Friday, June 11, 2010

Feeling His Presence







“You have made know to me the paths of life;

You fill me with joy in Your presence.” Acts 2:28



Have you ever felt God’s presence as you performed a task or read a book or even your Sunday School lesson? How did it make you feel?

This past week, I received four blessings. The first was a note in a book I had won in a blog drawing. The lady who wrote the note how she felt getting to know me through this blog was a blessing to her. I was touched.

The next day, I received an e mail from another of my blogging friends. I was aware of the fact she was going through a prolonged tough time last month. I had sent her an encouragement card. The e mail was her way of thanking me.

I went to the grocery store and heard some say hello to me. It was a dear lady who I had met when I stared going to our former church. We talked about her cousin’s wife, a very close friend of mine. The cousin died right before Christmas last year. The cousin’s wife is now having an unusual health issue. My friend reminded me she would soon be 90 years old. This lady’s daughter was principal of the high school that is closing. The daughter will be principal at the one remaining high school in town. My friend’ house sits between two vacant houses and she expressed concern about the value of her house dropping a real concern given the economy.

Then, Friday night I started to read my Sunday School lesson. I haven’t started reading my lessons before late Saturday night in several years. We are starting a new quarterly. I spent time reading the Editor’s thoughts, the writer’s bio, and the first lesson.

I felt as if the words of Paul were aimed directly at me(1 Thessalonians 1).

Oh, a friend and her husband and son are going through a rough time right now. She also is possibly going to receive an appointment to a church as senior pastor. I found myself sending her and her husband a note of encouragement on Thursday, I saw her on Saturday at a meeting. After the meeting, we were talking and she thanked me for the card.

We don’t know how we might affect another person when we yield to God’s leading. He could bless us with His presence over and over and over.

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Trials of Life

“Ask and it will be given to you,

seek and you shall find, knock and

the door will be opened to you.”

(Matthew 7:7)



When we hear of people going through times of trouble. Our human nature is to pray for God to remove that trial from their lives or take them out of the situation.

Sometimes, God allows these tribulations into the lives of people because they need to learn something about themselves or maybe about God. He knows what He is doing and, most of the time, we don’t.

We can ask God to strengthen them. Maybe we can plead with Him to send someone to them to help them through, or a friend to listen.

God blesses us with answers to our prayers when we pray correctly. Its when we don’t pray as we should that he chooses not to answer as we would like. How many times have we prayed for something and not received the answer we desired, could we have prayed wrongly? (James 4:12)

When we approach God and leave the circumstance and its particulars with Him, we might be surprised at how God answers our prayers. He might allow the remedy of our plight to come from a source we might not have expected. It all comes down to our trusting the Lord.

“If we can not believe God when circumstances appear against us, we do not believe in Him at all.

Charles Spurgeon
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  This past Sunday, hubby's sister fell and sustained a concussion to the back of her head. She is bleeding inside her skull. She takes blood thinning medication. She is in a neuro-critical care unit in Indianapolis. There has been no positive change as of Tuesday afternoon. She may have to go through surgery. Please pray.

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

God In Our World






“Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue,

but with actions and in truth. Then this is how we know

that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at

rest in His presence.” (1John 3:19)



There are people who believe God created the world and stepped back from His work. I am not one of them.

For me, God has his hand on the shoulders of each believer who works for the Kingdom the laity as well as the clergy and the missionaries We see marvelous signs of His presence around us each day.

He blesses us with His love, shows us answers to our questions, showers us with His mercy. We see God’s hands in the maturing of each of the crops grown for our enjoyment.

Last year, I noticed the late spring summer season contained smaller seasons when locally grown fresh fruits were available. Again this year, we enjoy God’s bounty of strawberries. At this writing, I just had breakfast a slice of angel food cake topped off with fresh berries, slathered in whipped cream. We will enjoy Bing cherries, watermelon and cantaloupe (if they mature well),and closely followed by sweet corn, let’s not forget the plums and peaches.

I see people growing in their faith, people wanting to learn more of God. I witness family members growing close to each other as they grow close to the Lord. Ministries work to restore families as well as individual lives. Other groups work to assist those hurt by decisions made by other family members.

Also present in our world is the presence of Jesus’ adversary. We have the account of Job being pestered by this enemy to the point that he lost every thing but his faith. The story of Job has a good ending.

Job himself speaks of having hear of God before but of seeing Him as a result of what he has endured (Job 42:5).

Even the hard times of our lives fall under the watchfulness of God. He allows them for His purposes we have a lesson to learn and the only way we will learn it is by going through the tough times.

Now, if sometimes we don’t hear the message God wants us have. Be assured that we will have a ‘remedial course’ another trial or tough time to wade through. I’m sorry to say that some of us don’t learn the lesson the second or the third time. The good news is when we finally begin to listen to Him, we grow in our faith. We eventually learn to listen to God early on and continue to become closer to Him.

God Alone

  Jesus and the children at our church's prayer walk.          I will both lie down in peace and sleep;  For You alone, O LORD make ...