Strength comes from working the muscles....

I was stopped today in my prayer time by one thing in particular that I felt my heart cry out for...something that is dear to me and I felt as if God was bringing it to surface today for individual "special" prayer time and as a teaching moment for myself.  As I prayed, I began to ask God to help to lift some of the heaviness, some of the weight off of this individual.  But, then my prayer turned...my eyes were opened to something else...

      See, I started to think about how we use our muscles and if we do not use a muscle for a long period of time, that muscle will start to waste away.  In order to keep that muscle strong, you must use it and exercise it.  The more that muscle group is used, the stronger it becomes.  The more you deny that muscle group any type of "heaviness", the more it waste away and becomes "UN-use-able".  So, my prayer changed and I began to ask God not to remove all of the weight from the individual, and not to take away all of the "worries" in their lives, because I believe that we need to carry some weight sometimes in order to keep our muscles strong. 

     This doesn't mean that God will not help you carry some of the weight of this world and help you to move about in life, but if we ask Him to totally take away the heaviness and worries, then are we depriving ourselves of being strengthened? 
Some things come into our lives to train us and mold us....yes, to be more like Him.  Sometimes the heaviness of this world (with our family, our work, our children, and spouses, our loved ones, health issues, financial burdens, etc) may be allowed into our lives to teach us new ways to handle them and to strengthen us in the process of dealing with them.  God is there to help hold them when they become too heavy. 
Just like at the gym...some weights are too heavy for us to lift and we need a "spotter" to watch over us as we lift them to make sure they don't come crashing down onto our chest.  God is that "spotter"...ready to lift the weight off or to relieve a bit of its pressure by placing His finger under the weight to help you to bring it all the way up and place it back onto the holder.  But, what if God constantly lifted the weight, brought it down to our chest, and then lifted it back up onto the holder while we just laid there on the bench?  Would we grow in strength?  Would our muscles become stronger?  No, we wouldn't benefit at all from it.  Our muscles, if not used, will waste away and become limp and brittle and eventually break apart.

      God is the all consuming, all knowing, all present God.  He is there when we need Him, the very minute that we need Him.  He will not allow us to be crushed.  His word says to "Cast your cares on the LORD and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous be shaken" (Psalm 55:22).
He will sustain us...sometimes we need to carry some of the burdens, and ask God to show us how to carry them, how to move in them, and how to react to them appropriately.  We can learn so much if we are open to being taught. 
So my prayer began to change.  I began to cry out for God to not lift the weight completely off, but to allow the weight to be used for Him to teach this individual how to act in it with all of its heaviness and for this individual to be strengthened, and to grow stronger in the Lord and to draw closer to Him in the process.  And when the weight is too much for them to carry, then God is there to sustain them.  The definition of sustain is  "to support, hold, or bear up from below; bear the weight of, as a structure"(dictionary.com).  The Hebrew word for sustain is "saad" which is also translated as "to support, sustain, stay".  God can support the weight without totally taking it completely away.Whatever it is that you are carrying today, whatever you feel is weighing you down...ask God to show you why you are feeling this way and how you can be strengthened through it. 

    

     God is right here waiting to sustain you and ready to teach you how to be strengthened...just ask.

Jennifer

God is Love

Come on over and join me at Faithful Devotions if you are looking for some God is love...moments.....little raindrops of grace falling down allowing us to feel
 His tenderness which indeed is inexpressibly sweet!
all of grace my dear friends,

http://faithfuldevotions.com/encouragement/god-is-love.



thankful for;

lemonade stands in the heat
husband who plants the more flowers
the blood of Jesus
for the pastor who cries the hard
for girlfriends that feel your pain
God's grace
 my old church pew
prayer books from the saints before us
finding forks in the teen's bed
glitter all over the floor
sea-shell necklaces
rocking chairs and sweet tea
rain
birds that chirp early in the morning during my prayer time
the work that is never done
craziness that life brings
for a Saviour who loves
Repentance
My Redeemer Lives


