Who do you turn to when you're facing pain?

Some more lyrics that caught my attention today as I listened to Tim Hughes, 'When The Tears Fall'

"I've had questions without answers, I've known sorrow, I have known pain
But there's one thing that I cling to, You are faithful, Jesus You're true
When hope is lost, I call You Saviour
When pain surrounds, I call You Healer
When silence falls, You'll be the song within my hear" 

These lyrics made me think about my own life and how I behave or react when things go wrong. Just because I know Jesus does not mean that everything in life is now going to be perfect, it doesn't mean that I'm not going to face struggles, it doesn't mean that I'm not going to face sadness and pain, but when those times hit... what do I do? Do I just sit wallowing in my own pain, or do I turn to Jesus knowing that He is my hope, my Saviour and my healer? 

Not everything in life is going to go my way, and I'm not always going to have answers for questions about why things had to happen they way they did, but what's important is that I don't lose faith in my God because in the end, I know that I am in His hands. 

When I find myself wanting to cry, do I let my emotions take over my body, or do I turn to God. I know that sometimes I probably do let my emotions take over, and then the longer I allow myself to do that the harder it is to come back from it, if I remember to turn to Jesus and to put my faith in Him, I can get through the struggles a lot easier and faster. 

If you take a look through the Bible it is full of scriptures that tell us to put our trust in him or reminding us that He is the one we should turn to and that He is strong or us and is our rock that will never let us down. Here are a couple of my favourites that I have posted on my wall.

"Truly He is my rock and my salvation; He is my fortress, I will not be shaken" (Psalm 62:6)

"God is our refuge and strength, an ever present help in trouble" (Psalm 46:1)

Thankful for: His Timing

Today, I just want to be thankful for His timing. I know that sometimes there are things that I want in life, and I want them now. There are things that I am still waiting for, but at the same time, I know that His timing is perfect and there is a reason I am still waiting. I know that when I do receive these things it will be perfect. Maybe I'm not ready for what I want just yet, and I do not realise, but He knows. He knows me better than I know myself. So I am thankful for His perfect timing knowing that He has my best interests at heart.   

The Lords Strength and Power

Psalm 29

"Ascribe to the Lord, you heavenly beings, 

ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.
Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name; 

worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness. 
The voice of the Lord is over the waters; 

the glory of God thunders,
the Lord thunders over the mighty waters. 
The voice of the Lord is powerful; 

the voice of the Lord is majestic.
The voice of the Lord breaks the cedars; 

the Lord breaks in pieces the cedars of Lebanon.
He makes Lebanon leap like a calf, 

Sirion like a young wild ox. 
The voice of the Lord strikes 

with flashes of lightning. 
The voice of the Lord shakes the desert; 

the Lord shakes the Desert of Kadesh.
The voice of the Lord twists the oaks 

and strips the forests bare. 
And in his temple all cry, "Glory!"
The Lord sits enthroned over the flood; 

the Lord is enthroned as King forever. 
The Lord gives strength to his people; 

the Lord blesses his people with peace."

Have you ever stopped to think about just how powerful our God is. As I read through this psalm, I am reminded about just how mighty and powerful our God is. He thunders over the earth, everything on Earth obeys His voice. I for one often go about my day not thinking about it. I forget to realise the almighty power that He holds in His hands. 

As the psalm says "the Lord gives strength to his people". He doesn't just give it to one or two people, He gives it to ALL his people. Now, I imagine to share strength with just one person would be difficult, but imagine how strong you would need to be to share it with everyone. God has some mighty strength! We need to glorify His name daily. We need to be thankful for all that He has done. We need to worship His name daily. 

This psalm was just a bit of a reminder to me. It's never stood out to me before, but it did just now. Sometimes God speaks to us through what we read. My guess is God is trying to tell me I need to glorify His name some more. I need to remember that it is Him that holds the strength and power, it is He that blesses me, not myself, nothing of this world can do what He has done for me. 

Thankful for: Tea

I am a tea drinker, and I love it! Now I'm sure there are other things that I could thank God for that seem much more useful than tea. But I want to thank God for tea because I really just love my morning cup of tea every day. 

Stuck!

Another lesson from yet another movie...

It seems that I'm learning a lot from movies these days. It's not so much that I'm learning it, most of it I'm aware of but the movies make me think about it more. 

Today's lesson came while I was watching Moulin Rouge. I watch a lot of movies with singing in them! 

The first thing that caught my attention was a line that Harold Zidler says to Satine. "We're creatures of the underworld. We cant afford to love." The truth is everyone can afford to love, but these people had taken on a belief that they couldn't, that they had to continue the same way they always had because there was no other alternative. It couldn't be further from the truth. There is always an alternative. 

It made me think about our own lives. How often do we find ourselves walking down a path because we think there is no other way to go? How often do we give up on dreams because we think they are impossible? I'm sure we've all done it, I know I have. But when we do this, we are putting limitations on God. So many of us take on a belief that cannot change who we are, we believe the devils lies when he tells us we're useless and then go about living the same life that God never meant for us to live. I was once stuck in this position. I had taken on the belief that I was meant to be a "nothing". I didn't believe that I could get past things I'd done, I didn't think I could get through tough times, I thought I'd be stuck in a hole for the rest of my life unable to dig myself out. In my head I believed that I had taken myself down a road, and I was beginning to call myself horrible names  that I would never dream of calling anyone else but myself. But I believed that's who I was, and I believed that's what was to become of me. Nothing more that a disgusting excuse for a woman.

