How often have you told your parents, "no"? How often do you tell your boss, "no"? 

Just to be clear right up front! This will never be a political platform! I will never fight for one side or another here. What I will say, is that things in this world will change one way or another after this next election. The atmosphere of this nation is going to shift. Many people will have to make the decision to either stand up for God and be 100% in on Him or deny Him 100%. There will be no in between. God's arms are and will be open to all that turn to Him! And give Him 100% of themselves! But He also have us free will. And His heart will be broken by many. What are you willing to go through to stand with the Lord of the Universe?

Are you still living on the hope that as long as you are a decent human, that if you stay out of trouble, and live your life to the best of "your" abilities, that the Good Lord above will accept you with open arms? I know the answer, I used to say it all the time! "If God truly created all of us as His children, then He has to welcome all of His children home!" 

Have you ever been in a crowd of people whether at church, or maybe sitting with a really good friend, or a complete stranger, and you receive a gut punch? A serious desire to say something, but you're not exactly sure what? The thoughts in your mind don't make sense. And you feel like if you open your mouth, you are going to look like a fool? Maybe all you can think of is a topic, or one specific word. Did you battle within yourself as to whether or not to speak? Did you pray about it? Or did you just ignore it, and hope the thought goes away...

I went to this conference recently, as always, it was amazing! But there was this one speaker, that really blew me away. She was this eighty-three-year-old lady. This lady not only had it all together, but she was jumping around and spinning around the platform. She had such a drive, and tenacity about her, it was truly inspiring! Through the tears and the laughter, she touched every emotion possible! She touched your heart, she touched mine. She reminded me so much of my own grandma, she loved the Lord with her whole being! She was going to serve the Lord until the day He calls her home. I had always looked up to my grandma, she set the bar high! She displayed the love of Jesus everywhere she went. I pray that when I am in my golden years, God will still use me like that. 

I'm winging it today, so bear with me. 

 "1. The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to comfort the broken hearted and to proclaim that captives will be released and prisoners will be free. 2. He has sent me to tell those who mourn that the time of the Lord's favor has come, and with it, the day of God's anger against their enemies." Isaiah 61: 1&2.

Did you know that our God is BOUJIE!! I have written about our Boujie God before, but the more I read, and the more I get to know God! The more I learn of His Boujie ways! Everything about God, and everything that God is involved in, is beyond words! He loves us with a love that we will never understand. With an agape love! That's a love that we will never fully understand here on earth!

Where does the time go?? Sorry for the delay!!

How vocal are you about your God? Our Lord? Your Savior? My Savior? DO you tell your cashier or waiter, "God bless you" as you leave? Do you stand on the street corner, screaming at people that they need Jesus?!? Or do you just smile and go on? I think we can all agree that we need to do better in this area! Mark 16:15 commands us to, "Go into all the world and preach the Good News to everyone." 

   Ya all ready for some sassiness!? HA! I am going to go ahead and give this a television rating of MA! This is NOT suitable for children!

It is Good Friday! Today is the day that God our Father chose as the day that His one and only Son would die to save every soul from the pits of hell, from then until He returns! Today is the day that as Jesus breathed His last breath, that your face crossed His mind as He said, "Father forgive them, for they don't know what they are doing!" Luke 23:34. He may have died for millions of people! But your name was on that list! My name was on that list!

I'm going to be real with ya all here. I have been on a true struggle with writing lately. Which is usually when I need to shut up and listen! Ha! But I have written things, they start out one way and end another, it doesn't make sense! So naturally I started throwing myself into other things! But back to reality, and what God is calling me to do! My devotional, that was inspired by these messages, is about to hit the shelves! (That maybe what snapped me back!) So now is the time to think about next steps! Another devotional? A study? God is stirring something in my heart, and it may just be the end to this blog. 

  I'm a dreamer at times. Of all the things I could do, I would do, I would want to do if... I won the lottery! How many of you think about that? How many of you have actually sat down and wrote out exactly what you would do if you were handed, say, six hundred million dollars! Oh! I have! Ha! Many times! How many of you think about how much easier life would be if you were just rich! Unlimited money! That imaginary tree that we always talk about, that grows money- what if it became a reality!

