I am fearfully and wonderfully made...I know that full well

My friend sent me a picture of herself today and her subject heading was “look at the size of me”.  I opened it up and I knew what I would see.  It was a picture of a woman that got caught at a bad angle, and yes was overweight.  It was a picture of what I sometimes look like if caught on camera.  My response to her was quick.  God had already prepped me for this conversation before I knew I would have it.

 

To her I said, “Yes, we have definitely been transformed.  Not to worry, we can fix ourselves right back up.  Do you feel sometimes that your former body has been eaten by this new one?  :-)  Yep I have been there. It is funny I should come in and see this as I had a "pep talk" with myself as I looked at the reflection today (it’s funny how that image never quite matches the way I see myself in my mind).  My pep talk was a verse that we all know; I am fearfully and wonderfully made. It is a truth that I keep close because I need to crush the lies often.  You know the one that says, girl you fat eeeh (yes, it knows how to speak to me in my dialect).  Or girl your hair look a mess.  Or girl your chin has hair and you are supposed to be girl!  Or girl your face full up a so much spot and wart eeeh.  Yes my friend, I know fully well what you are going through. 

 

But to God be the glory, we have so much more going on than the size of our clothes, or the smoothness of flawless skin, or the shine of our hair. We have life.  We have breath and a hope [in God] that does not disappoint.  We have the word in our hearts and a Father that hears us when we call.  We have the fear of the Lord and that is beauty to the Lord. Our hearts are soft towards others and it makes us even more attractive.  Yes, we are pushing the scale and for sure exercise will benefit our bodies, but in the mean time we will not be ashamed. [If we are ashamed then let us not be any more]. We will not hide because God says shine!

 

I love you. God loves you.

 

You are fearfully and wonderfully made in God's image!”

 

Here are some verses that you can keep as ammunition against the lies of our enemy:

 

·        Psalm 139:14

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.

 

·        Proverbs 31:30

Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.

 

·        1 Peter 3:3-4

Your beauty should not come from outward adornment…it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.

 

·        1 Timothy 4:8

Physical exercise has some value, but spiritual exercise is much more important, for it promises a reward in both this life and the next.

In it to win it - GOOOOOOAAAAAALLLLLL!

How many of you are soccer fans (or football as I grew up calling the game)?  I know that I was not one of those people riveted to the screens watching the world cup games.  Yet, something about this world cup has triggered my interest.  I watched a few of the games and all I could think of was none of these teams came to loose. They were all in it to win it. They had practiced for months totalling years to get to this field and no-one wanted to be eliminated.  No one wanted to go home without the prize of being champions.  I was impressed. 

It was apparent which teams were stronger and who were less than ready for such an event.  While the end of this is still unknown, there is an end that I want to tell you about. 

This world and all those in it are going to one day face Jesus.  Only those that were in it to win it will be with him in the end. Only those that have kept their eyes fixed on the goal ahead and the final prize will be able to reap the reward.  We are all athletes.  (I find great joy in thinking of myself as such).  We are in a race.  Paul said at the end of his life, I have kept the faith and I have finished the race.  Let us allow our Lord to condition us as he is the best trainer ever.  Let us renew our minds daily to be in it to win it for the Lord.  Let us exercise with the intensity of athletes, to produce the fruit of the spirit.  Let us by prayer and the word build up our stamina and endurance.  Let us keep our eyes fixed on the prize and reach towards the GOOOOOAAALLLLLL!

Microwave prayer time - DING!

In today's world we want everything quick!  We want our lines short.  We want our service fast.  We want our meals in our mouths by the time the microwave stops turning the plate around.  We have taken that same mentality into our lives as Christians.  It's true.  We are the generation of the microwave prayers; two minutes and Ding! We're done and off to the next list of things to do.
                                              

We want to hurry the Holy Spirit along and have Him fit into our schedule, our program, our agenda.  I shake my head because while I am able to point at others, I can see myself behind the point of my fingers.  I am guilty just as much as that other woman or man.  You know them, they have a plan and Holy Spirit is not welcome to change it until after this or that.  You know them!  I can show you them right now.  Go look in a mirror, because more than likely, that person is you as much as it is me.


I am discovering some things about Holy Spirit.  He is a person, did you know that?  He is there to guide and to help.  He will tell you the truth and He will tell you what to do, when to do, and where to do - what to do.  He is in the know about what is to come and He does not hide it from those who live by Him, and quenches him not.  His word is always relevant and of great value.  He is one part of the trinity - he is God in the spirit as much as the father and the son is God.


If we would make the time for him then our lives would be forever changed.  It is hard. I know.  I live in this world too - microwave junky that I am, I get how hard it is to tarry in his presence.  I know how hard it is to wait for God to speak, long after we have said Amen. I know how the passages in the bible become jumbled beyond just a few "quick verses".  My friends, I know.


