This morning I awoke with a troubled spirit. I began to write about it in my journal not being able to put a finger on the root of it. I had a text last night from one I’ve been counseling for most of a year. We had met late last week. She was hoping we could meet again soon as much trouble had arisen in their home. I suggested a time for tomorrow trying to keep today free. Her response was a hope for Monday–today. Along with this I am seeing a family member earlier today who is dealing with much anxiety. As I was journaling all of this I began to see a very dark evil which awakened me to the root of my troubled spirit. At this moment I began to see God’s Light and Its Purpose–permeate the darkness. I surrendered this darkness to the Light of Jesus knowing the darkness must flee in His presence. These two opportunities to help others find Jesus in the midst of their storms will be today’s purpose.

When the journaling first started I was having my own attacks wanting to step into old temptations. “Just set aside all of this and enjoy a moment of gratification,” was the evil’s temptation. The root of evil–Satan himself, has so many deceptive ways which man can, in his flesh, sees as pleasure. Today, this very morning, God’s Light is shining. I have put my trust in God and surrendered. I know His Spirit will be present and I’ve prayed He is already working in each one’s life and they are responding to Him.

God Light has replaced my troubled spirit with an anticipation to see Him work today. To God be all Glory!

Being an early riser I love the sunrise. The light of day is never anything but a blessing. It is the one reason I don’t care for daylight savings. I have to wait an extra hour in order to have the beauty of the sunrise. I go through the anticipation of this as winter begins. Then, I go through it again when daylight savings comes about. It is a little thing, but for me, its worthy of writing it. Now for the rest of the message—-.

Our quartet had a singing engagement yesterday late morning for an assisted living place. This afternoon we are doing another concert for an assisted living facility close to Boise. The one yesterday seemed to be loved by the folks attending but I didn’t feel good about it for my voice was a little raspy. As I was journaling this morning I asked God to help me be at my best for Him today. (I selfishly want to sound my best if I’m going to sing). Of course, as soon as I wrote this I heard my dad’s voice coming through with his message–“all you want is to feel better than anyone else, just go do your thing and forget we even exist.” This message was never true for me,but is is true that I want to sound good if I’m going to sing. God provided a much richer message as I heard His response to my request. His message, “Let me take care of this. Your role is to do your part trusting and believing I will do mine. I want the performance to glorify Me. The spirit of the singing is what glorifies Me most.”

Getting my eyes off of dad, off of me and onto Christ is just what I needed to hear and be reminded. How I love this Savior and Lord we have–Jesus Christ!

Today is one of those days where I have much I “want to get done” and yet there is much I know I need to do to honor my walk with God. That selfish side of me wants to set some other things aside so I can get to some gardening needs. As I began my journaling this morning I was sensing this strongly within me. So, as I asked Jesus what He wanted me to know from Him for today? He noted this controversary. He simply said that if I’d just give it all to Him He would direct my paths and once again, I’d be amazed at what was accomplished. I know this so well, but each and every time I come against a day like today I spend more time anguishing about it than anything else. Just a simple reminder from dear Jesus is what I needed. God is so GOOD! This day is now another day committed to God.

I don’t know about you, but when I step into something selfishly knowing it is selfish on my part and thinking, “it won’t hurt anyone,” I am sacrificing God’s Peace. I’ve known this most of my life and I’m sure there isn’t a person alive who has asked Jesus into their life, that won’t acknowledge the truth in this. There is always a sense of guilt that manifests itself throughout our body. Our thoughts center around regret, our stomach may churn, our enthusiasm wanes, etc.

This morning’s devotional centered around this theme–Seeking God’s Peace. A quote within it says, “Perhaps you’ve heard people say, ‘I don’t have peace’ when speaking about a particular decision. They are referring to the fact that when you are either outside God’s will or working against Him, you’ll feel spiritual friction. But when you’re in the center of God’s will, you will feel harmony with Him.”

There isn’t a person our couple I work with that hasn’t talked about being outside of God’s will and they want to find His Peace. I know full well the feeling of this peace vs the feeling of regret, remorse, guilt, shame. There is no peace in any of them.

