How far we go with Jesus always depends on how much we trust Him.  Every journey begins with the first step.  If we follow Him it will be like stepping off a cliff.  We are never sure where the next step is all we know is He told us where to go.  I remember Abraham when he was told to go to a land that the Lord would show him.  I imagine that others thought he was crazy.  But one step of obedience lead him to a life of adventure in God.  

Ezekiel 47:4 (NIV) "He measured off another thousand cubits and led me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another thousand and led me through water that was up to the waist."

In the Bible a thousand is the number of maturity.  When God is measuring how deep the prophet will go He is actually showing Ezekiel the possibilities in God and that as we grow in trust and mature, we get lost in God; because we trust God and relinquish our hold on everything and everyone else.

Challenge for today: "Let go and let God"!  He will take you where you've never gone before. 

If you and I want to be a reflection of our Lord and Savior then we have to be ready to go where He leads us.  Sometimes where He leads us may be out of our comfort zone. There will be times that we feel totally unprepared for and ill equipped for the places where He leads us.  Trust Him.  He knows what He's doing. Just like physical exercise if we want to get stronger we have to gradually lift more than we thought possible.  He is with us. Our faith is sealed. Our hope is real.  Come what may, we are not afraid.

In order to be a reflection of Him then we must get lost in Him.  More on this tomorrow.

Two totally different pictures.  When someone leads you can relax and follow.  If you trust your leader to lead then it is easy even if at times it may be hard.  You trust.  Horses spook easy. They sense things. We are the same. We sense danger and the Lord assures us He is a good shepherd and He leads us.

John 10:11 (NIV) ""I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep."

Psalm 23:2 (NIV) "He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters,"

The problem is many times we give up in the middle.  We follow God when He leads us in the direction we want to go but then when we are driven from evil forces from within us and around us we give up.

Don't give up in the middle.  Continue to pursue God and the things of God.  When the going get tough keep following God by staying in the word and doing the last thing He told you to do.  We were made for greatness.  We are more than conquerors.  We can not lose if we do not quit. 

Jeremiah 12:5 (MSG) “So, Jeremiah, if you’re worn out in this footrace with men,
    what makes you think you can race against horses?
And if you can’t keep your wits during times of calm,
    what’s going to happen when troubles break loose
        like the Jordan in flood?

I hear the Lord saying, "Sometimes you have to run alone."  This saddened me because as a pastor my heart is that we would all run together.  Then He said, "But I will always run with you and the Holy Spirit is within you."  God knows just how to talk to me.  So prophetically I am hearing that some of you have decided to come if no one else you know comes with you.  If you are concerned about the drive or the sleeping arrangements...be at peace.  He is with you.

The real puzzle of life in this first part of the 21st Century is why so many people live so badly. Not that people are so wicked, but that they are content with what is so ordinary and, in some respects, utterly stupid. Not that people are so cruel, but so unaware. There is little to admire and less to imitate in the people who are prominent in our culture. We have celebrities but not saints. Famous entertainers amuse a world of bored sleepwalkers. Those we read about and shake our heads at - as insane criminals - are, sometimes, those who act out our aggression. Petulant and spoiled athletes play games for lazy and apathetic spectators. People, aimless and bored, amuse themselves with trivia and trash. Neither the adventure of goodness nor the pursuit of righteousness gets headlines. The human race is “a bleak business,” says Tom Howard. 

If we want to do what has never been done before and go where no one has ever gone before then we must step out of what everyone else is doing and saying.  We must be spirit lead and not flesh driven.  We must seek the Spirit and not be stagnant and satisfied with the status quo.  

So let's run the race set before us and be confident that we do not run alone.

Jeremiah 12:5-6 (MSG) "“So, Jeremiah, if you’re worn out in this footrace with men,
    what makes you think you can race against horses?
And if you can’t keep your wits during times of calm,
    what’s going to happen when troubles break loose
        like the Jordan in flood?
Those closest to you, your own brothers and cousins,
    are working against you.
They’re out to get you. They’ll stop at nothing.
    Don’t trust them, especially when they’re smiling."