The other line that really stood out to me was when Satine was talking to Christian. She said "You can leave anytime you choose. This is my home." Satine had taken on what Harold had told her, she didn't see any way out. This "home" that she spoke of is all she knew. She didn't know anything else so how was she going to escape it? In my situation I got to the stage where I saw no light, I saw no love, I saw nothing but disgusted faces in my future, I had given up hope on all that is good. In my mind I believed I was "home" and even though I didn't like it, I felt like it was all I knew, I didn't know how to change it, and I didn't think I could. I was stuck and it didn't matter how much I didn't want to be there, I saw no way out. 

 

It's hard to come back from something like that when you live like that for a while. The more you believe something, and the longer you believe it, the harder it is to let go of it. But I found that God has helped me through all that I've done and he has shown me that there is another alternative, a much better alternative and He is painting that path for me. When I think of myself now, I don't think of those same horrible names, I used to think. I think of myself as God sees me... a beautiful and pure daughter of God.

"Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." (John 8:32)

Jesus came so that we may be set free, we can't do it ourselves. When we feel trapped in a hole, Jesus takes the shovel and digs the way out for us to follow and places us on the right path. He can show us how to live differently, He can show us life that we didn't think was possible. 

"It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery." (Galatians 5:1)

When we have Jesus and we have found that way out, we then need to stand firm with Him. When Satan gets a hold of us, he chains us up and binds us to the life we do not like, so when we have been set free we need to stand firm in His freedom and know that His way leads to life. We need to hold on to the new life we have been given and not give in to Satan's lies again, for that is all they are... Lies! Choose to believe the truth, don't let yourself think that you are stuck in a position that you can't get out of, there is always an alternative, we just need to ask Jesus to help us find it. 

Thankful for: Fun

Fun is something we all need in our lives. We need to be able to balance the seriousness with a little bit of fun. There's not a lot to say about it, all you have to do is think about how life would be with out fun and you'd soon be thankful for it too!

    

Frame everything in worship

Wednesday night... another night of "family" dinner and Worship Team rehearsals. When I say "family" dinner, it's not my immediate family, it's just a bunch of us that have made a thing out of having dinner together on Wednesdays... it's nice. I love Wednesdays!

Being worship team night we always have a meeting before hand to find out what God has is speaking to us about and what we think He wants for the weekends services. Then we discuss it. So today, a few things were mentioned and then we discussed how we live a life of worship. I may have previously mentioned this but, I think it's a very important part of any Christian's journey. 

In everything we do, we should worship God. Not putting Him aside and coming back to Him only on a Sunday. It was mentioned that often we see Wednesday as hump day, getting over that hump. We don't want to see it like that, we want to see it as the beginning of the rise and Sunday during the services being the amazing tip of a mountain kind of thing. So, I can't word it well, but I know what I mean. So if we don't want to see Wednesday as hump day and we don't want to find ourselves just coming back to God on a Sunday during the praise and worship songs in a church service, what can we do to live a life of worship?

A life of worship, not just Sunday worship, involves more than just singing. It's about getting out into the community and shining God's light. There have been opportunities recently for people to go to their neighbours and help them out. This isn't just a nice thing to do, this is sharing God's light and God's love to them.  He gave us His all and tells us to love one another, so when we do just that, when we love one another, we are sharing His love. When people get to see the good works we are doing, it may just bring back enough faith for them to believe there is something more. 

One person tonight mentioned that they try to frame everything they do in worship. I liked this idea, but again, it's difficult to put in words that everyone would understand. Basically, we do a lot of things in life, we go to work, we go shopping, we cook for our family, sometimes we have a moment to ourselves to do nothing. In everything that we do, we need to frame it in worship. We need to know that everything we do is for God and we should be thankful for the opportunities He gives us. Sometimes we go to work when we don't want to, we don't want to have to put up with the boss pushing us to get things done faster, we don't want to have to listen to the whinging of the person next to us, we don't want to get up early in the cold. I'm sure there is a long list of reasons why we don't want to go to work, but we should have just one reason above all of these that should be the reason why we DO go to work, and that is to worship God. We do it for Him, not for us. The boss that seems pushy may just be under a lot of stress and may just need to know he can rely on you, the whinging person may just need some love, getting up early in the cold may be horrible but if we don't we may miss the opportunities to shine God's light in places where it needs to be seen. 

We do what we do not for ourselves, we do it for God. He has placed us where we are for a reason and if we struggle to see that reason, maybe we should just sit and pray about it for a while. Ask Him why we are where we are and what it is He wants to do. He will answer you, and when you know, you can then face the day in worship knowing that what you are doing, you are doing it for His purpose.

Instead of my usual thankful for, I'm doing something a little different tonight.

Making sense of a vision:

So I had a vision tonight while I was in silent prayer. I can't even say it was prayer, because I was simply being silent after a time of worship. So... I saw a bunch of the team from church together in a room but spaced out from each other, then two massive arms came and encircled everyone bringing them closer together so there was no longer space. 

What does this mean? 

The arms obviously represent God, but I'm not sure what the entire vision means. I feel like maybe He is trying to say that it is only through Him that we can be completely unified as one, and He will bring us together. We cannot work for Him or with Him while we are spaced out from each other? I'm not sure, so if anyone reads this and has any idea what the vision could mean, please let me know. In the meantime, I'm going to send it to our worship team leader, and pray about it myself.  

Don't Let Walls Contain You!

Something that was said during the service on Sunday really caught my attention.

"We can't let walls contain us!"

When it was said at church it was talking about the church. We can't let the walls of the church be the only place we are Christian or do good deeds. The person we are inside the church should be the same as the person on the outside. We should aim to be able to do all that we do on the inside of the church building, on the outside also. We need to reach out to people in the community and help them however we can. 

