GOD'S PLANS????

 

"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 a hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11

I got to listen to one of my colleagues last week as we had lunch as she shared with us about a few people she knows who would rather give sexual favors to get jobs than wait for one that they get the right way. I have a feeling a good number of people seated reading this article would probably do the same thing. 

I had an interesting experience last year when God told me to quit my job... yes, quit my job!!! One of the things I really battled with was what did He want me to do next. I prayed so hard, asked Him over and over again, what am I to do after that??? But no answer came, the only thing God kept repeating was that He was asking me to quit my job. 

So, very reluctantly, very unsure of what next, like running straight into a brick wall... I quit my job.

One of the biggest mistakes I made was to try and fit God into my plans, trying to direct Him to what I thought was the direction I would should have been taking. I pursued jobs I thought would fit who I am, make more money than where I was before. It just felt like I knew what God wanted for me instead of listening to what He was telling me. 

Many times we are all like me... Trying to guide God into what we want for ourselves yet we do not ask God what He wants from us; where we should go, what we should do, who we should be in a relationship with...

"For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." Ephesians 2:10

And many times we forget this simple truth... God knew exactly what He had planned for us way before we came into this world. Nothing that happens in our lives ever comes as a surprise to Him. In my anxiety to change my situation, I forgot this and began to rely on my on wisdom, or lack there of.

And just last week I sat in a restaurant and for a moment, I have to admit, I forgot it again. I became so focused on a very big part of my future and all that went through me was worry, fear, anxiety... I went back to that point of thinking of how I was going to achieve it all in my limited capabilities and I forgot about the God who knows all this about me, I forgot about the guy who says He knows the number of hairs on my head.

Have you ever been there, beginning to look at your abilities... rather your inabilities, and letting them cloud your mind? Ever ask yourself why those times come into our lives?

Here's one thing that I have learned through it all, God reminds me that I am weak but He is strong. How can I experience His strength if I do not realize I am weak? How can I see Him take control of all my situations without getting stuck and letting Him take control? How do I experience comfort in Him without experiencing discomfort in the situations around me?

"Come to me all who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest" Matthew 11:28

God is assuring us today that when we can find our way back to Him, he takes us in our situations, in our worries, in our pain, in our joblessness... in all of that, and He gives us rest.

So back to my jobless period of 2015... there I was, trying to make things happen away from God. When I did realize I was trying to make things happen without finding God first, I changed and started asking where He wants me to go. One more thing He taught me was that I am not the source of my daily bread.You see, that big worry when He directed me to leave my job, that issue of how I was going to earn my living became a reality. But every day He made it clear to me that it is He who sustains me.

"Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?" Matthew 6:26

This happens to be one of my favorite verses, yet so many times I forget that it is He who sustains me, not the monthly salary that I get. So being away from a job reminded me to rely on Him and to turn away from my worry. And last year I worried, I depleted every coin in my savings... but not a single day passed with me feeling like I was out, He took care of me one day at a time... and that last question became a reality, I heard Him repeat it to me over and over again... "Grey, are you not much more valuable to Me than the birds of the air?"

I remember one of the other significant lessons He taught me was that I got the feeling of being in need. Have you ever been there... at the place where you have nothing and you seriously want to move out of it? Need a job? Need success in your examinations? Need a Godly relationship? What is it that you are in need of? what is it that you need and you are seeking God for... or at times not going to God about it. Here's what the word of God says...

I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to be in plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want." Philippians 4:12

And He just told me that I need to find peace in Him, I need to be satisfied in Him... whether I have a job, whether I am jobless, whether I am full or hungry or dating or single. It just does not matter the situation...I need to be content in Him.

I thank God because, out of Him taking time to get me away from my comfort; He took 6 months to remind me to send my cares to Him and find rest in Him, to always find my comfort and contentment in Him, that I am of greater worth than the birds or the air.

He loves you and me so much!!

The most significant lesson was this, the confidence of going to Him in prayer;

"Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." Hebrews 4:16

Are you at a point of need? With all the confidence you can master, go to Him in prayer, and you will receive mercy and find grace.

I write this having completed 6 months in 2015 learning from God in my time of want and need; learning that He planned it all out for me in advance, having found out where He wants me to go, what he wants me to do, and seeing Him place me exactly there. I know, I am confident that even you can find that place, by just finding Him first and He will place you exactly there.

Prayer
Thank you Lord for the lessons we learn through our times of need, want, worry and despair. Forgives for when we forget you at those times and we focus on our own weaknesses and forget your almighty strength. May your word remain our foundation that we may seek you and find ourselves in your will. Amen

CONNECTED

 

One of the best things about starting 2016 was that I got a watch as a gift; and it was from a very special person, so you can only imagine what it meant to me. Having had the same watch for almost 7 years, I have to admit I was quite attached to it, so a new one was going to be one to adjust to... but I loved the feel of a new one.

I however had one challenge though... Its battery. I got a new one for it as soon as I could, but a few days later it was dead. I couldn't tell why because in my mind the new battery was still good. The watch was new, the battery was new... No way it could be a fake. It was quite disappointing, though I still continued to wear it. 

