The One who cares

Life can be overwhelming.


At work, the boss just isn't making himself clear, his lack of communication is bugging you.
Or you are the boss and you have been faced with impossible tasks and business decisions that will affect the lives of others, there is so much pressure to make sure you keep everyone happy yet turn a profit or stay afloat.


You have been hit with a number of awful occurrences, a broken marriage, debts which are now out of control, a victim of abuse. Your job is on the line.
You're facing a long and difficult illness and you worry about your children. What happens to them if you succumb to this illness? What about if you survive but you've had to take alot of time from work and now your employers regret that they will have to let you go? What about the bills coming in still?
Your parents are elderly, health failing and, as they get older, they get harder to take care of. You are trying to take care of them but you have your own family demands too, children at school who need your attention.
Life just gets so busy and it doesn't even have to be some of the more drastic ones above, it can just be the day to day tasks but everything seems to come at once and you can't split yourself into enough pieces


We all have this, its part of the human experience where we just don't know which way is up or down.
This may sound simplistic but, if you are a Christian, you can go to Someone in prayer. You can cry out to God. He may not actually remove any of these factors. That's a whole other post. But you can still go to God. He is the one Person whom you can just spill it all out at. He won't tell you to pull yourself together. He won't say there there never mind


The fact of just being able to talk to God about it is a form of release. Even if, initially, we don't actually feel any better for it (and I know because I have had those times), the very fact of opening that part of our lives to God gives the option for change, for allowing His Spirit into that situation.
Sometimes God will remove the thorn that causes pain or anger or irritation, even all three. Other times He wont. But in every case, God cares for us and wants us to go to Him


1 Peter 5 v7 says "⁷ Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you."
Ps 94 v 18 says "And when I was burdened with worries,you comforted me and made me feel secure."


So why am I telling you this? 


Well, my husband, who isn't a Christian, is going through tough times at work. He is under a lot of stress. In addition to that, two other family members are experiencing disappointment, stress, anxiety about finances, future of children. There are worries about harmful recent experiences and how this will affect them in the future, there is broken relationship. Neither of these other family members are Christians.
As I've spoken to them, listened to their worries, I have silently prayed for them, pleading with God on their behalf (no, I'm not all that as a Christian so please don't think this is me congratulating myself).
What has occurred to me is that, as a Christian, I believe that God my Father does actually give a stuff about me. The Bible tells me this is also true (see the above verses). David frequently spoke of his troubles and trials to God. Just read the Psalms. But people who have no belief, who do they turn to?


Well, yes, they can turn to family members, they can turn to friends. But as we all have our own issues to deal with, one can be reluctant to burden others with our own problems. There may be reasons why we can't involve others. This can make us feel isolated, alone in a morass of problems which no-one can rescue us from. Depression can also shut us in a room in our mind where no-one can reach us. Either way, it's very lonely there.
As I have prayed for these dear ones (no, I'm not congratulating myself on being Super Christian, I'm so not), I've had a revelation.
1) I am so blessed. God loved me so much that He sent someone to take time out to tell me about Jesus, to talk me through salvation and what it means and then God's Spirit prompted me to accept this gift of salvation and ask Jesus into my life. As a result, even when things are bad, I can turn to God always. I might rant and rail Him like David did. Our God is big enough to take this. But always, I know that He is there and that He does care. He knows the number of hairs on my head, He has all my tears collected and He values me more than the sparrows He provides for. What a privilege and a blessing to know God and to know I can cast my burdens on Him. I am never alone.
2) What about those who don't know God? Where do they go when the chips are down? When they lay in bed at night, worrying about those financial reports to be made, when they worry about how the next electricity bill will be met, when they are angry and feel that their trust has been irreparably broken and that no-one believes them or the hurt they've suffered? Who do they turn to? If they don't believe in a God that cares it doesn't leave them much.



That's what we have to do, be His hands and feet practically but also be ready to  speak up and point Him out so that they too might have the opportunity of being able to go to the God that cares about them.


Do you need to help someone today? To be God's hands and feet? Are you feeling lonely in your world of problems that just won't go away? Call on Him, please. He wants hear from you. He does care.