A lot of people leave it up to the churches to make a difference but the truth is, the church is not a building, the church is the people. We make up the church. We need to go out into the community and make the change.

What are walls for? They are for keeping things in or out. When we put walls up in our lives we are preventing ourselves from living out our full potential. We need to knock down any walls and think outside the box. Don't let the walls contain us, think about what we can do in our community, don't just leave it up the others. 

Thankful for: My voice

I've not been well over the past week and I've really missed my voice. It's not that I'm thankful for "MY" voice in particular, just the fact that I have one. I'm thankful that I have a voice, I can talk and I can sing. When my voice doesn't work, I miss it. So I'm thankful for my voice. 

When does He speak?

We had another discussion today about God speaking to us in our silent moments and it got me thinking again about when He speaks to me. 

Since starting this blog there are nights where as I'm about to sleep, I get all these thoughts and ideas, scriptures come to my mind along with lessons that I've learnt in life. When I thought about it today, figured that this is when I am most quiet. When I'm finally letting myself rest, taking time out from the busyness of the world, this is when He speaks to me. 

But then I stopped and thought about it. Is this really just when God speaks to me, or is this just the only time that I open my ears to hear Him? 

I've come to realise, it's not that He is not speaking during the day, it's that I am not giving myself the opportunity to hear what He is saying.

I've been on guided tours of the caves in Margaret River in WA. When you go on these tours, they talk to you all the way through. They tell you where to go, they tell you the story of the caves, they tell you why it looks the way it does, they lead you through it and don't leave you behind. They don't wait until you've walked all the way through and then tell you as you get to the end about things. They walk through it with you. That's what God wants to do. He wants to walk through the day with us, guiding us, telling us things, teaching us, inspiring us. 

It's hard to turn off our mind to all the noises of the world, I guess it's something we need to train ourselves to do. But to begin with, we need to turn off the unnecessary noise. An example would be instead of wearing headphones and listening to music as we jog along the road, we can just listen to nature, and listen to what God has to tell us. It's just one simple thing we can do to help train ourselves to listen to God, and I'm sure there are a number of other simple things which I am going to try introduce to my own life. 

Thankful for: Answered Prayer

Not such a strange one today. I just want to be thankful for answered prayer. My housemate and I need to move out of our current house by the end of September but we decided we'd start looking now. We were approved today, after visiting just one house, and applying on Saturday. It took half a working day before we got the approval. This to me can only be God answering our prayers for a quick and easy job of finding a new house that we both loved. I know not all prayers are answered so quickly, but I know they are all answered in His timing. So I thank Him for all those answered prayers and all those future answered prayers that are to come. 

Waiting Here For You

Sunday again... time for another video. 

Waiting Here For You - Christy Nockels (Passion)

If faith can move the mountains
Let the mountains move
We come with expectation
Waiting here for you, I’m waiting here for you

You’re the Lord of all creation
And still you know my heart
The Author of Salvation
You’ve loved us from the start

Waiting here for You
With our hands lifted high in praise
And it's You we adore
Singing Alleluia

You are everything You’ve promised
Your faithfulness is true
And we're desperate for Your presence
All we need is You

I don't have a lot to say about this song, but it just stood out to me when I heard it. It's not asking for anything but Him. He has given us everything, He is capable of anything, all we need to do is wait for Him. 

Thankful for: Family

I spoke to my family today, something I have started to do more of. They really are an amazing bunch of people. Families teach us a lot, and they make us smile. They love us and support us no matter what. They help us become the people we are today. So I'm thankful for family!

Fitting In

When I was growing up I often felt like I didn't fit, I would try to change myself to fit in but never really found my place. This often left me feeling quite alone.  I would like to say that since I found God in my life I never feel like that anymore. But the truth is, I do. 

It seems that sometimes I feel like I am the last person people think of when it comes to inviting people places. There have been a lot of events going on (weddings etc) around me at church of the past year and I have been invited to very few of them. Admittedly, most of them I understand that I'm not close friends with those involved however,  there are some where I have felt a little bit left out. Why was I not invited? 

I wonder why it is we feel the need to belong, and wanted. And why are some people the type that get invited everywhere and others don't. Why do some seem to have hundreds of friends and some have little? I can't answer that question, and although I used to want the answers, I don't need to anymore. 

I've come to realise that just because one person has more friends than another, doesn't mean one person is a "nicer" person that the other. I've come to believe that God places people in our lives where we need them. He has given us each gifts which may appear to attract more people. I'm not sure why, I don't really have all the answers at all, it's something I'm still discovering I guess, and as I discover more, I become more comfortable with the person that I am and the friends I have.

The biggest thing we need to be aware of in situations where we feel like we don't belong, or we feel lonely is how we react to these feelings. Reacting poorly by whinging and feeling sorry for ourselves, is not going to make us feel better, and it's not going to make people want to spend more time with us. In stead of focusing on what we think we are missing out on, we need to focus on what we do have. Now for me on those days when I feel like I have no friends, I just laugh at myself and think about all friends I do have. And one of my best friends, who is Jesus. The bible says in  Hebrews 13:5 that God will never leave us and never forsake us. Even when we feel alone, we aren't alone.

Thankful for: The strange workings of our bodies

Ok yes, it's another weird one. Maybe one of the weirdest ones. But I was just thinking how amazing our bodies are. How everything works. The brain sending signals to everything else, the heart pumping blood, our lungs helping us breath. If something fails, well our bodies fail. It's all very amazing, but I'm thankful that everything works together. I'm also thankful that when we feel ill our bodies know how to deal with it and fight it, which is what mine is doing right now. Without the strange workings of our bodies, who knows what we would be like. So I'm thanking God for how he has put us all together. 

