Tag: #life

Beauty

“Don’t be concerned about the outward beauty of fancy hairstyles, expensive jewelry, or beautiful clothes. You should clothe yourselves instead with the beauty that comes from within, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is so precious to GOD.” – 1 Peter 3:3‭-‬4 NLT

Been there; done ALL that. For the moment, I would feel desirable and worth something, but it is, at best, a fleeting satisfaction. I looked for fulfilment in the opinions of others, even from people I had no respect for. How messed up we are! Young girls – and boys – in beauty pagents, being thrust into an adult role at extremely young ages, being taught to strut their ‘stuff’ in a provocative manner; watching their ‘idols’ promise that by showing off their bodies and acting this way will guarantee popularity and acceptance …. and we wonder why we have so many child predators.

Am I preaching? You bet I am! Yesterday I heard about a new ride-share aimed at children. Instead of Uber or Lyft or a cab or other ride offering for adults, there are now companies just for kids to be taken to their destinations. I can only ask, how much more can we be disconnected from our kids? How have we gotten so busy that we can’t find time for the ones who should get the most of us? I understand that things happen and we aren’t able to fulfill our responsibilities and obligations. Medical issues are often unforeseeable. Emergencies happen. LIFE happens. I don’t have the answer, but I know Who does.

“Direct your children onto the right path, and when they are older, they will not leave it.” -Proverbs 22:6 NLT

Parents, how are you teaching your children? It seems that the overwhelming lesson being taught is to do what makes you feel good; to put yourself, your feelings and your wants, above anyone or anything else. The path to happiness is through appearance, popularity, and things….. but we know that path isn’t right, it isn’t REAL, and it won’t last. There is much to be learned from the scriptures, and by not teaching our children, we are doing them a serious disservice. Even though I rejected the teaching for many years, I came to realize that no matter where or how hard I searched, the real truth wasn’t found in the world. It can only be found in the Word of GOD. Everything – EVERYTHING – else pales in comparison.

“Choose a good reputation over great riches; being held in high esteem is better than silver or gold. The rich and poor have this in common: The LORD made them both. A prudent person foresees danger and takes precautions. The simpleton goes blindly on and suffers the consequences.” – Proverbs 22:1‭-‬3 NLT

The LORD made us to be in fellowship with Him. Everything will fall into place when we embrace the Truth in JESUS. Amen.

Beautiful depiction of the Love Jesus has for us. Unknown artist…. found on the internet.

He Isn’t Here! He Is Risen!

Early on Sunday morning, as the new day was dawning, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went out to visit the tomb [where JESUS’ body had been buried]. Then the angel spoke to the women. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I know you are looking for JESUS, Who was crucified. He isn’t here! He is Risen from the dead, just as He said would happen. Come, see where His Body was lying.” – Matthew 28:1‭, ‬5‭-‬6 NLT

What amazing words – He isn’t here! He is Risen! The priests, the very ones behind the death of our LORD, responded to the guards words that JESUS was risen by bribing the guards to say His body was stolen. They knew tbe Truth, and they rejected it.

Today, it is our responsibility, our duty as Christians, to spread this Good News of JESUS CHRIST to all the world. As Paul reminds us, take the Glory and the Beauty of today, Easter Sunday, and share the message with the world.

“And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to GOD because of all He has done for you. Let them be a Living and Holy sacrifice—the kind He will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship Him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let GOD transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know GOD’s Will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.” – Romans 12:1‭-‬2 NLT

Listen to the Newsboys – God’s Not Dead

UP From The Grave He AROSE

“He will swallow up death forever! The SOVEREIGN LORD will wipe away all tears. He will remove FOREVER all insults and mockery against His Land and [His] People. The LORD has spoken!” – Isaiah 25:8 NLT

Robert Lowry (1826-1899) captured the essence of the reason I celebrate Easter in this hymn he wrote. I remember singing it in church while growing up, and I can still see so clearly my Dad standing and singing this with his whole being. Thank you, Dad, for preaching the Gospel, and thank you, Mom, for always having his back and making his ministry possible ❤ .

Low in the grave He lay—
Jesus, my Saviour,
Waiting the coming day—
Jesus, my Lord.
Vainly they watch His bed—
Jesus, my Saviour;
Vainly they seal the dead—
Jesus, my Lord.
Death cannot keep his prey—
Jesus, my Saviour;
He tore the bars away—
Jesus, my Lord.
Up from the grave He Arose
With a Mighty Triumph o’er His foes.
He arose a Victor from the dark domain,
And He Lives for ever with His saints to Reign.
He Arose! He Arose! Hallelujah! Christ Arose!

