Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Wednesday 08/31/2011)

Why So Many Complaints?

1 Thessalonians 5:17-20 Amplified Bible (AMP)

¹⁷Be unceasing in prayer [praying perseveringly]; ¹⁸Thank [God] in everything [no matter what the circumstances may be, be thankful and give thanks], for this is the will of God for you [who are] in Christ Jesus [the Revealer and Mediator of that will]. ¹⁹Do not quench (suppress or subdue) the [Holy] Spirit; ²⁰Do not spurn the gifts and utterances of the prophets [do not depreciate prophetic revelations nor despise inspired instruction or exhortation or warning].

            My daughter is 18 and she will turn 19 in about a month and a half. For most of us who have teenagers or have been around teenagers we know that they have an inner battle going on, they want to be grown up and they are fighting to carve out their own way, BUT on the other side they often want mama or daddy to do it for them, they even will fall into baby mode.  My daughter is a vibrant young woman, she is intelligent and ingenious, creative and strong, but she is no different, she can turn into a precocious 10 year old when pressure comes or things are not working out the way she thinks that they should. There are days where she is my biggest help and days where my complaint box is overflowing about how her life is not flowing the way she wants.  Those are the days I need to pray hard, because it is those days that I have come to understand that she is most insecure about who she is and where she is going, and she is acting out because it is easier to act out then to articulate that she is scared to death about the next move or undertaking in her life.

            Does that description sound familiar to anyone?  It did to me as I read it back in my mind before I even put it to paper. It sounded like me. It sounded like days, weeks, and months of my life that I have had in the past complaining to God about all that was not right, about all that had gone wrong, about all that had been taken from me, about all that people had done to me.  I know for a fact there have been days where I am sure God wanted to turn off my connection to Heaven because I was on a no thankfulness diet with an all complaints menu.  It wasn’t until approximately almost two and half to three years ago when my parents were going through major physical challenges, I was going through a divorce that was hell on earth and my health came under attack, my children were feeling the effects of the divorce process in a horrible way and financially it was the worse it had ever been; that is when I had to realize that any day that I could sit up and get up out of bed was a great day.  I had to learn to focus on what was good.  I had forgotten that any day that I wasn’t kicking up dirt was a good day.  I had to remember that any day I could hold down food was a blessing (because there was a three month period that I could not, because of stress and migraine headaches).  I had to learn to that any day I could feel the warmth of the sun on my face was beautiful, and any day I saw all my family still alive and in what my Grandmother used to say was “a reasonable portion of health and strength,” was a blessing, and any day that I heard the laughter of my children was a miracle within itself.  But more importantly I had to learn that any day I woke up understanding the magnitude of God’s love for me and how He was thoughtful enough and gracious enough to provide me salvation, I was better than I ever had been. I had to come to understand that instead of complaining that my marriage was over I began to thank God for what His plan was for my life and take solace in the fact that He knows what is best for me and obviously that was not His best for me.

            What is it that you have been complaining about? What is it that has you in a place of unrest and in the mode of complaining?  Understand that our complaints often come from elements in our life we cannot control or we do not understand the movement of God in.  But it is when we come into a place where we allow the Holy Spirit to work in us and to abide with us that we can see things differently.  The Holy Spirit allows us to see truth and He provides us spiritual revelation and understanding that we will often miss because of our humanity and its fleshly reliance keep us blinded and in a state of confusion.  Life is not perfect, but look at all that is right, all that is good, all that is of a good report and pure in thought; it is these things that will lessen or eliminate the complaints and place a Spirit of Thanksgiving, peace, trust and renewed faith within us.  If we can see how much God has done for us and all that He has kept us through and all we have survived, our tone would be different and our attitude would improve…If we seek the mind of Christ our thoughts and speech would come into line with the things of God and we would trust and believe that ALL things are working out for our good, and NO good thing will God withhold from us if we walk up right before Him! So tell me as you look around yourself today and observe how much you do have, “why so many complaints?”

Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Tuesday 08/30/2011)

Will You Come And Spend Some Time?

Song of Solomon 4:7-9 Amplified Bible (AMP)

⁷[He exclaimed] O my love, how beautiful you are! There is no flaw in you!  ⁸Come away with me from Lebanon, my [promised] bride, come with me from Lebanon. Depart from the top of Amana, from the peak of Senir and Hermon, from the lions' dens, from the mountains of the leopards. ⁹You have ravished my heart and given me courage, my sister, my [promised] bride; you have ravished my heart and given me courage with one look from your eyes, with one jewel of your necklace.

            It is so funny to me that when we fall in love with a person our whole life can get flipped upside down.  Time that we once had for everyone and everything suddenly becomes consumed by the new love that we have to ensure knows that we love and have need of them.  We can be so twisted, sprung and into an individual that we want to block out the world and as my husband and I say all of the time, “I just want to breathe your air.”   It is our way of saying if I can just get to share space and time with you I will be just fine.  But we say we are so in love with God, But the question that comes to mind is how often are we just wanting to breathe His air, just wanting to be right up underneath Him, listening to His heartbeat?  How often are we spending time with Him?

