Are We a Thankful People?

“Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all you lands! Serve the Lord with gladness! Come before His presence with singing! Know perceive, recognize, and understand with approval that the Lord is God! It is He Who has made us, not we ourselves and we are His! We are His people and the sheep of His pasture. Enter into His gates with thanksgiving and a thank offering and into His courts with praise! Be thankful and say so to Him, bless and affectionately praise His name! For the Lord is good; His mercy and loving-kindness are everlasting, His faithfulness and truth endure to all generations.” Psalm 100:1-5

Last week-end was our Thanksgiving for Canada. It was a very unusual week-end for
us as a family as I always cook a turkey. This year, there was no turkey at our house.
However, we did not suffer for lack of any as the Tues. before the week-end we helped at a seniors’ dinner at our church where there was lots of turkey. Then, my husband found different places around our city that served a turkey dinner so he was quite happy by the time Tues. rolled around as he had turkey everyday from Sat. to Mon. Thanksgiving Mon. is usually just a day to laze around but this year my husband again, found a nice brunch that included roast turkey so we spent the day with some wonderful friends at this brunch eating, drinking and talking about God.
As the message on Sunday at church was about being thankful to God for all He does and has done for us, I started thinking, “Are we a thankful people?” Do we have any idea how good God is to us? Living in North America, there is so much we can take for granted. Clean water, lots of food, (sometimes too much), a nice warm/cool house, a place of employment, being able to take a holiday at least once a year, sometimes twice. These are just the basic privileges we enjoy every day and to us it is normal.
Until….something goes horribly wrong in our lives. Then, who do we cry out to? If we
have any kind of knowledge of God, He is the first one. Sometimes it is in anger and
frustration but God understands it all. He understands our pain and works with us to help us get through it all.
When my husband passed away suddenly many years ago, my sister-in-law who did not grow up in a Christian home, was totally amazed at me and my reaction. She and my brother had to drive 2 1/2 hours to where I was living that day and when things started to settle a little, we sat down at the kitchen table to eat some homemade turkey soup a friend had brought. I looked at my brother and asked if he would give thanks for our food. Now, to me this was the normal practice in our home. My Dad would always say grace and if he wasn’t at the table, then it was my brother’s job. She told my mother later, she couldn’t believe that I did that as she could not see anything to be thankful for. Well, in the natural, the circumstances weren’t the greatest, but God is still God. I had no idea she even noticed any of this until my Mom told me many months later. Although I did not know much that day as I was numb, I did know enough to give thanks to God for our food. When you have lived like that, it is just a normal thing to do.

“Thank God in everything no matter what the circumstances may be, be thankful and give thanks, for this is the will of God for you who are in Christ Jesus the Revealer and Mediator of that will.” I Thessalonians 5:18

I know what God has done for me, where He has taken me from and where He has taken me to. I do not need Thanksgiving week-end to thank Him for all He has done for me. He has given me beauty for ashes and for that I am eternally grateful!

“We give praise and thanks to You, O God, we praise and give thanks; Your wondrous works declare that Your Name is near and they who invoke Your Name rehearse Your wonders.” Psalm 75:1

Do We Totally Submit to God?

“I will exalt you, my God and King, and praise your name forever and ever. I will praise you every day; yes, I will praise you forever. Great is the Lord ! He is most worthy of praise! No one can measure his greatness. Let each generation tell its children of your mighty acts; let them proclaim your power. I will meditate on your majestic, glorious splendor and your wonderful miracles. Your awe-inspiring deeds will be on every tongue; I will proclaim your greatness.” (Psalms 145:1-6 NLT)

