Archive for the Faith Category

Yet not I

By on November 24, 2010

What do you like most about yourself?

I don’t even know how to begin to answer this one. The dislike question was much easier. LOL

Well, here goes. The things I like about myself, I cannot take any credit for because all of my “good” qualities are the fruit of the grace of God. I guess what I like most about myself now is that I am being given the courage I need to get out of my comfort zone(s) without “liquid courage.” It’s one thing to get all liquored up and post videos of myself playing along with Fleetwood Mac, but it took strength from through prayer to get up in front of the church and sing & play all by myself.

See, when I was in high school, I quit the youth choir before Bro Tommy got a chance to attempt to make me to a solo…because that was just not going to happen. No way was I going to sing all by myself in front of people. Yes, this kind of cowardice from the girl who wanted to be a rock star when she grew up. :giggle:

So, yeah. What I like most about myself is the change that is taking place in my life. I don’t know what is in store for me, and I doubt that it has anything to do with music, but it is ok if it does or if it doesn’t.

Galatians 2:20 (New American Standard Bible)

I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.

This entry is filed under Faith, Trust, Writing Prompts. | 7 Comments

A journey, part 2

By on September 18, 2010

“Lord, I am ready to do whatever you want me to do, no matter what.”

That was a hard surrender, and it still is. But not as much, because as I was about to finish The Promise, our pastor challenged us (as in our congregation) to read Radical by David Platt. Not only to read it, but to do the challenge and meet with him after Sunday morning service as a small group and be accountability partners for each other. So I rushed to finish The Promise so I could read Radical when the hubby was done with it. Oh, that was harsh reading. Convicting. See, I’ve been feeling the call to work with the youth for a few weeks, and then right after that, the pastor started preaching/teaching us to start working on discipling. “Coincidentally.” Well, The Promise followed by Radical was just what I need to convince me that I needed to volunteer to help with the youth whether I want to or not. (Kids scare me, by the way.) See, I was discipled by a young lady from when I was 10 to 15. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that is exactly what she was doing with me. (That story is a post in itself.) And I digress.

The day after I finished Radical, I got a book in the mail that I only vaguely remember ordering. Tortured for Christ by Richard Wurmbrand. Where those other books had begun to put life in perspective, Tortured for Christ rounded it out. Those of you on Facebook who saw my Sunday status, this book precipitated that. For those of you who aren’t on Facebook, why not? Everybody’s doing it. LOL Seriously, though this is what I posted: “owns multiple Bibles in multiple translations while Christians in many areas of the world cannot get even one Bible and suffer persecution and torture for their faith. I’ve taken my freedom for granted. How about you?”

Well, how about me. What now? What am I going to sacrifice and to whom am I going to give? What am I going to give up that will truly be a sacrifice?

This entry is filed under Faith, Life, Ramble. | 8 Comments

A journey, part 1

By on September 14, 2010

This turned out longer than I expected. My intent was a quick update to keep the blog “active,” but the more I wrote, the more I wrote, and it still ended up vague and all over the place with the need for expansion. So it will be multi-part, and maybe I won’t take 2 or 3 weeks to finish and post part 2. I’ve read 4 books in the last month, two of which I read last week. That’s not really why I haven’t been blogging, but, well, ok the last 2 I was reading when I could have been blogging.

Anyway, I was having some emotional issues over the summer once I finished school. Wild bouncing from high to low to high to low, and trying to keep it in rather than explode it on others. Particularly the low which tended to get angry. For a couple of weeks, SSgt Nemec was back with all her bitter issues. But, while I was on vacation, I got up every morning and walked, and prayed. I had already decided the problem was me, so I asked God to change me and my attitude. I was still having a hard time keeping my thoughts in check, though, with all my wild imagination of different scenarios that all centered around conflict. And then I happened across a Joyce Meyer video.

Ok, I will state right up front, Joyce Meyer has always rubbed me the wrong way. But I had watched one video of hers earlier in the year (again by “chance”) that just happened to be about submission which was something I was struggling with at the time. Well this one was about thoughts and about allowing our minds to just go where ever and dwell on whatever. I saw that she had a book called Battlefield of the Mind, and so I got it and read it. Within a week of reading it, I found myself in the middle of some drama which I will not go into. While some of the book I read with some skepticism, there was much from that book that helped me get my wild imaginations under control. Not on my own power, mind you, but I had the awareness of what was behind those wild thoughts and so every time I found myself dwelling on a scenario, I prayed.

