Music pulled
from https://www.youtube.com/ and
are free for public consumption**** Bible Verses pulled from https://www.biblegateway.com/ unless noted
otherwise and are free for public
consumption**** (NIV -New International Version, NKJV-New King
James Version, AMP -Amplified Version, TPT-The Passion Translation)
Date: Sunday, April 18, 2021
Covid and the Church @New Life Christian Church Spring Hill https://fb.watch/4Y2rPvq6-g/
Meditation
Opportunities
“But I tell you that everyone will have to give account on the day of judgment for every empty word they have spoken “Matthew 12:36”
(@Jesus Calling 365 Devotions with Real-Life
Stories @Sarah Young)
“Peace is My
continual gift to you. It flows
abundantly from MY throne of grace. Just
as the Israelites could not store up manna for the future but had to gather it daily,
so it is with My Peace. The day-by-day collection of manna kept My people aware
of their dependence on Me.”
Exodus 16:15-16, 19 Moses said to them, “ it is the bread the Lord
has given you to eat. This is what the Lord
has commanded: ‘Each one is to gather as much as he needs’…No one is to keep
any of it until morning.”
Philippians 4:6-7,19 Do not be anxious about anything , but in
everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your request to
God. And the peace of god, which transcends
all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus…And my
God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus.
Hebrews 4:16 Let us then approach the thrown of grace with
confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time
of need.
Romans 10:9-10 (NIV) @BIBLEGATEWAY.COM
9 If you
declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your
heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you
believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your
faith and are saved.
Soul Vibes / Motivation Movers (YouTube.Com)
Lead Me To The Cross @Hillsong
Daily
Journal/Thoughts/ Prayers (Thinking out loud)
As I find myself struggling for the quiet and
time to just mediate and come to the foot of the cross I am carried back to the
moment when we finally see that the one truth in this universe is God will Come
and all our chains will be broken.
Healing and peace will forever be for all who truly believe and call
upon the name of Jesus. So, as I struggle
with the elements of change in my home and my focus is being distracted, as I
find myself not seeing what is right in front of me at times. I know there is nothing the Lord will not use
for the greater good. You'll Come @Hillsong
As I let frustrations creep in and realize I
never planned to raise my grandchildren; truth be told I never took lessons or knew
how to be a parent. But we made it and
both beautiful souls I was blessed with turned out to be loving, caring
beautiful souls. Fully aware their
choices ar their own. Even if here and
now I am in the situation to be the stability for the extended bloodline.
Even if today’s so much different than what was
then. Even if some of us give up way
to easy and cop out using every excuse in the book to just not fight forward.
I was not always the nice and kind soul. I fought with demons all my life and in
the circle of life God has blessed me with the truth feeding my soul with peace
and deep gratitude. Yes I was that
91/2 year old kid awakened from a sound sleep fighting for my life unable to
breathe through the pains at the hands of a friend of the one called mother. I was that child that has no recollection
how I ever made it back to what was called home. Or from the age of 10-16 under the influence
of any thing the demons in the neighborhood in a Jacksonville trailer park
would feed the local kids just to have their way. Magic mushrooms to whatever. No, I do not talk about it much. But we all have a story. From being traded by a local named Ava so
she could get her high on. To taken
into the woods and left. Yet, somehow,
someway God chose me. Chose me to burn
bright and find my way, find myself. Burn Bright @Natalie Grant
How I ended up a survivor I will never question,
but I know I do not deserve a thing. Broken and filled with so much distrust,
hate and anger and constantly trying to allow anything to happen or even trying
to do it myself right up to the age of 17.
Still knowing holding a conversation on the front stairs in Albany
sharing a bottle of Mad Dog 2020 at age 15 fully bandaged up after being thrown
from a van I was passenger and sliding down the pavement one fall night. That single parent no parent household I
was given. I never understood
then. But remembering I had been working
odd jobs cleaning off the books to make money to eat and party since the age of
14. By 16 riding my ten speed from Rensselaer
to Albany to my Dieticians aid position at Eden Park Nursing home at age
16. When not on the bike I was on a
bus. It was then acknowledging nothing or
everything I had meant nothing. If God
did not give me purpose, I was surely going to die. Used up tossed out and so broken in so many
ways.
