Suffering a Loss

 

We all have suffered a loss in our lifetime whether it be a loved one or something that’s significant to us personally. The question is how do we deal/or get through our loss? I have suffered a few losses in my lifetime, but I never really knew how to handle my losses. Why? Because at that time I believed in God, but I never really trusted or looked to God to get through my loss. Following Jesus doesn’t mean avoiding loss. Whether its death of a loved one or something important to us is taken away------- somehow, we have experienced loss and grief.

2 Corinthians 1:3-4, “(3) Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; (4) Who comforteth us in all our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God”. Paul basically is saying God is the God of all comfort…. meaning God is able to completely comfort every loss and grief. Not in that moment, but through time and steps we must take through the use of faith. 

After going through losses and grief I have found a few steps that have helped me experience God’s comfort through the loss.  1. Turn to Jesus just as you are and trust that God will help you. 2. Provide God with your loss or grief as you are, in that moment. 3. Ask God to help you work through your loss. Remember to trust and believe that he welcomes you as you are and loves you. God will help you as you are, through his mercy and grace.

Through God's promise to comfort us.  He will help us to understand and feel the love he has for us that will help our griefs and losses to ease. They may not be removed, forgotten, but comfort, healed, even at ease. So, pray earnestly for God to increase this work of the Spirit in your heart.

When your heart is full of grief and loss — comfort doesn’t seem possible. But with God all things are possible. He doesn’t take the grief completely away, but he can give you that comfort you need in time.

Sowing Seeds

 

Question? Can we actually reap the benefits of good that we have yet to have sown? If we sow bad seeds there will be only bad seeds. Life is about what we give and what we take. When we speak negatively in our life we mainly are speaking it into existence, then that is all we will ever receive. There are many times in my life that I found myself not reaping the benefits of God. Instead of speaking positively in everything, I said and done; I never really spoke anything. I was always being negative about everything I said & did. I thought the worse of everything. I truly believe that this was my fault and why I was always receiving negative feedback, unwanted stress, and not progressing in the life I wanted to live. I have learned that the right thing to do is speak positively in everything I say and do in life, along with maintaining the Faith I have in God. According to Mark 11:22-24, “22 And Jesus answering saith unto them, Have faith in God. 23 For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith. 24 Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them”. We have to have faith when things are going well and when things are going bad. Speaking and sowing positive seeds into your life and reframe from the negative seeds.

Seen and Unseen

A flower will bloom, but eventually would fade away, but God’s word is forever.            

               As a young child, we had things that we cherished, and eventually, we will outgrow those things. They would either be tossed away, donated, or given away, as a child I never understood why I couldn’t keep those items, but as an adult with children, I realized that we can’t always have what we want, things will change. What we experienced as a child we don’t realize until we become adults, but even then, some of us adults do not realize that most of what we see, touch, and experience in our world is temporary. If life on earth is merely temporary, you should know that your problems are not permanent either. Think about it, what makes us think that our problems will last always? We must not lose hope in the midst of suffering. Our troubles should not tarnish our faith. There is always a purpose behind our suffering. Paul speaks of the troubles that God’s people have and it will not last. The enemy Satan and his followers will not last. We need to concentrate on things that will last, the unseen not what is seen. Money is temporary, a car is temporary, a house is temporary, and a career is temporary, but GOD is ETERNAL (unseen)! Paul references the glory, the beauty, and true greatness of God and what He has prepared for His people when Christ will rule forevermore. "So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal" (2 Corinthians 4:18, KJV).

 

Is there a Bridge between Anxiety and Christ?

 

Have you ever had a bit of anxiety knocking at your door? Have you ever asked the question: Why Me? Where are you, God?

A lot of the time we find ourselves worrying about things that never happen. Anxiety is a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease, typically about an imminent event or something with an uncertain outcome. Anxiety is nothing that comes from God.  Philippians 4:6-7 says, “(6) Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. (7) And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus (KJV). What this is basically saying is we should never worry about anything; instead, pray about it. We must tell God what we need and thank him for all that he has done. This is when we will feel the peace of God all over us. With his peace, it will guard our hearts and minds while following Gods word.

The devil can use anxiety in many ways for negativity and cause you to lose a bit of faith in God. For example, I was placed in a situation where I became very anxious and lost my way to where I was having an anxiety attack. Instead of me going to God, praying, and asking him to guide my heart; I went the other way and started thinking the worse of things. See when fear, anxiousness, and uncertainty come over you, that’s when those questions above start popping in your head. The good thing about this is, God has already provided us ways out of feeling anxious.

This all starts with us remembering our relationship with God. We must remember the key points to our relationship with God: We should always have trust in God, God has gone through tremendous pain before, he has great things in store for us, he will never lose his love for us, and never leave us. My 6-year-old son said something to me while I was going through my ordeal he said, “Mama, by Jesus Blood the virus will be removed from our bodies”.  Although he meant by the blood of Jesus the virus will be removed from our bodies. He was right, I was shocked he knew of this and to have so much faith in God (very proud mom moment). I knew then I had to get myself together and get back on track. “For God has not given us the Spirit of fear, but he has given us power, love, and a sound mind” (2 Timothy 1:7).  This verse right here shoots volume to me. This is something I have to remember time and time again. Be blessed!!