Spiritual maturity - a tough assignment

It's been a while since my last post. Much has happened. Some good, some bad. It's life as we know it. You can't expect life to play fairly all the time. Life is consistently inconsistent.

Happily there is One who is consistent and we can rely on. God, His Son Jesus Christ and His Spirit! The Trinity, the three Persons who are one (a mystery if ever there was)!
He remains the same always, whatever is happening in the world, in our life, at work, at home, in our relationships, in our bodies and minds. Whatever is going on, God is always the same and He never changes.

Hebrews 13:8 "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever."

Okay, so those of you who are Christians will say, "Nice one, way to state the flippin' obvious!".
Those who aren't probably have a number of arguments, questions or issues with that verse and previous statement.

I'm not going to address those here. All I can do is make you aware of discussions I've been a part of, the thoughts and struggles I've had and what I believe God is saying to me. I also believe He says this to all believers. I know there are others out there who grasped this some time ago so go make a coffee or something, flip to another blog because I don't wish to bore you rigid.

Somewhere along the line, the Christian faith was promoted as "come to Jesus and you'll never have another trouble in your life". It's the biggest pile of horsesh*t you are ever likely to hear and please disregard it if you do. It's an outright lie. Jesus never gave sermons on the Mount, or anywhere else for that matter, where He stated that belief in Him and His Father meant an easy life. If anything, He said the opposite!

Matthew 10:22 "all men will hate you because of Me..." Now does that sounds like life will really just become this carefree ride till death and Heaven?

But we somehow struggle with the "it's not fair" child syndrome, even in faith, even when we're cracking on in years and life on this planet should have taught us a few lessons about fairness, or the lack of it.

If I'm honest, there are still times now when I will say to my husband or even a friend the wonderful line of "It's not fair!".

If you've reached adulthood, I'm sure at sometime you have either had the conversation with a child about the concept of fair and unfair or have witnessed such a conversation and, with your life experience to date, you've smiled because you know that child will eventually learn that fair wasn't actually anything to do with that particular query. You know that they will experience, as you have, another person getting the job they felt they should have had, being passed over for promotion again, that that particular person didn't feel the same way they had felt about them and other such examples of "life's unfair".

So how come, when it comes to matters of faith, we can find it so hard to grow up in that regard? Trust me, I am a child when it comes to my faith and not in the heartwarming way that the Bible speaks of when it calls us children of God. I mean the full monty of childish pouting and posturing, "throwing teddy out of the pram"kind of child in respect of faith matters.

A case in point. I have been praying for many years about a situation that has caused me much heartache. This situation is one for which I take responsibility and sadly has steadily got worse with time rather than better. I can't tell you how many tears I've cried over this, how many times I've wished I were dead, wished all kinds of bad things, how my heart has been broken over and over again. I've repented, I've offered forgiveness, I've tried to make amends. I've prayed for strength, for a change of heart for me, for others.

I've begged, pleaded and basically tried to bribe God into giving me what I want, what I believe is the answer to this problem that I managed to set in motion. I've got angry with Him, shouted at Him for His seeming unwillingness to help me. I've even turned my back on Him when I felt that He was ignoring me. I've railed at the lack of an answer, just silence from Him.
Not exactly a testimony to a great faith, is it? But I'm telling it like it is.

So where does maturity come into this, you ask.

Well, think back to the verse at the beginning which states that Jesus is always the same. Jesus said when we saw Him, we saw the Father. So if Jesus is always the same, so is God. What's God like then?

" The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness" Exodus 34:6

" Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord, Jesus Christ, the Father of Compassion and the God of all Comfort" 2 Cor 1:3
(note here, if everything was meant to be hunky dory after faith, why would God need to be the God of comfort and have compassion?)

"For the Lord is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations" Ps 100:5

So this is our God. This is just the tip of who He is and the ultimate act of His love for us was this...

"But God demonstrates His own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us" Rom 5:8
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life" John 3:16

Now we have a measure of the God who created us and died for us, who loves us. All clear so far? Stay with me, we're getting there.

We have a starting point of who God is, what He's like. Key things to remember here are that He is good, loves us, died for us and that He never changes. See the above verses.

