4.2008

Friends are examples of God's grace, they can be encouragers, prayer warriors, and worshippers with you in Spirit and in Truth!

Thank you God for Friends....I'll be holding onto His promises with their help:

You will never leave me nor forsake me
You honor obedience over sacrafice and mercy above all
You love us with an EVERLASTING love
How much more of the Holy Spirit will I give you
How much peace you promise your servants
How much more love you promise to give us if we ask
How much our eyes need to be focused on your salvation
If we draw near to you, you will draw near to us
If the judge that does not believe vindicates the widow how much more will I vindicate you
If you clothe the flowers that are here today and gone tomorrow...how much more will you provide for us
You are our Redeemer, our Provider, our Comforter

Wall us into obedience Lord to the point of death, because we LOVE you and want to acknowledge what you did for us on the cross

For Joe's Happy Song go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmYkz_gleWQ

3.2008

The words for this month are perseverance, consistency, commitment:

per·se·ver·ance–noun 1. steady persistence in a course of action, a purpose, a state, etc., esp. in spite of difficulties, obstacles, or discouragement.
2. Theology. continuance in a state of grace to the end, leading to eternal salvation.
—Synonyms 1. doggedness, steadfastness. Perseverance, persistence, tenacity, pertinacity imply resolute and unyielding holding on in following a course of action. Perseverance commonly suggests activity maintained in spite of difficulties or steadfast and long-continued application: Endurance and perseverance combined to win in the end. It is regularly used in a favorable sense. Persistence, which may be used in either a favorable or an unfavorable sense, implies unremitting (and sometimes annoying) perseverance: persistence in a belief; persistence in talking when others wish to study. Tenacity, with the original meaning of adhesiveness, as of glue, is a dogged and determined holding on. Whether used literally or figuratively it has favorable implications: a bulldog quality of tenacity; the tenacity of one's memory. Pertinacity, unlike its related word, is used chiefly in an unfavorable sense, that of overinsistent tenacity: the pertinacity of the social climber.

con·sist·en·cy–noun, plural -cies. 1. a degree of density, firmness, viscosity, etc.: The liquid has the consistency of cream.
2. steadfast adherence to the same principles, course, form, etc.: There is consistency in his pattern of behavior.
3. agreement, harmony, or compatibility, esp. correspondence or uniformity among the parts of a complex thing: consistency of colors throughout the house.
4. the condition of cohering or holding together and retaining form; solidity or firmness.

commitment
1. the trait of sincere and steadfast fixity of purpose; "a man of energy and commitment" [syn: committedness]
2. the act of binding yourself (intellectually or emotionally) to a course of action; "his long commitment to public service"; "they felt no loyalty to a losing team"
3. an engagement by contract involving financial obligation; "his business commitments took him to London"
4. a message that makes a pledge
5. the official act of consigning a person to confinement (as in a prison or mental hospital)

2.2008

A poem about WHO the Lord is and His long suffering love:

You are in the seas, the trees, the mountains, in every heart that chooses to accept you, you are my brother, my friend, the one who wins in the end. You are God, the beginning and end, you are light that heals, the stops the day from being night, you are the glory that falls upon each one of us and brings us to our knees, you are the Healer, the comforter, the redeemer, the one that sets us free. You are the lamb, the sacrifice, the one that paid the ultimate price…Who are you God? But the heaven and the earth and all of anything that is of worth, you are love, you are God, you are all I see, you are all I want to be

1.2008

More recent part of my testimony:
He is our Provider, He is in Control, He is love and He cannot do anything outside of love (one of the women from a women’s study said that last week). All the tests, trials, temptations are all from Him and He does it so we’ll know that He is Lord. That’s all that He wants is us to know that He is Lord. And I’ve been thinking about Matthew 6 that we studied last week and I think that we pray do not lead us into temptation, but deliver us from evil..but we are death and death desires death and anything in this world is death and so we ask God knowing that we are going to be tempted that He should deliver us from the evil, from death and that’s the other big thing that He showed me was Is 54:1 I got this number in my head and I thought Lord you’re showing me about this verse that talks about singing for more are the children of the desolate women than her who has a husband and I’m not praying about a bunch of children. But I looked up the commentary and it said this is about Jerusalem being restored both physically and spiritually and I thought yeah – I’ll be close to God and allergy free, but I thought about it more and I thought the ultimate physical restoration would be death where there’s no more dying or crying or pain and interesting they would put spiritual in there because at the same time death is the ultimate physical restoration, the ultimate marriage with Jesus Christ when our spirits are to be at home and free with the Lord is also death.
The other thing He’s taught me about which Pastor Mike talked about this weekend is condemnation and I looked up the word and it means judgment and the only one that judges us is the enemy and when we walk in fear of judgment we continually put death back on the cross, we put Jesus back on the cross. So we can walk free of condemnation and free of judgment because Jesus died for us!
The other thing is that Psalm 51 and how David prayed the prayer of penitence after he went into Bathsheba and we can pray for jesus to forgive us and wipe us clean, but I’ve heard people talk about there always being a consequence to sin and in this prayer David is praying for more than forgiveness he’s praying for all the social, mental, physical, etc. implications to be taken away and that he would do anything for them to be taken away and God is like well my grace is sufficient for you, but what should we sin that grace should abound more? and that brings me to Sam.
He came to me and told me that his project was due and that he was just going to make it up because he had done that last time and I knew about that. Well I said WHAT and you go to Horizon and I can’t let you knowingly sin! He was angry and I put my arms around him and he’s getting big so it’s a little scary cause I can’t restrain him, but I finally let him go and then went to give him a big bear hug, telling him I couldn’t let him sin, but I loved him and eventually he started to laugh and that’s how God is with us He gives us a choice to sin, but He always covers us with His love. And that’s what’s important His love and He’s showing me that He’s our Redeemer. Job’s friends were telling him that his life sucked and he should stop sinning and he was like yeah you’re right my life sucks, but you’re not in control of it and the Lord redeemed him and then again with Naomi her husband and two sons died yet eventually He redeemed her and she was the grandmother of Obed the long lost grandmother of Jesus. That’s redemption. And I think that’s it for now….

