confessions about me...

I am still the same selfish person I was as a child.. I really thought I had overcome it... I thought I was the image of God.. or at least becoming the image of God.. and today.. I realize.. I am still dealing with the same ugliness as always...

I can't stand people to touch my stuff... it doesn't matter what it is... I can't stand it...
I can't stand anyone in my space...

this morning God reminds me that repeatedly in my life.. He has uprooted me.. wiped out all of my possessions.. because of this very issue... He is trying to teach me that nothing belongs to me to begin with... it is His...

I had a dream once about someone not wanting me to touch their stuff.. and I couldn't clean the house because of it.. and he had to realize that he had to give me some space in the house too... yet I see myself doing this exact same thing to the young girl in my own house... she has nothing.. she has no one.. and I am selfish and don't want her to touch my stuff... and I remember that dream and how it felt to not belong in that house...

I have got to change.. I have to be able to open more than my mind or my words to the ways of God.. I have to be willing to open also my house.. my heart.. my belongings... because in the end.. none of it is mine anyways... it all belongs to God...

becoming who we are supposed to be

Romans 8: 28 And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them. 29 For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them to become like his Son, so that his Son would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. 30 And having chosen them, he called them to come to him. And having called them, he gave them right standing with himself. And having given them right standing, he gave them his glory.

I am going to talk only about me.. but hopefully we can all put our own selves in this same scenerio...

when I was young.. I was a spoiled brat... you couldn't tell me anything.. because I knew everything.. all the gifts that God had given me were just my idea of why I was so wonderful... I knew that God had given them to me.. but He did it because I was so wonderful... and people who didn't like me.. well.. that was their own insecurities showing up in their jealousy...

now... all these years later.. God has shown me.. through rough circumstances.. that nothing I have or am is anything.. and He could sweep it all away in the blink of an eye... I am a person of value.. not because of me.. but because of God within me.. God shining out of me is the only value that I have... that is not low self esteem.. that is knowing that God is in control of all... that I am only what He allows me to be.. I am a much better person than I was when I thought I was great.. I can see other people now.. before I was the center of the universe... now I can allow others to be my universe...

my son is continuously putting himself in a bad situation.. he gets out of one and right back into another.. while I know that much of this is due to the circumstances he grew up in.. I also know that God is working things out for his good... so I have to sit back sometimes and just allow it... I wish he didn't have to smack his head off the brick wall all the time.. but I know that until he is the man that God created him to be.. he is not of any eternal value... so when God changes him through all these circumstances.. it can be God getting the glory for the magnificent change that has taken place..

if we look at the fruit of the Spirit.. they are love, peace, joy, kindness, gentleness, goodness, compassion.. these attributes are built into us.. not by the easy situations in our lives.. but instead by the hard ones.. it is through walking through hell that we learn what it feels like to just need someone to reach out and hug us.. or pray with us.. or just be kind sometimes... that is what creates these attributes in us...

so while we don't want someone else to go through all the tragedy they may experience.. whether it is self induced or not... these are the things that make us and mold us into the children that God is willing to smile down and say.. that one is Mine...

I think it is time that we all learn to be thankful for the things that have broken us to the point where we are worth something to God.. now.. after the bad experiences.. He can use us.. because we are the image of Him.. after we have gone through circumstances that have broken all the self off of us.. we are now like new creatures.. soft and loving.. in the image of God.. and for our loved ones who are still banging their head off the brick walls.. we can rest assured that just like God continued to chase us down.. He will chase them down too.. and they too will be soft and loving.. and in the image of God... ready for kingdom work..

