A brother offended is harder to be won than a strong city,

And contentions are like the bars of a citadel.

Proverbs 18:19

I keep asking God is this selfishness? Am I overreacting? Is this illegitimate hurt? Why has this stung to the core of my very being? Dear God, don’t allow my heart to grow hard…

I have never wanted to recluse so bad in my entire life. The introvert in me is at level highest ever. The walls of protection around my heart are not being built with straw, but strong concrete blocks… something that the big bad wolf that threatens to destroy all the faith that I had ever placed in friendship could never huff and puff and blow down.

This doesn’t seem to sting my father, but it stings me deep. It stings with the wrath of a hornets nest, no, more like a tracker jacker’s nest. Because it has made me utter delusional. Delusional that I keep going back. I keep looking, hoping maybe I have missed something… may it’s not what it appears. Maybe they just didn’t care to send cards or hope our way, but they are sending them to him.

We consoled ourselves with the reality that the others didn’t worship there. They just don’t see them, life gets busy, Sunday is busy. Of course it just slips their mind. They care, surely they are praying with us, for them, for us…

I could handle all the rest. I could. I could justify the lack. It’s me and Jesus. I got that. I do. Our expectations were too high. I get that. Whenever you expect anything you will be let down. Expect nothing and even the three cards will be enough… right. Three cards… three. That’s it. Three cards since May. Three cards and one gift of a book and a hand made blanket. 

Tell me. Please someone tell me. How can anyone expect me to worship in a place where no one wears white. 

There is an appointed time for everything.

And there is a time for every event under heaven…

Ecclesiastes 3:1

When is it okay to share publicly how excited you are to once again attend church when that church is a new church? The joy that has been restored to our souls has nothing to do with being coddled by the people or entertained by the stage show. The joy is from the Lord.

As we entered the doors of this new place God met us there. The Sunday School lessons, the music within the service, the message of the Pastor, the Wednesday night classes, the parent/youth meeting that shared the vision and goal of the youth ministry for the year and encouraged the parents to participate in the church life of their children including discipleship classes that were geared to train and equip parents to disciple their own children and to build relationships with them during this most difficult time of their lives. The youth activity list which consisted of only 4 activities off campus all the way through February. I could go on and on…

My husband and I just sat there giddy, elbowing each other and smiling, because this was everything we had been looking for in consideration of our family.

We walked out one Sunday and the deacons of the church were serving the widows lunch. I have yet to see one woman walk around hauling tables, boxes, or garbage while grown men sat and watched. If water spills over from the sink onto the counter in the ladies bathroom, the ladies there don’t leave it to soak the next ladies clothes… they dry it up before they toss their paper towels in the garbage. These things may seem trivial but they speak volumes to us.

Even at the church where I am serving as the Weekday Education Director. If I need tables moved the men do it. The cleaning ladies come and clean the floors and bathrooms every morning before our preschool begins and they come every evening to check on things. I am able to to do my job with joy because those who are supposed to be doing their job… do it.

Last Sunday as I sat and listened to the Word being shared from the pulpit I simply took a deep breathe in and breathed out while my heart said, “the soil is good.” I have realized that my families feet had been trying to suck nutrients out of soil that simply had no life in it for us anymore. As a matter of fact the soil was actually sucking what life we had out of us to feed itself instead of supplying life to us.  There no longer was any even exchange, no circular motion of photosynthesis. It simply was time for us to be replanted.

It is as the Lord God breathed the words through Solomon in the book of Ecclesiastes, there is an appointed time for everything…

A time to plant and a time to uproot what is planted.

(Ecclesiastes 3:2)

Trust me I know all the reasons why not to change churches. I have written about it, Hurt By The Church, read books and blogs about it, and counseled others on it. I have the same issues as any believer would with those who simply church hop to keep from becoming involved or committed. My husband and I were in this place several years ago and as we visited other churches seeing if the Lord was moving us, it just didn’t sit well. My husband explained it as, “it felt like we were cheating on our spouse.”

As we visited and prayed and were actually getting ready one Sunday morning for a first time second visit we heard from God. I was in the shower and my husband was driving home from a night shift. God spoke to both of us, even though we were in separate places, we both clearly knew that God had told us to stay put, but not to stay silent.

