Happy Thanksgiving!

A New Book – A New Chapter!

For those of you who have not heard, I have moved to a new website! I will no longer be posting at this blog site in WordPress.

IF you want to continue to receive my weekly blog posts, then please go to www.restoring-hearts.com and sign up for my weekly blog posts.

Meanwhile, I have great news: my book is done! I am now a published author on Amazon, for which I am eternally grateful to God.

As you can see in the ad above, this week my book is on sale at Amazon in both formats.

Many of us have wounded hearts from emotional hurts from the past. Please don’t remain stuck in those wounds, as you’re not only hurting yourself, but others around you.

I wrote the book so you could find healing in your emotional and spiritual hearts. I invite you to start your journey of healing today.

You can find a link to my book at my website: http://www.restoring-hearts.com.

Time Alone with God

Come check out today’s blog post at:

https://www.restoring-hearts.com/post/time-alone-with-god?postId=5ffcb866d83941001743f94e

And while there, sign up to receive my weekly blog posts.

Thank you for being faithful followers on WordPress. As I say good-bye to posting on WordPress I hope to see you and serve you better at my website:

http://www.restoring-hearts.com.

Being Fearful, Lacking Faith

“Faith is to believe what you do not yet see: the reward for this faith is to see what you believe.” 

St. Augustine of Hippo 

Faith and fear are like oil and water; they don’t mix well. Fear and faith are the same as two sides of a coin in which only one side can be displayed at a time. If we’re fearful then we’re lacking faith. Being full of faith causes the absence of fear and worry. 

Faith requires trust – not in ourselves but in the One who is trustworthy – Jesus. Recognizing and believing in God’s ability leads us to trust Him and to let faith override our fear.  

When Jesus asked His disciples the question: “Why are you so afraid?” in Mark 4:40 after they woke Him up during a storm, He was implying that there was no need to be afraid since He was with them. The windstorm, waves breaking into the boat, and the boat filling up with water weren’t reasons to become fearful. Jesus was incredulous as to why His disciples were so afraid when they had His presence. 

Jesus knew who He was, the all-powerful God who created the universe and had control over the weather, but His disciples didn’t know and believe who He was. And therein lies the problem, as to why they lacked faith and were fearful. Even though the disciples had spent time with Jesus and watched Him repeatedly perform miracles, they still didn’t believe who He was. They didn’t understand that He could do all things and that no purpose of His could be thwarted (Job 42:2). 

In what situation do you lack belief in who God says He is? The place where you’re lacking faith is the same place where fear has seized your heart. Those are times we need to cry out to the Lord, “Help my unbelief” (Mark 9:24)! 

Even though things are uncertain in our world today, we don’t need to become fearful. God is with us, holding onto our hand. Fixing our gaze on the One who is trustworthy, all- powerful, reigns over each situation, and understands what we need, pushes fear out of our hearts and grants us faith to believe He’s got this. 

“The cure for fear is faith.” 

Norman Vincent Peale 

Relevant Reflections: 

1. In what current situation are you tempted to become fearful? 

2. Reflect on God’s attributes and choose to place your faith and trust in His ability. 

Faithful WordPress Followers

Thank you for signing up to follow me at restoringhearts.wordpress.com. I appreciate your faithfulness to read my weekly posts. Some of you have been following for 8 years and others began just this month. No matter how long you’ve received my weekly posts, I hope they have encouraged your heart and have brought you one step closer in your walk with God. 

I’m excited to share we have a new website: www.restoring-hearts.com. Please check it out and sign up to receive my weekly posts here: https://www.restoring-hearts.com/blog. They will be the same type of posts you’ve read on Wordpress. 

Starting February 1, I will no longer be posting at restoringhearts.wordpress.com. So if you’d like to continue to receive my Monday posts, you will need to press the “Subscribe to blog” button on my website. My last post on WordPress will be tomorrow.

Thank you again for being faithful followers. Hope you will continue to receive my posts each week and that I’ll be better able to serve you from my website: www.restoring-hearts.com. 

The Missing Piece

“Jesus knew where he had come from, why he was here, and what he was supposed to accomplish. He came down from heaven, not to do his own will, but the will of the Father.” 

