I WILL BE STRONG!

Psalm 95:6 Come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the LORD our maker,

7 for he is our God. We are the people he watches over,  the sheep under his care.

  Oh, that you would listen to his voice today! 8 The LORD says, "Don't harden your hearts as Israel did at Meribah, as they did at Massah in the wilderness. 9 For there your ancestors tried my patience; they courted my wrath though they had seen my many miracles. 10 For forty years I was angry with them, and I said, `They are a people whose hearts turn away from me. They refuse to do what I tell them.' (NLT)

Read Psalm 95

When we read the Old Testament and the history of the Israelite's we see a people who made plenty of mistakes.  What we should also see is ourselves, and the many times we have refused to do what God is telling us.  In this Psalm, there is a call to be different from the early people of God.  We have a new opportunity, by the power of the Holy Spirit to be obedient.  We have to make a choice, a choice to make God proud and not angry.  Everyday we are challenged to choose.  We must choose to please the Lord Jesus, and not our flesh.  We must choose to please God, and not satan by our nasty attitude and behavior.  We have a choice of whether we are or are not going to sin against God, and if we are going to rely on the Word of God and the power of the Holy Spirit to enable us to make the right choice for Christ.

I don’t know about you, but I don’t want the Lord looking down and shaking His head at me saying, “How many times must I give her this test?”.  I want to pass the test, and I WILL NOT be weak and subject to my flesh.  The Word says that greater is He that is in me, than he that is in the world.  Do you believe it?  I know sometimes we don’t act like we do; BUT today make the right choice that shows that you do!  Declare that you will NOT be in the “they” that refuse to do what the Lord tells you (v10).  Declare that you WILL BE strong in your discipleship, and walk in all that the Lord has for you!  

Jesus thank you for helping us, strengthening us, encouraging us, and teaching us.  In Your MIGHTY name we pray, AMEN.  

The God Influence

@2015  A Poem from "I" Can Relate: How Not to Lose Yourself in Relationships

Who has influenced you?

God wants to…

What has defined you?

Until you read God’s word,

You won’t know the truth.

What do you think of yourself?

You were created by God himself.

His love will define you.

His love should influence you.

His love is always thinking of you.

His love is waiting on you.

WLS

So Beautiful……

Cookie Lyons on the FOX show Empire was lying in jail singing the words to a song that I think every woman should admit that they long to hear:  You’re so beautiful, I will wait for you!  

That scene just touched me….I could feel it.  How our hearts need that hope, hope that allows us to survive even when we are locked up. You might not have been physically behind bars, but we do have a way of locking our heart up because of the pains we have experienced in this world.  We shut people out, we don’t open up to know people or let them know us.  It is all the same.  We want to be safe from the pain.  We have lost hope that that there is someone who thinks we are beautiful, and will wait for us as to heal and hope again.  We might have even lost hope that anything could be beautiful, nonetheless think that about us.  Some of us have lost hope. 

So what kept Cookie Lyons while in that jail cell?  I don’t know.  Maybe hope that the words of the song that her husband sang were true, and that he thought she was so beautiful that he would wait for her. Maybe it was looking at the picture of her family and hoping that she would one day be with her kids again…to love them.  Well he did not wait, he divorced her.  BUT I know someone who we can always hope in, and hope in Him will not disappoint us.  He is a keeper and a mender of hiding locked up hearts.  His love waits and calls us to beautiful.  His name is Jesus and He thinks we are one of His most beautiful creations, perfect, fearfully and wonderfully made.  AND He will always wait for us…until the end of time.  The Lord Jesus longs for us with an incomprehensible love that can break us out of jail and give us a hope that will keep us eternally. 

Ecclesiastes 3¹¹ He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He has put eternity in their hearts...