Looky-Loo!

Why waste time peering into someone else’s life when you can trust God that one day you will look out of your own?  Voyeurism is a waste of time unless you are observing someone headed in the direction that you want to go.   We stare at others living their lives and we dare not dream of being an inspiration to another.  If we are focused on getting after our own promise, we won’t have the time to be a looky-loo into another’s.  Why not dream your own dream and see your own promises come to pass instead of trying to watch what someone else is doing in theirs?  Today I made up in my mind that I would trust God for more – and that was it – no stipulations whatsoever!  My frustration in my life has grown out of desiring that God bring the promise to pass as I had designed in my head.  My job as a believer is to believe that God will keep his promise to me – not do whatever I say or think.  If we could know the mind of God – then what would be the purpose to us serving and worshiping him as God, if we controlled him?  I am starting to see my faith walk a whole lot clearer.  If you desire to correct your vision for your future – first thing first – start looking to God to be God.  Next start wanting to enjoy your own life instead of gazing at someone else’s thinking that their life is better than yours.  We serve the God who has more than enough to go around.  Do you always want to be the one looking in or do you finally want to get to that place where you are the one looking out?

Propaganda

Father my prayer this morning is that I don’t simply have a life full of propaganda campaigns of what I “think, believe and hope for”.  People are losing hope because in their myopic scope the blessings of God are far out of reach; and from what they see going on in the “world” and in the “church” that we just talk but there is no true benefit in serving God except for salvation.  I pray that what I stand for in you and what I hope for in you; and to accomplish to your glory is manifested with tangible evidence in order to be placed in a position to lift your name on high.  People are not moved by lip service but rather action, proof, evidence and by example.  You yourself Lord came and performed miracles so that we might believe on you.  We who love and represent you can talk all day but in the end of the day, people want to see it demonstrated in order for them to believe.  Bless me to walk out my life of faith, so that people want to come to know and fellowship with the God that I serve for their own selves.  People hear Christians preaching and evangelizing but they want to see the fruit.  Prosperity, health, wellness, wholeness, a good family life and blessings exceeding and abundant are fruits of serving you.  Not that we don’t have trials and tribulations but through them all, they see that trust in you pays off.  And that is what I want my life and that of my family to consist of – for your light that shines in me to light up the darkness in someone and they decide that it is better to serve you because there is evidence that God is real.  By encouraging others, I am also reinforcing my own faith to not only seek you for myself but because I know what the power of the Lord can do and can be to another who makes up their mind to go all the way with you.  Propaganda pushes one’s personal agenda ahead of the good of others.  You are good and I pray that your presence and favor shows up so great in my life; that it lifts your name up and that all who comes into contact with me - draw to you. 

Stride...

·       Oprah – Started out in the business in 1986 and today she is worth a billion or more.

Now Age 60.

·       J.K. Rowling – Started out with the concept of a book in 1990 and in 1997 she published her first novel.  Today she is worth a billion or more.

Now Age 49.

·       One started earlier, has been in the business much longer and yet they have made the same strides in life; and they are both worth about the same.

Father, my prayer is that you shorten the gap between me and my destiny, cause me to be successful at an early age and increase my borders, territories and substance.  Help me to take this life that you have blessed me with in stride!

Submission vs. Dominance

If you give a man ALL of you, then he will have ALL of you.  You must reserve and set aside a special place in you that only God resides in and has access to.  There is a difference between submission and dominance.  Yes – we submit to our HUSBANDS.  Many are giving out hubby benefits and being dominated by someone who isn’t committed to you; and doesn’t submit himself to you.  And if he is your husband, he still has to treat you with the respect that you rightfully deserve.  You are cooking, sexing, planning and taking trips; you share a dwelling, you help him with his kids, you cater to him and his friends and family when they are over at your house.  You see about him when he is sick and pick up his clothes from the dry cleaners – the list goes on and on.  You hold him down, but who’s holding you down?  Women are getting their roles confused and discombobulated; and who is supposed to be taking care of whom.  If he is the MAN – then let him be that.  Don’t keep giving man after man all of you and all that you possess when he is not all the way committed.  Much of our pain is self-inflicted and could have easily been avoided.  The only one that we should allow total dominance over us is the Lord and even he gives us free will.

SUBMISSION=   PEACE

DOMINANCE

Things just got REAL!

There was a time when the promise was out of reach and I couldn't see or feel it. Now it feels as close to me as breath and I can sense it nearer to me than ever before.  It has to be real to me in order for it to be “real to me”.  Faith in God makes the impossible – Real!

So you think you can dance?

No matter how much we would like to, we cannot choreograph life.  All we can do is dance to it.  Allow God to take the lead and he will guide us across many dance floors throughout this life; not to fail in mentioning – he is the one that invited us to this ballroom called life in the first place.  Do not let anyone make you think that they did it all by themselves.  Even though they might like to think so, no one was able to get to a place in success all by their lonesome.  Tina Turner needed Ike and I am sure she would tell you that she wouldn't change nothing for what she was able to accomplish.  Beyoncé had no idea what her Father had in mind when he directed her steps in to the music business; and neither did she know that she would one day meet Jay Z, who took her career to another stratosphere  and become the Phenom and force that she is today.  No one can write a script for their lives.  The script is already written and we are simply acting out the parts that were handed to us.  We have to trust God and know that he is the right dance partner for us to move fluidly throughout life.  There are a lot of people out there that think they can dance all by themselves and you can but it is so much nicer when you have a partner.  So you think you can dance?  God wants to show you that you have never danced until you have taken a spin on the dance floor with him. 

More...

Father God I do not know from whence the blessing will come – be it from the East, West, North or South but no other day that I have felt that it was this close than today – right now.  This morning while getting ready for work and while driving to work I just mused over the thought after seeing a woman walking across the street, who isn’t homeless but her soul is.  She is holding on to anger and a hurt that no one knows the depths of but her.  I said a prayer for her and blessed your name Father because I would rather hold on to you until you bless me – any way you want to bless me – instead of hold on to pain, hurt, disappointment, failure or unbelief.  Why hold on to it when we have the choice in the matter to choose better?  We can choose to hold on to God’s unchanging hand and promises? 

I was able to speak it today, aloud and boldly and it was so refreshing, rejuvenating and exhilarating – to speak unfathomable promises to someone who has no idea what hoping against hope is and can do for a life of a believer of Christ Jesus.  You gave me the opportunity Father to stand on a word that you had placed in my heart just minutes before.  Tracy (my Manager), was carrying on about how Cris (my Co-worker), as going to be well off in fifteen years when he gets his second retirement from the Navy.  Mind you – he has already put in his first 20 years and is returning to active service. 

Retirement seems to be the running theme and the root of where my fear, if that is what I want to call it, stems from.  All of my life I have resisted a regimented and incarcerated life.  All of my life I have believed for more and ever since I have trusted you that first time as far back as I can remember, I have been hooked.

That first instance when you kept my mother from finding out that I had gotten into trouble in school.  I had prayed for the first time that I can remember and I remember distinctly that it was you who kept your promise to me; it was then back in grade school that I remember knowing that you were real, not just “that person” or “that God” who I had heard through preachers or people – I knew for myself.

On a daily basis I hear people talk themselves out of the very blessing that they say that they are standing in need of – They are either speaking doubt or they are speaking unbelief.  Today I received confirmation in my spirit that I may as well speak what it is that I want and believe God for it!

If we don’t believe that you are well-able Father, then why serve you?  There is a blessing in the privilege to speak God’s word.  There is power in declaring his word and promises over our own lives and see it blossom just as he said that it would. 

My spirit keeps telling me that there is more… And I simply believe that there is – MORE!