Words Of Encouragement For Your Day (Thursday 05/31/2012)

When Ordinary Just Won’t Do Because It Is The Uncommon That God is Looking For

Luke 7:2-10 Amplified Bible (AMP)

² Now a centurion had a bond servant who was held in honor and highly valued by him, who was sick and at the point of death.³ And when the centurion heard of Jesus, he sent some Jewish elders to Him, requesting Him to come and make his bond servant well.⁴ And when they reached Jesus, they begged Him earnestly, saying, He is worthy that You should do this for him,⁵ For he loves our nation and he built us our synagogue [at his own expense].⁶ And Jesus went with them. But when He was not far from the house, the centurion sent [some] friends to Him, saying, Lord, do not trouble [Yourself], for I am not ^[a]sufficiently worthy to have You come under my roof;⁷ Neither did I consider myself worthy to come to You. But [just] speak a word, and my servant boy will be healed.⁸ For I also am a man [daily] subject to authority, with soldiers under me. And I say to one, Go, and he goes; and to another, Come, and he comes; and to my bond servant, Do this, and he does it.⁹ Now when Jesus heard this, He marveled at him, and He turned and said to the crowd that followed Him, I tell you, not even in [all] Israel have I found such great faith [as this].¹⁰ And when the messengers who had been sent returned to the house, they found the bond servant ^[b]who had been ill quite well again.

            I woke up in the middle of the night, finding myself reeling with thought about so many things, and how we would be able to accomplish these particular things.  I found myself feeling anxious and feeling almost overwhelmed, and then the Holy Spirit reminded me, “Without faith it is impossible to please God,” (Hebrews 11:6) and God will only more when we have faith, that is focused and solution motivated, not problem centered or focused.  I began again to pray and I felt a calm wash over me, as I communicated with God, asking Him to intervene in situations in our lives and in the lives of so many that we know.  This time when I prayed I did not fret because in those previous moments I remembered it is not about my ability to make things to happen, it is about God’s ability and my faith in Him to cause things to be as they are supposed to be and in the divine order of His Kingdom.

            My husband and I have noticed that ordinary just won’t do in our pursuit of God here of recent, to accomplish, handle and do all of the things that God is asking of us, we have to maintain a focus, and a connection with Him that we had not thought we needed before.  We have also noticed that we cannot be the ordinary. I don’t mean outwardly, but in our inward being.  Our attitudes, behaviors, thoughts and even our words have to be filled with the Word of God and based upon Kingdom principles.  I am far from saying we are so serious all of the time (Hardly), but I am saying that we are conscious of what we think, allow to come out of our mouths and how we treat people.  I think sometimes people think that we can remain doing “us,” in the same way we have always, expecting God to move for us, in us and through us; providing us with blessings, His power, authority and wisdom, but not requiring us to change anything we are doing to include those we allow to fill out time, space and company, that is further from the truth.  For some of us, we come into the understanding that God is looking for the ordinary to become extraordinary, and uncommon, He is looking for us to become someone that will not conform to what the world says in normal, like John the Baptist.  Then there are the remainders of us that have to go through the Damascus road experience.  We have to be knocked off our high horse and find ourselves on the ground blind and lacking the abilities we once had for God to be able to get into our space to change us, speak to us and for us to understand that our life in Christ is no longer business as usual, but it requires the uncommon commitment, sacrifice and perspective.  God wants us to understand that coming out from among “them,” and becoming separate, touching no unclean thing and allowing Him to truly become a Father to us (2 Corinthians 6:17), is not a bad thing but it is the thing that allows us to sit in Heavenly places and to find favor, and God’s blessings because God understands He can trust us and now wants to entrust things, people and places us.

            How common have you allowed your walk with God to become?  Has complacency and leaning back on what you think is okay become the practice of your life, instead of allowing God true access and authority to change your heart, thinking, behaving speaking and living?  God wants you to surrender the ordinary to Him so He can cause it to become the extraordinary.  God is looking for us to walk in uncommon integrity and obedience to His word, in order for Him to provide us with uncommon favor.  It is when we realize that not everyone is blessed the same way, because not everyone acts, submits and lives the same way, we will understand why the uncommon moves the heart of God!