2 Samuel 6: 10-12

10 So David decided not to move the Ark of the Lord into the City of David. Instead, he took it to the house of Obed-edom of Gath. 11 The Ark of the Lord remained there in Obed-edom’s house for three months, and the Lord blessed Obed-edom and his entire household.
12 Then King David was told, “The Lord has blessed Obed-edom’s household and everything he has because of the Ark of God.” So David went there and brought the Ark of God from the house of Obed-edom to the City of David with a great celebration.

when I woke up one morning about 2 or 3 weeks ago.. as has been the case for about the last 2 years.. I think.. oh I don't want to get up.. I just want to sleep forever... now we all know that I am getting plenty of sleep.. this is not about being tired in the physical sense.. I am tired in the mental or spiritual sense... and I have am reminded that a while ago.. I used to wake up smiling.. thinking about God and how much I am in love with Him.. and I would talk to Him much the same way that women talk to a man... then He told me He is no longer my Husband but now my Father... well.. I don't know about you.. but my own experience with fathers was not so great.. so I have not at all been thrilled about this... and I wonder.. what is it that changed? we know it isn't God.. we know that God is the same forevermore.. so the change had to occur in me...

in the scripture.. this is about the Ark of the covenant.. which represented the Presence of God... now we all know that the Ark is long since lost.. but yet we can have the Presence with us.. somehow.. some way.. we decide to walk away from the Presence of God in our lives all the time.. and then we wonder what happened...

I think that like any other relationship.. we need to be active in the relationship with God.. He has encouraged me to wake up 15 minutes earlier each day and meditate on Him for those 15 minutes.. to read just a verse or two and think on Him... He has also encouraged me to set aside an hour every evening.. before the TV comes on.. to read a chapter and meditate on Him.. then I go sit in the bathtub in the candlelight and be silent and still before Him for about 15 minutes... and give Him time to talk to me.. time to just be with Him... I am believing that as I am faithful in giving Him time.. He will again become the Joy of my Salvation...

we let circumstances determine our emotions.. we let our situation determine our spiritual high or low... really.. God hasn't changed.. we have.. when I was so in love with God I didn't have a job.. wasn't sure what was going to happen.. He brought me out of that state.. and in response.. I found more time for actions of worship but less time for true worship.. less time to truly sit still before God... I am walking forward in changing that.. day by day.. God will be my first thought and my last thought.. and many of the thoughts in between... I truly love Him and now I intend to really act like it.. I am sure if He were a man He would have long since left me... and I surely don't want Him to go... He is everything...

a few years ago something really tragic happened in my family... my sister's son killed my brother's son... it was an act of self defense.. they were both drunk and stupid and someone pulled a gun so someone protected his family and also pulled a gun and shot... tragic..

but what was more tragic was the fact that my brothers and sisters have allowed one tragic act to destroy the entire family... instead of just looking at the situation as horrible for the whole family.. they determined to lay blame on one another's children and now they don't speak.. they don't see one another...

and what I have really seen happen in this circumstance is for everyone's heart to become hard and bitter... and THAT is the real tragedy...

I wondered.. would we think that forgiveness is a learned behavior? would we imagine that a family doesn't forgive one another because they really haven't been taught how to be forgiving? or is it because they are unwilling to do the right thing? or is it really because God is not in the center of all of their lives....

we always hear that forgiveness is not as much for the other person as it is for the one doing the forgiving.. I would say that in the past I didn't believe this.. because I was the one that needed to forgive someone who had been wrong toward me.. but now.. when I can see this from the outside in.. I feel like the ones that need to forgive are the ones suffering.. and the saddest part to me is the fact that they don't even know it.. they cannot see their bitterness and how it is infecting their children.. and for generations to come they will now live with the fact of unforgiveness being a new generational curse...

I remember just recently telling my son that he needed to forgive his father for being the way that he has been... and my son didn't want to do it.. but I believe he did in the end and I am so glad that he did...

the bible tells us to protect our heart... we often feel like this is a free pass to treat someone else the same way they treated us.. that we don't need to be loving to everyone because we are protecting our heart... well is it possible.. that protecting your heart is really about protecting it from the bitterness that comes from unforgiveness.. the hardness of heart that the world views give us...

