WE HAVE A PROMISE

2 Cor. 1:20

For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.


How exciting is that!! ALL His promises are Yes and Amen! There have been times that my kids have asked me for something or to do something for them and being the caring mom I "promised" to do said thing. Then things happen, circumstances change, time constrictions arise and I have accidentally broken my promise. Boy, do they let me hear it too. "You promised!" they'll whine at me. I always feel really bad that I let them down even if it was out of my hands. The beauty of this scripture is our Heavenly Father has already said YES! All His promises are Yes and He can't break a promise! If we want to please and help our own kids how much more does He want to help us. How sad He must feel when we move out of faith while waiting on a promise from Him. He's probably saying something like " don't go darling, I have a wonderful plan for you. I already promised to feed your family, and the job your husband lost, don't worry I have something awesome coming next week. I know you haven't been feeling well, that's why I sent my Son, He took that sickness with Him so go ahead let Him have it and I have worked everything out and you're going to be feeling better soon. Your kids are going to be fine! I remember the day they arrived to you. How wonderful it was! You commited them to Me and I promise I'll take care of them, don't worry. Darling, please don't go, just hang in there, I've already taken care of everything and it's going to be awesome! You really don't want to miss what I am going to do for you!" How wonderful He is!! We have a promise from our Father and He never lies. We just need to find our promise and hold on with everything we have.

If it's a financial need hold on to Phil 4:19. God promises to supply all our needs.

If it's relational problems hold on to Prov 3:5,6. He promises if we trust in Him He will direct our paths.

If it's healing you need hold onto 1 Pet 2:24. He promises we WERE healed.

If it's peace you need, hold onto Phil 4:6,7. He promises a peace that surpasses all understanding.

What ever it is we need He has made a way and there is a promise to back it up. We just need to find our promise and hold on until we see it manifest in our lives. We need to be listening for that still small voice saying " Hold on darling, I promise it's going to be awesome!"

2 Kings 7:3,4

Now there were four leprous men at the entrance of the gate; and they said to one another, "why are we sitting here until we die? If we say, 'we will enter the city,' the famine is in the city, and we shall die there. And if we sit here, we die also. Now therefore,come, let us surrender to the army of the Syrians. If they keep us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall only die."


Pastor Josh was teaching about getting through sensesless seasons. I have been definitely going through a senseless season. Nothing in my life has made much sense to me lately. This lesson helped me so much. Pastor listed 5 things we can do to get through these seasons and the one that struck me the most was don't just sit there and take it, move! The men mentioned in the scripture decided to move! They weren't going to just lay there and die anymore, they were going to get up and do something. The outcome of the something didn't really matter too much. The men did weigh there options, picked the most reasonable one and went with it. The point is they DID SOMETHING! I feel very inspired today to learn from this lesson and get moving. I know I try to rationalize everything. I want to figure everything out. Weigh my options, plan the steps and make sure there are no surprises. I am learning God doesn't work like that. He responds to faith and faith is taking that blind step and trusting you aren't going to fall. We serve a good God and He only wants whats best for His children. He has a good plan for my life, a plan where I walk in the victory His son died for. Now I need to stop asking why, trust Him and get MOVING! HALLELUJAH!!!

PLANTING SEED

Psalm 19:14

Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, o Lord, my strength and my Reedemer.

I have been thinking about planting seed lately. I always tend to limit my thinking to financial seed. Probably because that seems to be the biggest need sometimes. This scripture made me think past that and about the seed we plant with our words and our thoughts. I asked myself would the words of my mouth and my thoughts be acceptable to God. The answer I got was a huge NO! I have been extremely selfish in my thinking lately and I am sure that has made its way out of my mouth too many times. Today is a new day! My prayer today is for the Holy Spirit to help me control the words I say and the things I allow myself to meditate on. I want to speak words of encouragement to my children and not always words of critizism and complaint. I want to speak words full of energy and happiness to my husband instead of complaining how hard my day was and how tired I am. I want to be able to speak words of wisdom and support to my friends instead of hearing and feeling there pain and finding myself struggling to figure out what to say. I want people to hear Jesus and see Jesus not me. This all begins with the words we speak and the things we allow our minds to meditate on. Thankfully we don't have to do this on our own. If that were the case we would be hopelessly sunk. This scripture reminds us that Jesus is our strenght and reedemer. We don't have to go it alone, we couldn't go it alone and be successful in controling our words and thoughts. We need to pull our strenth from the Lord and be constantly depending on Him and listening for His guidance and correction. We need to be quick to repent and quick to seek Him so He can redeem us and pull us out of whatever mess we are in. It's in that place of redemption that we will be acceptable in His sight. So I am going to continue listening for that still small voice, being obedient, and doing my best to live a life that my Father will find pleasing and acceptable in His sight! I am precious to Him and this is the least I can do for all He has done for me. He is so worthy!!! Let's continue planting seed to glorify Jesus and rest in the harvest we will recieve!

I AM FREE!!!!!!

John 8:36

Therefore if the Son makes you free, you shall be free indeed.

I AM FREE! I am shouting from the rooftops, I am rejoicing and praising my King! I AM FREE!
I have been set free from the bondage of depression. I have been set free from the yoke of despair the devil had on my life. I am set free from the lies and deceptions the devil has put in my heart. I AM FREE! Jesus has destroyed the blanket of darkness that had swallowed my life!

