Category: Matters of the Heart

Doing Life, Getting it together, Jesus, Matters of the Heart, Seeking God

Bare Necessities: Why an empty life is a full life

writergirljenn99

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God is all around. He is in all things, He is the maker of all things.  Whatever we are, have, or can do is only because of Him.  Sometimes it is easy to be so good at something, for us to be so natural at it that we often forget how we came to do the thing in the first place.

Lord, may I never forget it is all because of you.

Opportunities come, chances are there, every morning we get a fresh slate. I think a lot about how I am so thankful that He’s not up there keeping score.   (His patience won’t last forever, there will be a day when the trumpet sounds)

We were driving down the road and I looked across (what any other time of the year would look like plain ole woods) anyway I looked at it and peeking through the bare trees was a house that I never knew existed.  “How adorable.” I thought.  How is it that I have been driving this same road for 10 + year and I never noticed that. It didn’t just magically appear:  it has been there for no telling how long.

Normally the trees are full and lush. Now they are bare.  All that foliage has been striped away to reveal things not normally seen. They look so empty. But the empty is necessary.

Our lives are like that too you know.

Full. But yet EMPTY and we don’t even realize it until a tragedy Our lives are  Full of…

Social Media ( Keeping up with everyone else, and for what?)

Entertainment ( sitting down watching someone else live a fake life on T.V)

Tasks

Shopping

work work work

Driving kids to and from the latest activity they’ve been signed up for ( I agree while it’s good to keep them into something good it’s also easy for them to get priorities mixed up)

Taking care of that big house we had to have

Commitments that we never should have agreed to

The Lord was really talking to me in this moment. I knew it because it was such a powerful revelation and also because earlier this morning while getting ready for church I happened upon a video speaking about this very thing. About how we are so busy maybe busy doing all the right things but we are too busy to enjoy and see the Lord and the people He has entrusted us with.

I have been guilty of being entirely to busy doing all the wrong things. After I have finished said tasks there is little time or energy leftover for what matters most.

So you see,  we have always associated bareness with lack.  Today I see bareness in a hole new light. I see it in having time to see and know what matters.  

How many times have I passed over and neglected the important things because my life was so full.

Normally the Message version isn’t my go to. However I love how this is written.

Proverbs 13:7

“A pretentious, showy life is an empty life: a plain and simple life is a full life.”

Pretentious means attempting to impress by affecting greater importance, talent, culture, etc… than is actually possessed.

What if a bare life was really a full life?

What if we got alone with God, totally surrendered and ask Him to forgive us of our business? Forgive us for trying to know best. And ask Him to reveal to us what needs to go, What do I need to let go of or add?   Ask Him to shake us down like a mighty tree on a cold November day. Shake off what isn’t needed so I can make way for what is.

New blooms can’t come in the spring if the old, dead leaves are hanging on.

Growth in God’s will and plan can’t take root if we are busy with everything other than what He intended for our lives.

I love this verse so much, our Pastor actually spoke on it today.  God is really working on me today.  This post is if nothing else a message for myself to strip down to the bare necessities.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is-His good, pleasing and perfect will. Romans 12:2

A bare life will mean more time for love, family, friends, stewarding the things we need well.  Studying HIs word more. Deep meaning prayer times that render the enemy inafective in our lives. Having time to help someone in need rather than fullfilling our needs. Being more hands on with our kids, modeling for them that life is precious and love is what matters. When we are bogged down we are stressed and irrritable.  Any favors for others come at inconvientent times of tiredness and teach our kids that we really don’t have time. That joy in serving others is a burden rather than an honor.

Lord Jesus, please clear my mind. Empty my life of the chaso.  Show me what is not necessary in my life.  Reveal to me what needs to go so that I can carry out your good, pleasing and perfect will. Forgive me for being busy and patterning that same hustle and bustle for my kids. Redeem our lifestyle and habits by revealing truth to us.  In Jesus name, Amen.