TESTIMONY

This is my testimony to the Lord’s love: God knew me before He formed me in my mother’s womb. I cannot give you one significant point in my life when the Lord began to work. He has been working all along. He healed me from meningitis at the age of 21 months, when the doctors (mistakenly/or not?) told my parents that it was spinal meningitis and I wouldn’t be able to walk or dance or live a normal life. The Lord proved them wrong! My life was then given to the Lord at age 7. Two years later as my family moved to California, we drifted away from church. The difficulties of the teenage years, I always wished I were like my friends at school who knew the Lord, but I didn’t understand how to get there because I thought I was there. When I turned 19 I got married. We bought a condo at age 21, had a baby at age 23, and decided our marriage was unhappy at age 25. We divorced when our baby was 1 year old. After the divorce I lived out the end of my rebellious teenage life style with greater access to funding life destroying activities. My brother continued to bring me to church, praying for me. 1 year after my divorce I was reading my Bible at home, heavily immersed in the Old testament (I mean after all if the Jews believe this part and the Christians, that’s almost everyone – based on that, I have a pretty good chance of being right if I believe in the Old testament). I then read a verse like I had never seen it before: John 1:1 and understood that Jesus really was God. This led me to John 3:16 God loved the world He sent His only begotten son that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. My eyes were opened. I slowly began to learn what obedience was and how sinful my life was. At the end of 1996, I crashed my car, giving up my worldly counselors and their medications and I turned to Jesus as my Heavenly counselor. He began healing my mind, my heart and my body. Part of that healing occured when I broke my wrist while horse back riding at the end of 1997 with a new Christian girl friend. My wrist took 6 months to heal. I was blessed with time to read God’s word and work worldly influences out of my life. One year later I went forward as a public confession of my sin when Miles McPherson was at Horizon on Sunday night. Through Miles, God had stirred my rebellious nature, irritating me enough to continue attending church. He yelled at the congregation, “If you’re living your life in sin, GO HOME!” He listed many of my obvious sins at the time and I was MAD, “He can’t tell me that I can’t come to church!” So I continued to go to church and live how I wanted to. Through God’s grace, on November 12, 1998 I went forward and publicly acknowledged that I am a sinner and I need Jesus to constantly forgive me. On Valentine’s Day of the next year I was baptized. I started attending Home Fellowship and at this time I began to pursue learning how to answer the Lord’s calling on my life to be a mother. I attended parenting classes left and right, searching the scriptures and through wanting to share the love that I had found, I became involved in the Single Parents Ministry. Praying the Lord would help me overcome my unbelief; My car crashed right after church the following day. The fact that he saved me from injury was a loud answer! The next day our Single Parent Ministry started. Astonishingly, I was there to do my part. One day later, I was not able to lift my head off my pillow. The Doctor said I should have been paralyzed and then I knew why the Lord gave me a scripture in the hospital, it said “Rise and shine for your light has come. The glory of the Lord rises upon you.” The verse is in Isaiah, as is, the rest of my life’s focus, starting with a good friend discipling me. She gave me: The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Isaiah 58:11 This specific Chapter of Isaiah has been and continues to be my focus after 7 years. In May of 2000, I felt led to quit my job of 10 1/2 years at Costco and work at a Christian Preschool. While attending the single mother’s ministry at a different church, I met Kay, never realizing she directed the preschool. How good is God? I went for my interview and we laughed as we already knew each other (that’s just how God is). She gave me a job and helped me grow spiritually. She even worked around my school schedule as I felt led to pursue my Social Work degree. Through my BSW I focused on what I believe the Lord has laid out for me as a road map for life…Isaiah 58. I thank God so much that I had and still have that scripture to hold onto or I might not have finished. Especially, since during the last Semester of my degree in 2003, the condo I was renting filled up with mold and both my son and I became extremely sick. Do you believe this? We found a place in 2-weeks to move into and it was absolutely better than what we had and the neighbors even came to help us move in. Of course we found out that their son had the same name as mine and they were actually from the same church! See, God is sooo good! Even more good news is that the Lord had interested me in taking sign language classes for the last three semesters of my BSW and that allowed me to continue worshiping the Lord while my voice recovered from the mold. What would I do without ASL?!!! 6 months after the move I realized that in order to continue living in San Diego I would need a better job or better education. I then began the application process for the MSW program at SDSU. I continued to practice my signing skills and my love for the people and the language grew. I began praying that if it was possible that the Lord could combine counseling, sign language and children in the same job then sign me up! He took me up on it and I began my internship counseling children that were deaf or hard of hearing. Yipppeeee! It really happened! I seriously had no idea that this job existed. Now with the MSW the Lord has allowed me to obtain a position continuing in that same line of work. This didn’t come easy. I waited much longer than anticipated for this job and actually took another job for a couple of days working at a shelter. I believe that the Lord was showing me that we can make choices that glorify Him and sometimes there really are two or more choices. Either way I ended up working with believers doing what the Lord has equipped me to do for now. I’m continuing to work toward my LCSW and ASL Interpreting Certificate and keeping my eyes open…