God never gives an even exchange…
You pour out your love on him, he pours it right back.
You come in praising him with anxiety, he leaves you with his peace.
You come in with depression, you leave with joy.
You come in with burdens, he brings you freedom.
We go in to pour out our love upon him and we end up blessed. Our Father is a giver even when we are giving thanks unto him!
I will praise You with my whole heart; Before the gods I will sing praises to You. I will worship toward Your holy temple, And praise Your name For Your lovingkindness and Your truth; For You have magnified Your word above all Your name. In the day when I cried out, You answered me, And made me bold with strength in my soul.
When you open up your bible and pray to God what is the intention of your heart? I ask this because recently Holy Spirit had convicted me of going into the Lord’s presence to find out answers rather than just spending time with him. OUCH!
I am not saying it is a bad thing to go into God’s presence with an expectant heart that he will speak to you. I hope you do that. As you should do that; God wants nothing more than for you to follow his will. What I am saying is that when you go into God’s presence the intentions of you heart are very important. We can come into trouble if you go into his presence with the sole purpose of receiving answers instead of being in awe of his goodness.
When the answers become more of a priority than God himself, Houston we have a problem!
It is like that song: “Help me want the savior more than the saving. Help me what the healer more than the healing. Help me want you Jesus.”
Once Holy Spirit gave me a love tap and revealed to me what was going on. I ran with the conviction, asked for forgiveness, and turned in repentance. When I started coming into God’s presence I asked one thing… Who are you Lord?
No one on this earth knows God to the full extent. We can never reach the depth of his goodness and love here on earth. We should be getting to know him on a more intimate level each day. If you are in season of what seems that everything is running dry, know that there is more wisdom, understanding, and revelation that God wants you to receive just off that one question.
Who is God?
Everything trickles off that one question.
Here are some things that God has revealed to me or reminded me of:
I am loved by God.
I am chosen by God.
I am appointed by God.
I am God’s friend.
I am God’s child.
The Lord has removed my punishment
The Lord is among us.
The Lord is a warrior who saves.
The Lord will rejoice over us with gladness.
The Lord will renew us in his love.
The Lord delights in us with singing.
The Lord saves the lame and gathers the outcasts.
The Lord will restore our fortunes before our eyes.
Sometimes we get so caught up in wanting the answers that we forget the whole reason for being in his presence. Simply being in it. We should always want to spend time with him more than what comes out of it. Spending time with him in his word, in prayer, and through other spiritual disciplines will always result in fruit. However, do not forget to step back and simply be in awe of who he is.
There is something that has been laying on my heart rather heavy lately and that is: Our Priorities.
We live in a world that will do anything it can to distract you from your relationship with God and him being rightfully placed at the throne of your heart. Anything we put before him is what we call an idol. As we read throughout scripture, worshiping idols are REALLY bad. We see this in both the Old Testament all the way to Revelation. But often I think because we aren’t worshiping a golden calf that we think we don’t have an idolatry problem.
We are all worshiping something…What are you worshiping?
It is ultimately up to you whether God has the throne of your heart. You can easily put things or people above God. Your spouse, children, addiction to sex, drugs, alcohol, social media, and even food can be a problem. We all have been there or are dealing with this right now. What I have come to find is that when we put our crazy schedule above church on Sunday morning or quiet time with God, we look to fill that void in other things or people, creating even more of an idolatry problem.
Not only that, but when our relationship with God isn’t our number one priority, all the priorities below are completely out of order too!
When I put my relationship with God in its rightful place, above my husband, our marriage flourishes. When I MAKE TIME to spend time with God, my mind is renewed. When I MAKE TIME to renew my mind my heart is lined up with God’s and I reflect the character of Christ. When I trust God with our finances, he provides. When I actively look for fellowship with other women, I am encouraged and filled. This all has to do with us putting forth the effort…
Our relationship with God takes time and dedication. It takes us putting down what we want and our selfish nature and listening to Holy Spirit and what God wants. I have never regretted a time I have been obedient to God. It is actively being aware of the world and it’s distractions. The Spiritual War we are in is the real deal ya’ll! Walking with God takes a lot of opening your heart and seeing that there is some work to be done and allowing God to change you from the inside out. Starting with your heart and mind.