[And Repeat with gusto!]

The cross is empty, and most importantly, the grave is EMPTY. He Arose, He Arose, HALLELUJAH, CHRIST AROSE! Sin, you have no power over me; Satan, you can just leave! There is NO power that can separate me from my GOD. I believe in what Paul said to the church in Rome:

“And I am convinced that NOTHING can ever separate us from GOD’s Love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from GOD’s Love.” – Romans 8:38 NLT

And all the people said “AMEN!”

What A Beautiful Name

JESUS.

But JESUS called them together and said, “You know that the rulers in this world Lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first among you must become your slave. For even the SON OF MAN came not to be served but to serve others and to give His Life as a ransom for many.” – Matthew 20:25‭-‬28 NLT

Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, “I AM the Light of the world. If you follow Me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the Light that leads to Life.” – John 8:12 NLT

The Lord says, “I will rescue those who love Me. I will protect those who trust in My Name. When they call on Me, I will answer; I will be with them in trouble. I will rescue and honor them. I will reward them with a long life and give them My Salvation.” – Psalms 91:14‭-‬16 NLT

Listen to What A Beautiful Name by Hillsong Worship

Set Apart From the World

“You can be sure of this: The LORD set apart the godly for Himself. The LORD will answer when I call to Him.

Don’t sin by letting anger control you. Think about it overnight and remain silent.

Offer sacrifices in the right spirit, and trust the LORD. Many people say, “Who will show us better times?”

Let Your Face smile on us, LORD. You have given me greater Joy than those who have abundant harvests of grain and new wine.

In Peace I will lie down and sleep, for You alone, O LORD, will keep me safe.” – Psalms 4:3‭-‬8 NLT

I know, and have known, many angry, bitter people. It controls them, and it eats away at them inside. I know this, because I was one of those people. Being angry and bitter put me on medications to stop my stomach from hurting, and heavy doses of pain killers for my migraines. Who did I hurt with my anger? Me! It kept me from being content, and caused upheaval in relationships and in work environments. I have a friend who is very angry and bitter. Trouble and discontent follow him. He claims to be a Christian, but he has no peace. He is unhappy, and ‘hate’ is one of his most used words. That was me, too, until I finally – FINALLY – figured out how much I was hurting myself, and that JESUS was patiently waiting for me to let Him have all that mess. It’s absolutely amazing how much better I am when I’m not carrying all that junk inside. Do I still get upset? Of course; I’m human, and I am very flawed and broken. I have found that when I let other’s attitudes flow around me i stead of into me, life is so much more pleasant. Your anger and your bitterness may hurt me or disappoint me, but I don’t have to take it on myself and react to it in a negative or hateful way. Sometimes I struggle, but I know that with the help and support of the Holy Spirit, I can move past it. The ‘crazy’ driver who cuts me off, the person who is rude to me, the one who calls me a ‘b**’ or other unflattering names…. It’s their problem, not mine. I can react, or I can take a breath and respond. It’s my choice, and as long as I let the LORD take the issue, it’s an easy choice. No one can make me angry without permission. Satan no longer has that hold over me! I give thanks daily to my Saviour for releasing me from my bondage of hate and bitterness, and all the ugly that goes with it.

As Christians, we are supposed to be set apart from the world. The greed and possession-hungry ‘ME’ attitude, the anger and hatred that seems to permeate the world…. it’s not for us. I admit that I enjoy my home, and having the kinds of food I like to eat; I am happy to have a vehicle that I picked out. I have done with much less, and I could again, although I would like to stay where I am. I acknowledge that I am blessed beyond measure. My prayer is to be thankful for having enough and not to be greedy, and that I not be like a stranger, a foreigner in my LORD’S eyes. I am His child, the daughter of the Most High. Don’t be like the lepers who were healed by JESUS. When He heals us of our brokenness, give Him ALL the GLORY. When I come face-to-face with my LORD, I surely don’t want Him to deny me because I refused to recognise His Power and Mercy in my life.

“Has no one returned to give Glory to GOD except this foreigner?” – Luke 17:18 NLT

Listen to Chris Tomlin sing Amazing Grace. My chains are gone; it’s right where I love to be, in the Amazing Grace of my LORD. I know I am Forever His! AMEN.

