Until they all come home.

Today my heart is on fire. I am armed and ready to fight. For too long I have stood by as a helpless victim as the enemy ravaged those around me.

I have seen how my enemy has set out to destroy all that is good and right. How he has taken those closest to my heart and wounded them to what seems to be the point of no return at times. I have seen friends families go through the same.

NO LONGER.
The Book of Jude tells me to not give up. Tells me to love those that have fallen away and to continue on…. “ Relax, everything’s going to be alright; rest, everything’s coming together; open your hearts, love is on the way.”

“But you, dear friends, carefully build yourselves up in this most holy faith by praying in the Holy Spirit, staying right at the center of God’s love, keeping your arms open and outstretched, ready for the mercy of our Master, Jesus Christ. This is the unending life. The real life! Go easy on those who hesitate in the faith Go after those who take the wrong way. Be tender with sinners, but not soft on sin. The sin itself stinks to high heaven.

I am committing myself to go after those who take the wrong way. Those who have been touched by the hand of God at some point in their life, but have since been lied to and destroyed by those closest to them and in turn walked away.

I believe it is time to call out and in Christ call forth who they were created and crafted to be.

I will stand for them. I will in prayer fight for them. I will love them. I will believe in who they ARE instead of who they show themselves as. I will believe the fight is very much worth the effort and will use every ounce in me to prove it until they all come home.

If you would like to join me in my fight. Let me know. There are some that I am already fighting for, there are others who I would love to join.

Richiesbaby@gmail.com

In Christ’s love.

Tammy

LIFE instructions

Simply put by James in chapter 3
there really isn’t anything I have to do except live by this. Remember what it says and then go do it!

- Faith and works go hand in glove. Anything else is a corpse

- James 3:16-18
“Live well, live wisely, live humbly. It’s the way you live, not the way you talk, that counts….
Whenever you’re trying to look better than others or get the better of others, things fall apart and everyone ends up at the others’ throats. Real wisdom, God’s wisdom, begins with a holy life and is characterized by getting along with others. It is gentle and reasonable, overflowing with mercy and blessings, not hot one day and cold the next, not two-faced. You can develop a healthy, robust community that lives right with God and enjoy its results ONLY if you do the hard work of getting along with each other, treating each other with dignity and honor. “

True life lived out as the reflection of true love. Let it be engraved on the lining of my heart and resound for all to experience.

Painful Perspective

Today is a very hard day. Emotions and the truth of them and the past are coming to the surface and we feel very alone.

We feel very alone and without a place. We can’t go back for the past no longer satisfies us, but we can’t find a way to go on either. It is as if we are a puzzle piece looking for a place to fit, but no matter how hard we try, we cant find the place we belong. Other pieces have come into our lives and we desperately try to make them connect with us… (even to the point of misshaping ourselves to form to them), but as time continues on we find ourselves alone and searching once again.

I keep getting a picture of a room full of people (elbow to elbow really) all with eyes tightly shut buying into the lure of the lie being told to their heart that they are alone. That they have blown it and can never come back… after all anyone who said that they loved you and cared have walked away because your failure was too big. On the occasion that an eye did chance to open, there was the realization that “No they were NOT alone” They were in a room surrounded by people… unfortunately they took comfort in that and did nothing else. Why is it that they never told the others surrounding them that the whisper was a lie? Why is it that they were content knowing that they were surrounded by others, never reaching out and touching any of them?

I don’t know where God is leading, I can’t begin to see what he has in mind for me? When I look back I see the reality of pain that has trailed my life. At times I am still the same lost teenage girl longing to have a friend. Faced with the reality that those who have said they loved me and my family have found someone else to love. I don’t understand this? Why is it when I vowed in their pain and choices to always be there when they called my determination is the same, but because I have chosen to follow where I believe God to lead me the same vow has been abandoned in return? It hurts, it is staggering and leaves me numb and without breath.

I know God is for me, I know that these are just emotions and they will pass. I know that God has great plans for me and my family. I know he is continually walking beside me and my family and we are walking where he is leading… I just wish, others would see the same.

Oh Lord, let our hearts be deaf to the lure of the lie and in tune to the truth being whispered. And give us courage to continue to touch others and tell them they too are not alone.

Faith = Rest

Hebrews 4:1-3 (The Message)

For as long, then, as that promise of resting in him pulls us on to God’s goal for us, we need to be careful that we’re not disqualified. We received the same promises as those people in the wilderness, but the promises didn’t do them a bit of good because they didn’t receive the promises with faith. If we believe, though, we’ll experience that state of resting. But not if we don’t have faith.

Amazing that we can believe in God, believe that He exists, that He is got good plans for us, and all, but if we do not have faith… true faith that He is for our good… that he longs to walk minute by minute with us,…that he is our life’s meaning, we will not receive the rest that we are seeking.

How many times I have found myself longing for rest from the craziness of my life. I have questioned God and to be honest at times wondered if he really was faithful. I thought I had all my “duties” as a Christian taken care of, all of my plans “blessed by God.” after all they were good ideas…. But still the restlessness and the failure came.

Could it be that although I had the best intentions, I did not have faith in God. It was my works, my plans, my decisions that I believed and trusted in and asked God to bless?
Boy did I miss the boat!

Hebrews 4 goes on to say that God keeps moving the appointment he has set with us to TODAY. “Today please turn, Today listen to me.” He longs to have relationship with me. He longs to take me to a place of safety, of rest, and of adventure in HIM. It can only happen as I have faith in Him and trust in our relationship together. If I try to do it on my own, even if I ask him to slap a blessing on it, I will not find what I am looking for.