I am not perfect. I will continue to grow until Jesus comes back or I go to my eternal home. I have to ask Holy Spirit to search my thoughts and my heart. I don’t want anything or anyone to be #1 in my life or in my heart besides him. Not even my husband.
This is a time to reflect…
Are you truly putting God first in everything you do or has the world distracted you?
I can say I have been distracted before. I have been that girl to go to food when I am stressed and have a bad day instead of going to God. I was that girl that called someone for advice before casting my cares to God through prayer. You are not alone. I can also say that God has forgiven me and through his word and fellowship with other believers I have the tools to overcome.
If you have something or someone before God, now is the time to ask God for his forgiveness and ask him for the help and Holy Spirit for his guidance. You don’t want anything on the Throne of Your Heart besides God. That just causes a whole lot of unnecessary problems. God being at the Throne of Our Heart is where he belongs. We were made to worship him.
This past weekend my husband and I went to the TobyMac hits deep tour. Outside of the concert while we were waiting in line we were face to face with protestors with signs that said “We will go to hell for our sins” “Repent or go to hell you…*insert every type of sin + er*” as they were quoting scripture OUT of context. I sat there quietly in line praying to God for the people that had such a misconception of the bible. I finally saw the world’s view of God. This very twisted, condemning, not loving, hateful God. THIS IS ABSOLUTELY NOT WHO HE IS!! This, my friends, is what we call satan himself at work, twisting the word of God to make it something hateful instead of the love story to his creation it is.
Am I saying sinning is okay? NO.
Am I saying people won’t go to hell? NO.
Am I the judge? ABSOLUTELY NOT.
Does God look at your heart? YES.
What I am saying is, this particular group of people were lost and didn’t understand the word of God. They don’t understand their creator. There was no love in their chants. There was nothing but condemnation. Which is straight from the pits of hell.
As I prayed I asked Holy Spirit what Jesus would do in this situation. What should I do? Should I talk to them? Should I hug them?
Holy Spirit spoke to me and said “look around you”. As I looked around there were people laughing, people making remarks about the love of God, and others that stood there in silence. What Holy Spirit revealed to me in that moment was powerful. As they stand here judging us, most of us were doing the same as them. WHO is called to judge? Not me, not you, not anyone but God. I asked Holy Spirit why they thought the way they did…I asked him to show me them through the eyes of Jesus. He revealed to me that it was generations and generations of the word being twisted all being rooted in fear and darkness. Years of abuse and ancestry curses haunted them. He spoke to me and reminded me that we never know what people deal with at home. I asked Holy Spirit to let me know what I was supposed to do and if I was supposed to speak up, give away hugs, or anything else, just let me know. He let me know that there are people to get those people who were lost out of darkness, but that wasn’t me. By then I had entered inside.
There were many conversations inside about what was going on outside the 4 walls that surrounded us. One included me telling my exact conversation with Holy Spirit to a lady that was eating to the table next to us. I wasn’t here to gossip. I wasn’t here to slander them. I was here to be the light as God called me to be.
The flesh in me originally wanted to march right up to these people and yell at them about how wrong they were for telling people they were going to hell and judging others. But I would be doing the EXACT SAME thing as them. Trying to be the judge of someone’s sin and pointing fingers when I have no room to do so. I would have spread hate, not the love of God.
Holy Spirit led me on a complete and opposite direction.
BE THE LIGHT TO THE DARKNESS.
LOVE THE PEOPLE WHO NEED IT MOST.
DON’T BE FRIENDS WITH THE WORLD.
STAND WITH GOD.
WALK IN THE SPIRIT.
As Children of God we are called to LOVE.
PERIOD.
Love.
EVERYONE.
ALL.THE.TIME.