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thoughts to ponder

Be still, and know that I am God;
Psalm 46:10

Move in the truth...
Grab it...
Don't live like everybody else lives...
We need a fresh accurate view of Jesus
Turn your eyes upon Jesus...
Be delivered...
Walk in the Spirit...
Acquire Proper Vision...
See with the eyes of the Spirit...
Some of us need to see in the Spirit a place of continual eternal burning...
This world does not own you...
Fight the good fight...Take hold and live in that place...
Experience God...
Do not get distracted...
Don't wait for the rain...be a rainmaker
Sometimes we have to die another level of death to experience another level of eternity!!!!!!!

all is grace,
the Yahweh Sisters

"Peace...Be Still"

"Sometimes he calms the Storm"

Sometimes he calms the storm with a whispered, "Peace...Be Still".

He can settle any Sea- doesn't mean he will.

Sometimes he holds us close and lets the wind and waves go wild.

Sometimes he calms the storm, other times he calms his child.

The New Testament has three different interpretations of Jesus calming the storm.

Matthew 8 23-27

Mark 4 37-41

Luke 8 23-25

In Matthew-  the disciples cried, " Lord, Save Us"

Mark says- " Don't you Care?"

and Luke said, " We are going to drown!"

Jesus calmed the storm- after rebuking them for having such little faith. But this - increased their faith.

" Why are you so afraid"?, he asked the disciples. " There is nothing to fear!"

The disciples were amazed- Nothing is impossible when... You put your Trust in God!

Jesus first calmed their fears.. Then increased their faith, by calming the storm- thus protecting them.

The Sea of Galilee- really a lake- is north of the land of Israel. The only fresh water lake in the land. Great for fishing. Capernaum and Bethsaida- fishing towns. The Sea of Galilee is seven miles across and approximately 160 feet deep.

The surface of the lake is about 600 feet below sea level.

The lake- Sea of Galilee is in the famous " Rift Valley" a natural fault line that runs down the Jordan River Valley to the Dead Sea. In Fact all the way to Africa.

Mount Hermon is 9000 feet high, and the Dead Sea is 1250 feet below sea level. The valley drops sharply- hot air can come up suddenly and collide with the cool air from Mt. Hermon- causing sudden storms.

I have the same responses as the disciples when I experience storms in my life. " Jesus, Don't you care?"

I'm drowning here, Lord

Lord, Save Me!

A storm grew strong around me this past weekend. I couldn't explain why, just did- a sudden storm. I was caught off guard. At the time looked like a large one, but looking back now- it was really just a few rain drops. I felt- MEAN inside. I didn't like that feeling. Why am I acting this way. It was in the mist of the storm- Jesus tapped me on my " Hard Head" and said- Keep your eyes on me, not yourself OR your situation. And suddenly- the storm was gone.

Jesus can calm the storm- that quick

He will calm your fear

He will calm the storm

Have Faith

Keep your eyes on him!

Amy

Doing for others

“When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in,  I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink?  When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you?  When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’  “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.  For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink,  I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’  “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’  “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’  “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life."
(Matthew 25: 31-46)