The chapter ends with this: (Hebrews 4: 14-16) “ Now that we know what we have-Jesus, this great High Priest with ready access to God- let’s not let it slip through our fingers. We don’t have a priest who is out of touch wit our reality. He’s been through weakness and testing, experienced it all- all but the sin. So let’s walk right up to him and get what he is so ready to give. Take the mercy, accept the help.

A New plan

10 This new plan I’m making with Israel
isn’t going to be written on paper,
isn’t going to be chiseled in stone;
This time I’m writing out the plan in them,
carving it on the lining of their hearts.
I’ll be their God,
they’ll be my people.
11 They won’t go to school to learn about me,
or buy a book called God in Five Easy Lessons.
They’ll all get to know me firsthand,
the little and the big, the small and the great.
12 They’ll get to know me by being kindly forgiven,
with the slate of their sins forever wiped clean.
13 By coming up with a new plan, a new covenant between God and his people, God put the old plan on the shelf. And there it stays, gathering dust.

With the changing of the year, this scripture is timely for me. Out with the old, and the looking toward the new.
As with previous years, at the changing of the old and new, God will speak to my heart as to what the topic of the year will be for me. What direction He and I will be walking together so that I can find all the blessings he has hidden for me in my personal adventure. This year is no different. This year as I look ahead and listen to the voice of the the one who guides my life, one direction is ringing loud and clear.... He desires truth in my inward parts.
Although I am not a dishonest person by any means, I know that there are things inside that need to be released. My God desires not only a life of truth to be lived by me, but a truth that runs to my very core.
I know that I am a people pleaser by nature... I am a fixer, a worrier, and I must admit a bit of a self inflicted, self driven martyr. These are the things that I must bring light and truth to.

I must release the old... the old way of doing things.
The way I react, the way I view things just because that is what was handed down to me and I myself have taken on.
I must instead turn to what has been written on my heart.
The personal love letter written to me by my personal God.
Letting go of the old and do just as God did
set it up on a shelf to gather dust.

Not only Love, love well

Philippians 1:9-10
So this is my prayer: that your love will flourish and that you will not only love much but well. Learn to love appropriately. You need to use your head and test your feelings10 so that your love is sincere and intelligent, not sentimental gush. Live a lover’s life, circumspect and exemplary, a life Jesus will be proud of:

Learning how to not just love much, but love well is the part that sticks out in my heart this morning. It is so very easy to just lay on thick the love that is as it is put in this verse the sentimental gush. but this type of love will not touch anyone. It is a phony love that does nothing but serve myself. People were created to crave the deep personal love. The love that is committed, tenacious, and long-suffering. We... I need to go past my feelings, my comfort zone, my rescue for the sake of rescue reaction and show others the deep love they are created for. When others see this type of love, they begin to get a glimpse of the love of a father that would send his son to give his life just because we needed him.

This is loving well. This is living well. This is the great commission that I am called to.

What Changed?

I think if there was one person identified with most in the bible, it would have to be Peter. He and I could be twins! … ok in thinking anyway. Peter like myself seemed to have great plans. He had zeal like no other! Until it left the brain and moved into action, and that was where things seemed to fall apart.

He was the first to jump out of the boat and walk on water…. For about 10 seconds and reality set in! He was the one praised for proclaiming boldly who Jesus was…. And then turn around and be corrected for his wrong thinking in the next breath. And it was Peter who proclaimed that he would never leave Jesus and jumped at the chance to protect his master and friend, cutting off a guard’s ear in the process, hours later only to deny ever knowing him not once, not twice but three times!

How devastated Peter must have been when the rooster crowed and he found himself eyeball deep in the reality of his failures. His master and friend, the one he declared his life to, the one he shared life with, the one he thought he would usher in the new kingdom with, the long awaited messiah being tried and beaten before his very eyes and he walked away!

Life must have been breathtakingly hard at that point. All that you have known stripped from you.. all that you had ever hoped, all that you had ever dreamed, crumbled like sand between your fingers. So Peter did what I would most definitely do, went back to the only thing that He knew to do, He went fishing.

The next that we ever hear of Peter is when Jesus find him after a long frustratingly empty night fishing, He has been resurrected and tells his friends to cast their nets on the other side of the boat. And they bring up a huge catch! It is then that Peter recognizes his friend!

Jesus later comes to Peter and they go for a walk alone on the beach…. Peter is a changed man… He no longer has the cocky conquer the world at any cost attitude. He is humble, and broken, very aware of his limitations…. What changed in Peter in the days between his denial and Jesus’ resurrection meeting with him?

If I would guess it would be Peter had probably been the kinda guy that we all want to be. Self assured, liked by most, had the world by the tail…. Until he came to the end of himself… until he was shown who he really was and life came crashing in on him.

This is were Jesus met him! Humbled and broken Jesus, the one he betrayed and walked away from, walked up to him. Peter for the very first time in his life truly understood forgiveness.

It was this forgiveness that brought Peter to honestly tell Jesus that although his heart longed to love him unconditionally, in reality only loved him as a good friend… and it was here that Jesus put his hand out and took that friendship and taught Peter how to unconditionally love.

Why is it that we choose misery and bitterness over doing what is right and what our heart longs for? It is such a natural reaction! We have been wronged! We have a right to be hurt! It wasn’t fair! In our zeal we declare we will right the injustice done and never let it happen to another person the way it has happened to us! All well and good, but in the end we find ourselves the same place Peter found himself, breathtakingly lost in the reality of our failure. And we go back to what we know.

It is only through forgiveness, through the letting go of all that we thought was right and true, letting go of what should have been and allow Jesus to teach us unconditional love that we can embrace who we were really created to be.