Tag: #beboldbebraveandkeepyourgodfocus

God’s Desire

There are days when the words flow so quickly that I cannot type fast enough. God inspires me in the smallest ways.  Other days, like today, I stare at a blank page and ask God for revelation. I always depend on him to pour into me, something that will bring you encouragement.  Sometimes, I stare for a while, like today.  I have had random thoughts and do not see the connection. Nothing I read in the Word today inspired an article.  I sat with worship music in the background quietly.  It is a sweet melody. I recognize and think of the words in my head.

Jesus are you there? Are you going to give me inspiration? I feel him say not yet.  I ask why Lord, you know I am doing this all for you? He says, “Your fellowship right now is more important than what you do.”  So, I sat quietly in worship. “Open the floodgates of heaven…let it rain.”  His presence filled the room, and I was refreshed. He is never far away. But He wants our undivided attention. More than anything, we say or do for him.  He just wants us to love Him. To slow down and sit with Him. 

In the quiet, I was reminded how much he loves me and wants only good for me. He reminded me, as I often do you, to keep my God focus. I am a very goal-oriented, to-do list kind of person. It is hard for me to slow down and sit quietly. In the quiet, we realize how much we need His sweet presence. It is awesome to worship with our church family. But there is something special about the one-on-one time.

Matt 5:6-Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.

If we hunger and thirst for righteousness, we are actually wanting God. Because He is righteous.

I Chr. 16:10-11  10 Glory ye in his holy name: let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord. 11 Seek the Lord and his strength, seek his face continually.

Without God’s anointing, anything we attempt is just our ability. Any message, song, lesson, any type of ministry is just earthly understanding. But God can take our effort, add a little anointing and that same lesson, song etc. can change the world.

I heard a preacher say that when God fills your cup, it’s for you. But, when it overflows, it is for others. May the overflow of my quiet time today (that you will read tomorrow) fill your day with inspiration to sit quietly and listen.  He wants to tell you he loves you, too. I ask that you take today’s lesson of remembrance to heart and find quiet time to just love Him and listen for his thoughts concerning you. May we never get too busy to stop and have alone time with our Heavenly Father.

Until next time, BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

ARE YOU IN THE BOOK

Many of us have a treasure box of things from our past. Trophies from a contest or sporting event that we won. Grade cards and awards from school. Tiny things that were given to us by friends or a first love. A seashell we picked up on our first beach trip. More important than any of these treasures, we have friends and family that we can really truly rely on to be there in times of crisis. (If your family is not like that, I am truly sorry; I know some aren’t.) But the family of God should be that way. We are to treasure one another.

There is a treasure that far exceeds any memory or knowing how much you are loved by close friends and family. The biggest treasure is to be a child of God. Many say, “We are all God’s children.” Referring to mankind, but that is not true. We do not become his children until we are born again and have received His Spirit. The work He did on the cross gives us the right to be called the “children of God or sons of God.” But unless we accept what he did to redeem us. He will say, “I never knew you.”

It is nice to go to class reunions and relive our youth’s “glory” days. Looking through old photos and treasure boxes can be fun. Looking at our old yearbooks and seeing who all signed it is always bittersweet. But the best treasure is to know that our names are written in the “Lamb’s Book Of Life.”

Have you ever thought about the name of the book, “Lamb’s Book Of Life.” It is a book that lists all those who are born into the kingdom, those who have passed from death of sin to life in Christ. That is one book to make sure our names appear, the book that the Lamb of God owns that lists all who are alive in Him.

Luke 10:19-20  Behold, I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you. 20 Notwithstanding in this rejoice not, that the spirits are subject unto you; but rather rejoice, because your names are written in heaven.

We need to be determined to see that the book doesn’t have any space left to write one more name. The harvest is ready. Jesus has the ink pen ready to write the names, all we have to do is go out and share his words.

BE BOLD. BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

RIGHT WORDS

It’s hard sometimes to sit back and watch people struggle with situations and problems when you have the answer. But we must be careful about how we deliver that answer. Yeah, Jesus is the answer to every problem. But, if it’s the wrong timing or said in the wrong way, we can do more harm than good. 

Prov 25:11 -A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver. 

Which means that timing is everything. You can tell people the right thing and be right. It still could be wrong. What if you say it like you are a know-it-all all and you have the answer? What if your attitude is off by coming across as being self-righteous? People are going to be hurt or put off by the judgmental tone.