            When we love there should always be some expression that identifies that we are in love.  We should be desirous to spend time with God as we are with those we love in the natural, probably more so.  Why do we think that going to church on Sunday is all of the time we need with God?  Why do we think if we throw up a prayer on the run, that we have given God enough time?  Why do we offer up excuses like God knows my heart, when we would not do that with someone we love in the natural?  Just like when we are in a relationship with a person, if we don’t spend time together we feel some kind of way.  We begin to feel neglected and we have a sense of loss, fear, anger and detachment, it is the same with God. God may not fear, being without us or losing us, but He does hurt when we neglect to spend time with Him and we choose so many other things over Him.  He may even be in a place with many of us to question our love and actually how much we do love Him, but how much time we actually do not spend with Him, or how we actually prioritize our time with Him.

            If we understood the magnitude and how much God loves us, we would curl up in His presence like a satisfied lover curls up under the one that they love and attempt to stay there for as long as possible.  We would be running to God so much more often and we would prioritize Him above all other things, or as often as humanly possible.  Many of us are thinking right now, how hectic, and full our lives already are and that there is not a minute to spare anywhere.  But think about this for one minute, what if someone told you that if you were able to carve out an hour a day that they would give you ten million dollars would you?  Or maybe if someone told you that you needed to find a way to carve out an hour each day, or your health would decline or you would die, how many of us would find a way to get an hour out of our day somewhere?  Most of us would not just carve out an hour we would probably carve out two.  But we don’t think of the fact that God is the King of Kings the Supreme Being, that created Heaven and earth and who knew us before we knew ourselves and created a process of redemption because He understood without it we would be lost.  We do not think about Jesus, who left Glory and being at the right hand of His Father to come down and walk in the earth for thirty three years and then suffered and died on Calvary’s cross and shed His blood for the remission of our sins.  We do not think about the Holy Spirit that operates here in the earth for us, on our behalf and keeps us safe and instructs and leads us.  We do not remember that He loves us enough to comfort us and to fill us up and give us unhindered communication with God.  You see if we kept before us how much God loves us, would that change our expression of love and the time we spend expressing that love to God?  That is a question that only you and God can answer.  So thinking about how much time you come away with God how much would you say you love Him or express the love you do have for Him?

Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Monday 08/29/2011)

Have You Made That Move Or Is Your Back Still On The Wall?

Matthew 17:20 Amplified Bible (AMP)

²⁰He said to them, Because of the littleness of your faith [that is, your lack of firmly relying trust]. For truly I say to you, if you have faith [that is living] like a grain of mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, Move from here to yonder place, and it will move; and nothing will be impossible to you.

            I started writing a book some years back.  I have struggled to gain confidence to structure my time and my thoughts to finish it because I think deep down inside I have struggled with failing and the possibility of success.  As I was awakened this morning I heard the song by Kool and The Gang, “Get Down On It.”  My first thought was that is odd, but then I began to hear the words, and understood what God was saying, “How you gonna do it if you… really don't want to dance… By standing on the wall? Get your back up off the wall… 'Cause I heard all the people sayin': Get down on it.”  In those moments I realized the Spirit of God, and the great cloud of witnesses that we all have behind us when we are hid in Christ were using the words of this song to let me know, you can never win or lose a fight or get a decision if you never get in the ring.  You will never dance if the desire is not there, even if the music is great.  You actually have to get off the wall and let the rhythm or the beats take you and engage you to become a part.  Basically I will never know if the book will sell if I don’t finish it and get it published!

            There are many of us who have dreamed dreams, have had aspirations, have started doing things like writing books, making plans to finish college, or start a business and we are not following through.  Like me, many of us have let fear or failure or success keep us on the wall as an observer, not taking the bull by the horns and going after it.  It is because we lack faith in not just ourselves but in God.  We can have strong faith in many areas of our life, but lack it in a particular area that ties directly into our destiny track, and our dream cycle.  This can hinder us from becoming the one who dreams and succeeds; the one who aspires and obtains, and the one who says and does.  The Bible encourages us that if we have faith the grain of a mustard seed we can say to the Mountain, be moved, and it will move.  We have to begin to build up our faith in our personal lives, not just for others to stand in agreement with or to bring healing and deliverance to others, but it should begin in our lives, it is us who should be a living testimony, and sacrifice that shows forth the Glory of God.  How will people be drawn to God if our lives are full of “woe is me,” and “I am barely making it” and “I have left all my dreams and aspirations by the way side?”  We are living in a time period where hope is sparse and faith is weak, and people need to be able to see Jesus moving in us and that we are still reaching for our goals, still dreaming and moving towards those dreams.

            God said through His Son Jesus, “I came that you might have life and have it more abundantly.”  Where is our abundance if we have given up on our dreams, goals and visions? The Bible tells us “without vision the people will perish.”  We need to stop being the wall flowers, and push past that fear and apply the faith that we do have and ask God to help our areas of unbelief and do what we need to do to be the one that obtains the goal, hits the mark, lives the dreams, because that is God’s desire for us, he said He “I wishes above all things that we be in health and prosper as our soul prospers.”  Are we prospering, are we obtaining; we cannot do that living in fear and standing still, we have to move out.  We can’t dance if we never move. We have a faithful dance partner in the person of the Almighty God, He makes us look good even when we are not sure of the moves, if we trust Him, have faith in Him He will lead us and make us look like the professional, the success and the winner that we are if we can only “get our backs up off the wall!”