This week my husband and I had the privilege of attending a “Tehillah Extended” that was hosted by our church. What is does Tehillah mean? “A song of praise” as in Psalm 145 above. The whole 21 verses of this Psalm are praise to God and how awesome He is! David sure loved God and knew how to praise Him!
What is Tehillah? It has been going on for years for the young people from 16 to 25 that come from all the different churches across our city to get together on a Monday night to praise and worship God. We love to go and see what God is doing with the younger generation and it is awesome! The music is amazing and these kids know how to worship God. The “Tehillah Extended” just meant that it went on for three nights instead of just one. We heard the announcement in church on Sunday morning so we decided to check it out. Anybody can go, you just need to love young people and be young at heart.
Sunday night was wonderful with the praise and worship that took place. Of course there are different speakers brought in for a fresh teaching. These kids got a different teaching on the submissive heart. Okay, I am the older generation (our kids are 32 and 29) and there was teaching here that I had never heard, yet knew it to be true. I was so excited to hear it being taught to the younger generation as they will learn and move on it.
The pastor taught on a submitted heart. How we need to totally submit everything to God and not hold back any little piece of ourselves which we are inclined to do as human beings. A submissive heart gives us full authority to walk in what God has given us. When we don’t have a submissive heart, there is deception. This helped explain so much to me as we see Christians all the time that seem to sit on the fence – a little world, a little God and we could not figure out where they are coming from. Now, I understand, they have not totally submitted their hearts to God. How can you submit to something if you have never been able to trust? This pastor said we need to wrestle with God for our submissive heart. Give it all to Him and let Him work with it.
He was also teaching these kids to “learn how heaven thinks as that is the truth to live by”. I was so thrilled to hear this, as that is how we are supposed to be living and what took me 40 years to figure out, these young people are being taught now! It was the most interesting three nights that I have seen in quite awhile, as although there were different speakers, the theme was the same! My question is: How submitted are we? Sure made me think.

“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.” (James 4:7, 8 NIV)

How Great is God’s Mercy?

“His compassion never ends. It is only the Lord’s mercies that have kept us from complete destruction. Great is his faithfulness; his loving-kindness begins afresh each day. My soul claims the Lord as my inheritance; therefore I will hope in him.” Lamentations 3:22-24 (TLB)

A different version says, “His mercies are new every morning.” How awesome is our God?Every morning when I get up, I declare, “This is the day that The Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it.” I am so appreciative of all that God has done for me that I want Him to know how thankful I am.
Not only that, but that He has granted mercy to me for a whole new day. No matter what happened the day before, as long as I have repented on whatever stupid thing I did or said, I have new mercy for a new day! If only we as humans had that kind of mercy for others when they step out of line. I keep thinking about someone that I know that has gotten so far away from anything we thought would be possible. I keep asking for God’s mercy upon this person as that is what is going to bring them back to God. It is not only God’s mercy but we as humans need to sow mercy into this person as well. Whatever we sow, we will reap in return so I would like to sow mercy as I need mercy every day. We have to remember that God loves us all no matter where we are or what we have done. He just does not like our sin. He loves us too much to leave us the way we are so He keeps changing us and bringing us closer to Him.
When I look back over my life, I required alot of mercy which I received so I would like to be able to extend that mercy to someone else when it is required of me. People will always let us down as in our humanity we are very frail. However, God never will. He is always there willing to help anytime we get into trouble. All we have to do is ask. He is my best friend as I know that He will never leave me or forsake me. He promises me that and He has proved Himself very faithful over the course of my life. It makes me very sad when I see people who believed/loved God, fall into a trap that has been set for them by the enemy. Sometimes it is hard to understand with our small minds but one thing I do know is that God is merciful and faithful so we know that what the devil meant for evil He will turn into good! He is an amazing father. We as His people have to pray and believe that He will do as He has promised.
“Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of The Lord forever.” Psalm 23:6 (NKJV)

These verses that follow explain exactly what God has done for me. Therefore, I want to be able to do it for others when they need mercy and comfort!

“What a wonderful God we have—he is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the source of every mercy, and the one who so wonderfully comforts and strengthens us in our hardships and trials. And why does he do this? So that when others are troubled, needing our sympathy and encouragement, we can pass on to them this same help and comfort God has given us. You can be sure that the more we undergo sufferings for Christ, the more he will shower us with his comfort and encouragement. We are in deep trouble for bringing you God’s comfort and salvation. But in our trouble God has comforted us—and this, too, to help you: to show you from our personal experience how God will tenderly comfort you when you undergo these same sufferings. He will give you the strength to endure.” 2 Corinthians 1:3-7 (TLB)

Do We Forget God?

