SPEAK IT! * BELIEVE IT! * RECEIVE IT!

There are so many neat things that the Lord has sent my way in the last few weeks, I can hardly contain it.  I may be repeating some things here, but it all started with the phrase. . "Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass, it is about learning how to dance in the rain."  When I would try to tell my mother several years back about trying something new, or let's go over here, or can I drop you and dad off at the. . . she would say, "I've been there and done that, don't want to do anything. I just want to sit here!"  I would get irritated to say the least.  "Well, I am not going to be like that when I am her age!"  "There will never be enough time to do everything, reinvent myself, experience all the things I want to do." 

Yeah! Right!  My experiences over the past couple of years have been quite interesting as I look back.
Not only do I not have the ability, vitality, and desire to do all those things, I hear a negativity creeping in.  I told a friend today, that I feel like someone has their hand on top of me, and is pressing down.  When I made that statement, it came from a conviction that I need to step away from that thought.  I woke up to, Speak it!  Believe it!  Receive it!  Okay, I heard that, I wrote it in my journal, what and how am I suppose to do that.  Speak what?

See, I don't know how you operate or what committee you hear in your head.  But, I hear a lot of things.  I've experienced a lot in my life.  I have observed a lot in my life and yet when Anna Bell said - God's Got It, I was taken totally by surprise at my response.  Of course, I know God's Got It!  I teach it, preach it, counsel it and live it.  His Word is full of how we are to trust Him, lean on Him, and focus on Him.  And, yet the true meaning of He has got this covered rolled over me like a two-ton metal rolling machine.  It was going to be very important for me to DISCOVER what all that entails and why is He impressing me with all this fever to Let Him have it!  In today's world, our Lord and Savior has to yell sometimes over the busyness of life and the tyranny of the urgent.  Therefore, I knew that all this stay-in and can't go anywhere due to the weather put me in the right place to FOCUS on Him.  I have had weeks of great mornings and so much input, I can share with you these things for weeks.

So while the snow storms were wailing outside, I lent myself to be captive to new thoughts and lassoing my attitudes through negative thoughts to the cross.  II Cor 10: 5.

It begins with practicing in your mind that you are sitting on His lap and while you do that, being quiet.  What does He want you to know about your life right now?  If He has it covered, If He has Got this!  This situation you are going through with your family, or a friend, or a boss, or a career choice, or the loss of someone important in your life, or the anger/resentments;  it is nothing He hasn't taken care of before, seen before, and fixed before.  Stop arguing, stop worrying, stop fretting, fussing, stewing, and steering.   If you are and that is your thing, tell if it is working for you?

Next we will talk about how to Speak it!   I will be back with that first one, Sunday!

'GOD'S GOT IT!'

Most of us know in the back of our minds that God does have it covered!  A friend of mine brought me straight up to attention last night with this quote.

Which emphasizes again, the fact that God is in the drivers seat as we talked about last week.  His sign on the lake that He brings all things together for good, still stands tall.  My friend has been in the hospital most of the week with her husband having either a heart ablation surgery, and then home one day, and back to Parkview FW due to Pneumonia, and fluid on his heart.  They have spent the better part of the last three years in one hospital or another for either one.  She had been at the hospital for twelve hours and was getting ready to lay down and try to sleep.  I felt frustrated that I couldn't be there or help other then prayer.  Her words, and I will never forget them. . .  It's okay, God's Got It!

2014 hasn't started out very well for a lot of people.  Not only in our families, but with friends and the list is growing.  It is hard sometimes for us because we get "breathless", sick to our stomachs with worry.  Then someone comes along and says. . .it's okay, God's Got It!  It brought a final peace to my mind and spirit when I read that.  Thank you Anna.

WHO IS IN THE DRIVER'S SEAT!

   I just never get tired of looking at this picture and trying to establish in my mind what message this is from God.  Besides the obvious.  Many people have asked me about this message speculating all kinds of things.  The one I chose is,  that it means God will be with me in whatever situation or journey that comes my way. Most likely a journey I won't like taking.   Then this scripture came up this week - and it comes from the translation in The Message.    Mark 8: 34 to the end of the chapter.