   Do you act differently around other people? We would all love to say no. That we are completely ourselves no matter who is around! But the truth is, most of the time, we don't even realize that we do it.  When we are around our grandparents, we are on our best behavior.  Around our friends and our siblings, we act like ourselves, whatever that means for each individual. However, in different friend groups, we change, maybe not much, but enough to fit within the group. We all crave to fit in! So we change how we talk and walk and interact!

 Do you seek the Lord in "good times"? Even when you feel like you "don't" need Him? Do you praise Him and thank Him for the calms within your storms? Or are you like some many, that quickly forget what God does for you? Living your life like you don't need Him, acting like you save yourself, and He has never intervened for you. Do you wait until your situation is no longer bearable once again to cry out for help? Do you wait until anger boils up with in you, and you scream at God, "How you could you let this happen!" Do you only acknowledge God when you have nowhere else to turn?

  Does anyone know the true definition of Commitment??

  I don't know if everyone truly understands the wrath of God. When God declares enough is enough, He has given enough warnings, enough time outs. Some people say that the rainbow is God's promise to never destroy the earth again. Folks, that is oh so wrong! The rainbow is God's promise to never wipe out the earth again with a flood! He made that very distinction! Genesis 12:14&15 says, "When I send clouds over the earth, the rainbow will appear in the clouds, 15. and I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures. Never again will the floodwaters destroy all life."

I heard this verse recently, and it felt like someone stabbed me right through my core. Isaiah 59:14&15 says, "Our courts oppose the righteous, and justice is nowhere to be found. Truth stumbles in the streets, and honesty has been outlawed. 15. Yes, truth is gone, and anyone who renounces evil is attacked."

  God is amazing! He keeps pressing on my heart, that this year is going to be awe inspiring! The most unexpected people in our lives are going to come into relationship with Jesus! There are going to be miracles that happen that will leave no other explanation other than God! There will be absolutely no doubt for anyone that God is ALIVE! God is not dead! That God reigns! The same as all these things that are going to absolutely amaze us, we will also be amazed at the heart break. The heart break of loved ones being completely sucked in by the lies of the enemy. Our loved one's denial of God. There will people whose hearts that will be turned to stone. For some of these people they will be people that we looked up to. They will be people that we perceived as godly. It will be shocking. 

  How good are you at twisting a narrative? Or twisting the truth just a bit... its still the truth! Just missing some key details!? We all do it! Especially when we are in trouble! Or when we get into a fight with someone, and you are looking for others to take your side... we usually state exactly what happened, and exactly what was said! But when we change the tone, and the attitude! Then we are changing and twisting what actually happened! It helps others pick sides in a fight! Fact is- both sides can be telling the truth 100%! But also changing the delivery 100%. So, is it then a lie? A half-truth? Or still truth? 

   Today I am writing directly from the heart! We are about to come into 2024!!! As you can all see, the world around us is not getting any better. As prophesied in the Bible, it is not going to get any better, in will in fact get a whole lot worse. I want to challenge each and every one of us this weekend, to do some serious reflecting.  Turn off your t.v.! Turn on some Christian music! PRAY! Pray about you mindset. Pray about habits you need to give up! Pray about people you need to forgive! Pray about whether or not you are walking with the Lord! Or if you are walking to the beat of your own drum.  Think about the movies and the t.v. shows you watch, are they speaking truth into you? What about the music you listen to? Is it drawing you closer to God?? 

Have you noticed that some of our key words are being taken out of our vocabulary? Some of the simplest words have been blacklisted. Or have been put in a category all of its own, as "trigger words". Now I am not an insensitive person. In fact, I would say the opposite. But I do know that I should be able to walk into a room and say, "Good Morning! It's a beautiful day!" Without being punished. How quickly we are now corrected on what is acceptable, and what is not. When will stand against all of this brainwashing and manipulation?? I will and can agree on some things! But the one I am hyper focused on today, is the word- "Nervous". That word has been cancelled! Void! Anyone want to guess what it has been replaced with?! Anxiety. Anxiousness. 