“But watch out! Be very careful never to forget what you have seen God doing for you. May his miracles have a deep and permanent effect upon your lives! Tell your children and your grandchildren about the glorious miracles he did.” (Deuteronomy 4:9) TLB

Earlier this week I read an article in our local newspaper that really made my heart sad for two different reasons. It was about a young man that grew up in our city here in Canada who had a dual citizenship so decided he was going to enlist in the Marines in the US after 9/11 happened.
He never got in the Marines so ended up in the Army and of course in Iraq. He has been so traumatized by his tour in Iraq that he now has been diagnosed with PTSD. This is the first thing that makes me sad.
The second thing that really bothers me is that he grew up as a Christian even went to a Christian school and since experiencing all the horrifying things that he did, he has basically turned his back on organized religion. He says he is agnostic which I am sure his parents find very upsetting as they tried their best to teach him the ways of God. I totally understand that he is confused greatly and has been traumatized by what he endured in war, yet he doesn’t seem to understand that it was God who kept him alive for His purpose. I am praying for this young man that he will be able to receive the help that he needs spiritually and emotionally. It grieves my heart to see these young men and women suffering from all the trauma they dealt with in a war. My precious nephew who is in the Canadian military did two tours in Afghanistan and he is dealing with the after effects of all the trauma he went through as well as being blown up by IEDs. This man was taught as a little boy all about God as well. My dear mother made sure of that as she felt his parents weren’t doing the job, so he knows, yet he claims to be agnostic! What is it that goes on in these wars to make these men doubt God? I know with him, as well as the other young guy, they saw so much horror. Their buddies being blown up and of course things they don’t even talk about. He really questioned about God after his first tour as he could not understand why God would let this happen. Why does God get the blame for all the bad things that happen? God is good and only good comes from him. It is the evil of man that causes these wars and the devastation that comes with it.

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” (James 1:17 ESV)

God kept him alive when he was in the thick of gunfire and patrolling out in the wide open desert. All because I prayed and had other people praying for him as I am sure the parents of this other young man did as well. The interesting part about my nephew, is when he was doing his last tour to Afghanistan, he was the Sergeant in charge of his company of soldiers leading them into combat. Before he left, I was asking him the names of each and every troop he was leading and he sat down with me and gave me every name. He knew why I was asking, he knew I would be praying for them. I had prayed for him on his first tour and told him so. They all came back without any significant injuries so God was watching over him every step of the way. These dear young men do not seem to realize that it was God and only God that brought them through.
My prayer is that someone will come into their lives that can show them how much God loves them, that He has laid His hand upon them and hedged them behind and before. God’s word and truth is in there so I am asking the Holy Spirit to bring it to their remembrance. This should not be with these young people who were willing to lay down their lives for our freedom. To see them aimlessly wandering around their country with no job and no place to call home breaks my heart. God has not forgotten them, they are His creation but they have to ask or invite Him into our circumstances before He will be able to do anything for them. Unfortunately, they turn to drugs or alcohol to numb the pain. He is standing by just waiting as He loves these young people so much and hates to see them suffering like they are. Let us pray for our troops who have served and are still serving. They are a special group of people, very special and they deserve far better treatment than they receive.

“He will not allow your foot to slip or to be moved; He Who keeps you will not slumber. [I Sam. 2:9; Ps. 127:1; Prov. 3:23, 26; Isa. 27:3.] The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand [the side not carrying a shield]. [Isa. 25:4.] The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night. [Ps. 91:5; Isa. 49:10; Rev. 7:16.] The Lord will keep you from all evil; He will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.” [Deut. 28:6; Prov. 2:8; 3:6.] (Psalm 121:3, 5-8 AMP)

These verses became very important to me for my nephew. I prayed them over him every day as to me they were quite appropriate for men patrolling on foot in the desert where IEDs were everywhere!

Oh How He Loves Us!

