Frustration, Favor, and the Finishing Work of Christ

Merry Christmas!

I’m well aware this is not the actual date of Jesus Christ’s birth—and honestly, I couldn’t care less. What matters is that He was born. He was God's Son, lived a life led by the Spirit of God, died for our sins while we were still His enemies, counted us as the joy set before Him, and was resurrected on the third day. That is what we celebrate.

Over the past year—probably longer if I’m being honest—I’ve been walking backward in my relationship with Christ. I encountered adversity I wasn’t prepared to handle, and instead of giving it to Him, I searched the world for comfort. I intentionally drove myself into confusion because I didn’t want the truth to be true. I thought if I ignored it long enough, it would go away, people would change their minds about me, and we could all be friends.

It doesn’t work that way.

That approach only keeps people and situations in your life far longer than they were ever meant to stay. And once you’ve allowed yourself to drift far enough from Him, finding your way back is harder than most people realize. For the last fifteen years, I’ve preached that you can simply turn back to Him—that He’s right there, ready to receive you, and that you can move forward from the place you wandered off.

I still believe that.
But I’ve learned there are nuances you don’t understand until you have to live them.

First, the place you think you wandered away from faith usually isn’t where you actually did.
Second, you have to allow the Lord to reveal what you never dealt with in the first place—because that’s often why you strayed.
Third, release the urge to tear yourself down. There are plenty of people willing to do that for you, and they don’t need your agreement. Self-condemnation only slows the process.
Fourth, any justification you make for staying where you are isn’t really a justification—it’s an excuse that keeps you stuck.
Fifth, God’s favor is often found most clearly in the places you least deserve it, sometimes even more than in the seasons where you were actively expressing His love and truth.
Sixth, continue to speak truth over yourself and your circumstances regardless of outcomes. This is where faith is tested.
And finally, forgive yourself and come back. You may never receive compassion from the people you want it from most—and that’s okay. Some people’s pain prevents them from seeing you differently, and you can’t change that. Let them.

I am highly favored, deeply frustrated (and probably frustrating), and walking in the finished work of Christ. I’m grateful for what I’ve learned through years of studying the Word, and now I’m realizing how necessary it is to apply it. I feel stuck—but feelings lie.

My prayer is that those of us who believe our circumstances are nothing more than the irreversible consequences of our choices would begin declaring the truth of God’s Word over our lives. It may take time—especially if the choices that led us astray didn’t happen overnight—but we will return to where He desires us to be.

The Lord cares more about His glory than we do. So if it’s truly our heart to glorify Him, we can trust Him to lead us there. I’m not promising it will be easy, attractive, or unfold the way you hoped—but it will glorify Him. And that is what matters most.

Be blessed, and be a blessing. ❤️

We Make Hard Things HARDER By Our Beliefs

It really comes down to what's in our hearts. Our thoughts reflect our heart. Once we truly believe what the Lord says, the enemy has nothing he can do to us. Until then, he can give us trials in every area while we figure out whether we believe God or not. Thankfully the Lord already knows how He is going to work out His tests and our enemy's trials and tribulations in our lives. That said, we have a part to play in how long we're going through the thing we've decided is our current personal hell.  That part is how we choose to look at it, think about it, and talk about it.

I do very much believe that grumbling and complaining about everything prevents us from walking in the truth of what the Lord has done for us and in us. It also keeps the enemy hooks in our lives quite firmly making his lies appear all the more true.  It's secularly proven that we believe what we hear ourselves say the most, so SHUT UP with the self-defeating talk people (said super lovingly!!!!).

We need to be doers of the word instead of just hearers only… no angel, human, nor even God himself, is going to do what he is set forth biblically as our part in this beautiful relationship He has designed with us. We can be overcomers by the blood of the lamb AND the word of our testimony, or we can continue to sit and complain that things are so hard while we wait for him to give us a miracle on our terms.  Proverbs 23:7a For as he thinks within himself, so he is.  Our behavior follows our thoughts, so we need to set our minds on the Lord and His truth. Until then, we're constantly in a battle of our flesh versus our spirit. 

He's not angry with us though! He knows our weaknesses and He’s allowing us to choose to stand on His truth or choose to go around the mountain again and again like we enjoy it or something.

The Lord gave me a picture :  Huge mountain, with a few cliffs to rest on in various places.  We are standing at the bottom looking up and saying "Wow, too hard, there’s no way! Lord just place me at the top near you, I can’t do the climb."  The Lord says “You can’t stay at the top if you don’t climb though, that’s how you get your hinds feet which allow you stay up here.  If I place you here, you’ll just fall and that will be more harmful than just staying where you’re at.  His children respond "Ok Lord, if that’s how it’s got to be, I’ll just start walking around the mountain AGAIN until you change your mind.  I told you it’s just too hard for me."

