Love the difficult ones too

This isn't a " maybe when" or "if" statement. 

This is a continual, all the time statement! 

Our Christian friends and family, those closest to us will be hard to deal with. They will disappoint, hurt and straight up aggregate us! We are all sinful people! It is going to happen. And probably happen a lot. 

The wonderful, always sweet and thoughtful "ideal" Christians in our life will be so easy and rewarding to live around and love. And when those people come in our life whose burdens are too much for us we will find it easy to not love on then and bear with them as we blame

It on their sin, and not our responsibility. But we have to bear and love the difficult ones as well. 

Our focus needs to be on continually bearing each other,  giving freely of love and  forgiveness.

Just as God did for us

When we have no strength

None of us are equipped to handle life on our own. 

We are meant to rely on God and need Him.  

No matter what is overcoming you today or taking your strength, remember to go to God! 

He wants to be your strength and refuge!

God time? Spiritual life? Help for the busy woman!

We hear it all: read your bible everyday, pray, read those uplifting books, and don't forget the Bible studies, and service opportunities at church!
 We know in our hearts we want more time with God and serving God, but reality strikes and the whirlwind of life doesn't seem to let us even sit down!

So how do we do it through all of this?

This has been on my heart lately as I've talked to woman after woman who struggles with this, and knowing how much I struggle as well ! Now with my husband and I trying to have kids my mind has been in mommy mode and This daunting task looms before me - How am I going to get God time when this happens?

So I decided to ask! I have pooled together some of my past ways I have helped keep my time with God during busy schedules as well as wisdom from Godly woman I know who all have busy crazy lives- kids and no kids!

Here is a summery of what I gathered:

1) Make it  a priority first thing.
  Multiple resources and woman mentioned the importance of talking to God first thing!
 You may not be a morning Bible reading person, but taking the time first thing in the morning as you wake up to say a short prayer to God for your day helps you to get into the gear you need to be. say thank you to God for a new opportunity, thank Him for your blessings and pray over your day that it be focused on Him. Ask God for help finding opportunities for Him. This has helped me so many days when I know it will be busy. I ask God to reveal to me time for Him and He does!
This is also a great to time quickly overview your day and to plan when you want to sit down with God.

2) Get creative with your busy!
God time doesn't have to just look like sitting down for half and hour and reading and highlighting your bible and writing out life changing thoughts every time! While I love when my schedule works out that I can soak in Gods word and devote time to studying Him, time with God that enhances your relationship with Him involves much more! Think of ways where you can feed off of God WHILE in the midst of your busy day! Some wonderful ideas from friends and family include keeping Christian praise music playing in the house and on drives and at work. Having audio Bible either from CD's or from a Bible app, or devotional Cd's playing to you while you drive or work on household chores. Check out radio stations websites and you can find internet sermons and multiple sources. Look up sermons online and listen to them. You can even re-listen to your churches sermons. Read the Bible out loud to your kids. I love one friends story of how she incorporated more prayer time into her life by praying over her child as she put her to sleep. She used the time to pray out loud to God and let her child listen to her as she fell asleep.

3) Use the small moments
I know I like to hold lofty goal for myself that I consistently fail to keep. When I set too high goals I end up worse then if I had set smaller goals I could keep because all I end up doing is failing! Throughout the day be looking at your day and seeing where you can reasonably squeeze in a few minutes to sit and pray or read your Bible. Be willing to sacrifice a little bit of cleaning if you know that the time you are using may be the only quite moments in the house.

4) Allow for Grace

God gives us so much grace, why is it so hard for us to accept grace? Remember that those things that bog us down a lot, the laundry, the cooking, the groceries, taking care of the husband and kids, they are beautiful callings from God that are acts of love and service too.  I am my worst enemy when it comes to that. I am the one who tells myself I am a bad christian, or not doing enough for God if I am not achieving "such and such" in "specific amount" of time "so often." God's word is only filled with His love and grace for us! He never lays out a specific time amount we need to study or pray, or read uplifting and nurturing devotionals, or how clean our house needs to be, or a set number of people we should help and encourage each day. All He asks is that we seek Him, talk with Him, love Him and worship Him. He asks for a relationship with us and for us to serve others! Don't get caught up in labeling yourself and meeting a set list of criteria, instead focus on loving God and those around you. And when you fall entrapped to the busy schedule of the world and all its distractions, allow for Gods grace and fall back into His comforting loving arms.



Thank you to the wonderful woman in my life - friends and family who helped me with this!!

The constant in life is God

Life changes. Societies change. People are different. 

There is much unknown and constantly changing in life. Many of us, me included, can start to be inhinged and scared when  introduced with the unknown. 

Our security can come from the one constant we do have in life. 

God. 

He never changes! 

We can have assurances of His character  because we know He is the same for all eternity! 

Read through the Bible and you see His character!