   I keep coming back to this, so buckle up! 

JESUS WEPT.

    That moment. That one moment when you find out that someone you loved and trusted, turns out to be someone else. Someone you have shared life with. Maybe a spouse. A best friend that you have had since kindergarten.  A parent. A sibling. That moment when they stab you right in the back. You can literally feel your heart falling out of you. You feel like it isn't real. You don't want it to be real! Because if that person is capable of doing that to you, then what about ALL the other people in your life? Who can you trust!! Especially now that the one you trusted the most was capable of doing that! What do you do? Who do you turn to?

Things are changing every day! Everything is now available at our fingertips! With the internet and smart phone being capable of connecting at any moment. We can search and Google anything and everything! The day of going out to the driveway to pick up the newspaper are over. That trusty paper that told all of the local news, and shared all the events that were about to come up! Now what? We don't have anything to give us those helpful suggestions! We go searching on our own, and type in key words that would fit our likes and interests, and a world of possibilities show up! From the world. 

   This is for the doubters. The one's that believe that God and all His infinite power is a made-up fairy tale. That He is something for weak people to find hope in. This is for the one's that do believe, but they believe they can manage their relationship with God all on their own. That they don't need to be around a family of believers to grow, To the one's that raise their hand and say, "yes" I believe in God! But live their whole lives within the wants and desires of their own flesh. 

There are so many questions about the end times. There are books and movies about the ending of the world and humanity. Many are created from very imaginative minds! Some claim to be based on science, and some are from what the Bible tells us. Here is what I know, Jesus is coming back! All the other details- we will all be in awe of and amazed by! 

    Does the Holy Spirit speak to you? Do you believe the Holy Spirit can speak to you? When you pray, and you cry out to the Lord- do you stop to let Him respond? Did you know that the Holy Spirit has as much to say to you, as you do to Him?! When you pray, in those still small moments, He is talking to you too! When you cry out in those moments of distress and fear- He is crying out to you!  These words have been on my heart so much lately!

  2 Peter 2: 4&5 says, "For if God did not spare even the angels who sinned. He threw them into hell, in gloomy pits of darkness, where they are being held until the day of judgement. 5. And God did not spare the ancient world--- except for Noah and the seven others in his family. Noah warned the world of God's righteous judgement. So God protected Noah when He destroyed the world of ungodly people with a vast flood."

  Have you ever given up hope? Are you on the verge of giving up hope? Have you ever thrown your hands up in the air, and declared, "If there truly was a great and powerful Almighty God!!- there is no way that He would allow these things to happen!!" 

  In that last post- we only got through the first 6 verses of Zephaniah! This one may be a bit longer! But now that we have had an eye-opening introduction to Zephaniah! We will go through the rest of the first chapter!

   We are going to start digging into God's power! If this doesn't stir up something in ya- ya better get to prayin! I'm convicted from these writings! There really isn't a human that wouldn't be! So buckle up!

  We have become so comfortable sitting in the lazy boy recliner of God's loving hands. We search the Psalms to be uplifted with verses of God's grace, and God's mercy, and God's love! We swaddle ourselves in the comfort that the Holy Spirit is with us - no matter what! And that He will pull us out of whatever pit we find ourselves in! Don't get me wrong! I LOVE all these parts of our amazing Lord!! But how often do we talk about how POWERFUL our God is!?!? He told Noah to build a boat! Save his family! And to save two of each animal! He sent the animals to Noah! We love that story! Noah listened to God! He was faithful! But we neglect the other half of that story! 

I apologize for being inconsistent! I am trying to do better! Life has been crazy! But I think that is true for everyone!! But here's what I got for you today!

We have used this scripture before, we are warned in 2 Timothy of how deceitful people will be in the end times. I feel things rings true a little more every day. 

