Child's Heart

Sometimes I don't know if what I'm teaching my daughter is sinking in or not, the other day I got a glimpse and it was good. My daughter saved up loose change to send to India for a program that is teaching children about Jesus through bible clubs, for every dollar saved one child gets to go to this program and her homeschool company was matching it dollar for dollar, well my daughter saved up $5.10 and got to see that she was sending 10 kids from India to bible club to learn about Jesus, she really understood what she was doing and right before I pushed the send button, she said wait and brought me what was in her piggy bank as well. She is very particular and never wants to spend anything in it, to my surprise she wanted to send all her dollar bills with her donation as well so she could send as many kids as possible to bible club. This touched my heart and I said a thank you to Jesus, everything I have been trying to teach her she is getting it!!!! no greater joy is there than having a child who loves Jesus. I let her know when she gets to heaven she will get to meet those kids because they would be there because she donated that money and she liked that. I told her to go get a cookie and watch some t.v. special treat :)

To die is to gain and to live is to die.

The problem with a living sacrifice is it gets off the alter, we've all heard this saying before, recently God has been dealing with me about dying to the flesh. We as christians cannot let the flesh control us or lead us around on a leash, we must let the spirit of God lead us to be effective christians. To die to the flesh is gain, we gain it all and we don't have anything to lose but this life on earth, to live to the flesh and for worldly desires is to die. Jesus paid the price and God gave up his only beloved son for us, Jesus also lived a sinless life and gave not only his life on the cross, but his life the whole time he was on this earth. We have nothing to lose and everything to gain we must sacrfice our selves on God's altar and die to the flesh so that we can stop crawling off the altar.

Trials

As christians we all go through trials and temptations in our walk with God, they are not all easy and we don't always pass with a perfect score, but if we keep on pressing on we will be transformed into the image of his dear son Jesus Christ. The world looks at us and wants to see us rising up, we can look at our brothers and sisters and see that their lives look perfect and they are doing it right, they are reading their bible at least 12 chapters a day and we are struggling with 1. I am going through a trial and it has been hard but I am thankful that God is always faithful and that he will never put on us more than we can handle and that this will pass. I will hold on to God as hard as I can and give thanks when he brings me out. Is going through trials worth it? To me it is, I want to be used by God, I want my mind renewed daily and I want him to search me and try me and change me daily, I want to be refined by fire and I want to give all my life to him and hold nothing back but sometimes my flesh gets in the way or i get busy and I rush through prayer. I want to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit and sometimes its hard to put aside my schedule for his but its what I want more than anything. I think trials grow us and most important we need to be faithful in our time with God, if we commit to an hr a day of prayer we need to be there and stop pushing the snooze button.

offense

It is so easy to be offended in the body of Christ, does God ordain the offence so you can learn to walk in love or is it satan working through that person? I dont know, I think sometimes it can be either but no matter what, we have to walk in love and we have to forgive, I believe as christians we hold each other to higher standards so when someone hurts us we are shocked as well as mad and offended. We also don't understand why when we offend someone they don't forgive right away because we'll thats what we are suppose to do, when Jesus told his disciples offence will come they said Lord increase our faith, if someone offends us we must forgive and sometimes we may have to say Lord increase our faith because we are all being transformed into his image but we are not perfect people. Praise God for mercy.

God saves the unsavable

God saves the un-save-able and changes the un-changable. Sometimes as christians I think we look at certain family members and friends and although we don't say it, our prayers reflect that fact that we think they are un-save-able. We may even spend more or less time in prayer but are not be surprised when they are not moved by an great alter call. God saves the un-save-able and I know this to be true because he saved me. I have recently seen the person at the top of my needs salvation list give there life to God and I labeled them un-savd-able without meaning to. So If there is someone on your list, in your family, at your job who you think will never get saved, I challenge you to rethink it and don't give up because God saves the un-save-able.

Thinking

Today was a good day but as I sat and reviewed it, I thought how could I have done this better? I didn't get to frustrated with my child today, I made time and played with her, I even went outside and kicked a ball around with her, but I can't help thinking how can I do this better, how can I be a better mommy. The most important thing to me is passing my faith on to her, in a perfect day I would;

