Broken, Glued, and Made New
I recently read Andy Andrews new book, “The HeartMender”. It was a story of pain, hurt, anger, bitterness, and tragedy. Two people from opposite ends of the world were thrown together in a strange series of events. They were both bitter and angry about the deaths of their spouses due to the war. The good news was that God came and mended the broken hearts of those two people and allowed them to move beyond their painful past and onto a bright future filled with love and joy. I needed that reminder that God can do the same for us if we let Him.
God can do that for you too. No matter your pain, He can heal and mend your broken heart. Let Him be your “Heartmender” today.
“…Like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand…” Jeremiah 18:1-6
Continuing My Story
For the last entry to our My Story Bible study, it asks us to journal about what we want others to know about Jesus. Wow, that is a big task! Are you like me in that, I am afraid, more often than not, I fail to show Jesus in my life at all. I let my emotions and drama of the day and my baggage determine how I act/react to situations around me. I want to be like an elderly lady that I read about on the Proverbs 31 ministries daily encouragement email. This lady was going through a crisis in her life, Her husband was in very critical condition and she still had a glow of joy while she prayed. Another lady was in the waiting room, and had just received bad news about her sister. The elderly lady made eye contact and before the younger lady knew it, the elderly lady was by her side, holding her hand, and praying that if God could only save one that day that it be the younger woman’s sister. The older woman’s husband was 85 and had lived a full life. She really showed the presence of Jesus in her life that day. How I desire to do that everyday. How is it then that I fail to show Jesus to my own family much less some stranger (Although it is easier to show Him to strangers sometimes). My mind goes to the verse that says ” through the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks”. That puts a kink in things doesn’t it. It tells me that I have not allowed the Holy Spirit to come and fill me so full that it overflows to those around me at all times. My heart is still full of pain and hurt that it overflows out of my mouth. Disappointment and dismay are my constant overflow…..I want it to be encouragement and love, and gentleness and patience, an arrow pointing to God.
Oh God, forgive me. Come and fill me so much with you that I am empty of anything else. Place it so heavy on my heart to spend time with you so that this will be the result. Woo me, Oh God! Seek me, search for my heart! Let me be the kind of woman that glows with your spirit! I want to fall in love with you more and more everyday! Let me be so immersed in you that others don’t even see me! Let my speech be from the abundance of my heart!! Let that be the Jesus others see and not the one I have been (or rather not been) showing.
Who is God?
I came up with the normal like A- amazing, awesome, and then it hit me :Active, because God is always at work in my life.(Rom 8:28)
B- builder, God builds strong families and marriages
You see what I mean, look for the unusual. I got down to F and came up with Funny. God has a sense of humor, after all He did make some funny looking people (some of you can look at the person next to you and see what I mean) and animals. But He is also Freedom, He frees us from worry and care. He is Handy, because He is always near, just call His name and He will be there. Then He just IS! (Exod. 3:14)
The list can go on forever because you can always find something to add to it. You see God is really indescribable. Dr. Shadrach Meshach Lockridge put it best in his “Seven Way King” prayer. Look it up on the internet and you will be amazed.
So, the next time I am uneasy or restless about my very CRAZY life, I am going to learn this list and recite it. I can come up with new descriptions to add to it every time God teaches me a lesson in His character through some trial and it will give me peace and comfort that God IS and everything will be just the way He planned it. (There is another one..P- Planner Jer. 29:11).
Once upon a Time
As little girls, we all love to hear a good fairy tale. We love to hear how a maid or a princess is rescued from a horrible situation and taken away by a handsome prince. And of course the ending is always “and they lived happily ever after.”. If your life is anything like mine, it has been far from “happily ever after”. But (and that is a big word remember), I can correlate the first part of the fairy tale to mine. I can use it to describe my salvation.
Once upon a time, there lived a poor fair maiden, who was the daughter of an Innkeeper. Every day she worked hard to please her father and the travelers who visited the Inn. No matter how hard she worked, she still got yelled at to do more and do it better. Then on one of the rare times that she got to get away from the Inn and take a quiet walk all alone, He rode up to her side. He wore a Breastplate of Righteousness, a sword named truth, and a Helmet named salvation. He was strong, and rode a large beautiful white steed. When we dismounted, He removed his helmet, and knelt down on one knee. He stretched forth his open hand and said to her “Fair maiden, will you be my bride? My Father has sent me to search for you and to find you and to bring you back to his kingdom far,far away. I have searched for you for many years. Please accept my invitation.” Well the maid, in shock and dismay said to the prince,”My prince, how did the king know about me. I live nowhere near his kingdom and I am just a lowly maid who is the daughter of an Innkeeper?” The prince replied,” He knew about you before you were born. He had kept an eye on you and sent me for you at just the right time. He is a great and mighty King.” So with hope in her heart for a better life and the thought of being a beautiful princess, she accepted. She took his hand and climbed up on the steed and with the Prince, rode away.