I Asked You For Life

I just thought I'd share some lyrics that really spoke to me

These are from a song called I Asked You For Life by Kim Walker. 

"I asked you for life, and you sent your son to die for me.
I asked you for hope, you came in the night and gave me a dream.
I asked you for freedom, you broke every chain and gave me the keys.
I asked you for love never-ending and every day you surround me!"

As I listened to this song I really just sat and took in what the words said. 

When we ask God for something, He always answers, as the Bible says “So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you." (Luke 11:9)

 He gave us life, He gave us hope, He gave us freedom and He gave us love. Not only did He give us these things but He continues to give these to us every day. 

I'm not sure there is really much more to say about it, but I know that when I ask for something I need to believe that my prayer will be answered, because aHe answers prayers!

Thankful for: Sleep

I know I was thankful for rest the other day but after having very little sleep last night I realise how great it is! I have had a cough for the past week and am finding it difficult to get to sleep to night, just as I'm about to sleep I cough and wake myself up. It has made me realise just how important sleep really is and I appreciate it a lot more than I had done. So I am thankful for sleep because I know just how important it is for us all. 

 

Who are you?

Another lesson from another movie. 

As I watch The Lion King the other day one part drew my attention. It is the moment Simba sees his father in his reflection and then goes back to be the lion he was meant to be. I realised that we can relate this to ourselves in our Christian walks. 

Jesus lives in us! When we look in the mirror, what do we see? Do we see just us? Do we see nothing? Do we see a future or do we just see the now? Do we see Jesus in us? Well, of course, our actual reflection is going to look like us but do we realise what is in us, and do we live that way. 

When Jesus left the earth, God gave us the gift of the Holy Spirit. John 14:25-26 states "All this I have spoken while still with you. But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you everything I have said to you." God gave us the Holy Spirit to guide our ways. We need to know that He is within us. The Holy Spirit is God so if the Holy Spirit is within us, then God is with us. So what stops us from reaching our full potential? What stops us from being the person we were meant to be? What makes us think we can't do it? It certainly isn't God, because He gave us all we need to succeed. The only person stopping us from being all that we can be is us. When we believe what the devil has told us, that we are not worth it, that Jesus is not within us, that is when we fall short of what we could be. 

Just like Simba did when he had seen his father in his reflection and then in the clouds, he realised that he was not living the life he was born to live. We need to wake up, look at ourselves, and realise that God has a plan and a purpose for us and we need to live it! When I look in the mirror, I no longer see a struggling, young woman who knows not what to do with her life. I see a woman of God, strong and confident in serving the Lord, who lives with purpose and knows who she is!

Thankful for: Children

I don't have any kids myself yet, but there's something about children that just makes me want to be thankful. They bring such joy to the world, the smiles on their faces can light up a room, their laughter is infectious (in a good way) and they have no fear! We could learn a lot from the children in our lives. I want to get to know the children in my life better, and see what they have to teach me. 

Joking, What Is It Doing?

I was thinking today about joking around. We all do it, we all make fun and have a laugh but I got thinking, what does it actually do? The first part of proverbs 17:22 says "a cheerful heart is good medicine" so having a laugh is fine but proverbs 18:21 says "the tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit". The words we say may be fun at the time, but what are they really doing to our spirit? 

This isn't something that I've only just thought about today, but it's something that happened today that made me verbalise it, and then made me realise I wanted to read more about what the bible had to say about it. 

As a single woman, 26 years old, people often try and match me up with others, and a few times this has ended in us joking about it all the time. Often however, these words then trigger something in me and after a while I almost start believing the jokes, I start seeing something that isn't there. Maybe it's the way a woman's mind works, maybe it's just me... I don't know, but I know it's not healthy. So today, when a joke was made, I decided to put a stop to it. I asked that these jokes stopped. When questioned about it, I simply said, 'it may not appear to be doing something now, but we don't know what this is doing in our spirit'. I likened it to making inner vows, which is may not the best thing to compare it to, but it was all I could think of at the time. When we make inner vows we tell ourselves something that we then stick to without realising like, 'I will never allow myself to have a debt like my parents'. Without realising, we have taken control of our finance, and we don't let God in to it. So my thoughts are that with jokes, we are saying something that eventually our Spirit believes and takes on and removes God from those situations. While I'm busy joking about the guy across the road, I may miss the guy God has for me who is standing right in front of me. One joke may seem fine, but after a few... the possibility that it is doing harm increases.

Now of course, there is nothing wrong with making jokes but I think the best thing to do is focus on jokes that are not about particular people, are not rude, and are not immoral. Whenever we go to say something we should ask ourselves... Is this giving someone false hope? Could this get in the way of Gods plans? Will this make someone see something that is not there? And ultimately... Is this building someone up, or pulling them down?

"Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen." (Ephesians 4:29)

Thankful for: Encouragement

This isn't a physical thing to be thankful for, I guess it's a gift God gives people. The gift of encouragement. There are some people in the world who are just natural encouragers. I was encouraged today by another person in our worship team to play guitar next time I was at rehearsal. There was no pushing to do it, it was a suggestion, and an encouragement that I should not be hiding the talent. It's a talent that needs work, but without the encouragement, it could stay hidden.   

Purpose & Meaning

I decided to do something different today. I randomly chose a bible verse and read it to see what God had to say. I was taken to Luke 24 and the title of the chapter is "Jesus Has Risen"

It didn't take long before God was speaking to me through just a few verses. 