God knows that we are fragile, and are but dust.  He knows that with one breath He can erase us from this existence.  He knows that and yet he is still mindful of us.  The bible says, what is man that he would be mindful of us?  Oh how he loves us.  I believe it is time to return to the days of old, where we were not in a hurry with God.  I want to go back to the days where I was excited about his word and where his presence was where I stayed.  Let us return to the days of stove top, spending the time to stoke the flames and rekindle the fire - the fire of God.
                                                       

On the day Maya Angelou died

On the day that Maya Angelou died, hate coloured with meanness was evident in the life of a friend of mine.  She came back from Wal-Mart, two blocks away from our office.  We were to have lunch together and she was late.  In my blissfully unaware state, I imagined that she got caught up walking the aisles. It has happened to me more than a few times and I was not going to give it another thought.  If only that were the case.  If only she did not have to experience what she did on a day like today; the day that Maya Angelo passed away.

It began with a scuffle for a parking spot.  She drove into one that was available without a thought.  A man was not as nonchalant about this and he made sure his opinions were known to her and anyone with ears to hear.  He yelled to her, “Why did you park in that spot you F#a%^***ing N***ger?”  Perhaps to you and me, that was a bit excessive.  It was bad, but she kept going, choosing to ignore him and finish up her chore at hand. 

Run into the store, grab the one item, run to the cashier.  MacDonald’s beckoned, better get some nuggets. Run to the car.  Her car was attacked.  She said she walked around her entire car, thinking maybe a bird, a flock of them, did a number two?  But upon closer examination it was not what she hoped but what she had initially feared.  .  Streams of saliva made its way down the driver’s side window and door.  As Maya Angelou says, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”  This man showed himself to be a small minded person, with the vocabulary of someone lacking social graces and culture. He had left his mark in a more tangible way.  He was gone like the coward he was – fighting a woman he felt was beneath him and then running away to hide.

 

He was like a member from the KKK, who did their evil with covered faces to hide their identity. Cowards.  She was shaking and held back the tears that were threatening to override her control.  By nature, she is strong, but this had gotten to her and I could see it despite her valiant attempt to appear unruffled.  How is it that on this 28^th day of May, in the year 2014 we are still faced with this kind of hate?  How is it that blacks and whites are still so far apart?  He was a reminder of what we had forgotten – racism is real and very much alive in the hearts of men today.  In North America, we hold our noses up and criticise the East and their intolerance.  Yet, we are hypocrites and fools if we think that same hate is not here in our back yards, lurking in the parking lots of Wal-Marts, and smiling at us from across the counters of fast food restaurants and fancy banks and stores.

God help us we have not come far enough. God help us we are still colour blinded.  God help us we are a mess and our secret is showing through the gaping cracks in our masks.  We sit, work, eat and live amongst people that hate us because of our colour, gender, economic class or whatever else they deem we don’t measure up to.  God help us not to hate each other, but love as you have commanded even when it is not reciprocated.  As Maya Angelou said “Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leap fences, penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope.”

 

 

Amazing Grace

I once was lost, oh but now, thank God I am found

You see I once was blind, oh but now, thank God I see.

These are the words that played from my phone just mere seconds ago.  My heart clings to them like water to a thirsty man.  I am the one that was lost and now found. I am the one that was blind and now see.  I remember myself before Jesus. I remember the way I thought about things. I remember how I saw things. 

I smile, because in my own arrogance, I thought I knew everything that I needed. My plans were to never marry, never have kids, and travel the world.  I thought living with a man was nothing.  Sex before marriage was not a stretch in a committed relationship.  Lying was okay as long as they were “white”.  I was world smart and morally tainted by its colour.  I was lost and blind.

In my heart I reasoned that I am not like those people. You know the murderer, the thief, the promiscuous and the others.  I was a good person.  I was so lost.

Do you know that your sins will find you out?  In Numbers 32:23, Moses tells the people “…be sure your sin will find you out.”  Do you know that what you sow you shall reap? Paul writes to the Galatians 6:7, you can never make a fool out of God.  God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.  The choices we make in the “spring’ of our lives will be harvested in the “fall” of it. 

I chose to get into a relationship with a man who was a boy at the time, as much as I was just a girl. In our spring, we went along as the world dictated. We did not wait, and never considered that as an option.  In our summer we thought we were safe. Nothing had happened that was life changing. The sun was out and all that was ahead, we thought, were blue skies.  In the fall, we harvested what we did not expect, a son.  Unwed, unprepared, unhappy and unlikely to make it was my life’s picture at that time.  I was so lost, but God….  My life changed and the worst thing that I thought that could happen to me was the beginning of the best days ahead.

To make a long story short, what I was hiding was now fully exposed.  I used to always hear whatever is done in the dark will be brought to light.  Well, not only was I pregnant, it was for a boy no-one knew I was dating.  Exposed.  Shame.  Guilt. Terror.  I had no choice, and I had to come to Canada.  I had to live with my family.  That family led me to the Lord and here I am today. 

I was so lost, but now I am found. I was so blind but now I see. Amazing grace is the anthem of my heart. I was a wretch undone, but God saved me.  He changed me. He rearranged my moral compass, my thinking, my point of view and gave me a purpose for His glory.