Following that, I picked up a book that was recommended to my hubby by the pastor of the church we first went to a couple years ago. He had recommended Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire by Jim Cymbala also, and that was a great book, so I started reading The Promise by Tony Evans. The Promise is about the Holy Spirit, and that was a great follow up to Battlefield of the Mind. It was while reading this one, that I thought that the drama happening in my life just might be there to break me and that last vestige of pride (self-righteousness) I was clinging to. Whether that was the intent or not, that’s what happened. I was broken. I was reduced back to that insecure “little ignorant girl from Birdtown,” so overwhelmed by life that all I could do was surrender. The kind of surrender that I should have done when I was 12, but didn’t until a couple of weeks ago.

“Lord, I am ready to do whatever you want me to do, no matter what.”

This entry is filed under Faith, Life, Ramble. | 8 Comments

For Mel

By on April 16, 2010

So she will stop tapping on her desk waiting for a post. LOL

I had a bad start to the week. It felt like depression, but that wasn’t it. I won’t go into it, but I spent quite a bit of time this week in quiet introspection, at least as far as anyone could tell. I started a journal this week over it. First I thought, “Well, that’s what your blog is for,” but no, not so much. At least not yet.

Most of the rest of my “free” time has been spent doing homework. My goodness, I am glad this is my last class. I was going to do a thesis, until I really read through the requirements and realized the thesis I was going to do was entirely to too narrowly focused. So, I went with my backup project, which is an eCommerce software solution for my future small business, should I ever go there. Storefront and inventory control. Should probably through throw in accounting too, but I think that would entail too much in the short time frame. The inventory control portion might get cut too. I guess I will make that determination this weekend as I work on my proposal.

I will make no promise of a video this weekend. I do have to practice tonight for church since I haven’t at all this week. A couple of the songs I don’t know at all and a couple more not very well. Then again, I just looked at the schedule again and I was looking at the wrong Sunday. Good thing I hadn’t practiced since I had the wrong songs anyway. LOL

This entry is filed under Faith, Life, LinkWhoring. | 4 Comments

He’s Alive

By on April 4, 2010

This entry is filed under Faith, Remembrance, Salvation, Video. | 2 Comments

Facing a fear

By on March 30, 2009

Back when I was in the Air Force, in Combat Comm, I had an attitude. Actually, I had several, but the one I am speaking of pertained to the prospect of facing the enemy. I tried to keep the attitude that I would never ever cower to whatever enemy I had the potential to be captured by. In fact, my attitude in readiness school was “Better to be dead than captured.” I didn’t, and still don’t fear death, per se. I don’t wish to die, but I am prepared. That has helped me tremendously with panic attacks, because I know if I am really dying, I won’t be terrified.

Prior to that, I have always had the apocalyptic account of the end times in the back of my mind, along with the “What if the rapture isn’t pre-tribulation?” My dad believed it to be mid-tribulation. I’ve read Revelation several times, and I can see either way. Now while I was pretty much taught mid, I was also taught to be prepared to go through the whole 7 years. So I have always tried to keep myself prepared to face all that comes with and end-tribulation rapture. Do not deny God. Do not deny Jesus. I know it would be difficult, but I don’t completely fear it. I know I have help in God if or when I am put in that kind of situation.

Matthew 10:28 (New American Standard Bible)

28″Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

But what about friends?

That put much more fear in me than any enemy. I feared possible ridicule more than death. I feared the accusations of hypocrisy. I feared not being able to stand up and profess my faith without shame. But really, why fear any of that? I’ve been ridiculed before, and it didn’t kill me. I had a couple of events in my life as a teen that were waaaayyyy worse than anything I could imagine my friends and co-workers might say to me. And what would it matter anyway?

Matthew 10:32-33 (New American Standard Bible)

32″Therefore everyone who confesses Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven.

33″But whoever denies Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father who is in heaven.

Well, today, I put my fear to the test, and my faith. See, I have prayed that I would have courage, but yet kept keeping my faith mostly hidden. How can I ask for courage and then avoid a situation that would require it? Well, I wanted to go over notes from a class I attended at church yesterday. With that also came reading through Luke 15 and 16. So, I took my notes and my study bible to work, and opened them up during lunch. One of the guys walked by and asked me what I was studying. So I told him, along with half the office. And before lunch was over, we all had quite a nice little theological discussion. Now I feel relieved that they know that I am trying to change how I act. I don’t want them to change how they act and talk because of me, and I tried to convey that to them, however. They aren’t my problem. I am my problem.

I learned over the weekend that I am not alone in my fear. Amazing what I learn when I listen. ;-) The more I study, the more I realize how little I know, and the more I want to study and learn. Not so I can boast in knowledge, but that I can walk the right path, and not be a stumbling block to anyone.