Loving One Another
“Dear friends, let us continue to love one another, for love comes from God. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not love does not know God, for God is love.God showed how much he loved us by sending his one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. This is real love—not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.Dear friends, since God loved us that much, we surely ought to love each other. No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us.And God has given us his Spirit as proof that we live in him and he in us. Furthermore, we have seen with our own eyes and now testify that the Father sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. All who confess that Jesus is the Son of God have God living in them, and they live in God. We know how much God loves us, and we have put our trust in his love.God is love, and all who live in love live in God, and God lives in them. And as we live in God, our love grows more perfect. So we will not be afraid on the day of judgment, but we can face him with confidence because we live like Jesus here in this world.Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love. We love each other because he loved us first.If someone says, “I love God,” but hates a Christian brother or sister, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see? And he has given us this command: Those who love God must also love their Christian brothers and sisters.” 1 John 4:7-21 NLT
How often do we wait, have a breakdown, and then call upon Jesus? Why didn’t I read more and pray more this week? These thoughts ran through my mind this past week as I lay sobbing on my bed for no apparent reason. I had struggled with Mental Illness from a very young age until 2015, when God healed me. Was this depression? Why am I so anxious? The same thought pattern that haunted me years ago, arose from somewhere…I assume the pits of hell because this week was anything but sunshine and roses.
Brad and I are transitioning into something that God has called us to and is apart of our purpose. What a better time for Spiritual Warfare! The devil is just as real as God and will do ANYTHING to stop you from your God-given purpose. What I have realized about spiritual warfare is that it happens slowly and subtly. Then, all the sudden, you are an overwhelmed mess of emotion crying and snoting everywhere.
The devil is REALLY good at placing little thoughts that seem harmless in your mind, that later on can become increasingly reoccurring and even more harmful than the thoughts you fail to take captive. The devil has absolutely no limits. He has attacked my identity, as a Child of God. He even tried to make me believe that God didn’t heal me. Thank God, literally for The Word of God. It is alive & well!!! Once Holy Spirit tapped me on the shoulder, and wiped off my tears, he pointed out that the devil or spirts had NO AUTHORITY over me. I soon rebuked the spirits and felt an overwhelming peace…until I woke up for church the next morning.
As we drove to church I felt a great deal of anger for no reason. I rebuked the spirit and not even 10 seconds later, the spirit showed its ugly head. I really had no idea how to fix this. I had been calling on God, rebuking spirits, getting in my word, and praying like crazy! We arrived at church and I began to sing praises to God. I knew that no matter what I was going through, God is faithful. He will never leave or forsake me. I knew in my heart that singing to him was the best thing I could do at that moment. Even if I felt embarrassed and frustrated with what I was dealing with this past week, I had plenty to be thankful for. I sang my heart out to The Lord, and Holy Spirit took over and I felt the chains being broke off, one by one. I began sobbing and I felt a heaviness being lifted off my heart and shoulders.
Before I walked into church, I prayed out loud that I knew God is strongest when I’m at my weakest. I told him that I was sorry for what was going on, I really didn’t know what was going on but I am giving it to him because this isn’t for me to carry. His burden is light and this felt anything but light.
It is hard to explain to you what happened in the spiritual realm with what happened after I prayed and during worship. However, I can tell you that I not only felt different but I knew that the devil and the spirts cannot stand when we worship God nor can they stand when we call upon the name of Jesus.
Of course the devil didn’t stop there either… I came home fell asleep and woke up with a major cold. Not today satan!!! It is really important for us to know the word of God and to implement his words in our prayers to make them Kingdom prayers. Not only is it important to give it to God through prayer, it is so important to praise God through the storm. We should always come to God with an attitude of thanksgiving, no matter our circumstances. The devil will try to damage your relationship with God whatever way he can. That’s his goal. He wants to take away everything that God has planned for you. He will disguise himself in such a sly way that you may not even realize it is him. He doesn’t come in a red suit with horns! When we pray, praise, and speak the Word of God over our lives, the devil and his buddies don’t have a chance!
As much as this week has been rough, and even though I have really had a hard time being Steadfast (my word of 2018)… I have saw God take a burden I wasn’t meant to carry, and immediately felt lighter in heart and in my soul just by praising Jesus. I have witnessed how correlated our body, soul, and spirit are. I was taught that even when you feel like crumpling underneath the pressures of the world, God is my strength. I was reminded that God keeps his promises and my healing is one of them. As much as I thoroughly enjoy the mountain top, I learn so much through the valley. God really is at his strongest when I am weak.
“Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”-2 Corinthians 12:8-10
