Constricted to be Fixed

Psalms 94: 12-14-12 Blessed is the man whom you discipline, O LORD, and whom you teach out of your law, 13 to give him rest from days of trouble, until a pit is dug for the wicked. 14 For the LORD will not forsake his people; he will not abandon his heritage;


Hebrews 12:6-For the LORD disciplines those he loves, and he punishes each one he accepts as his child


Beloved, are you stuck somewhere in your life? Have you been there a long time, seemingly unable to progress no matter how much you commit to yourself to change, to get it right, to make a dent in progress? If so, and you're a believer,  there is a lesson for you right there where you are that you're simply not taking a hold of. Consider for a moment...could it be possible that God is constricting you to fix you? Constrict means:

1. To make smaller or narrower by binding or squeezing.
2. To squeeze or compress.
3. To restrict the scope or freedom of; cramp: lives constricted by poverty

You're stuck. And, you're stuck for a reason. I believe God doesn't move you past your last act of disobedience and He does it specifically to fix a problem and bring about a change in you that is needed before you progress to the next step. God is order and He does all things well. Don't think you're going to slop through a life in Him.  Yes, God is love and yes He is a good Father. If you're His....if you're His child He will discipline and correct you. Not just to break you (He does sometimes break your will and make you wish you'd obey) but the goal is to equip you, to make you fit for use. As you suffer, remember the end of your suffering is to establish, strengthen and settle you through your experiences with Him in each season of your life (1 Pet. 5:10). He loves you so much He won't leave you alone as you are so instead He leaves you right where you are in your hot mess of life until/unless you desire change and obedience rather than sacrifice. That is the reason your life feels so confined and the resistance to positive, lasting change is so stifling, upsetting and frustrating!

If I repeatedly merry-go-round on an issue in my life seeing the same thing over and over and over...I realize then the situation is speaking to me and I'd better listen up. I've learned that God speaks in a multitude of ways that are consistent and thorough, the problem is never Him speaking! Its always our "not listening" ears  that He won't shout into.  He won't shout over your lack of willingness to do the hard thing, to discipline yourself, to change and repent. You have free will and God respects that free will He gave us---despite our wishing He'd just make us change! God is truth Beloved.  Don't you know truth and revelation never have to shout? Only deception covers itself over in disguise, whispering sweet nothings or shouting freedom that's really bondage. Truth quietly and simply stands bare, naked and in place. It doesn't move or change from day to day. It stares you right in the face until you accept it and take a hold of it.  You can pretend its not there...you can blur it with self-medicating things to soothe the ache but still it stands. You need truth to face this confined place in your life. You need revelation to clearly see what to do and how to do it.

Dear one, your quagmire has a purpose. You're constricted for a reason. Get the lesson---apply this truth to your life and see if its true. Its simple and not difficult. God won't hide from your request for wisdom concerning your life and relationship with Him (James 1:5). Write down your life story, what's going on right now? Then, get alone with God, pray, ask Him to show you what the issue is. He'll speak so be prepared to obey. I believe you'll be amazed how you'll finally and swiftly move forward and out of your purposeful constriction!

Now that you know, what will you do?

James 1:23-25 (New International Version)

²³Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror ²⁴and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.²⁵But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.


Many times when coaching individuals in life and spiritual matters they will say to me ..." Cheryl, I just don't know what to do. Why won't God tell me what to do here?" and I have a standard reply because its true. What is the last thing God told you to do that you've left undone? I believe God does not take us past our last act of disobedience. Its just been a truth I've experienced over and over in my own life and I believe its as true as the air we breathe. Beloved, why would God give you further information when you're not applying the information you all ready have?  We seek further guidance for our lives when in reality we don't want to do what we all ready know to do right now, especially if we don't LIKE what we're to do so we'll just take some new information to disobey thank you very much. When reading that can you see the idiocy in that attitude and request of God? Examples:

We ask God why He isn't blessing us but we're unfaithful with the money we all ready have, yet we want more to misappropriate and spend on our lusts.

We don't want to forgive someone but we blow it big time and ask God to forgive us, never mind the un-forgiveness and lack of mercy/grace in our heart we want our forgiveness, even if we won't give it.

That's just two examples but if you sit and dig around in your mind you'll find things that you're not doing that you KNOW to do and yet, you're asking, seeking and knocking for more information from God.


If you're in need of direction, if you're questioning God what is His will in and for your life, get out a piece of paper and sit down, make a list. Write the things you know to do and then check yourself in those areas. Its rare that I don't find a revealed truth that I all ready know without a shadow of doubt that I'm just not fully obedient in. I then repent, ask God to show me what to do right there right now and trust me HE will let you know. I am always amazed at how that then opens the flood gates for the next step. Just like you put one foot in front of the other to walk, God will give you step by step instructions to follow that are very specific for YOU and your life. Reflect back and then don't forget what you look like in that mirror. God speaks. He is ever faithful.

Excel in the Grace of Giving

2 Cor. 8:7- But just as you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in your love for us^a—see that you also excel in this grace of giving.


Beloved, why do you give?