In Celebrate Recovery’s step study one is asked if you have done anything to harm your body? I always hear responses about drug use, alcohol use, sexual disclosures, over-eating etc. spoken in response to this. This morning as I read this devotional I was shown how stepping outside God’s Will hurts our body even when it is something we think “won’t hurt anyone”. It hurts ourselves and God wants us awake to this. He wants us in the center of His Will where we will find Peace and Harmony. I don’t want to stray from this. Thank you God for this lesson!

Yesterday’s post just showed me again why Trusting and Obeying is so important in my walk with God. He didn’t want me preparing any materials for the two new clients. He wanted instead for me to be a good listener to each of them and to His Holy Spirit. I want to counsel well and having substance in hand somehow makes “me” feel like I’m better equipped when God wants me to quit thinking like me and to listen to HIm instead.

One of the young men I meet with on Wednesday’s struggles with his value. If he doesn’t live out each day “sinless” he is a failure. This young man is also in the Saturday morning group where this Saturday we are working through the topic of God’s discipline as it relates to our own discipline measures we use or were used with us by our parents.

As I was journaling this morning I asked God how I could better communicate with this young man helping him to see his value to God? It was amazing that instantly I heard His Voice saying to help him see the difference between God’s discipline and that of man. We often call our discipline punishment and tie it to something we did that was bad. As we grow up we begin to think that anything we do “bad” makes us a bad person. When God punishes (disciplines) He wants us to learn from what we did. He uses discipline to grow us. That makes us a “learner” and not a “bad” person.

This young man has been believing the lies of Satan that he is bad. God wants me to help him see that he truly is a good learner who is in the middle God’s lessons. I’ve lived where this young man is and I’ve finally learned the truth God wants us to understand. Yes, we will battle our flesh, but God’s discipline helps us learn how to put our flesh in check so we can live in His Freedom and not in Satan’s bondage.

“Trust and obey, for there’s no other way to be happy in Jesus, but to trust and obey.” These words are the closing line of the old hymn TRUST AND OBEY. They are brought to mind somewhat regularly by God’s Spirit within me. There are times when I just don’t know which way to step and I pause waiting for some insight. It is then I will often hear this song and these words. In other words, don’t fret, just wait for God’s timing to be your timing.

I have always been a person who, once I know what I’m suppose to do, jumps in with both feet to get going. It is after I’ve done this that I’ll begin to realize there are prep steps needing to be taken and I’ll have to slow down and take care of these steps.

I have two new clients asking for counsel I’ll meet with later today. The rationale given in their intake forms for their counseling needs are unique. I want to jump in and prepare but this morning early as I was pondering this I had these words singing through my mind once again. The phrase “happy in Jesus” happens when I trust, and obey my trusting. So, today I’m going to go into these two sessions with the intent to listen to the client and to God’s Spirit within to see just what any next steps are to be. I am going to TRUST AND OBEY.

I had the privilege of spending a couple hours with my prayer warrior yesterday, Lois. She is soon to be 93 and is still being used by God to give godly wisdom to so many who seek it. She is such a wonderful gift. On the sentimental side, she is like a second mom to me. Yet, being a prayer warrior is truly what this second mom does. I share the names of those I’m counseling with Lois (with their permission). Yesterday, I needed to tell her that one of the men had specifically asked me to share his need with that prayer warrior lady. He needed someone bombarding heaven with this current need of his. I told her this yesterday along with the need and she just smiled saying, “he is right at the top of my prayer list”.

One of the needs I shared with Lois yesterday was from an abuse victim–dad using daughter in her childhood. She is now is her 40’s and we have been working through this time of trauma. We had a meeting with her parents attending several months ago. Her dad is now in his own counseling. She is wanting to speed his own recovery along so he will see the damage he did to his own daughter. As I shared this wit Lois, she pointed me to a devotional she had read many years ago and God had highlighted some of it for her. It is very relevant for this present need. It states: “We all know how difficult it is to rescue a drowning person who tries to help his rescuer, and it is equally difficult for the Lord to fight our battles for us when we insist upon trying to fight them ourselves. It is not that God will not but that He cannot, for our interference hinders His work. Spiritual forces cannot work if we are trusting earthly forces.”

