Before & After -A Photo Shoot

I love looking at before and after shots. Sometimes they are so drastic that I spend more time than is necessary trying to figure out if that really is the same person. You can see some similarities, but the transformation, most of the time through weight-loss, makes them look like a whole new person...on the outside.

As I was spending time in the Word of God today, I was struck by change. Jesus changed lives. When He touched them, they were never the same, sometimes on the outside, but mostly and most importantly on the inside. He cleansed the lepers, He drove out demons, he healed the sick, he raised the dead and HE FORGAVE SINS.

Through the past decade or so, I have gone though changes. I have lost weight drastically, but even though I looked really good, my heart was in a bad place. God changed my heart during that time, I gained weight back, but more importantly, I was brought back into a right relationship with Christ. He healed me.

Recently, I have put on a nice 40 pounds, which I am working to loose through balanced exercise and wise eating choices, but regardless I know where my heart and my trust lie.... In Christ Jesus.

I think about the times when I lacked discretion and I mad really poor decisions that almost destroyed my family, left me out on the street and separated me from fellowship with other believers.

I may have looked really good to some, but the reality is that I looked like this (see picture below) to my husband.

THE BEFORE & AFTER

Proverbs 11:22 "Like a gold ring in a pig's snout is a beautiful woman without discretion."

All those years ago, I lacked discretion, I made horrible choices, BUT GOD healed me. It is because of God's healing hand, redemption and forgiveness that I was able to begin to make wise choices, choices for life and not death, choices that allowed my husband to look at me and see the AFTER version of me in Christ.

Yes, drastic change. I am not who I was.
I am a child of God, an heir to the Kingdom of Heaven. 

I am a child of the King!

Who are you?

Do you know the truth about your identity?

 If not, ask me and let me tell you about my Lord, let me tell you about YOU!

FROZEN

This is the verse that continues to minister to my heart especially today, 2 Samuel 23:10

"He rose and struck down the Philistines until his hand was weary, and his hand clung to the sword. And the Lord brought about a great victory that day, and the men returned after him only to strip the slain."  ESV

The NIV version uses the words "frozen to the sword". I love both. The beauty and the reality of it blows me away.

In the battles of life we often grow weary, but it is what we cling to in the battle that brings about victory in our weariness. I am clinging to the Word of God. It is life to me. May I be frozen to it!

What are you clinging to today? Victory is here!

I love this quote I came across at  Suburban Stereotype
"At the end of my life, I want it to be said that I fought with my hand frozen to the sword"

Declaration

"But whatever were gains to me I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. 

I consider them garbage, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God on the basis of faith. 

I want to know Christ—yes, to know the power of his resurrection and participation in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, and so, somehow, attaining to the resurrection from the dead. 

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me."

Philippians 3:7-12 NIV

Constant Grumblers

I am reading through the Bible and have been in the book of Exodus this past week. After reading of the constant grumbling and complaining of the Isrealites when they were hungry, wandering and thirsty, even after all the miracles that God performed before their eyes, parting the sea and saving them from Pharaoh, I was mortified.

This is what I said to the Lord..."Lord, how do you deal (tolerate) with them....How do you deal with me....How do you deal with people...God, how do you deal with flesh?!?!"

To which He immediately replied  "Through the flesh of my Son, Your Savior, Jesus Christ"

And I then sat in silence, humbly thinking "Oh, yeah, that's right"

Then I asked myself this question, "How do I deal with people that grumble, complain, don't appreciate?" I think my response to those same people that God deals and how He deals with me should be the same.......through the blood of Jesus Christ, with His forgiveness, mercy and grace.

"Lord, help me to view your people the way that you do. Help me to love and to forgive and to remember that you loved us first. You deal so patiently, firmly and steadfastly with us...with me. Help me to do the same. In Jesus name, Amen"

Can't Read My Poker Face

I used to be a really good liar and a really good cheater.....Then God changed my life. Now (by God's grace) I am horrible at it. When I am talking with my family and I (on the super rare occasion) tell a half truth, my family looks at me and asks if I am lying and I say "No, why?" to which they reply "look at your face." Then we just laugh because it's the most horrific poker face ever.....hence why I could never play cards.

I look at it like this. I used to be a hot mess. Now I'm just a mess. But when God changed my life, called me out of the darkness of my lies and self destruction, He also took away my ability to lie well. It's a gift and a curse, especially when someone asks who finished off the ice cream or who had three pieces of pie....oh and who ate the box of Oreos. That's when it really bites me in the butt.

But, for reelz, I count it as a blessing...... a reminder of what God has done in my life. I am not who I used to be. I am done with wearing fake masks, lying to those I love, sneaking around and just hiding the way I feel.

Do you ever get tired of wearing a mask or being so good at faking that you almost believe the lie yourself? Been there....Done that! When I submitted my life to Christ, He gave me the gift of being my own lie detector and I thank Him for it.

It has it's perks in that it keeps me accountable and it has it's down side in that people know exactly what I'm thinking and feeling by my facial expressions. I have had friends comment on numerous occasions that they can tell when I am not happy, when I am frustrated, when things make me cringe, but they also tell me that they know when I am happy, when I am grateful and when I am thankful. So I count it as a blessing.

My prayer is that God would do whatever He has to do to make us Holy in every situation. For me, He helps me not to lie and lets me get caught if I do.

I have been reading through the Bible and I was so deeply spoken to through the account of the Israelites leaving the Egyptians. Repeatedly God allowed and did things SO THAT the people and Pharaoh would know that He is Lord of all. God went to great lengths to show His people that He is God by taking them out of Egypt and into the wilderness and eventually the Promised Land.