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.” (Matthew 7:7, 8 ESV)

It is now two and half weeks without coffee and I don’t even miss it! God is so amazing and willing to help us whenever we ask. You have to understand, I had a love affair with coffee and when I tell people who know me, that I am not drinking it anymore, they are amazed! Our daughter works at Starbucks and a good friend of mine works at another store so I could get coffee whenever I wanted. I am in awe at how I feel so much better and guess what? The aches and pains are almost gone! I certainly do not have any in my fingers anymore which I am very excited about.
However, I knew this was going to be a struggle with me and my flesh as I so enjoyed my coffee first thing in the morning. I did what I heard a great preacher tell he did when he decided he was going to stop drinking coffee. I prayed and asked God for His help as I certainly could not do this on my own. I also asked for no withdrawal from caffeine such as headaches. Well, He did exactly as I asked and I have never had a headache – not one! There was something that I did not know and did not pray for, was muscle cramps. For the first week and a half, around my knees would get so sore by evening, that I would be limping around the house. I could not figure out what was happening until one day I was reading on a website that muscle cramps can be a withdrawal symptom from caffeine! Those symptoms have disappeared which I am most grateful for.
I used to drink coffee to help me get through the day which I believe most of the population of North America does. The more I am learning, the more I believe that my adrenal glands have not been functioning properly as I would just drag through most of the day and need the pick up from the coffee to help me get by. One of the things I was dreading the most about giving up coffee was the afternoon slump. Well, I have been speaking to my adrenal glands and commanding them to function properly so I don’t have that slump in the afternoon. Guess what, I don’t have that anymore either! God is so good to us when we trust Him and do what He is nudging us to do. He created us, so He knows what our bodies need and each one of us is different. Mine happened to be no coffee.

“Commit everything you do to the Lord. Trust him, and he will help you.” (Psalms 37:5 NLT)

Sent from my iPad

Trust and Obey

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take. Don’t be impressed with your own wisdom. Instead, fear the Lord and turn away from evil. Then you will have healing for your body and strength for your bones.” (Proverbs 3:5-8 NLT)

I was listening to a well known Bible teacher and she was saying how we need to get the message out that God loves us. This is what I am trying to do as I have experienced so much of what He has done for me and He will do it for anyone. All we need to do is ask, trust and obey. The asking is easy. The trusting, well we kinda do. The obeying….that is the hard part. We are such a rebellious people determined to do things our way that obeying what God wants is difficult for us.
Sometimes it comes out of having bad role models for parents so we have a job trusting and definitely in obeying.
I always struggled with obedience growing up as I had so many rules and regulations and wasn’t allowed to do much of anything. In a small community where you are the only Christian, that is
very difficult. Looking back now, I am thankful my mother was so determined to keep me from as much wrong as she could while she could. However, there is a saying, “Rules without relationship brings rebellion.” Oh how I believe that as of course when I got old enough to be on my own, I rebelled! I did things my parents would not have wanted me to do, but I truly believe their prayers kept me out of alot more trouble that I could have gotten into! It seems like God has you on this long leash letting you run to and fro and then all of a sudden the leash gets really short and He gets your attention one way or another! He is so amazing as He knows exactly what and when will get our attention. Sometimes it is something simple, sometimes it is something very difficult. He does not bring evil as there is no evil in Him, but He certainly can turn evil into good!
For two years maybe longer, God has been nudging me to stop drinking coffee. How do I know this? I keep thinking that I should, so I know that is His Spirit gently trying to get me on the right path to healing and wholeness. Last year when my husband and I toured San Francisco, I saw a sign while in Starbucks that they use a chemical in their coffee that California believes causes cancer so they have a sign in every Starbucks in California as they are trying to get the law passed to rule out this chemical. Now, wouldn’t you think that would make one think a little? It did for about five minutes but off I went on to the next thing. I did have the thought, maybe I should stop drinking this stuff. A year has passed, and I have been having these thoughts all along that I need to quit drinking coffee but I enjoy my cup of coffee first thing in the morning. This has been my argument with God and myself for a year now. Well, I have been getting pain in my fingers, wrists, knotting of muscles and it is never the same place twice! I hate pain and do not do well with it at all! Let me think, what is going on? You would think when I heard a friend of ours one morning in church tell me that his muscles were all stiff from drinking too much coffee that I would clue in. I did, but I kept on drinking coffee as I like my coffee very much. This was the rationale! Oh how we can rationalize anything we want to!
My husband and I decided in April to change our eating habits so we bought some supplements, got a health diet and one of the things was to stop drinking coffee. Guess what I have been doing?
Still drinking coffee. He quit as he said it gave him jitters anyway but I kept on drinking. How stupid and stubborn can we be? I have read what coffee does to us when we drink it and still didn’t clue in. Wether I realize it or not, I have been disobedient to God by doing all this as I know He wants me to stop and I have heard, but I have not acted on it! I am not saying that everyone has to stop drinking coffee as that is your choice. I totally understand anyone that enjoys their cup of java. It is that God has been nudging me to quit so obviously He has something good in store for me. We can pray and ask God for healing which in His mercy He does, but sometimes our healing is right under our nose. It could be something we are eating, doing or drinking that needs to be dealt with. It sure is in my case. I have been asking God to heal my aches and pains and it goes for awhile, but in a couple of days, back it comes! I know that I know it is not arthritis so this is the reason I have finally decided to quit drinking coffee. Like our adult children say, “Oh you are a quick one!”
Next is my journey of no coffee!