 

Is this you as well?  Could this be your song for your life today?  Did God take you from the wretchedness of your life to show you the truth and beauty of His Abundant Life?  Or maybe, you are not saved. You are the almost Christian, the one that never seems to leap completely into Jesus’ waiting arms.  Almost Christians, always go to Hell, (harsh, but oh so true).  I urge you to leap, don’t think.  I pray that God’s spirit will still reside with you, drawing you to Jesus, tenderizing your heart and ridding you of the stone that has been there all these years.  His amazing grace is for you as much as it was for me, come and dwell in it.

 

 

 

 

Walking like I don't believe

Good morning, afternoon or night.

I greet you in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord and Saviour! 

I was happy to attend the Church Of God's annual Missions Banquet on Saturday.  I heard so many good things from people I travelled with last summer on my very first missions trip to Belize.  Let me share some with you.  J I heard have since been back to Belize with Uncle Pastor.  Nickayla I heard have been travelling all over and I believe Japan is next on her list.  Sarah, I heard is going to the Philippines for a month and I know and have seen the work as the Belize Plan continues.  (I wondered again if God wanted me to go and be a foster parent for those kids in Belize…not hearing anything so far. J) 

With all of that said, I believe anything is possible.  Yet, sometimes I don't live as if I do. 

 This brings me to the text, Matthew 6.  Jesus was talking to the people about worry. Anybody have a problem with this?  You know, you worry about what you will eat or not eat, what you will wear, and the big one – Money.  How little you have and how much more you need.  If you are like me, these things can consume your mind.  Jesus says these are the same things that dominate the mind of an unbeliever.  This was my AHA moment.  WHAT!?  Have I been walking like an unbeliever?  Yes. I have. 

 

Jesus assures us that God is quite capable of taking care of all our needs.  As I listened to the testimony on Saturday from Pastor Youdi and Sister Pam, I realized that the mission that God has given them is one of faith.  How else could they build and buy and ship and give and do?  It is not possible without faith.   When I listen to my little "niece" Nickayla, I am reminded again of the life of faith. How else could she go to London, Japan and where ever else with no money if not by faith?  How else could Jevaun go to a job interview and boldly declare that he was going to Belize and if that was going to be a problem then they were not to hire him, if not by faith?

 

Jesus calls us to believe in His father for our sustenance.  He says seek God’s kingdom first and everything else will be added unto you.  I believe this is what our friends are living out.  I am taking notes from their classrooms.  They are seeking God’s kingdom first.  They are walking in a  realm of faith that makes them look like mad men to those around them.  Yet, it is this crazy faith that makes them “believers”. 

 

We know that God owes us nothing but we believe that He can do anything.  With this in mind, I am willing to seek after his Kingdom as well. I am willing to renew my mind today (and every single day after this), to ask Him what I can do for Him today.  Food, money and clothes God will take care of – no need to worry anymore. J

Lord, if we had your eyes then we could see...

Last night my son brought a friend home.  She was a young girl that my family was meeting for the first time.  She came and my son asked me for some food for her to eat. She had told him before arriving that she was hungry.  In my head, I heard hospitality, hospitality (repeated word intended).  So I gave her some dinner of rice and chicken. I thought to myself, well she is very bold.  I thought perhaps she would allow us to convince her to take something to eat.  You know, pretend she isn't hungry and then accept our offer graciously. 


When my sister came home, I told her of our guest and what I thought.  I am ashamed of it now, because I planted the seed of judgement when that was not what I heard.  Where was the hospitable charity?  Yes, I gave her things but my heart was not in the right place.  In my giving, I was judging.  In myself I knew that was wrong before the Holy Spirit checked me on it.


In continuing the germination of a bad seed, my sister told my other sister and they both made judgements about this girl of whom we knew nothing but her first name.  I looked at them and I was ashamed.  I then said to them, what is wrong if she has no fear of us. What is wrong if she is not acting all shy and coy?  Maybe someone is saying the same thing about me.  For anyone who knows me, I am able to fit in with most people, starting conversations with strangers and making myself happy no matter where I am.  Of course my sisters were like "oh no, she is prime.  No fear...."  Our eyes saw what we wanted.  I saw my wrong and they saw someone they considered a bad influence for my son.


God has his own way of correcting us when we stray off course.  After I drove her home, my son told me that she spoke to him about God.  In fact, she continued a conversation I had started with him last week - why does God get all the credit for everything good in our house?  She wanted him to attend church with her - a youth group she attended with her friend.  He said she was searching for God and also encouraging him to do the same.  Wow.  I smiled inside because I knew God was speaking to me and confirming what he already started in me.  I told my sister and she was surprized.  She was shocked and asked repeatedly, "she goes to church?"  Yes. She does.


As if I needed anything else, a song I never heard before played on the cd that I recently bought.  It was called "If we had your eyes" song by Michelle Williams.  The lyrics was like the full stop to the lesson God's spirit was teaching me and led me to repentance:


People judge from what they see
But Lord you see the heart

If we had Your eyes
We’d see things right
If we could just see from Your point view
Then most things won’t be as they seem
If we had Your eyes
If we had Your eyes


I share with you because maybe you have been quick to sum something or someone up based on what you see.  However, I urge you to ask God to give you his eyes so we can see things as they really are and not as they seem.