Am I dreaming, or did God just bless us with a beautiful Fall day?

God is in control of the weather, and no one else is. Only God can take us from a 97 degree week and bless us with a cool, crisp Fall day! I hope that you, like me, were able to take a walk in this beautiful, low 70 degree weather and feel the cool breeze blow refreshment into your soul.

Tomorrow promises to be even cooler than today. Now that is what I call an awesome forecast!

Today is Tuesday, and the truth is, “Today is the day the Lord has made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.”  

Tomorrow never comes; it is just something we wait for in vain. And too easily, it can become an excuse for not doing something today. Yesterday never really was, so don’t allow it to become a regret. Today is truly the only day we have. And Tuesdays are my favorite!  Why, you ask?  Because they are the best day ever!

It is the day I get together to unite and become one with fellow sisters in Christ. Our age doesn’t matter; there are some who are in their teens; some in their 20’s, just starting out with their families, or embracing single hood. There are some who are in their 30’s, and sending kids off to school has become routine. Finding themselves busy with schedules, homework, games, dance recitals…There are those in their 40’s: kids learning to drive; needing us one minute and not the next.Then there are those of us in our 50’s and beyond: some empty-nesters, some grandparents, some alone. But regardless of our age, stage, profession or giftedness, we are all united with one heart and one purpose: to seek the Lord our God through His Word, and in fellowship with one another, and cheer each other on to growth and maturity in Him.

“And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.” Hebrews 10:24

Last week I talked about “kick starts.”  Needing to be encouraged to take a positive step in the right direction. Maybe the long, hot days of Summer, and the change in a regular routine or schedule caused you to get out of a regular routine in God’s word. Maybe like me, you’re ready to be kick-started back into this spiritual discipline.  God’s word is living and active. It is not just a book we read for knowledge and insight. It has the power to change our very lives!  We have to be “transformed by the renewing of our minds.”

How does that happen?  That doesn’t happen by magic. It also doesn’t happen by osmosis. You can’t simply sit in a church service and expect it to penetrate your life.  You have to take this living truth and put it into your mind and heart. Then and only then can its living power transform you from the inside out. I know that what I speak of is no easy task. Putting one more day or night on your calendar can feel like it is the crack in the dam that causes you to break. But that could be precisely where the enemy wants you to fall.

Do excuses like these sound familiar?

“I went to church this weekend; I’m okay.”

“I listened to a simulcast.”

“I read a Christian book.”

All of these things are good, in and of themselves. What is missing, however, is the “spurring one another on to love and good works.”  It is the encouragement and inspiration that you get from hearing someone else’s faith walk, whether it is a victory or a struggle. It is looking other faith travelers in the eye and encouraging them to keep on keeping on, as they do the same for you. It is declaring out loud your decisions to allow God to be first in your life, and no longer let the voices of this world dictate to you how you should live. You find yourself in good company when you decide to live wholeheartedly to honor God!

Truth Bomb

 Today is the only day you have!  Make it count!

That is why I can say confidently that Tuesdays are THE BEST DAY EVER for me! My kick start, after God’s incredible blessing of a fresh cool start to Fall, is Tuesday night Women’s Bible study!  What is yours?

Speak Truth Love

We’ve all heard of “fresh starts” and “new beginnings” and, while we need those, I think sometimes what we really need is a “kick start.”
For example, we all got “kick started” into the month of September. It is the very first week in a new month that we get a day off. Now I think every month should start off that way! But here we are, presented with a “kick start” into a new month, and into a new season. Summer is now behind us, and Autumn is ahead of us. The long lazy days of Summer are gone, as the morning sun takes longer and longer to peek over the horizon. And yet, it goes quicker over the western horizon to usher in the night.
You don’t have to take my word for it, that it is officially Fall. Starbucks has declared it for us all, with their return of Pumpkin Spice Lattes. Known to all of us fans the first day of the PSL! And speaking of kickoffs, college football is in full swing with their kickoff weekend!
Whether or not you’re a football fan, you cannot help but feel the excitement of team camaraderie and loyal fan hood, with high hopes of a championship season. Aren’t we all looking for a championship season, in our own way? Do we not all want to be winners at this game called life? Do we not want our victories to outweigh our defeats? Victory does not come without effort. And God does not reward without faith and obedience. Our ultimate victory is our eternal home in Heaven with Christ Jesus, so every day should see us making strides in that direction.
Regardless of the time the sun rises or sets, we are each given the same number of hours every day. While Fall brings later mornings, earlier evenings and (hopefully) cooler days, we still have the same amount of hours to utilize.
Jesus said,
“As long as it is day, we must do the work of Him who sent Me. Night is coming, when no one can work.” John 9:4
Maybe Fall is the kick start that we need to re-energize committing to and working on fulfilling God’s purpose for our lives. You may be called into a profession where you are able to speak, teach, or pray God’s Word over people daily. If so,