“Who among you fears the Lord and obeys his servant? If you are walking in darkness, without a ray of light, trust in the Lord and rely on your God.” (Isaiah 50:10 NLT)

God Never Leaves Us Or Forsakes Us

God has promised to never leave us or forsake us and He never does!

“Let your character or moral disposition be free from love of money [including greed, avarice, lust, and craving for earthly possessions] and be satisfied with your present [circumstances and with what you have]; for He [God] Himself has said, I will not in any way fail you nor give you up nor leave you without support. [I will] not, [I will] not, [I will] not in any degree leave you helpless nor forsake nor let [you] down (relax My hold on you)! [Assuredly not!]” (Hebrews 13:5 AMP)

Although we may not feel that He is there working things together for us, He never stops working. Usually when we are in the pit of despair, that is when He is working the most. We are so desperate and caught up in our pain, that we cannot see what He is doing. He always provides people just at the time you need something tangible to keep you going. They either have an encouraging word for you or do something that gives you hope to keep pressing on.
I so witnessed this in my own life as God kept bringing me people all along the way to help me make it through another day. When you are so desperate, the only focus you need to have is to make it through just ONE day! Things can change so fast for you in the matter of just ONE day
Looking at the overall picture of your circumstance, can get you too overwhelmed and that is when we really get into deep trouble.
How do I know these things? I have lived it and I have seen it come into play in someone else’s life just in the past three months. When I look back over my life, I can see how He was orchestrating
people to help me before my despair ever took place. Let me give you an example:
I grew up in a small rural area in eastern Canada and when I say small, I mean small. I left there after high school, went to college, worked away for a few years, returned and got married. As everyone knows, things change, people change and when I moved back there of course everything had changed. I did not seem to fit in as anyone I knew was having babies and I was not interested in that yet. Well, you do change your mind and I got pregnant after a couple years of marriage. There was a lady that I had heard of for many years but had never met living in this small community. She and her husband had moved there from another province and had decided to raise their family there. I am about maybe three months pregnant or so when my Mom meets this lady at the mailbox one day. She tells my Mom about the Lamaze classes that she had taken as she is pregnant as well. She offered to teach me if I was interested as I had missed the classes.
Now, this is God ordained as I have never seen this woman and she had never seen me! I met her and we became fast friends. She already had two small children and her baby was born in Nov. where our baby was born in April.
My husband passed away suddenly when our baby was 20 days old, needless to say, I became quite a basket case! I was so overwhelmed with the responsibility of a new baby and no husband, that I was grasping at any lifeline that God could throw me. This precious lady was one of them! As she was a nurse by profession, she could understand the grieving process where most people in this small place did not seem to. She was more than helpful and I know that I know, God provided her for me to help me make it through! That is only one of the things He did for me in such a desperate time in my life.
One of the young pastors in the church we attend, lost their little baby 13 months suddenly from an accident. These dear young couple have two other children so they have more than enough on their plate. He stood up on Sunday and said the exact same thing about people either saying or doing something to encourage them along. I was just sitting and smiling and thinking, “Yep, that is what He does.”