Now the story doesn’t always end right here with happily ever after. The road has been long, and the journey hard, and there are still many miles to go. There have been many battles for me, and the enemy has captured me several times, but my Prince has always came back to rescue me time and time again. I am glad He never gets tired of it. He has unwavering strength and fortitude.
Jesus is my Prince. He is my Prince of Peace when times get hard. He is my strength to lean on when I am weary. I am glad to say that I am now a Princess, and one day when the journey is over, I will rest in the glorious Kingdom God has called me to and then I can live Happily ever after.
Sandi
Perspective
Have you ever noticed how people who are at the same event see the actions all differently? It is all a matter of perspective. Jim mentioned this in his sermon this past sunday. The disciples were all at the same events with Jesus, but each had different perspectives. Occasionally we need a different perspective on our lives. When we are in the middle of a rough or hard situation, it is hard to see the end of it. It is then that we need a change of perspective. We need to go to God and ask Him to give us His perspective of the situation.
In the book, “The Noticer”, Andy Andrews hits this idea home. It is a great narrative about an older man who “notices” details of other peoples lives that many of us usually overlook. He then shares with them a different perspective of their lives and it changes them. Isn’t that what we need? After a different perspective, it should change our lives.
This book is a must read. It gave me alot of aha moments, kind of like the book “The Shack” did.
So what does all this have to do with anything? Well, as you are journaling this week, let’s see if we can use God’s perspective to look back at our past and see where He has been working.
PS Andy Andrews is going to be at Women of Faith this year!!!! Get his books and read them. They are great!
Until next time.
God Bless
Sandi
This is My Story
Sandi Cooley is a new contributor to Prodigal daughters. She is currently leading the This is My Story Bible study at Meck.
So the This is my Story Bible study has started. I am so excited about what God is going to show us about how He has always been at work in our lives. In my preparation of the study I was reading from the book Destination: Community, a book about small groups. The following is applicable to our study:
“In Waking the Dead, author John Eldridge wrote, ‘Our life is a story. A rather long and complicated story that has unfolded over time. There are many stories, large and small, and many ‘firsts’. Your first step; your first word; your first day at school. There was your first best friend; your first recital; your first date; your first love; your first kiss; your first heart heartbreak. If you stop and think about it, you heart has lived through quite a story thus far. And over the course of that story your heart has learned many things. Some of what you learned is true; much is not.’
The truth is that God does keep his promises, but we have a responsibility to journey into our own stories if we really want to experience the peace and joy that comes with being a child of God. The process begins with each of us remembering; realizing; verbalizing; processing; and diving into our past.
In To Be Told, author Dan Allender points out in that we must answer some important questions before we enter into our stories. Our answers will help us to realize that God (the Author of our stories) cares deeply about us and longs for us to have “happily ever after” lives. They also reveal how our past experiences are affecting our present lives.
Here are the questions:
1. What sort of Author do I have? (Romans 8:28; Psalms 139:13-16)
2. What kind of characters populate my story? People in our lives shape our stories in both good and bad ways.
3. What sort of plot does my story have? Every story has a beginning, middle and end. In fact, the plot of most stories include 1) the background or situation, 2) the complication or conflict in the story, 3) the unveiling flashbacks, tone, mood, and even irony during the story, 4) the turning point when conflict and suspense resolve, and 5) the return to normalcy for the protagonist.
4. What sort of ending am I co-writing?
Remember that in all of our stories there is a villain. His name is Satan. His primary job is to destroy our lives. We have the weapons necessary to defeat him. God’s word! Hide it in your heart in order to fight the good fight. And as our study encourages us to do, (Deut. 4:9, Deut. 11: 19 both tell us to teach these things to our children and grandchildren) lets share our stories with the next generation so they may know the things that God has done for us.
I am excited about what stories you are going to share this week as you work through your journaling.
God Bless
Sandi
Twilight
Okay, I’ll admit it… it’s not the easiest thing for me to do, seeing as I am a 26 year old mother, for Pete’s sake… You see I fought it and fought it and fought it for a long, long time… I didn’t want to get sucked into the phenomenon that seemed to be sweeping the country… I wasn’t interested in even looking at it… but then, it happened and all of a sudden I realized…
I’m one of those Twilight people.
Yes, after the Bible, I have been completely into the Twilight Saga. I’ve read them all at least 5 times, and I’m in the middle of reading Breaking Dawn again. I’m a member of “Team Jacob” (and yes, I was that way BEFORE I saw the movie *giggle giggle*), mainly because he’s the underdog (no pun intended) and I can’t resist rooting for him even though I know every time I reread the series that it’s not going to magically change and he ends up on top. But anyhoo… onto my point here.
