God make me useable

I heard a statement the other day that really made an impact on me. Have you ever asked God to use you? I’ve prayed that prayer many times, “God use me… I want to be used by you.” That’s a good prayer, but there is a better prayer, here’s how it goes, “God make me useable.” Many of us want to be used by God to do great things in this world, but we also have to be useable. What does it mean to be useable? I think the most important factors involve your heart, your attitude, and your willingness to be obedient to God at all times. Of course, there are many other factors involved in being useable, but I think these 3 are key.

A lot of times we want to be used by God , but our heart is not right. We have wrong motives, a hard heart, a heart that still has bitterness, unforgiveness. If God used us we could hurt people. These heart issues lead to a negative attitude toward leaders, and the people who God wants to use us to be a blessing to! Check your heart today. Is your heart right? Do you need to let go of things you have been holding onto today so that God can use you in a greater way? Let go of the past so you can move forward to the good things God has ahead for you!

“Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” Proverbs 4:23

Let’s talk about attitude for a moment. Attitude is everything. It will open doors for you in life, or literally shut doors. Your attitude will cause you to soar high, or it will bring you low. It is the hinge on which the door of your destiny swings. The great thing about attitude is you have total control over it. You choose daily what kind of attitude you will display. I heard a statistic the other day that 97% of people who lose their jobs are let go because of their attitude. The employer may give some other reason, but the underlying reason always comes back to attitude. We should be the kind of person that adds value everywhere we go, in every situation we find ourselves in. If you are the kind of person that chooses to be positive and chooses to go the extra mile, you will always rise to the top. This world is full of people today that only do what is necessary, nothing more. Take a look at this verse.

“If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.” Matthew 5:41

If you want to stand out in the crowd, go the extra mile.

Obedience is a word most of us shy away from. We don’t like to be told what to do. We like to make our own decisions and rightfully so. God is such an amazing God and He will sometimes ask us to do things we don’t understand, but it always turns out for our good! We may have to trust Him when we would rather go our own way. If we are willing to do whatever God asks of us and we are obedient to do it right away God will bless us beyond measure. If we want to be useable by God He has to be able to trust us as well. If God gives us responsibility He needs to know that we won’t squander it. God needs to know that we will treat people right, display the right heart, and the right attitude.

“If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good things of the land.” Isaiah 1:19

We all have imperfections. God is not looking for a perfect person to use. He just wants a willing & obedient heart. God wants to be able to trust you. Can God trust you with people? Do you have a right heart? How’s your attitude been lately? So, the next time you catch yourself asking God to use you, try asking God if you are useable instead.  Let God change you into a vessel He can use today.

Prayer for today: God make me a person that you can use. Create in me a clean heart O’ God. Renew a right spirit within me. Help me to be the kind of person that forgives easily and loves all people. Give me your heart God for others, help me to be a person that genuinely cares for others and adds value in the lives of people around me. God make me useable, help me to make a difference in my world today. Amen!

Overwhelmed

Have you ever said these words…” I am so overwhelmed?”  I have too much on my plate. I just can’t do it all.  Take a look at the definition of Overwhelmed:

To bury or drown beneath a huge mass.

 

God never meant for us to be overwhelmed with life, work, church work, or family issues. The only one that should overwhelm us is God Himself.  To be overwhelmed by His presence, to experience glory of His goodness and to be changed in that place, that should be our heart’s cry. 

God wants to drown you today in His presence.  In His presence is rest, peace and the answers you are seeking! The problem is we are too busy and overwhelmed by other things to allow God to overwhelm us!  When was the last time you got alone with God and just sat in His presence? Look what the Bible says will happen when take time to wait upon the Lord!

“But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.”  Isaiah 40:31

If we can get into God’s presence the pressures of life will be lifted and we will be strengthened, we will be refreshed, we will have renewed hope!  What is keeping you from getting into the presence of God today?  There is nothing more important than your time with God!  God knew that our lives would be difficult, He knew we would have all sorts of demands fighting for our time and energy, that’s why He said this in His Word…

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”  John 16:33

“Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.”  Matthew 11:28

I want to encourage you today if you are feeling overwhelmed with life, just stop, take a deep breath today and know that God loves you.  He is with you and He is here to renew your strength.  Run to Him today, take time to get in His presence and allow God to restore you.  Everything you need is found in God’s presence. 

“You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.” Psalm 16:11

Maybe you don’t know how to get into God’s presence… here is how you get there.

Get a good worship CD, I suggest Jesus Culture (Live From New York) Kari Jobe, Passion, whatever moves you…put on the music and just begin to talk to God. He will meet you there.

“Come close to God, and God will come close to you.” James 4:8

Before you know it, your troubles will feel quite small compared to the grandness of God’s Glory!

Be overwhelmed by God today!

All Things Are Possible!

