God’s Promises – Isaiah 43:1-3

Today’s promise comes from Isaiah 43:1-3.

Don’t be afraid for I have saved you,  I have called you by name, and you are mine.  When you pass through the waters, I will be with you.  When you cross rivers, you will not drown  When you walk through fire, you will not be burned, nor will the flames hurt you.  This is because I, the LORD, am your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior.

What a promise!  We needn’t be afraid because we’ve been saved.  He knows us intimately by name and calls us His own.

No matter what kind of trouble we go through, waters of our life or the rivers of our life or when we are walking through the fires of life, God is there and will not allow anything to hurt us.

This is a hard concept to understand.  Don’t those circumstances in and of themselves cause us hurt?  Let me put it this way when your going through the fire of life God promises that you won’t be burnt and the flames won’t hurt you.  That doesn’t mean that your clothes might not get singed and you’ll reek of smoke.  But by contrast of what your going through and what God is doing for you even behind enemy lines is ultimately for your benefit.

He doesn’t promise that while going through the water and river that we won’t get wet but He does promise that we won’t drown.

We all face problems in our lives and some of those problems are a daily source of conflict for us.  But God promises that He is bigger than the conflict and His protection is available to every believer on a daily or hourly basis, whatever each individual needs.

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart!

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Quote from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Today’s quote is a poem from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

I shot an arrow into the air,

It fell to earth I new not where;

For, so swiftly it flew, the sight

Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,

It fell to earth, I knew not where;

For who has sight so keen and strong,

That it can follow the flight of song?

Long long afterward, in an oak

I found the arrow, still unbroken;

And the song, from beginning to end,

I found again in the heart of a friend.

I believe what Longfellow is trying to say in this poem is that our actions eventually come back to us.  Possibly the actions of the arrow were compliments and words of encouragement that long after they were given were found unbroken, cherished by the receiver the oak.

The song could have been actions or deeds that whisked off because they had become habit to the individual and that is why they are found in the heart of a friend.  When we tend to naturally do the right thing we attract people to us.

It is my hope that what Longfellow describes is what I become one day.  Shooting out words of encouragement to all that pass by and that my actions speak even louder than my words of encouragement.  That’s the kind of person I want to be.  How about you?

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart!

30 Days of Gratitude – Day 16

Today I’m grateful for our unsung heroes.

Those men and women in uniform that spend their lives making it possible for us to live free and wonderful lives.

They are working hard and dealing with things we can’t even imagine and some of those wonderful heroes will be doing all this while missing Christmas with their loved ones.  For their selfless acts I’m eternally grateful.  I wish them the safest of Christmases and that they will be able to be reunited with their families soon.

Let’s not forget our wonderful men and women of the military this Christmas time and say prayers for them and thank them when you see one walking down the sidewalk or across the street.  It is the very least we can do for them, after they have done so much for us.

And let’s pray for those and their families who didn’t make it home.  They need our support always but especially during the holidays.  So while we are celebrating let’s not forget those less fortunate than us.

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart!

30 Days of Gratitude – Day 15

Today I’m grateful for the ability to be content.

The Lord has blessed me with the ability to basically have what I desire and know what it is to live relying completely on Him to get you through the month.  I have learned to be content in each situation.  For which I’m eternally grateful.

He has taught me how to be content in His leading.  How He restores my soul with quiet waters and makes me lie down when needed.

He knows what is best for me and always has that in mind.  To know that He has my best interests in mind and that I’ll never lack for anything that I really need, is very comforting and brings much contentment.

Just like His eye is on the Sparrow so is it on you and I.  From the fact that He cares for such a little bird and knows just how it’s doing, we can confer that He is even more concerned about us.  Whom He sent his Son to die for us.

I love this song and it rings in my heart!  Because His eye is on the sparrow I know He watches me.  And if that isn’t cause for contentment I don’t know what is.

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart!

Quote for 12/7/12

I don’t know who the author of this poem is of today’s quote but I’m begging to believe that God wants to make sure I get the message clear and loud.  Father, I’ve hopefully got it that procrastination is the enemy.

Mr. Meant-To has a comrade,

And his name is Didn’t-Do;

Have you ever chanced to meet them?

Did they ever call on you?

These two fellows live together

In the house of Never-Win,

And I’m told that it is haunted

By the ghost of Might-Have-Been.

Whoever wrote this poem knew that meaning to and not doing will have you wind up not wining and leave you and me if we allow these things in our lives with nothing but regrets of what might have been.

