We Are Hardest on Ourselves

Encouragement came when I needed it and I didn't even know that is what I needed. As I was reading the chapter about Prayer of Tears in Richard J Foster's book Prayer-Finding the Heart's True Home, I found  myself in tears from the words he wrote. Here is a little excerpt:
Be encouraged by the observation of Thomas a Kempis that "habit overcomes habit." You are building new habits of prayer, and patient, kind, firm persistence is what you need with yourself.
Tears came as I read these words. I had been disillusioned and down on myself for my seeming inability to stop and prayer, to go to Him, to rely completely on Him. I was being too critical of myself, not forgiving myself for my humanity but these words brought a peace to my soul. It's okay. I am a sinner, I am human, I am not perfect but I can overcome because I have Jesus on my side. But, that is a life-long pursuit that will not be fully achieved. I can only keep striving to overcome the bad habits with the good ones, to rely and trust in my Father. It is with patience and kindness towards myself that I can continue to be persistent and keep moving forward and growing into being more Christ-like.

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 336

I have been pondering the word rely since Monday when I got through my day without calling on God for help. I resorted to doing it my way and I was frustrated, angry and even said something that offended someone. To make matters worse, I knew I was not being a very good example of Christian love and the fruits of the Spirit had turned sour. I was a mess and instead of taking my stress to God and dealing with it in godly ways I went home had a glass and a half of wine (that is a lot for me these days) and then proceeded to let go of self-control and ate too many chocolate almonds. I woke up the next morning feeling very sorry for my pathetic display and asked God for forgiveness and help on being better prepared to handle my day at work that is extremely challenging right now. That word “rely” popped in my head so I tried looking it up in the concordance of my bible but it wasn’t there so I did a search on line for scripture about relying on God and was led to what I needed. I gave me a good visual and for me a visual works so well. God led me to another visual too of a father walking with his daughter holding her hand and as they go down the path they encounter a big pile of sticks in the way so the daughter looks up to her father and asks what they should do. My pile of sticks is my current workplace and the challenge of dealing with another culture and a communication barrier in the middle of 5 butt-loads of work that keeps piling up. Prayerful preparation with my Daddy and the visual tools helped me get through my day with patience and gentleness and my self-control was focused on what would glorify God.  The visual brought me instant peace and a smile to my face every time. If you have encountered a pile of sticks in your path, look to our Daddy and let him help you decide the course you should take.

Jeremiah 17:5-9 Thus says the Lord: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord. He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come. He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land. Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose trust is the Lord. He is like a tree planted by water, that sends out its roots by the stream, and does not fear when heat comes, for its leaves remain green, and is not anxious in the year of drought, for it does not cease to bear fruit.

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 263

The word “rely” means to have trust or confidence in. God demonstrates our love for us in so many ways. Every day of our life is filled with how he loves us but the greatest example of his love is through his son Jesus. I can’t even imagine being a parent and watching my child be tortured and brutally be put to death on a cross. God can do anything. He could have told Jesus “never mind these humans, speak up and defend yourself” or he could have made the cross turn to dust and the nails become invisible. He could have stopped his only son from dying on a cross if it were not for the amazing depth of his love for us. That love is our confidence! If you are ever feeling doubts, fears or separated in any way from God, look to the cross and be reminded of God’s amazing love.

Father, it isn’t even possible to convey with words the feelings of what you did for us. Thank you is not enough. Help us to show the kind of love you showed us through Jesus. Amen.

1John 4:16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 65

How dependent on God are you? I am betting not as much as you could be only because that is where I am at too. I am finding that being dependent on God, relying on God takes away the worries of life and brings peace. But can I be relying on God more? Yes. The goal is to be relying on God 24/7, all the time, every minute of every day. Imagine feeling that peace that passes all understanding every day. It is possible with the Holy Spirit’s help and doing our part in asking. Lord, we ask that we see the reminders in your creation today of how well you take care of us all and ask you to take away our worries and bring us the peace that only you can give. With you all things are possible. Amen.

Matthew 6:25-27 Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

365 Days of Praise Challenge-Day 44

Do you get bombarded with emails? Are most of them junk mail? I delete far more emails than I actually read and I am sure most of us are in the same boat. I do take a quick look at the subject line and if I have the time to take a look I will open a forwarded email to see what it's about. These are few and far between and I am very selective in my subject choice. I love animals and love inspirational stories so those two subjects may catch my attention. I recently opened one from my dad with the subject FROG. It was such an odd subject that I decided to take a look just to see and found myself reading through a story and the moral, FROG, forever rely on God. I have had those four words in my head for days now. I, of course, had to create a scrapbook page and a card for this great acronym. I used the Lucky paper pack from Close to My Heart which will be going away by the end of the month with the launch of the newest catalog. My arrows were created with the Art Philosophy cartridge and given dimension with an embossing folder. I have the frog jumping up to represent looking up to God. I still have to add my journaling about the photos I selected which are from a dentist visit for my daughter when she had to get her first tooth pulled.

We were definitely relying on God that day to get us through the trauma.
Psalm 16:8 I have set the Lord always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.

365 Days of Praise Challenge-Day 43

So all that worrying I had about a possible surgery for my shoulder was for nothing. You would think I would have learned by now that worrying over something that may or may not happen is pointless. Thankfully, my worrying over it was short-lived and I made the choice to just be patient and wait for my doctor's appoitment before getting too freaked out about it. So, there is no bone spurs in my left shoulder like I might have thought. It's just the same thing as the last time I went in for my left shoulder which was because of an indoor sky diving injury I had over 3 years ago. Back than, it was explained that I had a "loose" shoulder so the muscles were very strained trying to keep my arm in it's socket during the indoor skying diving thing, which by the way was awesome! He basically said I have a very sensitive shoulder. Since the last shot of steriods I took gave me an allergic reaction, we are going the more conservative approach and doing physical therapy. There is relief in knowing what's going on with it and how I need to proceed. I think I am slowly learning how to avoid aggravating it but I do have to clean my house at some point so hopefully the physical therapy will do it's thing. So, I am praising God today for a direction to take and for showing me once again that worrying never gets me anywhere and I have to rely on Him.
Matthew 6:34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.