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Talking Like Your Dad

Posted on September 17, 2015 ·

Talking Like Your Dad

31 And when they had prayed, the place where they were meeting together was shaken [a sign of God’s presence]; and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak the word of God with boldness and courage. Acts 4:30-32 (AMP)

Think back to when you were a little baby. Most of us had parents who patiently taught us how to speak. Little by little we built a vocabulary and then learned how to make sentences. The Lord speaks things into being. “Let there be Light”. He wants to teach us how to speak like Him. He has given us His words in the Bible.

When we speak out the word we begin to talk the language of our Father. As time goes on and we learn more and more of His word, it is easier to speak it. Speaking words of life to our children, words of healing and hope to others. Speaking out loud the promises of God. That is Father God’s language.

As children we practiced with our parents repeating over and over the words they were teaching us. We need to practice speaking the Word of God. Little by little His words become ours.

Let’s talk like our Father.

Jesus is Lord!

 

 

Filed Under: Holiness, Uncategorized, Word of God ·
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Trial to Triumph – or “Why is this happening to me?” Part 5

Posted on October 20, 2014 ·

Trial to Triumph Part 5

picture of gold after chemical separation3 He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and He will purify the priests, the sons of Levi, and refine them like gold and silver, that they may offer to the Lord offerings in righteousness. Malachi 3:3

I had gotten the very job that terrified me. Emergency Room Nurse Practitioner, but I felt that the Lord wanted me there. Remember He had given me a heads up months before. So I surrendered myself to the Lord. I knew I could not do this on my own. The doctor that hired me told me that I would be given a three month internship with an experienced ER Nurse Practitioner and would not be expected to operate alone until she was satisfied with my skills. She taught me to read x –rays, suture, what labs to order etc. She was literally a God-send. I actually started to like the job. The Lord gave me favor with the doctors and staff. The job paid significantly more than I made up North.

There is a process to purifying gold:

First the gold ore is crushed.

Then it is placed in a furnace in excess of 1900 degrees Fahrenheit to elevate the gold about its melting point. Impurities are burned off in the furnace – but other metals remain.

In order to separate the gold from the other metals, chemicals such as mercury or cyanide solution are introduced. This causes the gold to coagulate and form nuggets and clumps of gold.

After the gold smelting process is complete, the gold is melted once more and poured into molds to form ingots.

Later the gold ingots may be used for various purposes.

When our faith is purified from self reliance, fear, doubt, reliance on money, people or things it is able to be firmly placed in the Lord. We can access the power of the Lord. Then the fruit of endurance, steadfastness and patience emerge, the way purifying gold brings out its clarity, shine, brilliance and usefulness.

Jesus is Lord!

Filed Under: Faith and Trust, Holiness, Hope, Obedience, Peace ·
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Trial to Triumph or “Why is this happening to me?” Part 4

Posted on October 13, 2014 ·

picture gold being poured into ingot shape 

11 Now faith is the assurance (the confirmation, [a]the title deed) of the things [we] hope for, being the proof of things [we] do not see and the conviction of their reality [faith perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses]. Hebrews 11:1

I was told to go for my interview for the State of Florida job to Tampa GeneralHospital. It is a huge trauma center and hospital. I thought “I hate working in hospitals”. After an initial intake with Human Resources I was sent downstairs to: The Emergency Room! Oh. NO! Yes, the job was for Emergency Room Nurse Practitioner. The very job I had thought to myself when the Lord put it in my heart – NO WAY! I had what I can only call a backwards interview. I was asked “Can you suture?” “No”. I replied. “Can you read x-rays?” Again I replied “No”. Then the doctor who was interviewing me said “Looking at your resume I see that you are an administrator!” “Yes”, I answered, but I can do the job!” What?! Did I just say that? The doctor left the room. I was left sitting there with the Nurse Manager. “Uh, should I go now?” I asked. “No”, he answered, “You got the job!”