My husband came in the door and we shared our experience with one another and then he got ready and left to meet with our Pastor and I began a full force leap into the Children’s Ministry. God actually used the places we had visited to educate me into what I needed to do in that ministry.  We obeyed God and we stayed.

This time when we visited… well, actually we felt called before we visited. The visiting simply was for seeking confirmation. Fifteen years ago, when we walked into the church that we used to attend, it immediately felt like home… and now once again we have walked into a church and it feels like home. The Lord has met us there time after time and spoken through the messages and the people… it’s been both encouraging and liberating.

A pastor can feel called to leave a church and no one questions it… but there is blog after blog by pastor’s about how horrible and devastating and cruel and childish it is for members to leave, as if the pastor is the only one who can be called of God to serve somewhere else.

Not everyone leaves because of the color of the carpet, or which side the piano should go on, or whether or not the drums are too loud. Every once in a while there is indeed legitimate reasons, legitimate convictions, and legitimate hurts. No the church can’t please everyone, but mocking and becoming offended by the reasons they give instead of asking God if this is a valid claim that needs attention called to it… to me that’s arrogance.

Sometimes the Lord let’s the well run dry so that we will pack up and move on… we entered the doors of this new church broken, hungry, hurting, feeling absolutely abandoned and rejected. Today we walked in and I noticed this verse on the wall:

Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.

Matthew 11:28

There is light in my daughters eyes again. There is hope in my husbands. And there is laughter in mine. We don’t know yet what specific place in ministry we will have here, but that’s okay… right now we are in desperate need of being ministered too and we are finding that here. 

One of the hardest parts has been not attending church with my parents. I loved serving with my parents. I also miss the kids that I got to love on and teach the Word too and I miss encouraging their parents… but this missing is not as hard as watching the continual reminder of hurt scroll through my newsfeed. 

We have chosen to not post about about the encouraging moments we have experienced or “check in” at our new location… out of respect for those we still so love at our old church… but this time of silence is coming to a close. The Lord has moved us to another well, we have found Rehoboth, and we are ready to openly praise Him for it.

But when Isaac’s servants dug in the valley and found there a well of flowing water, the herdsmen of Gerar quarreled with the herdsmen of Isaac, saying, “The water is ours!” So he named the well Esek, because they contended with him. Then they dug another well, and they quarreled over it too, so he named it Sitnah. He moved away from there and dug another well, and they did not quarrel over it; so he named it Rehoboth, for he said, “At last the Lord has made room for us, and we will be fruitful in the land.” Then he went up from there to Beersheba. The Lord appeared to him the same night and said,

So he built an altar there and called upon the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there; and there Isaac’s servants dug a well.

Genesis 26:19-25

Moses said, “This will happen when the Lord gives you meat to eat in the evening, and bread to the full in the morning; for the Lord hears your grumblings which you grumble against Him. And what are we? Your grumblings are not against us but against the Lord.”

Exodus 16:8

I am in the midst of new study. This is my first Priscilla Shirer study. I’m a Precept girl so topical studies are usually not my choice, but my sister-in-law invited me to attend this new study that was starting at her church, which just so happened to be the church we felt the Lord leading us to… and well there is no “just so happeneds” with God. Since the first class the Lord has been drawing me out of myself… And each Sunday and Wednesday that we visited the Lord spoke directly to a place in our hearts and minds that needed desperately to hear from Him.

Just this past Sunday the Lord woke me up from my self proclaimed victim pity party… I was at my pinnacle of my pity party this past Saturday as I wrote, His Thoughts Are Not Our Thoughts. I mean there were tears and downcast of soul and I was done… again. The depression of oppression had fallen and settled in and as I just wanted Jesus. Just Jesus.

My joy cup was empty. So Sunday as I was getting ready for church I sat that morning before the Lord and I prayed… really prayed. In the shower I prayed… really prayed. I didn’t just go through the motions of prayer… I prayed.

I surrendered.

That morning the Lord spoke to me clearly in the Sunday School class we attended and then again clearly in the morning service… he spoke to every hurt of my heart. He reminded me that He knew and that He cared and that He forgave me.