It was not until my mother said we were moving
back to Florida in 1978. End of 16 into
17 I let my guard down and instead of playing football and fighting with the
boys I learned what I thought love was supposed to be. Two months after my 18th
birthday the best thing in my life that ever happened what my beautiful baby
boy.
God gave me purpose and every battle, every hurt
that I fought through and saved by many along the way from being pulled out of
swimming pools almost drowning or driving the wrong way. Oh yes, I can tell you a lifetime of
stories and how blessed I am and how blessed the gifts of life were even
through all the brokenness and so many scars.
I can tell you even when I did not walk the walk
or know anything of who God was; but from what growing up with Irish Catholic
family exposes you to. That God the
entire time was the captain of this vessel.
Captain @Hillsong UNITED
How can we believe anything when it hurts most
days we cannot even breathe from the choices we make thinking we are doing
something right? When we are seeking
love and we do not even know who our very essence is to know what we need for
love. When We Fall Apart @Ryan
Stevenson
Somewhere, some how we keep fighting through and
holding on to the only thing that matters and for me even though I just wanted
to have a family and make it everything I never had for my son. How badly it hurt most times; when the boy I
grew to cling to, and love said I ruined their life. Somehow even when the pain never went away. God gave me purpose to get back up and keep
fighting forward and just pushing through.
Even When It Hurts @Hillsong United
I am that kid from the school of hard knocks and
not really getting it because 4.5 years later thinking I had it all together I
let my guard down again and fell all over.
Not like the first time but just without question, without expectations enjoyed
the company and the ability to be a grown up.
Thinking maybe this was it, having another child out of wedlock. Man, there is so much to the journey in
between that I could tell why I should have just been that statistic. But somehow God had his hands all over
me. I own my mistakes and scars that
were given to me that gave my own blessings something better but not even close
to what the world qualifies as that family that everyone looks up to.
I gave my children love when I could and all the
material things my 2, 3, 4 jobs at a time would allow me to give.
Backwards but fighting forward. I made the decision and put myself through
college to make something for my life and the life of my children. It was hard; a five-year-old and a baby and
me trying to do it all. Periodically
opening up for those who cared, exposing myself and the children to the darkness. Finding my way to a Lutheran church because
the catholic church I was raised to believe was for the greater good; the same
local catholic churches that the priests that ended up at all my friend’s
wedding receptions having a good time drinking and carrying on... Refused to Christian my children because I
was an unmarried mother.
People are people, secular verse spiritual! There is no doubt about that. The glimpse into that stained glass crystal
ball does not even begin to tell you
what was and is. Becoming a Sunday
school teacher for the church and learning just bits and pieces during that
time. I cannot tell you if it was then
that I lost my heart to Jesus; most likely that is doubtful. When I Lost My Heart To You
@Hillsong UNITED
I was just
going through the motions of survival and trying to seal my children’s fate to someday
know who God really was. As I did not
even really know at that point.
I just knew we absolutely had to be in church
every holiday and found something about being a servant was freeing.
It was not until years later in life which is my
only regret of my life is that it was not sooner where I could have exposed my children
as babies to the name of Jesus. Something About That Name @Anne Wilson
It was
not until so many more testimony moments, broken hearts, broken lives, broken
dreams that there was something about
the name of Jesus that I had to cling to.
That I he was opening the window to my heart and showing me abundance
even when I had nothing.
I wish I could tell you it all went full circle,
and every dream came true, and I am living happily ever after.
Maybe I am maybe this is just what it was supposed
to be. What I know for sure is that God
allowed me to learn who I was as I cried and fought so many times with the
demons of all the scars, they bled me out from all my life.
I could never understand why we had family photos of
mom, dad and brothers and sisters when I was just a baby, but I grew up and
only had my brother and sister.
Why I never understood and had the constant
flashbacks of me as a child crying and screaming as my mother walked out that
door. Or on not one occasion wandering
off as a toddler and the police finding my mother or another the man who was my
so-called father beating me for finding my way back to my house for the dog we
had.
What about as a teenager seeing my father on a construction
site as my brother and I were walking home, and I was trying to make conversation
and he would only have something nice to say to my brother.
How all my life I just needed to be held and
loved. Later at age 50 to learn how it
all made sense. That man was never my
father at all. And because of misdeeds
on his part and that of a teenage wife my mother and what he allowed to happen;
He walked away from his own blessings and turned against and turned away
leaving even those children that were his.