We must be loving with our words, even though we’re right and there’s nothing wrong with the sentiment. There’s nothing wrong with telling people that God is the answer. But it’s how we say it.  We can be compassionate, “I know you’re really struggling with the situation. I understand because I’ve been through similar things. Or I understand that you’re really bothered about this and you’re hurt by your situation. I’ve been through things in my life that have really hurt me. I’ve found that Christ is the answer.”

The people will become more accepting of what you’re saying. But still, if that’s not at the right time, it may plant a seed. It may open the door a little bit. I’m not telling you not to ever tell anybody Jesus is the answer unless you think it’s perfect timing. Because we are called to witness to others. It’s just all a matter of timing.

Praying for God’s guidance will help us to know the right timing of everything. Because God’s time is always perfect. Nothing is impossible and we need to be willing to step out and talk to people.

But again, we can’t be aristocratic about it like we know it all. We have to be humble. God wants us to be humble. We can say, “Let me help you out here. Let me give you some advice.” God will use that to make an impact in somebody’s life. And that’s why we’re here. We’re here to see the lost saved.

Someone witnessed us or we wouldn’t be where we are today. Someone stepped out of their comfort zone and taught us about Jesus, or we wouldn’t know anything about him.

 If we depend on the media, they are very anti-religious and very anti-God and most of them consider themselves atheist or agnostic. And many of them, it’s because they’ve been hurt by church people. They said there can’t be a God or I wouldn’t have got hurt like I did. The enemy uses offense. It’s one of his greatest tools. If he can cause us to be offended by something and take that to heart, he can use that hurt and grow it into all sorts of things. He could grow in anxiety, fear, and stress. The enemy will grow it into a hatred for a person or hatred for a church. He even turns it into hate for God himself, to the point that people say, “I don’t believe there is a God.” And it’s just because they’ve been hurt.

It is not enough to have the right answer. It is important that we share the answer in the right way at the right time. We will know about God’s timing because he will lead us to speak. We cannot be effective unless we are close enough to God to hear his voice.

Staying in the Word and praying for His guidance is important. If we do these things, we can be assured he will give us the right words at the right time. Don’t be afraid to share the good news; just be careful how you do it.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

GOD IS NOT SURPRISED

You know, sometimes we feel like that, we are one mistake away from God doing a facepalm and saying, “Uh, I’m so done with them. They just make too many mistakes. They fall down too many times. They’re just not what I thought.” Because that’s how we get with people sometimes.

People often test our limits and we’re like, “I just can’t deal with them anymore. Not one more thing can I deal with, when it comes to them.” Then we have a tendency to walk away from people that gets us to the point of being so exasperated that we just can’t take one more thing.

But God never feels that way about us. He sees the potential of what we can be. He sees our worth is far greater than we can see in ourselves. He never shakes his head and goes, “I just don’t know what I’m gonna do with them. I just can’t believe they did that.” Again, He’s not surprised by anything. He knows everything. He knows why we make the choices we make. It’s because of some trauma or experience in our past. Most of the time, we have a tendency to react instead of stopping and thinking about what we should do. It is easy to just react. But sometimes, we lack self-control when those situations arise. But God has never been surprised. Nothing we do shocks him. And you know He says, if we are His child, “I will never leave you, forsake you or fail you.”

 Deut 31:6 Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.

He will not fail or forsake us; He wants us to put on the whole armor of God. (Eph 6) Then, we are equipped to stand strong and be courageous. Fear is the opposite of how we should react to situations. The God who created everything is our Father and he will send angels to protect us.  He will move mountains for us if we just stand strong and believe.

Heb 13:5 6 Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them: for the Lord thy God, he it is that doth go with thee; he will not fail thee, nor forsake thee.

My encouraging words to you today are: Do not fear. Do not get hung up on the past; if you have repented, then move on. He doesn’t expect us to wallow in self-loathing and self-bashing. He has already blotted out your mistakes, sins and shortcomings. We can be encouraged because He is with us.