Holy Spirit, Jesus, Matters of the Heart, Seeking God

The downfall of silent Christians. The truth about what it means to be a true disciple, love, sin, and truth.

writergirljenn99

A year ago Lauren Daigle was a name known only by “Christians.”  Secular people and circles alike had no clue who she was and probably had never heard of her.  Recently Lauren has made her way to the Ellen show and Jimmy Fallon, I have no idea where else, but what I do know is most of North America probably knows her now. Not for her funky, soul sounding Christian songs, no, unfortunately she is surrounded by much controversy at this moment.

In her interview she says and I quote “I don’t know… I can’t say one way or the other. I am not God….”

Image source: You Tube WWUTT

Now let’s just stop right there.

The lyrics below are not full version or in exact order. Stay with me…

In her song “You Say”  (she is singing to God)  “You say I am loved, you say I am strong, you say I am held…..”

In her song “Still Rolling Stones” she says The grave let go, the darkness should have known… Now that you saved me, I sing cause you gave me a song of revive so I put it on vinyl….  I was blinded but now I see, I heard about the power and now I believe.”

In her song “How Can It Be” she says…You plead my cause, you right my wrongs, you break my chains, you overcome…

These are just a few lyrics from some of her songs. Beautiful lyrics.  However, she obviously has read enough of the Bible to know the words to these lyrics. To know that Jesus saves, He gives sight to the blind, He overcame darkness.

Guess she’s never gotten to…

“Do not have sexual relations with a man as one does with a woman; that is detestable.” Leviticus 18:22

By now you may be asking yourself, ANNND??? What’s it to you?  Who are you to judge?  You’re right. Who am I to judge?

If by speaking up about truthful, biblical  facts then call me Judge J.  For far to long now true Christians have been shrinking back and keeping quite for this very reason, fearful of being perceived as “judgmental” “self-righteous”  “hypocrites”  We constantly are reminded how it’s not our place to judge and that we are supposed to be loving and accepting.  That if we are “what a Christian is then I don’t want to be apart of that.”

We have stayed silent to extend peace.

My friends we have exchanged “tolerance” for “condoning”

While we can’t condone who people love and choose to bed, we can choose to speak up if point-blank asked.

True Christians, I can assure you love the person, but will tell with all the love, kindness and honestly that sin is sin, we strive to point to the truth of the gospel. I can also tell you that we know more than anyone how flawed we are.

We have to be sure to discern and fix our eyes on truth.  We can’t skirt around it because we love the person. thing, or fun, we have to love the truth.  And telling people the facts about scripture is a sure-fire way to show love.  Mostly though we have to walk out the scripture we quote.

As I was saying we have stood by in the name of keeping peace and slowly our rights are being stripped from us.  We have to stand up for the gospel and standing up for it means living by it and if we are living by it WE ARE SPEAKING THE TRUTH ABOUT THE LIVING WORD. Saying ” I am not sure if homosexuality is a sin” but telling me I am loved and free is contradictory.   There is no freedom in sins grasps.

Here’s some more truth.  If a person confesses that Jesus Christ is Lord and asks HIM into their hearts and confesses that they are a sinner in need of His saving, they are saved.  IF a person is truly saved the Holy Spirit dwells inside them and they are changed, they are a new creation, the old has passed away, behold, the new has come.” 2 Corinthians 5:17

That means that If you are homosexual, a thief, a murderer, an adulterer, then the desire to do those things should be going away.   You shouldn’t be able to continue to do that thing and not feel convicted.

So saying I believe in God and I love everyone, I go to church here and there, I read the Bible some, that’s simply not enough.  The Bible says that even the demons believe and tremble.

Or do you not know that wrong doers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither the sexually immoral, nor idolators nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor the drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ by the spirit of our God.”  1 Corinthians 6:9-11

Being a perfect angel is hard, ha impossible but we should have the desire to Love the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, and strength, we should have the desire to love others as ourself.    Yes love others, but point them to truth and that is love too. Him living inside of us changes us.