Patiently Waiting

Patience my ass, I want to kill something…

In my more bohemian days, that was something I think I said quite often. Then, my patience was very short – nonexistent, much of the time. Later, I was talking with a pastor and he said something quite profound to me. He said not to pray for patience, because when we do, GOD will provide us with plenty of opportunities to learn it. I realized I’d been going about it all wrong. Instead of praying for patience, I began to pray for strength and perseverance, and make it a point to ask GOD to please don’t send me any more ‘opportunities’ to learn patience! Even the great leaders in the Bible, Old and New Testament, felt persecuted and in desperate need of patience. Look at David. Both before he was king and after he became king, David needed patience. I love how his poetry shows his reach for the LORD, and how the LORD sustains him with willingness to wait in GOD’S Strength – patiently waiting….

“I love You, LORD, my Strength. The LORD is my Rock, my Fortress and my Deliverer; my GOD is my Rock, in Whom I take refuge, my Shield and the Horn of my Salvation, my Stronghold. You, LORD, keep my lamp burning; my GOD turns my darkness into Light. As for GOD, His Way is perfect: The LORD’S Word is flawless; He Shields all who take refuge in Him. For who is GOD besides the LORD? And who is the Rock except our GOD? The LORD Lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be GOD my Savior!” – Psalm 18:1‭-‬2‭, ‬28‭, ‬30‭-‬31‭, ‬46 NIV

If you do a word search for the words ‘patient’ and ‘patience’ in the Bible, you will find many references. James, especially, spent a lot of time talking about it. He only has 5 chapters, but check out how he begins:

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds….. ” – James 1:2 NIV

Really? Pure joy for an abusive relationship? Pure joy for financial difficulties? Pure joy for losing a loved one? Patiently waiting my a**. No, I am so far from being patient, it can’t even be measured. The thing I hold on to is GOD’S Patience. Without Him, I am incapable of doing or saying anything good. I cannot fathom patience without His Hand guiding and holding me, and by Him carrying me when I simply cannot go on. The LORD is the epitomy of this scripture:

“LOVE is patient, Love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails….” – 1 Corinthians 13:4‭, ‬7a NIV

Thank You, LORD, for never giving up on me, for being patient with me, and for perservering with me. AMEN.

Empty Minds, Empty Lives

“Listen to Me, listen, and pay close attention.” – Isaiah 28:23 NLT

When the prophet Isaiah spoke those words to his people, they weren’t Isaiah’s words, they came straight from the LORD. Since the very beginning, God has wanted us, His creation, to listen to Him; to hear Him. Why do we chose to ignore the God Who created us; why not listen to the GOD Who Loves us with an incomparable, incomprehensible Love, a Love that far surpasses anything we experience here on earth? Instead of listening to the Words of Love, we listen to the enemy, the false prophets and teachers that Satan sends.

“Don’t let anyone capture you with empty philosophies and high-sounding nonsense that come from human thinking and from the spiritual powers of this world, rather than from Christ. For in Christ lives all the Fullness of GOD in a human body. So you also are complete through your union with Christ, Who is the Head over EVERY ruler and authority.” – Colossians 2:8‭-‬10 NLT

Buddha taught of Nirvana, of karma and rebirth. Isn’t it interesting that he took some of the teachings of the LORD, perverting them to introduce those ideas? Mohammed was another man who twisted the teachings of JESUS to benefit himself. Joel and Victoria Olsten have their “Prosperity Gospel,” teaching that creating wealth is the most important thing in our lives. There have been hundreds of thousands of men, purporting to be prophets since the beginning of time, who have twisted GOD’s Words in order to take us away from the ONE True GOD. Their goal is Satan’s goal: take us away from our LORD. Our Creator GOD had been telling us of heaven since the beginning – live righteously and spend eternity with Him in paradise. How do you know a false teacher from a man (or woman) of the REAL God?

Test them through the scriptures. Look at their lives. Do they live as The LORD commands in His Word, or do they live as the world? Jesus said:

“Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves. You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way they act. Can you pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? ….Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.” – Matthew 7:15‭-‬16‭, ‬20 NLT

When our minds are empty of the Words and the teachings of GOD and His Prophets, and especially of the Words of our LORD JESUS CHRIST, we become susceptible to the teachings of the enemy. Listening to music that encourages being selfish, promiscuity, unfaithfulness, greed, even violence and murder leads to changes in our lives and acceptance that these things are okay. Watching the immoral lives of leaders and the so-called society elite, looking at the athletes we cheer on…. What do their lives teach us? Looking especially at church leaders and religious leaders around the world, how many do you see living lives that glorify GOD rather than man? Following any of these causes our minds to empty of the Truth, and that leads to empty lives. Without God, without JESUS, to fill that God-shaped hole, we are truly empty minded and lead empty lives – no matter how successful you are by the world’s standards. Satan is a liar; a wolf in sheeps clothing. I pray for discernment against false prophets.