  There has been much discussion about the people of the church, and how so many come on Sunday mornings, they smile, they wave, they drink their coffee, and then you don't see or hear from them again until the next Sunday. Then there is the small group that shows up for everything! Every Bible study, every worship service! Even just random times- just to pray!! People talk, and so many say that Christians are "Hypocrites". That they are only good on Sundays. Here is what I say. There are plenty of people that are hypocrites! We are all human! We are all going to make mistakes! I am not perfect. God is still working on me! But for those people that come on Sundays, just to check God off your list for the week--- I have news for you!!! That is not enough!

   Sometimes we get confused as to what we should or should not be doing! I have on my wall, 2 Timothy 3:1-5, You should know this, Timothy, that in the last days there will be very difficult times. 2. For people will love only themselves and their money. They will be boastful and proud, scoffing at God, disobedient to their parents, and ungrateful. They will consider nothing sacred. 3. They will be unloving and unforgiving; they will slander others and have no-self-control. They will be cruel and hate what is good. 4. They will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather than God. 5. They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Stay away from people like that!"

This entry may be a little sensitive for some. If you feel offended or mad about anything that I have ever written, that is ok! That is the Holy Spirit convicting you. Pray about it! Seek your heart! Ask God to show you what about it is so painful for you! Let God start His work! Let Him start the healing process! 

    2 Timothy 2:20&21 says, "In a wealthy home some utensils are made of gold and silver, and some are made of wood and clay. The expensive utensils are used for special occasions, and the cheap ones are for everyday use. 21. If you keep yourself pure, you will be a special utensil for honorable use. Your life will be clean, and you will be ready for the Master to use you for every good work." 

Have you ever sat down and thought about how absolutely glorious our God is?? I was recently in a prayer meeting; God has a way of showing up in a big way during our prayer meetings! The more the Spirit moves, the rowdier we get! But I start laughing! And I said, "How awesome is it, that we serve a boujie God!" Now stay with me! Yes! We know our God is awesome, wonderful and powerful! 

What is your deepest darkest secret? What are you ashamed of? What do you try to hide from the people that you love? Some people live secret lives! Some people live double lives! Some just hide parts of themselves...

So, someone asked me to talk about the word absolution. They said, "If God puts the word on my heart!" Well, I believe that God speaks to us in different ways! If they were felt compelled to ask, there must be a meaning behind that! So naturally I prayed on it! So here we go! 

 When God speaks to you... Do you listen? Do you even believe that it is possible for God to speak to you? When people are "called" to do something, like I was "called" to write this blog! Other people are "called" to go to foreign countries to share the word of God! Some people are "called" to minister to the homeless! Some are "called" to help single parents! Where do you think that comes from? Do you think people just wake up one day, and say, "Oh that's a good idea!!" Or do you think that there was a tiny but mighty voice inside of them that possibly repeated their calling over and over again, until the person finally listens and acts upon what they are being called to do!?!

 I know I keep going back to, "your purpose", and "God's plan for your life"! But I keep thinking, what would my city look like if.... What would my state look like if... What would my country look like if... What would the world look like if!!! If everyone acted upon God's calling in their life! If every person that was called to help the homeless! DID! If ever person that was called to help prostitutes! DID! If every person that was called to hunt down human traffickers! DID! If every person that was called to search out the pedophiles! DID! If every person that was called, just stepped out in faith! 

Is there something that God has placed on your heart, that you are super passionate about?  Something that is so BIG that it seems utterly impossible to do on your own? Something that you wish you could have a sound system that reached around the world, so that everyone had to listen! HA! So many times, about so many different things, I just wished I had the loudest voice in the room! I wish I had the control to break into every television show, and shout! "JUST LISTEN TO ME!" Whether it is about human trafficking- or child abuse- or foster care. There are ways to make great strides in these areas! But where do you begin? And how do you get the right people to listen?

 We have spoken before, about what our purpose is here on earth! How God created each one of us for a specific purpose. Knowing full well that each one of us has free will. God knew millions of years ago- which of us, His beloved children, would turn their backs on Him. His heart still breaks just the same when it does actually happen. 