“Do not grow wearing in doing good, for in due season you will reap a harvest if you do not give up.” Galatians 6:9
If you are in a place or profession where Jesus is not a welcome or a comfortable part of the conversation, maybe you need a kick-start to be the only Jesus some of them will ever see. Are you showing them Jesus through the way you do your job, the way you treat others, the way you react to unfair criticism? Jesus said,
“You are the salt of the earth…” Matthew 5:14
Salt does at least two things: it preserves against corruption and decay; and it produces thirst. After people spend time with you, do they seek or desire to live better than they do? And, do they thirst to know your Jesus, the One who makes all things better?
If your influence is primarily at home, where you work to raise a godly family, are you actively pursuing a life that radiates God’s love and gospel Truth?
Do you need a kick-start to realize the importance of the influence you have in your home, your neighborhood and in your kids’ school? Influencing your children, your children’s friends, their parents, and teachers, instructors and coaches they have? A kick-start will activate you toward the right goals with renewed energy!
Pick up God’s word and open it, each and every morning of everyday. It may feel daunting at first. But God will meet you there, in the pages of His word. It is His love letter to you and me.
“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” Psalm 119:105
They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, and I do believe that is true. So instead of trying to encourage you with words, look at this picture:

Do your obstacles feel three times bigger than you are? Does the morning come with every intention of meeting God in His word, and then the fatigue sets in, or the children demand your attention, or the task at work seems beyond your expertise?
Then maybe they need a swift hard kick! Woodstock isn’t allowing the size of the football to stop him from kicking it. God doesn’t want you or me to allow our issues to become so big that we stand in their shadow, and are afraid to kick them. Nothing is too big for God! Open His word and you will see. He will give you the kick-start you need every time!
Truth Bomb

God offers us a kick start each day, when we meet Him in His word.
Let this new cooler season allow you to cozy up with God’s word, a strong cup of coffee, a delicious cup of tea, or a warm cup of cocoa. Don’t let the enemy discourage you, or keep you from the most important place you can go every day: meeting God, in His word, and allowing Him to kick start your everyday!

Speak Truth Love

Have you ever felt so physically exhausted that you can hardly put one foot in front of the other, yet simultaneously your spirit soars and you are filled with a joy that is inexpressible? If you have ever experienced this, you are undoubtedly functioning in the area of your giftedness!

Just as we build up our bodies with physical exercise, God has called us to build up our spirit by exercising our spiritual gifts.

God graciously gives us spiritual gifts for the purpose of building up and growing His Kingdom, and for blessing others! The best part is, since we have such a gracious and generous God, WE end up getting blessed even more! Your spiritual gift is not just something you enjoy doing. It isn’t a hobby or an interest. It is so much more. Your spiritual gift is a God-given talent and ability that you possess, because God wants to work through His people: people like you.  

Do you love to open up your home and have others in it?  When they leave and go home and “the party is over,” are you energized, or exhausted?  If you are energized, even if you still are tired, you more than likely have the gift of hospitality. So exercise it! Open your home and have a group of ladies over for Bible study. 

 If you see someone in need and immediately reach out to help him or her, and don’t turn the other way, you may have the gift of helps or mercy. Carry health bars and water bottles in your car, and be ready to roll your window down and give them when the opportunity is there.

 If you like organizing things and insuring that events run smoothly, and you feel great after they do, you may have the gift of administration.  So step up and help that event to excel and sparkle!

I Corinthians 12:5-6 says,

“…so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others. We each have different gifts, according to the grace given us.”

Unlike a natural ability or talent, where you can become physically worn out and exasperated, a spiritual gift will lift you up and leave you feeling exhilarated.