get up at 4am and pray until 6, get dressed fix my hair makeup look georgeous lol at 6
get Valerie up and start out day in intense prayer followed by an hour of bible reading before breakfast, and although this would take a good 2 hours, it should only be 7am by now
Next fix a healthy from scratch breakfast and have the house completely cleaned by 8am and breakfast over by then also
next homeschooling and spending quality time on it going slow and doing all the experienments, all the suggested activities and not getting frustrated not once and her reading perfectly and surpassing all expectations.
done with this by lunchtime and then we would make lunch together and start dinner, because dinner would be done from scratch also with all fresh ingredients from our own garden that we would have to squeeze time in for in the morning also to tend to
then in the afternoon we'd go out for a brisk walk or some type of exercise followed by some type of education activity.
that evening would consist of family game time, lots of bedtime books and I would smile as i read the same book I've read every night that week once again. bedtime would consist of a perfect sweet prayer and she would go straight to sleep without a fuss while I get all my school work done and somehow I have to squeeze my Avon business in the afternoon also. then before bed a good 2 hours in the word and in prayer to end the perfect day and I wouldn't go to bed till about midnight, and then turn around and get up at 4am to start it all over, not including, field trips, doctors appointments, and just plain surprises. Wow that's a lot of stuff. When I write it all down doesn't sound to fun after all lol.

My Knight in shining armor.

I have been single for about 4 years, no dating no nothing, at one point I was "talking" to a few nice guys, but have fallen so deeply in love with Jesus that I don't have time for that type of relationship nor am I interested. When I was out living in the world I was always searching for prince charming, my knight, my happily ever after and guy after guy just proved not to be the right one, didn't even come close to what I was searching for, I wanted someone who would love me for me, love me with an undying unchanging love that you see in these movies ya know, then one day I found him, he was everything I ever wanted everything I had been searching for his name is Jesus and he hasn't yet proved to be unfaithful or untrue. He is the true prince charming. I know God puts this desire in us for him and no matter what or who we find we will never have that void fulfilled until we get into a real relationship with him. I am crazy in love with him and am not interested in a relationship, when asked what do I do for fun I honestly answer I go to church and that is fun to me. Sometimes when i have answered this way (and this has happened more than once), a guy will look at me like I'm lying but I'm not. I don't need to have a man in my life when I have one and he's perfect. I am living my happily ever after better than any princess in any fairy tale.

God changing my plans

I was watching the revival on livestream that has broken out I believe in alabama? not sure but it was really good I got into some deep worship, it's thursday night and I start school on monday mind you, when all of a sudden my school comes to my mind and I get a knot in my stomach and I feel the Lord saying I needed to take my classes online again and to get up now and email my advisor, So I obey kinda confused but I do it anyway thinking well if it isnt God there is no way this will work out because all classes are closed at this point, within 24 hours I am enrolled in all new online classes and have my new books on there way. I don't understand what this was about but I knew that if it was God's will he would make it happen and he did, I am still sitting here in shock, he changed my plans, I am so thankful I was able to listen to what he was saying, I was uncomfortable leaving my daughter for that long, and my mom is going in for surgery and driving all the way to Etown would of cost a lot of money, maybe those are the reasons or maybe there is another reason that I dont know about yet, either way I know it's in his perfect will and he will work whatever it is out for me because the bible says he will work everything out for the good of those who love him.

Prayer night

Went to prayer tonight, when I got\ home I was brushing my teeth looked in mirror and thought whats wrong with my shirt it was inside out and I wore it like that the whole time. I got a good laugh at it and I know I have grown in the Lord because a few years ago I would be worrying and upset about it, but now I just laughed. The Lord is good and he does have a sence of humor.

Why a blog?

Today was good, great start huh, I woke up late an hour later than planned and missed my scheduled prayer time and had to squeeze it in literally, I sat in prayer thinking Lord I want you to consume every part of my life and I want to surrender every part of my life to you but I don't know how to do it, I get up and am automatically on fast mode, I gotta do this I gotta do that, when my heart is yearning to slow down and wait on the Lord and let him lead me. I prayed but it didn't satisfy my soul so I know I cut it short even though I did break through into his presence. I homeschooled my daughter today and she is learning her bible verses fast, I know that God is going to put his word in her and it will always be apart of who she is and I love that, It's because of his mercy on me that I got saved when I did, otherwise I dont know where I would be or how I would be raising my child. We visited my dad today, I go over there and I feel so out of place now, I definatly don't see where and how I ever fit into the family, they are unbelievers and live that way to the extreme and they look at me like my faith and my behavior is some kind of joke to them, I remember them saying once I would be back I'd be smoking pot with them again, once a smoker always one, but I thank God that he has broke every addiction to that off me. Some days are good, some days are great, some days I walk in persecution and frustration. I want so much more of God I want to breathe him and lately have been distracted with things that don't matter. I want to be humble before him and understand I can do nothing, that its him its all him its all about him, and I want him to be able to use me for whatever he has planned. I love him more than anything he saved me from things I can't mention, he delivered me from everything you can be delivered from, he had mercy on me even when I didnt see it, he called me before I knew he was calling me, I just pray I can rise up and do what he's called me to do.