Pages

A Verse for the Day... (that you've heard 100 times...)


In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.
(Proverbs 3:6

God desires to be acknowledged in ALL your ways—every seemingly silly, apparently trivial detail of your life!

ALSO! This verse doesn’t read, “and He shall direct thy paTH" … It’s “and he shall direct thy pathS" – He’s going to direct me and you over and over and over and over and over and over again, every single time we come to Him, acknowledge Him, for direction!!!
Praise the LORD and Thank GOD for the promise and provision of his guidance!!!

Trust: A Matter of the Heart


Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. (Proverbs 3:5)

I need and am supposed to trust in the Lord with all my HEART ♥. Not all my MIND! While, yes, it is a good thing to have, a “head knowledge” is NOT ENOUGH!!

It’s not!
It’s a matter of the heart! ♥♥

Finding Favor (Part 2)


 Yesterday, we looked at Proverbs 3:3-4 in reference to how we ‘find favor’ in God’s sight. But let us look at these verses again! J

Let not mercy and truth forsake thee: bind them about thy neck; write them upon the table of thine heart: So shalt thou find favor and good understanding in the sight of God and man. (Proverbs 3:3-4) 

Not only does this verse promise favor with God if we apply verse 3, but it actually tells us that we SHALT find favor in the sight of man!!!!
While this verse says you SHALL “find favor in the sight of…man”, it doesn’t say what type of “man”—lol.
Ever notice how your church family can be all warm, supportive, and encouraging when you do something for Jesus, or something you believe God has called you to do? But over that same decision, others can be rude, cold, unsupportive and standoffish?? Obviously you haven “found favor” with that second group! J lol. But most likely, when this verse says you’ll gain favor in the sight of men, it’s speaking of Godly men and women (People whose good opinion is actually worth having because of their walk with GOD) (***what is your opinion about this?? I’m curious to know??*** J) And, occasionally, even thought unsaved people may oppose and disagree with you for a certain decision, they WILL RESPECT you for making and standing by it!!
(ALSO! What is your Biblical ‘opinion’ about this verse’s principal? I’m curious to know! J If you feel like sharing your thoughts, simple leave them as a comment below! J)

BUT!
My/your/our ultimate goal should NOT BE to find favor in the sight of any man or woman—Godly or not!!! Our main objective needs to be to find favor in GOD’S sight by keeping His Word’s not anyone else’s! No one else’s respect or recognition should matter!!!


However, Not only do we find favor in the sight of God and man if we “let not mercy and truth forsake us, bind them about our necks and write them upon the tables of our hearts” (verse 3), BUT! We will find GOOD UNDERSTANDING in the sight of God and man!!! Not sure if that means that we will be “greatly understood”, but I imagine not lol. (Again, your thoughts please!!! J) Probably refers to possessing good, Godly wisdom (or possessing good, Godly knowledge and then having the discernment and know-how to apply that knowledge which equals wisdom!) how to serve and obey God, and how to relate to others. Even more amazing, is the fact that it will not simply be “understanding” that we will obtain—but GOOD understanding!! As James tells us, if we only take a moment to ask God for wisdom—He WILL give it to us… liberally!!!!! (YAY!!!!! JJJ) (James 1:5) And guess what?! That’s another promise!!! J
So perhaps, before you continue with your day, you may take a moment to pray and ask God for wisdom to attain favor with Him and man—to endow you with the wisdom to obey Him and relate in a Godly way to others you deal with today! 

Finding Favor (Part One)


“Let not mercy and truth forsake thee: bind them about thy neck; write them upon the table of thine heart: So shalt thou find favor and good understanding in the sight of God and man.”  (Proverbs 3:3-4)

{found via Google Images}

If you and I, as young ladies, obey the advice laid out in verse 3, I will find FAVOR with God and Man. This is an actual promise from the Lord!

With Christmas so rapidly approaching, surely we've heard Gabrielle’s famous proclamation to Mary quoted at least once! Mary, at a young age, had not let mercy and truth forsake her. She had “bound them about her neck”. She had “written them upon the table of her heart.” Then, out of nowhere, an angel brings her the astonishing news that she of all women is honored with the privilege of carrying, giving birth to, and rearing the Messiah! After she voices her humble “why me!?” Gabrielle informs her that she had “found favor with God.”
Not by doing any huge extra-Godly act—but by a lifetime of humble, faithful obedience.
Sometimes, in trying to please other people and finding it impossible, we may subconsciously decide God is impossible to please as well. L
But thanks to the Biblical account of Mary we (you!) may rest assured, dear sister that just as Mary did it is possible to obtain favor with God!!!
AND! Before you even begin to even set up that ‘spiritual gymnastics routine’ to obtain that favor with God, let me stop you… (And stop myself as well). While we should strive to attain favor with God, there are no phenomenal, nearly impossible feats we must first accomplish in order to do this! (Ever notice that the SILENCE in the Scripture in reference to a detailed description of Mary or her spiritual “accomplishments”?? Maybe God left it that way for a reason!)
Perhaps the best way to “find favor with God” is by daily simple and humble obedience to God’s mercy and truth as written in His Word—not any type of ‘performance’ we must do before we can be ‘excepted’ or ‘a good Christian’.
So today, focus on that, dear sister. God loves you for who you are in and by Him—not because of what you do!!!!!

Encouraging Devotions


In verse 18 of 2nd Samuel chapter 7, David poses the question of “who am I, O Lord GOD? And what is my house, that thou hast brought me hitherto?”

