Hearing God - and obeying him...

I have been spending a lot more time in prayer these days, especially dealing with Robert's impending mission. And I have been hearing God a lot. Has it been more? Has it been clearer? That I really can't say with certainty. I talk to God a lot and I know that I hear his voice regularly, so I don't know that that has really changed. Upon reflection, I think it's more that I am hearing the messages that aren't as palatable a bit more clearly. God is calling me to 'step it up a notch' and I am hearing those messages more. I don't think the messages are new, I think my attitude has changed and I'm realizing I need to listen and obey on those points too. Maybe in the past I have been too quick to disregard, or rationalize them off, or simply & frankly ignore them. Sorry LORD, I realize that you have been calling me and I have chosen to say 'no'. Today, I am saying 'yes' knowing that it is beyond me and calling on you to help me to be obedient. I realize that you are correct, you have given me all the tools that I need, and have provided guidance and help, but I have have nonchalantly been going my own way instead of following your path.

Yesterday, God got my attention. I was driving home and had our local news station on the radio. This is what I always listen to on the way home. But something in my spirit urged me to change to the Christian radio station. At first I gave a light protest - it's always just music at this time, I don't particularly like the music they play. The nudge continued so I switched over. After a few ads, In Touch came on. I had been hoping for Walk in the Word. Again I was tempted to change the channel but stopped. The message started and I realized it was about health. How God cares not only for our spiritual and emotional health, but also for our physical bodies. Ok, my physical body is currently in bad shape. Pastor was talking about how our bodies will be resurrected like Christ's body was. I had never heard this before and frankly I'm not sure I believe this, but a terrible thought came into my head. God said to me, what if when you're resurrected you are resurrected in your current body. Is this how you want to present yourself to me? Is that how you want to be for eternity? Shock & horror at that moment was overwhelming. I realized God was calling me to much better that I am settling for. I need to get healthy and lose weight. God is giving me a direction and it is very clear and I need to say YES. But it is also very scary. I don't know that I can do it. In fact that's not true - I feel that I really can't do it, that I am weak and undisciplined and will surely fail. But everything I'm reading is telling me that God will help me and give me the strength. He will prop me up and help me. Will he give me the self-discipline? I'm not sure about that, I think that has to come from me, but I do know that if I can learn to lean on him and follow his guiding, I can and will succeed. I know that he has given me the tools - a naturopath who has outlined a diet and exercise plan, access to healthy nourishing food, the knowledge and tools to prepare the food he has provided, a membership to the fitness centre, a husband who is supportive. But I still have to say that this is really scary to me right now. When do I start? Does this mean I can't have a drink once in a while? How strict does this have to be? Where exactly do I start? The enemy is attacking me over this, bringing in self-doubt and a lot of questions. I will choose to ask God to guide me in my choices TODAY! I will listen and CHOOSE to follow him. I will acknowledge that it IS his voice and remember I need to say YES.
I need a lot of prayer around this!! I need a few verses and to remember that if I am obedient I will be amazed at the results.

Letter to my prayer group for the new year

I pray everyone had a wonderful Christmas and rung in the new year safely.  R & B your dinners both sound yummy although I'd probably prefer B's... He he...

C, I'm glad your tooth is more bearable and glad to hear your sales were good. When Derek was out of work there were many months his eBay sales kept us afloat as God blessed us with good sales and merchandise to sell.

And now we're into the new year. Like you R, I also love the new year. To me its a time to reflect on what God has done in my life the past 12 months and to contemplate what his direction appears to be for the months to come. I like to take a couple of days vacation so I can focus without the distractions of Christmas activity and the pressures of work.

This year instead of resolutions I have set priorities with a plan on how to reach them.

Goal #1 is sort of an overview goal that breaks down to three specific goals, that is to finish some of the things I started last year. In reflection last year was a year of starts but not a lot of follow through. The two major exceptions was keeping active with this group and I had a very successful year at work. God has blessed me mightily in that area.

