Are you filled to the full of all the wonderful things God has for you?   Today I want to share about how important it is that we pay attention to the condition of our hearts. Is your heart being kept full, strengthened and maintained by the power of the Holy Spirit? You know He desires that we be full and stay full that we may live the victorious life that He intends for us to live. How many things in life do we diligently pay attention to ? Just think about it …our gas tanks, our bank accounts, the parking meter, food in the refrigerator, etc… We keep a mental note and physical notes that we are maintaining these things, yet our spiritual being could be in a state of lack, and we may not even notice. When our spirit is lacking, eventually we are going to pay for it. If we do not tend to our hearts we will not have the strength that we need, therefore we cannot persevere. As our peace is no longer present, we will react to things in a way that we wished we had not.

 

 

 

This past week while I was busy doing errands, running here and there, my “gas is low” light came on and I heard the signal.    I kept driving for a bit and I noticed the needle was falling way too close to EMPTY, and felt an urgency to get to the gas station.   So it is that we need to stay sensitive to the state of our spirit.   When God speaks to your heart, are you hearing Him, and attending to His direction He is giving you?   We can not afford to try to live this life on the “fumes” of yesterday’s faith and victories.

 

 

 

 

Romans 15:13 ERV
“I pray that the God who gives hope will fill you with much
joy and peace as you trust in him. Then you will have more
and more hope, and it will flow out of you by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I can assure you that there was no doubt among them, and they began to seek that which they were told, and they did it immediately with great anticipation!   I love how the scriptures say that they went in a hurry too.   Wouldn’t you have gone in a hurry?    If you were there among the shepherds, and saw this glorious angel of the Lord that just declared the birth of the Savior…would you move quickly to seek Him out?    I know I would have!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A few days ago I had shared with you regarding resolutions for the upcoming New Year.   As I said, when you go into a New Year you can feel like you are wiping the slate clean.   A year has passed and now it is time to start a fresh one.   Sometimes people may feel like they really had a bad year full of challenges, and they are just ready to start fresh.    Again, may I mention that I personally feel this is something we should do everyday.   As we live one day at a time, we can start afresh, thanking Him for His new mercies, His grace that will sustain us, and His provision that He promises to give us to help us do His will.    Most importantly is His forgiveness when we miss the mark.   Isn’t it precious that even when we mess up, all we have to do is ask Him to cleanse us, and get us right back up and running the course that He has set before us!!!

 

 

 

 

 

As the psalmist prayed here you can see he plainly realized that he had lost something, and he wanted it back. He was walking in the blessing of feeling right, he was a persevering person with a spirit that was steadfast, yet he knew something was wrong. He was no longer clean and pure.   When we mess up and do not ask the Lord to help us, things are not the same. The longer we put it off the more we will become callous to our spirit trying to let us know that something is not right within us.

 

 

I have shared this little teaching analogy before but it will serve to minister to your heart again since we are looking at cleansing and renewal. I can still remember when I shared with some preschoolers a simple little object lesson about forgiveness. It was precious watching their innocent little faces and their eyes light up as they took hold of the truth. I was teaching them the importance of knowing their hearts were clean. I mixed up a big old batch of mud. I took them all outside and we sat down around the bowl of mud. I squished my hands into the mud (may I add the little boys were loving how gross it was!) and rubbed it up and down my arms and my hands were caked with mud. I emphasized to them how bad it felt not to be clean, and I just wanted it off of me.

 

 

Psalm 51:2-3 Amplified
“Wash me thoroughly [and repeatedly] from my iniquity and guilt and cleanse me and make me wholly pure from my sin! For I am conscious of my transgressions and
I acknowledge them; my sin is ever before me.”

 

 

 

There are two key words here that the writer wrote and these are our keys to living with a clean heart and those words are CONSCIOUS and ACKNOWLEDGE. It is plain and simple, as we stay conscious of the condition of our hearts and we acknowledge it before God, He will always help us, and work within us and renew us again. Let us be quick to humble and repent when we are out of align with His perfect will. We serve a merciful and loving God. Think about anything that has hindered your steadfastness and strength in Him and ask Him to cleanse it so your heart pure and totally restored. This is truly freedom!

