The Bible that I try to read from everyday, in my office, is a T.D. Jakes Bible, KJV. I really like some of the things that he writes in there. Today I was reading Genesis 29, and he wrote a comment about verse 17 which reads... Leah's eyes were delicate, but Rachel was beautiful of form and appearance. Jakes' comment was about comparison. He wrote "He [God] never asks us to compare ourselves with any other person. In fact, it is a slap in God's face to look at someone else and say, "I wish I were like her."... None of us has the privilege of criticizing God. He is the Creator who looks at each of His created beings and says to Himself, "It is good.".... It is dangerous to give so much power to another person that their opinion determines your self-esteem..... God made you for His own purpose so that you might reflect a unique aspect of His glory....God wanted you to be you. Nobody else. You!"
Comparing myself to someone else and basing my own standards on them is something that I constantly did. I still catch myself doing it sometimes. It left me (and still tries to) feeling like I would never amount to much. I always felt intimidate and awkward, especially around other women. Those feelings will cause you to never try. They cause you to beat yourself up over the smallest things. I had such a desire to change, but I didn't want to change the right things for the right reason. I wanted to fit in, please people. I gave people the power to determine MY self-esteem with their opinions, actions or even just lack of. I gave them the power just by watching them and thinking I had to be just like them. I felt like I was always failing. I have a good friend that inspires me alot. I compared myself to her, and wanted to be like her. She still inspires me, being inspired is a good thing, but I don't want to be like her anymore. I want to be like me. What inspires me the most about her is her confidence to be herself. I want the confidence to be MYSELF.
I have learned to not dwell on the bad feelings of myself. I work hard at pushing those feelings out of my heard as quickly as possible. I try to instantly hit the delete button on those thoughts. I remind myself that I am the person God made me to be, and it really hurts Him when I don't think of myself the way He thinks of me. He loves me, and He is proud of me when all I do is try my best to live my life for Him.
Have a Blessed Day!
Monday, August 25, 2008
Thursday, August 21, 2008
God's words
I was just writing a prayer letter to God. I was talking to Him about how I need to be more aware of Him throughout the day. I can be at the end of a day and realize the day has just past me by and I didn't really get much from it. God is working in my life every second of everyday, and I have missed what He has done for me that day. I focus more on the worldly things still rather than focusing more on God.
I use to hear people talk about how God has given them a word for the year, something to dwell on, to help them with their relationship with God. I never use to understand how people heard from God, how they new God has given them this word. Well, now I have been able to hear words from God. It is like my pastor said last night at bible study. You will start understanding God's words when you are filled with His Holy Spirit. When I became filled with the Spirit it gave me a new desire to set my life right. That took me a couple of years, and it was difficult for me, but once I was able to put things behind me and start to remove the barrier between me and God I was able to really start to hear from Him.
It started for me back in September. My word then was TRUST. God showed me that word in my BSF (Bible Study Fellowship) class. I needed to trust God more, to give Him control of my life. In May it was OPEN and HONEST. I needed and wanted to be more open and honest in my relationships. I want people to know the real me, and I want to be comfortable with who God has made me to be and to stop trying to be someone I am not. In July it was INTEGRITY. God spoke that word to me through my Pastor. That word came after a hard lesson in how to be open and honest in a loving way. It was a reminder that I need to be very careful what I say to people, and more importantly, how I say it. This month my word is FOCUS. I have really been trying to work on what I allow myself to focus on. I want to focus on God so much more than I do. I want to focus on the love and support that comes from Him. I catch myself allowing my thoughts to put myself in negative situations in order to feel loved and ,basically, pity from people; to feel important and special. I truly don't want that. I want to keep my focus on God so that when people look at me they see God shining through me.
I asked God while I was writing to Him this morning to inspire me to be able to write something in my blog today. He did so instantly. I actually stopped my letter to write this. Sorry God, for cutting my letter short.
Wow! I really need to work on writing a little faster, I have been working on this for over an hour. I need to go get ready, today is beach day!
Have a Blessed Day!
I use to hear people talk about how God has given them a word for the year, something to dwell on, to help them with their relationship with God. I never use to understand how people heard from God, how they new God has given them this word. Well, now I have been able to hear words from God. It is like my pastor said last night at bible study. You will start understanding God's words when you are filled with His Holy Spirit. When I became filled with the Spirit it gave me a new desire to set my life right. That took me a couple of years, and it was difficult for me, but once I was able to put things behind me and start to remove the barrier between me and God I was able to really start to hear from Him.
It started for me back in September. My word then was TRUST. God showed me that word in my BSF (Bible Study Fellowship) class. I needed to trust God more, to give Him control of my life. In May it was OPEN and HONEST. I needed and wanted to be more open and honest in my relationships. I want people to know the real me, and I want to be comfortable with who God has made me to be and to stop trying to be someone I am not. In July it was INTEGRITY. God spoke that word to me through my Pastor. That word came after a hard lesson in how to be open and honest in a loving way. It was a reminder that I need to be very careful what I say to people, and more importantly, how I say it. This month my word is FOCUS. I have really been trying to work on what I allow myself to focus on. I want to focus on God so much more than I do. I want to focus on the love and support that comes from Him. I catch myself allowing my thoughts to put myself in negative situations in order to feel loved and ,basically, pity from people; to feel important and special. I truly don't want that. I want to keep my focus on God so that when people look at me they see God shining through me.
