4GIVEN

When God seems silent doesn’t mean He is absent. God’s silence is how it feels, it’s not how it is. God is always actively moving, orchestrating, and weaving the affairs of our lives. Nearly everyone throughout biblical history has experience God’s silence but never was He not present. So recognize that you are not alone in the stillness. In fact, you are in good company. A right biblical outlook will cause you to think rightly about your experiences. When you realize that Abraham, Isaac Jacob, Joseph, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Noah, Moses, and Jesus all persevered and were all eventually promoted through God’s silence, you will truly embrace the fact that you are not alone.

When God delights in in us, He will open the heavens to us (Matthew 3:17; 17:5). Psalm 37:4 says, “Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you your heart’s desires.” Now some will take this scripture literally, however, David is not referring to the human heart because he knew all to well that the human heart is wicked and filled with evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, and slander (Matthew 15:19). Fortunately, God does not abandon us in our struggles with hurtful tendencies and sinful propensities. Instead, He literally plants His own desires into the heart of man, the heart that, without Him, is desperately wicked and deceitful. This heart transplant can only happen when we come to Him in repentance and accept the gift of salvation through the Lord Jesus Christ. At that point, He removes our hearts of stone and replaces them with hearts of flesh (Ezekiel 11:19). He then implants the Holy Spirit into our hearts. Then our heart’s desires become His desires, our wills seek to do His will, and our rebellion turns to joyous obedience.

Is God listening to me and if so, when will He answer me? Yes of course, our prayers never land on deaf ears and God will never leave us hanging. God responds to our prayers with ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ or ‘Wait’. When your prayers appear to go unanswered, you may need to evaluate your motivation behind your prayer. God not only hears our words in prayer, He also discerns our hearts (Hebrews 4:12). The apostle James writes, ‘When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives’ (James 4:3). In other words, your prayers will go unanswered when the motive behind them is spawned out of your own selfish desires. This is just one of many obstacles that can impedes God’s response to our prayers. Proverbs 16:2 says, “All a person’s ways seem pure to them, but motives are weighed by the LORD.” Because the human heart is very deceitful (Jeremiah 17:9), we can easily fool ourselves about our own motives. Conversely, the right motivation is always found in a surrendered heart. I John 5:14 confirms that when we pray according to God’s will, plan and purpose He not only hears us, He will also grant us that prayer. Jeremiah 33:3 says, “God will always answer our prayers: “This is GOD’s Message, the God who made earth, made it livable and lasting, known everywhere as GOD: ‘Call to me and I will answer you. I’ll tell you marvelous and wondrous things that you could never figure out on your own.’

It’s easier to forgive than to forget. However, ignoring the choice to do both will leave the offended party partially broken! Victims shouldn’t allow the venom of bitterness, resentment, and regret to lease space in their hearts because it cost more to harbor an offense than it does to let it go! Mahatma Gandhi said: “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” There are numerous biblical scriptures that were written to help strengthen us in this area. Interestingly, the phrase “forgive and forget” is not found in the Bible but, you can find its demonstration in several of the biblical characters mainly Joseph and Jesus. Joseph forgave his 11 brodies for what they did to him and Jesus forgave everybody including the men at the foot of the cross and to boot, one of the thieves on the neighboring cross was gifted an invitation straight into heaven. If forgiveness is a decision of the will then so is forgetting! I get it, it is impossible to truly forget sins that have been committed against us. We cannot selectively “delete” events from our memory. The Bible states that God chooses not to “remember” our wickedness (Hebrews 8:12). But God is still all-knowing. God remembers that we have “sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3:23). But, having been forgiven, we are positionally (or judicially) justified. Heaven is ours, as if our sin had never occurred. If we belong to Him through faith in Christ, God does not condemn us for our sins (Romans 8:1). In that sense God “forgives and forgets.” If this message is speaking to you and your caught between forgiveness and forgetting stop preying and start praying for God to supernaturally change the offender’s heart and for your strength to do His will. It is far more rewarding to forgive and forget than to relive and regret!

The process of brokenness can be very painful. However, there is healing, deliverance, and power in brokenness. We have the tendency to view brokenness as a bad thing i.e. Broken things. Broken bones. Broken relationships. Broken vows. Broken homes. Broken hearts. Although these things may happen we must remind ourselves that’s we don’t stay broken forever. God, our Great Physician, fixes all the broken pieces in our lives because He loves us and wants the very best for us. 2 Corinthians 4:7-10 says, “But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies.” We acquire our testimony in our brokenness and our testimony is not about what we could or couldn’t do. Our testimony which is a byproduct birthed from our brokenness reflects what God has done and is still doing in our lives. What a blessing it is for God’s marvelous Light (Jesus) to shine through our cracked jaws of clay. So today remember that God’s best is best reflected through us when we are healed from the things that are broken in us.

