Cheating On God

 

Are You Cheating On God?

God's Word says that we are not to put any form of gods or idols before Him. We are to always seek and glorify Him first in all we say and do.  For if what we say and do does not glorify Him, we need not say or do it.  To do otherwise would be an act of cheating on God!

True story: prior to my recent divorce, I was in a hopeless and broken marriage. I was sincerely laying everything before God because I wanted a miracle to happen in our relationship. In my brokenness, it was easy to surrender my all to Him because I wanted something from Him. I was determined in my mission to cross my ”t’s” and dot my “i's”, but once my marriage was over, I found my relationship with God beginning to slip. I began to creep and cheat on God by consuming His time with "things" that would keep my mind off the disappointment of my failed marriage. My already busy schedule got busier and at first, I wasn’t using that as an excuse to hinder my relationship with God but after a while it did.

For example, to have one-on-one time with God, I would sacrifice my sleep every morning to pray, study the Word and meditate on Jesus before I corporately joined the 6am prayer line.  My cheating first started when I began to ignore my 4:45 a.m. alarms. Every time I snoozed or canceled that alarm, I was satisfying my own desire to choose sleep over God.  I was cheating!
My studies as a Social Work major are often times overwhelming. My evening routine included me spending some devotional time with God before hitting the books.  However, my cheating continued when I chose to only do schoolwork and exclude my devotional time with God.

I absolutely love being a grandmother! I get so much joy being with my grandkids doing all sorts of silly and fun things with them.  Sometimes these "things" we do can go on for several hours and by the time we're done, I'm too pooped and worn out to do God or anything else for that matter.  Please don't get me wrong, I am not suggesting that snoozing a little or furthering your education or loving your family is wrong. God forbid! What I am saying is that if what you do from day to day happens before you do God, then you, as I, are guilty of cheating on God.

Let us pray…Dear God, please forgive us for not operating in the purpose you created us for continuous honor, glory and praise to you first, before we do anything or anyone else.  Please reveal to us the errors of our ways so we may nip our "cheating" ways at the bud.  Help us to be obedient to Your Word to “seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things (rest, education, family, money, etc, etc, etc) shall be added unto us”.  In Jesus' precious name we pray, Amen.

I Am her - Debbie Wallace

Hello My Name Is Mom

Hello my name is MOM!

One particular morning in my home pure chaos broke out.  Everyone was calling my name; Mommy this and Mommy that.  My daughter was pouting and whining because she did not like her hair, while my oldest son was scrambling to find a gym sweat shirt.  Meanwhile, my youngest son sat at the kitchen table asking me a thousand and two questions.  Even my husband, who calls me Mommy, was asking where is his belt.  I had to call the angels to quiet my roaring spirit because if I heard “Mommy” one more time, I think I would scream!  I finally stopped and exhaled and told myself to get a grip and to look at what was going on in my house.  However, it was my youngest son, who is obsessed with writing that came up behind me and showed me a picture that said “I love Mommy”.  My heart melted and I just thanked God for that moment in time.

I am learning that most of our life is about appreciating where we’re at.  We often want to get to the destination without enjoying the journey.  Without the journey, we would neglect to be grateful for how far we’ve come in life.  It took me a long time to put into practice that being happy is a choice I had to make every day.  I learned through many painful lessons to enjoy today and not put too much stake in tomorrow.  Believe me when I say, it did not come easily because I am a forward thinker, always going ahead of myself in all things.  However, God is teaching me that I have to enjoy today and today only.  It takes lots of practice and prayer to be content with where you are in life.  However, we should never discount small beginnings because they give way to new horizons.  For example, I often hear parents of small children wish their kids were older; while the parents of older children wish their teens would be back in PreK.  If we can’t just be content in the moment we will miss the beauty of our children being children.  

I understand when Paul said in Philippians 4:12 “… I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation,…” (NIV).  It takes a lot to be content in every situation you may find yourself in.  As a mother, I am embracing my children in new ways that allows me to enjoy their childhood each day and if I we’re honest, each day with them teaches me about more about God, them and myself.  They are my greatest ministry and I am thankful for them and the child-like faith they have.  We all have needs and desires that we want to fulfill for the future, but what we have to do is appreciate where we are at the moment.   Sometimes it pays to just stop and look around and appreciate the life God called you to today.  

