HAVING TO CHOOSE

Sometimes we have to make a choice.  We have to choose what is good, what is right, what is perfect.  The only perfect person is the Lord.  This is why, when the Holy Spirit gnaws at us, we have to choose.  He will not let us rest, He will not let us have peace.  We can no longer live the way we once did, or the way the world says is OK.  We can no longer live in the flesh and WE MUST live righteously.  We MUST walk with integrity.   Actually, at this point it no longer becomes a choice, it becomes a necessity.

Those who do not walk in the light are not able to understand this necessity, this lack of choice.  When you reach this crossroad, this is where the Ruths and Naomis are separated.  Ruth was willing to go where her mother-in-law, Naomi went.  She was willing to accept Naomi's God as her own.  She even went so far as to say please stop asking me to leave you, because she was not going.   

If we are unwilling to walk with our friend, no matter where the Lord takes him or her, then that is where our roads part.  The parting does not have to be in animosity, it does not have to even be any conflict.  It is a reality.  Two people cannot walk on different roads and still hold hands. We have to be willing to follow where the Lord is leading us, even if it means losing that friend.  We must also be willing to give our friends also the freedom to choose, to walk with us or to go their own way. 

The apostle Paul understood this the most when he wrote in Romans 7:15 "For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do".  In other words, as a Christian we do the things we know as Christians to be sinful because of the flesh, even as we try fight not to do them.

We may lose some friends along the way, we may gain some friends along the way. But wherever this choice or lack thereof choice leads us, in order to find peace, we MUST follow it.

More Than You Can Bear

You ever feel all used up, at the end of your rope. Well I feel that way right now. I am surrounded by people that no matter what I do, or how I try to help, they always want or need more. My aunt tells me I need to learn the shortest complete sentence in the world. "No". I actually thought I had it mastered but alas, no, I haven't. When it comes to myself, I am the master of deny. I love to tell myself what I don't need to buy, eat, drink, wear, or do.

However, when it comes to others, I am the master of "lets do this, lets make it happen". I really don't mind the cost of things, but it all becomes too costly after awhile. It costs me energy, it cost me peace, it costs me grace. You may ask how could it cost me these things. Well, it costs me energy because even when I don't really feel like doing something for someone else, I do it. But in the end it feels like I've drained every part of me. It costs me peace, because now I'm in the position that I'm doing something that I really did not want to do, however, because I am a woman of my word, I do it, but there is no enjoyment in it. Lastly, it costs me grace, because, I'm doing the thing with animosity, worry, discontentment and most of all without love.

Someone once said, I do things for people because I like the control. That is the farthest from the truth. I do things for people because A)that's the type of person I am, B) because if you are a part of my life I want you to be as happy as I am and C) the Lord has blessed me and I want to bless others. The problem is this. Reciprocity. Just once in a while, I'd like to ask something of someone and actually receive it. I want it given in love and not payback. I want it given because they want me to have it. I want it given because it is the right thing to do.

So, what is the lesson here? If it feels like a burden it is. Don't do more than you can, don't do more than you're able, and don't do it, if it is not being done with love. Otherwise, it becomes to much for you, and I know that the Lord does not give me more than I can bear.

2 When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze. Isaiah 43:2

You Are So Beautiful To Me

Hello Readers,

I know it's been a while since I have written anything. A lot has gone on since my last post. My eldest son turned 25 years old and my youngest son turned 21 years old and graduated from school. He is now in an adult program for the developmentally challenged. However "sad" this may seem to others, we view it as a milestone and an achievement. So suffice it to say, I feel blessed.

These children (I have two) are so beautiful. They are handsome, physically (you are unable to tell they have mental challenges)and they have beautiful personalities. They are loving and easily pleased. They do not care about name brands, cell phones, the internet, etc. They simply enjoy being with their family and friends. They hug and kiss you, when young men their age would shun mom's demonstrations of affection. They willingly go to Walmart and even push the cart. They tolerate mom's buying them new clothes and wanting to take a picture of them wearing them. They welcome new people into their lives and are a great barometer of who is a good person at heart. I could go on and on.

