365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 110

Reality TV is popular for a reason. It is real and you see some real emotions. Usually, it is the heartfelt tears but this week’s Survivor had a man who was really mad. He was so mad he literally dumped out the rice and beans for the tribes food. That is a big bad on Survivor! His tribe had unanimously voted to forfeit the immunity challenge to the other tribe and go to tribal counsel which has never been done before on all the seasons of this show. This man was crazed with his anger and it was like a volcano going off to watch it. He was out of control. He is one of the fan favorites from a past season who from the past talked about his faith and God but not this season. He has strayed the path and it showed in his total loss of self-control and tantrum of anger that he displayed. He was proud to be voted off in the end because he wanted to control his destiny. He needs our prayers. This was a very real example of how our temperament weaknesses can be played out. Without God in his life, this weakness with anger was able to take reign over him. I pray that he will find his way back to God and get in the Word and ask the Holy Spirit to help him with his anger, give him self-control and especially understand and accept that God is the one in control. 

Proverbs 29:11 A fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man keeps himself under control. 

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 109

When I walked into my office yesterday, little did I know the drama that had just unfolded before I had arrived?  A long-standing, top-notch co-worker of mine had taken her stuff and walked out. I don’t know the details of what happened but was told that our operations manager threw her under the bus. Our operations manager has been out of the office due to family issues and healthy issues and put some of her work onto this other co-worker, leaving the co-worker with piles of her own work that cannot get done. It sounds as if the operations manager did not back her up when asked about her excessive workload. Thankfully, our assistant manager went and talked with her and convinced her to come back. It just made me think of how any one of us can experience this kind of betrayal and lack of support. God will always be on our side. He is our rock, the one whom we can lean on always and the one who will always be there. These kinds of things can happen to us so be prepared by asking the Holy Spirit for his fruits so that you will be able to persevere and know that God is on your side.

Isaiah 41:10 So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 108

During some of my wakeful hours during the night, the TV show The Amazing Race ran through my thoughts and I started to see the connections in the show to our lives. For those that may not have seen The Amazing Race, it is a traveling race around the world where pairs of people travel from one country to another and in between have road blocks and speed bumps that they must get through. These pairs of people are all mixed from spouses to best friends to brothers. Now some of these pairs work well together and have no trouble but for others the challenges they face bring out their worst. These road blocks and speed bumps often have to do with overcoming fears such as fear of heights but also have to do with working past something you don’t do well like swim. Some of them can be difficult and you need to have perseverance and patience. Some of these teams get into trouble because they are in too much of a hurry and will not read the clues carefully. Other teams will just make the wrong choices and end up lost or at a challenge they cannot conquer. We are living out our own amazing race. We aren’t necessarily traveling the world but the concept of going through change and seeing new things we do go through. We need to be partnering up with the Holy Spirit for our race. Without the help of the Holy Spirit, we will find ourselves lost, impatient and a whole host of other negatives. But with the Holy Spirit, we will be guided and given all that we need to overcome the challenges we all face in our lives. However, it is a partnership and like any relationship it takes two. We have to do our part in this partnership by praying, studying and reflecting. Take the time today to reflect on how well you are running the amazing race of your life.

Hebrews 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 107

My dear daughter will be turning 10 in a couple of weeks. She is very precious to us but she is pushing our buttons right now. It seems that she is one of the quiet kids all day long at school but as soon as she is home, she talks non-stop. She wants to give you a play-by-play of everything. It is definitely wearing on our patience but we have tried to listen to her and respond to her questions. She has also developed this attitude that is bordering on disrespectful. No, it has crossed the border into disrespectful. So, I am trying to figure out how best to approach this issue so we can turn that attitude back into loving responses and the Lord lead me to this passage about being gentle. It is going to start by myself and my husband being gentle in the way we approach her. She has always been very sensitive to harsh words or yelling but much more responsive to simply and gently telling her what she needs to know and learn. We will be calling on the Holy Spirit for his help with patience and gentleness in the days ahead so we can guide our daughter towards being more like Christ.

Proverbs 15:1 A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 106

Unfortunately, my brain is not engaging. I read something but nothing wants to sink in. It is a time in my cycle that I feel the furthest from God. My brain just doesn’t want to focus. I know it is a temporary thing but it is pulling at my heart now because I want my brain to cooperate but I read scripture and I can’t engage. Well, no one is perfect, least of all, me. The sermon yesterday went in one ear and out the other. This is one of those monthly struggles that I am sure most women go through. My prayer is this no brain function issue will end soon.

James: 3:2 We all stumble in many ways. If anyone is never at fault in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to keep his whole body in check.

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 105

The idea of self-control has been on my mind lately. It has been my typical pattern to go on a diet and lose some weight and keep it off for a while but than something triggers my lack of self-control and I go back to my old habits of eating like I did when I was 20. I can’t do that anymore! My mind and my body are not on the same page. So, yesterday after having an evening of feeling too full, which is so uncomfortable, I opened my bible and started reading some scriptures about self-control. I get the impression from the bible that people didn’t have a problem with self-control when it came to food back in those days. The bible talks more about controlling our speech and our in-take of alcohol. There are probably lots of various things that we can let control us like the television, email, computer games, Facebook, etc. How much of those things am I giving control of my life over to? Think on these things in the week ahead and start making a list of those things that seem to control you and your life. Put the control back into the hands of the Holy Spirit.

1Peter 15-16 But just as he who is called you is holy, so be holy in all  you do, for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”

365 Days of Spirit-Filled Fruits Challenge-Day 103

As I walked into my office building yesterday, I ran into our office manager who was waiting for the elevator. She greeted me and asked how I was feeling and than I asked her how her daughter was doing. I had heard thru the office grapevine that she had had a second seizure within a month. I decided to ride up the elevator with her instead of taking the stairs which is my normal routine. She said that her daughter who was a preemie has had this place in her brain that may not have gotten enough oxygen and now the doctors are saying that it is a degenerative thing and that symptoms will worsen, etc. She ended up in tears telling me how she just needed to stay home yesterday to just be with her daughter and how she started a diet program to lose her excess weight so she can be healthy and take care of her daughter as she grows older. The interaction I had with her has stayed with me. I don’t know our office manager outside of office stuff so this was on a personal level that I had not gone to with her before now. It is amazing to me how little we know about the hearts of others. I got a good look at her heart yesterday after working there for almost 4 years but God knows our hearts inside and out, through and through, completely. He knows what we need and how we are feeling and will answer those needs and comfort those feelings. Lord, I ask you to give comfort, peace and strength to this woman whose heart is breaking for her daughter and heal her daughter. With you all things are possible. Amen.

1 Samuel 16:7 But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."