I believe that if we love with all our hearts.. everyone.. regardless of what they have done to us... then God will protect us from being destroyed.. we may get hurt.. everyone gets hurt.. but it will not destroy us.. and if we keep from getting bitter and angry.. we can grow from these situations...

people used to think I was such a strong person because of the things I have lived through.. it was not true.. I was very weak.. I was very hardhearted and unforgiving and angry and bitter... as I have become transformed by God.. I am much stronger now.. I can now love you in spite of how you act.. I may not agree with you.. but that doesn't make me be hard toward you anymore.. I can love someone I don't like anymore.. this is a much stronger person than the one who hates and is bitter...

I am so thankful to have learned the importance of forgiveness in our lives.. it has changed me...

John 13: 34 So now I am giving you a new commandment: Love each other. Just as I have loved you, you should love each other. 35 Your love for one another will prove to the world that you are my disciples.”

if you remember back to the things that made the holidays so special in your life when you were a little one.. it really is not the gifts.. it is the love and the family that came together on the holidays.. some of us didn't get many gifts.. some of us really didn't get any love... it is far more of a tragedy to not receive love than to not receive gifts.. yet for whatever the reason.. every year.. we allow ourselves to stress and try to get all these wonderful gifts.. thinking that will be what shows love to our children or loved ones..

idk about you.. but if I could spend my day with the person/people I love the most.. that would be the greatest gift I could ever receive... that is what is important to me for christmas... being with the ones I love...

yea.. the gifts are nice... wonderful even.. but the love far exceeds all of that...

and this is our call to the world.. daily we are to be the living love of God to a world that may not ever feel loved... that is our real purpose in life.. to love those who don't know love... and this will prove to the world that we are living for God.. and that He lives within us..

Psalms 50: 16-23

16 But God says to the wicked: “Why bother reciting my decrees and pretending to obey my covenant?
17 For you refuse my discipline and treat my words like trash.
18 When you see thieves, you approve of them, and you spend your time with adulterers.
19 Your mouth is filled with wickedness, and your tongue is full of lies.
20 You sit around and slander your brother— your own mother’s son.
21 While you did all this, I remained silent, and you thought I didn’t care. But now I will rebuke you, listing all my charges against you.
22 Repent, all of you who forget me, or I will tear you apart, and no one will help you.
23 But giving thanks is a sacrifice that truly honors me. If you keep to my path, I will reveal to you the salvation of God.”

isn't this really what we are all like?? but we surely do not consider ourselves wicked... but we talk about people.. we tell casual lies.. sometimes we get caught up in 'religion' rather than worship.. sometimes we follow the rules but spend no time alone with God... how is that a relationship?? anyone that we have relationship with.. we spend time with.. therefore.. we obviously would need to spend time with God to stay in a healthy relationship with Him....

sometimes we do approve of thieves... we steal from the government.. through taxes.. through government programs.. we try to get all we can get even if we don't necessarily need it.. we feel we deserve it...

and God had remained silent... or did He? did we just ignore His gentle prodding that our actions are wrong...

but the great thing about God is... in the end.. He says.. repent... meaning there is another chance to get it right...

give thanks.. that is what He is really looking for... thankfulness for our lives.. even though they may not be what we want them to be.. they are not what someone else is surviving either... if we keep His path.. He will reveal to us salvation... and I don't know about you.. but I am trying to make that train!!

I think that God hand picks each of our trials... we cannot handle someone else's... or another person's could be too light and we would not even recognize the weight of it... and some days.. while I feel like I am just surviving till this storm passes... I know that it could truly be worse... and even in the heavy days.. the days that we are burdened for a long time about a situation.. even in those days.. rise up and praise God for His ultimate mercy and goodness... without it.. we would have no hope...