Words Of Encouragement To Start The Day (Friday 08/26/2011)

What Are You Holding On To, That God Is Trying To Get Rid Of…

John 13:5-9 Amplified Bible (AMP)

⁵Then He poured water into the washbasin and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the [servant's] towel with which He was girded. ⁶When He came to Simon Peter, [Peter] said to Him, Lord, are my feet to be washed by You? [Is it for You to wash my feet?] ⁷Jesus said to him, You do not understand now what I am doing, but you will understand later on. ⁸Peter said to Him, You shall never wash my feet! Jesus answered him, Unless I wash you, you have no part with (in) Me [you have no share in companionship with Me]. ⁹Simon Peter said to Him, Lord, [wash] not only my feet, but my hands and my head too!

            One of the hardest things for me is when I need help to ask for it.  It has nothing to do with pride and everything to do with experiences.  I have learned through experiences in my life when I have relied upon people they have all too often let me down. In some cases taken great pleasure in attempting to bring me down and destroy me or pieces of who God designed me to be.  So I have learned to be resourceful, take care of it myself, or suck it up, hurt and do without it.  Now I am not saying I am right, nor am I advocating this stance, because not all people are the same, I have come to know that.  Over the last four months, I have been in school, God has had me in change your thinking 101.  He has been teaching me about reliance, and trusting Him and allowing people access to different parts of my life that I deemed off limits.  He is retraining my thinking and my posture because He sent someone into my life that helps me trust and encourages me to lean on and need him.  I am finding this is an area that God had to send someone that literally had to pry my fingers open and talk and pray me through letting go of being in a posture that I don’t need anyone I can do it myself.  I know people now, that when people do not function in their lives as they “think” they should or in a little box that they have checked in the friend or relationship category they walk away from friendships, and relationships, detaching them, as if they were a bra that no longer suited their taste. 

These attitudes and mindsets are things that God is trying to get us to discard, but for many of us it is going to take God telling us, if we don’t change our thinking that has led to specific attitude and behaviors that we have no part of Him.  Many of us lack the understanding that God is trying to clean us up, He is trying to get us closer to Him and thinking more like Him, but instead we are so busy holding on to past hurts, words that people have whispered in our ears that validate our pain, instead of going to God and praying that God gives us peace, understanding, and that His great and abounding love abide over us and in us.  Many of us, just like me, have held on to things in the name of protecting ourselves and taking care of ourselves.  Our society places so much emphasis on being independent, but when God established mankind, he wanted us to rely upon one another, to love in a way that generated reliance to some degree. But many times it is our thinking that gets in the way; it is our attitude that holds us back from healthy relationships and changing or abiding in the place God wants us to, with people.  For some others it is the company we keep and who we are listening to that inspires us to be out of God’s will.  We allow people that are unqualified because they are speaking out of their own pain and insecurity to speak into our situation.  They get us drinking the Kool-Aid, and buying into the hype of drama and confusion that really isn’t drama and confusion.  Then one day they get upset because we don’t check their friendship relationship box, or follow the rules that they “think” are appropriate and then we are out there, because we pushed others away based on their validation of our situations, and then the one thing that we tried to protect ourselves from we are abiding in, rejection, loneliness, pain misuse and discomfort.

I love the song in the movie the Color Purple, “God Is Trying To Tell You Something.”  And it is true that He is trying to tell you something RIGHT NOW, that will have great impact on your life and the way you live it, but it is always our choice to hear Him and act upon it, or stay in the same mindset and posture we have been in.  But just like Peter when Jesus went to wash His feet, if He had stayed of the mentality that Jesus should not wash His feet, He would have missed being a part of God’s plan, and the greater works that God had planned for Him.  The one thing that God reminds me of periodically is that we cannot serve two Masters, one we will love and the other we will hate.  One we will serve in diligence and the other we will neglect to serve. We cannot say that we love God with our mouths and cry out to Him when we are in trouble and live according to our flesh, our own mindsets, our friends’ words and expect Him to answer and expect that we will still reap the blessings and favor of God upon our lives.  We need to Let Go of the noise and chatter of idle words spoken to inspire mess and mindsets that are negative and destructive and Let God change us from the inside out; in order that our hearts and lives are truly changed for the better, not a temporary fix, nor a temporary solution to what may feel good or look like a great solution to us, but one that follows what God requires of us and who He is encouraging us to be!  Stop holding on to things that are holding you back from the will of God, it will only help you to grow from love and progress into the man or woman that God intends!  Love covers a multitude of sin…Psalms 119:165 says, “Great peace have they who love Your law; nothing shall offend them or make them stumble.”  If we are stumbling, falling offended and hurt, chances are we are not loving God’s word and living in His will! I’m just saying!