Do you need a reason to shout?

Ok……here it goes…..

Hell haven’t authored a sin that the BLOOD OF JESUS can’t WASH AWAY!!

#Boom #Hallelujah

#SavedByTheBlood

#ThankYouJesus

God operates in seasons and it doesn’t matter if you are in a season of plenty or lack, brokenness or breakthrough. In any season God’s Grace, mercy, and presence is with us and equally said His Spirit lives in us both to will and to fulfill His good purpose (Phil 2:13). Therefore, it’s imperative that we remember that life is way too fleeting to wake up with regrets and un-forgiveness in our hearts. So in this season of Thanksgiving love, love, and love some more!!! Love till you are overflowing with God’s joy and peace!! Forgive the unlovable and unfavorable in others because God through Christ Jesus love the unlovable and unfavorable in you! Trust that everything happens for a reason; penned by God Himself before you were an embryo formed in your momma’s belly and even before your first sunset came to be (Psalm 139:16). Thankfully, we serve a God of second chances and when He dispenses them to you, embrace it with both hands. If your willing and broken it may just change the course of your life; so let it!! Beloved of God, take a few minutes to think about these words today and remember God never said life would be easy. He just promised it would be worth it!

Soon and very soon sin, guilt, and death will be gone forever!! Still not shouting and rejoicing? Lemme say it again; sin, guilt, and death will be gone forever! Paul gave the church at Corinth plenty to shout about! In 1 Corinthians 15:57 he said from the MSG paraphrased, “But let me tell you something wonderful, a mystery I’ll probably never fully understand. We’re not all going to die— but we are all going to be changed. You hear a blast to end all blasts from a trumpet, and in the time that you look up and blink your eyes—it’s over. On signal from that trumpet from heaven, the dead will be up and out of their graves, beyond the reach of death, never to die again. At the same moment and in the same way, we’ll all be changed. In the resurrection scheme of things, this has to happen: everything perishable taken off the shelves and replaced by the imperishable, this mortal replaced by the immortal. Then the saying will come true: Death swallowed by triumphant Life! Who got the last word, oh, Death? Oh, Death, who’s afraid of you now? It was sin that made death so frightening and law-code guilt that gave sin its leverage, its destructive power. But now in a single victorious stroke of Life, all three—sin, guilt, death—are gone, the gift of our Master, Jesus Christ. Thank God!” No more sin, worry, anxiety, guilt, discouragement, depression, heartache, sickness, disease, disappointment, and death. Destination Eternity with the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, and all of our loved ones who passed before us; here we come!!

#Hosanna

God ain’t not joke! He flips the script on just about anything man thinks he/she has figured out! Who knew that a handicap would be one of our greatest attributes? The Message Bible paraphrased Paul’s thorn dilemma perfectly in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 and it reads, “Because of the extravagance of those revelations, and so I wouldn’t get a big head, I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations. Satan’s angel did his best to get me down; what he in fact did was push me to my knees. No danger then of walking around high and mighty! At first I didn’t think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and then he told me, ‘My grace is enough; it’s all you need. My strength comes into its own in your weakness.’ Once I heard that, I was glad to let it happen. I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ’s strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become.” Welp….that’s a wrap for me! God takes my handicaps (weaknesses) and covert them into my strengths…..GLORY TO GOD and AMEN!!

Father God of compassion and provisions, Your love for humanity was revealed in Jesus, whose earthly life began in the poverty of a stable and ended in the pain and isolation of the cross. We pray before you for those who are homeless and cold especially in the bitter winter weather. Father, how thankful we are that we have place that is called home. We truly pray and lift up all those suffering and sleeping on the streets, especially Father for children, who are so weak and vulnerable. Father God, make a way for them and draw them near, comfort them in spirit and bless those who work to provide them with shelter, food, friendship, and fellowship. Lord Jesus, your word declares that what we do unto the least of them; we have done it unto you! Through the power of the Holy Spirit O’God, we declare and trust by faith that you will provide!! In the righteous and forever perfect name of Jesus Christ, AMEN and AMEN!!

(Please say a pray for those who are homeless and are seeking shelter in this season!)