The Lord with tears in His eyes “My child, just follow my Spirit.  I will take you up the mountain strategically, allowing you to rest after each victory before climbing more.  You’ll be here before you know it”.  Us:  "Lord it sounds good and all, but I just can’t yet.  Give me more of your grace and strength so I can... "

The Lord:  "My child, I’ve given you everything.  There’s nothing left that can be done to help you.  Believe Me, trust Me, and follow Me. There’s only one way to victory, but lots of mind numbing circles to defeat.  You CAN trust Me.   Declare Phil 1:6, 2:13-14, 4:13 over yourself and just keep looking up to Me.

ETA:  This blog entry is written for those that are struggling with normal life events, not life altering ones. When dealing with the death of loved ones, serious illnesses with children or spouses, this is not even close to covering the gamut of what you need, and I apologize that you're facing such heartache.  If you want to reach out, I'd be happy to pray with you, and ask the Lord to give you wisdom, grace, strength, and power to walk out your pain with Him.

What will you build with?

This morning my son and I were discussing 2 Timothy 2:19-21

19 Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, having this seal: "The Lord knows those who are His," and, "Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity." 20 But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay, some for honor and some for dishonor. 21 Therefore if anyone cleanses himself from the latter, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified and useful for the Master, prepared for every good work.


I explained to him that although all born again believers (repented for your sins and were baptized in the name of Jesus Christ accepting Him as Lord of your life, once you've come to an age where you can truly make that decision ~8-12 yrs, maybe?) build their lives upon the same solid foundation, the rock of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, we don't all use the same materials to build our houses with.  I told him that when we work for money to have nice things and a more comfortable life (e.g. having a DS in his case, lol), that is building our house with wood.  I also told him that when we work for money so that we can bless God's kingdom ad enjoy some of the blessings he gives us from that prosperity, that's building with gold.  Only God is able to tell us which we're doing as many Christians debate and argue what that means.  There's many other examples not using money, but for my son, that one works best, lol.


In my opinion, most of us are born into this world with parents who love us and want what's best for us, we are immersed into our culture of what the world says looks good, sounds like, makes sense, and so on.  Some of us are even told that Jesus died for our sins because He loved us and that we can always count on God, but very few of us are actually taught that.  We've been under the impression that our faith is developed at church and if we regularly go, we're good with the big Eye in the sky.  As we grow older, we develop our own ideas of who God is, what He will and will not do, and if we believe in scripture, we twist that to accommodate the lifestyle we keep.  Wow, that was a tangent.  Sorry, back to my son and I talking about the Lord and what we build our houses with...


I asked him to ask God where we should start, and He did and opened his bible to 2 Chronicles 26 and I said "no honey, ask Him again" because I didn't think God would have him in the Old Testament (HA! to me) and he resisted and said "no mom, look this is exactly what we were talking about" and there was a picture of building the temple with gold and wood.  He was really excited that happened (even though I wasn't convinced yet that it was God b/c it wasn't the same thing I was talking about, just the same materials), but then we read the passage and it was talking about a young man who was given success in life (both in the natural world and the spiritual) b/c he continually sought guidance from the Lord, just as his father had taught him to do. And that I knew was a confirmation of what we had just been talking about with the Timothy scripture because it illustrated to me that children will follow after what their parents have taught them. So cool!!!!  It also reaffirmed to me that it is my job to teach my children about the Lord and all of His multi-dimensional qualities.  That is it my job to train my children up in the way they should go and they will not depart from it.  God has told me in a general sense what my older two children's purpose is here on earth, and I get the privilege of raising them up knowing how they will be utilized.  It also helps me to see where their weakness may lie, and to allow the Lord to give me divine wisdom on how to combat them.


Recently I had something arise with my one my lil' ones that had me angry with God.  I asked Him WHY he didn't let me know there was a problem sooner than He did.  I never really got anything from Him other than the scriptures I shared in a previous blog about Him revealing the hidden things and that the voice I was hearing was His.  I was speaking with my Aunt the other day, and was telling her about my heartache and told her my biggest issue was that God didn't choose to reveal to me earlier than He did what was going on, and her response totally caught me off guard, and at the time pissed me off.  She told me that He had shown me signs I chose to ignore them, and that this was the time that I was supposed to have figured it out for reasons that I am not to currently know, nor may never know.  Since I was irritated at her for saying it, I ruminated on it for awhile (totally a Godly thing to do, NOT!) and God showed me that she was right.  That revelation was not easy to swallow, but I knew it to be true, and I did trust that God knew what He was doing.  He had to because I sure the heck hadn't even the slightest clue!  


I hope that God continues to reveal to me all the areas where I'm building my house with materials that His Holy Fire will consume when the day comes, and to allow me the opportunity to build with gold, silver, and precious stones so that when the heat increases in my life, those materials will only purify, and will never disintegrate into dust.


Here's a brief representation of what happens when we build our house with straw, wood, and bricks ;)