     How many times will I break my Savior's heart? It's me who craves the easy in my me-ism little bubble that complains that I have to work the two days a week. How many times will I choose not to pick up my cross and follow HIM? To love COMFORT more?
     Longing to be the Christ-centered can sometimes feel like a roller coaster ride. Wanting so badly to live for Christ to live bent the lower as long as????? As long as I am not taken out of the comforts of my life.
Pastor preached Sunday on the blind beggar from (Mark 10: 46-52); he sat by the road-side blind and begging; the truest picture of humanity....and people just kept passing him by.
But one cry out to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords (Jesus son of David) have MERCY on me!
     Jesus stopped dead in His tracks and turned around and said "who called my name?"
 Who is it that we are passing by?
Are we the ones passing by the blind and the hungry?
     I have had the stench of death all over me lately. The people come and their lives are the broken. Some with the no families. Others that are dying with AIDS or Cancer sometimes it's a stroke and it's the Brain that is gone.  And it's the me who steps right over them to do what is called  "my job."  Aren't all those people supposed to be made in His image?  It's me when the shift is over that runs to the car like a mad women so I can breath again. Speeding home to stand in the shower trying to scrub the stench right off of me.........the stench of death.  It is then standing in my shower that I cry out "Jesus son of David, have mercy on me."
     In Hebrews 2:17-18; Jesus knew we are the helpless. He knew we couldn't save ourselves. HE looked on US and felt merciful. He saw us as sheep without a Shepard. (Sheep are not very bright animals, and they are always going in the wrong direction). So how do I keep my eyes off of me and put them on the King and live with Jesus being my everything?  As I toss another load in the wash with my Belarus daughter looking at me with those huge big brown eyes and she smiles a faint little smile and tells me they have no washer or dryer. The have to use the well water that is not close to their house and they pump water into a bucket. A bucket that is used for their drinking water, bath water, and for cooking.  How can my comfortable little life ever be considered Christianity? What is my life all about? To better my blog? To be a speaker or a writer? All for what? To simply elevate myself spiritually? I have yet to forsake my American dream.....I am living the American dream! Wanting to simply WAKE UP!!!! Wake up and say YES to God!
     If each of us lived our life waking up everyday with pure joy and saying, "Here I am God....over here....send me!!!! YES God I will go where-ever you lead.....not my will, but your will and cry out Jesus "son of David," have mercy on me, wouldn't we live in a different world?

Maria Skobtsova, (a twentieth-century nun) quoted this quote that will stay with me the rest of my life:
"At the Last Judgement I shall not be asked whether I was successful in my ascetic exercises, nor how many bows and prostrations I made. Instead I shall be asked if I fed the hungry, clothed the naked, visited the sick and the prisoners."

all of grace,
Robbie

    Thankful for:

the nephew who loves me

family time

being with my mom

swimming in the pool with my lab

the squeal of laughter at the beach from the teens

finding his grace

family whose hearts are fixed on the cross

the ocean

finding stillness

seeing His fingerprints everywhere

the gift-salvation

standing on holy ground

prayer shaw

old sermons

for my niece who I call "Etty," who cried the hard because I wouldn't give up my dog

poly pockets(my girls are too old so we took poly-pocket world to the beach for Etty)

who played for hours and the teenagers who took turns playing with her.

moments that take your breath away

slowing down

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Holy Spirit Come

There is nothing sweeter- than when a child asks Jesus to come live in their heart. What does that really mean? To a child- They really believe that Jesus comes to "Live" in their heart. Well actually... he does. When you receive Jesus as your personal savior, you are saying that the spirit of God has joined with your spirit- That Jesus' indwelling spirit has come to dwell within you.

Ezekiel 36:26-27  the lord says, " I will put my spirit within yours and cause you to walk in my way."

Once the Holy Spirit transmits the quality of love into you- your very core- your job will then be to walk in his love. Once his divine love is transmitted in us, we will be able to love others as easily as he loves us.

When you start to feel God's love for his people- you will not be able to stop yourself from loving his people.

As I hold their tired and wrinkled hand- as I bathe the sick and weary- or sit by the bed of a lonely outcast- I cant help myself. The tears begin to fill my eyes as I begin to see that person- through Jesus' eyes.  There is a song on the Christan radio station that I listen too that says..... Give me your eyes for just one second- give me eyes so that I can see- everything that Ive been missing- give me your love for humanity.

Why is it so hard to step out of our comfort zone and help another in need? Can you make eye contact with someone hurting- and then look away as if you do not see them?

I want to get to that place- that place where Jesus is in control of me all the time. The old me is gone and the new me is so filled with the Holy Spirit that everyone that comes in contact with me- sees Jesus in me. How can we get to that place? I feel God so strongly in that twenty bed ICU where I work. Is it because so many call out his name? It is at home where I fill the most resistance. The most tension.  Sometimes I feel like two different people- no not multiple personalities- but full of Jesus one minute and lonely and empty the next.