“Never! Can a mother forget her nursing child? Can she feel no love for the child she has borne? But even if that were possible, I would not forget you! See, I have written your name on the palms of my hands. Always in my mind is a picture of Jerusalem’s walls in ruins.” (Isaiah 49:15, 16 NLT)

What an awesome thought that is, to think, our name is written on the palms of His hands!

Does God Direct Our Steps?

“The steps of a [good] man are directed and established by the Lord when He delights in his way [and He busies Himself with his every step].” (Psalm 37:23 AMP)

By now we have made it to Washington state and as the weather is not so great, wondering what we will do next. We want to hang around for the week-end as we know a great church in Seattle that we plan on attending on Sunday. It has been decided that our activities will involve shopping
and whatever else we can find until the weather clears. My wonderful husband decides we are going to cut through Mt. Rainier again so we start of. Well, it is overcast and of course on top of a mountain that height, you are in low lying cloud. This was not my idea of an adventure as there are not a lot of guard rails and we could not see much around us – not to mention it was very cold! Thanks to the guidance of our wonderful Father, we made it through without any problem but we
were freezing by the time we got to the bottom. When my husband is cold, it is cold! He will ride around in the fall on the motorcycle when I have my heated jacket on and he just has on a couple of layers of his jacket which is nothing compared to what I am wearing. We come upon this town and of course spot a McDonalds, time for something warm to drink. We search the wi-fi for a place to stay and find a nice little motel that suited everything we asked for. Other than going out to eat, we
are still wondering how we are going to pass two days in crappy weather sitting around Seattle area. I am checking out Facebook – not that I am such a fan but I get awesome feeds from many amazing ministries and there is one from Joan Hunter saying she is going to be in Seattle this week-end! How do you like that? What are the odds? Joan Hunter has a worldwide healing ministry and I have followed her for quite awhile. She has an amazing story of what God has done for her when her life was turned upside down. The thing you have to understand, is my husband is very interested in divine healing and has studied quite a bit on it. He loves to pray for the sick and see them healed. Guess we know now how we are going to spend the week-end in Seattle! Who says God doesn’t order our steps when we ask and believe? He loves us so much that he thrills in
providing good things for us! The interesting thing is, we never got to the church we had planned on attending in the first place. We spent the week-end at one we had never heard of before!

“A man’s mind plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps and makes them sure.” (Proverbs 16:9 AMP)

How God Works In Us

When I was a young kid, there used to be a preacher that came to my home town to speak now and then and one of his favorite lines was “Be sure your sin will find you out.” How true is that one?
I had no idea it was actually in the Bible until I started searching and sure enough it is part of a verse in Numbers!

“But if you will not do so, behold, you have sinned against the Lord; and be sure your sin will find you out.” (Numbers 32:23 AMP)