"On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them. In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’ ” Then they remembered his words." (Luke 24:1-8)

The line that really stands out to me is "why do you look for the living among the dead?". In this case the two men (or angels) were speaking to the women who had gone to Jesus' tomb, and found that He was not there. But even in our lives today, we all seem to go looking for life among the dead. What do I mean 

by that? Let me see if I can put it into words. 

I guess one way I can put this is that many of us look to worldly things to find answers or to find purpose and meaning in our lives. It is purpose and meaning that keeps us living and there is only one that can help us find it, and that's Jesus. A lot of us try to find these things in our jobs, in our money, in our belongings, but these are all things of the world, they are not living, they can not make us happy and cannot bring meaning or purpose to our lives. We need to stop looking to the dead, and look to Jesus among the living. 

Personally, I used to think that just going about my day to day life, doing my job, making my money and paying my bills was all that I needed to do, but when that didn't seem to be enough, I tried to fill my life with other things but the more I looked, the less I found. It wasn't until I found Jesus that life started to make sense and I found there was more to life than just living day to day. I finally had purpose and meaning, I had God's purpose for my life and I now live to fulfil that. I know that now I am living, and I am no longer dead, and I don't go to the dead "worldly things" for answers or meaning, I go to Jesus, I go to the living!

Thankful for: Choices

God gave me the gift to choose. Sometimes these choices are difficult, sometimes easy. Sometimes I choose wrong, sometimes I choose right. But each choice I make I know that I can be thankful that there is a choice and there are no "HAVE TO's" in my life.    

Silence

Today, I was shown a video which really opened my eyes and made me think about how much I open my ears to God and how much I allow Him to actually speak while I listen. 

Noise - Rob Bell

 

These are some of the questions the video asks:

• Do you feel like God is distant? 
• Do you wish that God's voice would be louder in your life?
• Is there a connection between the amount of noise in our lives and our ability to hear God?
• Have you spent the same amount of time worrying and talking about your difficult, confusing situations as you have spent in silence, listening to what God might have to say?
• Why is talking so much easier than listening?
• Does my schedule, my time, my life look like that of a person who wants to hear God's voice?
• Do you really believe that God's voice is more interesting than the voices around you?

The truth is we do find talking is easier than listening. I know for myself that when I go to pray, I will often pray but then forget to stop and listen to see what God has to say. I'm so busy caught up in my own world and the busyness of life, I forget that He wants to talk back to me. 

There are times when I feel like God is distant, and usually what I find is it is not Him who is distant from me. He is always near. When He feels distant, it's because I have neglected to communicate with Him, I've not stopped to hear His words. If we want God's voice to be louder we need to stop talking, we need to shut out everything that is keeping us from hearing Him. We cannot blame God for not being there, He is always there, always willing to communicate, but He cannot talk to us if we do not listen. 

In discussing this video with a few friends we were talking about how often when we speak to each other we find ourselves not listening so much but deciding what we are going to say next. We can do this with God too, we can focus on what else we need to pray about, what else we want to tell Him and we don't give Him the chance to say anything. 

"Tremble and do not sin; when you are on your beds, search your hearts and be silent" (Psalm 4:4)

 

Listening doesn't always come easily, some of us need to train ourselves. I know I do! I often find that I don't know a lot about people, and I think this is because I talk so much I don't let them talk about themselves. It's not that I'm not interested, I just don't think about it at the time. The same thing can happen with God. When I don't let him talk, when I don't listen, I cannot learn more about Him. If I want to get closer to Him, I need to listen to Him. I need to open my ears and close my mouth, the more I do this, the more I will learn about Him, and the more I will be able to receive His love. 

Thankful for: Rest

I like to be thankful for some strange things, so today I'm thankful for rest. I was not feeling 100% today... sore throat, dizzy eyes, but I refuse to let myself get sick! It made me realise just how important rest is. If we make ourselves so busy that we get no time to rest, we increase our chance of becoming ill. I know sometimes viruses go around and they get us anyway, but the doctors then always tell us to "go home and rest". Rest must be important, so I am thankful that I can actually have that time of rest. I am thankful that I am not so busy that I can not look after myself. Rest is great!

Nothing But The Blood

It's Sunday again... time for another worship song. This week at church we had communion so I feel I should keep with that theme. 

Nothing But The Blood - Hillsong Church

 

What can wash away my sins?

Nothing but the blood of Jesus. 

What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus. 

O precious is the flow

That makes me white as snow

No other fount I know

Nothing but the blood of Jesus

This worship song truly focuses on the one thing, the one reason why I am here today. And that is the blood of Jesus. If He hadn't shed His blood on the cross over 2000 years ago, life would be very different. 

His blood washes away our sins, we are forgiven. 

His blood makes us whole, all our brokeness is healed

His blood makes us white as snow, God sees us whole and perfect, without any imperfection or sin. 

Communion is a great time to remember all He has done for us however, we should remember to be thankful for Him every day. 

Thankful for: Jesus

Yes, I'm just going to say today that I am thankful for Jesus. I am thankful for Him coming to earth and dying for us so that we may live as God intended us to live. Thank you Jesus! 

Would I go back?

I was asked today, "if you could go back in time and change some of the things you did, would you do it?" And my answer, though many would choose differently, was no. If I could go back in time and make different choices I wouldn't. It got me thinking about my blog from a couple of days ago. It was basically running along the exact same lines. Would I go back and change the "mistakes" I have made. 

Many people would jump at the chance to relive some of their past. So why not me? 

If I went back to change some things

• I would not have learnt the lessons I have learnt today
• I would not be the same person
• I possibly wouldn't have moved and met the great people in my life here
• It was the bad choices I made that forced me to realise there was more to life that what I was living, and then ended up with me finding faith in Jesus Christ
• I could not share with other teens of my own experiences so much 

These are just the few answers I can think of now, but I'm sure there are many more. In the end what I had decided is that if I was able to go back and relive certain parts of my life again, I wouldn't. However, if I was to be faced with the same choices now, I would choose different. This shows that I have obviously learnt the lesson from the previous time and will have even more experience to help show others the right way to go. 