You see, the Lord had just finished lavishing David and his household with manifold blessings, (what we now call the ‘Davidic Covenant’) in 2 Samuel chapter 7 verses 5 though 16. At the end of this huge speech from the LORD, relayed to him through Nathan the prophet, David was absolutely DUMBFOUNDED. The Bible tells us that he (David) “…went…in, and sat before the LORD, and he said, Who am I, O Lord GOD? And what is my house, that thou hast brought me hitherto?” He continues in verse 19: “And this was yet a small thing in thy sight, O Lord GOD; but thou hast spoken also of thy servant’s house for a great while to come. And is this the manner of man, O Lord GOD? And what can David say more unto thee? For thou, Lord GOD, knowest thy servant.” {Emphasis mine}

As you can tell, David was absolutely blown away and excruciatingly humbled at the promise the Lord had just made to him—and rightly so!

As I read this passage during my devotions last week, this really ‘hit home’ with me. you see, I may not know everything about/ have all the answers for either one of the questions David poses to the Lord in verse 18. But! I do know enough to know that neither David, nor the people of his household and family, were “perfect, little Godly, never-do-anything-wrong people!!!!!

Seriously! I mean, David himself committed adultery with Bathsheba and then ordered the death of her husband; David’s son Absalom committed incest in the sight of all Jerusalem!!!!—With his father’s concubines; David’s son Amnon committed heinous adultery with his own sister; and Michal, David’s (first!) wife (did you catch that? That means David had several wives, which isn’t right either!!!) was super disrespectful to and haughty towards her husband; and I’m sure I could come up with more instances if I put my mind to it. But, for one thing, these examples (surely!) give you the general idea; and for another thing, this are intensely wicked actions!

At this point in David’s story, only one of these things (okay, two, if you count the multiplicity of wives David already had going) has taken place, so David wasn’t aware of them when the Lord made him this incredible promise. Yet! David was still aware of his sinful state before a Holy God and extremely humbled at God’s special blessing upon ‘him and his’.

Funny thing, though, is what David brings to our attention in verse 20—“…for thou, Lord GOD, knowest thy servant.”

David wasn’t omniscient. He didn’t even know the horrendous sins he and his family would commit against God in the future that would warrant such feelings of unworthiness.

But God is omniscient. And God did know all this already.
He knew David inside and out, backwards and forwards! He knew all the sins of David’s past, and all the sins of his future! (Including the incident with Bathsheba!) And yet He loved David and held him special to His heart! Even with His infinite knowledge of David’s sin, He made David this promise! And David’s family (who was very much included in the blessing) sinned as well! (Michal, Amnon, Absalom…even Solomon, later in his life!!!) His family more closely resembled Jacob’s soap opera –like family than many may care to admit!!!!! YET!!! God proactively chose to bless David and his family!!!!!

Why?

Because He knew one more thing… that David was a man after His own heart. He knew David wasn’t perfect. But He knew that David strove to please Him in everything. And when David messed up (and he certainly did!!!) he picked himself up, brushed himself off, and by the grace of God, kept pressing on! (Proverbs 24:16) (Philippians 3:14) God was also gracious, and remembered that David was merely a man—made of flesh and blood. (Psalms 103:14)

This was a great source of encouragement to me. I tend to think of God in a very negative way. As my Pastor put it from the pulpit Sunday night, {I} “wait for his wrath” rather than “living in His goodness”. Yes, God is a God of judgment and justice (as Hayley DiMarco puts in it her book A God Girl, God “…isn’t a big teddy bear just waiting passively around for your next hug; {H}e is a powerful and perfect God who won’t tolerate sin in your life. And that knowledge a lot of the time becomes our sole focus. That’s why BALANCE is so important… You have to be willing to agree with God that sin isn’t good for you… and then you have to accept the love that {H}e freely gives when you turn to {H}im.”[1] Our God is also a God of LOVE! (1 John 4:8) So often we (I!) as young ladies miss this, and don’t dwell in the grace and goodness and love of our precious Savior, who loved us and gave Himself for us (Galatians 2:20).

Is this the way you see Him dear sister? Do you dwell in what you just know is His impending or present punishment for some wrong you’ve done? Do you find that you are actually afraid of God, more than you are in love with Him?

O sister! I’ve been there! (Pft! I am there!) And that’s why David’s story was such an encouragement to me!
If God could know the end of David’s life from the beginning (which He did), know all the sinful things that David and his family would ever do (which He did) and yet still promise to secure David’s line as the ruling Jewish line, and promise him also, that His (wonderful, amazing!) mercy should NOT depart away from David’s descendants, even though it had departed from Saul—don’t you think that the Lord loves you deeply, and will “preserve you whithersoever you go” (2 Samuel 8:6&14), even though you sin against Him? Even though you don’t deserve it?

He remembers your frame! He knows that you are frail and fleshly! And for some crazy-wonderful reason,
                                                HE LOVES YOU ANYWAY!!!!!
If you take anything from this post, please, dear sister! Know that Jesus loves you! Think of how he blessed a sinful man like David, when you feel discouraged later on! Remember it, perhaps read it, then press on for Jesus, aiming, like David did, to be a young woman after God’s own heart!!!!!



[1] A God Girl, Hayley DiMarco, Page 143. Emphasis and capitalization of Christ’s pronouns, mine J