BLOGGER TEMPLATES AND TWITTER BACKGROUNDS

Tuesday, November 26, 2013

Enough

     Good Morning! This last Saturday I got to host a women's event at our church. It was wonderful! I spoke on being Enough in God. It has been quite the journey for me to realize that I am enough for God to use. I don't have to be like anyone else, I just have to focus on Him.
     We looked at the story of Leah and Rachel and how these 2 ladies really lived in an atmosphere of competition and striving and jealousy.  If you have never read that story in such a way as to see  their heart conditions, I would suggest that you do.  There is so much "not enough" going on between the 2 women that they don't even know the difference between a good decision and a very, very bad one. Through out their story God remembered them. He loved them. I love that He never forgot them in the mist of their mess, of their own making, he remembered them and He chose to love them. He blessed them with the 12 tribes of Israel.
     As usual thinking about the impact that this story could have on our lives it leads me to think of the next step. How to we go from just believing that we are enough in Christ to living that we are enough. Not sure that I have that answer other than to say one step at a time. I need to continue to place one foot in front of the other and continue to move forward as I see that God is calling me. I love that He is often calling me from places that I would never go by myself. Because with out Him I am for sure not enough.   There will be more related to the whole idea of being enough in Christ. There is more to knowing Christ, but for now just believe that you are enough and move forward in the confidence that He has called you. Don't let your past disqualify you from moving forward into a relationship with God, don't let it disqualify you from doing what God has called you to do. Whether it is reaching out to the orphans, feeding the homeless, or helping women believe that God loves them and has NOT forgotten about them.  Move, move towards Him, looking at Him not on our situations.
     Read about how Leah and Rachel looked at their place in life, their situations and based their choices on the things they could see, instead of Him who is in control.
     Genesis 29:31-30:22.  Go on read it, maybe God will reveal something about your heart condition, I know He did with me.
   

Monday, November 11, 2013

Prosperity Gospel?

     Hello again! It has been awhile, and things have been crazy over here in our house. It would appear that the last time I posted was over a year ago. Well I am hoping that I will be able to keep this up a bit more as  I only have one child at home. This has opened up a whole new world for me, as far at time goes.  The last time I only had one child at home was 7 years ago when our #2 son was born. Wow how time flies.

     I do have a reason for writing. I feel like I have grown spiritually so much since I started writing this blog and even more in the last year. God has done some really great restoration work in my life. I am so thankful to Him for loving me so much that He would come down into my dirtiness and lift me up!
     So here is the reason that I went through the work to find passwords and get log back in...

     I was recently watching a show that I am ashamed to say I watch (because of that I am not sharing what the show was).;-)  Although I really enjoy watching it, it really does nothing good for me. My hubby was out playing basketball and I knew that I had about 20 minutes left before he walked in the door. So I watched the preview of an upcoming show on this channel.  It is a show about a pastor and his family. There have been a lot of these shows and I really have only watched one episode and was pretty disappointed in the "pastors". But they are on TV so really what did I expect? It:s not likely they will show Jesus in a way that could actually change your life that type of show doesn't get as much ratings. Anyway...on this preview  the wife of the pastor said If I had to live in poverty I would never have given my life to Jesus. (about 90% sure these where her exact words.) She also said she knew that God was calling them to the abundant life. She and her pastor husband went looking at a 2+ Million dollar air plane for personal use.
     Ohhh, I started to get hot under the collar. What are they doing?!? When you can blatantly say if I had to be poor I won't follow Jesus you have some serious heart issues.  It seems like I remember a rich young ruler who asked Jesus about this very topic.

Matthew 19:16-20    Jesus Counsels the Rich Young Ruler
16 Now behold, one came and said to Him, “Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?”
17 So He said to him, “Why do you call Me good?  No one is good but One, that is, God. But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments.”
18 He said to Him, “Which ones?”
Jesus said, “‘You shall not murder,’ ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ ‘You shall not steal,’ ‘You shall not bear false witness,’ 
19 ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 
20 The young man said to Him, “All these things I have kept from my youth. What do I still lack?”

     In this exchange with Jesus we see him say, "go, sell what you have and give to the poor." We also the ruler walk away, but he didn't just walk away, he walked about sorrowful,  sad maybe crying. He had just been told that even though his whole life had be honoring to God, his possessions had control of his heart.  He had a heart condition. He had great possessions, those things defined him. They made him the "Rich Young Ruler". He gave that up he gives up his identification to become another no body. A nobody who gave up for Jesus. His heart was not bent in a posture of submission, but of pride in his possessions. Feels to me like our country. We believe that the more possessions that we own the more important we become.
     My heart breaks for how many people these pastors misleading Jesus to. 100? 200 or 300?  No I think they had a congregation of 4000 people and growing. Here is the thing that I have been learning about my Lord. He has called us to teach others about His love, not His hands. If everyone in their church, community and state is taken care of and not one in need, and then they wanted to buy that plane go for it! God for sure put people on this earth for Helps ministry, meaning they have the money to "help" a person in need.  But here is the thing, for a person called to Helps ministry is going to struggle with money being an idol, they may struggle with another issue that they put as an idol but money won't be it.  I believe that because of that I don't believe that they would mind being poor if that is what Jesus called them to. We are called to help take care of foster kids, widow and widowers, and the poor. I would love to hear about a community where hunger was no longer and issue, but I haven't heard that. In fact it is quite the opposite that more people are hungry and without jobs.
     Jesus didn't say this life would be easy or that if we wished/believed enough that He would give us what we want. He told us that He would be with us in times of trouble, but that this walk will make us look different than the "world".  Here is the verse that prosperity is based off of...

John 10:10
 The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.


The Abundant life is one where we are in search of the secret place with Him. Where we live our lives, abiding in Him, in rich or poor. Not depending on what our earthly lives look like, even if we have to work a job "beneath" us. Jesus came as a servant and we often forget how to serve. Our lives in America look so different than a servants life. We live to be served instead of getting down and dirty in areas of life where Jesus is needed the most. We all need Jesus, but Jesus doesn't show up in our things but in our lives. In our heart condition! 
If I have misjudged this couple, and I am sure that I have because I don't know them there is a chance that what they represented on TV is NOT who they are in life, I am sorry. But as a re-presentative of Jesus, not just pastor but all Christians,  they are leading people into hell, not heaven because they aren't re-presenting Jesus at all. When all I seek are the hands of Jesus and what I am wishing and hoping for doesn't show up and now I am worse than I was in the beginning, that doesn't sound like the Loving God I know. There will be times of testing and trouble to build our faith and trust in God, but God doesn't hand us things on a silver platter because those things are good in our eyes. They may take our eyes off the Face of God and puts us in a mind set of a genie god, which He is not. He loves us and wants us to have great things and an abundant life (a life spent in relationship with Him), but He wants to be first and only in our hearts. Be the One that our heart posture in surrendered to.  Saying Jesus wants you to be rich is so superficial and not what Jesus wants! He wants deepness and relationship with you! He wants us so desperate for more of  Him that nothing else matters. Talk with Him! Spend time with Him! That is what He wants and what He desires for us to want in return not what He can give to us.

So I will be praying for this family and their church members. That the Spirit of God would move and change their thought if they have wrong thinking.   They have an amzimg oppertunity 


All verse taken from Bible gate way.