Today was a great day.  I got to be with family and friends and that is priceless. It amazes me that we can just pick up right where we left off as if we have never been apart.  We remember the same stories and laugh all over again at the same ones we have told one another for years.  This year however was different.  The topic of conversation always comes back to our children and our grand children.  

I have decided we never out grow parenthood.  Being a parent is probably as close as we will ever get to being like God.  We actually get to create life and birth another human being onto this planet.  We nurture and care for this little person that will grow up in our image.  Literally many of my brothers children and my own look just like us.  I see photos of my friends grandchildren and they look just like their own children did.  I have a hard time wrapping my mine around the fact the little children that played next door now have children that look just like those little children that played next door.  

That got me thinking.  Do we look like Noah, Abraham, Sarah and Jacob, etc. etc.  Does God look down and see the resemblance?  Then I thought about all the joy those little next door neighbor children brought me. As I traveled down memory lane I just kept smiling.  I have had a wonderful life. God has allowed me just a glimpse of what He must feel and how loving He really is to allow us to procreate and enjoy family.

Thanks for just allowing me to ramble.....I am on vacation you know.  I truly am enjoying the pleasures of a well lived life.  I look forward to coming home and kissing on my grandsons, seeing my staff, hugging some friends and just being where I belong.....

Ahhhhh but the beach?  It has allowed me time to think, reminiscence and reflect.  So take-a-way for today?  Find time to reflect on your life.  Take time to remember and when you do be thankful we serve a great God.

1 John 4:19 (NIV) "We love because He first loved us."

1 Timothy 5:8 (NIV) "8 Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever."

James 1:25 (NIV) "25 But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed."

I am a real Bible believer. I believe if I ask God to do something He will. I am one of those crazy fanatics that actually take God at His word and believe it when He speaks to me.  I believe I am God's favorite!

Now before you get all mad at me I believe you can be God's favorite too.  I believe when we ask anything in His name and it is according to His will He will do it!

John 14:13 (NIV) "And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son."

I am also convinced that God is no respecter of person. What He will do for me He will do for you.  People are often surprised by the favor of God on my life when they first meet me.  After they know me awhile they too think I am God's favorite and I have some kind of special powers.  I tell the rain to stop and it does.  I ask for a parking space and I get it.  I must admit sometimes I get that parking spot and on purpose give it to someone else just because I want to sow a seed for a future parking space when I really need one.

So I experienced the favor of God.  It was almost to great to believe so I ask God to confirm it with a sign. Now remember I said we can ask according to His word?

Judges 6:37 (NIV) "look, I will place a wool fleece on the threshing floor. If there is dew only on the fleece and all the ground is dry, then I will know that you will save Israel by my hand, as you said."

So all along the beach I kept finding these pieces of sand dollars.  I had ask let me find money or something that lets me know You are confirming this thing that has just been spoken.  My mother loves shells and usually she comes with me to enjoy the beach and her family.  After all she was the one of the first Condo owners back in the day.  Each morning we would have to go for a walk and pick up shells for her to take home.  When she found a sand dollar she'd be so excited. If she found a half of a sand dollar she exclaim, "I found 50 cents!".  Then she'd walk awhile and find a forth of a sand dollar and yell, "I found a quarter!" On the game would go until we returned from the Pier to see who had the most money~Mother always won.  

This week we had not seen a shell.  Not one big enough to even bother to bend over and pick up.  All the way to the Pier there were no shells.  We had commented that mother would be disappointed this year because there were no shells.  Now after my prayer it was as though it had suddenly rained sand dollars.  Bits and pieces, quarters, fifty cent pieces were everywhere.  I wanted to shout, "Hey Mom I know I am going to win! I found 50 cents! I found a quarter!" and on it went until I returned from the Pier.

God is faithful.  Start asking Him according to His word.  He doesn't take a vacation!  He wants us to Daily Divert, Weekly Withdrawal and Annually Abandon to be refreshed and recreated we must recreate.  So go ahead enjoy life and take Him with you wherever you go.  Your life can be a living testimony!

By the way just in case you didn't know it, inside every sand dollar are these little doves.  To me they always reminded me of the Holy Spirit; especially today.