Thankful for: An unnamed friend. 

I do not wish to put her name here, but today, I am thankful for a particular friend who has helped me through many battles. She has encouraged me in my walk, and kept me on track. Not only that but today she stepped in and helped me serve the men of our church. She has skills that I do not have and with her help we were a great team! I am thankful for lots of people, but today, I just wanted to be thankful particularly for her.

 

Encourage One Another

I watched another movie today which reminded me of an important lesson.

I was watching "The Kings Speech" and although he had people laughing at him or not thinking he could do it, the smallest amount of support and belief in him gave him all the strength he needed to keep going. Yes, it was difficult, but it would have been much more difficult had he not had the support. 

In life, there are going to be times when things seem shard for us, in those times, it's important we have a support system of friends. In the same way, we need to ensure that we are there to support our friends and family when they are in need. A little support goes a long way. 

So keeping it short today as it really is quite a simple concept, but something that the bible mentions quite often. Here are just a few bible verses:

^"This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth." (1 John 3:16-18) We can be suppportive by giving with our actions, not just cheering them on, but by doing things that will help them on their journey.

^"Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing." (1 Thesalonians 5:11)

"not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another —and all the more as you see the Day approaching." (Hebrews 10:25)

"Therefore encourage one another with these words." (1 Thesalonians 4:18) Sometimes just a few reassuring words is all someone needs. 

Thankful for: A home

I got a letter today from my Compassion child that I sponser. It told me about her home she is living in and made me realise how lucky I am to live in a proper house with walls and a roof to keep me safe and warm. I see houses every day so to me most of the time, I don't realise how much I actually have. Sometimes we get caught up thinking about what we don't have we fail to realise just how much we actually DO have. 

Mistakes?

According to dictionary.reference.com a mistake is defined as "an error in action, calculation, opinion, or judgment caused by poor reasoning, carelessness, insufficient knowledge, etc." with an error being "a deviation from accuracy or correctness"

So my question today is... are what we consider "mistakes" really mistakes? If I look at the above definition, it seems like a mistake can only be a mistake when we know that what we are doing is wrong, when we deviate from accuracy we need to know what is right to begin with. So, when I think back on all the things that I've considered to be mistakes I need to ask myself, are they really mistakes?

There are a lot of things in my life that I considered to be mistakes, but when we see them as mistakes I feel as thought it puts too much of a negative feel on it. When we think of things negatively it often makes us feel bad about it which can then lead us down the path of insecurity or self doubt. So, instead of looking at things like they were mistakes, I am choosing to look at them as lessons. 

There is a saying that goes, "There are no mistakes in life, only lessons." I would have to say I agree with this quite a lot these days. 

I've come to realise that there are times in my life where the choices I have made have not turned out the best for me, but I don't look at them as a mistake, I look at them as a lesson. The problem with these lessons is that sometimes it may take a while before we realise what the lesson was. 

I went through a really tough time about 7 or 8 years ago, and in the space of a few months, I had made so many bad choices and made many, what I would have called, mistakes. I was once a very depressed, diffident person. I felt unloved and unwanted and I would do anything to try and feel anything different. So, I made choices which were not right for me, I let myself do things that I now know were wrong for me and I let people take advantage of me because I thought it would make me feel better. At the time, I thought it was the right thing to do, I thought that maybe that's what I was meant to do. I carried on like this for a while until I realised I was living life wrong and I was making a lot of mistakes. I stopped a lot of what I had been doing, but my attitude toward myself worsened because now not only did I feel unloved by others, but I hated myself for making the mistakes that I had been making. 

Thankfully, I had not let myself get so down that I gave up on everything, I had decided I needed to make a change, and I did. I moved myself across the country knowing that I was running away from the mistakes I had made and not wanting to deal with them. We can take our mistakes with us, if we don't think about the lessons that we've learnt from them, they weigh us down, we let them run our lives, and I lived like this for a few years. I wouldn't go out with friends in the evening because I didn't trust myself, I was living with my mistakes, and I didn't want to make more. 

Then one day, it finally clicked. They weren't mistakes that I needed to be carrying with me. I needed to change my perspective. I needed to see the lessons in them. Once I started doing this, life started looking up again for me. I started to trust myself. It's taken a while but I'm at the place where I know I don't have mistakes. Everything that I went through, everything I did, was for a reason. I have learnt how to look after myself, I have learnt how to be a strong individual, I have learnt more about love, I have learnt to be happy in the life that I have been given. And I really could not have done that without finding Christ. He has taught me so much, He has taken away the weight I was carrying, I can now face the things I did, and not let them affect my future. The greatest thing about learning my own lessons is that now I can share my lessons. There are a bunch of teens that I know will be going through the same thing that I did when I was their age, and because I have been through that, I can try and help, I can talk them through what they are going through, so they don't go about life with the weight that I had on my shoulders for years.

Stop thinking you have made mistakes, and realise they are lessons... we can learn lessons every day. What lessons have you learnt from the choices you've made? 

Thankful for: His Love

When I was younger I used to joke and say that I didn't want to get married, as a child we joke about boys having cooties but, as we get older that need or want for a partner becomes more apparent. So here I am, 27 and still single. I'm not complaining about being single, but there are times when I can feel very alone, especially when the people around me are all getting married and having babies. At times like that I know there is only One that can fill my heart with love... that is God. So I'm thankful that I have His love in my life and I don't feel the need to go elsewhere putting myself in meaningless relationships just to feel a little bit of love. 