Erwin W. Lutzer 

On Christmas day we started to work on a 500-piece jigsaw puzzle of the nativity scene. While I made dinner, John sorted through all the pieces to find the ones with a straight edge to make the border of the puzzle. It’s easier to start from the outside frame to fill in the center pieces. Likewise, when we see the broader picture in life of why God created us, our purpose, then we can fill in the specific details in our life. 

There was one problem though, we were missing a puzzle piece of the border. We hunted for it on the floor and on the top of the table, but we never found it. This frustrated us as we wondered how many other pieces of the puzzle were missing. The temptation was to throw the pieces back into the box and to give up, just as we started. 

Life is like that. Sometimes there are pieces missing and we can’t seem to figure out what the piece looks like, or what it’s to be, let alone how it fits with the rest of our puzzled life. We may know the overall vision or purpose of our life but are missing the specific pieces to fulfill our destiny. When that happens, we can become discouraged. 

Don’t allow the missing pieces to dissuade you from following God’s destiny for your life. Keep pursuing the next thing He shows you and place each puzzle piece where it belongs. Because eventually you’ll have the completed work of art that He created your life to be. “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10). 

“We know not what the future holds, but we do know who holds the future.” 

Willis J. Ray 

Relevant Reflections: 

1. What does the overall puzzle of your life look like? 

2. What is the next piece of the puzzle God’s given to you to use? 

A Reminder That We’re Moving

Thank you for signing up to follow me at restoringhearts.wordpress.com. I appreciate your faithfulness to read my weekly posts. I hope they have encouraged your heart and have brought you one step closer in your walk with God. 

I’m excited to share we have a new website: www.restoring-hearts.com. Please check it out and sign up to receive my weekly posts here: https://www.restoring-hearts.com/blog. They will be the same type of posts you’ve read on Wordpress. 

Starting February 1, I will no longer be posting at restoringhearts.wordpress.com. So if you’d like to continue to receive my Monday posts, you will need to press the “Subscribe to blog” button on my website. 

Thank you again for being faithful followers. Hope to be better able to serve you from my website: www.restoring-hearts.com. 

Entrustments

“All Christians are but God’s stewards. Everything we have is on loan from the Lord entrusted to us for a while to use in serving Him.” 

John MacArthur 

A few months ago, a friend gave me a prophetic word and when I heard it, I felt the weight of its responsibility. I ignored it and “covered my ears,” pretending I didn’t hear it for almost a month afterward because I feared what it might mean. My fear caused me to temporarily bury my “talent” instead of investing it. We invest something in order to multiply it, so it has a greater effect on others. 

 In the parable of the talent, Matthew 25:14-30, the Lord encourages His children to take what He gives to us and to multiply it. When someone entrusts to us a gift or responsibility, we need to steward and take care of it. The talents aren’t given just for us to enjoy; they’re given to us to multiply them and to give them away. Spiritual gifts are given to us by God to steward and manage so that others are ministered to. 

God reminded me that the result of multiplying my gift instead of denying its existence is not only a “Well done, good and faithful servant” (Matthew 25:21) but I receive joy as I share in God’s happiness. And when we’ve been faithful with a few things, He will put us in charge of many things (Matthew 25:21). Being faithful stewards of what God has given to us builds His trust in us which results in greater influence and authority. 

Instead of keeping the prophetic word buried, I began to believe it and declare it. I told the Lord, “Yes” to receiving and unwrapping this gift. “Let it be to me according to your word” (Luke 1:38). I’m choosing to not let fear get in the way of multiplying what He’s given to me and I’m embracing the joy that comes from my partnership with the Lord. 

Don’t let fear cause you to bury the gift God’s given to you. Thank Him for the gift, ask Him how to best steward and multiply it and allow His grace upon you to do all that He desires. Enjoy partnering with God and enter into His happiness. 

“God charges us with utmost seriousness to be trustworthy with the treasures He’s entrusted to us.”  

Beth Moore 

Relevant Reflections: 

1. What has God entrusted to you? 

2. How are you multiplying it? 

We’re Moving!

Thank you for signing up to follow me at restoringhearts.wordpress.com. I appreciate your faithfulness to read my weekly posts. I hope they have encouraged your heart and have brought you one step closer in your walk with God.

I’m excited to share we have a new website: http://www.restoring-hearts.com. Please check it out and sign up to receive my weekly posts here: https://www.restoring-hearts.com/blog. They will be the same type of posts you’ve read on WordPress.

