Monthly Archives: July 2020

Living from the Inside Out

Rumble…Rumble!!!  That is what was heard late this afternoon during a thunderstorm here in the city where I live. The thunder was so loud and powerful until it could be felt throughout the house. It was indeed a rough thunderstorm. Life is like that as well. I am reminded at how loud things are right now in our nation. Not only in the nation as a whole, but in my personal life there are some pretty loud voices resounding forth in my ears.

But just as the thunder and lightening finally calmed itself and faded away after a while, I am believing that the noise in my life will do the same. That is, until the next storm. In the meanwhile, God has designed for us to continue to exercise a supernatural quietness from within our souls when the noise of life seems to drown out the still small voice of the Lord. The word says that when we keep our minds stayed on Jehovah, that we would experience perfect peace. What does this really look like anyway? It looks like a baby bird tucked under the feathers of its mother, hiding under those wings until the calamity of what can be heard passes on. It looks like Jesus Christ, sleeping on a pillar at the bottom of a ship while the disciples were startled with so much fear during a dangerous storm. And lastly for me, it looks like me, choosing to sit under the shade tree of God’s sweet presence praying, singing, declaring His word over my circumstances until my peace returns and is dominating my every moment.

Lets remember that we can live from the inside out…no matter what is going on in our world…God has ordained peace for us. We can’t be taught how to live in this divine peace, but it’s something that we have to experience by faith.  Lets work this peace out in our walk each and everyday. After all, it is impossible to please our Lord without FAITH…

Enjoy an older clip of a dance that speaks to living in a divine place of peace..

Blessings,

Denise

 

I Have Not Divorced You

Life as we know it right now is off the chain! Our nation is in chaos. We do not know from day to day what is literally going to happen when it comes to the pandemic, the health of the economy, and so on. We cannot even meet for church as we need to. Some of us are in the fight of our lives and it is NOT surprising that many are falling away and have given up.

Well, as I am reading and preparing for a short sermonette, I realize that I am not exempt from being totally overwhelmed right now myself. I thank God for the Word in Isaiah 50:1—

50 :1—-This is what the Lord says:

“Where is your mother’s certificate of divorce
    with which I sent her away?
Or to which of my creditors
    did I sell you?
Because of your sins you were sold;
    because of your transgressions your mother was sent away.

In this verse, the prophet is continuing from a point in the previous chapter where the people of God questioned God’s love for them because of what they were suffering. (See Isaiah 49:13-18).  Just as God spoke through the prophet at that point to ensure the people that He had not forgotten them, He now was asking a rhetorical question…”where is the paperwork that shows I have divorced you?”  There was no paper work. God did not change HIS love or alter His attitude about the future of His people. It was because of their disobedience that they were suffering.

It is the same way with us. We suffer because of the consequences of our choices. Or, sometimes God will allow suffering when we are in His will for a purpose. Regardless, We must set our faces like a hard flint rock and continue on our path during these dark days. God has not forgotten us and He still has a future plan for us. This is not easy, but we must trust the process.

I believe God will always find a way to confront the soul that harbors a feeling of “Where are You God?”, or “God does not care about what I’m going through”.  Is that you today? Do you feel that God is ignoring your pain or that He is hard to reach right now because of what you are suffering? Well, if it is, go ahead and acknowledge it. Let God comfort you the way He did for the Israelites long ago. You will never be put to shame when you trust your bewildered emotions to God. He’s waiting to comfort your soul. Let Him.

Has God Cancelled on Me?

Have you ever been really excited about plans made with someone and out of nowhere those plans got cancelled? Something like this can be really disappointing. Well, there are some among us right now who are feeling disappointed because they feel as if their purpose, destiny, and promises from the Lord has been cancelled! I did a teaching on our local radio broadcast this past Sunday morning where I taught on the true context of Jeremiah 29:11. This scripture verse is popular and most do not ever take the time to receive the essence of the meaning of the verse because of the failure to dig deeper into the context of the scripture verse:

11 For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.

First of all, this word was given to a people who were in captivity in the form of a letter from the prophet (29:1). What is captivity?  Captivity is confinement, imprisonment, enslavement, bondage, restraint, etc. God’s intentions was to encourage the people while in this condition. Even though the people disobeyed and rebelled against the Lord and He caused them to be carried away captive, He wanted them to know that His attitude about their future was still the same. He wanted them to know that He would visit them in the future and cause HIS promises to come to past for them.

10 For thus saith the Lord, That after seventy years be accomplished at Babylon I will visit you, and perform my good word toward you, in causing you to return to this place.

Even though God, in His righteous judgment allowed the captivity, He assured His people that His thoughts toward them were only peaceful and beautiful and that they still had hope for the future. He instructed the people to “get comfortable” in that place so to speak because they would not be able to escape the situation until their season of judgment was over.

My encouragement to us today is that we must trust God in every season, even the reaping seasons where we are going through chaos and fire because of our own choices. Not all sufferings are the result of sin; however, some are. Nevertheless, God has not cancelled our destiny. We still have hope as long as there is breath in our lungs.

Blessings,

Minister Denise

Denise with Praying Hands-Backyard