Ephesians 4: 29

29 Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them.

the first thing that God cleaned up in me was my swearing/cuss words... yet there are many others who are in Christ or at least in the church.. that never cuss in public.. but certainly cuss plenty in private... and I couldn't understand why God felt this was an issue for me but not for so many others.. I still don't understand it really...

let everything you say be good and helpful.. that has more to do with our thoughts than cussing.. if our thoughts are dark.. we speak dark.. if our thoughts are light.. we speak light... meaning positive and negative.. so if we are always speaking negatively and condemnation of self or of others.. then our thoughts are not as they should be.. because out of the heart flows the words of our mouths...

hmmm.. I guess that would also mean.. if we are doubtful or untrusting.. even of God.. that doesn't really come from our words... although that is how is is revealed.. it comes flowing from our heart.. I would say even with me.. I was very sure of God.. very trusting.. until it seems to take forever.. then doubtful and unsure words seem to come from my mouth... which is actually coming from my heart.. these are seeds that I have allowed to take root and now I have to weed them out and burn them... I was thinking maybe I never heard from God at all.. or maybe I have deceived myself.. or maybe I am not that special to God afterall... all of these seeds had taken root... yesterday God said to me that I allow the actions of man (people) to cause me to doubt what He has said... and in truth.. that is meaning that even originally.. my trust had been in the actions of people and not the words God said..

our words should be an encouragement to all who hear them.. are we really that encouraging? or is it just that we want to imagine we are? do we complain? surely complaining around people would not be encouraging them... do we get irritated and talk in a way that is not encouraging? think even about the menial parts of your day.. the cooking dinner... are you complaining? or the going to work? if we instead realized how many people.. normal people just like us.. don't have food for dinner.. don't have a job to go to.. if we thought positive instead of always thinking of our own comfort.. how much of a change would that make in our daily speech?

I know for me there would be quite a lot of change.. and I am set upon starting it today.. not that long ago we did a fast of the tongue.. one day a week for 12hrs we only spoke what was necessary and good.. you find out that you speak way more negativity than you would have imagined.. I think I will go back to this practice.. but not only once a week.. more like daily... maybe I will start out with a few hours and build my way up to a lifelong change...

today I am just talking..
I think have realized why so many of us.. myself included.. follow God for a time and then fall away...

Matthew 13: 3 He told many stories in the form of parables, such as this one: “Listen! A farmer went out to plant some seeds. 4 As he scattered them across his field, some seeds fell on a footpath, and the birds came and ate them. 5 Other seeds fell on shallow soil with underlying rock. The seeds sprouted quickly because the soil was shallow. 6 But the plants soon wilted under the hot sun, and since they didn’t have deep roots, they died. 7 Other seeds fell among thorns that grew up and choked out the tender plants. 8 Still other seeds fell on fertile soil, and they produced a crop that was thirty, sixty, and even a hundred times as much as had been planted! 9 Anyone with ears to hear should listen and understand.”

I think when time goes on.. we get weary.. we can't see the change we are looking for.. things are even harder than they were when we were in the world.. so as the trials and storms of life come on us... we fall away.. get washed away.. fall back into what is easier and more familiar... but if we remain true.. if we stand strong and continue forward.. there will be a harvest.. it may not be what we wanted it to be.. it may only be the lives that our own stories change.. but we will see the kingdom of God advanced.. if we only stand strong through the storms..

so many times in the past I followed God for a year or two.. then the world called me back.. because God was obviously not my first love.. I felt like so many others that I could keep one foot in the church and one foot in the world.. that going out really didn't affect me... I still loved God.. I still attended church.. fornication wasn't ruining my walk with God... yet if I am honest with myself.. these things DID affect my walk and my relationship with God.. I allowed the world into my mind.. and I was not completely devoted to God.. instead I was completely devoted to self.. with a little God on the side.. just for good measure...

so this time.. as I have remained faithful.. although not sinless.. I still see the struggle being in the mind.. it just seems so much smarter to think like the world.. it is so much safer.. we cannot be hurt if we cannot be touched... but as I continue to focus on what is right and pure and honorable and good.. and cast out the thoughts of what might be... then my life is being changed.. my heart is being cleansed..

