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| So Yesterday was fun. BUT we will continue our bracelet making next tuesday night. Pray that God will reveal your spiritual gift to you. and for the devotion for the day... Hosea's story is an interesting one. Here is a prophet, whom Go tells to marry a prostitute. Yes. Marry a prostitute. Hosea obeys and marries Gomer, a prostitiute. Marriage does nothing to change her ways, and eventually she is led astray and into apparent slavery. And then Hosea. in an amazing act of love, purchases her back from her enslavememtn and treats her more lovingly than she could ever deserve. She had turned her back on Hosea, and though it tore him up, he still pusued her and redeemed her in an effort to show his total love. This is how God loves us.Though we turn away from him at times for other pursuits, He still loves us. He longs to redeem us even when in our sin, we speak lies against Him. When we ignore Him and abstain from crying out to Him, He still longs to love us. THAT IS AMAZING!!! His redemptive love makes as much sense as the love of a husband for his prostitute wife. It defies logic, yet at the heart level, it's understandable. It's the unbreakable bond of a covenant. God's redemptive love is so strong that not even our sinful adultry can quell it. "Woe to them, because they have staryed from me! Destruction to them, because the have rebelled against me! Ilong to redeem them but the speak lies against me. They do not cry out to me from their hearts bit wail upon their beds. They gather together from grain and new wine but turn away from me." Hosea 7:13-14 | | |
| Hey Girrrrrlssssss... just a reminder about the camping trip. Make sure your 1. Get off from work. 2. Ask your parentals. 3. Save up 7 dollars!!! ALSO next week we're going to make bracelets. Think of a few of your strengths and then a few weaknesses. You'll see why. Another thing... i'm going on a women's retreat and i won't post anything through the weekend... so i really encourage you to just read James this weekend. It's small and about facing trials in life.So in other words... DO IT! Love yooooooouuuusssssss! But for today.... Are you seeking great things for yourself, instead of seeking to be a great person? God wants you to be in a much closer relationship with Himself than simply receiving His gifts— He wants you to get to know Him. Even some large thing we want is only incidental; it comes and it goes. But God never gives us anything incidental. There is nothing easier than getting into the right relationship with God, unless it is not God you seek, but only what He can give you. If you have only come as far as asking God for things, you have never come to the point of understanding the least bit of what surrender really means. You have become a Christian based on your own terms. You protest, saying, "I asked God for the Holy Spirit, but He didn’t give me the rest and the peace I expected." And instantly God puts His finger on the reason-you are not seeking the Lord at all; you are seeking something for yourself. Jesus said, "Ask, and it will be given to you . . ." ( Mathew 7:7 ). Ask God for what you want and do not be concerned about asking for the wrong thing, because as you draw ever closer to Him, you will cease asking for things altogether. "Your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him" ( Mathew 6:8 ). Then why should you ask? So that you may get to know Him. Are you seeking great things for yourself? Have you said, "Oh, Lord, completely fill me with your Holy Spirit"? If God does not, it is because you are not totally surrendered to Him; there is something you still refuse to do. Are you prepared to ask yourself what it is you want from God and why you want it? He is not concerned about making you blessed and happy right now, but He’s continually working out His ultimate perfection for you— ". . . that they may be one just as We are one . . ." ( John 17:22 ). | | |
| The great lesson to be learned from Abraham’s faith in God is that he was prepared to do anything for God. He was there to obey God, no matter what contrary belief of his might be violated by his obedience. Abraham was not devoted to his own convictions or else he would have slain Isaac and said that the voice of the angel was actually the voice of the devil. That is the attitude of a fanatic. If you will remain true to God, God will lead you directly through every barrier and right into the inner chamber of the knowledge of Himself. But you must always be willing to come to the point of giving up your own convictions and traditional beliefs. Don’t ask God to test you. Never declare as Peter did that you are willing to do anything, even "to go . . . both to prison and to death" ( Luke 22:33 ). Abraham did not make any such statement— he simply remained true to God, and God purified his faith. | | |
| Many of us suffer from the unbalanced tendency to "be ready" only "out of season." The season does not refer to time; it refers to us. This verse says, "Preach the Word! Be ready in season and out of season." In other words, we should "be ready" whether we feel like it or not. If we do only what we feel inclined to do, some of us would never do anything. There are some people who are totally unemployable in the spiritual realm. They are spiritually feeble and weak, and they refuse to do anything unless they are supernaturally inspired. The proof that our relationship is right with God is that we do our best whether we feel inspired or not. One of the worst traps a Christian worker can fall into is to become obsessed with his own exceptional moments of inspiration. When the Spirit of God gives you a time of inspiration and insight, you tend to say, "Now that I’ve experienced this moment, I will always be like this for God." No, you will not, and God will make sure of that. Those times are entirely the gift of God. You cannot give them to yourself when you choose. If you say you will only be at your best for God, as during those exceptional times, you actually become an intolerable burden on Him. You will never do anything unless God keeps you consciously aware of His inspiration to you at all times. If you make a god out of your best moments, you will find that God will fade out of your life, never to return until you are obedient in the work He has placed closest to you, and until you have learned not to be obsessed with those exceptional moments He has given you. ~Oswald Chambers. | | |
| FINALLY! we can now start our XANGULAR!!! | | |
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