It's Fri-Yay!

Happy Friday! Are you fully awake to who God has called you to

be?

Twenty years ago, my favorite time of the day was going to bed. Can you believe that? It was the only time I could escape the chaos of life and get some peace from the noise around me. Have you ever been in a similar season? Life can be messy, right?

During other seasons of life, Fridays have been a fav of mine as I rushed through the workweek to get a break. While I still look forward to Fridays, I've slowly embraced a God-given, purpose-driven mindset, and guess what? For the first time, I wake up EAGER with a sense of direction and enjoy God and life more.

I've been reading Dream BIG by Bob Goff. He shares a story about a painting called "Sleeping Cardinal." The portrait depicts an artist painting a cardinal of a church. If you look at the picture, the artist looks quizzically while trying to capture his subject. Why??? He's creating a masterpiece, yet the cardinal is sleeping!

Bob shares, "I think God sometimes sees us and wonders the same thing the artist was wondering, 'I'm creating a masterpiece here, when is this person going to wake up?... I wonder what our lives would look like if we were fully awake …Take the next step. Don't just look away; come alive to who God has called you to be. "

Here's a verse: "Forget what happened in the past, and do not dwell on events from long ago. I am going to do something new. It is already happening. Don't you recognize it? I will clear a way in the desert. I will make rivers on dry land." (Isaiah 43:18-19) That's right; God can do that for YOU!

I hope this brought you a smile. Wishing you a Happy Friday. May we all awaken a little more today.

Listening Leads to Obedience: An Excerpt

This is an excerpt from a guest post used by Living By Design Ministries for their Saturday SOULFood devotional email. The full post will be released for our readers on March 4, 2023.

#listening #meditation #spiritualrenewal

God Speaks: The Unexpected Mother’s Day Message

Photo by Haitham on Unsplash

As a woman of faith, I recognize I can’t make it on life’s journey without God’s divine strength and wisdom leading me. Currently, I’m reading the book Known: How Believing Who God Says You Are Changes Everything by Aubrey Sampson, with a group of extraordinary women from my church. It’s all about how we see ourselves and recognizing those lying voices, doubts, and fears. We’re also learning the names God calls us and letting His words transform who we are.

While this knowledge is essential, I recognize that there is nothing like that in-your-face-moment when God reaches out of heaven and SPEAKS to you to stop listening to those falsehoods. He can certainly change your mental replay. Known includes some fabulous stories where that happened to the author, and now I’m recognizing my own experiences when God has stepped into my narrative and said, “No more.”

When I was in my mid-twenties, I was interested in someone at my school. After spending a reasonable amount of time together, he set expectations that we’d never be a thing. I appreciated his honesty, but he could have better strung together his communication, “You are an emerald, but I’m looking for a ruby.” OUCH. Those words stung, and I replayed its interpretation, “who you are is not good enough,” repeatedly.

I don’t know how long I let someone else’s script dominate, but I felt inadequate. While I am aware you can’t move forward in life with a “less than” attitude, I felt bloodied and bruised. Until the day God turned my neck and pointed my eyes in the right direction rewriting this script.

It was Mother’s Day, and I was invited to join my friend that Sunday morning. My girlfriend struggled with infertility and couldn’t bear to go to church motherless for yet another year. She knew I had my own struggles and the thought of me finding anyone to share my life with, let alone ever become a mother, was a distant dream. We were a perfect pair to tend to our misery together.

Halfway through the service, God blew me away and shifted my attention when the minister interrupted himself, stopped his sermon, and said,” I feel like someone here needs to hear this scripture.”

“She is more precious than rubies, and all the things you may desire, cannot compare with her.” Proverbs 3:15

I recognize that “she” refers to wisdom in this passage. Wisdom? She is my oldest friend!! Since I was a teenager, I have been praying for wisdom and held onto the promise it would be granted to me as God gives it to those who ask.

If wisdom is more precious than rubies, and I carry her, I must be (more precious) too! I about jumped out of my seat. This was a Mother’s Day sermon, it certainly wasn’t crafted for me, but in that treasured moment, everything about that sermon was just for me. I KNEW God recognized my pain.

I have faced much more pain than the dump from a potential love, but I recognize how words can sting. If you are struggling with limiting beliefs, let me confirm that we are all limited, it takes an act of God to open our eyes and see our unlimited potential and value only through Him.

I’ve had several of those reach down from heaven moments since, and I genuinely believe that God invites us to stop and allow Him to reveal more of Himself so you can see more of who He created you to be.

What are the lies that come to visit you? In your own strength, you can battle them, but in God’s strength, you can overcome. This Mother’s day weekend, regardless of your story, I want to remind you that God crafted you, and after he did, he smiled and said, “It is good!”