Filed under: Uncategorized
I was offered the job today. 
I’ve been speaking with a company about a job and just learned today that two of my three references have not returned their calls. Would you please pray that my references will call them back today? they want to fill this position quickly, and I’d hate to lose it because they couldn’t reach my references. Thanks so much in advance.
Filed under: Uncategorized
I want to post this song for my mom. I think it will really bless her, and likely others. It puts such a beautiful picture of the Messiah in my mind, and reminds me that “Hosanna!” is not just a messianic cry, but also means “please save” or “save now!” I know I want to pray that all the time! He is the God who saves! Lyrics are included below. Love you, mama!
Hosanna by Brooke Fraser
[Verse 1]
I see the King of glory
Coming on the clouds with fire
The whole earth shakes, the whole earth shakes
I see His love and mercy
Washing over all our sin
The people sing, the people sing
[Chorus]
Hosanna, hosanna
Hosanna in the highest (x2)
[Verse 2]
I see a generation
Rising up to take the place
With selfless faith, with selfless faith
I see a near revival
Stirring as we pray and seek
We’re on our knees, we’re on our knees
[Bridge]
Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like You have loved me
Break my heart for what breaks Yours
Everything I am for Your Kingdom’s cause
As I walk from earth into eternity
[Chorus]
Filed under: Legalism
I found this from Wikipedia’s entry on Oswald Chambers:
Oswald Chambers (born July 24, 1874 in Aberdeen, Scotland; died November 15, 1917 in Egypt) was a prominent early twentieth century Scottish Protestant Christian minister and teacher, best known as the author of the widely-read devotional My Utmost for His Highest.
He was born to devout Baptist parents, and was inspired to become a Christian following a service conducted by Charles Spurgeon. He mentioned to his father that, had there been an opportunity, he would have become a Christian. Chambers developed quickly in his faith, but he did not plan to go into ministry. He studied at Kensington Art School and attended the University of Edinburgh, where he studied fine art and archaeology. But while at Edinburgh, he felt called to ministry, and transferred to Dunoon College. An unusually gifted student, Chambers soon began teaching classes and started a local society dedicated to Robert Browning, his favorite poet. But during this time, Chambers did not find satisfaction in Christianity, finding the Bible ‘dull’ and uninspiring.
After four years of religious dormancy, Chambers came to believe that he couldn’t force himself to be holy; once he realised that the strength and peace he was looking for was Christ himself, Christ’s life in exchange for his sin, he experienced great renewal, so much so that he described it as a “radiant, unspeakable emancipation.”
The Lord has been pulling me into the radiant light of that emancipation, and I pray for everyone reading this that He brings you to that place. The place of freedom from depending on the self, and totally trusting and surrendering in Christ to accomplish His work in your life.
It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. – Galatians 5:1 (NIV)
Christ set us free once and for all from the penalties of sin and death, and from reliance on the flesh to please Him. May we forever resist the temptation to the slavery of relying on our flesh!
Another great word from yesterday’s My Utmost for His Highest;, written by the late, great Oswald Chambers. The emphasis at the end there is mine.
This one goes out everyone that is troubled, especially those that I know and love. Jesus sees your sorrow.
Are You Ever Troubled?
Peace I leave with you, My peace I give to you . . . —John 14:27
There are times in our lives when our peace is based simply on our own ignorance. But when we are awakened to the realities of life, true inner peace is impossible unless it is received from Jesus. When our Lord speaks peace, He creates peace, because the words that He speaks are always “spirit, and they are life” ( John 6:63 ). Have I ever received what Jesus speaks? “. . . My peace I give to you. . .”— a peace that comes from looking into His face and fully understanding and receiving His quiet contentment.
Are you severely troubled right now? Are you afraid and confused by the waves and the turbulence God sovereignly allows to enter your life? Have you left no stone of your faith unturned, yet still not found any well of peace, joy, or comfort? Does your life seem completely barren to you? Then look up and receive the quiet contentment of the Lord Jesus. Reflecting His peace is proof that you are right with God, because you are exhibiting the freedom to turn your mind to Him. If you are not right with God, you can never turn your mind anywhere but on yourself. Allowing anything to hide the face of Jesus Christ from you either causes you to become troubled or gives you a false sense of security.
With regard to the problem that is pressing in on you right now, are you “looking unto Jesus” ( Hebrews 12:2 ) and receiving peace from Him? If so, He will be a gracious blessing of peace exhibited in and through you. But if you only try to worry your way out of the problem, you destroy His effectiveness in you, and you deserve whatever you get. We become troubled because we have not been taking Him into account. When a person confers with Jesus Christ, the confusion stops, because there is no confusion in Him. Lay everything out before Him, and when you are faced with difficulty, bereavement, and sorrow, listen to Him say, “Let not your heart be troubled . . .” ( John 14:27 ).