I wondered how someone I know was so.. polly purebred all the time.. and this is the answer.. her mind is focused on the things of God and that which is pure.. and she is not allowing the ugly of the world to invade her mind long enough to made her worldly wise.. she is not allowing the circumstances that she lives to harden her heart.. she is centered.. in her mind.. on Christ.. above all else..

and I wanna be just like her when I grow up!

perception...

Luke 1: 46 Mary responded, “Oh, how my soul praises the Lord. 47 How my spirit rejoices in God my Savior! 48 For he took notice of his lowly servant girl, and from now on all generations will call me blessed. 49 For the Mighty One is holy, and he has done great things for me. 50 He shows mercy from generation to generation to all who fear him. 51 His mighty arm has done tremendous things! He has scattered the proud and haughty ones. 52 He has brought down princes from their thrones and exalted the humble. 53 He has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away with empty hands. 54 He has helped his servant Israel and remembered to be merciful. 55 For he made this promise to our ancestors, to Abraham and his children forever.” 56 Mary stayed with Elizabeth about three months and then went back to her own home.

this is what mary said when she was pregnant.. unmarried.. and carrying the savior of the world...

now... I don't know about you... but most of us.. myself included.. tend to see what is wrong in a situation rather than what is right.. it is about our perception... we look at what needs fixed rather than what is spectacular...

realistically speaking.. mary's parents surely think she slept with joseph... who she is engaged to... can you imagine your daughter coming to you and telling you an angel told her she would become pregnant by the Holy Spirit... come on now.. she is trying to cover up her own lack of fidelity before marriage.. that is just how we think..

joseph.. the husband to be.. KNOWS HE didn't sleep with her.. so obviously.. someone else has.. and he is planning to leave her behind this action.. which most men would... in those days.. they are contractually bound from the time of engagement but not allowed alone together so this type of thing can't happen... yet it has.. so it has got to be another man.. he probably doesn't even ASK her what happened.. instead just accuses her of sleeping with someone... but he doesn't want to shame her so he is going to QUIETLY divorce her.. since when is divorce EVER quiet?? even now...

yet mary praises God.. that He chose her above all the other righteous women in judea.. and she is praising Him and telling Him what an aweseome honor it is...

again.. here would be me.. saying LORD.. how can I do this??? everyone will think I am a whore and say I am crazy... everyone will hate me.. they will hate my son all of his life.. we will always live in shame.. the man I love no longer wants me.. my parents don't believe in me.. why would you do this to me?? why wouldn't you choose someone else for this??? yea.. I get that it is supposed to be some great honor.. but it surely doesn't feel like one right now.. please get me out of this...

today I say.. Father.. I praise your Holy Name.. I lift you above all the heavens.. I cannot understand why you would choose a lowly servant like me for such an amazing and awesome calling.. Lord I cannot say how much I love and adore you.. there are no words for this honor you have bestowed upon me.. I praise you for your faithfulness to me and all the generations.. your word always holds true.. everything that you promise comes to pass.. you have lifted my name and my face.. you have shown me love far beyond what I deserve or expect.. I honor you Lord above all things..

self esteem vs God esteem...

Isaiah 53:1 Who has believed our message? To whom has the Lord revealed his powerful arm? 2 My servant grew up in the Lord’s presence like a tender green shoot, like a root in dry ground. There was nothing beautiful or majestic about his appearance,
nothing to attract us to him. 3 He was despised and rejected— a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. We turned our backs on him and looked the other way. He was despised, and we did not care.
4 Yet it was our weaknesses he carried; it was our sorrows that weighed him down.And we thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins! 5 But he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. 6 All of us, like sheep, have strayed away. We have left God’s paths to follow our own.Yet the Lord laid on him the sins of us all.
7 He was oppressed and treated harshly, yet he never said a word.He was led like a lamb to the slaughter. And as a sheep is silent before the shearers, he did not open his mouth. 8 Unjustly condemned, he was led away. No one cared that he died without descendants, that his life was cut short in midstream. But he was struck down for the rebellion of my people. 9 He had done no wrong and had never deceived anyone. But he was buried like a criminal; he was put in a rich man’s grave.
10 But it was the Lord’s good plan to crush him and cause him grief. Yet when his life is made an offering for sin, he will have many descendants.He will enjoy a long life, and the Lord’s good plan will prosper in his hands. 11 When he sees all that is accomplished by his anguish, he will be satisfied. And because of his experience, my righteous servant will make it possible for many to be counted righteous, for he will bear all their sins. 12 I will give him the honors of a victorious soldier, because he exposed himself to death. He was counted among the rebels. He bore the sins of many and interceded for rebels.