Specific goals:

My health- God gave me the tools for this last year and I made few good starts but allowed myself to get distracted from the plan. I've made progress with the gluten free but my weight is as high as ever. There are two major events this year and I am determined to be as healthy as possible for them. I'm following a book called Never Say Diet by Chantelle Hobbs. She has a Christian approach to getting healthy and I know this is the plan God has given me. I'd really love to have an accountability partner if any of you ladies are interested. That's one of my prayer requests for the new year.

Ministry - late last year I felt God guiding me towards volunteering for the prayer lines at our local Christian television station. I started the training in December and hope to finish it off this week. They require a commitment of a minimum of 4 hours per week. This is way outside my comfort zone but I am really excited about it. I've felt a huge desire towards missions but logistically it's not feasible nor does it fit with where God has me right now, but this seems like God's answer to that desire.

Finances - I made lots of not so good decisions last year and set us back financially. This year I need to get brutal with setting my budget and sticking to it. We have been blessed with a wonderful home and great jobs that pay well but I have been indulgent instead of diligent and have accumulated debt that needs to be paid down. Please pay for strength and discipline in this area. I plan tho talk to Derek about

Chapter 1 Questions - Never Say Diet
What do you want to change and why?

1. Beyond losing weight, what do you most want to change about your life? I really want to be more self-disciplined. I want to be able to  reflect on each day and know that I strived to be the best I could be
2. Are you willing to do whatever it takes to see certain areas of your life undergo radical change? If you're not yet willing, what is holding you back? This is a scary question and truthfully I'm afraid I will fail, but I know that this is where God is leading me and I have faith that he will help me through. So my answer has to be YES.
3.  When in your life have you felt the most hopeless? Are you now ready to move past those scars and never look back? I felt the most hopeless before I accepted Christ. Since then I've had my ups and downs but have never felt like there was no hope the way I did before Christ. For me the question is more am I willing to now take the next step in my growth as a Christian and never look back. Again, my answer has to be YES,
4. When you gained weight in the past, what factors caused you to lose your focus on health? I think if I am truthful it really comes down to a pattern of laziness and self-indulgence, combined with a sense of  fatality.
5. Identify 3 reasons or influences from the past that convinced you that you couldn't achieve permanent life change. After considering these reasons, can you now admit that they were merely excuses? I like the wrong type of foods too much, I feel I can't live without them forever. It's easier to just eat what I feel like, we're busy and its hard to cook good meals every night. I deserve to have nights off and that leads to eating the wrong foods. I've always had issues with food, to be slim would mean starving and depriving myself. My weight gain was due to medications and beyond my control. I'm hopeless and just can't permanently lose weight. Yes these are all excuses although the thought of giving up the foods I love is hard. I know I need to get healthy to live the life I want to live,.
6. Think about the necessity of changing your mind before you change your body. Do you agree that lasting change begins on the inside? As you consider being the best you can be, are you ready to work from the inside out? YES and YES.
7. A total life change involves your body, mind and spirit. Do you accept the role  that faith plays in the process of changing your life for good? Yes, that is something I have no doubt about and God has brought me to this point so he will not quit until he has perfected the good work that he has started. This is probably the only thought that makes me really hopeful that I can finally change and that this book can help me.
8. When have you been held back by a fear of failure? Write down your biggest fears in this regard. As you face your fears, can you decide to let them go and give your all to permanent life change? I basically fear failure, that this is just too good to be true and like all the other times, it may be successful for a time but eventually I'll just end up back in the same place I am now. I am fearful of letting myself down again, of feeling like a visible failure to my family, friends and colleagues. I am afraid I can't do it. I remember when I first accepted Christ I had similar fears, that it wouldn't last and I'd fail yet again,. With Christ my faith has never waivered and I recognize the changes he's  brought about in other areas of my life. I know that it's God bringing me to this place and time, and that gives me the courage to stand up to my fears and push past them. Oh, and I'm petrified of the exercise that will be part of the program, but I know I have to just suck it up and strive to be the best I can be. Please Lord, make this work!

The Winds of Change

Yes, the winds of change are blowing through and I have the feeling a storm is brewing.

For a while now, maybe even a year, I've felt that God is leading and preparing me for a period of challenge and growth. Actually as I reflect, it goes back to 2010 and my 50th birthday. Not long after I turned 50 it was like my body fell apart. I had constant pain in one area or another. As time went on it got so bad I could barely walk or turn over in bed. I had difficulty getting out of bed and doing the things I loved. For a while it was my arms & shoulders, then my foot, and finally it hit my right wrist to the point I could barely use my hand.