In my study this week I read:

How can we make it successfully through our dry and dusty journey? We are covered by a cloud of God’s presence as we learned yesterday and we must also keep in mind that God will refresh us by a river of His provision. He will provide healing places and oases for us too. We will not always be engulfed with fatigue as we travel from one day to the next.
~ Priscilla Shirer 

You see the final straw for me had came when BCBS had denied my Daddy’s PET scan the Thursday before, placing a financial burden and cloud of doubt upon my Daddy who was already fighting for his life. I didn’t understand how God could allow these people in a building somewhere to overrule my Dad’s doctor. I could have personally choked President Obama and any other “political genius” who is behind all this “free” healthcare hoopla. You see the sovereignty of God is a double edged sword. You know God is in control so you know that God allowed it and you also know that God didn’t have to allow it. Sovereignty is hard to swallow sometimes… and this was one of those times.

However, Sunday morning I swallowed.

Sunday morning through the teaching and preaching of His Word I was washed, renewed, and my joy cup once again was beginning to fill… it was a good day.

Then Monday my Daddy went to the oncologist to have his chemo treatment. The oncologist told him that day that his numbers looked so good that he should only have to have one more chemo treatment. He will have that PET scan to confirm the numbers and then take only a thirty minute maintenance injection once every three weeks.

As this news sank into my heart I realized that had my Daddy had that PET scan the week before and that scan missed one single cancer cell he might not have had these last two chemo treatments and there just might have been that one cell that God could see that the PET scan would miss…

How easily we forget that God is in control when things are not going the way we think they should go. Yep, sovereignty is hard to swallow.

This past Monday night I wrote this on my Proven Path FB page…

There are those that have the ability to bring the sour out in me… and well the Lord has been too good to me and given me far too much for which to be thankful for me to be sour. 

My Daddy received the most amazing news ever today and a phone call that began as a praise session, I found myself turning it into a “gripe” session. My Daddy didn’t need my sour dump and my God most certainly deserved better in that moment.

It’s no secret I have been in an uncertain place… and yesterday in the midst of our Sunday School lesson I realized that I had taken on a mentality that grates my own nerves in others… the victim mentality. As I sat in class and the teacher discussed the victim mentality I heard my God clear as day speak to my heart and remind me that those in Christ are not victims, we are VICTORS. It was time for me to pick up my pallet and walk.

Yesterday was a good day…
Today was an even better day.
Tomorrow isn’t to be worried about.

Everything happens for a reason. Everything. People come and go out of our lives for a reason. There is a time for every season under the sun… every season. We will learn in summer to look forward to fall and in fall to prepare for winter and in winter to hope for spring… yet in each season we see the beauty of our Creator God and the ever present glory of His sustaining mercy and grace.

God is good. I am not so good… the only thing good about me is what He has brought to life in and through me. The more I get to know me… the less I like me and the more I sit in awe that He even tolerates me… much less loves me enough to reach down from the throne of the KIngdom of Heaven to lift me up out the depths of the pits of hell and then to actually take up residence within this decaying flesh… I mean… really?

When I begin to think that I have “put up” with a lot… I remember that God has put up with me. Twenty-four seven. No break. No time-outs. No vacations. I mean day and night, inside and out. When I think and speak sour words that are so foul they should be rotting my bones… He gently whispers sweet words flowing with milk and honey that brings healing to my soul.

Oh precious ones… do you know HIM? Oh, how I hope that you do! The God of do-overs is my God. His name is Jesus. Jehovah Saves. Just say His name… that sweet, sweet name.

God had just poured out glory on me and in a second I was complaining and grumbling again about things that no longer even concern me personally anymore. Then tonight in the class as Priscilla shared I was reminded of the verse in Exodus that begins this post…

Moses said, “This will happen when the Lord gives you meat to eat in the evening, and bread to the full in the morning; for the Lord hears your grumblings which you grumble against Him. And what are we? Your grumblings are not against us but against the Lord.”

Exodus 16:8

How quickly I find that I forget the goodness of God. How easily that I find that I forget that in the knowledge of His sovereignty the complaints that I make about or against others are really against my faithful sovereign Savior who is working all things for the good of those who love Him and are the called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28)

Tonight I was reminded that I am to be silent and let the Lord fight for me.

Tonight I was reminded that I am on a journey and the Lord will finish what He started in me.