1 Peter 5:10, "In His kindness God called you to share in His eternal glory by means of Jesus Christ. So, after you have suffered for a little while, He will restore, support and strengthen you, and He will place you a firm foundation."

It is no secret that this world is in great turmoil! It is heart wrenching to watch the news, and it is truly scary what is happening in our own neighborhoods. Cities that were once deemed safe! Are no longer, there is no longer a way of telling when or where the next great catastrophe will take place!

 I started reading Ecclesiastes today, and I have to tell you, this first chapter made me belly laugh!! It starts out with, "Everything is meaningless, says the teacher, completely meaningless!" How many of you have felt like that? How many of you have questioned the point of life? We seem to go in circles, doing the same things day in and day out. Generation after generation- history repeating itself over and over! Funny that they felt the same way over two thousand years ago!

Did you know that God Commanded us to do more than what He listed in the 10 Commandments!?! Do you think God sent out the 10 Commandments and stamped it good for everything! Well, that is kind of true, but so very false! While everything that He adds on later, can be backed by the 10 Commandments, they are also new! We do the same with our children. We start with a base set of rules, but as they get older, they get new rules! But their new rules, are backed by the original rules! As situations change, and the things that they want to do, become more independent- we have to adjust!

 Do you struggle with anger? When confronted with issues, whether they are big or small, do you fight the urge to lash out?  Or do you not fight the urge at all, and go straight to lashing out? Who is on the receiving end? Is it all verbal? Physical? How are you hurting the one's that you love? Do you feel remorse afterward? Do you apologize? Swear that you will never do it again? Do you beg for forgiveness? Or are you the complete opposite, and make excuses for your actions? Claiming that they deserved it? 

So, I have been on a mini struggle bus lately, wondering what God has planned for me next!  Do not get me wrong, I am loving where He has brought me this far!!! He has been faithful and amazing! And I am simply amazed by Him daily! But in my flesh, I want to know! I want to know what is next?? What is He setting up right now for me?? What is He working on?? Then this verse slaps me right in the face!

In the midst of the 10 Commandments, a topic of "False Doctrine" came up. I think this is super important to discuss. False Doctrine is an increasing issue all around the world. With people wanting to be put on their own pedestals. They are creating narratives to fit their circumstances. With Pastors and teachers being bullied into and threatened into preaching and teaching in different manners that do not Aline with the word of God. 

The Finale!!! The 10th Commandment: Exodus 20:17 says: "You must not covet your neighbor's house. You must not covet your neighbor's wife, male or female servant, ox or donkey, or anything else that belongs to your neighbor."

 Imagine if you will that you are sitting on your couch, watching t.v. minding your own business, and all of a sudden, the SWAT team has guns pointed at you, screaming for you to get on the floor! You are arrested, and during interrogation you figure out that your neighbor claimed that you had a drug lab in your basement.  

 We are complicated people, with complicated issues! It's no secret that each one of us have things that we have to face and deal with, that we have no desire to do! Which leads us to simplifying other areas in our lives, that are actually to be just as complicated, if not more! The biggest one for most of us, is our diets! We spend so much time and energy on other things, that we make our own bodies a burden to take care of. The more we stop thinking about it, and we push the big things into the background, the less it matters to us. Until it becomes a giant problem that you can no longer ignore! I've known people that have done this to every aspect of their lives. They truly didn't care about anything, and they expected things to fall into place for them for everything. 

 The Seventh Commandment:

 We are onto the sixth Commandment already!!

 My youngest child has this heart! It's the size of Canada!!!  It's big, bold and beautiful! It often astonishes me! She loves fiercely! But MAN! She can battle just as fiercely!  Like most young children, she often doesn't know or understand what she is battling for! All she knows sometimes, is that another person's heart is breaking. When she sees that pain - she instantly wants to fix it! Anything to take that pain away! To make their live better! Happier! (If we could all just love that way!) 

If this is your first Moving on to the fourth Commandment, I hope you are enjoying this!! If not, it's a great reminder! Maybe it will be a fresh look at something that we have made a million excuses for over the years! These might be old rules! However, they still pertain to us! And as long as we have breath! They always will!!