"I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them. And I will gain glory through Pharaoh and all his army, through his chariots and his horsemen. The Egyptians will know that I am the Lord when I gain glory through Pharaoh, his chariots and his horsemen." Exodus 14:17-18

"And when the Israelites saw the mighty hand of the Lord displayed against the Egyptians, the people feared the Lord and put their trust in him and in Moses his servant." Exodus 14:31

I am thankful that God desires that we know Him and still today, will go out of His way to make sure we know that He is Lord. "He MAKES us lie down in green pastures and LEADS us beside still waters, He restores my soul"

We are works in progress, Holy and Redeemed, set apart and Loved.

#IamMyOwnLieDetector

Insert Job Title Here________

So these are a few of the titles that I carry, Worship Leader/Singer Songwriter/Public Speaker, and honestly I have very little clue about how to do any of them except that I know God has called me to glorify Him through these means.

My husband and I had a wonderful night sharing our testimony of God's healing in our marriage. I loved leading worship with my Celebrate Recovery family. I loved sharing a song of encouragement that I wrote and I loved standing next to my husband and telling our story. It all went well....really well....And I am always in shock when that happens. Let me explain that.....

As my husband and I talked on the way home, we both marveled at how there is really nothing that special about us, there is nothing extraordinary about my worship leading or our presentation when we give our testimony. Nothing, but the fact that we ask God to strip ourselves away and help us to present what we have without expectation and sit back and watch God's spirit move among His people.

As a worship leader and speaker there is, at times, a pressure to be on, having to be so spectacular and dynamic that you move people into an amazing experience of worship. What I KNOW to be true is that I have none of that.... all I have, by God's grace, is the ability to simply go before the Lord (with a microphone in hand & people watching me) and present what I have, as simple as it is, and leave it at that. Worship leading, singing, writing and speaking is simply an offering of being present, being honest, being transparent before the Lord SO THAT He can do what He does so perfectly.....Move the hearts of his people.

John the baptist had nothing great to offer physically (in fact, I'm sure people thought he was insane...and coincidentally there are times when people think I'm crazy too, but that's a different story), but He was present, submitting to the Father, testifying of the promise to come and the Spirit moved through him to prepare hearts.

The apostle Paul  was spoken of like this.."For some say, 'His letters are weighty and forceful, but in person he is unimpressive and his speaking amounts to nothing.'" To which the apostles Paul says "such people should realize that what we are in our letters when we are absent, we will be in our actions when we are present." II Corinthians 10:10

There was nothing spectacular about the Apostle Paul, yet I don't think anyone will argue the impact He had on the world and spreading the gospel.....so that had to be the power of God working through a humbled man present to be used by God.

This is what was said of Jesus..."He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in His appearance that we should desire him." Isaiah 53:2. Jesus was simply present in the most powerful way. He, the perfect example of being present and submitting to the Father's will.

My encouragement from Christ is this. I don't have to be concerned with being spectacular, having the worlds best set, a full band, wearing just the right outfit to speak or worship lead in or a fog machine with amazing lighting (ok, the fog machine does hide wrinkles, just sayin...but, I'm not concerned). My concern is that I am humbly present before God, worshiping Him alone, speaking boldly the truth that He shares in His Word, trusting that as I put out my best and honest worship, that HE WILL show up and move the hearts of His people, because I am not the Holy Spirit, nor do I want to be.

Friends, I am NOTHING and I am happy with that. My prayer this night was that God would strip away everything that I am and the only thing left was only what resembled Christ.

God is faithful, God is amazing and He is amazing in and through us. That's the only reason people can look at us and say we are amazing, because of who is in us. "Greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world" I John 4:4

May you be encouraged that God can and will use you no matter what. Come before Him and lay it all out and watch what He does with your offering and sacrifice. Sometimes you may be blessed to witness it, other times you may be blessed trusting that God is doing something EVEN IF you don't get to see it on this side of heaven.

Do Special

We live in an age of auto-correct. We type, we do not proof and then we hit post, just to find out the auto-correct genie has struck again (at least this is the story of my life.) The good thing is that we can normally figure out what people meant to say and simply blame it on the auto correct genie.

I find it funny that my phone changes God to good and good to god. The word Instagram got changed to undrafted on Facebook the other day, but I think Facebook did that one on purpose. I have to admit I have had some very embarrassing attacks from the AT-genie that I won't share here (hence, the word embarrassing.)

But, sometimes I find the irony of the AT-genie quite inspiring. She makes me look at things differently. One of my favorites was when I was emailing a friend of mine discussing the fact that someone threw the verse about women are to "remain silent" in church at me regarding me sharing and "teaching" (NOT going to go into that now, because that's not the point, so don't get me started.) However, it auto corrected/spell checked itself to: women are to "Remain SENT." When I replied to my friend about what I meant to type, he pointed out that the truth was that we ARE to remain SENT!  So thank you to the AT-genie for reminding me that I am to remain sent to do God's will, to answer His call. Hard to do that with my mouth shut and without the Word of God.

Now, what really got me rolling on this today was the latest AT-genie attack. My friend commented on Facebook about the fact that I was so excited to see her last night that I (literally) picked her up. She said it was "do special." I'm guessing what she meant was that it was "SO special." I like DO SPECIAL!

My motto for this day is DO SPECIAL. Special is as special does. Special moments are created when we act, when we love, when we do. That, my friend, is pretty special. So as it says in James 1:22 "But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves."

Let's go DO Special! Do Love! Do what it says! God Bless!