Around the same time, I got my new Kindle. When exploring what it could do, I went to Amazon to look for books to buy. It had one suggestion - Made to Crave by Lysa Terkurst. Now I had never purchased anything on Amazon.com nor had I ever heard of this author. It was a book promoting a godly approach to weight loss. Well I knew I needed to lose weight and I also knew that it was God's way of telling me that book was for me.

Well I bought the book and sort of read it, it made sense to me but I never really made any attempt at serious weight loss. But what it did to was to point me to Proverbs 31, a Christian woman's web site. From there I joined an online prayer group for women 50+. God's answer to my prayer for feminine fellowship and prayer partners. I have been a part of that group for almost a year now.

While dealing with my ongoing health issues, I was pleading with God to understand what was going on. What was it that I was missing. Then the answer came. God showed me that he had made all these provisions and had provided blessings that I was rejecting. I have all kinds of medical insurance through work but rather than reach out for help, I was scorning God's blessings. So I started off going for massage therapy. That helped one are but the pain just moved somewhere else..

Derek suggested that I try seeing a chiropractor. I'd heard some horror stories and where would I even start. Through a series of events God directed me to a doctor and broke through my skepticism to make it clear that this was where he was guiding me. After about 6 months,, the damage in my neck has reversed itself, I am pain free in my shoulders, arms and pretty much pain free in my neck and lower back. My headaches have decreased dramatically. Then the pain moved to my hand. Okay Lord, where are you leading me now?

The next step on the journey was to a naturopath. Again he led me to the right one. And she found all kinds of issues. Somehow I think we've just touched on the surface. And all the solutions so far revolve around my diet. Great - one of my most challenging areas so far I haven't made much progress except to convince myself that this is what needs to change.

A month or so ago, Derek and I decided to start a bible study by James McDonald on Godly change. So that's where this finds me - almost half way through that study. God is calling me to address the following areas:

• my lack of self-discipline
• my lack of self-restraint
• my tendency to self-indulgence

There are 3 areas he's made it clear I have to address - my laziness around the house, my spending habits and my lack of discipline and self-indulgence when it comes to food. Ouch. I know he's calling me to clean up my diet and get serious about  exercising more. I know that the only way I can change is if God changes me. He starts on the inside when I ask for help and I have to partner with him if I want the change to be permanent. This is what I've learned so far in the change bible study.

So I know what I have to work on but where do I start? I remember Lysa's book Made to Crave and figure that's a good start. The problem is her book is a support to whatever diet plan you choose to follow, but I don't have a diet plan. I know I need some sort of plan. Counting calories doesn't work; Weight Watchers doesn't work, so what should be my plan. I've prayed about it, I've asked Derek about it, but until today there was no answer except to point out what doesn't work.

Today, I get to work early to get a parking spot in the good lot, and have time to spare so I decide to start re-reading Lysa's book. I read the first chapter and decide to see if she has a podcast. She doesn't but itunes suggests this book called Never Say Diet by some woman who was 350 lbs and now runs marathons. Well it was pretty strange how this just suddenly came up and in my gut I knew it was God. But I don't weight that much and I certainly have no interest in running marathons. The other kicker was that the brief reviews I saw seemed to emphasize exercise. Yuck!! But in my heart I knew God had pointed me here. Okay, I'll investigate more. And then I found it - her approach is to change your brain, change from the inside and that will lead to the change in diet and fitness, and she is a Christian emphasizing the need to partner with God.  The winds are  howling...

Tonight after work I bought the book, stopped at Chapters on the way home and read the introduction and first chapter. In the first chapter, Chantel talks about how God told her "You're not being the best you can be". Well God told me that tonight too. I was in tears driving home because I know that I'm also not being the best I can be, and I want to be. I don't want to be anything less.