 

The Guardian

I have found that I get a lot of thoughts come into mind when I'm listening to music or watching movies. They are not necessarily Christian praise and worship songs or Christian movies, but it doesn't mean that God can't speak to us through them. 

So the other day I was listening to a Delta Goodrem song called "The Guardian" and some of the lyrics really stuck out to me. 

"I'm the guardian
I am the sole protector
Of a heart that's been abused"

It really started making me think about my own heart, and who I consider to be the guardian of my heart. Now if I am, as the song suggests, the sole protector of my heart then I choose who and what to let into my heart. This seemed like a great idea, until I really thought about it. How am I to know what is best for me? What makes me think I will know better than the one that created me? I need to let go of being the 'sole protector' of my heart and let God be the protector of my heart. If I listen to Him, He will let me know what needs to be let in, and what I need to let go of. 

"For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."" (Jeremiah 29:11)

God knows what is best for us, He has plans for us and if we don't allow Him to take care of our heart then, we may stop Him from being able to do all that He wants to do for us, we may be putting a stop to the amazing plans He has for us without even realising.

Thankful for: Wednesday night dinner

Ok, so this really is me being thankful for a number of things. Every Wednesday over the past couple of months, a bunch of people from church have gathered on Wednesday night and all had dinner together. I'm someone who doesn't get to have family dinner often because my family is on the other side of the country, so I love these nights. These people make up a different type of family, and we all enjoy a meal together. I love it! So I am thankful for the great people and the great food that I am able to share every Wednesday.  

Find a balance - why do you wear what you wear?

I was thinking today about the way I dress, and why I sometimes put in more effort. What I decided was that it is important for us to find a balance in how and why we dress the way we do. 

It says in the bible that we are God's temple. It says in 1 Corinthians 6:19, "Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own" To me, this means that we should look after our bodies, not only with what we eat but how we dress. We need to treat our bodies with respect, the same respect we would have towards a temple. If we care about something, we put effort in to make it look good. 

However, in thinking like this I also thought about how the bible says we are "fearfully and wonderfully made" (Psalm 139:14). So should we really feel the need to constantly try and make ourselves look better by covering ourselves with make up and putting on the best clothes? 

I think we need to find a balance. We need to be happy with the way that we look and know and believe in our hearts that we are beautiful and God loves us the way we are without the extra make up and fancy clothes, but at the same time, we need to ensure we have put in enough effort to look like we respect the temple of God that we are.

We don't need to dress up in order to please God or to worship and praise God. In the old testament there are a number of times where people would be fasting and praying, and they simply wore sackcloth. We can see this in Jonah 3:5, 2 Kings 1:1 and Daniel 9:3. We don't need to dress up for God, but by putting in effort, we show others that we respect our bodies. 

For me personally, I know I went through a stage where I was unhappy with the person that I was and I tried to change myself by the way I dressed. Changing the way we dress doesn't change the person we are and people can usually see if you are trying to cover your insecurities about yourself. I'm still working on my own balance but I know that I am on my way to finding it. I don't feel so insecure that I will not leave the house without make up. I know that God made me this way and He thinks I am beautiful, but I will always make sure I look respectful. 

Thankful for: Music

I almost wanted to start quoting lyrics to the Abba song when I wrote that, but I wont. Music is a huge part of my life, it always has been since I was young. Obviously being a dancer, we hear music all the time, and then when I started singing, music became a bigger part of my life. These days I find music helps to express how I'm feeling and what I want to say. There are times where I can just put on one of my favourite praise and worship albums and really just spend some time with God. I can, of course, do that without music, but when I can't put my own words together, the praise and worship music helps me. I also find it nice to be able to sit with my guitar and just quietly worship by myself at home. There is some music that really sends out the wrong message to the world, so I make sure I am picky when listening to it, but all in all, I love music and I'm thankful for it!

Clear out!

Do you ever have days where you go through all your stuff and clear out all that old junk that has become useless or you just don't use anymore. There's always a bunch of stuff that has become just that... stuff. Things that are just there cluttering up space. 

Well, I moved houses about 6 months ago and did not have room to empty out all my boxes so a lot of things have stayed in the boxes and guess what... I haven't missed any of it. So today, I went through those boxes and sorted it into three piles. The things to keep (mainly books), the things I can sell or give away, and the things that just need to be thrown out. The throw out pile was the biggest! There were things I had bought YEARS ago, and had thought about throwing out many times before but always had come up with excuses to keep it. Well, today, I was strict, no making excuses, if I didn't need it... it was going! 

Clearing out my "stuff" made me stop and think about the other things in my life, not the physical things, but the emotional, the baggage I carry with me. How often do we stop and take the time to go through that and get rid of all the stuff that is no use to us, the stuff that we should have let go long ago, the stuff that could be holding us back from the future or that is preventing us from filling it with new things. 

There are a lot of things we may hold onto from the past. We think we can't let go of it, we can't let those thoughts or memories go, but sometimes they can be whats holding us back. If those memories and thoughts aren't helping us move forward, if they are just taking up space in our minds preventing us from filling it with new memories and thoughts, then we need to get rid of it! Throw it out! De-clutter your life!

