April 18, 2022
It’s Easter Monday!! I’m not sure why the Monday is a holiday but it is so I’m not fighting up, I’m just thankful. Thank you for a new day. Thank you for life and for the many big and small ways you bless me. Show me how I can be a blessing to others because sometimes I can miss ways until after and am just like “shucks.” Today Yahweh, I am yours. To do what you desire of me. I pray for this family and household. Help us to lift up your name in the way we live, the way we interact with others. Forgive us because we have done wrong and we pray for the strength to live a life that is pleasing and acceptable to you. Thank you for who you are.
Yahweh, thank you for this season of preparation. Passing through the refiner’s fire, every issue to be stripped away. It’s not always fun, but it’s necessary. Prepare me for the duties that you have called me for. The work that I am to do: at home and outside the home. Thank you for your promises and for guiding me. I pray for RaeRae. He is working on the design of the blog. I pray that he will allow you to inspire him, because you are the master creator and make all things beautiful. Bless him to be the husband and father in his household. That he leads his home, not by words only, but by actions. That he shows your love and grace to his family.
I pray for Dad. That each day he would choose you. Not as an abstract God who is just there, but as his personal friend and father. Help him to model you at all times, not just as an outward reflection of who he thinks you are, but as a true inner outpouring that comes from knowing you. Help him to honour you and to trust you at all times.
Remember Mom. She is your child. She is a wife and mother and I pray that in all that she does, she will choose you. She will always do what you desire of her with a willing heart.
This community. Yahweh. We need you. We need your Holy Spirit to move through. To cleanse and restore and to build anew at times. Sadly we are more concerned about fetes than you, but you can work on every heart. I pray that we would be able to reach each of them, that they would choose you and honour you as their Lord and King. Thank you for your grace over us. Your will be done.
There’s no God except you. Only you can say that and it be true. Really and truly when you think about it: how can I make something (an idol) and think that it has more power than I do? By the mere fact that I made it: I had to decide what it looked like, what material to make it from and then I would say, it’s more powerful than me? That not making any sense. The same way, there are those who want to proclaim that there is no God and don’t want to serve you. Can they make themselves? If they can, then by all means they can deny you. But you formed us. You choose what we are made of, so then we cannot claim to be greater than you. You formed this earth and everything in it. You were there at the beginning. You are there at the end. Only you alone are God.
Isaiah 44:18- 20 – They don’t know or understand anything. Their eyes are plastered shut, so they can’t see. And their minds are closed, so they can’t understand. No one stops to think. No one has enough knowledge or understanding to say, “I burned half of the wood in the fire. I also baked bread over its coals. I roasted meat and ate it. Now I am making the rest of the wood into a disgusting thing and bowing to a block of wood.” They eat ashes because they are deceived. Their own misguided minds lead them astray. They can’t rescue themselves or ask themselves, “Isn’t what I hold in my right hand a false god?”
Yahweh, they may be blinded and lack understanding, but you formed them also. You can open their minds and eyes to see, to see that anything that they serve other than you, they are attempting to make a god. It’s only an attempt because nothing can truly take your place. Thank you for who you are: who knows us better than we know ourselves. Who made us and who loves us despite our nonsense. Help us to trust you and to serve you with our whole hearts. Thank you for your promises, that you would rebuild once we return to you. That you will provide rivers in a dry land (and literally our rivers are drying up). We need you in every aspect of our lives and we can’t live without you.
Breathe in us and light our hearts on fire for you. The talents that are used to serve false gods would be used to honour you. Thank you for being the one and only true God.
What is it about music that is so pervasive? Guard my mind father. Thank you for your protection.
Isaiah 44:28 – He says about Cyrus, “He is my shepherd. He will do everything I want him to do “
This is the simplest of verses but you know what I love about it? Cyrus wasn’t an Israelite, but Yahweh used him. So often we want to turn away someone because they don’t meet our expectations, but yeah we uses them anyhow to accomplish what he wants to do. Thank you for using us no matter where we come from.
Today I’m going to rest. Physically, mentally. What does that entail? Guess we will see.
Camping Spot!
Omg!! Excitement!! There’s a spot I wanted to camp. It’s a bit isolated but I really loved it. The only thing is, part of the road to the area was so bad my vehicle could not go past. Today in my quest for a quiet spot I drove to the area and the road was fixed! I am so excited it is also a perfect area for a group tent camp but I hesitate to bring anyone here.
It’s so weird, I keep saying that so many things don’t happen because so many things have been changed, perverted from what they should be. But we expect that we will succeed by doing the same things the same way we did before. If Satan (if?!!). Because Satan has ramped up the attack on Yahweh’s people, we need to ramp up our prayers to Yahweh.
I often think about the story about Jehoshaphat and the king of Edom were fighting against the Moabites and they will prevailing (2 Kings 3:24), but when the king of Moab got desperate he sacrificed his son as a burnt offering. And then there was bitter anger against the Israelites, so they went home to their own country (2 Kings 3:27).
I have always heard this story that the Israelites won. But the truth is, they may have won the battle but they did not win the war. (CONFESSION: It was someone who pointed out that the Israelites did not win in the end). But the question is: why didn’t the Israelites cry out to God even more? When the enemy ups his anté (And sacrificing a child? That’s next level anté), then we needed to increase our level of praying.
The problem is that we often associate prayer with a physical posture, a special place or sometimes just church service. But I truly believe that prayer is both a lifestyle and the heart posture, so that it is not a matter of waiting to get before a prophet to pray and seek intervention. There’s always a constant aroma being lifted to Yahweh that will always exceed whatever the enemy is attempting to do.
(Sermon)
The speaker said:
- Commitment to the Lord.
- Confidence in the Lord.
- Character before the Lord.
- Confirmation by God.
Not gonna lie. So many sermons on singleness and potential marriage always focus on what the woman has to do: how she has to prepare. The truth is, it bothered me for a while, why isn’t a man called to be prepared also? To be a virgin? (Yeah I said it). To be industrious, kind all of that. The truth is, men are also supposed to be prepared.
Sigh. There is a thought that seems on the verge of crystallizing based on this, but it’s just out of reach.