Get to know God- His love for justice, and His love for redemption! God has a constant desire to save us and be Glorifified! 

We need to know who God is and this will be an anchor in our rocky changing world. 

 We are weak. God is strong.

 We mess up. God saves.

We are don't know our life plan.

God has it all sorted out. 

We hurt others, and are hurt.

God heals. 

Read the bible from cover to cover just to see Who God is.

invitation for revival

Our most Holy and mighty God chooses to live with us! He seeks for hearts that recognize their sinfulness and bring themselves low! To us who seek God in the remorse of our sinfulness He will invite us to live with Him so that He may bring us new life and comfort! What a forgiving and merciful God! Such a blessing we don't deserve!

When I forget who I am..

Hiking a trail, exploring the very depths of a mountain, has to be one of my favorite things to do. I love the beauty and majesty of nature. I walk in constant awe of God as I am surrounded by each changing scene. Thick green trees, intricately designed plants and flowers, unique birds and wildlife, trickling to raging waterfalls and rivers, all displaying the depth of wonder that must fill that place! Then there is the view! You climb and climb, until you reach the spot where you look out, and its more than just seeing the majesty, you feel majesty! And it is there I wonder most at the feeling of majesty that will take over me when I finally get to fall in the presence of the designer and creator of this artwork.

This verse today brought that back for me with a new perspective.

Isaiah 51:1

51 “Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness
    and who seek the Lord:
Look to the rock from which you were cut
    and to the quarry from which you were hewn;

I love this image of how we are made by God! I have never picked up a rock while hiking and thought, “Wow, this is the mountain!” because I am so wrapped up in the beauty of the mountain! When we see a huge boulder and the small rocks beside it we look at the boulder to tell us what is there! But there laying right around it are small pieces, made up of the very same material. And the rock tells a story to us of our image in God.

A small pebble from the side of a great mountain, is not a mountain, you don’t look at it and tingle in the majesty and power and awe of all that you behold. This is similar to how we are not in anyway comparable to God, or the majesty of God.  But we can pick that rock up and match it right along with the piece of the mountain that it came from! We see that in a very small way it tells of the characteristics of the mountain. Likewise, we are made by God, and God tells us we are made in His image!

We are cut from the same rock! Our search for truth, our desire for justice, thirst for knowledge and truth, and enjoyment of beauty, all speak back to our roots. Read the Bible and you will see Gods desire for truth and justice to be made known. Look around you and you see Gods love for beauty! Isaiah reminds us that when we are searching for truth about who we are, when we are seeking knowledge of how to live the righteous life, to be who we were made to be, we should turn to the one whom we were made in His image! When you learn how God wants you to live in life, when you follow the example He set, how God would live, when we follow - that is when we start to feel that fulfillment and satisfaction in who we are.  It is only when we turn to God as a guide to how to live our life that we find the contentment that comes from knowing who you are.

Remember as you live each moment who you truly are! 

Can we move mountains?

 

Honestly, this verse scares me every time I read it.
A battle of thoughts presents itself,:
           "moving a mountain is impossible..."  
                       "What would God ever want me to do that was big?.."

           "a mustard seed is ridiculously small.."  
                        "if the disciples faith wasn't big enough, how would I ever be able to.."

It challenges me every time! What might God be wanting me to do that seems impossible to me, but with the slightest bit of faith in God would be done?!

Maybe instead of searching to see what God wants me to do by looking at what I'm capable of I need to look at what seems impossible.

Moving a mountain seems impossible and ridiculous all at the same time. Human vantage point! This gets me thinking, what out there might God be laying on hearts that when first looked at we may set aside as not from God because of our human vantage point only sees it as "moving a mountain" aka "something completely impossible and ridiculous. " The question I would want us to ask ourselves is this, "is this something you know God would want?' Yes, moving a mountain may seem silly, but what if it was in the way of God rescuing someone? So challenge yourself, what do you know God wants that seems impossible?

A small mustard seed?? How can I possibly not have that much faith? I'm a God following, good Christian girl, head over heels in love with God? Of course I have that much faith, right...?
Reading the Gospel stories we continually see the disciples side-by-side with Jesus. They witness His miracles, they hear his stories, they are there learning and following Him every step! Yet, this task they were trying to do on their own and failed! Maybe it isn't that we don't logically see the facts of what Jesus can do, but more the belief in our hearts of what He will USE US to do. If we believe God can do ALL things, then He can most certainly work THROUGH US. The light at the end of this story is that we know the disciples did go on to do great works for Jesus! After Jesus has ascended into heaven He is working through his disciples to cast out Demons, exactly what they couldn't do here. So have faith in God that He would use you, and that no matter your weaknesses and failures, it isn't about what YOU can do (because most certainly then it would be bound to fail) but what GOD can do!

And He wants to use you!

I praise God that He uses a broken sinner like me!  I pray that He shows us what mountains He would have us move in His name!