You want to know how to gauge your spiritual maturity?  The time it takes between your sin and your confession of your sin.  If it takes a while for you to confess you may wanna take a step back and reevaluate your life.

While we’re on the subject as I was writing this I had this thought, “why is homosexuality the one sin that creates the most controversy, why is it the one that when spoken out against true Christians fall under such scrutiny.

I feel like it’s this. Of all the sins homosexuality is the sin that is shoved down our throats that we should learn to be okay with, the one that we should understand that love is love and you can’t help who you love.  It’s the one sin that tries to overtake any place of life that was once normal. It’s on T.V. It’s in songs, it’s in commercials, it’s in advertising, it’s coming to a bathroom near you, it’s coming to a classroom to our kids, it has its own organization, it can sue the pants of you for disagreeing with it or the people who stand for it.  Painted up, decked all out to be called love.  Last time I checked there are not commercials and rallies for murder.  There aren’t things just openly out there enticing you to steal.   I know there are gangs and I know thieves lurk everywhere, but I think you get the jest of what I am saying.

I have read where many so-called Christians say ” we aren’t to judge, at least she got the gospel in front of millions and millions of people who may not ever hear the lyrics.  And they’re right but she also just left out a big truth in the Bible, she may have very well just let someone think it’s okay.  And that’s not okay.   So on one side of the coin, yes many heard that Jesus is Still Rolling Stones, and on the other they can bed a person of the same gender and all is well.

Bottom line is this, if we (I am talking to myself here as well) are going to stand on any one word of truth in the Bible, if we are to bring glory to God and be the salt and light then we must stand on every single word, Even the one that says to LOVE.  Again, I say speaking the truth is a way of love, truth leads to the saving of many and what could be more loving than that.

Doing Life, Jesus, Matters of the Heart

Forgiveness. Giving it or withholding it. 6 ways to tell if you’ve forgiven

writergirljenn99

Sometimes I don’t know which is more difficult, having true joy no matter what comes along or deciding how to proceed with someone who has done you wrong.

They’ve betrayed you and hurt you, shed a whole new light on the real them til the point you wonder how you missed it and how you got involved with them in the first place.

Oh and the kicker… they have the nerve to carry on as IF you are in the wrong! How dare you be hurt or take offense!  They are the people that will talk about you to EVERYONE except YOU!

They are the people who don’t want to admit they are wrong or have been mean. The ones that when you see them again they want to pick up right about the place before they wronged you as if nothing ever happened.

Being a true disciple is easy when things are great, it’s those hard times, hurtful times, trying times and trying people that make it tough.  As children of God we are called to be loving,merciful, peacemakers and keepers.  But sometimes it is downright hard. I am fine with serving, church, scripture,  and prayer. Just struggle with PEOPLE sometimes.   Then I think of Jesus and how He showed so much love, grace, mercy and kindness while people spat on Him, beat Him and left Him for dead.

Forgiveness… sometimes even when I think I have forgiven, I have to ask, have I truly forgiven?

What does truly forgiving someone even look like?  Do you even go forward with this person and if so how? Especially if you’ve been down a road similar to this with them once already,  It’s like Ok, I forgave you once already, got passed that, I mean truly got over it and now here we are again.

Currently I am a situation such as this.  Here are some signs that hit me that maybe I’m not over it this time.  I never really paid much attention until now.  I want to truly forgive and I want to be in right standing with God. See if you have ever been able to relate to any of these things.

  1. You keep replaying the situation/fight over and over in your mind.
  2. If you hear of someone that talked to them you wonder what they are saying or have said about you.
  3. If you hear of any good news from them you feel like {wow, they really don’t deserve that.}
  4. You may find it difficult to pray for them.
  5. You may feel hypocritical asking God to forgive you if you have’t truly forgiven them.
  6. They keep showing up in your dreams.

Seventy-Seven

Jesus answered “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” Matthew 18:22 NIV