"And don't be wishing you were someplace else or with someone else. Where you are right now is God's place for you. Live and Obey and Love and Believe right there. God not your marital status defines you." I Corinthians 7:17 msg

Singleness seems to place a negative stigma on women in our society as in the Old Testament, in Isaiah 4 it reveals that the same desperation for marriage existed in that day. The scripture reveals that there were seven men to one woman because of the many men murdered during war and captivity. The women were in such despair of being single they expressed themselves in this manner, "On that day seven women will seize one man, saying, we will eat our own bread and provide our own clothing. Just let us be called by your name. Take away our disgrace." Isaiah 4:1

Singleness is not a disgrace but a gift from God. Until a person is truly single they can never be ready for marriage. Marriage does not define nor does it complete anyone, it is actually singleness that makes you whole. In I Corinthians 7 Paul was forced to answer these questions most likely presented to him by women who wanted answers concerning the issue of singleness and marriage. Paul who spoke with men exclusively took the time to give his perception on this matter. Paul in essence is saying that singleness is God's original plan, but because sexual immorality is so common, that each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband. But Paul expressed that I wish all people were like me in singleness, but each person has his own gift from God.

We focus more on interrelationships more than intra-relationships. Until you can be single, marriage will never work for you. You have to work on you just imagine this, the person you are now would you marry you and all your issues? If you can't put up with it why expect someone else to, we have to deal with the issues before we are locked into marriage. Dr. Myles Munroe said it best that for the most part "many women meet men who are in heat and not vision and purpose they are in passion and we think it's love." We should be careful of who we marry even God doesn't join Himself to everyone. Dr. Munroe gives us three principles for singleness......1. Singleness is the most important state of human development. 2. Singleness is the foundation of God's design for the human family. 3. God began the human family with one single human being not a couple.

You don't marry to improve yourself, singleness is your foundation to long lasting relationships. Never enter a relationship in despair but approach relationship with discovery not with a mindset that relationships improve you but that relationships expose to you what you need to work on in you, not the other individual but you. Singleness exist in marriage because every individual is responsible for their own actions not the other individual. You have to be accountable for you, the one single person, married or unmarried.

Never let a lapse in time be your determinator for marriage let your singleness determine that. Where you are right now is God's place for you. Live and obey and love and believe right there. Married or Unmarried, God, not your marital status defines your life. Live life in the situation the Lord has assigned you to.

GODFIDENCE

          “You are fearfully and wonderfully made...”  “…For in the image of God made He man,” this is what God says about us.  This is what we are taught in the church, that God made each and every one of us in his own uniqueness.  But, when we look in the mirror we see any and everything except what God has said concerning us.  We initially see our exterior imperfections and blemishes.  If we look deeper we see our interior fears, doubts and short-comings; not the fearful or wonderful image of God.  Lord forbid that we begin to listen to the negative voice that speaks to us, that helps magnify what we don’t have enough of or what we have too much of.  The voice, which is oftentimes self, begins to point out that we are everything else, except what God says that we are. The voice that ultimately tells us we lack conFIDENCE in ourselves.  The voice that makes us start looking at other things, people or places for the conFIDENCE that it tells us we are lacking, instead of God.  

So we begin searching for this conFIDENCE, but this search begins to pull us farther and farther away from what God has said about us, and closer to what self thinks we should be.  Then we find it.  The things that God has spoken to us ceases to be heard, allowing our new found conFIDENCE in self, to begin speaking, telling us that we can change all those negative external and internal things that we see when we look in the mirror.  The conFIDENCE tells us that we should believe the world’s view of how we view ourselves.  The conFidence begins to teach us about self.  Self-confidence, Self-esteem, Self-respect, Self-love, Self-dependence.  We find ourselves no longer fearfully and wonderfully made but Self-made.  No longer are we dependent on God or the Word that has been spoken about us.  We become our own god, searching and seeking Self and in that search we become self-indulgent, self-righteous and self-fulfilled, which will ultimately lead to self-hatred and us being by our-self.  

God wants to turn that around for us.  He wants us to know that the conFIDENCE we search for is an illusion that is unattainable.  God says that He never intended for us to have conFIDENCE in ourselves but confidence in Him.  God wants us to have GODFIDENCE.  GODFIDENCE in the Word.  GODFIDENCE in what He says about us.  GODFIDENCE that He wants and desires what is best for us.  GODFIDENCE that He will take our external imperfections and blemishes along with our internal fears, doubts and short-comings and use them for His glory.  GODFIDENCE that we are fearfully and wonderfully made in His image.  GODFIDENCE in the love He has for each and every one of us.  Psalm 118:8 states, “It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man,” and this is true even if we are that man.  So today let’s not continue to listen to the conFIDENCE that speaks to us but let’s choose to hear, accept and believe in the GODFIDENCE that comes from the voice of God.   

