It has been AGES since my last post. I’ll admit, I’ve been lazy about writing down some of the things swirling in my mind.

It seems that lately every time I listen to a TV minister, open the Bible or go to church, I hear about the love of the Father and how our self worth must come from Him. I am fascinated by His love for us and have been for several years now. Sometimes I just search the Bible for what He has to say about me. Needless to say, if I can truly understand how God thinks of me, what kind of troubles can I possibly face that would seem insurmountable? If I truly understand the depts of His love and all He thinks of me, I’ll be a better mom, a better wife and a producer of Godly fruit all on accident! I must create a stronghold of love in my life.

It seems that the only times that I hear the word “stronghold” it is used in a negative way. “She has a stronghold of addiction” or “He has a stronghold of lust.” I never hear something like, “She has a real stronghold of love!”  I believe that stronghold is a military term and means a place of fortification or a place that is protected or heavily defended. If I can create a stronghold of love in my life, this will be the place that I receive my self worth from and give love from. How can we create this stronghold of love in our life? I’m glad you asked! We need to know what God has to say about us.

Psalms 139:17 and 18 states, “How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand.” David seems to understand how much God loves him! Here are a few things said about us from Romans, Corinthians and Ephesians: We are children of God and joint heirs with Christ, we are justified, no condemnation awaits those who are in Christ, we are sanctified, righteous and holy, a new creation, we are the righteousness of God, adopted as His children, raised up to sit with Christ in glory and have eternal glory! Wow!!! This is only a few thoughts He has for us.

Dig in to the word and begin to understand God’s love for you! Build a stronghold of love in your life that the enemy cannot come against. Feelings of failure, hopelessness, depression, self pity, self loathing, confusion, strife, division and much more are all attacks of the enemy, not from God. Fight back with what the Word has to say about you. Take every thought captive and fight back from your stronghold of love!

I don’t know why, but I’m always rethinking the christian box. You know, the area around our perceptions of what christianity should be.  I grew up in a Nazarene church. They loved God dearly, and were wonderful christian people, but something was missing and I knew it as a child and as a teenager. It seemed that christianity was contained to the four walls of a church building. It was what we did in that building that made us all christians. I remeber thinking, “This is so dull. Why do people want to do this? There is no life here. It just feels dead. They have all lost their minds.” I kept repeating this over and over in my mind. I became bitter and rebellious because my parents wanted me to live this way, but it was simply impossible in my mind. Looking back, I can now understand what went wrong. I wasn’t a bad kid, just starved for His presence. It wasn’t until I started dating my husband and attending his church that I began to find what was missing, the Holy Spirit. I found a direct connection with God the Father. I had never had that before! Worshiping in His presence is the sweetest place to be. What had seemed like worship to a dead man, now seemed like worship to a living God.

I wonder, can people around us see the living God in us? So much of the world sees christianity as a dead religion and in many cases, rightfully so. Here’s a scripture to think about:

Acts 10:38
How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power: who went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil; for God was with him.

Even Jesus needed the Holy Spirit! If Jesus needed him, how much more do we need him? Also, His acts were not confined to a church building. The scripture states that He “went about.” I want to go about and show Him to the rest of the world.  The rules of the christian box state that salvation only happens in the church building, and so does healing and deliverance. Wrong! I charge you to go about and do good in your community, neighborhood and workplace. Let them see the Holy Spirit on the inside of you! That is God’s plan for the world, one neighbor at a time!

It is sooo great to be me.  I have been a christian for so long! I’ve also been in ministry so that makes me a very mature christian, right? I even tithe! Surely I’ve arrived to the status of super spiritual christian, especially since I only listen to christian music.  I’ve been a christian so long that my thoughts are God’s thoughts now! I don’t even have to question myself anymore! I can’t stand to see people who are squandering their life away in abusive relationships, drugs and alcohol. I’m sure they don’t even want to hear about God. I don’t think they could do what I do. After all, they are weak but I on the other hand am a very strong person. I’d rather not get mixed up in that. It may affect my spirituality.

I hope you have figured out by now that I am just being silly. I certainly see how it would be easy to fall into the trap of thinking more highly of myself than I ought. Have you ever met anyone like this? In The Message translation it’s stated in 1Peter 5:

God has had it with the proud, but takes delight in just plain people. So be content with who you are, and don’t put on airs.

I’m sure many of you will need to read that in another translation (elbow to Kelly). I don’t know about you, but I like being me and I don’t want to try to fit into man’s mold for christianity. I want to fit into Jesus’ mold. After all, he’s my example! In the New Testament, I see Jesus taking the time to be with those who were unlovely and unwanted, the misfits. He also addressed religious thinking in the Pharisees. He took a bunch of fishermen and other unlikelies and used them to spread the gospel throughtout the world. I think he must have seen their heart and not their outward appearance. I hope my heart is in right standing. I want to be just like Jesus, he’s my hero! What are your thoughts?

Have you ever looked at something that you’ve looked at a thousand times before and seen something new? That’s what happened to me. I was riding down the road a few days ago admiring the trees and it struck me that their branches seemed to reach to heaven as if to thank God for creating them. I thought about that for a while and was happy with my discovery but then noticed that not all the greenery I was seeing was reaching for heaven. I noticed a large amount of shrubbery that had long flexible branches that leaned over towards the ground. I was almost a little sad. I was hoping that all God’s greenery would raise up in praise. Then I realized instead of lifting it’s branches towards heaven, it was bowing instead, almost in worship. This thought made me happy again. Even nature knows how to praise and worship our God!

Well, this is my first attempt at blogging on my own. I usually like to springboard off of other peoples blogs, but my husband Kelly talked me into it! I’m sure it will be a blast! More to  come…..