Listen to “Come to the Table” by Sidewalk Prophets.

Come join the sinners who have been redeemed
Take your place beside the Savior now
Sit down and be set free…He said come to the table
Come join the sinners who have been redeemed
Take your place beside the Savior now
Sit down and be set free…

Living In The Past

Guilty.

(E/A, I hope you are reading this!)

“Jesus did not promise to change the circumstances around us. He promised great peace and pure joy to those who would learn to believe that God actually controls all things.” – Corrie Ten Boom

This is an immensely powerful statement, coming from a woman whose entire family died in a Nazi concentration camp, and who almost died there herself. Could I find the Joy she speaks of if I were put in her circumstance? Could you? We can’t achieve either true Peace or Joy on our own, without JESUS – Giver of the Peace that passes understanding….

“Then you will experience God’s Peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His Peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.” – Philippians 4:7 NLT

When we spend our time looking back, holding on to the sorrows of our past, we can’t obtain the Joy or Peace Jesus is offering us, because our eyes are clouded over by the regrets. There is a time to mourn for what was and what could have been. People are gone in the space of a heartbeat, and whether they are an unborn baby or the most elderly person, or anyone in between, it hurts when they are gone. I find that many of us romanticize the loss. With babies, it’s especially hard, I think, because of the lost potential, and the lost love. Now, with tbe LORD at my side, I can finally rejoice over the losses of babies in my family and my friends, along with the countless billions who have been murdered through violence, abortion, and disease. How, you ask? Two reasons:

1. Those babies don’t have to grow up in the flawed, sinful world (HALLELUJAH!), and

2. I will see them and hold them in heaven – we get to spend eternity with them! How cool is that?

All of the regrets and what ifs and could haves and should haves will never change the past. It is past, over with, passed through, gone. DONE. Remembering can be good when done in a positive manner. When we lose a spouse or other loved one as an adult, it’s easy to only remember the good, even though we know the flaws. There is absolutely nothing wrong with remembering. The “wrong,” if you will, is in dwelling in the past and wallowing in self pity for all that was lost. I can play “coulda shoulda” with the best, but to what end? Satan loves it when we start the game! Next to suicide, that wallowing is most damaging to our families and our friends. It’s SELFISH to the extreme, shutting everyone out and dragging them down at the same time. I have done it myself, and I have experienced it in people I care about.

God doesn’t want us mired in the gunk of the past. God LOVES us! He wants to give us JOY, and He wants us to have PEACE. He is the Rock we can cling to when the storms of life threaten to sweep us up and drown us. His Arms are the ones that hold us when we hurt, and He is the One Who carries us when we can’t go on. It isn’t easy to let go of the past; the shoulda coulda’s. With prayer – i.e. just TALK to God – and immersion in His Word, with counseling by a pastor or other Christian professional, and a doctor to help us with medicines if needed, we can emerge from the muck and gunk Satan has buried us in. All you need to do is lean into the LORD. Talk to Him first, before spewing your guts to someone (again, I’m guilty of all this, too!) If you don’t know what prayer, just say JESUS. Cry out to Him. He knows.

Listen to “Live Like You’re Loved” by Hawk Nelson, and read “Finding Joy in the Heartache” devotion by K-Love radio Pastor David (10 March 2018.)

Wonder

“Listen to me; listen, and pay close attention.” – Isaiah 28:23 NLT
I wonder, wonder who, who-oo-ooh, who

(Who wrote the book of love)
Tell me, tell me, tell me
Oh, who wrote the Book Of Love…

The Monotones made this a a popular song in 1958. I know it wasn’t written about the LORD of Creation, but if you look at the lyrics from the chorus, Who else could it be about?

“For this is how GOD Loved the world: He gave His ONE and ONLY SON, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have Eternal Life.” – John 3:16 NLT

The LORD offers us Life; the LORD knows what we need to fulfill our lives. He knows Who we need – and it is JESUS. It is all about Love, and it doesn’t cost us anything. The price has already been paid in full for us by JESUS. He paid it forward so that we could have LIFE. Listen to this message the LORD gave to the prophet Isaiah.

“Is anyone thirsty? Come and drink – even if you have no money! Come, take your choice of wine or milk – it’s all free! Seek the Lo6rd while you can find Him. Call on Him now while He is near. Let the wicked change their ways and banish the very thought of doing wrong. Let them turn to the LORD that He may have Mercy on them. Yes, turn to our GOD, for He will forgive generously.” – Isaiah 55:1‭, ‬6‭-‬7 NLT

The WONDER of it all!