Baggage

When I change pocket books, in haste I just take everything out of the old bag and put it into a new one, not even knowing that I was bringing the old papers, receipts and bills along with me. It wasn't until one day in the middle of this routine that I realized this is what I've been doing in my own personal life.  I was carrying old bills, receipts, gum wrappers etc., or in other words "trash" in a brand new bag.  Everything looked good on the outside but what people didn't know was that inside my nice new bag was trash.

That's how I have been walking around for a while; looking great on the outside, but on the inside, were old behaviors that I carried into this new season and new life in Christ.   I would constantly throw new items that I’d bought into my new bag adding to the clutter of the old stuff.  When it was time for me to retrieve the new items, I had to push around the clutter to get to them.  It would have been so much easier if I had just discarded the old things instead of putting them into the new bag.  God gave me a new life and he constantly places new ideas, new desires and new behaviors in me that get lost in the clutter of old behaviors and thoughts. 

It wasn't until I got tired of all the clutter in my bag that I decided one night to take everything out of my new bag, separate the items and put the old things in the trash. I also realized that I had to do this in my own life as well.  There were nights when I sat alone to trying to separate the old from the new and even though the old thoughts and behaviors I had unraveled frightened me, I had to look at them to distinguish the two in order to discard what I no longer needed.  What's in you that is causing so much clutter?  What's taking up space and blocking the newness God has called you to walk in?  Grab hold to the new ideas, new thoughts, and new perspective about yourself that will allow you to clean out your bag.  You don't have to settle with the mess.

The bible explains in detail what happens when you mix the old with the new in Luke 5:37, "And no one pours new wine into old wine skins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wine skins will be ruined."  The end result will be devastating.  If you are a new creature in Christ you cannot allow the old things of your past continue to dwell in you or you will die in the confusion of trying to be new while still practicing the old.  Such behavior breeds frustration and bitterness, and God has not called us to walk in frustration but instead he has called us to walk in love.  I Am Her - Bianka Rios.

 

-Romans 12:2
-2 Corinthians 5:17
-Luke 5:37

Do you ever find yourself constantly bored with the hum drum of every day? Do you hope and dream of a life filled with "more" but have no clue of what that is or how to get it? Do you surround yourself with people, places and things you don't necessarily "fit into" but convince yourself to because it doesn't occur that better awaits you? If you answered "yes" to any and or all of the aforementioned questions, then it's time, my friend, for you to "Raise the Bar"! Raise the Bar is an expression that stems from track and field events where an athlete has to clear a bar successfully in order to continue competing in a race of the high jump or the pole vault. The object is to set the bar at a certain height and continue to raise it to see who can jump the highest. In everyday life this simply means to not settle for less. It means setting higher standards to get better results. It means never accepting ordinary or the bare minimum because ordinary and minimum will never make you great. All too often, we as people have a tendency to do and accept less than best. You know why? Well as for me, it was because I didn’t know who I was. I didn’t know my purpose and therefore I didn’t live on purpose either. I accepted less because less is what I thought I was. I failed to ‘Raise the Bar’. As a result, my eyes began to see the dark reflections of my thoughts. Thank God for blessing me with a Pastor that teaches me who I really am. She constantly reinforces that the scriptures I grew up hearing aren’t just reading material, they are alive, active and powerful and are actually relevant and they apply to me! How amazing God’s Word is to help me discover that God fearfully and wonderfully designed me to be a precious Royal Gem specifically chosen to live a life of abundance; abundance that has been granted to me through Christ offering Himself as a living sacrifice to die for me. I don’t know anyone that values me enough to die for me – but yet and still, Jesus did it for me. You want to know what else He chose me to be? He chose me to be an ambassador and messenger to show and tell others of His goodness and how they too can be freed from darkness and brought into His wonderful Light of Love, Peace, Joy and more by ‘Raising the Bar’ – “I Am Her” - Debbie Wallace. Scripture References: Hebrews 4:12; Proverbs 23:7; Psalm 139:14; Proverbs 3:15; 1 Peter 2:9