Starting February 1, I will no longer be posting at restoringhearts.wordpress.com. So if you’d like to continue to receive my Monday posts, you will need to press the “Subscribe to blog” button on my website.

Thank you again for being faithful followers. Hope to be better able to serve you from my website: http://www.restoring-hearts.com.

Follow the Breadcrumbs

“But, if we’re going to go where we’ve never gone before, we’ll need signs to get there. These signs will restore the wonder.” 

Bill Johnson 

Once again, John and I are embarking on a new era: retirement. Just like when we first got married, became parents, and moved to a new city, we had no clue what we were doing, so too we have no idea how to best navigate John’s retirement. Thankfully, God knows what He’s doing. We trust that God knows the plans He has for us – plans for our welfare and to give us a future and a hope (Jeremiah 29:11). 

When we first moved to Wichita, we paid attention to the “breadcrumbs” God placed right in front of us. With anticipation, we watched for our masterful Guide to lead the way. We had no idea who He wanted us to connect with and how He wanted us to minister. But He did. He divinely orchestrated the church we would attend, the people we met, and the opportunities that opened to us. One breadcrumb led to another and another. Deep friendships that fed our souls were formed, not by random coincidences, but by divine guidance. 

As retirement came on the horizon, God kindly reminded me of when our daughter was born, I thoroughly enjoyed and delighted in each stage she was in. It seemed I enjoyed the next phase more than the prior one. So too, He promised we will enjoy retirement more than the years John worked. I’ve grieved the loss of what was, but now I look ahead to what will be.

God gave Isaiah 43:18-19 as my verses for the year 2021, before He divinely directed John to retire. “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” Even though we have no idea what this “new thing” will look like, we have childlike expectancy. We are keeping our eyes and ears attentive to follow God’s breadcrumbs. We have no doubt we will love what He has for us next because our Father is good, and He loves to give His children good gifts.

“We give credit to human wisdom when we should give credit to the divine guidance of God being exhibited through childlike people who were ‘foolish’ enough to trust God’s wisdom and His supernatural equipment.” 

Oswald Chambers 

Relevant Reflections: 

1. Describe a time when you followed God’s “breadcrumbs.” 

2. Prayerfully ask God for a scripture verse for 2021. 

2020 Hindsight

“Faith is moving forward even when things don’t make sense, trusting that in hindsight…everything will become clear.” 

Mandy Hale 

Hindsight is the “perception of the nature of an event after it has happened.” People said 2020 would be a year of clearer vision. In a way it was, as I muddled through the pandemic and its repercussions. I discovered more clearly the character inside me by what rose to the top, when heat in the form of loss, was turned up higher. Isolation, loved ones passing, not attending public church services, choosing to wear a mask and social distancing in order to protect others and myself, the loss of planned vacations, and what I used to call a normal life. Loss puts things in perspective, levels the ground we stand upon, and needs to be grieved.  

My verse for 2020 was “Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil” (Ephesians 5:15-16). This guided and encouraged me on the days when I fought against fear, anxiety, and disappointment. But it was James 4:13-15 that the Lord kept highlighting to me throughout the year. These verses discouraged boasting about tomorrow, for we “do not know what tomorrow will bring.” 

Last spring a friend mentioned the phrase “a handler clipping the bird’s wings” as a possible explanation as to why God had allowed the pandemic. A bird’s handler does this as a form of protection, to limit their access to danger and it forces the bird to be more dependent on its owner which enhances the bond between the human and the bird. Could it be that one of the primary reasons God permitted this year to look the way it did was to encourage us to draw closer to Him and become more dependent upon Him? 

Sometimes we must look back before we can move forward. Before the year 2020 ends, take some time to reflect on the year: who God was for you, what you learned, and who you became as a result of all that took place. Acknowledge how He’s working everything for the good to those who love Him (Romans 8:28). I encourage you to close out 2020 by giving God thanks before you ring in the New Year. 

“I have learned that faith means trusting in advance what will only make sense in reverse.” 

Philip Yancey 

Relevant Reflections: 

1. What did the Lord teach you during this difficult year? 

2. Who was God for you? What attributes did He display to you? 

3. How did you spiritually and emotionally mature in 2020?