we can think of all the things we blame on having low self esteem.. promiscuity.. drugs... lack of initiative to work or provide.. depression.. anger... resentment...
truly... Jesus did not have high self esteem.. he did not pick up his divinity and power and use it to his benefit.. everything that he had at his disposal.. he could easily have risen above man and taken power.. he could have chosen to stop man from coming against him.. but he laid down his entire life.. he lived as a servant.. without love.. without family.. to continue to give and save those around him but also for generations to come...
we often refuse to be a martyr.. we refuse to truly be a servant.. we refuse to lay down our own lives of comfort and give peace and joy to someone else in place of us having it... honestly.. we are unwilling to give up a day a month and do community service at maybe a soup kitchen or a shelter... we are selfish and constantly building ourselves up to say all that we are worth.. in truth.. if we died today.. how many lives would we have impacted? would 20 people be able to say that we represented Christ for them? are our actions and words a replica of the life of Christ...
our value needs to come from how God sees us.. not how man sees us.. we work so hard to please man and all the while shoving God to the side or the bottom.. never giving him our first fruits in action or finance or even in words... if our value came from God.. from what God sees in us.. wouldn't we then be willing to lay down our own desires and live for others.. even though this is not the popular plan.. it is the life of Christ and should be the life of each one of us.. this is what our children should be able to remember in us... this is what others should say about us when we are gone.. if Christ was crushed for God's good will.. what would make us imagine we would not be...

Psalms 139: 16-18

16 You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. 17 How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! 18 I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand! And when I wake up, you are still with me!

do we really imagine our lives are already recorded in God's book of life? I don't think we do.. if we did.. why do we imagine that things will not work out? I mean realistically.. they may not work out as we desire.. but they will still work out to the best for all involved... if you think about the people who have come and gone in your life and how we tried sometimes to hold on to them.. maybe if we had been able to keep on to them.. they or you.. would never have taken the road you should have taken... what if we were able to get rid of people that we see as an annoyance.. possibly we would not have been changed and shaped by their abrasive personality... sometimes I cannot see the day before me.. sometimes I have completely forgotten in my eye the picture of the future God has spoken to me about... those are the days that I think I must not be praying right... I must not be asking in the right manner.. maybe I should be fasting and sacrificing... maybe I never saw what I thought I saw... some days we think God doesn't see our pain or our frustration.. we think that maybe He doesn't care.. we can't hear Him sometimes.. His voice is muffled..

if we really accepted that God already has written out what will happen.. if we accept that His will is already set.. that we will walk into it when it is right.. then all this frustration could possibly be avoided...

how precious are His thoughts about me.. they cannot be numbered.. the idea that all the time.. God is in heaven thinking great thoughts about us... what a picture that is... what an amazing idea... yet here we are.. thinking God has forgotten us.. thinking God is not going to work our situation out... disillusioned by what we see... dishearted by what we hear...

today is a new day... believe.. speak.. walk.. in the truth of God's word.. believe He has already worked your situation out.. speak that He is sitting on the throne.. thinking about how much He loves you... walk in the truth of God's word...

all tied up

I saw before my eyes.. my hands tied together behind my back... there is plenty of scripture about being tied up and beaten or killed.. sometimes it was the intention yet it was not accomplished... it seems that the enemy is forever trying to get us so that we cannot do anything.. we are instead stuck with no hands.. but some times.. being tied up and powerless comes from God...

ezekiel 3: 24 Then the Spirit came into me and set me on my feet. He spoke to me and said, “Go to your house and shut yourself in. 25 There, son of man, you will be tied with ropes so you cannot go out among the people. 26 And I will make your tongue stick to the roof of your mouth so that you will be speechless and unable to rebuke them, for they are rebels.

