Friday, October 23, 2009

Don't fight the season!

Dear Friends-
I hope this email finds you blessed and highly favored.
I've been struggling to balance my life now that I'm back to an official 9-5 (hence the spottiness of your messages from me).

Today I was blessed with a few minutes of quiet and I thought about being so extraordinarily busy after 18 months of consulting on my own. I thought about the concept of reaping and sowing but couldn't figure out what season I was in.

God spoke to me and now I understand. The scripture below illustrates my understanding even further...
The years at my last job were for learning and hard work. Those were my sowing years. The early years of marriage, the job you had before you were laid off, the years after financial ruin, these are all "the sowing years" characterized by learning, hard work, mistakes, pain and occasional fun.

The Bible verses below tell the people of Isarael ..." sow, and then REST!"

No matter how we much fight the season of rest and eat from "untended vines", God will shut all doors of opportunity until we stop. When the kids grow up and leave home, when you reduce your living expenses, and when we're unemployed, these are periods of rest.

How do you know you're in a period of rest? Everything you do to take advantage of "the next best solution will fail.

Finally, after working and sufficient rest, God will shower us with favor- overwhelming favor. We will reap what we've sown and it is such a wonderful blessing when it comes.
Don't worry, the right job will come soon and your financial matters will work out.

Accept your season and plan for the next one!

Stay blessed,
K.

Leviticus 25:1 (Whole Chapter)
[ "The Land Will Observe a Sabbath to God" ] God spoke to Moses at Mount Sinai: "Speak to the People of Israel. Tell them, When you enter the land which I am going to give you, the land will observe a Sabbath to God. Sow your fields, prune your vineyards, and take in your harvests for six years. But the seventh year the land will take a Sabbath of complete and total rest, a Sabbath to God; you will not sow your fields or prune your vineyards. Don't reap what grows of itself; don't harvest the grapes of your untended vines. The land gets a year of complete and total rest. But you can eat from what the land volunteers during the Sabbath year—you and your men and women servants, your hired hands, and the foreigners who live in the country, and, of course, also your livestock and the wild animals in the land can eat from it. Whatever the land volunteers of itself can be eaten.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Grace and peace

Dear Friends-
Hello! I'm sorry that I've been offline for the last few weeks but my new schedule has made it difficult for me to send you these messages. Please pray for me because I believe that sharing these messages is the most important thing I do as a Christian.
Thankfully, I had time today.

Despite the busyness- and the occasional curveballs that life throws our way- the Lord gives us His Grace (His Divine power and favor) to move us through our challenges.
Grace keeps us from going crazy when we just can't take any more. Grace keeps us from making irrational or dangerous decisions when we receive life altering news.
Grace keeps us strong when all we want to do is fall apart.
Whenever we become troubled by the difficulties of life and we wonder, 'what's it all for?', now we have an answer. It's because the Lord wants us to rely only on Him. He gives us His grace everyday so that we can keep going and achieve His purpose.

Please enjoy the scriptures below.

Stay blessed and stay in prayer for each other. Some of us are on the verge of a major breakthrough and others will be blessed by a long awaited 'Aha' after a long period of confusion.
Love to you all,
K.

Psalm 84

1 How lovely is your dwelling place,
O Lord of Heaven’s Armies.
2 I long, yes, I faint with longing
to enter the courts of the Lord.
With my whole being, body and soul,
I will shout joyfully to the living God.
3 Even the sparrow finds a home,
and the swallow builds her nest and raises her young
at a place near your altar,
O Lord of Heaven’s Armies, my King and my God!
4 What joy for those who can live in your house,
always singing your praises.Interlude

5 What joy for those whose strength comes from the Lord,
who have set their minds on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
6 When they walk through the Valley of Weeping,[b]
it will become a place of refreshing springs.
The autumn rains will clothe it with blessings.
7 They will continue to grow stronger,
and each of them will appear before God in Jerusalem.[c]

8 O Lord God of Heaven’s Armies, hear my prayer.
Listen, O God of Jacob.Interlude

9 O God, look with favor upon the king, our shield!
Show favor to the one you have anointed.

10 A single day in your courts
is better than a thousand anywhere else!
I would rather be a gatekeeper in the house of my God
than live the good life in the homes of the wicked.
11 For the Lord God is our sun and our shield.
He gives us grace and glory.
The Lord will withhold no good thing
from those who do what is right.
12 O Lord of Heaven’s Armies,
what joy for those who trust in you.