Tonight I was reminded that neither cancer nor insurance companies are greater than my God.

Tonight I was reminded that God has me… and God has my Dad… and God has my Daddy-in-Law… and God has my Sis-in-Law… and God has our family right where He wants us.

When we know that we are not deliberately running away from God then the only other possibility is that we are on our way to where He is taking us… it just might not be the route we had planned. There are times that it seems we have the very cloud of His glory going before us clearly showing the way, but there are also times where the light has blinded us and darkness is all we can see, yet it’s still God’s will and way.

I will extol You, my God, O King,
And I will bless Your name forever and ever.
Every day I will bless You,
And I will praise Your name forever and ever.
Great is the Lord, and highly to be praised,
And His greatness is unsearchable.

Psalm 145:1-3

 
So what’s your problem?

Beloved of God be reminded that He is faithful… and He hears your cry… and He’s got you.

And there occurred such a sharp disagreement that they separated from one another, and Barnabas took Mark with him and sailed away to Cyprus.

Acts 15:39

The Greek word for sharp disagreement in this verse is paroksysmós and it means a provocation which literally jabs (cuts) someone so they “must” respond.

Barnabas and Paul had been serving together for years. Barnabas was the first one to stand up on behalf of Paul and say, hey this guy has been called of Christ, let him in and let him serve…

 While they were ministering to the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, “Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.” 

Acts 13:2

Paul and Barnabas served well together. They no doubt were quite comfortable with one another. They had known great success in their ministry together. As the book of Acts continues to share…

All the people kept silent, and they were listening to Barnabas and Paul as they were relating what signs and wonders God had done through them among the Gentiles.

Acts 15:12

These two were unstoppable. Together they reached out to the Jew and the Gentile. Together they watched many be saved and be filled with the Holy Spirit. Together they testified to the beautiful grace of God. They stayed in Antioch for many days… but there came a time for things to change. Paul’s heart began to stir and Paul said to Barnabas let’s go back over our old route and see how everyone is doing. 

Then came the change. Then came the paroksysmós, the provocation which literally jabs (cuts) someone so they “must” respond. 

As I sat last night entering into a committed study in a new church one of the facilitators of the study closed the lesson with the separation of Paul and Barnabas… supposedly caused by a conflict. Here is what I know, sometimes God creates a conflict to get us moving in a different direction.

My family begins the journey of leaving the place we have called home for over 14 years. The place where all of our girls were baptized. The place where we learned to study and proclaim the Word of God. The places where we have spent the majority of our days the past decade. The place that allowed us to teach and to learn and grow. The place where we met others who helped us through rebellious kids, sick kids, financial strain, and hard moments of marriage.

If I knew what divorce felt like… I would say this is pretty stinkin’ close.

The months and weeks and days that have brought us to this place have been beyond painful. The paroksysmós started coming and before we could recover from one another would hit harder and deeper and sting even longer. The confusion that comes in the midst of this is something that is hard to put into words. As you sit and lay it all out trying to decipher if this Satan trying to prevent a move of God or God allowing Satan to torment and sift so that you WILL MOVE with God is mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually draining.

As you begin to slowly loosen your grip on all that you have ever known you find yourself deciding to just keep clinging on to this one small part… but then comes the moments where it is like you are holding on with one hand and something like a sledge hammer slams down upon that hand and you can no longer hold on to anything at all… and you have to let go… because the pain is simply too great to be able to hang on.

In the letting go there comes the thought that you must justify to everyone all your legitimate reasons for letting go… we could make a list of the paroksysmós that we have experienced… but we don’t want anyone keeping a record of wrongs against us so we shall not do it to another. Our family is not in the business of tearing down the work of God… we have always tried to be those who built up and encouraged and helped bear the burdens of others.

So a new journey begins for our family. A new journey that we believe God Himself always had planned we just were not going to go easily… because who likes to leave the comfort of home and step into new seas that you have never swum… especially when you know that so many waters are infested with sharks and you know you could easily be devoured.

What if you step out of that boat and you all sink to destruction? What if the giants of the land defeat you?

But what if you step out and are able to walk on that water and find once again life and that sweet taste of honey?

For the first time in a long time my family came home from a service with peace… leaving better than we arrived.