I know that Satan is the king of lies- that he plays on our weakness. One of my weakness' is my family. I have such high expectations for my boys- it is when I take my eyes off what is truly important, and focus on things of this world- is when I fall short.

Father, I pray for you to live in my heart- to dwell in me every second of every day.

Amy

suffering brings glory...

Romans 8:15-17  
The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship.  And by him we cry, "Abba, Father." The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's children.  Now if we are children, then we are heirs-heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.
John 21:18-19
Jesus said, "Feed my sheep.  Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go."  Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God.  Then he said to him, "Follow me!"

     The message at my church on Sunday really brought me to my knees and made me take a look at my own life and rethink things. The following stuff is a lot of what was spoken in my church and I do not take credit for it all; however, I thought it was worth sharing. I wrote on running hard after God the other day and how we must go through some trials in life, but these scriptures back up the fact that we will go through sufferings in order to share in God's glory.  We are heirs of God. 
What would have happened if they had delayed the sufferings?
God instructs Peter to take up his cross and Follow Him....think about that....take up your cross and follow him...
As followers of Jesus, we are in the world, but not of it.  We must swim against the tide. 
We may have to suffer.
We will come into conflict with the forces of hell....sufferings will come our way.....but glory will come too...
Do you want to experience God's glory?  I do!!! 
Let's not focus too much right now on the sufferings because I do not want you to run away for fear of experiencing sufferings.  God does not want us to live in fear, but we must live in reality of the world that surrounds us, even if we are not of the world.

     We need intimacy. Intimacy with God- we have to truly get to know Him and through intimacy comes knowing Him.

     In Acts 20, we read about Paul and his willingness to go to Jerusalem, "not knowing what will happen to me there."  He only knew that "in every city the Holy Spirit warns me that prison and hardships are facing me.  However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me - the task of testifying to the good news of God's grace." (Acts 20:22-24)

     Does your life mean nothing to you compared to what it means to live for God and His kingdom?  It seems a bit scary to really answer that question honestly.  BUT, we have to get to that place where we say...HERE I AM LORD, I AM HERE TO GO WHERE YOU WANT, DO WHAT YOU WANT, SUFFER THROUGH THE HARDSHIPS YOU WARNED ME ABOUT IF IT MEANS GETTING TO THE PLACE THAT YOU WANT ME TO BE AT...where is that place that you want to go with God?  Has he spoken it to you in the still of the night and your first thought was that it was impossible?  Has he prophesied over you a calling to something that seems so far fetched that you cannot see it playing out in your life?  What is it that God wants from you?  And are you willing to give it to Him? 
     We must fix our eyes on what is not seen instead of what is seen (1 Corinthians 4:16).
The things that are seen are only temporary.  They do not possess us.  They do not own us.  We are owned by something far greater than what we can fix our eyes on.  Life is like a vapor...it is here for awhile and then it vanishes away.  (Colossians 3:1)

     Paul is saying, "listen, this life here is only temporary, it will fade away, dim out.  We must not focus our eyes on earthly things, but on things above. 
Colossians 3:4 says, "When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory."

     It is not about being comfortable. It is about being CONSUMED....consumed with more of Him.  Longing for more of His presence.  God is knocking on the hearts of His people...how many will open up the door and let Him in?
We need to hunger to go after God...no matter what the world looks like around us...no matter what the consequences are...no matter what we see with our earthly eyes...We need to burn for Jesus.  We need to be awakened...awakened to a new life in Him...
I am praying for a new awakening in the hearts of those that read this blog and for the families of those that read this blog and for the churches that they attend and the cities that you live in and the neighborhoods that you call home.  We need to be awakened and burn for Him....are you willing to risk it all for a glimpse of his glory? 
Hunger.
Thirst.
Be Filled.
Long.
Run.
Fear Not.
Trust.
Grab hold.
Don't let go....
God bless you this day....pray for a fresh touch from God today in your life and go after him....He is waiting....

Jennifer