During a trial our faith is being proved with the resulting fruit of patience, steadfastness and endurance. Faith has to be tried to remove other things which can mix with it making it ineffective.

 Like:

Faith in God plus faith in money, people and things

Faith in God plus doubt

Faith in God plus fear

Or Faith in God plus faith in our own abilities.

Have you ever opened an electric cord? If you have you will remember seeing several pure copper wires intertwined. But what if one of the cords was made of lead? Putting the plug into the wall would avail nothing because the pure copper was mixed with something else. That is the way it is with faith. If it is faith plus something else we will not be able to access the power of the Lord.

6 Only it must be in faith that he asks with no wavering (no hesitating, no doubting). For the one who wavers (hesitates, doubts) is like the billowing surge out at sea that is blown hither and thither and tossed by the wind.7 For truly, let not such a person imagine that he will receive anything [he asks for] from the Lord,8 [For being as he is] a man of two minds (hesitating, dubious, irresolute), [he is] unstable and unreliable and uncertain about everything [he thinks, feels, decides].

A faith that is mixed with any thing else will cause us to be double minded.

I am glad that the Lord cares enough about us to purify our faith.

Jesus is Lord!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Faith and Trust, Holiness, Uncategorized ·
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Trial to Triumph or “Why is this happening to me?” Part 3

Posted on October 6, 2014 ·

He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and He will purify the priests, the sons of Levi, and refine them like gold and silver, that they may offer to the Lord offerings in righteousness Malachi 3:3.

After losing my second job in six months, I was devastated. I had no clue what to do. My mother suggested that I come down to Florida where she and Dad had retired and see if I could get a job there. I agreed to give it a try. I prayed. And I surrendered to the Lord. I knew that I could not do it on my own. I went down to Tampa and got three job interviews lined up. The first one was with the State of Florida Health Services. I had no idea what the position was.

We are the McDonald’s generation. We don’t want trials to be difficult or last long. But consider this: Let’s say that we want to train Marines. So we come up with training and a testing plan. We want to test strength so we tell them to run ten feet, and then jump over a one foot fence, and finish by doing one push up. If we did that we would have one weak bunch of Marines. But in reality Marines do many, many push ups, climb high walls and run many miles and then are severely tested in realistic war games before they are sent out to defend our nation.

 It is the same with us. A short easy trial is not going to build up any faith muscles. We need to trust the Lord to do what needs to be done for our good in His perfect timing and plan.

Gold being melted to remove impurities

Jesus is Lord! picture gold being melted

 

Filed Under: Holiness, Hope, Peace, prayer, Word of God ·
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Rivers of Living Water

Posted on September 1, 2014 ·

picture spring and riverHe who believes in Me [who cleaves to and trusts in and relies on Me] as the Scripture has said, From his innermost being shall flow [continuously] springs and rivers of livingwater. John 7:38

  But whoever takes a drink of the water that I will give him shall never, no never, be thirsty any more. But the water that I will give him shall become a spring of water welling up (flowing, bubbling) [continually] within him unto (into, for) eternal life. John 4:14

 My husband and I went canoeing a few years ago. We traveled to the RainbowRiver in Florida. It is a crystal clear spring fed river. We paddled upstream until we came to the end of the river. There bubbling up from the river bed we saw fresh water coming up from the riverbed overflowing to what looks like a very large pond shaped area and then flowing out as a crystal clear river. When we canoed it felt like we were floating in the air because the water was so clear. It made me think of the rivers of living water that flow from our innermost being when we follow Jesus.

 I have noticed how stressed out even seasoned Christians can get. Some go for massages, some over eat, some share their worries with friends, some watch a lot of TV, or read novels. None of these are necessarily bad, but there is a great place to get rid of stress.

It is in the rivers of living water. Not just wet water. Living water. Water that is alive with the Presence of God. Where is it? It is flowing from our innermost beings. We are overflowing with the life of Jesus! Wow!