Fill me Up

Hebrews 12:28-29 

"Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: 29 For our God is a consuming fire" (KJV).

One day I was sitting in my family room when I looked at our fireplace and the song “Fill Me Up” by Casey J popped into my head. The words to this song are incredible and speak on God filling us with the Holy Spirit while we open our hearts to receive it. I thought to myself, as Christians, we are similar to a fireplace. The Holy Spirit is the fire and our willingness to give God praise is the wood. As Christians, we offer our sacrifice to God. When we get cold, we need more wood. Often times we think our fire has gone out, but if we add a little more wood to the fire, the flame would get bigger. This is similar to us giving God praise if we just open our hearts, and add our willingness to give God praise our flames will become bigger! When our hearts cry out to him, God is Faithful. He fills us up and causes an overflow so we can pour into others. 

Listen to God's Whisper

 

Have you ever heard a soft voice or a silent whisper, and you wondered where it was coming from? Have you ever stopped to think that God is trying to tell you something? The Holy Spirit wants to enter our lives providing us with grace through the presence of God. God comes to us in different ways with truths that will not allow us to have doubt. The Holy Spirit whispers words that will comfort our hearts. Have you ever felt as nothing seems to be going the way you planned it to go? You try your hardest to make things work, but you just seem to fall short. Have you ever thought to stop and listen to that soft whispering voice and think…is the Holy Spirit trying to tell you something? I’m here to tell you…you’ve tried things your way and it didn’t work, you put yourself first before God. You never stopped to think hmmmm, I believe God is trying to tell me this is not the way, and I need to try his way. There is nothing like listening to God’s sweet whispers in the time of need, or anytime really. It doesn’t have to be bad times it can be good times too. I ask again have you ever stopped to listen to what the Holy Spirit is trying to tell you? It is very important to listen to what God is saying. There is always a lesson in his message to us. Remember my favorite verse, Jeremiah 29:11? I have to result back to this verse all the time I know he has a plan for me I must stop and listen to what he is trying to tell me. Then I reflect on the verse Psalms 16:7 “I will bless the Lord who guides me; even at night, my heart instructs me” (NTL). His quiet whispers of grace that will enter into our hearts will always draw us closer to God.

Being Obedient

 

Exodus 19:5, “Now, therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine” (KJV).

 

Many times, God calls his people to obey and trust him. There are times consequences are given for our actions for not trusting and obeying God. We miss out on blessings daily due to us not obeying and trusting him. We will not experience the fullness of our cup overflowing with the many blessings he has in store for us when we don’t trust and obey his word. Our obedience is our way of showing God how much we love and trust him. God is after our hearts, when being disobedient we miss out in many ways.

Here’s an example for myself I was asked to do this blog whether it be daily, weekly, every other week, at first, I was like yes, I will do it. I then began to think about what was I thinking agreeing to do this. I thought to myself who are you to try to spread God’s word when you are just starting your journey yourself? I then began to pray about this thing, I prayed and prayed about it. I still continued to say I can’t do this, but I continued to hear this quiet voice telling me you can do it all you have to do is try, but I still continued to say I can’t do this. I finally said no, you have to be obedient to God’s will, if it was laid upon someone’s heart to ask you to do this blog, then it is meant for you to do it. I thought although I am on my Christian journey there is nothing wrong with having others to walk on this journey with me because I am doing something for God.  So, I am being obedient.

Being obedient can be hard sometimes, but it is important if we want to live in agreement with God’s Will. Charles Stanley wrote: If we are going to do all that God requires of us, we must be ready to “Learn to listen to the Lord and take heed to what you hear” (Mark 4:25, KJV). God wants to speak to us, we must be willing to listen; “We must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29, KJV). There are times when the people of the world would want us to do one thing when God wants us to do another we must be obedient to God; “We are to lay aside all our sinful ways” (Ephesians 4:25-31). We cannot obey God while indulging in sin, we know we may not be perfect, but when God convicts us of sin, our 1^st response should be confessions and repentances; Surrender our will to the Lord “Yet not my will, but yours will be done” (Luke 22:42). We should be obedient just as Jesus was obedient and yield everything to God. We should want to please and honor Him not yielding to his Will, we will be following our own desires and may suffer consequences due to us being disobedient. A true sign of your love for God is obedience to his commandments, the only way you will know you are obeying God is by knowing his word.

Am I Doing God's Plan?

 

I know some of you may have a few uncertain things in your life and you don’t know what is to come. You may be someone who loves to get out and do things at the spur of the moment or more of a quiet mellow person who likes to have some type of plan in place. Have you ever gone down a path you thought God has laid out for you, but later on questioned yourself, “Am I doing the right thing”?

What if I’ve taken the wrong path and it’s not the path God was wanting me to take? Just a little reminder for you to keep in the back of your mind that you are not powerful enough to mess up what God has planned for you. We all have choices that we make but what God has set in motion will soon or later materialize.