The Lord will give strength to His people;

The Lord will bless His people with peace.

Psalm 29:11

What you might not know doesn’t matter. Because we can’t put it behind us and press forward to what lies ahead if we don’t forgive it and forget it, and we can’t forget it if we hold on to it to make a list of it to justify what we now clearly see as God’s leading. God knows we would have never went easy.

As Priscilla Shirer said in the video message last night… sometimes it is just time to walk down a different street. Each of us must decide if we want to go where God is leading.

There is song by Sidewalk Prophets that has been ringing in my ears for almost a year… as I struggled with so many questions and hurts… and I have sang it as a prayer and a cry… it still brings tears to my eyes and hope to my heart all at the same time.  Whatever His will. I lift my empty hands to Him. I need my King to have His way in me and in our family.

I am currently working on the 2014 Judgment Seat script. I have made it to the Judgement scene. This one is always the most terrifying to write because I am, in a way, putting words in God’s mouth. That makes me want to throw up just typing that. With that in mind, I desperately try to use direct Scripture that is not taken out of context. So as I opened up the Word this morning as I began specifically praying and pondering over the content of this scene I opened the Bible to Psalm 89…

Amazingly it fit the heart of the message that has been attempted to be conveyed through the life of one of the characters…

If his sons forsake My law
And do not walk in My judgments,
If they violate My statutes
And do not keep My commandments,
Then I will punish their transgression with the rod
And their iniquity with stripes.
“But I will not break off My lovingkindness from him,
Nor deal falsely in My faithfulness.
“My covenant I will not violate,
Nor will I alter the utterance of My lips.
“Once I have sworn by My holiness;
I will not lie…

Psalm 89:30-35

All things are possible with God and nothing is too difficult for Him, yet there are things that God will not do.

God will not lie.

God will not alter the words of His mouth.

God will not violate His covenants.

God will not be unfaithful to us.

God will not stop loving us.

There are no ifs, ands, or buts when it comes to some things with God. There are things that are non-negotiable and not up for discussion. There are some things that no matter what we do, and no matter what we say, God just simply will not do.

Once God has sworn by His holiness it’s a done deal.

He might take us to the woodshed. He might be silent while we live out the consequences of our choices, but once we are His… We. Are. His.

Beloved have you actually believed the lie that God has forsaken you because of the choices you have made? Do not be deceived and do not be afraid… come boldly to the throne of His grace and seek His mercy… and know that He will never, never, never, never ever forsake His own.

 

 

In not more than a few hours my husband and firstborn will continue their journey to Guatemala. I say continue because it began the moment they said, “Yes, Lord. Here am I, send me.” Of course, I suppose the truth be told, the journey truly began the moment the Lord breathed life into them.

My husband shared the other day that he really doesn’t know what or how God is going to use him while in Guatemala. He questioned, is he just there to smile and hand out shoes and say Jesus loves them, or is there more… what exactly is his job, his purpose for being a part of this mission.

He travels a lot. He has traveled the world from China to Portugal with his jobs, but in all those there was a plan. There was an objective and a set schedule and particular things to accomplish. However in an international mission trip, in the God business, that just simply is not the case. These are the things that we have no choice but to simply step out in obedience of faith and see what God is going to do as He chooses to do it. These are the times that we can’t look back and we can’t plan ahead. We simply have to live in the present, completely and totally abandoned in the present.

Trusting.

Anticipating.

Ready.

As I flipped through the psalms this morning seeking a prayer I was stopped here at Psalm 126:

Then our mouth was filled with laughter
And our tongue with joyful shouting;
Then they said among the nations,
“The Lord has done great things for them.”
The Lord has done great things for us;
We are glad.

Psalm 126:2-3

Will you join me in this prayer…

Oh Father,

We come before You now and we thank You for Your willingness to allow us to be a part of Your story. You are the Most High God and Creator and Sustainer of heaven and earth and You have no need for any of us, no reason to use us, no obligation to us in any way… yet You still choose to use us. Thank You, Father, thank you. We trust, Father, that You have already gone before them, that Your Spirit has already prepared the way… and so Father I lift up Patrick and Shelby and the entire mission team and pray that they would walk according to the path that You have laid. 

