I can!

Got any struggles?  Feeling weary of the day-to-day demands or spreading worldwide chaos and confusion?

Hebrews 12 ^:2 Looking unto JESUS the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before HIM endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of GOD. ³ For consider HIM that endured such contradiction of sinners against HIMSELF (GOD who took on a body for us), lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. ⁴ You have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.

Why would pondering/considering the unfairness of JESUS life help us in our day-to-day struggles?

For me it happened this way nearly 30 years ago now.  I was running late for work, there were issues with my two teens and Mac was working out of state, so it was up to me to figure it out. To top it off all the demands kept me too busy to read the Bible.  To put it mildly, I felt overwhelmed.  You know what I mean, for we have all had days like that.  

I didn’t feel like I could take another step, so before I headed out the door I cried out to GOD, “I need a word from YOU, just a word!”  Then I blindly opened my bible and read Hebrews 12:1-4, glanced at the clock, rushed out the door heading for work.

As I drove to the space center I thought about JESUS.  I considered some of what I knew concerning the total unfairness of JESUS life, HIS willingness in giving of HIMSELF, how HE joyously endured even the cross, though HE despised the shame of the weight of sin put on HIS back and being displayed naked before those passing by. 

JESUS, the SON of GOD, set the joy of you and me being cleansed of sin, living eternally with HIM and fulfilling GOD’s eternal plan before HIM.  As HE thought of what HE was accomplishing HE endured.  As I thought of these things, somehow the struggles I was facing faded as I began to worship and praise JESUS.  Too soon I arrived at the base and had to go through the portal.  But no longer was I weary and dragging but energized ready to step out and to do whatever needed to be done.

If you are struggling and weary, maybe even wondering how GOD could allow all this to happen I urge you to consider JESUS and what HE endured for you. Somehow it changes your perspective.

Hugs

Sharon

A clothesline

I love hanging out clothes and the way sheets feel and smell after drying outside. Until we moved to Pueblo, we always had a clothesline, or I’d rig one up myself.  If you look closely behind my two oldest girls and our blind dog sitting in the grass in front of the little picket fence of a ramshackle house we lived in 55 summers ago, you will see clothes I hung up on a makeshift clothesline.

Then in 2008 we moved to Pueblo and one day, I glanced out my dining room window into the back yard of my neighbor, and saw something I wanted, a clothesline.  As I looked at it, my thoughts took it even further and I said to myself, “they don’t even use it.”   Then the Holy SPIRIT nudged me, “you are lusting, Sharon.”

“Oh, LORD,” I cried out, “I’m sorry, Thank you for my dryer.” 

Then it hit, the realization, and I had to smile at the humor of GOD in answering my arrow prayer for a lead-in to the devotion on my heart to write.

After the waves of the Red Sea came crashing down over their enemies the Egyptian troops chasing them, (the Jews) believed HIS (GOD’s) words, they sang HIS praise. (but) They soon forgot HIS works, they waited not for HIS counsel, but lusted exceedingly in the wilderness and tempted GOD in the desert.

What happened?  The Jews got to thinking about the different kinds of food they had back in Egypt. The more they thought about it, the more they focused on those delicious foods and forgot all about what GOD had done for them (Psalm 106:12-14).

Scientists have discovered a way to see thoughts and have learned that each thought is like a small branch growing on a tree.  If I understand correctly, the more you think of something the stronger the branch becomes.

Here in Pueblo, we have some pretty old trees with huge branches.  Well, if you think about wanting something over and over, it becomes a stronghold, like a huge branch (2 Corinthians 10:4) that keeps you captive and revisiting those thoughts.

That is why GOD speaks so much about changing our thoughts.

John 14:1 Let not your heart (thoughts) be troubled, Believe in GOD, believe also in ME.

Proverbs 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding…

Romans 12:2 do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind…

Philippians 4:6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to GOD.

2 Corinthians 4:15 For all things are for your sakes ^16. Therefore, we do not lose heart…¹⁷ for our momentary and light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison ¹⁸ while we look not at the things we seen (our situation with its struggles), but at what is not seen (that which GOD is achieving and producing for us through our situation with its struggles).  For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

We lust when we focus on what we think we want- it makes us dissatisfied, and we lose our GOD focused perspective. That lust and our dissatisfaction will grow in intensity as we think on it.  

But, we have the power of GOD to run to JESUS for mercy and grace to help in our times of need (Hebrews 4:16). When my thoughts go where they should not, in anger or lust, I run to JESUS and HE enables me to control my thoughts, as HE redirects them by showing me how HE looks at things by bringing Bible verses to my mind (2 Corinthians 10:5, Proverbs 21:1).  I don’t know how HE does it, but it works.  It always works.

Looking unto JESUS,

Hugs

Sharon

Broken

She came looking defeated and broken…please pray.

As we were beginning our Bible study at Wendy’s today, through the window we noticed a woman, thin as a rail, sitting at a table outside. She walked in off the street and came directly to our table. J, though definitely under the influence of some substance, began by touching my Bible and apologizing for interrupting us and then asked if we would pray for her.

J said she wanted a change and named several things very wrong. We talked and showed her a few scriptures. She confessed knowing JESUS but also said she felt she needed help getting back to HIM. Drawing her in a half hug we prayed. As the prayer began, I was so sad and it was hard to even speak for I wept quietly within as a heaviness of grief cut through me. Then a sweet peace pushed the heaviness aside and I noticed a change also in J’s expression and that light had come into her eyes.

I believe she encountered our marvelous GOD. That in those moments HE spoke to her heart. Please join me in praying for J for GOD is able and nothing, absolutely nothing is impossible for HIM (Luke 1:37).

Looking unto JESUS who is able to save us to the uttermost, we who come to GOD by HIM seeing HE ever liveth to make intercession for us (Hebrews 7:25).

hugs

Sharon L Manning