HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!

Welcome to 2019!

Today is an Anniversary for me! Today marks three years of writing this BLOG!

If you would have told me three years ago, that I would have written a blog post each and every Tuesday for three years, I would have called you CRAZY! Not because you yourself are crazy, but because you would be crazy to believe that I could write, each and every week, without missing one week. Not even due to illness, vacation, sadness, pressing engagement, tragedy like a fire storm and evacuation, discouragement, family obligation, etc., etc., etc.! Not to mention CHRISTMAS DAY and NEW YEAR’S DAY falling on TUESDAY’S!

I could never have pulled this off by myself. In and of myself I am weak, discouraged too easily, distractible, lacking confidence, and tired. In fact, the truth is, God asked me to write this blog one year before I ever started writing it. I told Him He was crazy, not something I recommend doing by the way. I am not going to write a Theology book on talking back to God, but I could. I have done it way too many times to count. However, God is patient with me and He waits for me to come up to speed. He reminds me, ever so gently that I am indeed being disobedient. 

So, after the first six months of waiting I signed up for this Blog spot and paid the yearly fee for it. If you are doing your math correctly, that means I should be celebrating my three and a half year anniversary. Unfortunately, my disobedience continued another six months. I allowed discouragement and fear of rejection to rule the day, instead of my confidence and trust in God and His faithfulness. Also, something I do not recommend.

Finally, I listened and obeyed. It took me laying down my pride of rejection and fear of failure. In other words, I had to not care what people thought about what I was writing and care only about what Jesus thought about it. I had to not care about how many “hits” my posts were receiving, and care only about the content being the Word of God seasoned with my personal experiences and study.  I had to step aside from the game of comparison and allow God to speak through me. While that may seem like the hardest step to make, it wasn’t! For me, I LOVE studying the Word of God! The studying and the writing and the praying was the easiest part. THE CONSISTENCY of writing each and every week was the tough part. Now God has clearly not called everyone to writing once a week. In fact, “Blog Experts,” if there is such a thing, would tell you not to write so frequently. Leave your readers wanting more. Do not saturate the market, sprinkle it with nuggets of truth. But, my commitment was to write this Blog for God’s approval not for man’s. God asked me to write weekly, I am going to write weekly.

So now, three years later and I am writing weekly with no hesitations or problems. WRONG!

There have been many times I have come close to stopping. There have been many Tuesday’s where I have posted at the end of the day when my goal is to post my “TRUTH BOMB” in the morning. There have been times I have felt like I make no difference, so why should I continue? But each and every time I feel this way, I go back to God and He affirms His call to me.

So, I stick with it! I keep on keeping on and do my best to write what God has placed in my life to encourage, build up and support friends along the way. It’s not easy, but I have learned an important lesson!

TRUTH BOMB

Don’t underestimate what you can do, if you stick with it!

If you would have told me three years ago that I would have been faithful to God’s call on my life without fail each and every Tuesday NO MATTER WHAT, I would never have believed I could do it. But with obedience to God, step by step, each and every day, we can accomplish much more than we think we can.

“What is more pleasing to The Lord, your burnt offerings and sacrifices or your OBEDIENCE to His voice? LISTEN! OBEDIENCE is better than sacrifice, and submission is better than offering the fat of rams.”   I Samuel 15:22

My interpretation= “obeying God’s call and listening to His voice  and being obedient to it, is better than sacrificing something in my life through a “New Year’s Resolution”, and offering my futile attempts at giving up the “fat” I love to indulge in, in my life.”

For me, that “fat” can be food, self-indulgence, and wasted time. It quickly can turn into self discouragement, loathing and unhealthy lifestyle.

What is it for you?

No matter what our “sacrifices and offerings” are, God is calling us to His better way of living. He is calling us to OBEDIENCE! When we obey, we will experience His faithfulness in accomplishing what we believed was impossible.

My obedience to God in 2019 is to listen to His voice, stick with whatever He calls me to do, and never underestimate the power of my God working in me!

HAPPY NEW YEAR FRIENDS!

You can do it!

God’s power is working in you!

Meet me back here next Tuesday as we look at “SOMETHING NEW!”

Speak Truth Love