I ask Father that as they walk, You would fill their mouths with laughter and their tongues with joyful shouting. I pray Father that they would be able to tell among the people of Guatemala the great things that You have done for them… that those among the nations in Guatemala that do not know about the sacrifice of Christ, that those who have not heard that You sent Jesus, Your Son, the Word made flesh, born of a virgin, to live among us, sinless and with great compassion and mercy and grace, into this world for the purpose of rescuing them from the kingdom of darkness… that He willingly went to the cross and died on that cross for their sin and was buried and then three days later rose again so that they might have life, and that life be everlasting. Might they hear the Word of the Lord. Might they know O God, the great things that You have done.

And Father, while Patrick, and Shelby, and the entire team are there might they also remember the great things that You have done for them personally. When the enemy attempts to cause them to be discouraged, frustrated, confused, agitated, or aggravated let them remember to be glad. Let them remember that it is the joy of the Lord that is their strength. Let them remember that greater is He that is within them than he that is in the world. Give them eyes to see past the circumstances and into Your heart and Your will. May You help them to think with Your thoughts and walk in Your ways. 

Father, might you grant them boldness and confidence and bring to remembrance Your Word that they might speak it, breathe it, and live it. Protect them from the evil one. Keep them in Your perfect peace. And Father, after they have done Your will, bring them safely back home… with an even greater desire to do something… always keeping it in present tense. And Father, always keeping You in the present. 

My Jesus, it is in Your name that I pray…

Amen

I have been at my computer here a bit the last couple of days. We spent last week in Gulf Shores with our daughter as she battled in the USSSA 12U World Series and the wifi just wouldn’t hold up, so now I am playing catch up. As I sit here working on things and checking emails and answering calls and texts, I also am realizing that in three days I will be saying goodbye to my husband and daughter as they head to serve in Guatemala.

You know… I probably should be freaking out about now. But I ain’t.

Walking with the Lord is funny like that…

It’s amazing the way He is able to provide peace in the craziness of life. Tonight I will lead a lesson to our K – 5th grade kids about the sufficiency of Scripture. Tonight they will learn, or be reminded again, that God has provided us with His Word, not just for salvation but for help in our everyday struggles in this life.

His Word is filled with wisdom for us.

But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

James 1:5

I have an inkling that some people read this verse from James and pray that God would give them wisdom in a certain situation and then they just look up and wait for God to drop it in their head. I don’t believe that is quite what God had in mind when He inspired the half-brother of His Son to pen these words.

Do you know how you ask God for wisdom?

You open up His book and read it… and you don’t just read it but you dig into it. Have you ever misplaced something of value, maybe your wedding ring? Did you just glance around the house for it? Or did you flip over every couch cushion, grab a flash light and climb under the bed, crawl around on your hands and knees running your fingers through the carpet…etc? If we really want God’s wisdom and God’s answers for our life, we will search His Word like we would search for anything else of high value… that is if we truly value Him and His will for our life.

God has protected His Word for thousands of years and made it available in all type of forms and languages. He gives it generously, and He tells no one they can’t have it. It’s free and generously offered to all by Him. He doesn’t care who you are and He doesn’t care what state you are in when you open up His Word to seek Him… He will not withhold His wisdom from anyone who is sincerely seeking.

Because there’s even more to it if we want to receive of the wisdom of God…

But he must ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

James 1:6-8

We have to be willing to take it as God said it… no but’s or what if’s… no waffling or wavering… no taking just a little of it and twisting and manipulating it to try and make God say what we think we want Him to say.

God doesn’t play like that… if we want to receive His wisdom we have to take it like it is.

There are things in life that may not make sense to us from our point of view. We may be wondering what in the world God is up to and try as we might we won’t figure it out here in this life and we might not even in the next… quite possibly we won’t even care or remember on the side of eternity.

For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he will instruct Him?

1 Corinthians 2:16

We have no ability or right to ever instruct God on the how’s or why of life… not ours and certainly not anyone else’s. This verse ends with this…

But we have the mind of Christ.

2 Corinthians 2:16

Think about that.

What on earth does that mean?

In John 15:15 Jesus says to His disciples…

No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.

In John 8:28-29 we read…

So Jesus said, “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He, and I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me. And He who sent Me is with Me; He has not left Me alone, for I always do the things that are pleasing to Him.”