 

“…But with God all things are possible.” Matthew 19:26

You may not be able to see through the dark place you are in right now, but God is WITH you and He is FOR you, and nothing is too BIG for HIM!

Trust God today with your life, your future, your hopes and your dreams! He’s a BIG God!  He is making a way for you. 

He will not fail you!

 

 

See yourself as a overcomer! With God all things are possible! Your troubles are behind you and God has a great future ahead!  You may be going through a storm today, but you will go through it and you will be stronger than you ever were before!

When you get taken down, keep your attitude UP!

God wants to dream a dream through us! Sometimes we go through difficult times and we can’t see our dream clearly, or we stop dreaming all together. I want to help you today to get your dream back and keep a good attitude on the journey. Joseph was a dreamer and he endured an extremely difficult path for it. Yet, through it all Joseph was consistent. He consistently had a right attitude regardless of his circumstances, and God promoted him and blessed him even in the midst of his circumstances. We can learn a valuable lesson from Joseph and apply in to our lives today.

 
At some point we will all be in a difficult place. Maybe you have a dream and you have lost hope that it will ever come to pass. Have you allowed yourself to get down and out? Do you have a bad attitude at work, at home, or at church because things have not gone your way? I want to encourage you today don’t stop believing that your dreams will come to pass! The door to our future hinges on our attitude! Joseph was hated by his brothers and sold into slavery. He was taken to Potiphar’s house and made to be a servant. He was wrongfully accused and thrown into prison. Yet, through it all, he still had a good attitude, and God blessed him there! Take a look at the verses below from Genesis chapter 39:

 
“The LORD was with Joseph so that he prospered, and he lived in the house of his Egyptian master. When his master saw that the LORD was with him and that the LORD gave him success in everything he did, Joseph found favor in his eyes and became his attendant. Potiphar put him in charge of his household, and he entrusted to his care everything he owned. From the time he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the LORD blessed the household of the Egyptian because of Joseph. The blessing of the LORD was on everything Potiphar had, both in the house and in the field.” Genesis 39:2-5

When you get taken down, keep your attitude up! Even though Joseph was a slave in Potiphar’s house he kept a good attitude and the Lord made him a success and blessed him! Our attitude determines our success. Most people, when put in a difficult situation, a place you don’t want to be, will display a negative attitude. It’s easy to get down and sour when you are not where you want to be. The lesson here is to follow Joseph’s example and keep a good attitude even though you are in a hard place. It is then that God can make you a success and bless you in the midst of the difficult place you are in.

We can’t always control what happens to us. We can control what happens in us! Our attitude is up to us! It is the one thing in the equation that we can control. You may not be able to get out of the place you are in right now, but you can have a good attitude while you are there. We all need to learn to enjoy where we are at, on the way to where we are going. Let me give you 3 things to keep your attitude UP:

1) Know that God is WITH you!
“I will never fail you, I will never abandon you.” Hebrews 13:5

2) Know that God is FOR You!
“If God is for us, who can be against us?” Romans 8:31

3) Know that God is working ALL things out for your Good!
“And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.” Romans 8:28

 
Joseph never gave up on his dream and he kept a consistently good attitude through all that he endured. In the end, God promoted him and made him the ruler over all the land, second only to the King! Keep your attitude right and you will be a success! Keep your attitude right and you will be BLESSED!

Hope 4 Today!

Let’s face it, sometimes we are all lacking in the area of hope. Our lives can become so mundane and we can easily feel as if we are going through the motions and only doing what is required to get by. God did not design us to live this way. God has placed hope on the inside of us all. Hope defined: A happy anticipation that something good is going to happen. I love this definition of hope, because we all need to have a happy anticipation for good things to come. You may struggling today, feeling down or like things will never change, but the God of hope wants you to know that He is well able to lift you out from where you are and place you in a new season of His grace, favor and provision. Take a look at this verse:
“For I am about to do something new, See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.” Isaiah 43:19
This is one of my favorite scripture, because God is always doing something new. He does not want us to stay the same. He loves change and we should too! We should continually be getting stronger, closer to God, pressing on to new things in Him, and making a difference in our world and the lives around us. One of the devils tricks, is to try to get us to stay right where we are, stuck in a rut, never breaking free from old habits and old ways of thinking. Change is good! We should be masters of change. Embrace change and look forward to change. Don’t get too settled into where you are. God has more for you! Change keeps life fresh!

“He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.” Revelation 21:5

So, don’t lose hope today that your life will never change. God has a plan for you!
“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11

If you feel weak today and like you can’t take much more be encouraged with the verse below:

“Yet those who wait for the LORD Will gain new strength; They will mount up with wings like eagles, They will run and not get tired, They will walk and not become weary”. Isaiah 40:31

Take some time to get in God’s presence and wait on Him. He has the answers you need. Your times are in His hands. He will not fail you! He has amazing things in store for those who love Him!