A few years before I met Jesus I had made friends with a guy. He was just what I felt like I needed at the time but, it was one of those relationships where I thought it was going somewhere, and he didn't see it as anything. It was quite unhealthy for me, but I was in a bad state at the time, quite depressed, and willing to do anything to feel loved. I held onto this relationship, I knew it was bad for me, but at the time I did not care. It probably went on for at least a year before I actually realised it wasn't going to change and I had to move on. A couple of years later I moved to NSW and for a while life was going great. But... when another guy came onto the scene, suddenly memories of this previous relationship had come back to haunt me and I was suddenly afraid that any other guy will be just like the friend from WA. Just like we can with physical things, I had hidden away these memories and almost forgotten them, but suddenly something had triggered them, and they surfaced. Not letting go of this memory could affect the rest of my life if I didn't deal with it. 

Eventually, I came to meet Jesus and at a ladies weekend away, I dealt with this past. I realised that I needed to let God into every part of my heart, and clear away all that junk. I can't forget the memory of what had happened, but He showed me how to deal with it, how to not let it take hold of my life. He helped me to clear out any of the darkness, the fear and worry, the negativeness I held towards men so I could then move on with my life how He planned. I am still currently single, but I know that when God sends His man my way I am not going to allow my previous experiences affect how I behave around men anymore.

"Let your eyes look straight ahead; fix your gaze directly before you." (Proverbs 4:25)

"Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead."(Philippians 3:13)

As the verse above says, we need to forget what is behind, we need to focus on what lies ahead of us. Learn from our past, ask God to help us move forward, and then do just that. Move forward. Let's not dwell on things we cannot change. Let's look to the future. 

  

So, how often do you stop and allow God to do a work in you? How often do you let him search your heart and help you to let go of things that sometimes you don't even realise you're holding on to? It's probably something we forget to do but we should make it something we do daily. Just spend some time and ask God if there is anything that needs to be cleared away. And just listen, when He speaks you will know. Then just give Him time, allow Him to help you to show you how to move on in His purpose. 

Thankful for: Laughter

Ok, so yesterday, I fell off the bottom step at church. Most of the people that saw were concerned, but me and a friend of mine were just laughing at it for about 10 minutes. Now, some people might think it's weird that I'm thankful for a friend laughing at me when I could have hurt myself, but I'm fine, and having a friend to just laugh with me made the whole thing so much easier to deal with. If everyone was worried, and there was no laughter, I probably would have felt worse about it, and allowed myself to feel down, but with laughter, I was able to get up and just continue to enjoy my evening. Of course, I know that if I really had hurt myself, my laughing friend would have been one of the first to help me. So, I'm thankful for laughter, for those times where there's just nothing else to do but laugh! 

Break Every Chain

It's Sunday so I thought I'd change things up a bit today and share a song which I have found powerful. The following song is called "Break Every Chain" from the Jesus Culture - Awakening album. The lyrics are repetitive but so powerful!

 

There is power in the name of Jesus

There is power in the name of Jesus

There is power in the name of Jesus

To break every chain, 

Break every chain 

Break every chain

All sufficient sacrifice
So freely given
Such a price bought

Our redemption
Heaven’s gates swing wide

There’s an army rising up
There’s an army rising up
There’s an army rising up
There’s an army rising up
To break every chain
To break every chain
To break every chain

I don't think I can really extend on that... everything I want to say has been said in the lyrics. So I'll share a bit of my own personal testimony of broken chains.

We all know chains are used to keep us tied up to something, we cannot get free. The enemy will use all sorts of things to chain us up, to keep us from receiving the life God had intended for us to have. I was once tied up in my own chains, chains which I personally, was too scared to remove. I had chains around my heart, which had been hurt and broken by a number of people. Friends and family had hurt me in ways that I never had expected. The enemy had convinced me that I didn't need anyone else. I was convinced that if I let anyone in again I would only be hurt further so I let the enemy have his way. I chained up my heart, I was determined never to let anyone in again. 

But...

Then came along Jesus. From the moment I stepped into church with my friend, I felt the pull. It was a good pull, it was a pull that told me I was where I belong. Once I was there, I was convinced I was where I was supposed to be, but I was still not willing to let anyone get too close. 

Then one day, I had an amazing encounter with God. I experienced Him in a way that I had never experienced before. He opened my eyes to realise that I had closed myself off from people and from Him. I knew that it was time to let go. It was time to release those chains, but even though I had put them up, I wasn't able to break them myself. I was scared, and the only way to get through it was with Jesus. 

All it takes is for us to ask, and Jesus CAN and WILL break those chains. He is all powerful. His name is higher than any other, all it takes is a little faith and great things can happen. 

He broke my chains, they are no longer holding me back. I have now made so many more meaningful friends, my relationship with my family is no longer difficult. The biggest change is that I now know that I can love without fear of being hurt. Without my heart being chained up, I can let Jesus in, I can let Him do a work in me, I can let Him show me how to love and allow Him to love me. There are still times when I may get hurt, but I'm not afraid, and my hearts stays open. When it was closed off, I was unable to accept God's love, but now with those chains gone, His love flows in me always and I'm not worried about the hurt that may come my way because I know that God will never leave me or hurt me.

Thankful for: Phones

I like to be thankful for things that most people wouldn't think of being thankful for. Today I am thankful for phones. I know there are all sorts of ways of communicating these days, mail, email, phone call, skype, in person. But for me, the phone is a very handy thing to have. I have family that live on the other side of the country, and although I have lots of ways to communicate with them, I find the phone is the greatest blessing of all. There are times when you just want to hear that familiar voice of a family member, but when they are a 5 hour plane trip away, a catch up in person is difficult, mail and email take time, skype and on line chats need them to be on line at the same time as you, but a phone call is usually the most effective. Yes, sometimes they don't answer, but leaving a message will have them call you back as soon as they can. So today, after spending about an hour on the phone talking to all of my family back home I'm thankful for my phone. Without it, talking to my family would be quite difficult. So, I thank God for my phone.