I’ve finally found something interesting. A Twilight Devotional. Now I know in no way did Stephanie Myer write the series as a devotional, but the one I’ve been reading brings up some good points.
The first devotional I read was about Bella’s fear of growing old since Edward never ages. Can you imagine having your husband stay the same age while you grow older and older? I can only imagine how scary that would seem. For everyday to get less in tune with each other and get more different from each other. It’s not possible.
Have you ever had a day where you felt like that was representative of your relationship with God? Do you ask questions like: Is it really possible for God to love us the same when we’re at our most beautiful and when we’re withered and wasted? Do we fear a day when He’ll just look at us and say, “I’m sorry, I just can’t stay with you any longer”? He already promised that nothing can separate us from His love, ever.
Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying threats, not backstabbing, not even the worst sins listed in Scripture:
They kill us in cold blood because they hate you.
We’re sitting ducks; they pick us off one by one.
None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us (Romans 8:37-39; The Message)
So wanting to avoid end-of-life questions like wills, power of attorney, etc, I’m going to focus on one thing: Losing Edward’s love. It’s not exactly the same as what we face with God, as the end of our days actually brings us closer to being one with Him forever, but symbolically, we can look at aging as a symbol for life, circumstances, and time itself.
How secure are we in God’s love? Do we look at ourselves in the mirror and question whether or not we’ll always be lovable to Him? What if we looked at Gran’s wrinkled and withered face as a symbol for how we may look to God now?
Another version says, “Nor even things which are to come,” which, to me includes any unforeseen circumstances. He’s in it for the haul.
Much like Bella and Edward’s discussion on the subject, later in the series, when Edward says “Bella, I’ll always love you; I’ll always want you, no matter what.” Bella says “What about when I look like a grandmother?” Edward’s response is just classic, conveying that it didn’t matter to him what anyone else thought, she would still be the love of his life (er, existence?), even when/if she did age.
This is a promise of undying, unconditional love; of absolute security. Can we receive it, or will we choose to walk in fear of the future?
God’s Timing
Wow… this week has been crazy! That’s why you haven’t heard from me this week, and I apologize for that. You see, my husband is from Florida, and for the past year and a half we’ve been discussing relocating down there. So we’ve been job hunting and praying over it for about a year now. Up until this point there’d been no luck. Then a week ago, I got a phone call from Tallahassee Memorial Hospital wanting to know when I could get down to see them. So I took a 1000 mile round trip road trip on Friday and was called back 30 minutes after I was on my way back to Charlotte. They want me to take the job and wanted to know when I could move.
Then started the indecision. For some reason after you have looked and prayed for something for so long when it’s finally presented to you, you seriously don’t know what to do with it. At least that’s how it is with me. I’ve fretted over this and fretted to the point that I’ve actually lost sleep and been extremely stressed out all the time. Do we jump out on a limb here and pack up so I can jump on an opportunity to work in a Cardiac ICU in the area where we’re sure we want to be?
Today a friend of mine, who sings in a group called 4given Souls (you should really check them out, awesome group), posted on her facebook this verse:
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11
Why did it take that to make me realize that God was answering our prayers. That for the past year his answer wasn’t “No” it was “Not right now”? Why did I have so many problems trusting that? We’ve been praying on it for a long, long time and I’d just got so used to the way things were I just assumed that the answer was no (and we all know what happens when we assume right?). Someone sent me something one time that said, God only gives three answers to prayers, “Yes”, “Not right now”, and “I have something better in mind”.
So, I’m going to be selfish here, and ask for prayer. I’m going to need it. Help me make the right decision in timing, and terms for employment, and other things. Prayer for protection over how ever many trips I’ll be making. And prayer for me to understand if God tells me “Not right now” that does not mean “No”. And I’ll do the same for you!
Rath de’ Ort!
Candice
It’s a “Full Armor” Kind of Day
I tell you what, today has been one heck of a day already and it’s only 9am. I woke up late and therefore did the “Flight of the Bumblebee” running around my house trying to get things ready. I couldn’t find ANYTHING I was looking for. I felt like…. Well crud, with a headache, stuffy nose, and scratchy throat. Finally I got my tail in gear and left the house only about 5 minutes behind schedule. I ended up having to sit in traffic around Concord Mills and got to the house of the kids I watch during the week about 15 minutes late. Then I realized that I had forgotten diapers for Owen and was running lower on formula for Dean than I thought. On top of all that, the coffee isn’t working this morning (QUICK… somebody grab the jumper cables!) and I’m dragging. Dragging, dragging, Dragging. I was barely there in time to catch Owen right before he was about to turn defenseless Dean into a little pink piggy with a magic marker.
It’s just been one of those days. You know the kind. You wake up on the wrong foot and feel like you keep stumbling all over yourself. So I was fairly aggravated with myself and everything that kept going wrong.