I visited a watch shop and the information I got is that the battery was a fake... A fake! Really!? And he was right. I bought a new one again, and the watch is still ticking along and I'm all about the time piece I got as a gift. It's a memory of the person who gave it to me... One that I wear proudly and think about every time I check the time. 

And this experience reminded me of a few life lessons... 

Now, the challenge I had was that my lovely watch was that it was not connected to a power source, hence even if I wore it every day, it still did not serve it's purpose. 

Let's think of a different situation. What car do you fancy? Yes, think about it... You're sure that's the one, the one you're thinking about... Yes, that one.  Imagine you had the chance to own it, but with one thing missing... Its battery. Remember this, it's a car. It's meant to be driven, to move from point A to point B. Let the whole world see you in it. But without a battery, how will that happen?? There is no way you are showing that off. 

I bet you have a mobile phone in you're pocket right now...maybe it's on your desk, or that's how you're reading this. If you take out its battery, or even it's Sim card, then you are no longer connected. What then becomes the point of you having that phone? 

I was reading an article somewhere recently on the most annoying things in the world right now. And somewhere near the top of that list is slow WiFi connection.

Yes, connection... That's what we are talking about today, connections. 

Everything in this world needs to have a connection to serve it's intended purpose... My watch, that car you dream about, your mobile device, your laptop, radio. It's all about the connection.  

Our lives have the exact same principle... Firstly, we have a purpose, one that our maker says He intended for us even before we came into this world.  

"For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do" Ephesians 2:10

Yes, way before you were born, you had an intended purpose. Before every device in this world was created, the inventor sat down and thought about what that device would achieve once it was created. So did our Maker... He knew the reason He made you, the reason He chose everything about you, your family, your job, your school, your life partner... everything was designed for you in advance. 

But...the tricky bit is, just like the connections we talked about, our lives as well, need to be connected to a power source so as to achieve their intended purpose. 

So what is your connection??? Here's a hint... 

"Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me." John 15:4

The connection we need to achieve our purpose in this world, is a connection to our Maker. How else do we know who we are if not by knowing Him who made us?? Just like a manual is the guide from the creator to an end user of an appliance, we have our Maker who knows us and knows why He made us. 

We battle so many times with why we exist, we battle with why things go the way they do and we find anger and disappointment creeping into our lives. We get so lost trying to find ourselves, yet we have the answer right in our faces... get connected to God!!!

BATTLE GROUND

 

"War, its been a part of humanity in every age. We fight for power, for riches, for rights or for freedom. there always seems to be something to fight for."

I start this blog post with the introduction of War Room, because today, its all about getting to know that we are at war, and we need to understand this battle.

I got the chance to watch the movie a while ago with some friends and it pushed me to make radical decisions in my life. It reminded me of the really important things and the not so important things that I make a priority many times. It showed me how much I have made God secondary yet He is The Primary aspect of my existence.

It reminded me a lot about my childhood. I loved watching movies... romance, action, comedy, thriller; it was dad, sis and I... mum could never do movies.

Of all these, I think action movies had quite the impact. I don't know if it was because of the way my friends narrated how the "starro" would get beat up, just to the point of death and just when it seemed impossible, they would 'resurrect' and beat up the bad guy and take the day.

These movies just got me as a kid... Rambo, Arnold Schwarzenegger. Then there was the damsel in distress that they all had to save, come to think of it, how come there had to be a beautiful girl involved??? Enough of that...

Combining all these with studying the book of Revelation has reminded me.. actually not so much of a reminder, but a realization... that the devil is real, that evil does exist, that the devil will do all he can to take us away from our focus of God.You see, we are that 'damsel in distress' Christ is the 'starro' and the devil is the bad guy.

Getting to read through Revelation 12 and I realize, the only difference is, we are dealing with a bad guy who was already defeated... but we give him the chance to take control of our lives, we allow him to terrorize our lives yet, according to Rev. 12:9, he was already beaten up by the good guys... yet we still let him have his way with us. Now his only strategy is to come down to the earth and attack the closest thing to God... you and I.

Now back to War Room... what does it take to beat this bad guy in our lives, what does it take to get us from the point of letting the devil out of our lives?

Just like Miss Clara starts by saying, every war needs strategy. To beat the devil away from our lives we need to have a strategy. The biggest strategy we have for battling with the is being connected with the one who has already beat him... our God.

Our human nature has caused us to turn to the world seeking joy, seeking all the good things that the world (read the devil) can give us, yet we do not realize that it will lead to our destruction. We are forgetting to include God in our relationships, we forget God at work, in every single thing in our lives... and the devil occupies that room. He leads us to sin in every situation of our lives, he brings strife, anger... he sucks away all good things that Christ has given to us freely. And guess what... we are the reason he stays, we keep him in our lives.

But God is calling us to go down on our knees, to seek Him and we shall be reconciled to Him.

"But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." Matthew 6:33

 The only way to get our joy back, the only way to get the good things in our lives... is to turn back to Christ, to seek Him with all that we are and He will remind the devil that our "Starro"  has already beat the bad guy... the battle was already won.