We at times forget that we must trust what God has for us. His plan may not come when we want it, but it comes when he feels it is our time. Often times we find ourselves jumping through hoops, going through difficult situations because we may have taken a slight left along our path when it should have been a slight right. But its OK, you will be able to get back on track by turning your attention back to God and following his word. This is when we finally realize we should trust what God has planned for us.  God’s plan may not make any sense to us, this is because we can’t see the plan he has in store for us, but we must trust his plan.  Proverbs 3:5 states, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding”.

Broken Pieces

                                   

1 Peter 5:10 “But the God of all grace, who hath called us unto his eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after that ye have suffered a while, make you perfect, stablish, strength, settle you” (KJV).

The path we take for our prayers to be answered is harder and even longer sometimes. Our path sometimes includes our past choices and the consequences that come with our choices, along with growth, and through our healing, then our prayers will be answered. BUT GUESS WHAT??? GOD IS WITH US EVERY STEP OF THE WAY. God will never leave us. There are somethings we have to go through, but he will always be there to pick up our broken pieces. So, for a little while, we may suffer through our broken pieces, to gain the strength to restore us into whom he wants us to be. I was reading something the other day that stood out to me. It read “There are three key things to remember when you are on your journey getting close to God. We should remember this when we have broken pieces: You are not alone, develop a relationship with God, and believe that God’s word is true”. Now you’re probably saying what does she mean by this? Well, with you are not alone means…YOU are not alone there are others who have broken pieces, although other people's broken pieces are not the same as yours, they too have to suffer through their broken pieces to get where God wants them to be. Developing a relationship with God means just that. We must establish a relationship with God. We may acknowledge who God is, but do we really know WHO God is, not really, not until we begin to study his word, trust that God is working out a plan for us while praying. In addition to all this, we have to remember that God’s word is true. God’s word never changes, he will give us all that we need and help us get through those broken pieces. Psalms 37:4 says, “Delight thyself also in the LORD; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart” (KJV). Studying, trusting, and knowing that God’s word is true will help you through those broken pieces.

Is there an Effective way to Pray?

“But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and when thou art converted strengthen thy brethren” (Luke 22: 32, KJV).

Have you ever waited on the Lord to show you how to pray; whether it was for yourself or a loved one? I have struggled with this praying thing often. The question is there really a correct way to pray and how to pray? I began doing a little research and stumbled upon the scripture Luke 22:32 and as I was reading this scripture a light turned on for me telling me in a way how I should pray. Now for me, I got from this verse that I should pray without letting my faith fail me. A lot of times we pray for God to remove the problem, to heal a loved one, bring us out of that situation or make it better for us, but when we pray are we praying with strong faith? By all means, I am not saying there is a wrong way to pray I am just asking is there a better way to pray?  When reading Luke 22:32 we see how Jesus prays for Peters faith to be strong at his time of need he didn’t want him to fail: it is important that Peter face his situation with his own strength. Jesus wanted Peter's faith to be strong and to not let it fail him; we must be strong in faith to help us to get through our problems. When we begin to understand the purpose of God in people around us this is when it is a growing process for us. In order to pray effectively, one must pray not only for ourselves but for others' faith to hold strong instead of praying for the situation to change, praying to help us see through problems with faith. Having strong faith shows there’s God in you because God is the power behind the faith that helps us to move through our situation. Effective prayer comes from the heart and the will of God. It comes from the wisdom we are seeking to learn from God. James 1:5-6 states, “⁵ If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him.⁶ But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed” (KJV).  Having God in our hearts and gaining wisdom from him we will then learn to pray and ask in His will that it shall be done. Through my continued journey of learning to pray effectively, I am learning that if I pray according to God's will, I have to seek his wisdom. We must continue to seek his will for things we are praying for and I am learning that I cannot pray with fear in my heart, rather than faith, then I will be praying amiss not seeking it clearly. In order to learn how to pray I (we) must pray in his will, have faith, and seek wisdom from God while having God in our hearts. 

Unity

HAPPY🐪DAY, I pray that you may read and receive God's word.  May He be with us throughout our day.

 

But what is unity?  Unfortunately, many think that unity means “sameness.”  This is not true. Unity is not uniformity.  Instead, unity can be defined as any group of people who are characterized by a shared purpose, vision, or direction.  It’s not about being the exact same, but about advancing toward the same goal.  Think about a football team.  There are different positions on the field.  Each position has different skill sets, roles, and responsibilities.  But all players on the team march toward the same end zone because their goal is the same.  What we must realize is that race has always been a part of God’s plan, but God’s plan also included a way to create unity among the different races.  That plan’s epicenter is Jesus Christ.  I hope you have a GREAT day...I LOVE YOU❤️

Trust in the Lord

GREAT🦁MORNING, I pray that you may read and receive God's word. May He be with us throughout our day.

Remember, "God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases Him" (Philippians 2:13).  I think He’s already given you the desire.  Now He’s going to give you the power too!  He’s going to help you find relationships that will honor Him at the same time they give you more satisfaction and greater fulfillment.  I hope you have an AWESOME day....I LOVE YOU!