And so to maturity. I have a friend who is going through a tough time. It has caused her much heartache, sorrow and anger and she is by no means out of the woods. In fact, recently, it has seemed as though the darkness has got that much deeper. As we spoke about the difficulties she is facing, we've spoken about faith, about praying for change and believing that God is with us in the midst of our troubles. This incredible woman told me recently that it comes back to believing God is who He says He is, believing His Word, the Bible and not going by our feelings. Like me, she has often felt abandoned because she has no sense of God's Presence but ( can you feel the but) she chooses to believe in God's Word over her feelings. Why? Because that, my friends, is spiritual maturity.

Oh that isn't why she's doing it. My friend hasn't decided that life is sh*tty so "I'll just use this opportunity for some spiritual growing up!". No, it's grim detemination to hold on to God because He is for her in a way that no other person can be. That maturity however will be the result of her determination to believe God and that transient feelings aren't to be believed. Sometimes, and I don't pretend to fully understand it, God asks us to walk in the dark and continue to believe Him, even as we feel His hand slip from our grap. The fact is our feelings are lying. God still has our hand firmly held in His.

The Bible says we are to be transformed by the renewing of our minds (Rom 12:2). The act of transforming is the gaining of spiritual maturity. It's not necessarily a pleasurable experience but it will serve us in the end as we view God with a clearer understanding rather than the childlike surmise that He is unfair, unloving and unresponsive.

Still more recently, I had the joy of spending time with a friend who has been living the other side of the world for over 10 years and had made an unexpected visit. During our conversation we touched on her recent experiences in her daily faith walk and, surprise - surprise, she feels God is encouraging her to grow in spiritual maturity. For the second time, I was presented with the experiences of a person whom I greatly admire who was struggling with issues which have thrown up a number of extra concerns and cares. Again, prayer has been involved but also conversations, experiences which have all pointed her to the conclusion of the need for a mature faith to deal with these problems. "Keeping short accounts" is part of this walk that she is currently on. As this dear lady pointed out to me, whilst it's great to have encounters with God, see things in the heavenly realms and get words, pictures etc, what will change the world more than anything will be love and a solid faith that weathers all storms. That's what people will notice in the long haul over the more obvious razzamatazz of faith.

So what about me? Where am I in this discussion? I've thought about the temptations, the deep flaws in my character, the battles I have with my emotions, the struggles with recurring sins. I go back to my, as yet, unchanged situation. I've shed more tears recently, stormed and raged, been in despair. I've asked for and received prayer support and encouragement from these two amazing women and, in both instances, I have felt God pointing me towards the need for maturity in Him. To not believe my feelings of hopelessness but to persist in prayer, to not give up when the fickle infant in me wishes to "not play" anymore. That there is more to my experience than just this issue. God is aware of my needs and maybe, right now, whilst I may not like it and may not see it, perhaps my most pressing need is not the one I think it is. God is all-knowing, He sees exactly what I need, the need He has placed at the top of His agenda and how best to address that particular need.

So I'm going to concentrate on God, on who He is. I'm going to look at His character and attributes rather than focus on me and my issues. I won't always be successful. I suspect I will forget frequently but I want to persist. I know that God will honour my efforts if I do this with a willing and open heart. Nothing in this world is as important as knowing who God is, NOTHING!

I want to let God change me from the inside out, develop me into what He has called me to be. It's time to put the milk bottle down and start tackling solids.

It's time to grow up.

I'm not getting it!

This isn't my first blog. I have blogged previously and spoken about my journey of faith but, if I am honest now, not always being completely truthful but following what I saw as the way of accepted "christian blogging", never really being that real about my struggles, never really saying how it is with me. I was so scared that I would be shunned from the Christian blogging community if I was honest about just how deep my struggles go. Well enough I say. Its time to be honest, to say what is on my heart and, if God and I are the only ones to ever view it, well atleast I am being honest here - finally.

Incredible though it may seem, I am a Christian of over 30 years but still, at this late stage of the game, I am not getting it - my faith that is. That which I profess to believe in and is supposedly making a difference to my life, I'm not getting it still.

I have written Christian poetry, short stories, I have been an intercessor with Lydias International, studied long distance on Intercession. I have been to Christian conferences, attending workshops where I have been healed of self-inflicted traumas and can testify to seeing God move in my life and that of my family in miraculous ways. I have had times of walking in the Spirit and felt God's hand on my life so strongly, felt His anointing on my life.