 

 

 

by Dona Hake

 

 

 

 

 

I can hardly believe that Christmas is only days away…where did this year go?   It will not be long that you will hear some speak of their resolutions for the fresh new year.   Many times people see the New Year as a fresh start and a beginning point to accomplish a desire of their heart, break a bad habit, or press into a goal.    If one makes a resolution it is of utmost importance that it is coupled with a desire to accomplish it or follow through with it. My thoughts on this are to live each day as unto Him and do that which He is speaking to your heart about. Do not get me wrong, I think it is great to make plans and goals but I kind of love staying in that place of living one day at a time knowing that I have His hand of blessing on all that I set my hand to, and everything else seems to fall into the right place.   The Lord desires that we look to Him every day as a clean slate with fresh beginnings in which He can direct the work of our hands.

 

 

 

 

Psalm 90:17
“And let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us,

and direct thou the work of our hands upon us…”

 

 

 

 

 

I believe as we allow His beauty or His grace to be upon us He will direct the work of our hands and lead us in our God given assignments.   He will begin to deal with how we view everything. He is well able to put us in alignment with His will as we stay humble to Him. He will in turn cause all that we set our hand to to be blessed and prosperous. If there are things in your life relative to disciplines that you desire change in, I just encourage you to prayerfully take them to Him. Let Him do the changing and bring growth in His timing.    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lord, we thank You for Your Holy Spirit that is at work within us, and we humbly ask that You direct every work of our hands.   As we look at going into a new year let us start each day, and look at it as a new beginning as we acknowledge You.    May Your beauty be upon all that we do that we may glorify You, in Jesus Name, amen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today let us meditate on His light that is within us, and for that we should feel honored and thank Him.   We are His vessels and He desires to radiate that light each and everyday we serve Him.   We live in a world in which there is darkness and there are so many  that do not know Him.    How else will they know there is light if we do not allow Him to shine through us.

 

 

Matthew 5:14-16 ( Amplified )

“You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden.

Nor do men light a lamp and put it under a peck measure, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.

Let your light so shine before men that they may see your moral excellence and your praiseworthy, noble, and good deeds and recognize and honor and praise and glorify your Father Who is in heaven.”

 

I think God is calling each and everyone of us as believers to shine and bloom where we are planted.  In the plan of God, He has wonderful desires  to use each one of us differently and uniquely. We should never compare how God chooses to use us to how He works through others. This is not a competition, it is command….we are lights and we are to shine! Today I encourage you to shine for Him through every word and deed you do. As He continues to mold and make you into His image He will be faithful to show Himself through you that others may see how awesome He is.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“When you get into a tight place and everything goes against

you until it seems as though you could not hold on a minute longer, never

give up then, for that is just the time and place that the tide

will turn.”

Harriet Beecher Stowe

 

 

 

I love this quote. It makes me wonder how many times that I have given up on something or someone just when the tide was ready to turn.    There is power in perseverance and the determined heart cannot be stopped or shaken.    Determination is when you come to a decision or you fix yourself on a purpose, and nothing is going to hold you back.

 

 

 

Matthew 14:28-31 Amplified

 “And Peter answered Him, Lord, if it is You, command me to come to You on the water.

 He said, Come! So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water, and he came toward Jesus.

 But when he perceived and felt the strong wind, he was frightened, and as he began to sink, he cried out, Lord, save me [from death]!

 Instantly Jesus reached out His hand and caught and held him, saying to him, O you of little faith, why did you doubt?”

 

 

 

How many times are we just an arm’s reach away from the finish line of success in that which we are setting ourselves, but then our minds begin to “perceive” and we get ourselves into trouble?   How many times is the tide ready to turn and we throw up our hands and give up?  We must apply faith, persistence, and determination to all we set ourselves to do. As we fix our eyes on Jesus with determination and faith in our hearts, He will enable us to do the impossible. It is as we do this that we can share the testimony of what we learned in our accomplishment to those that need this same word of encouragement!

“And let us not get tired of doing what is right, for

after a while we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t get discouraged and give up.”

Galatians 6:9 TLB

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Isaiah 58:11 (ERV)
“The Lord will always lead you and satisfy your needs in dry lands.

He will give strength to your bones.

You will be like a garden that has plenty of water, like a spring that never goes dry.”

 

 

 

 

As we draw upon the living water from above, let us be mindful to share that water that gives life with those around us. Let us be thankful that the water He gives is the only water that will quench the thirst of the human soul. I love how this scripture in Isaiah says that we will be “like a garden that has plenty of water, a spring that never goes dry.” No matter how much we draw upon it, those waters will continue to flow toward us to meet our every need! The only requirement is that we continue to seek Him and draw upon that river of life that proceeds from Him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

by Dona Hake

 

 

 

P