Words Of Encouragement For Your Day (Wednesday 05/30/2012)

Don’t Even Realize How Good You Have It

Philippians 4:4-12 Amplified Bible (AMP)

⁴ Rejoice in the Lord always [delight, gladden yourselves in Him]; again I say, Rejoice! ⁵ Let all men know and perceive and recognize your unselfishness (your considerateness, your forbearing spirit). The Lord is near [He is coming soon].⁶ Do not fret or have any anxiety about anything, but in every circumstance and in everything, by prayer and petition (definite requests), with thanksgiving, continue to make your wants known to God.⁷ And God’s peace [shall be yours, that tranquil state of a soul assured of its salvation through Christ, and so fearing nothing from God and being content with its earthly lot of whatever sort that is, that peace] which transcends all understanding shall garrison and mount guard over your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.⁸ For the rest, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is worthy of reverence and is honorable and seemly, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely and lovable, whatever is kind and winsome and gracious, if there is any virtue and excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think on and weigh and take account of these things [fix your minds on them].⁹ Practice what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and model your way of living on it, and the God of peace (of untroubled, undisturbed well-being) will be with you. ¹⁰ I was made very happy in the Lord that now you have revived your interest in my welfare after so long a time; you were indeed thinking of me, but you had no opportunity to show it.¹¹ Not that I am implying that I was in any personal want, for I have learned how to be content (satisfied to the point where I am not disturbed or disquieted) in whatever state I am.¹² I know how to be abased and live humbly in straitened circumstances, and I know also how to enjoy plenty and live in abundance. I have learned in any and all circumstances the secret of facing every situation, whether well-fed or going hungry, having a sufficiency and enough to spare or going without and being in want.

            I have been extremely tired recently, but in the place that I am presently I am learning not to complain, why because I have realized that living through certain seasons in my life, my life could be vastly different and so much worse.  Even with many of the struggles I experience now, I am learning to pray, walk and live in faith and keep it moving, because I realize how good I actually have it.  One of the things that I tell me young adults when they get into a place of “what they don’t have, can’t afford or their friends are acting crazy,” I will graciously remind them, their lives could be so much worse. I remind them of the children I saw living on the streets in Panama. The record numbers of homeless people in Hawaii (Paradise of all places), and all those who do not have the opportunities that they have and been afforded. I remind them it may not be perfect but they are blessed!

            We have become a nation and generation of complainers and soft individuals that cannot handle adversity in the least; we have come to a place where we think we should be comfortable all the time at every cost with little work or effort.  Our work ethic is horrible, we want things our way all the time and when we don’t get it, our frustration will lead us to a barrage of complaints and attitudes in an effort to make people pay for our discomfort.  Or we just begin to throw a tantrum because life isn’t giving us what we want.  We vow to treat people as they treat us instead of understanding that God requires us to live according to His Word regardless of what people do or do not do.  We have turned to complaining about everything instead of understanding that we should feel blessed to be alive, have a home, food on our plates, family to come home to and love to experience.  I am by no means saying that life does not become challenging and difficult, but, the word of God reminds us to give thanks in ALL THINGS. Paul wrote that he learned to be content in whatever state he found himself in.  God’s word also reminds us that in our lives we will experience trial, but there is a purpose and that purpose is in the development of character, hope, and perseverance.  But that is a part of many of our issues is that we just want it our way, without having to develop any self-control, humility, submission or character.

            Even when we are so blessed we find a way to see what we don’t have.  Even when we have a home, a family and we are healthy we find a way to miss all that we do have and all that we should be grateful for, to focus on what is missing, what is absent and we do not have the ability to obtain presently.  My Grandmother even when she had to raise five children alone after losing her husband tragically, still proclaimed the Lord was good and He was a good God who had blessed her with so much.  My mother the day, my father passed away, was not looking at her lose she was looking at how blessed she had been to share a total of fifty four years with my father.  We have a choice, in everything that we do and in everything that we experience to see the blessings of the Lord and how faithful He has been, or to complain about all we are not getting our way in and all that we feel that we still may need and want.  If we would only choose to look to the Word of God for our responses and to learn to live in the world and not of it, we would be in a place of find ourselves seeing the truth of how Blessed we really are. If we would look to Philippians 4: 5 in order to understand how we should operate and the attitude we should exhibit towards others, we would stop being self-serving, selfish and lacking humility.  We would understand that we are blessed  and are created with a purpose and unto good works, and not unto complaints, whining and just be mean because we are not in a place that we want to be.  We need to pray to see with new eyes, the eyes of Christ that show us the truth of our situation. It is time to take the blinders off and see what God has truly and really blessed us with!