This is procrastination in its worst form and I pray that these quotes God’s shared with me will teach me to stay far from it.  I don’t want to live a life of regrets.  I doubt you do either.  So let’s say we take to heart what these sages have to teach us?  I’ll do my part.  How about you?

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart!

Quote From Benjamin Franklin

I think God is trying to tell me something about my writing and being more diligent about it.  This is the second quote in a row that has struck me about work.  And for me, my work is my writing.

So here goes today’s quote.

“Work while it is called today, for you know not how much you may be hindered tomorrow.  One today is worth two tomorrows; never leave that till tomorrow which you can do today.”

I think Benjamin Franklin had the right idea, procrastination can be the death of a project and acid to the soul.

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart.

30 Days of Gratitude – Day 14

Today I’m grateful for the fact that in Christ I am a new creation.  The old is gone and the new has come.

“So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view.  Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.  Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!  All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men’s sins against them.  And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.  We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us.  We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.  God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”  –  2 Cor.  5:16-21

How can one not be grateful for God making it possible for us to be new that we might be reconciled to Him?  What an honor and blessing!

God could have wiped His hands of us so many times in history.  With the first sin He could have decided I’m done with them they made their choice against Me, but that’s not who God is.  His love wouldn’t allow Himself to turn His back on humanity when humanity has turned it’s back on Him time and time again.  Anytime that He did divorce Himself of mankind once they cried out to Him, He responded.  That’s just the way of love.

God’s ultimate act of love was; that He loved sinful man so much that He sent Christ to pay the penalty of our sins thus reconciling us to Him and making us new and the righteousness of God through Christ.

If God never did anything else for me my entire life I would sing His praises my entire life for this awesome blessing!  Hallelujah!!! Praise the Lord, God Almighty!!!  Thank you my Savior for dying for me and all sinners!!!

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart!

Quote From McGuffey’s Primer

Today’s quote from McGuffey’s Primer is a poem that children memorized in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Work while you work,

Play while you play;

One thing each time,

That is the way.

Do with your might;

Things done by halves

Are not done right.

There is a beautiful simple wisdom in this poem, that we can learn from.  Those who study with music blaring or the television on might gain some insight from these lines.  Or employees spending more time chatting with co-workers or smoking cigarettes than at their desk actually working might gain some insight here.  Likewise are the people that can’t go to the beach or on vacation with out their laptop or iPad.  There is a time to work and a time to play and as the poem says both times should be respected and separated.  I think if we live by this poem we may find that 1) We get more done when we work and 2) We have more fun when we play.  Both are equally important for a healthy life.

30 Days of Gratitude – Day 13

“Peace I leave with you; My [own] peace I now give and bequeath to you.  Not as the world gives do I give to you.  Do not let your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.”  –  John 14:27

As one that struggles with General Anxiety Disorder, I’m ever so grateful for the peace that Jesus left as an inheritance for me.

“The word bequeath in this verse is a term used in the execution of wills.  In preparation for death, people usually bequeath their possessions, especially those things of value, as a blessing to those they love who are left behind.

Jesus knew He was about to pass from this world and He wanted to leave us something.  He could have left any number of good things, like His power and His name, and He did.  But He also left us His peace.

You don’t leave junk for people you love – you leave them the best you have, Jesus had a special kind of peace that surpassed anything mankind had ever known.  He knew it was one of the most precious things He could give.

From: “Ending Your Day Right: Devotions for Every Evening of the Year”   –  Day 12/3  by Joyce Meyer

Knowing that peace is one of the greatest joys of being a Christian.

The peace you have when you’ve prayed over a matter, listened to God or just waited for peace over a matter so that you know what your doing is in God’s will.

The time you thought about buying something and didn’t have peace and decided not to make the purchase and the peace that came with that decision.

Or the tug on your heart to visit a friend or call a friend and the peace you felt and possibly even joy after following your heart, when you learned that you were just what that friend needed at that time.

When praying over something that hasn’t come to pass but you receive a peace about it.  What a blessed gift from God.

All of these and I’m sure you can think of even more ways you’ve felt the peace that only Jesus can give.

But may I venture to say that being in His will, obedient to Him is the only way you can receive it.  Outside of Him this kind of supernatural peace does not exist. So we must be rooted in the vine to attain it.

I’ve known anxiety most of my life but I’ve also experienced the peace that only comes from Jesus.  That peace is a blessing that I’m eternally grateful for.

All you have to do is ask Him for that peace but if He tells you to do something you better do it, because with obedience comes peace.

Joy – A Fellow Sojourner & A Woman After God’s Own Heart!