I AM FREE TO RUN
IAM FREE TO DANCE
I AM FREE TO LIVE FOR JESUS
I....AM......FREE!!
THE DEVIL IS A LIAR
THE DEVIL HAS NO HOLD ON ME
JESUS IS KING
HE IS MY SAVIOR
HE IS MY STRENGTH
HE IS MY COMFORTER
HE IS MY PATIENCE
HE IS MY JOY
HE IS MY LOVE
HE IS MY PEACE
HE IS MY LIFE
HE IS MY REDEEMER
HE IS MY STRONGTOWER
HE IS MY SAFE PLACE
HE IS THE LAMP TO MY PATH
HE IS THE GREAT I AM


all i can say today is I AM FREE!

TO BE NEAR GOD

James 4:8-10

Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double minded. Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.

More choices. Reading this scripture, I see that again I have a choice to make. It says draw near to God, not do nothing but cry and complain and God will notice and just simply draw you in and make everything ok. Wouldn't that be easier? But God created us on purpose with a free will and this is another example where He wants us to use it and make a choice to draw near to Him. Well, I have not done a very good job of this lately. I have allowed the devil to wreak havoc in my life and fill my head with lies. I've allowed him to convince me I am worthless, useless, unloved, slow, sick, old and just worn out. I have allowed at first seemingly small sins to creep into my life. Pride, jeoulosy, covetousness, grumbling, complaining. I have allowed myself to be decieved. But God is so good and His grace and mercy are new for me everyday! The Holy Spirit has lovingly shown me this scripture to show me I don't have to allow these deceptions to control my life, I just need to make a choice. I need to choose to draw near to God. I need to be intentional about it, live life on purpose. As I have made my choice to draw near to my God He is drawing me near to Him and tucking me in His secret place of love and protection and He is thankfully helping me close the door to the sin in my life.
The other choice I need to make is to cleanse my hands of my sins and purify my heart. I need to do this. God will surely help me when I ask but He will not just take that sin out of my life. I need to turn away from it and like the scripture says draw near Him. Near Him is the only place He can rescue me and keep me safe. I need to cry over what I've done and how I have sinned against my God and my brothers and sisters in Christ. I need to feel true sorrow and I need to feel broken. That's how I need to go to the cross, broken. That brokeness is beautiful in the eyes of my God and it will only be there, at the foot of the cross, broken and humbled that He will be able to start picking me up and putting me back together. I am so thankful that His eyes are always searching for me and He'll never stop loving me nor will He ever leave me broken. He is so worthy!!!!

CHOOSING PATIENCE

colossians 3:12,13

Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you must also do.

So many things about this piece of scripture really touched me today. First, we are the elect of God, holy and beloved. We made a choice as believers to believe in Jesus as our personal savior. Now we are finding that we need to make a choice to put on all these things God has listed here for us. I am being reminded that like salvation this is a choice and we can choose to be obedient and follow these traits or we can choose to ignore this and put on our fleshly carnal traits. For me this has been a tough revelation. I have been struggling with my flesh a great deal lately. I have fallen into allowing myself to be controlled by my feelings rather than by my spirit. I have been saying for along time now,"my patience has run out." What an awful thing to say! The Holy Spirit has reminded me that I as a believer have the fruits of the Spirit inside of me which includes longsuffering, self-control, gentleness among others. As a believer I have Christ living on the inside of me and the Holy Spirit so the fruits of the Spirit are going to manifest in my life if I am following His leading. So by my saying I am out of patience or joy or peace is like saying Jesus is out of patience, joy and peace. He is the same yesterday, today and forever. He is and always will be. He is the great I AM! Jesus can never run out of patience so as long as I am walking with Him and He is my source I can never be without a source to refill my patience, joy, longsuffering, self-control. My being without is a choice and never His fault, He never changes, I just need to remeber where my source is and seek that first! I am so thankful for His grace and mercy and that I have a choice to follow Him everyday! So lets choose to put on these beautiful traits and wear them proudly for our Savior and live everyday to glorify Him!

UPDATE

just to keep everyone up to date ... i had to take my 8 yr old to the drs for her tonsils today. they have suggested surgery as we all knew and we have the date scheduled for feb 20. we are still believing that we are going to see God's hand move in this. we have three weeks to see what wonderful blessing He has for us. i am so thankful that no matter what happens He will protect my sweet little girl and he will give us peace and the strength to do what ever it is we'll need to do. He is truly an awesome God! well enough on that for tonight....i am also excited to report that we recieved another small financial blessing in the mail today..we somehow overpaid on a drs bill and the sent us a check for $30. so i am going to use that blessing to start my new grocery shopping plan. i am going to really start utilizing coupons and our grocery store sales to start stocking up on things we use often. my hope is that in time i will essentially be able to "shop" my pantry instead of scrambling every week to make a trip to wal-mart for groceries. so hopefully this plan will work and now i have a little extra cash to get it started, i am soooo excited. so wish me happy shopping:) on that note my sweet bundles of joy are sleeping soundly, dh is on an erand trip to town and my chair and knitting needles are whispering my name...have a blessed day:)