Words Of Encouragement For Your Day (Tuesday 05/29/2012)

Moving All The Way In

Revelation 3:20-21 Amplified Bible (AMP)

²⁰ Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears and listens to and heeds My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will eat with him, and he [will eat] with Me.²¹ He who overcomes (is victorious), I will grant him to sit beside Me on My throne, as I Myself overcame (was victorious) and sat down beside My Father on His throne.

            This weekend we took what we call a quick turn trip to New York, no it wasn’t a shopping trip or about “Fleet week,” a holiday or sightseeing trip. It was about getting my mother to see her sister and finally moving my husband to Virginia.  Many of you, who know us, are probably saying I thought he already lived in Virginia, he does, but the way he moved was quick, fast in a hurry and he left almost everything in New York, and moved to Virginia with two suitcases and a few boxes.  Because my father at the time was in the hospital and he was hired quickly, the move was done quickly and without us really moving him in because of the circumstances.  I have been feeling he was still living in New York and here because most of things that he loved and valued were in New York, but he chooses the importance of his new family and being here to support over things.  Now was the time for him to fully move so that he could be present, because his presence has a lot to do with his ability to fully minister and fully abide.

            It is funny that we don’t move God fully in; we keep Him on the outside or we don’t allow Him full access into our lives, and so He doesn’t abide with us fully, and He is not allowed to minister to us fully.  We won’t allow God to move all the way into our lives and homes because we fear what He may see, find and we fear even more what He may ask us to change or give up.  The craziest thing is we seem to forget God is not limited in His access to our lives like man is. He knows what we are up to anyway.  We think that if we don’t open the door to Him, fix up a room for Him or give Him full access to our home that we don’t have to change our thinking, behaving or life in any way shape or form, because He won’t know. How wrong we are, trust me He knows… I love God because He is not one that will force us to do anything that we don’t want to do, He gave us free will which always allows us to choose, His way or ours, His will or our own.  Then we can’t blame Him, for our bad choices although many of us try to anyway.  When we move God all the way, we allow the Holy Spirit to become our QA (quality assurance).  When we open the door to God we open the door to all that He has access to and all that He possess, but we have to be aware that He has access to all of us as well, and Him moving in, exposes all that we possess good and not so good and He will have access to all that we possess.

Just as my husband moving in He feels fully apart and I feel he is fully apart.  He has His instruments to make music and that is his worship which connects him to God and more fully places him in God’s presence; allowing God to fully move in allows Him to connect with us, be a part of us and connect with us on a deeper level, a more intimate level.  Just as we sorted through the things my husband left in New York, packed him up to fully move him in, I began to know him more and to understand the depth of who he is; when God moves in He will know us and see us for who we really are and we will be able to truly identify where we stand with Him and how well we really know Him. Do you want a full measure of God or just a partial portion, the choice is always ours to make!

Words Of Encouragement For Your Day (Thursday 05/24/2012)

The Only Drawing You Are Doing Is On A Piece Of Paper

James 4:6-10 New King James Version (NKJV)

⁶ But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.” ⁷ Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. ⁸ Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹ Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.

     I study a lot about relationships and how we interact within them, what is healthy and what can lead to unhealthy behaviors within them.  Each time I discover something new, I discover how much work I have to do within all of my relationships especially when it comes to my fellowship with God.  I used to think if I prayed, went to church read my Bible and was relatively nice to people and tried my hardest to exhibit obedience that I was in like Flynn.  Boy did I discover that there is so much more that we miss when it comes to God, especially when it comes to drawing near to Him.  Most of us, like me, are filling in blanks and checking off boxes, but we are not drawing on anything but a piece of paper because we are too busy accounting for all that we already do; we are scheduling God in around what we are already committed to do thinking that because it is something God that it pleases God.  This is not necessarily true.

     We are missing what God is really asking of us, when He is asking us to draw near, He asking for us to understand where we are in relationship to Him, and understand what is inside of us, what our real motives are and to get to a place of humility, because we understand that we have not arrived, and it is going to take only God to get us where we need to be.  Our Bishop said something in Bible study last night that blew my mind; He said God does not have tolerance for toxic relationships.  God is the one who initiated relationship with us, it reminds us in Jeremiah 31:3 and Psalms 31:21 that in loving kindness He draws us.  But relationships are never meant to be one sided, they are meant to have balance, (although, most of us understand that we will probably never love God the way that He loves us, but we can surely try).  It is then we are supposed to continually draw near to God, having an understanding that we are in need of something He is in great possession of Grace, Mercy and His love.  It is our ability to draw near to God in humility that drives out pride and haughtiness, it drives out self-serving behaviors and worldly focus. The closer we get to anyone the more vulnerable we are and the more open we are and the more sensitive we become.  Many of us don’t want to get that close to God because we fear, what might happen or what it is that this type of closeness will do to us, what God will show us about ourselves, or the people we keep company with or heaven forbid He allows us to see our focus is off.  When we draw near to God we draw near and receive revelation, insight and abilities that we do not possess without God and without the grace that is provided by becoming close to Him.