I often wonder if I should have been silent long ago and now I am being forced into a season of silence.. with my hands tied so I cannot do anything to help someone.. maybe some times people have to be able to see and accept for themselves without any help from someone who can see...

who knows.. maybe I am the one who will see at the end of the silence... at this point... only God truly knows the outcome.. we can think and imagine and even be shown.. but the truth of what we think will be shown by God in the end..

Speak Life

Luke 6: 45 A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

out of the mouth speaks what the heart is full of... what is it that comes out of our mouth?
as much as I have changed.. yet there is evil in my heart sometimes... there are mean and dark thoughts.. people I don't like.. things I do that I shouldn't....
we can ask God daily to change our hearts.. to cleanse it... yet somehow.. the world still seeps into it and makes it dark...

I will use my own example of gossip... as this is one of my largest weaknesses...
I can tell myself daily that I will speak nothing negative about anyone.. yet daily.. some piece of something comes out of my mouth...

even if we only talk about our children.. we can determine to say nothing but good things about them.. speak nothing but life... yet the words that come out are still not what they should be.. they are better than what may have been in the past.. but not what they should be...

God spoke to me one day that as long as we are influencing a child.. anyone's child.. it is our responsibility to speak life and hope into the child.. if you think back to your childhood.. the things we tend to remember are the ones that should not have ever been said to us... if we take this stance on everyone that we know.. refuse to speak negative things.. even if they are true.. and instead find the life in that person.. find the positive and speak that out instead.. how much better a world this will be.. even just our own small world...

speak life daily.. as we reap what we sow.. don't we desire to receive life and not death... the future lies in our words.. speak life..

Leah's Beauty

Genesis 29: 17 There was no sparkle in Leah’s eyes, but Rachel had a beautiful figure and a lovely face.

imagine this being what is in the bible about you... the bible.. read around the world.. for thousands and thousands of years... everyone in the world knows of the bible whether they read it or not.. and always when they speak of leah.. they speak about her lack of beauty....

what is that really about?? worse yet.. do we do that to people too?? do we look at someone and determine all that is wrong with them instead of searching out their good qualities? and if we do that... what would we feel if everyone did that to us... and maybe they really do...

not all of us are beautiful in the face.. not all of us have a beautiful body... but every one of us has the ability to be a beautiful person... and part of us being beautiful is to look for the good in someone else instead of only seeing what is not attractive... every one of us has qualities that make us unattractive too...

it should be our goal to find the beauty in a person.. every person.. instead of focusing on what is wrong with them...
leah was someone who was a good mother.. she was strong and dependable.. she relied on God above man.. she loved her husband despite the fact that he treated her badly and didn't even know that he loved her or needed her.. she continued to be a woman of God in spite of her circumstance.. that should be how people remember us.. as a woman of God "in spite of"....

Philippians 4: 7-9 7 Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.8 And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. 9 Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.

when the things of God are our focus.. peace will be the result... beauty will come from within us and make us loveable regardless of our appearance...

1 Peter 3: 3 Don’t be concerned about the outward beauty of fancy hairstyles, expensive jewelry, or beautiful clothes. 4 You should clothe yourselves instead with the beauty that comes from within, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is so precious to God. 5 This is how the holy women of old made themselves beautiful. They trusted God and accepted the authority of their husbands.

leah was beautiful in the eyes of God.. those are the eyes that really matter to me.. if I am beautiful to God.. in my spirit... then I am satisfied...