Everyone has their opinion of what you and I ought to be doing with our life. If you haven't experienced this yet it simply means you have no one in your life.  All joking aside. Children think they know what their parents should do.  Parents think they know and (usually do I might add) what their children should do.  We all think we know what the politicians should be doing and on it goes.

There is really only one person who knows what we should be doing.  The creator of the universe knows what every one of us should be doing.  That (should be) is different for everyone at different times.  If you are sick you should be sleeping or at least resting.  If you are healthy and you just got back from vacation or a long weekend then by all means you should go back to work.  However, doing something just because others think you "Should" is a sad way to live.  God gave us all boundaries and guidelines, and yes He gave us COMMANDS! That's what we should be doing.  If we each would busy ourselves with the business of our Father we would be far too busy to worry about what everyone else should or shouldn't do.

I guess what got me on this subject is having the time to actually hear all the conversations around me.  One person tells another they should go eat here.  Another person says everyone should cook at home  Still another says get "take out".  I am persuaded that if we do what God would have us to do we would encounter many divine appointments. I have gone out to eat and had the opportunity to co-labor with God and lead someone to the Lord.  Other times I have gone to the grocery store and prophesied to someone and brought a healing and changed the course of their life.

Here is my challenge for you.  Do what God tells you to do and let Him be the highest authority in your life.  I am not saying be a lone ranger you all know me better than that.  I have a husband and pastors and many counselors and family members as well as friends in my life that love me and want the best for me but as far as this world goes? They are headed the wrong way.  That's why you and I are still here.  We are called to be a light in the dark.  Let your light shine!  Be someone others can imitate.  Be Jesus with skin on as they say.  But more than anything be what God has called you to be! Do what God has called you to do!

John 1:5 (NIV) "The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it."

Everyone knows when you go to the beach your going to see birds.  Lots of birds.  At the restaurants there will be signs that tell you not to feed the birds.  I always want to feed them anyway.  I don't because then they invite all their friends and the other patrons frown on that.  So I take my scraps and feed them along the ocean.  I feel like the pied piper.  Today was no different.  They followed me because I had food.

Jesus knew that we were a lot like birds.  We follow for the bennies.  Only problem is it is not always Him we are following.  The desires within us determine who we will follow.  If we are addicts we will follow our supplier.  So I guess the question would be who or what is your addiction.  I have worked with enough addicts to know that people will do anything to get their addiction satisfied.  They will give up family, friends, and finances to get their fix.

Mark 10:29-30 (NIV) "   29 “Truly I tell you,”Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel 30 will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life."

Everything in life cost.  There is a price to pay for every relationship, job, recreation, material thing and even sleep.  It's just easier to pay the cost for some things than it is for other things.  Jesus paid the ultimate cost.

It's NOT about your condition it's about your position!

My spiritual grandmother told me this, "Daily Divert, Weekly Withdrawal and Annually Abandon".  At the time she said it, I never dreamed I could do it.  I was looking at the statement from my current condition.  Now that I can do it I see it from my position.  

Ephesians 2:6 (NIV) "And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus,"

When we look at life through our current conditions many things that are possible will seem impossible. However when we look at things from our position in Christ even the impossible seems possible. A friend of mine was battling a health issue and she suggested we walk to the Pier.  It seemed a long way to me for her to walk,  but walk we did.  There were times she had to stop and her pace at times was much slower than mine.  From her condition I did not think she could or should do it. From her position (the one she confesses-that she is already healed) she knew she could.  Her faith took her places that in the natural seemed impossible.  She knew that in Christ she was already healed and in Him she could do all things. Walking to the Pier was just one of the many "things" she believed she could do.

What about you?  Never mind where you are today.  Where are you headed?  Today I am at the beach but when I get home I have an opportunity to pour into a group of women that are going places.   So from my position I am allowing Father God to refresh and renew me.  He knows I am about His business and I know He is about mine.  My condition is I am tired from the last few days of ministering in South Carolina.  But I do not listen to what my condition says, for my position tells me I am an overcomer and that everything I lay my hand to prospers.  

​Position matters more than condition!