He didn’t come to punish us or make us feel bad. Jesus died to set us free. He took all of our punishment because we were not able to bear it. Instead of repenting over and over for the same thing, we are already forgiven. Try thanking Him for what he did on the cross to set us free. Then, BE FREE from the past. Remember, Jesus loves you.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS

BE STILL, THEN SPEAK UP

I keep asking God to reveal the unrevealed to me.  I have asked him to search my heart and take out anything that is not pleasing to him.  He spoke PS 46:10 to my spirit, which says: 10 Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. This was after I was praying for the people of Maui and the people in California that are about to get hit by a massive hurricane. God is tired of being on the back burner.  Some people only pray when they are in severe distress.

As I stared at that verse, many things started pouring into me.  God wants us to turn off all our distractions. He wants us to sit quietly and ask Him what He wants from us.  We need to sit quietly in His presence and wait for Him to download into us. We need to absorb the sweet peace that only God can give, then take it out into the world.

Psalm 139:17 How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them!  He loves us with a love that we cannot even fully understand. Especially people that have been abused and put down by others. Those who have done things that they are sorry for doing but cannot release. We all carry baggage from past experiences. Pain that we would like to have avoided.  But without the pain, we would not have learned the lessons that drive us to be better. I have started to pray for God to allow me to keep the wisdom that my experiences have taught me. I have asked him to let me keep the lessons but to set free everything that tries to weigh me down.

Psalm 139:23-24  Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: 24 And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

David was a man after God’s own heart. He made a lot of mistakes and committed sin several times.  But He would cry out to God for him to search his heart.  He worshipped him from a place of love and respect, not out of obligation.

The higher we climb, the fewer the people.  This means that not everyone will understand us.  But I don’t want to be so heavenly-minded that I am no earthly good.  There is a balance between the two that we must achieve to be effective in our callings. What is God calling you to do? Are you running from that calling? I did for many years. I denied who I was meant to be out of fear of what someone may think or say. I am done with that now!

It is never my intention to hurt anyone or put anyone down. But I am going to speak what I believe God wants me to speak.  If the word offends you, you need to take it up with God.  I want only what is best for you and God’s will for us all. For too many years, the gospel has been weakened and watered down to make people feel good.  We all love to hear how he will bless us and take care of us. Many leave out the part that we must obey him. They skip over the parts that sometimes life will give you pain that you do not know if you will survive it. Look at what Job suffered. He didn’t have a feel-good doctrine.  His wife even told him to just curse God and die. I am thankful I have prayer warriors in my life that will stand with me in prayer.

Too long the bride has sat quiet or been asleep.  While babies are being murdered in the name of women’s health and choice. Other children have been stolen from their homes and placed in horrific situations. We need to repent for allowing these things to happen while we sit back and complained to each other. Speaking about how bad things are or appear to be, helps no one. We need to take it to God and not give the enemy credit by talking about how evil things are now.  Our God will take down the evil of this world. It is up to us to partner with him in prayer and speak out about the wrongs and sins.

I have been on a journey for 19 months now since the loss of my spouse.  God has shown me a lot about myself and a lot about Him. I realized that I have been holding on to things for years that have tainted my view.  Hurts, disappointment, offenses and fears that I came by honestly but should have let go by now. Offense is one of the biggest tools of the enemy.  If he can keep us offended, he can keep us from reaching our potential in Christ.

There is not one denomination out there that is 100% right.  Too long, the bride has been divided.  We need to pray for religion to fall away and leave us with understanding about our relationship.  Jesus never came to start a religion. He came to have a relationship with each of us. But the body of Christ allowed offense to enter and start dividing. They should have reasoned together and asked God to show them the truth. Our leaders allowed pride and offense to come in; before you know it, there is another denomination.

Is 52:8 Thy watchmen shall lift up the voice; with the voice together shall they sing: for they shall see eye to eye, when the Lord shall bring again Zion. The watchmen were the first line of defense against the enemy.  They watched to warn the people of a pending attack from the enemy.  I feel like these are our pastors and teachers.  I think they should see eye to eye.  God can help them to come together if everyone would set aside their pride and pray for answers.

We have been blessed to be allowed to live in this time. God is depending on us, “His Remnant,” to be strong and bold. It is time to speak up, be prayed up and love people. Jesus is coming soon. Are you ready? Take some time to be still and listen to what God is saying, then speak up; be that bold witness you were meant to be today. The harvest is ready and the people are starving for God.

BE BOLD, BE BRAVE AND KEEP YOUR GOD FOCUS