Jim and I experienced this this week, as we both exercised our gifts and felt our spirits soar.  Amidst the study guides, teacher’s manuals, handbooks on policies and procedures, miles high of HR paperwork, cleaning out an old classroom and setting up a new classroom, preparing desks, cubbies, and lesson plans for twenty-five students…I felt an inner strength and joy in using the gift of teaching God has given me with my new 4^th grade class! And then, the moment those kids walked through the door and I began teaching them, I went home excited and exhilarated each night after school! 

 Jim studied, researched, wrote and re-wrote a sermon, prepared a PowerPoint outline, utilized a movie clip and preached two sermons in a row on Sunday morning. He felt more energized walking out of church on Sunday afternoon, than he felt walking in!

  Teaching those kids is for their benefit, and preaching the Word builds up a local church: our gifts are best used when they benefit others and build them up! Our gifts are intended to be a two way street: we travel down it and we are built up; and we intersect with those who are impacted by our gift, and they in turn are built up!

Truth Bomb

Do you want your spirit to soar? Then find your spiritual gift, and exercise it!

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and he will direct your paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6

Sometimes growth steps are just putting one foot in front of the other, even when you cannot clearly see the way to go. It is stepping forward toward a faithful God daily. Not because you can see the path, but because you are following a faithful God who has led you in the past. Sometimes the steps we are taking are painful, but they are growing us into the person that God intends for us to be. Sometimes those steps feel like we’ve walked this way before, stepping into the unknown, knowing God is leading us there, but not knowing where we are going. Those are the hardest growth steps to take! We have prayed, we have read God’s word, we have fasted, and now we must simply continue to walk daily, one step at a time, in complete trust and obedience.

These are the hardest Growth Steps to take. They call for blind trust and obedience in the same direction. Our human nature wants a map! We want to have the path drawn out for us, calculated ahead of time. We want to know what to expect around the next bend. But these are not patterned steps. These are steps of blind obedience and faith! They are steps through darkness, when we cannot see anything ahead of us. They are steps through the fog where the mist hangs so dense that we know something is there, but we do not know what it is. Other times, we have taken steps upon the sand, but if we turn and look back, they have been washed away. Yet we are called to faithfully step one step at a time toward Him. The steps are heavy as we put one foot in front of the other. They can at times produce great fear, fear that paralyzes us and stops us in our tracks! But the steps are necessary and they are taking us to the place that God is calling us to. Our faith in God has to be greater than our fear of stepping forward. So we must continue to call out to Him, to cry out to Him with our whole heart. We must pick up our foot and put it in front of the other, to know that if He is calling us to take the steps, then they are moving us in the right direction!

Our challenge is to pick our feet up every day when they feel as heavy as bricks, our strength and courage must come from Him!

“Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus (or to step confidently in His direction), but to trust and obey.”

Praying, and trusting and obeying.

Reading God’s word daily must be our constant companion! Crying out to Him continuously in prayer must be the first whisper our voice makes in the morning, and the last plea our weary heart makes before we lay our head down at night. God and God alone must be our constant companion, for only He can direct these growth steps!

You may be going through them yourself, and you can’t make sense of the path God is taking you down. You may have a loved one you are watching go through these growth steps: a beloved nephew, a precious niece, a son or a daughter… They have given their whole heart to someone else just to see it crushed, and yet they must continue to put one foot in front of the other and keep walking down God’s path to grow! Maybe it is a sister who is letting go of yet another child who will leave her home, and is taking the steps toward maturity and growth on their own. Meanwhile, a sister is learning to grow in her own way as the number of children in her home diminishes, and her growth steps take a different direction? Or perhaps, it is watching a sister take growth steps toward God meeting the needs of her heart as a friend betrays her? Or praying for another dear sister as she waits and trusts in God’s clear direction for her and her husband.  Maybe it is watching a parent as they navigate the golden years of growing older: more aches and pains, and the mind isn’t as sharp and clear as it once was. Their growth steps occur as they slow down, and each step becomes shorter and more regulated.

Many times in my life’s journey, I’ve been through this process. I’ve always given praise and honor to the Lord my God, because in hindsight, I’ve seen where He was leading me and why I needed to go through that particular journey. He was always with me; He is always faithful!  And by faith I’m convinced that He will indeed direct my path once more, and lead me to another place where I can serve Him and help build His Kingdom. My life’s Bible verse becomes my sure anchor that holds me close to my God:

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”  Philippians 4:13

The tiny growth steps I took as a child while my grandma was holding my hand come to my mind quicker than any other memory, and help steady me through this course. The songs she sang to me about her faith and trust in Jesus, while I knew her path had never been an easy one, ring in my ears and in my heart, and steady me. “Trust and Obey, for there’s no other way, to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.”

