Wednesday, June 24, 2009

The Real G-P-S-

Bless the Lord!

A while back I gave a reflection on a GPS. And God reminded me of it recently, actually a few times, so I just felt led to share it with you all.

We had taken our daughter who is away at college, back to school, and driving on the way home from there, we had to rely on a GPS, which is a navigation system. It gave us detours and guided us home as it was designed to do.

A couple of days later, Minister Jeff and I were going out to eat at a new restaurant and we didn't quite know the way. And again we relied on this GPS, this NAV system to get us there. And in that God spoke. God said that He is our GPS. He is our Navigator. He leads us and guides and gets us to where we need to go. That we need to rely on Him and His promises. The GPS for us is God's Promise System.

Anyway, we rely on this NAV system, we put all our trust in it and it doesn't give us any direction until we actually get to a certain point. And God said we need to trust in Him the same way. We have a route, we know the path that we are on, we set out to go, and then we need to rely on God to give us direction when we get to certain points. We don't always have to know where to go. God said to just follow His direction and He will tell us where to go when we need to go.

But anyway, as we set out to drive to this restaurant, I sort of jumped ahead of the NAV system and got a little off the path. I told Minister Jeff to turn around from where we were headed, because the NAV system was taking too long to say something. And God spoke again and said, "That is exactly what you do to Me." God doesn't move in the time frame we think He should move and we quickly jump ahead of Him. We try to anticipate where He would have us to go and then we end up lost. We go in our own direction instead of waiting to hear a Word from the Lord.

Sometimes it takes a while. We drive two miles, the NAV doesn't say anything, and we change the route. We do the same thing with God. Go a little while with Him and then when we don't hear anything, we want to go another way. Then we do that and we end up lost and off the path that God has set for us. But God is good, because just like the NAV system, when you ask for further direction God will direct you back to where you need to be.

So that is what happened. We got a little off the path and had to re-enter where we were so that we could get to where we were going and the NAV system said to us, "as soon as possible, make a legal U-Turn." Then I heard the Spirit of the Lord say this, when you know that you messed up, as soon as possible, make a legal U-Turn. And He is specific. He said, a legal U-Turn. Don't go someplace else where He did not tell you to go. Don't go off in another wrong direction. Don't go where you THINK you should go. Make a legal U-Turn. It's okay to get off the path, but get it right and get back on it again.

We have to know that God is good. And He desires to lead us. We trust this NAV system, we trust that our cars will start, we trust that elevators will go up, we trust so many things. But we need to trust in the Lord, even more so. God knows everything. He created everything. All we need to do is follow His lead and direction that we may have and get to whatever He has for us. That is His promise to us. That is God's Promise System. That's the real GPS.

And one more thing I should add, when we do we will hear God say to us, just like with the NAV system, "You have arrived." Well done, my good and faithful servant.

Hallelujah!

God is good. And He's real.

A servant of the Lord,
Sis. E




http://sis.e.home.comcast.net
http://www.ongoodground.org

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

You Must Don’t Know About Me

Grace and peace.

While I am a little hesitant about sharing this, the desire to please the Lord rather than man, is overwhelming. Because God’s love is overwhelming. How can I not consciously do what He told me to do? I keep hearing if you love Me, keep My commandments. That is everything and anything He tells you to do, regardless of how it might make you look (or sound). Sure it happens often enough that I fail to disobey the Lord, but God is merciful and He yet stands ready to forgive and He loves us so much that in spite of how we listened before, He always calls us to go higher and higher the next time. And be better than how we were on yesterday.

With that said, a song, a “worldly song” some might add, has been going over and over in my head and whenever that happens, God is saying something to me. And I had to stop and really listen.

The song is Beyonce’s Irreplaceable. I must have picked it up n my spirit a couple of weeks ago, while browsing in a department store. Had to be. But anyway, the words go like this, for those of you who don’t know, (or at least don’t want to admit you do) and I am paraphrasing it… “To the left, to the left, everything you own is in the box to the left. “ And it says, “Don’t get me twisted, you must don’t know ‘bout me, I could have another you in a minute, matter fact, he’ll be here in a minute. You must not know ‘bout me, I can have another you by tomorrow, don’t ever for a second get to thinking, you’re irreplaceable.” And since I don’t listen to songs like this, I asked the Lord, okay, Lord what is it with this song? What are You trying to tell me? And this is what He said. Sometimes He asks us to do things, and we do them… reluctantly, halfheartedly, and sometimes we even do them, without leaning on His strength, but in our own power. Pridefully. We steal His glory.

God said that sometimes we get so caught up in our own righteousness that we forget that He is the One that saved us… He is the one that delivered us. He is the one that gives us power. He is the one that blesses us. He is the one that has showered us with the abilities and the talents to do the things we do. He is the one. And we forget that. We forget He is the one. And God said through this song to me, "Don’t get it twisted… you must don’t know about Me. I AM God. I asked you to do something and if you don’t want to do it, I will get somebody else to do it. Don’t ever get to thinking for a second that you are irreplaceable.” A hard word, yes. And I said, “Lord, Jesus. What did I do?” Because whenever He speaks something like this it’s personal, first. And God went on to tell me that every now and then I am still reluctant, I am still hesitant about doing what He asked me to do… I still frown when I am asked to speak. Yes He knows I don’t like to do it, but simply because He asked me to, I should do it. And I do it, but like He said, that natural man comes out first. He said, I still hold on to some things that I should let go of, and even this, I still don’t believe some of the things He tells me. Then He comforted me, because He said I wasn’t alone. Lots of us do these things.

And then He said, "You must don’t know about Me. I gave you that talent, I gave you that gift and I could have another you in a minute. " Then I was reminded that Mordecai had to tell Esther, don’t get it twisted. He told her that if she wasn’t willing to ask the King, God will raise somebody else up to do it. Don’t you think for a moment that you are irreplaceable, Esther? That’s what Mordecai said. And God went on and He said this, "All that stuff you think is yours, it’s in the box to the left. Your talent, it’s in the box, your gifts, they’re in the box. I don’t need them. You can take them with you and do what you may in your own power. You’re not relying on Mine. You don’t know about Me.“

Yes a very hard word, saints. But I am taking heed to the warning. My husband mentioned recently in one of his sermons that if God has told us to do something, we don’t need to stop and think about it, we don’t need to waste time thinking about it, we just need to do it. Anything else is disobedience, no matter how we try to dress it up. Is He God or not? If we can admit it we do get caught up in what we can do. We catch our little attitudes or snit fits when our idea does not go over and then pout inwardly saying, we’re not going to help then. God sees that. And He says fine, don’t. You must don’t know about Me. Then when He tells us something and even confirms it through somebody else, we have a hard time believing Him. God said, "You must don’t know about Me. I AM God and beside Me there is no other.”

Like I said earlier this is not something that I would normally write or even like writing, but it is something that my God has told me to do and since I know about Him I am persuaded to obey.

God is good and He’s real.

A humbled servant of the Lord,

Sis. E




http://sis.e.home.comcast.net
http://www.ongoodground.org