For the first time in years I shared a bit of my testimony. I shared how I used to live a debauched, hedonistic, broken life, driven by manipulation, alcohol, drugs and promiscuity. How I was a prisoner of my own sin and enslaved to evil...but that Christ had radically set me free and given me new life. Not long after, that I penned my testimony in a spoken word piece and filmed it. The lid on the message I was carrying had opened a little, yet other areas of my calling beckoned and I focused on my fashion label and other creative pursuits. I came to discover during that season that empowering purity was a core life value I lived for, though it was still only brewing below the surface and not seemingly bearing fruit on the outside. All the while I stayed hidden in the secret place, content that my life was in the hands of God and He would lead me in every area of my life. 

In 2015 I went through a sifting that was deeply painful yet deliciously liberating. God showed me that He had called me to be wild, untamed, bold and someone that was truly Living in Light. He revealed that I had allowed myself to be tamed by religion and in the name of humility I had let the wild, fearless side of me die - and that was totally not who I was. In the name of protocol and driven by people pleasing I had feared what man thought of me. I had allowed a lid to be placed on me. What a wake up call. Literally chains of false humility, religion and fear of man began to drop off and the boldness I had once known in the world - which had now been sanctified and redeemed for the Kingdom - kicked in unapologetically. God showed me that in my pursuit of laying low, dying to self and pursuing humility I had been waiting for God open doors for me when God had been waiting for me to govern in the places He had already given me. Haaaa!

He showed me every sphere of influence He had already given me - and told me to step out in authority and start governing in those places (instead of waiting for Him to open new doors). He asked me what was in my hand. I considered the resources, gifting and places of influence that were already in my hand, that I had failed to step out in, under the impression that God still needed to give me permission, when in fact I had already been given all the permission I needed; I just needed boldness to unapologetically boss those places for the kingdom. I instantly began to rise up and truly lead without apology in the areas that He had already granted me, with a new sense of authority and confidence. 

And then I realised something. The area that was in my hand which I hadn't stepped out in at all was empowering purity.  I hadn't exercised the authority I had in that area. I hadn't poured out at all in that area even though there were so many people who could eat the fruit of it, in my sphere of influence. This was particularly highlighted one day when I was at church and one of the young guys on team was showing me something on his phone. I caught a glimpse of the last search in the google bar - it was: how to deal with sexual lust. My heart broke. That was it. The journey began. I asked my Pastor if I could teach the young adults at my church about sexual purity after service one day. Because my Pastor is so deliciously bad ass he insisted that rather than after a church service, I would take a Sunday service and preach it to the whole congregation.  Bricking it, I agreed.

I had no idea what a catalyst that Sunday would be. The joy and freedom that broke out after I preached my sermon was electrifying. The stories and disclosures that ensued were heartbreaking. Slowly it dawned on me: I knew empowering purity was a message the world needed - Yet I had simply had no idea about how desperately the church was also in need of this message.  As I listened to people's stories and become exposed all the more to places of sexual brokenness in the body of Christ, God began to show me that this wasn't just a Sex issue - it was a Sexuality issue. So I found myself deliciously delving into the wider issue of Sexuality from a Biblical perspective.  

As I continued to explore God's design for sexuality in the Bible I made an amazing discovery which took me by complete surprise.  You see, I discovered just how incredible sex could be when enjoyed God's way! Suddenly my understanding of the subject changed gears. It was no longer a case of all the stuff you needed to avoid if you wanted to follow God's design for sex in marriage - the spotlight was now on all the glorious pleasure you could totally tap into if you pursued sex God's way.  It was about all the incredible, incomparable benefits that were available to those that follow God's design for sex!  

What ensued, was a six month workshop called Sacred Sexuality and I was humbled by the support and vulnerable participation from people young and old, married and single, broken and whole. A few months before I began to deliver these workshops I felt God impress upon my heart that I needed to write a book on the subject. He gave me a clear strategy of how to do it. By God's leading, I wrote the first draft in a month. As I penned this first draft and prepared to deliver the first workshop I felt the wind of heaven undergirding the entire process. I asked God out of curiosity, why now? Why was it that the time was so right now Papa? Why, when I had carried this message for thirteen years was it only being shared now?  He lovingly responded that it was only now that I was qualified to bring such a message to this generation.

He showed me that it was only now that I had a true understanding of love - His delicious, unconditional, covenant love - a fiery, reckless, overwhelming love, which I had spent the last thirteen years hidden in, enjoying, experiencing and abiding in - it was only now that I could teach His creation about sexuality. You see sexuality ultimately is about intimacy.  He explained that the reason He couldn't allow me to teach about sexuality a day sooner was because I needed to first understand that the purpose of Sexuality is rooted in our God-wired need for intimacy.  It's not a purity thing, or a holiness thing...it's a love thing. An intimacy thing. And our drive for intimacy is rooted in our need for connection first and foremost with God - because that is what we were created for...we were created for love - by God, in God, with God.  We were created for the highest, sweetest, most satisfying love ever in a relationship with Him and with others.  

My message had found its heartbeat. It was no longer just about Sex or Sexuality - the heart of the book ultimately was intimacy. The book became an amalgamation of biblical principles, personal experiences, scientific references, practical strategies, prayers and spiritual processes that I had journeyed through in order to get to this place of truly understanding that sexuality is rooted in intimacy and true intimacy can only be found in God. It became a step by step, going to the roots, holistic offering of understanding sexuality from heaven's perspective and rewiring the way that we approach sexuality - away from counterfeit versions of intimacy, towards the source and designer of intimacy. The only one who can satisfy our thirst for connection - and the only one who can teach us how to experience love and connection in the most fulfilling way possible.

And so Sacred Sexuality - Rewire Your Desire Towards True Intimacy was birthed. Yay God!  A labour of love in more ways than one. A bearing of my soul and an irrevocable exposure of my inners. I desperately hope and pray I have written a God-breathed, heaven kissed book that will radically change lives the way my own life has been transformed - in the most delightful way. I feel God's well done all over it so I am overjoyed to have completed this assignment. It has been a sheer delight...during the mountain tops and valley lows I have felt the grace of God on this book like I have felt it on nothing else. The favour on it has been off the charts and the book launch event was beyond my wildest dreams... but you'll maybe hear all about that in a future blog...for now though...the book is available to buy. I sincerely hope it blesses your sock off and bears ridiculous fruit in your lives!

In His love. x