Truth Bomb

When we can’t see the step ahead of us, growth steps occur as we trust and obey in Jesus.

Growth steps can be those we lead others by, or growth steps can be those we are led by. Ultimately, all growth steps lead us in the direction of Jesus. Whatever growth steps God is calling you to take, or whatever difficult growth steps you’re going through, I pray that you’ll have the confidence in knowing that by trusting and obeying our powerful, BIG God, He will direct your path!

Speak Truth Love

“This is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and gave His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” –1 John 4:10

God loves big! He does not love when we deserve it; He loves all the time! He does not love with just words, but He loves with everything He has! He gave His son, His one and only Son, so that we could have a relationship with Him!

Now that’s a big love!

“Big” is a great word to describe my 4th of July experience. The fireworks were BIG, the mountain was BIG, The climb was Big, the view was Big, and the love we shared as a family was BIG!

We were in Tahoe Donner on the North shore of Lake Tahoe. There was a fireworks show down at Donner Lake, and we had been told the view was spectacular from the side of the mountain. We had been told where to go to find the trail, and where to park…but we had NOT been told how far the hike would be! After a delicious BBQ dinner, we loaded up the car with all of us, and headed out. There were 10 of us total, two young children, two elderly adults, and six adults in between. We got to the foot of the mountain where the trail head was, and we saw many other families, with the same, wonderful idea.  We excitedly exited the cars, grabbed two blankets, and followed the line up the trail head. The first few hundred steps only revealed a few more hundred steps. Then we looked up, and in front of us we saw nothing but a long trail! We walked on, still in great anticipation of the spectacular show that we would view. We walked on, and we walked on, and on and on and on! We walked on for a good 30 minutes, only to see that the trail was veering left and we were now going to hike up to the mountain side. We had come this far, so we were not going to turn back now! This was going to be a big adventure! After all, Papa is 83 and he was hiking it, and Grammie is 75 and she was hiking it too! The example of their big adventurous spirit was an encouragement to all of us! After a good 15 minutes more of hiking, we reached the mountain side where you could no longer take the trail. We walked over bushes, plants, rocks, and fallen tree logs. We decided it was best to allow Papa and Grammie to sit on one of the closest logs we found. My mom zipped up her puffy coat clear to her chin. While I had laughed at her earlier for bringing a puffy coat in July, I was now envious of her. They cuddled together as the wind picked up on the mountain side, and the sun began to go down. The rest of us went forward a bit more and found another log. We lifted the children over the top of it and sat down in anticipation of the fireworks show. And what a show it was!  I have watched many fireworks shows in my life, but I have never been on top of the fireworks themselves, looking down on them!

The walk was big, the mountain was big, the fireworks were big, and the love that we felt for each other was biggest of all!

I believe that God calls us to love big, no matter what circumstance we find ourselves in.  There are times in life–like on the 4th of July for me–that are easy.  Surrounded by my family, God’s beauty and splendor, and the flashing lights of the fireworks, I had big love for all of it.  I easily expressed to my family how much I loved them and how much I loved doing this activity with them. But as the mountain itself exhibited to me, I could walk up it and be on a literal high, and love big; and within the next hour, I had come down from the mountain, and could have easily felt the low, making it harder to love big.  God is so amazing, because He always loves big!  And He gives me the strength and encouragement I need to love others big-when they are deserving of it, and when they are not. When you love big, you pour your whole heart into another person, and you give all of yourself for their well-being.  And when you do, that big love is not always reciprocated.  And when that happens, your first response is to draw back that big love.  But God calls us to continue to love others big, just as He continues to love us BIG.

I have recently experienced hurt and disappointment from those I have loved big and trusted. Let’s be honest: more than likely, each and every one of you could say the same thing.  When we love big, we make ourselves vulnerable to those we give ourselves to.  When that love and support is needed, and yet not given, it makes us want to recoil, to draw back, and to not give out that love, so that in the future we won’t be hurt again. But that is the opposite of what God desires for us. Instead, I must seek to follow His example. I have to receive His big love, and then love others big in the same way He loves me.  Only through His strength can I love BIG like He does.  Once again, this practice draws me to my favorite Bible verse:

Truth Bomb