4 Practical Ways to Keep Your Hope Alive:

1) Be thankful for what God has done!
2) Stay positive, and know that God is faithful. He won’t fail you.
3) Keep yourself built up in God’s Word. Listen to an uplifting podcast, or read! Faith comes by hearing the Word of God!
4) Keep your mouth in check. Don’t be negative! You believe what you say! What have you been speaking over your life lately?

 

Open Doors of Opportunity!

Have you ever wanted things to change so badly that you try to make things happen in your own strength? You manipulate things, people, and situations to get what you want, but you still aren’t satisfied in life. True fulfillment comes when you allow God to open the doors of opportunity in your life at the right place and at the right time!

God has amazing doors that He wants to open for you if you are able to trust and rely on Him. What is an open door anyway? It’s an opportunity that leads you to a place where you can use your gifts, talents and abilities for God and a place where you will grow spiritually and you will help others grow in God as you flow in your gifting that God has placed on the inside of you! When God opens a door for you; no one can close it. Check out the verse below:

 
“I know all the things you do, and I have opened a door for you that no one can close. You have little strength, yet you obeyed my word and did not deny me. Revelation 3:8

 
Sometimes we feel like we have very little strength for the place we are currently in. But, the verse above says if you will stick with it and obey God, He will honor you and open the right door for you! Keep your prayer life strong. Keep thanking God for what He is doing where you’re at, and He will open a new door for you in His time! Or He may just change your perspective for where you’re at!
You don’t have to worry about how or when or where the next door in your life will be opened. The doors God opens for you only have doorknobs on one side…His! So you can be sure that God will open the right door at the right time — the knob is in His hand.

Colossians 4:2-4, Paul says, “Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with an attitude of thanksgiving; praying at the same time for us as well, that God will open to us a door for the Word, so that we may speak forth the mystery of Christ, for which I have also been imprisoned; that I may make it clear in the way I ought to speak.”

If you feel like you need a new door of opportunity to open up for you then Pray! Stay alert and be looking for what God has ahead for you! When God does open the door don’t be afraid to take a risk and walk through it. Doors, all kinds of doors, are swinging open. Seize the opportunities.
When you walk through the door of opportunity God has opened you will feel a sense of purpose, accomplishment and success, like you are right where you need to be in life! There is nothing like knowing that you are right where God has you to be, doing exactly what He created you to do!

I am praying for open doors of opportunity today! Be blessed!

 

 

One Bad Seed…

“Jack the Giant Slayer,” was one of those movies my husband couldn’t wait to go see! As usual, he convinced me that we had to see it over the weekend and I was enjoyably surprised at how much I loved it! The storyline was taken from “Jack and The Bean Stalk,” the age-old fairy tale of the magical beans that grow a bean stalk to the heavens. In the movie, the beans are buried with an Ancient King, King Erik for safe keeping to prevent them from ever being planted again. If the beans touched water they sprouted a gigantic stalk to the heavens which opened to the world of deadly giants that wanted to kill mankind. I won’t go into the whole movie, but it got me thinking about seeds, our thoughts, and giants in the spiritual realm. So, here goes… every thought we think is literally a seed. It can either sprout and grow into a good thing in our life that produces good fruit, or like in the movie, “Jack the Giant Slayer,” the seed can sprout and grow into a bad seed, opening our world up to dangerous giants that can kill, steal and destroy us… sounds like the devil to me. Take a look at what the Bible says …

 
“The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy.” John 10:10

 
So, if every thought is like a seed that sprouts and grows we need to be sure that our thoughts are good & pure. What have you been thinking lately? If your thoughts were a movie for everyone to see would you be embarrassed at what played on the screen? Would people see negative, angry, or bitter thoughts on the screen of your mind, or thoughts of hope, encouragement and peace? Our thoughts are powerful, powerful enough the shape our lives. Thoughts give birth to words, and our words shape our future!

“Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” Phil. 4:8

It’s crazy to think that one thought can cause so much trouble in your life, one bad seed can get planted in your heart and cause roots of bitterness, resentment and un-forgiveness to grow. You have to recognize the strategy of the devil to get you off track and take every thought captive that does not line up with God’s Word.

“Casting down arguments and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ.” 2 Corinthians 10:5

Let me end on this thought: Your thoughts are seeds. Let them be seeds that sprout and grow into a beautiful life, abundant in God’s favor, hope and blessing. Don’t let the negative seeds of hurtful, resentful, and depressing thoughts open up your life to dangerous giants, giants that want to kill, steal and destroy everything that God has blessed you with! Remember, your thoughts have the power to shape your future!  Watch what you plant in the soil of your heart!

“…But we have the mind of Christ.” 1 Corinthians 2:16

Oh, and I highly recommend “Jack the Giant Slayer,” if you are looking for a good movie to see!