This father is dealing with 60+ years of being prideful and arrogant about who he is. He is finally getting help. He is a believer which is good. As difficult as waiting on God’s timetable is, it is what is needed at the moment. The daughter and I have had these conversations, but the quote above says it so well. Trusting God during crisis is never easy. Having a prayer warrior is always a GIFT!

The conversation of yesterday turned out just as God would want it. In fact, yesterday had a couple more events planned into it which also turned out much better than I had hoped. Our quartet was singing for an assisted living place. We have been going there for 20+ years so we know these folks well. Our songs were almost all new ones so my own sense of preparedness was low. Singing was the one thing dad didn’t criticize so making sure it was “perfect” was intensely important to me. Somehow I still battle this sense at times like yesterday. However, before we sang we all gathered for prayer. One of the quartet members prayed thanking God for the excitement of singing for Him. I asked him following the prayer if he was actually excited? I was nervous. He just said he had a nervous excitement. I loved this. I just said in my head that I give this nervousness to You God and I just want to be excited and worship You fully.

It was an amazing time of worship yesterday with those attending. We all commented following the service how significantly we felt the presence of God’s Holy Spirit. God is never done awakening me (us) to Him and helping us let go of unwanted baggage. Yesterday was another good lesson day!

A dear friend who lost his wife only weeks ago is now having to go to his home state to prepare for his brother’s funeral. He passed earlier last week. Along with this, his wife’s brother here is in the hospital with sepsis and the hospital says there’s no more they can do to treat it. Added to all of this is that his only sister in the home state has poor health and her husband is near death. There’s more to say here, but this is enough. Today, after church, my friend is coming over so we can talk and I can feed him. Several are willing to help him by going with him to clean his brother’s home (which had been their parent’s home where all of them were raised). The brother has always been single and the house is a mess (disaster). This tender, dear friend already has a broken heart that hasn’t grieved fully and now all of this is added to his plate.

As I’ve gone through my devotional time I’ve asked God to let His Wisdom be understood and His Holy Spirit to take the lead as we meet later this morning. My friend has given of himself in helpful ways to everyone he knows. He and his wife were noted for this. Somehow, helping others is fine, but, receiving help offered is not easy. I know there are reasons for not wanting the help, but I pray my friend can open himself to what God wants him to receive at this point in time.

My devotional theme this morning was “Hearing God’s Voice through Others”. It was an insightful message and I know God is already in charge of the conversation we will have in a few hours. How blest we are to have our Loving God lead and support us. GOD IS SO GOOD!

My devotional is challenging the reader to take a look at the way God speaks to us. Yesterday was addressing God’s Word, the Bible. Today it addressed circumstances. There was one sentence that truly stood out in bold letters. It says, “If we focus only on what we cannot do, we often don’t realize the opportunities and blessings God has provided for us.”

I could name you so MANY times in my past when I told God–I CAN’T DO THAT! My one and only rationale for saying this was because the situation might reveal my past to the world and then I’d never be able to show my face again. This was really true for me in the education years. Being a teacher, one is not given too much attention. Moving into building administration, there are times when a light is shown on you, but it is very short lived. BUT, moving into superintendency, that position is often in the news. There was no way I could allow myself (even though I was often encouraged to do this) to even apply for a spot. I wouldn’t even ask God if He wanted me to do this. I knew better! I’m sure not sorry for my years in education. I know God wanted me there. I just was too cautious to let God be fully in charge.

The fear I write about, keeping me from stepping out, hit me squarely when I was asked to consider starting the counseling program. BUT, this time, I knew better than to say no without bringing it to GOD. In so doing, I kept seeing His Light shining. Today, I’m so grateful for this opportunity. It has taken me a lifetime to not focus on what I cannot do to willingness to let God lead me to what He wants me to do. No matter how long it took, I am so grateful to be where I am today!