So what does it mean to have the mind of Christ?

It means we do nothing on our own initiative, but speak the things that God has taught us and we do the things that please our Heavenly Father. It means we don’t tell God what we need Him to do… but we wait for God to tell us what to do… and even if what He says is hard to hear, say, or do… we obey knowing that He is with us and never ever ever leaves us alone.

In one of my emails today I read this from Chuck Swindoll…

Conquering giants isn’t accomplished without great skill and discipline. To be God’s warrior, to fight His way, demands much more expertise and control than one can imagine. Using the sling and stone of the Spirit is a far more delicate thing than swinging the club of the flesh. But oh, how sweet is the victory when the stone finds its mark . . . and how final.

Are you facing a giant?

Chances are you’ve already bumped into one or more of them this week. Is the intimidation reaching unbearable proportions? Do your ears ache from their constant threats? Don’t run . . . but don’t try a bigger club, either. Be like David. Turn your Goliath over to Jehovah, the giant-killer. Explain to your powerful God how anxious you are for Him to win this victory for a change—not the giant and not you.

Then load up your sling, soldier, and don’t forget the stones. You’re in for the time of your life.

I read this post and my mind immediately went to my family. It went to my Dad, my sister-in-law Phillis, and my father-in-law Jerry. All three of them are facing a Goliath called cancer. It went to my husband and daughter who will both be going on their first international mission trip. It went to my life as I submitted to what God was leading me to do, both in stepping down as Children’s Minister at our church and then out of the blue accepting the call to step into the Weekday Education Director over a preschool at a different church.

All these things have been bathed in prayer and oh how we have sought the wisdom of God concerning them. As I read the words, don’t forget the stones, I thought of what would have happened had David showed up that day with his sling and nothing but air to sling?

Nothing would have happened. Goliath would still stand taunting and ridiculing our Glorious God and striking fear into the hearts of His people.

It’s sad, because when I think of the people who are praying and asking God for help… but they never seek Him in His Word… that’s the same thing as if David had attempted to face Goliath without the stones.

So beloved, please, I beg you…

Don’t. Forget. The. Stones.

Praise the Lord!
For it is good to sing praises to our God;

Psalm 147:1

There are days when the thought of worrying about anything seems really a futile thing… then there are days when I realize that I have been worrying like crazy and didn’t even realize it because the worry is more like a trickling stream hidden in the deep crevices of an underground cave. This morning I awoke and as I began down the steps my mind immediately went to asking the Lord why…

Why are there those that live their lives purposely hurting others and they appear to skip through life unscathed and then their are those who are so very loved and seek to live their lives not for their own sake but for the sake of others and then one day they awake to find their lives under attack.

We can look at Psalm 73 and other places in the Scriptures and find that we have been asking God all the “why’s” of life for generations…

As I was walking down the stairs I so badly wanted to have a temper tantrum fit with my Heavenly Father… but He simply would not let me. I hear Him whisper every so gently in my heart…

 young lady, you are too big for that and you know better

<insert deep breathe and sigh here>

So I made my coffee and prepared my morning sugar and carb fix and sat down at my desk and immediately the words, It is well… began to sing in my head.

Yes Lord, I know. It is well with my Daddy’s soul.

I know. 

I do.

I know it is well with my soul… but that doesn’t make this present time any less scary for us.

Then I felt Him lift my eyes to the calendar on the wall. I noticed today’s date and my Jesus said, Psalm 147.

Have you ever just wanted to roll your eyes at God in that head-shaking-smiling-okay-I-get-it kind of way? I do quite often, especially when I let myself worry and He gently reminds me that worry profits nothing and besides have I forgotten that He is the One who counts the stars and gives names to each of them. Have I forgotten that He’s the One who provides rain for the earth and makes the grass grow on the mountains. Have I forgotten that He’s the One that makes sure the smallest sparrow and the largest has their food. Have I forgotten that He’s the One that causes the wind to blow and the waters to flow.

I have spent that last thirty minutes reading and re-reading Psalm 146, Psalm 147, Psalm 148, and Psalm 149 and so just as in the Psalm of Asaph (Psalm 73) I find myself once again at rest in His strong sovereign arms of mercy and grace and I pray that those who are facing similar fears are able to find their way there as well.