I will never really know what really happened, but
I do know that God gives us the truth and reveals the truth when it is
necessary and when we can handle it.
40 years prior I may have never understood what it
meant to be human and make mistakes day to day. And although I forgave all that was done
to me to those who allowed it and those that did it. Back then I had so much hate, hurt and
anger it would have been disastrous.
We all have demons in our closets that we think we
have a handle on or hurts that they left behind of what we did trying to be
something, trying to be loved, trying to fill gaps.
Mine was just needing to be loved and wanted for
more than 5 seconds of a kid being used or a free ride because I have a
transparent heart and care too much.
Opening my home, opening myself and just wanting pure, never-ending
connection and love and balance.
That perfect love!
I wish I could say even at this stage of the game, even with the wall of
all these years I built and the selective process I stand by letting anyone in
close enough to cut one more time.
Well, I still care too much and although I don’t
give my personal being away, I am surprised this heart still works. I still believe in the cries of many helps
those giving away making my more harder than ever smarter. I still even though I know that the only
true love is the perfect love of Jesus and that is because I live it, feel it,
and cannot explain it; still trust in many and get sucked in when I should
not. Perfect Love @Austin French
It is all good though! Really it is what it is until it is not. As we are all carriers of something and what
does not kill us either makes us stronger to grow forward into the light or
consumes us in the hate, anger and darkness hurting everything and everyone one
along the way. Carriers @Jeremy Camp
As adults we are supposed to lead by example. But we none of us really grasp the freedom of
choice, freedom of will gift to the full of extent that we all will see
judgement at the hands of God no matter how good, bad, or indifferent our
journey was. I know I say that often.
We are blessed and I will never be able explain
how I managed to still be here. From
being pulled out of swimming pools, auto accidents, beatings so badly even suicide
attempts.
Maybe it was getting on that bus and getting baptized
the very first time when that bus picked me up out of a trailer park in Jacksonville
Florida and asking and being sealed.
What I do know is I have taken the stand knowing
the saving grace of Jesus Christ is what gets me up each and every day. We can hold on to the past to relive and
be consumed by what didn’t work out or hurt really bad. I know we all need to stand for
something. With others or alone. The Stand @Hillsong
I choose to keep getting back up when he allows me
and seek what is light, what is love, what is so much better than drowning in
the quicksand of Satan’s sandbox.
Do I still feel those moments and urges of want? Heck yes!
I never said coming into this world.
Let me be all used up broken and lost as a child, make a mess of any
adult life given and walk in sadness hurt, anger, and hate the remaining days I
am given.
I don’t want it all in the sense of what the world
declares all.
I want pure Agape truth and love; from the outside in and never lose it from
the inside out!!!
I am who I am and always will be. I love everyone and no one is a
stranger. But on those days that those
put expectations on me, my friendship, my love. I am no fool and I will let it go. Let It Go @Jason Gray
To
just love someone right where they are even if what they have done calls for
justice and redemption only, they and the judges called forth will give. I am
still learning and know that the one truth is God has all that is, all that was
and all that ever will be. He and his
chosen, He and the 10,000 angel armies on any given day will always be. Even if we cannot see it, feel it or find
ourselves where we can be it. 10,000 Armies @Influence Music & Jonathan Traylor |
Live at Influence Church
I have no regrets of what has led me to the foot
of the cross but that which I was not young enough to find my way there to lead
those I am blessed with early on.
But I won’t stop trying now. Every test we are given, is a testimony to
share. Every mess is a message of hope
and redemption. Healing starts with
you and me and unless we do not grab on and learn to grow forward for our own
personal beings, we get what we
get. Everyone has a story; everyone
has a name. Everyone of us have a name
and everyone of us are made in the image of God. Finding that mercy, love, and grace for who
we are and how to shine forward every day given. Takes purpose to get back up and want to let
go and ask the Holy Spirit to fill us up.
I pray then, now, and always God’s chosen shine
bright through all things. Heal us Father
and guide us to lead others to your cross.
Your will, not my own as I pour
out and remember the fears and shame standing in the world all alone before you
came and took this heart and made me more than I ever will deserve.
All that I am, all that is connected. Every living soul belongs to you Jesus. Have your way~
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