The 3rd Commandment. This particular Commandment, for whatever reason... drives me the maddest. I think there are a lot of factors for that, and maybe it's simply because people don't hide it. So many people do not care about the words that escape their lips. Some people don't even understand the words they speak, and how harmful they actually are! Not just to that person, but also to the people that have to hear them in your presence. Maybe it is because my parents drilled this into my head at a very early age...

 So, we have gone through the first two Commandments. Before we move onto the third, I think it is important to comment on the verse that follows the second Commandment. So here we go! It's heavy!

Well, we are onto the 2nd Commandment that God gave us. I have heard people say that the Commandments are old school. That the bible as a whole is old school. That God needs to give us wiggle room with His rules. That we live in a different world now. That there is no way He could expect us to continue with the same rules that have been around since before Christ's birth!?! Here is the stone-cold hard truth of it! Do you think that just because we have buildings that go up into the sky, and cars that drive themselves, and that because we have computers, and cell phones, and the whole world at our fingertips. That the temptations that the world offers us, are different than they were back then???  NO!!! All the temptations are the same! The pressures may be more evident now. Things may be more assessable now! Just as the temptation are the same, the fact that God loves us fiercely is also still the same! He watches our moves! He still cares what we choose! 

God often makes me giggle. He uses some of the strangest things to speak to me. He put it on my heart to go through the 10 Commandments. Like a getting back to basics kind of thing. I got all the way to the 10th Commandment, and as I was writing, He really told me to get back to basics! Asking if He was in involved in writing these entries!?!? Hmmm.... OUCH! 

 The lies of the enemy can surely be obnoxious! Sometimes I shake my head and wonder how people believe the bologna he puts out there. But usually, it's mixed with a bunch of confusion, a little bit of truth, and whole lot non-sense. But I stumbled upon this website, that says that is you go to hell, even though you are guaranteed to suffer- that the amount of suffering will be weighted upon how much evil you actually did. 

 Have you ever heard the phrase, "God won't give you more than you can handle"? I know that most of us have heard it, in some of our deepest, darkest times. When things seem to go wrong at every turn, and at some points we find it hard to breath. Those are the moments, when someone you love, and trust comes in with that one line! Thinking that they are helping and comforting. Which really in make you, in that moment want to smack the messenger, and scream at God to really give Him a piece of your mind!

 I feel that we have moved past the phrase, "for fear of the Lord". I think most of us focus the following, "God is LOVE! God is merciful! God is grace!". Why would we need to fear the Lord if He is in fact all of these things?!?!

 I have heard a reoccurring theme today. That is, people being hurt by the church. We had previously discussed the importance of church, and surrounding yourself with fellow believers, but we did not talk about the other side of that. What if you have been hurt by the church? As we all know there are many different churches, and denominations. There are places that call themselves churches and speak absolutely zero biblical truth!  It breaks my heart as to how many churches are bowing down to the world to appease the people of the world. And changing scripture to fit their wants and needs. We are here to serve ONE GOD!!, Not any one person or group of people!

In the previous entry- we ended with 1 Corinthians 6:19&20: "Don't you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself. 20. For God bought you with a high price. So, you must honor God with your body." So, what does that all mean? How is that possible? In Jeremiah 1:5 it says: "I knew you before I formed you in your mother's womb. Before you were born, I set you apart and appointed you as my prophet to the nations." 

1 Corinthians 3:1-4 says this- 1. Dear brothers and sisters, when I was with you, I couldn't talk to you as I would to spiritual people. I had to talk as though you belonged to this world or as though you were infants in Christ. 2. I had to feed you with milk, not with solid foods, because you weren't ready for anything stronger. And you still aren't ready. 3. For you are still controlled by your sinful nature. You are jealous of one another and quarrel with each other.  Doesn't that prove you are controlled by your sinful nature? Aren't you living like people of the world? 4. When one of you says, "I am a follower of Paul" and another says "I follow Apollos" aren't you acting just like people of the world?