You have heard my story about unsetting the motorcycle and the angels of mercy coming to help me. Unfortunately, the story does not end there! You see, my husband cleans and polishes every vehicle we own so he is quite particular in how he keeps everything. However, he does have a habit of getting upset when things get scratched, dented etc., so here I am thinking, “Wow, I got away with that one. There are no marks on the motorcycle.” Except, I forgot about the trailer!
He comes out from the shop, gets on the motorcycle and we drive away. I am thinking, “How in the world am I going to tell him what just happened without him getting mad at me? As there are no marks on the bike, maybe I don’t have to even mention the whole thing.” What voice am I listening to?? Certainly not God! We continue on our tour, stopping here and there to take pictures and after doing this for a couple of hours, I am walking back to the motorcycle and all of a sudden I look down and there is a scruff mark on the trailer. As the trailer is black it is very conspicuous! Still, I am not saying a word. I have decided when we stop at the motel for the evening, I will tell him then. We finally get to our destination for the evening (many hours later) and what does my dear husband decide to do once we had everything unpacked? He is going to wash the motorcycle and of course the trailer! Now, it is time for me to be honest and take my punishment!
He is washing the bike and I am standing there, still wondering how I am going to ‘fess up, knowing that I have to and trying to get up the nerve to do so. As he is finishing up the bike and heading for the trailer, I blurted out my story. What was even more amazing, he was not upset with me! You have to understand this is a pattern that we have been dealing with for many years, but God is refining him! Guess what? he is refining me too as it is not only his dyfunk, but mine as well. You see, when I was a child growing up, my Mom was a drama queen and everything was a BIG deal!
However, my dear Father was just opposite so when I broke something (like a window) and figured I would get in trouble from my Mom, I would run and tell my Dad first. I knew then, if he didn’t say anything, which he never did, then she couldn’t! Isn’t that just like God? We can run to Him when we get in trouble and he does not condemn us, just loves us. He is such an amazing father as He loves us so much, that He will not leave us in our mess, but work to change us so we come out better than before! It is like Joyce Meyer says, “I am certainly not where I should be, but definitely not where I used to be!”

“Better yet, redouble your efforts. Be energetic in your life of salvation, reverent and sensitive before God. That energy is God’s energy, an energy deep within you, God himself willing and working at what will give him the most pleasure.” (Philippians 2:13 MSG)

God’s Watches Over Us

“And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38, 39 NLT)

As we toured all over the west coast of the US, we saw everyday the amazing love of God in how he provided what we asked for in motel rooms and restaurants. It got to the point, I would say,
“Father, we need wi-fi to book our hotel room.” Of course a few minutes later we would find
public wi-fi! A famous Bible teacher once said, “We should expect God to do these things for us.
Would we not do them for our children whom we love dearly?”
Sunday morning in Redding, CA we are heading to church, Bethel of course. We had been there the year before so “thought” we knew where we were going. We are heading north on I5 as it is on the north end of the city when my husband says, “I believe I just missed the exit. We will go to the next one and turn around.” We were running late as it was, and we really couldn’t afford to be screwing up on directions so I started to pray. “Father, please give us someone who can tell us how to get to Bethel as we don’t seem to know where we are going.” Now, how long does it take to go from one exit to the next on an interstate? Not very long. We reach the next exit, turn left to go over the interstate and get to a set of lights before we can turn back to get on the interstate heading south.
As we are sitting at the lights, there is a CHP car off to our right. We are turning left so when the light turns green, we go. As we start down the ramp to the interstate, all of a sudden the CHP car is behind us with the lights flashing and gives a bleep of his siren. My husbands says to me, “What is he pulling us over for? I haven’t done anything wrong.” Of course we stop and he gets out off his car and comes over to us on the right side. He is telling us that we made an illegal turn as there is no left turn on to the interstate – we needed to turn right. To this day, we did not see the sign in our rush to get to church. Now this is a witness to a police officer! He takes down my husband’s licence number on a little tablet he had in his hand and he is asking all sorts of questions about us riding on a bike, how long etc. Certainly, we were not about to argue with the law so we are polite realizing that he is only doing his job. After he lectures my husband for a few minutes, he says, “Where are going?” Well, this is a little embarrassing but my husband says, “Bethel” He says, “Oh, you just go down this ramp carefully, get on the interstate and get off at the next exit.”
He gave us all the directions we needed, told us to have a good day and got in his car. He followed us down the ramp to make sure we got on the interstate safely and off he went! All we could do was sit there, thank God for this nice young officer and laugh! That young guy got blessed that day as I prayed protection over him, and that he would have the best shift he has had in along time! I asked God for help and I got it! God will use whoever he can to help his people even in the form of a CHP officer, when you think you are in trouble! I keep wondering, was he an angel watching over us when we were not paying attention like we needed to??
By the way, we still got to church on time!

“He will not allow your foot to slip or to be moved; He Who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, He who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord is your keeper; the Lord is your shade on your right hand [the side not carrying a shield]. The sun shall not smite you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all evil; He will keep your life. The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.” (Psalm 121:3-8 AMP)