But here’s the thing….
Today IS a good day. No matter how many cookies Owen crushes into the carpet, or however many times Dean spits up all over himself and I have to change his clothes, today is a good day. It’s a blessing that I was able to wake up and get out of bed this morning, no matter how late. Each breath is a gift.
So here’s my scripture for the day and I’m sure I’m going to have to keep on reminding myself of it constantly today.
“Put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet the hope of salvation. For God did not appoint us to wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him.” ~ 1 Thessalonians 5:8-10
I know we all have those days where nothing is going right. It starts off as a bad day and just continues to get worse. This scripture reminds me that things aren’t always going to be easy. God doesn’t promise us a free ride, God doesn’t promise us a clear and clean path to walk. This scripture helps me see that life isn’t always going to be simple, but God calls us all to put on the Armor of God to withstand the difficult moments in our lives. When things get tough, or things just aren’t going our way, we should look to Christ for comfort. This armor means we should be ready for tough times in our lives and allow Christ to protect us by being righteous, truthful, peaceful, and faithful to him in all we say and do.
So, suit yourselves up with the Belt of Truth, the Armor of Righteousness, the Shoes of peace (don’t worry, they’ll fit right over your favorite pair of Nine West pumps! ;D ), Take up the shield of Faith, Put on the Helmet of Salvation, and Wield the Sword of the Spirit and know that tomorrow will bring a better day!
Rath de’ Ort!
Candice
Year of Love
Greetings, Sisters!
I’d like to start off by giving God all the thanks in the world and glorifying Him for helping us reach our Unhindered goal and then some. Our church family amazes me constantly. How great is our family?! How great is our God?!
That being said, as I was watching the service on our online campus I was moved by the one of the scriptures and decided to dig a little deeper into it and read a little more. So I started with Ephesians 5. The very first verse grabbed me:
“Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.”
Live a life of love. Are you doing it? Am I doing it? It’s so easy to become complacent and just go day to day with the same routine. But are you living a life of love? Are you giving love to all the way God does? Do you imitate him? Can people see God in you? I tell you in the world I see today, we need all the God-like folks we can get!
Then I when I got to thinking about that chapter of Ephesians, the message this weekend, and one of my favorite things, music (yes, I LOVE music and you’ll probably see me reference it quite a bit) I got to thinking about a song I’ve heard recently and it has quickly become one of my favorites:
“This is my temporary home; this is not where I belong
Windows and rooms that I’m passing through
This is just a stop, on the way to where I’m going
I’m not afraid because I know this is my temporary home”
(Carrie Underwood, Temporary Home)
This place is indeed our temporary home. It’s our training ground to practice how we will live life when we get to our permanent home in Heaven. And if that’s the case, why not make this “temporary home” a better place to practice how we’ll live in Heaven? Why don’t we all just stick together, band ourselves to each other and say, “We WILL make this place a better home!”
Therefore, I have decided that I’m going to try to make 2010 my year of love. I’m going to try to donate my time, money, clothes, whatever at least once per month this year. I’m going to show God’s Love through MY Love for my neighbors. Whether that be going to volunteer at Crisis Assistance Ministry for a day or donate clothing to a battered women’s shelter, or try to seek out a way to find those in our church and community that may need a meal during a time of need, or send out cards, try to help raise money for a charity such as March of Dimes or the American Heart Association, bring someone new to our church so they can experience the amazing work God is doing there and hopefully bring them over to God.
Now, with all my obligations to my family and my career, I’ll admit this is probably going to be a hard goal to reach. I’ve started my year off right by having a small part of every paycheck from the hospital going to Crisis Assistance Ministry and the March of Dimes. I’ve also decided to attempt to put together at least 2 shoeboxes a month to give to Operation Christmas Child at the end of the year. I know it’s not much, but a little bit adds up to a lot right? And that’s what I’m hoping I can inspire others to do.
So who is with me? Who wants to make 2010 a Year of Love as well? If it’s only me doing this, it’ll just be like one lonely little water drop, but if there are many of us doing it, we’ll have a whole bucket of water before you know it. And then if we can reach out and inspire our neighbors, our family, our friends to join in… well then, girls, we’d have enough of those “love drops” to fill up the oceans!
If you can, great, wonderful! I’ll be there to support you! And if you can’t join in with us, if it’s just not feasibly possible right now, or if you just don’t feel like you’re at that place yet where you’re ready to start giving, I ask that you pray for us. That might not feel like doing much, but I’m sure you all know what the power of prayer will do! And I’ll be there to support you in that as well. But I’m going to hold onto my mustard seed, because I KNOW that we can move mountains ladies! We CAN make this temporary home a better place!
Rath de’ Ort!
Candice
jill
Candice
memrycreator