 I have also managed to walk in the complete opposite direction, immerse myself in sin and align myself with those who are the opposite of everything a Christian stands for. I have walked paths that many would probably rather die than embark on because of misguided affection or even the need for something that would give me a buzz. I have walked a long and difficult path, often at my own poor choosing of direction.

In the last year, as I have come close to losing my marriage, my sanity and my faith, I have wrestled with the "dark side" of my character. I have laid down on the floor and wept bitter tears at the choices I have made and now seeing the "fruit" of those choices. I have looked at the promise of my life and what it could have been, how God had planned it and how I turned my back on those plans and decided that I was "mistress" of my own destiny. I have pleaded with God to remove the consequence of my choice and sin but realised that this is something that we cannot expect to happen. So I have asked God to renew my faith, put a heart of flesh within me to replace my heart of stone.

And so the reality... well, in the last month I have bought 5 worship CDs, highly recommended and anointed. I have also bought a new book by Bill Johnson about strengthening one's self in the Lord. I have listened to two podcasts of sermons, watched a number of Youtube worship videos and also some conferences on God TV.
I have prayed and read some daily readings.

But, inspite of all this, I notice that I am ungrateful, angry, selfish, resentful and peevish. I am hanging on to real and imagined slights by others, moaning about my lot in life when I know that materially I lack for very little. I bemoan my lack of sense of God but is this really that surprising?

I am not getting it. It is pointless to spend money on worship CDs, books and the like when the heart is just not truly focussed on God. It is pointless to pray and read the bible if I am not being changed and thereby reaching out to others who can then see the change and be attracted to Christ. How on earth can I fulfil the Great Commission when I spend my time trying to be unseen, staying out of sight? How is this honouring to God and bringing Him glory? Am I the only one to be frustrated by my lack of change, by my failure to grasp the basic tennants of our faith? Does Jesus bang his head against a wall, as I do, when He notes my complete lack of comprehension of just what He has done for me and mankind and yet sees my almost total lack of regard for it when it comes to living out the Christian life?

If I consider all that Jesus has done for me, and bearing in mind we have just celebrated Easter which is about the ultimate in sacrifice, but still not let it affect my behaviour, my attitude, can I really continue to call myself "christian"? There are non-Christians out there who are far more tender-hearted to the human race and consider their neighbour their brother. So why should they go to hell and not me? I struggle with these questions. Some, I know, are not of me but are placed in my sub-conscious to divert me from truly following the Master. Others are, I am ashamed to say, 100% my doing, my thoughts and cannot be blamed on mis-direction from hell's quarter.

I know that I need a re-think. I know that I need the power of Jesus' sacrifice, His Blood, to affect me deeply enough that a change will be instigated. I have read too many books promising that if I "just believe in Jesus" and read my bible and do whatever, it will all happen in a flash of light and I'll never swear again, lie again, be selfish again. I believe that God can do it but equally I also believe that not all of us experience that kind of deliverance. I have no idea as to the reason why these selfish desires trouble me so much but maybe, just maybe, its so I can relate to those who also struggle and, in struggling together but seeking God together, we can encourage one another on the road to Heaven. I also believe there is the struggle of "flesh" against spirit too and hold my hands up at my frailty with sin and worldly thinking and admit my faults.

And so I continue in my faith, it is a flawed faith inasmuch as I have still so much that I need to understand or experience, inspite of my 30 years "experience". I am still a child in my understanding but I hope and pray that God, as my loving Father, will look at me and not discount me from His Grace but instead, shaking his head and wondering at my slowness of spirit, grab my arms and lift me up in the Spirit, helping me to take that next step on the path to Heaven.

Some parents have to have extra patience with children of slow wit. God, I believe, is no exception and so I wait with hope for His loving patience towards me and that He will wake my heart to the changes required.

For those of you who are running with the Spirit, I encourage you and cheer your efforts and hope that you run a good race.Please be patient with your slower siblings.
For those of you who may struggle as I do with the basics, even many years on, I say not to give up hope but to cling to God because, above all else, He is our only Hope and without Him, we are doomed.


Bunny