I once read a poem and it described having a disabled child like landing in a country you did not buy a ticket to. Perhaps you wanted to go to the Caribbean and found yourself landing in Holland. The writer so aptly wrote. If you spend all your time agonizing over not being on the beach, then you will miss all the beauty Holland has to offer.

Although, it is sometimes still difficult to see my two handsome sons with this mental challenge and sometimes wonder what they would be like if they were so called "normal". I believe that my boys (they are still my boys)are a reflection of the love I have for them. I have learned to trust God and "lean not on my own understanding"(Proverbs 3:5). God is my strength and my refuge (Psalm 46:1), and because of Him, I am able to live life to the fullest, love with all my heart, and laugh with the deepest part of my soul.

"The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, the ears of the discerning seek it out'. Proverbs 18:15

They call the day Saint Valentines Day, and it is celebrated annually on February 14Th. It is a day where love and affection is expressed between companions, husbands and wives, girlfriends and boyfriends, parents and their children, and between friends. We send and receive cards, flowers, and candy.

I love to receive all these expressions of love but I prefer for my significant other to do it when he feels like it, and not wait until a day that society has designated. So, I asked myself how did this all start? What was the origin of Valentine’s Day? I must tell you, I really did not like what I found out.

Some say Valentine’s Day started as a pagan holiday. Pagans are sometimes defined as people who are polytheistic, or believing in more than one god. So as I did my research, already the holiday already did not sit right with me. This holiday was connected to fertility and amorous love. Several types of gods were worshipped in connection to this day; the Greeks had Pan, the Semites had Baul or Nimrod who is actually mentioned in the Genesis 10:9, the Romans had Baal, Saturn or Lupercus.

During the early Christian church days, the religious hierarchy tried to get rid of the holiday, but the people refused to give it up. So the church succumbed and tried to turn it into a religious holiday where-in the Virgin Mary was honored. The Catholic Church also tried to change it, and make it a day where Christian martyrs were honored, so they practiced their rites on Feb 14Th in an effort to make the people give up the holiday.

Another popular story is one of a Roman Priest named Valentine. Valentine was imprisoned and executed for performing marriages and refusing to give up Christianity. Roman Emperor Claudius II who was cruel and engaged in several bloody losing battles. He forbade young couples from marrying because he thought that then the new husband did not want to leave his wife. Personally, I think people were tired of dying in his losing battles. Anyway, folklore tells us that the Priest would secretly wed the young couples. Claudius’ soldiers caught him, and threw him in prison. While in prison Valentine befriended the jailers daughter and before he died on FEB. 14Th 296 AD, he wrote her a note and signed it “love from your Valentine”. Hence, Valentine's Day.

While I was doing this research on St. Valentines Day, the Lord pressed this on my heart. “YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL AND ALL YOUR MIND.” As a Christian, I know “we shall have no other gods before Him (Exodus 20:3)and this practice began with worshiping gods. can you imagine? They want to give me Cupid, when I have Christ’s love!

At one time Valentine’s Day was important to me. But as I grow in Christ, I know what is important. This ambiguous holiday designed to make the rich richer is based on our need for love. I came to better understand that God is the source of all our love, and loving God and loving others are interrelated. We cannot have one without the other, and more importantly the bible tells us, “we love because he first loved us.”

I know that it is stressful enough for some who are alone. It is a reminder that they do not have that one person who loves them. So if this is you, remember that God is your provider. "God has not forgotten even the sparrows and we have more value than many sparrows" (Luke 12:6) Do not be disappointed when you do not receive a card, flowers or candy and are feeling unloved, because you have God's love(1 John 4:16. After all, the bible tells us that "God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him, shall not perish but have eternal life”.

WHO CAN LOVE US MORE THAN THAT?