Mom is coming over tomorrow for Mother's Day weekend and the house is a mess. I know Derek has been stressed about it, plus the pool guys are coming to open the pool. I had promised him that I would help him clean Friday night. Normally I promise with the best intentions but if I'm honest cleaning is a big chore and generally I do only what I have to. Tonight I knew I had to do the best I could do. I realized that I owe it to Derek, I owe it to Jesus and I owe it to myself. I have to say I amazed myself and it is obvious God gave me the strength I needed. I cleaned the whole kitchen including the small appliances, I reorganized 2 of the cupboards, unloaded and loaded the dishwasher, cleaned both bathrooms, all before 10 pm. Derek was pretty amazed and commented several times what a relief it was for him. He says he's feeling much less stressed about tomorrow. I feel great and have a true sense of accomplishment. My foot and lower back is sore, I'm tired and there were several times when I was really aware of my weight hindering my progress, but I really feel despite all that I actually consciously strived to be the best I could be at the tasks I set before myself.

Bring on tomorrow, I have a few errands and plan to pick up a sports bra because I know I'm about to start exercising and I have to commit to striving to give it my best.

If Christ was willing to die for me, I owe it to him to try to do the very best I can., I want to start aiming to be the best I can be.

Called to Bless

On my way to church today, I sent up a quick prayer remining God that I am searching for my area to serve in this year. God seems to have a pattern for my life, I serve in some capacity for a time, that door closes and I enter a time of preparation or waiting. In retrospect, I have come to realize that what I saw as a time of inactivity or waiting around, God has used it as a time of preparation and learning for the next asignment. Sometimes it is my faith that needed to grow and other times it is skills that I've needed to learn, probably most times it has been a combination of both.Then, suddenly I'll feel the compulsion to pray. In the past number of years it has been the Jabez prayer that I've turned to, and when the time is right God has opened the door to the next opportunity.

At this point, I want to inteject that I do feel that all these little jobs are leading up to a bigger one further on the horizon. I believe that at some point in my life God is going to move me into a more missions oriented calling and I believe it will be outside of Canada. At one point in my Christian walk this would have been my worst nightmare of a thought, but as time has gone on I've come to realize that God has been working on my heart with that one, to the point that I find myself yearning to step out of my current comfort zone and really be feeding the hungry or reaching out to the needy. I see opportunities with different aid organizations and long to go, but know in my heart that the time is not now for that. I believe that that day is coming closer into view and the following items need to fall into place:

1. I need to be financially strong enough - Derek and I have spent the past week reviewing our finances. We have a plan that, God willing, can eliminate our consumer debt within the next 3 years. That will leave our mortgage. Once the consumer debt it gone, then our focus will be to pay down the mortgage as quickly as possible.
2. I need to be free to go - depending on how we progress with item 1, in 9 years I will be eligible for full pension with no major penalties in 15 years both Derek & I should be eligible for our pensions. My thinking is that most likely once my pension kicks in, we would be called to do short term missional assignments.
3. My health needs to be better - God has been calling me for some time now to work on both my health and our finances.

Okay, so much for long term, let's get back to today....

So I say my prayer as I head off to church, not really thinking much about it, my mind is quickly off in other directions. When I get to church I see that we have a guest speaker and I remember vaguely that there was some sort of a conference this weekend. It strikes me that it had peaked my interest somewhat and wonder briefly if I should have gone, but again this is a fleeting thought. We have a great time of worship and then the guest speaker gets up to give the message. He's talking about praying for your street. Apparently he visited our church in October, but it must have been a Sunday that I missed because I don't remember him. But my interest is caught because I have always felt that we let God lead us to our current home and that we had a mission to fulfill on this street. That said, I'm really not confortable with preaching to my nieghbours, but I'm interested in what he has to say. He talks about how years ago God gave him an illustrationl He saw a bathtub being filled with water and God asked him what happened to the air that was in the bathtub. He says he'd never thought of that before, as the water enters the air is dispersed. They'd been called to minister to a very resistant neighbourhood, where Satan had a strong hold over the people. God showed him that the water was his peace, or spirit and the air was Satan. From that they developed a prayer misistry based on the book of Luke.