I asked God while I was writing to Him this morning to inspire me to be able to write something in my blog today. He did so instantly. I actually stopped my letter to write this. Sorry God, for cutting my letter short.
Wow! I really need to work on writing a little faster, I have been working on this for over an hour. I need to go get ready, today is beach day!
Have a Blessed Day!
Monday, August 18, 2008
Thoughts on yesterday's sermon
Do I use the hard times in life as a way to plug into God? This was one of the questions asked by Pastor Tom. This is something I have recently been learning how to do. My initial reaction has always been to focus on the horrible thing that is going on at the moment, to allow it to completely ruin my day. To let it have control. I still do it. The difference now is that I do eventually see what God wants me to learn from the experience. I see that each experience changes me and strengthens me, and with each experience it does not take as long for me to reach out to God and lean on Him instead of just dwelling in the situation.
The Pastor also talked about how Jesus always heals the spiritual before the physical. I have experienced that through my time of depression. I have talked to people about my feelings, over and over. Talking helped me to sort things out. I took the medication, which I was not happy about but, it helped to calm my emotions enough so I could focus. What has really helped me through it is my developing relationship with God. It is during my quiet times with Him that things really sink in.
He also talked about the importance of alone time with God. This is, also, something I have been working on. Reading the bible for me was always a big struggle. I felt frustrated because I just didn't understand it. I have learned that God will show me what I need to learn from the Bible each time I read it. It is ok if I read a chapter and nothing jumps out at me. I may not have needed what that chapter was teaching that day, and it is ok because more importantly I had my special time with God through reading His word.
Prayer has been my biggest struggle. Part of that was a self-esteem issues. I could pray for others sometimes but not for myself. Now it is more of a struggle with staying focused. My mind loves to wander. So I have started to physically write God letters of prayer. I have to stay focus in order to write what I am thinking.
I don't always do these things everyday but, I have been doing them pretty regularly. I truly am a different person than I was when I first started to go to church, about five years ago. It is all because of my relationship with God, through his Son. Sometimes life can feel like a non-stop, uphill climb. It can make you feel like you just can't do anything right. God will get you through it, and He really does not allow you to go through more than you can handle. It is your choice on how you are going to get through it. Someone once told me that all of our struggles have a shelf life and that they will eventually expire.
Have a Blessed Day!
The Pastor also talked about how Jesus always heals the spiritual before the physical. I have experienced that through my time of depression. I have talked to people about my feelings, over and over. Talking helped me to sort things out. I took the medication, which I was not happy about but, it helped to calm my emotions enough so I could focus. What has really helped me through it is my developing relationship with God. It is during my quiet times with Him that things really sink in.
He also talked about the importance of alone time with God. This is, also, something I have been working on. Reading the bible for me was always a big struggle. I felt frustrated because I just didn't understand it. I have learned that God will show me what I need to learn from the Bible each time I read it. It is ok if I read a chapter and nothing jumps out at me. I may not have needed what that chapter was teaching that day, and it is ok because more importantly I had my special time with God through reading His word.
Prayer has been my biggest struggle. Part of that was a self-esteem issues. I could pray for others sometimes but not for myself. Now it is more of a struggle with staying focused. My mind loves to wander. So I have started to physically write God letters of prayer. I have to stay focus in order to write what I am thinking.
I don't always do these things everyday but, I have been doing them pretty regularly. I truly am a different person than I was when I first started to go to church, about five years ago. It is all because of my relationship with God, through his Son. Sometimes life can feel like a non-stop, uphill climb. It can make you feel like you just can't do anything right. God will get you through it, and He really does not allow you to go through more than you can handle. It is your choice on how you are going to get through it. Someone once told me that all of our struggles have a shelf life and that they will eventually expire.
Have a Blessed Day!
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Answered prayer
I had a pretty exciting day yesterday, a prayer of mine was answered. A couple of months ago I wrote a song. I wrote my own lyrics to an exsisting song. My thought was to either find a karaoke CD of it or sheet music so I could sing my song at church. It turned out that I couldn't find the song anywhere. So then I decided to look into having someone compose some music for my lyrics. Well, God put Mark into my life, and thanks to his talents my song has come to life. I was able to hear what he had come up with yesterday, and it was absolutely beautiful. It was just so neat to hear my words put to music. What was even more amazing was that Mark was able to tell me what my song was about. He really understood my song and he took my song to heart, and that enabled him to come up with the right music for it. Now comes the process of getting my song put on CD, he has even offered to produce it with me singing. I can't wait to share it at church. This song is about my life, before and after Jesus became a part of my life. Sharing this song is a way for me to share what inviting Jesus into my life has done for me. Music is another way for me to express myself, other than writing words on paper (or typing them).
Thursday, August 14, 2008
New Blogger
I have decided to enter into the world of blogging. This is a whole new experience for me. I like to put my thoughts down on paper, and sometimes I really want to share those thoughts with other people. I have a few people in my life that really inspire me, and I hope that maybe I will be able to do the same for someone else through sharing my thoughts on life and my relationship with God.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)