This entry is filed under Faith, Life. | 12 Comments

Was I really saved?

By on February 28, 2009

There was a point last summer when I began to question my salvation. I sat through sermons feeling, well, like a failure. I would listen to the pastor talk about eternal security of the believer, and how you don’t have to remember the day and time you accepted Christ as long as you remember doing it. Well, I could (and still can) remember it in great detail, short of the day and time. I know what time of year it was, what year, what time of day, where I was, where my parents were, and that I felt the weight of the world lifted from me as I prayed that night for forgiveness and for Jesus to come into my heart as my Savior. I can remember that additional relief once I went before the church and shared my salvation, and the following baptism. Yet, I sat Sunday after Sunday for the past few months wondering if I really had accepted Christ or if I had accepted instead a delusion.

So I turned to the Bible. I studied this, and I studied that, but the reassurance seemed to be escaping me. I would pray, but still didn’t feel reassured. Just after Christmas when I was home visiting Mom, I went to church with her, and she insisted I come to her Sunday School class. I laughed at being in the “old women’s” class, even though they aren’t all old. But anyway, as they were discussing the lesson, one of the ladies told a story about a woman she used to work with who at one time had questioned her salvation as well. She told how the woman said she finally prayed to God and said “If I end up in Hell, I will go there trusting You.” So I prayed that same thing, because I remember accepting him. Yet, I still didn’t feel reassured.

I decided that the reason I felt so unsure was because of how I was living my life. First I cut the drinking. Then I started working on the potty mouth. Then the innuendo-laced joking. Then the anger. Then the sharing of my experience. With the exception of the drinking, I still felt like a miserable failure. About 3 weeks ago, I had a meltdown to God. I poured it all out to Him as I sobbed uncontrollably. All the guilt, all the feelings of worthlessness, I poured out. And I began to feel some peace.

As I was studying something after that little meltdown, I ran across “the unforgivable sin.”

Matthew 12:31-32 (New American Standard Bible)

31 “Therefore I say to you, any sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven people, but blasphemy against the Spirit shall not be forgiven.

32 “Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man, it shall be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come.

Well, that really got my questioning going. Had I blasphemed the Holy Spirit? My Apologetics Study Bible says in the footnotes that “Fear that one has done so is probably a good sign that one hasn’t, for full-fledged apostasy is a defiant rejection of everything Christian and lacks the tender conscience that would be worried about such an action.” In the Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary under blasphemy, it states that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit “is a state of hardness in which one consciously and willfully resists God’s saving power and grace. It is a desperate condition that is beyond the situation of forgiveness because one is not able to recognize and repent of sin. Thus one wanting to repent of blasphemy against the Spirit cannot have committed the sin.” So, after all of that, I stopped questioning whether or not I was saved back when I was 12. However, it seemed I was questioning my eternal security, when I shouldn’t.

John 10:27-29 (New American Standard Bible)

27 “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me;

28 and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.

29 “My Father, who has given them to Me, is greater than all; and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand.

Romans 8:1-4 (New American Standard Bible)

1 Therefore there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death.

3 For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh,

4 so that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

Romans 8:35-39 (New American Standard Bible)

35 Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

36 Just as it is written,
“FOR YOUR SAKE WE ARE BEING PUT TO DEATH ALL DAY LONG;
WE WERE CONSIDERED AS SHEEP TO BE SLAUGHTERED.”

37 But in all these things we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.

38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers,

39 nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

So not only can I be assured of my salvation, I can be assured that I cannot lose my salvation. Remember how I said “I decided” what was causing my guilt? Well, that is the root of my doubting problem.

Proverbs 3:5-8 (New American Standard Bible)

5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.
6 In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight.
7 Do not be wise in your own eyes;
Fear the LORD and turn away from evil.
8 It will be healing to your body
And refreshment to your bones.

As a child, I was taught the meaning of faith as “Forsaking All I Trust Him.” I grew up, and in my arrogance, forgot that lesson and had to be retaught it.

Psalm 121
The LORD the Keeper of Israel.
A Song of Ascents.
1 I will lift up my eyes to the mountains;
From where shall my help come?
2 My help comes from the LORD,
Who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not allow your foot to slip;
He who keeps you will not slumber.
4 Behold, He who keeps Israel
Will neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The LORD is your keeper;
The LORD is your shade on your right hand.
6 The sun will not smite you by day,
Nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD will protect you from all evil;
He will keep your soul.
8 The LORD will guard your going out and your coming in
From this time forth and forever.

This entry is filed under Faith, Salvation, Trust. | 12 Comments

« Newer Entries