Really giving has been a heart/mind set for me for the last year. During a time of great lack in my life I questioned God why. He began to show me my motivation and heart was in getting and being protected when I gave. I wanted Him to bless me and I gave out of fear and compulsion. I didn't want to be used so when I gave to others I had an eye on what they would do with what I gave and how they might use it.  I also gave so that I could be "seen as a giver," with no grace what so ever added to my giving (grace is unmerited or undeserved favor). That is the honest truth and the reality is, that I was never giving with a clear heart and mind. I gave to get, which is what I believe, if we're completely honest with ourselves most of us do this type of giving. God is not pleased or served in this type of giving and perhaps that is the reason so many of us Believers live in lack? I don't know. But, I determined to fix my own heart before God. Besides being ashamed of myself, I completely understood why the lack I so greatly despised was front and center in my own life and I determined to get over and out of it. I'm now living on my giving. When I give anything at all I pray over it to release it fully with no thought of return because I TRUST God with it. Return is not my responsibility at all, its God's and He is ever faithful. I can't out give Him! I see my giving just like putting a seed in the ground. Digging it up and looking it over in concern for its growth kills the seed and stunts it from doing what it has to be put in the ground and left alone to do! As I gave to people I truly prayed for them, and the person to do God's will with it. Many of us miss our blessings and entertaining angels unaware by not being led of God to give to people no matter the package they come in. I stopped wanting my giving to be neat, tidy, accounted for and seen by men. That's not a spooky spiritual thing either...we never know what helping someone out will do for them along the way and getting someone to do what we want with what we give them shouldn't be our motivation...getting someone to do what GOD wants them to do with what we give should be our heart attitude or simply don't give. Trust me, when you give like this amazing things will begin to happen. Opportunities to give that are divine and directed will present themselves to you and you won't give out of pride, obligation or compulsion or fear. You will just give and experience such joy! Yes, I still struggle with selfish pride and giving to get but at least now I'm aware and conscious of my motivation in giving. Now, I want to excel in the grace of giving first and foremost and I truly want to help others. I want them to be blessed and experience a full and rich life and I am willing to let God use me as He sees fit. I don't mind being used because I always know what I'm being used for...the grace of giving!

Pain's Path

Pain is cutting a swathing path through hearts today. We hurt and deny that hurt. We assume revealing that we hurt is showing weakness that makes us more vulnerable so we lock it down pretending strength and inwardly screaming in quiet desperation. I agree, you can't go around spilling your pain on everyone. Not everyone is equipped to care for you. Not everyone cares for you! But, there is rarely a person God has not assigned another human being to help you along pain's path. This person is usually someone who can comfort you as they've been comforted because they've been there (2 Cor. 7:7) and can identify despite not exactly knowing your pain because pain truly is relevant--yours is yours and mine is mine, we are intimately acquainted with our own sources of discomfort and pain-- we don't necessarily nor always can we understand it but we do have to accept it. God knows we hurt. He knows we get the life knocked out of us and He knows it because He's been there too! Beloved, today, be a noticer. Take the time to hear someone else out or even do the hard thing and ASK, "are you okay?" and then don't just quote scriptures and pray...let them talk and don't be afraid to suggest they see a mental health professional or take them to your Pastor and make sure they're not alone in despair. 



1 Peter 5:7- “Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.”

PAIN
Let it out to
Let it go
Our misery
Is not a comfort coat
To wear
Wrapped around us
Like there’s nothing under there
To soothe,
To heal
To open up and reveal
Where in the hell
Did we learn that
Pain is something we have to hide?
Our plastered smile
“Doing fine!”
Faking free
All the while our life
Is divided
we’re held
In captivity
Beloved pain spilled out is conquered, halve
Shattered in pieces
Conquered, unearthed
Reshaped into pieces
Of acceptance
not complacent
Finally a possibility of
JOY

LEAVING LUST BEHIND- 1 John 2:16

LUST. A deceptive vice that is running rampant in society and even the Church. Its couched as a passion for, an uncontrollable urge that must be obeyed. In fact, I've been a victim of, a willing participant in and I've inflicted it upon those willing to receive it. Lust has no place in the life of the believer and Beloved today I want to educate, inspire and inform you how to recognize and defeat this foe. What is lust? An intense (above normal to the extreme degree) appetite to fulfill selfish gratification. We pridefully cover our lust in amazing ways but its main objective in life is to get you what you want, whenever and however you want it. Never a good thing when we feed our appetite whatever it wants.  Engaging in lust feels oh so good to the flesh, for a period of time. In its inception, you feel in control of whatever you're lusting for because you activate it (so you think) by choice. In the end, it grows in its demand for fulfillment, it never stays inside the lines (again, its an intense, above normal, extreme degree desire to fulfill it). Very soon, it takes the wheel, controls and tells you what to do, where to go, who to be. It oh so subtly becomes your master and you will bow or suffer. Your lust for food, drink, drugs, sex, money, talking/gossip take center stage in your life and you have to pay rapt attention.  To leave lust behind, do these things found in James 4:7-

1. Submit to God. What is submission? I've heard it best described by a minister named Charles Finney:  "an active joyful, supreme acquiescence and delight in the will of God."  He comes first, not your desires and will. Its not hard to find out what God wills if you read the Bible and if you pray. Life is so much simpler than we like to make it. Its not as hard as living any old way, trust me.

2. Don't open the door! Avoid becoming aflame with passion for something by never giving in to it in the first place. You know yourself. What gets you going and feels so good to even think about that you know its going to be trouble? You know the process. No one just hauls off and does something. You introduce it to your self, you dwell on it, you mull its possibilities THEN you commit the act. Oh Beloved don't open the door in the first place and you will avoid your mind having to FIGHT the knowledge of overeating a certain food, pornography, saying certain words (cussing/profane speaking), sex with someone you're not married to (adultery/fornication), listening to music that stimulates you, smoking/drinking or taking that pill...just don't do it in the first place. Sounds simple but its the best defense, no defense at all!

3.Resist, repent and do it time and again--okay let's be real. A sanctified, pure life in this culture is next to impossible. We fall. But we have to get back up and not use that as an excuse to give in. You resist first and foremost but if you fail and fall then you keep getting back on the NO wagon over and over again. Each resistance makes the next one easier until you're free. Lust becomes a distant and dim call if you shut it down.

Lust is just not a friend you should hang out with ever. It will come around often and in a multitude of ways. Leave lust behind. Never pick it up and never let it in.