Luke 10 1-9 (NIV)
¹ After this the Lord appointed seventy-two^[a] others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. ² He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. ³ Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. ⁴ Do not take a purse or bag or sandals; and do not greet anyone on the road.
⁵ “When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house.’ ⁶ If someone who promotes peace is there, your peace will rest on them; if not, it will return to you. ⁷ Stay there, eating and drinking whatever they give you, for the worker deserves his wages. Do not move around from house to house.
⁸ “When you enter a town and are welcomed, eat what is offered to you. ⁹ Heal the sick who are there and tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’

He laid out a 4 step program:

1. When you enter a house, first say, ‘Peace to this house'
2. Felowship with them - Stay there, eating and drinking whatever they give you -
3. Listen to them and you will learn where their pain is, then you can pray for their pain so they may be healed
4. Tell them, ‘The kingdom of God has come near to you.’ - this is your answer when asked

The principles are as follows: the peace of God surpasses all understanding. We are sent out as lambs among the sheep but when we offer the blessing of God's peace the wolves are sent into confusion. Instead of devouring the lamb, they invite us in. Once we are an invited guest, if we fellowship and listen, we will learn their needs and can pray for them. Through this, God's peace will fill our streets, neighbourhoods, communities, cities, states/provinces and countries. He showed an illustration of how one domino can knock over another domino 1.5 times it size. God uses this principle. We are the 'others' that the bible refers to as the 72 'others' Jesus sent out. They weren't the disciples, they were the 'others'.

This resonated with me on many levels. Lately I have felt God urging me thst I need to be going into my son's room and praying for him when he is out. His room is dragging him down. It is always messy so you can't see the floor in there. He has one of the smallest rooms, but he is completely disorganized. He has temper issues that are exasperated by the state of his room - things constantly getting lost or broken due to the mess. The walls are a dark red which I regret now. When we moved to the new house we let the kids choose the color for their rooms, black was not allowed so Robert chose a dark red and Jess chose a barbie hot pink. It was a nice thought but I regret it. I feel in my heart that Satan is using his room to drag him down and I need to be praying in there. Shame on me because I've known this for several weeks at least and have not acted. I will do so this week.

Also, at New Year's God showed me a lesson on blessing. it was a devotional based on Abraham's blessing for his sons Jacob aned Ishmael. I don't claim to understand blessings in the bible, but God has impressed on me lately that if I understand it or not, they are valid and have immense power. I was led to bless both my children. I sent them each an email telling them what I loved about them, what I admired about them, what I wished for them in the coming year and ended by empasizing how much I loved them. Each came back to me immediately to say how much they appreciated my email. I have vowed to make it a new years tradition going forward. Our children need our blessing. My parents were not Christian growing up and God has called me to break that old cycle and start a new one for a new generation to take forward.

As the speaker ended his sermon, he invited anyone who felt they were being called to lift up their hands as he prayed a blessing over us. Now Derek and I are not ones to lift our hand or be that demonstative in church, for our own individual reasons. After a message like that though, there was no way I was turning down a blessing. Interesting enough, we both lifted our hands at the same time., I asked him on the way home what he thought of the message, and he talked about how he had heard about the work one woman was doing. (She gave her testimony about how her young sons went into a new school and were praying God's blessing on their classrom and their school and the consequences it had.) When we got home, as we got to the front door, Derek stopped, took my hand and prayed God's peace for our home as we entered. Thank you Lord.

And now he has called me to take his blessing to my neighbours, my workplace, my community. I have been challenged that everytime I walk through a door, any door, to bless that space with God's peace. If invited in, I am called to eat, drink and listen. As God shows me needs, I am to pray for them. And when asked for an answer, I am to tell them that 'The Kingdom of God has come near to you.' This is what God has called me to do.

My paradigm has shifted, I need to watch for doors and be responsive. God will do the rest. I invite you to come back as I report what God does over the coming year as I walk upon this new path that he has set before me.

2011 in review

I was reading a couple of older posts from 2009 and realized that that had been a year of big changes - we moved and my job changed. In 2011 God's vision for my job was further revealed. I changed positions twice last year. The first was a lateral move that went through several evolutions and then in August, completely out of the blue I was promoted two levels up. God faithfulness and generosity has overflowed in our lives. It puts my efforts to shame when I think how I still struggle with things like devotions and tithing. How much I have to consciously stay on track or it all falls off the rails.