. . ."Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead.  You're not in the driver's seat; I AM.  Don't run from suffering;  embrace it.  Follow me and I'll show you how.  Self - help is no help at all.  Self- sacrifice is the way, my way, to saving yourself, your true self.  What good would it do to get everything you want and lose you, the real you?  What could you ever trade your soul for?"

"If any of you are embarrassed over me and the way I'm leading you when you get around your fickle and unfocused friends, know that you'll be an even greater embarrassment to the Son of Man when he arrives in all the splendor of God, his Father, with an army of the holy angels."

Everyone should go and get this book . . .Jesus Calling!  It is a daily devotional.

From January 11th

Trust me by relinquishing control into my hands.  Let go, and recognize that I am God.  This is my world:  I made it and I control it.  Yours is a responsive part in the litany of Love.  I search among My children for receptivity to Me.  Guard well this gift that I have planted in your heart.  Nurture it with the Light of My Presence.  When you bring Me prayer requests, lay out your concerns before Me.  Speak to Me candidly; pour out your heart.  Then thank Me for the answers that I have set into motion long before you can discern results.  When your requests come to mind again, continue to thank Me for the answers that are on the way.  If you keep on stating your concerns to Me, you will live in a state of tension.  When you thank Me for how I am answering your prayers, your mind-set becomes much more positive.  Thankful prayers keep your focus on My presence and My promises.

Psalm 46: 10   AMP,  Colossians 4: 2  Peter 1: 3/4

ENOUGH SAID!

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN. . .

YOUR FEET HIT THE FLOOR EACH MORNING?

Of course it is nice if we hit a rug or carpeting!  When I think back to my early years out in "The Brick" near Servia, Indiana, I remember hitting hardwood floors with a few scattered rugs on them.
My room was at the top of the stairs on the second floor.  If you will note in the top front corner
there.

In the picture of this home was a rot iron fence and a huge Evergreen Tree.  In the winter time we had snow storms like this last week.  We thought nothing of it back then.  The trees would be bowed to the ground and the one had to be cut down as a result.  There was no heat on the second floor so we had to leave the stairway door open so I would have heat up there.  All that to say, I grew up with a real disdain for floors without carpeting or major rugs. They didn't make those furry "lub-lub's" (as my mother called them later on in life).  So when my feet hit the floor I scooted quickly to the first floor to be next to the stove.   To this day, anywhere I lived, you won't find me with linoleum floors.  I put up with my present foyer by covering it with lots of rugs. 

I share this statement with you, because today, and I do mean in today's world, we must have another agenda.  It must not be about comfort anymore, it must be about putting on the full armor of God.

The book by Larry Richards is a must read.  The Full Armor of God.  For me it is not about just getting cleaned up and facing the day with it's many different kind of schedules, it is about how will I manage it so I give Glory to God.  We need to HIT the floor ready to put on the Full Armor of God.  How can we bless Him today?  How can we put the enemy down today?  By being women who HIT the floor in the morning and the enemy says. . ."Oh crap, all these women are up again!" 

We need to be totally aware and processing that we carry the flag of armor:

The Helmet of Salvation
The Breastplate of Righeousness
The Shielf of Faith - to bounce off the darts and weapons of the enemy!
The Belt of Truth -  Knowing who we are in Christ Jesus!
The Sword of the Spirit -  God's Word
The Shoes made for walking on the enemy.

BE READY TO BE THAT WOMAN (OR MAN)!  who today is ready to kick butt!  We have more then the average to manage today.  Family members who need this message.  Even if we just pray it for them, friends who are alone and need comfort, a kind word, praying with them.  Whatever it is, be on Guard!
Th

A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS!

We have given up on trying to keep ahead of the snow.  Electricity went off once today.  Hope you stay safe.  Our neighbor Jack got out in this awhile ago to go up to his brothers place to feed a cat.
Wow!  Lectures didn't work either.  Now Dekalb County says we are restricted.

Stay Safe, Please!