 I want to float in the living water river! I want to be refreshed in the living water river! The good news is that I can, every day of my life! I can go to the Lord in prayer in my quiet place and soak in the river of His presence. Even if I don’t feel it I can still go there. Why? Because it never goes away. The bubbling living water flows eternally from my innermost being. Not just a little stream but rivers plural. Have you ever seen the Mississippi River? – bigger that that!

 I’m going to have a good soak in the rivers of living water.

 Jesus is Lord!

 

 

 

Filed Under: Holiness, Holy Spirit, Peace, Uncategorized, Word of God ·
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Be Patient with Me- I’m Being Pruned

Posted on July 7, 2014 ·

picture of man pruning tree15 “I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. 3 You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. 4 Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me.

 

I was out looking at my rosebushes a few days ago and decided that they desperately needed some pruning.  Branches were going everywhere, flowerless branches stuck out among the bloomers. They were overgrown and the flowers were getting unimpressive. Air and light were having trouble getting to the inner parts of the plant.

So  I Googled “pruning rose bushes”. Apparently pruning is a delicate business. Fruitless branches are removed; blooming branches are cut back but not too far. You have to look and see just the right spot to make the cut- not too high and not too low. Branches growing across the bush in the wrong direction are removed too. At first the bush looks pretty bad. No blooms and it looks kind of scrawny. But later wonderful large roses will bloom in abundance.

We are like those rose bushes. We may have some fruitless activities in our lives, maybe some things going in the wrong direction. Maybe our growth has gotten stale and slow or out of control. We need a good pruning by the Word of God. 

Another thing I learned is that the pruner has the best interest of the plant at heart. Pruning is done lovingly to bless and help the plant. But maybe the plant sees it another way. Ouch!, branches are being removed. Maybe the plant liked that branch that was not productive. Maybe we like some things in our lives that do us no good.

Jesus prunes us with the word of God. Our job is to listen, heed and obey the word of the Lord. Sometimes it can feel a little uncomfortable, but hang in there. The Lord is doing this to make you even more fruitful.

“But the fruit of the [Holy] Spirit [the work which His presence within accomplishes] is love, joy (gladness), peace, patience (an even temper, forbearance), kindness, goodness (benevolence), faithfulness,” Galatians 5:21-23

Good pruning brings good fruit. Prune us,  Lord.

Jesus is Lord!

Filed Under: Holiness, Obedience, Uncategorized, Victory, Word of God ·
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Follow Him

Posted on June 9, 2014 ·

 

picture jesus and cross

23 And He said to all, If any person wills to come after Me, let him deny himself [[a]disown himself, [b]forget, lose sight of himself and his own interests, [c]refuse and give up himself] and take up his cross daily and follow Me [[d]cleave steadfastly to Me, conform wholly to My example in living and, if need be, in dying also].Luke 9:23.

 

Once in a great while that Lord gives me a dream that is clearly from Him. One night as I slept I saw Jesus standing next to me. We were in what looked like a reception area with a counter that ran the length of the room on my left. Behind that counter I could see as we walked , Christians. One was watching television, one was reading a book, and I forget what the third one was doing.

 

 No one looked up to see that Jesus was walking by. At the end of the room the counter became an L shape. I went and stood at this counter and someone handed me a cross. I wasn’t too heavy for me to carry and I carried it easily. Jesus then led me to a elevator and we got in and went up in the elevator. Then I woke up.

 

As I thought about this dream later I understood that the people behind the counter were all me! But Jesus wanted me to follow Him and not be distracted by the many things I had let bog me down in my life.

 

He wanted me to pick up my cross and follow Him. Simple.

 

I began to streamline my life, getting rid of unnecessary activities. I’m following Jesus now with fewer distractions in my life. I pick up my cross daily to follow Him.

 

Jesus is Lord!

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Holiness, Obedience, Uncategorized ·