Oh give thanks to the Lord, for He is good,
For His lovingkindness is everlasting.

Psalm 107:1

Last night in the children’s class that I was leading at our church I was going over the kids memory verse for the second half of their study. The verse is Psalm 33:4,

What the Lord says is right and true. He is faithful in everything He does.

As I went over this NIRV translation of the verse with the kids the Lord zeroed in within my heart the word everything. In the translation that I regularly use (I stick with the NASB for continuity in my writing and if I use another translation I let you know) the verse reads, For the word of the Lord is upright, and all His work is done in faithfulness.

That word all (or everything) gets me every time.

I don’t know if you have figured it out yet, but I am a huge professor of the sovereignty of God, label me a Calvinist if you wish, paint a purple TULIP on my page, but all I know is that apart from Christ the Bible says we are dead… and dead men can’t save themselves.

So, for me, to accept the sovereignty of God in salvation is to accept it in all and everything else. He is either supreme or He is not. There is no democracy in the Kingdom of Heaven. There is One Lord, One King, One Creator, only one can be Most High.

I find great comfort that I can rest here in the arms of a Sovereign God. It is in this resting place that I find that I am able to give thanks in all things and at all times… even if it’s not an emotional joyful jumping happy thanks… it can be a take a deep breath with solemn trusting resolve thanks… and still be praise.

I give thanks in all things because I choose to trust in the Word of the Lord and the Word of the Lord says that He is faithful… in all His work… in everything He does.

Today is July 10th… the 10th day of the 7th month so I began my morning with Psalm 107 and here once again I read of the sovereignty and the faithfulness of my God.

This is one of my favorite Psalms.

As I read through this psalm my mind went to this song by Unspoken…

I don’t know where you are today… but I know the One who does.

Oh give thanks to the Lord, for He is good,
For His lovingkindness is everlasting.
Let the redeemed of the Lord say so,
Whom He has redeemed from the hand of the adversary
And gathered from the lands,
From the east and from the west,
From the north and from the south.

Psalm 107:1-3

He can reach you from anywhere… and if you have the slightest desire… the smallest inkling to call on His name… beloved there is only One who can awaken the dead enough to speak and feel and cause that aching in your chest that I like to call HOPE.

I started out this blog post with the intended direction of sharing of the place of trusting and resting and giving praise and thanks in the circumstances that my family is walking in because as I read through Psalm 107 I was reminded that their is no storm my Lord cannot calm and there is no storm that my God did not allow… and sometimes even cause

For He spoke and raised up a stormy wind,
Which lifted up the waves of the sea.
They rose up to the heavens, they went down to the depths;
Their soul melted away in their misery.
They reeled and staggered like a drunken man,
And were at their wits’ end.
Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
And He brought them out of their distresses.
He caused the storm to be still,

Psalm 107:25-29

…and although the storm can be scary, the storm is never without purpose, because our God does nothing without purpose. 

I for one am a girl who loves a good storm. The sound of the thunder and the flashes of lightening and the wind so powerful that it appears that the trees are going to break in half as the bows bend in its strength causes me to sit giddy at the window wishing I had a glass room that allowed me to be able to see it with no view obstructions. When I wait through an outside happening storm I sit and watch in awe anticipating the next lightning strike and wondering how loud the next thunder will sound… but when I face an internal one I find myself on the brink of despair… it’s crazy how things change like that.

When we are in the safety of the inside and watching the outside storm we can find the beauty and awe of the storm and even praise our Creator as we are mesmerized by His power, but when that storm rages within us we seem to so easily forget that our Creator is still there. We are still within the boundaries of His sovereign arm.

And in Your book were all written
The days that were ordained for me,
When as yet there was not one of them.

Psalm 139:16

He has ordained our days… whether they be sunshine and laughter or storms and tears… we must give thanks in all and everything because we know that He is faithful in all and everything and instead of complaining and wrongly feeling as though our God is against us… let us be ever more diligent to seek His face and know that He does nothing without purposeful intentions and to bring glory to His name.

Look for the glory.

Trust in His lovingkindness.

Stand firm in the faith even in the storm.

Give Him thanks.

Praise His holy name.