On May 4th, 2010, I returned to a 12-step meeting that I would regularly disappear from for months at a time. Afterwards, a friend that I trusted well, asked to speak with me privately. He told me that not long after I had last disappeared, God had given him a message for me in meditation. He said that God told him that I was thinking about doing something, and for him to tell me, as soon as he saw me again, that God said for me to go ahead and do it.
I immediately knew that the only thing that I had been thinking of doing was somehow starting a ministry. I was overwhelmed by the sudden realization of how great God's love for me truly is. For a long time, as part of regular spiritual practice, I had concentrated on my loving God with all my heart. I had developed the attitude that what really mattered was whether or not I loved God, rather than the obvious truth that He loved me, (which I dismissed with a perfunctory "well, of course God loves me but that's not the point or that doesn't matter because God loves everyone)." I would eventually come to find that this was yet another subtle form of my not accepting myself and not feeling deserving or worthy of God's love. As I got into my car and began to drive away, I immediately had to pull over, as I broke down in tremendous joyous grief over intuitively realizing the unfathomed greatness of God's love for me. I later saw the entire experience as one in which God had basically written me a spiritual blank check.