            We want so much, and so many of us are drawing our own plans and mapping out our own lives, neglecting the most important drawing we can do, which is the drawing close to God through Christ Jesus, and allowing the Holy Spirit access to provide us grace but to also provide us conviction, direction and humility to understand that we need God and that all that we do should be centered around that one relationship. If we draw near to God He will continue to draw near to us, because the closer we get to Him the more we can see how much more of Him we need and how much more we need to do to keep our relationship with Him from becoming one that He would spew out of His mouth.

Words Of Encouragement For Your Day (Wednesday 05/23/2012)

You Mean It’s Not About Me

Romans 15:1-4 Amplified Bible (AMP)

15 We who are strong [in our convictions and of robust faith] ought to bear with the failings and the frailties and the tender scruples of the weak; [we ought to help carry the doubts and qualms of others] and not to please ourselves.² Let each one of us make it a practice to please (make happy) his neighbor for his good and for his true welfare, to edify him [to strengthen him and build him up spiritually].³ For Christ did not please Himself [gave no thought to His own interests]; but, as it is written, The reproaches and abuses of those who reproached and abused you fell on Me. ⁴ For whatever was thus written in former days was written for our instruction, that by [our steadfast and patient] endurance and the encouragement [drawn] from the Scriptures we might hold fast to and cherish hope.

            Our mind has convinced us that where we are, what we have, what we do and how we live is about us.  It is not just our mindset and thinking that has convinced us, but society rarely sends a message that we have a civic or social responsibility, and it definitely does not speak of a spiritual or Christian responsibility.  It has become about who we are, what we want and how we see the world, even when our vantage point is not clear, or we do not have the wisdom or knowledge to assess it correctly.  More importantly we are leaving out what God asks of us in the instructions that He has given us that pertain to life. 

In a study that I read over a year’s time period only 75 percent of individual’s living in the United States read passages from the Bible during the year, but only 27 percent referenced reading God’s word daily.  How can we follow a blue print that we rarely look at?  How can we know what God desires from us, if we rarely reference what He gave us to guide our lives and our living?  Selfishness and becoming our own God is a large part the challenges to us being able to see anyone or their needs beside our own.  We can see the evidence of this when we look at the things that we focus on and our aspirations.  We can see it manifesting itself worse in each subsequent generation and how they live.  We can see it in the way we indulge ourselves and lack the self-discipline.  We can see it in the divorce rate and in the amount of abortions, and children sent to foster care, or taken out of the home for neglect.  We can see it in the high rates of elder abuse, and neglect.  We can see it plainly in all who choose not to honor our parents, because we are focused on getting ours.  How sad is it when we can look to the church for the biggest, scandals, controversies and drama.  We have not taken up our cross to follow Christ instead we have chosen to use the church as a ways to a means to get what we can, to get God to bless us with more, to become famous and obtain power; not to help anyone, but for ourselves; in order for us to say look at what I have, look at what I have achieved.  I remember my mother telling me years ago, that the happiest years of her marriage were when her and my father had little but they shared all that they had with others. They sowed into people, cooked for them, gave them a place to stay; they bore the infirmities of the weak.  Their focus was on loving God, pleasing Him and ensuring that love was shared with others.  As a result of their living in this manner God blessed them.

By no means am I saying that we should be poor, or that we are somehow better when we have little to nothing, but what is being said is, are we taking care of someone else? Are we paying it forward?  Have our blessings become a blessing for someone else?  Are we humbling ourselves to God, and His word to do His will, towards others, or are we too focused on us to see anything else?  Are we so busy being our own man or woman, have we left God and what He has asked us to do in concern to others behind us, or have we laid it to the side, to be alright with ourselves, and to satisfy our flesh?  God does not give us strength, power, position, possessions and resources for us alone, He clearly asks us to do, care, bear with and strengthen others weaker, and in a worse place than we are.  But instead we have often adopted I had to work to get mine, or I got mine, you can get yours.  Our life has become our own, and separated from the Word of God and relationship with God.  It is God’s desire and His command that we do more with our lives than just live it for ourselves; the question is, are you willing?