This is the day the Lord has made

I was reading the biography of Dr Martin Luther King Jr. in the encyclopedia. And it struck me as amazing that a man as unselfish as he could be reduced to one page. I began to wonder, if this man’s whole life story could be described in four paragraphs, then they probably would be able to describe mine in four sentences. It reminded me of the poem, The Dash by Linda Ellis where she says “on your tombstone is your birth date and your end date, but in between is a dash, that represents all your years and that only those who truly knew you, knows what that dash represents”.

Here was a man who could only be accused of doing God’s work. And for some reason, those who show no fear in pursuit of the path that God has set before them seem to reach the end at a fairly young age. MLK was 39 and Jesus was 33.

So I began to ponder about those who chose not to celebrate their birthdays. Whether it is because of their particular religion forbids it, or whether they just do not want to recognize they are getting older, or whether they grew up in a household where one day was just like any other. Personally, I love to thank God that He gave me another day. I love to thank God that He has blessed me with a mother whose birthday is today; I love to thank God for the births of my children, of my nieces and nephews. I love to thank God that you are all here and that we can celebrate the life He has given us. After all, didn’t an Angel of the Lord appear to Zachariah and tell him of the birth of his son John, 14 “He will be a joy and delight to you, and many will rejoice because of his birth, 15 for he will be great in the sight of the Lord“. After all doesn’t John chapter 2 tell us that when our Lord was born, “13 Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, 14 “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” and Psalm 127 sings, “3 Children are a heritage from the LORD, offspring a reward from him.”

So what happens after we are born with so much celebration and rejoicing. Are we then forgotten about? I believe it is ok to honor our elders, our friends, our family and even ourselves on our day. You see honor is not the same as worship. And as long as we continue to place God first and foremost in our lives, recognition should be given to those who paved the way for us. Each moment, each day, each year we live is a gift from God “THIS IS THE DAY THE LORD HAS MADE, LET US REJOICE AND BE GLAD IN IT. (Psalm 118:24)” What a blessing it is to live, celebrate, and show each other the love and appreciation we have for each other.

As for me, I say, “Bring the fattened calf and kill it. Let us have a feast and celebrate.
Luke 15:23

Look Toward The Future, Live For Today

This is what the LORD says--he who made a way through the sea, a path through the mighty waters.... "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland." Isaiah 43:16; 18-19

Happy New Year!
As we begin the New Year, we are forced into a time of reflection. We think about the past and what changes we would like to make for the future. Something about the New Year makes us thing now is the time for a fresh start. Some act as if when the clock strikes 12 and the New Year begins we magically get a do-over. All the wrongs can be righted and we can just erase what parts of the last year we did not like. However, as Christians we know that the only way that can be done is by being washed in the blood of Jesus. The only way our past sins can be forgiven and we can be given a fresh start is by accepting the salvation that only Christ can give us. Resolutions are ok to make but the only way we will keep them, if we make them knowing that, we can do everything through Him who strengthens us.

In Lamentations chapter 3 v40, God says, “Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the Lord”. That is the closest thing in the bible that I can find pertaining to resolutions. Some of the things we vow to do is to eat right, exercise, lose weight, stop smoking, stop drinking, spend less, save more, give more, make new friends, be a better friends, get rid of some friends, learn something new, get organized, help others, pray more, read the bible more, fast more, and attend church more. Some believe that your house has to be clean, your laundry washed and black eye peas, collard green, and pork had to be cooking on the stove in order to have prosperity in the New Year. My aunt and I were laughing the other day because we said every year we do the same thing, have dirty clothes, and have to clean the house anyway. So what is the point?