Filed under: The Church
It continually amazes me that God chooses to use mankind to accomplish His purposes on this earth. We are so broken, so faulty, and our behavior maligns His name over and over again. We misrepresent Him by our words and deeds, and still, He involves us! Look at the Jews in the Old Testament. They were to be God’s chosen people, proclaiming His name and goodness to all nations, but instead they became insulary and hoarded God’s goodness for themselves, despising the Gentiles instead of reaching out to them. How guilty of the same we can be!
God must really be a big God to be able to involve us and still get His job done. I have to keep reminding myself of His bigness when I see the disastrous consequences of the sinful behaviors of men masquerading as the “will of god.”
Isaiah 14:27 – For the LORD of hosts has purposed, And who will annul it? His hand is stretched out, And who will turn it back?
Filed under: Uncategorized
I love My Utmost for His Highest. Oswald Chambers really has a way with words. A real entry will be coming soon, but for now, I want to share today’s reading, because it’s really ministering to me.
As a saint of God, my attitude toward sorrow and difficulty should not be to ask that they be prevented, but to ask that God protect me so that I may remain what He created me to be, in spite of all my fires of sorrow. Our Lord received Himself, accepting His position and realizing His purpose, in the midst of the fire of sorrow. He was saved not from the hour, but out of the hour.
We say that there ought to be no sorrow, but there is sorrow, and we have to accept and receive ourselves in its fires. If we try to evade sorrow, refusing to deal with it, we are foolish. Sorrow is one of the biggest facts in life, and there is no use in saying it should not be. Sin, sorrow, and suffering are, and it is not for us to say that God has made a mistake in allowing them.
Sorrow removes a great deal of a person’s shallowness, but it does not always make that person better. Suffering either gives me to myself or it destroys me. You cannot find or receive yourself through success, because you lose your head over pride. And you cannot receive yourself through the monotony of your daily life, because you give in to complaining. The only way to find yourself is in the fires of sorrow. Why it should be this way is immaterial. The fact is that it is true in the Scriptures and in human experience. You can always recognize who has been through the fires of sorrow and received himself, and you know that you can go to him in your moment of trouble and find that he has plenty of time for you. But if a person has not been through the fires of sorrow, he is apt to be contemptuous, having no respect or time for you, only turning you away. If you will receive yourself in the fires of sorrow, God will make you nourishment for other people.
Filed under: Uncategorized
Has anyone ever been tempted to tell their doctor, “I want to get off all the medication I’m on now and start over from scratch.”
It’s been over a year for me and I’m still not stable. I’m so sick of this. I’m sick of trying to throw a new med in, and when it doesn’t work dumping it for another.
I’m on these meds:
- 200 mg of lamictal 2x daily
- 600 mg of lithium am, 900 pm
- 100 mg of seroquel at bedtime
before the seroquel, we tried 5 mg of abilify once a day and that didn’t make a dent.
It seems like every time I try a new med, it works for a while and then it doesn’t.
I’m so discouraged by this. I know that the Lord knows exactly what meds I need, and He has His reasons (good ones!) for not showing them to my doctor yet. But I am so so sick of this.
Filed under: Uncategorized
I don’t know if anyone else has ever felt this way, but ever since I got sick, I have felt this tremendous distance from some of the people that I love. I think it started with just typical depression and the social withdrawing that comes with it. Then it sort of migrated into the “secret life of the soul” where I just felt like there was so much inside me, inside my head, that I could never explain it all, so that created distance. Then there’s the fact that mental illness makes it so hard to do what you commit to, to leave your house, to do anything! And there’s the ever present fact that I am just not the same person that I was before all this. I’ve been changed. In some ways, maybe it’s like living through a violent crime, or the death of a loved one, or war. Not to equate those experience to mental illness, but maybe there are some experiences that just change us–deeply–from the inside out.
I have these relationships that I feel are just never going to be the same again. It’s sad, but maybe there are some relationships that can’t survive such deep and profound change in a person – at least not without them changing severely. I just wish I knew how or had the inner fortitude to fix them or bring them back to some semblance of real.
That’s just one of the things I love about Jesus: our relationship is always 100% real, even when I try to fake it. He sees and hears every thought I have; I never, ever have to explain myself or what I’m feeling to Him. He knows all this and He loves me anyway. He never judges me, never thinks I’m a flake when I really can’t do something, and doesn’t get irritated with me when I really am a flake.
I wish it wasn’t so hard with other people.
Filed under: Uncategorized
This weekend has been an improvement over last week. I’m still sick from some kind of cold or maybe allergies, but mentally i’m doing better. What’s really socking is that my house is actually clean. Well, almost all of it. I’m going to clean the kitchen tomorrow, and there’s some stuff in my bedroom to straighten up, but the bathroom is spotless. The living room is glorious and the dining room is actually ready for dining! I don’t know if I’m manic or what, but at this point I really don’t care. My house is actually clean!!
Nothing like mental illness to make you appreciate the little things.