With all that starting this and stopping that, we must remember to enjoy and really LIVE the life that God has given us. The bible reminds us of this in Ecc Ch 8 V15 “So I commend the enjoyment of life, because nothing is better for a man under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany him in his work all the days of the life God has given him under the sun”.
Therefore, while I am an advocate for saving for a rainy day, lately, I have been wondering what if the rainy day never comes. Even though I have a small emergency fund, I believe in enjoying the life that God has given me. I like the finer things in life and I love sharing them. I eat off of my good dishes, I use my good wash cloths, I let the kids eat in my car and I do too, and I lie down on the good couch in the living room. Sometimes we are so busy planning for the future and worrying about what happened in the past that we forget to live now. As Paul wrote to the Philippians in chapter 3 verse 13-14 No, dear brothers and sisters, I am still not all I should be, but I am focusing all my energies on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I strain to reach the end of the race and receive the prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us up to heaven.

The other day in the hospital, I was talking to my friend who is like another mother to me and as she faces mortality, she said, “You know life goes by too fast.” I was showing her a picture of my sons Anthony and Mychal who are now 20 & 24. She marveled at how it seemed just like yesterday they were 12 and 16 years old. As we sat quietly, thinking about how time gets away from us. I could not help but imagine that she was thinking about the vacation house she never got a chance to build. She had already invited my mom and me, and told me how we could sit on the top veranda and look over the hill at the trees the monkeys were swinging in and sip iced tea. I imagined she thought about that trip to Africa we were supposed to take, and the only thing we were still trying to work out was whether it was going to be West Africa or South Africa, and I imagined she thought about that new car she was going to buy, she just did not know which one. As we, both sat there quietly thinking, I thought, “You know it is ok to plan, but it is more important to do.” Therefore, even though I intend to continue eating healthy, I also intend to give myself permission to enjoy an occasional scoop of butter pecan ice cream. Moreover, although I intend to continue to save for an emergency, I give myself permission to go on my dream vacation to Africa. And although I intend to discipline my 10 nieces and nephews when needed, I intend to shower them with love, hugs, kisses, and presents while they are still little. While I still intend to reflect and learn from past mistakes, I also intend to cherish the memories and experiences of that same past.

Lastly, I want to impress upon you that as we look to the future with expectation, we must live in the present, because by living we still have hope.

1 Peter 1:3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy, he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Amen

Christmas Remembrances

Christmas

When I was kid, I loved to prepare for Christmas. I loved to wrap the presents, decorate the tree, listen to Christmas carols, and help my mom prepare Christmas dinner. We were not rich but we were not as poor as many. Nevertheless, the thing that made our holiday fun was the gathering of our family. I am the eldest of five and nine years older than the next oldest sibling. Although, I no longer believed in Santa, it was so much fun to pretend he was on his way, on Christmas Eve. I used to let my sister and brother look off of the terrace and tell them that the red lights on the airplanes was Rudolph nose and that Santa was flying to and from delivering presents to all the good boys and girls. They were so cute with there noses pressed on the terrace glass door, oohing and ahing as they watched the lights.

On Christmas morning, I could barely wait for them to wake up and unwrap their gifts. Marveling at the gifts, even though they were few, my mom tried to get the favored ones. As I got older, I was able to pitch in and buy one or two gifts. I like to think I was helping by doing this.

To this day, I love Christmas, it has nothing to do with the gifts, but with the joy of the season. I have ten nieces and nephews and even though I am on a spending diet, I just have to get them gifts. They are so excited on Christmas morning and believe me it is contagious.

Therefore, this season as we prepare for Christmas, I tell everyone who will listen, do not go into debt. You will be stuck with a bill way after the holidays are over. While the stores and big businesses are celebrating a prosperous new year, you will be wondering what you bought to put you in the negative. It will make you dislike the holiday. You will feel anxious, and miss the whole reason for the season.

As the holiday approaches, remember this is the season of love. Christmas is the time we celebrate God’s gift to us. He sent his son incarnate or in other words, in the flesh. Read the book of Matthew and Luke. Remember the child born humbly in the manager, who grew to a man who died in love for us on the cross, and the spirit who rose from the dead in power.

Let us celebrate the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.