Prayers for the Gray Family

CLICK HERE for an article about my previous post. I did find out that Kristy is paralyzed from the waist down and that she did not know about the loss of her child yet. Breaks my heart.


HERE IS another article on the accident.

It's Just Not Fair

Please I beg you to pray for the family above. Brian, Kristy, and Helen Gray. Kristy had a car accident and Helen went to be with Jesus. Kristy broke her back according to what I heard. I went to school with Kristy and worked with her after high school. She loves Jesus but y'all please ask God to help her to stand firm in her faith through this devestating time. I am just sick for them.

Christianity is Not the Big List of Don'ts

2 Corinthians 3:17
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

Christianity is not a big list of don’ts. I have had a few conversations with people lately that I wanted to share. First, I had a niece ask me why my child can’t watch “Wizards of Waverly Place”, or Harry Potter, and other things. I explained to her that Morgan has a few things that she can’t watch but she also has a lot of things that she can watch. My niece was telling me in the car about a friend that she has that was not allowed to have facebook and a list of other things because her family are “big Christians”. Well, that is up to her parents but I don’t want Morgan to see a big list of everything that she can’t do. When you try to just take everything away from a child in the name of “Christianity” it really sets your child (or anyone for that matter) up to run as far as they can from any legalism or “religion”. Don’t get me wrong there are things that we just plain need to stay away from. Things that we need to flee. But good grief let us be known for our love of Christ and others and not just for a big list of what we can’t do. Good Grief!! Let’s not just portray ourselves as some communist religion. Christ died that we might live in freedom through the power of the Holy Spirit, not in bondage to sin. Do we use our freedom in Christ as a license to sin? NO! Romans 6:1-2 1What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?
God is not boring. We may be bored stiff with our religion but we can’t be bored with God, the Lord of Glory. Romans 12:21 says “21Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” There is a lot of evil in this world yet we can also use the internet and other things for good, instead of just writing everything off as evil. There are some clear don’ts in the word of God but they are always for our protection. 1 Corinthians 6:12 says that 12"Everything is permissible for me"—but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible for me"—but I will not be mastered by anything. Also, when people say things that they watch do not affect them, they are the exception, I want to tell them to argue with God then: “Luke 11:34
34Your eye is the lamp of your body. When your eyes are good, your whole body also is full of light. But when they are bad, your body also is full of darkness.”
Garbage in garbage out. The Lord Jesus is the best thing that has EVER happened to me. I can not get over Him. I was in my car today just having a time of worship in the Word of God and I just told Him that I was not sure why in the world He had not given up on me. I deserve NOTHING from Him, yet He is so lavish with His love. I have sinned so greatly against Him. Why in the world would He contend with me, I do not know. He has disciplined me out of His great love as well. Listen, I desperately want a heart that beats of Deut 6:5-9. I want to love the LORD with all of my heart.
'For in him we live and move and have our being.' Acts 17:28 a
We have got to get it through our thick skulls that He is Life. He is where real living is.
Deut. 30:20 and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. For the LORD is your life, and he will give you many years in the land he swore to give to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
There is nothing in all of life that compares to knowing Him. There is no greater moment in my life than when I am spending time with Jesus and knowing Him through His word. Just like Adam and Eve we tend to consider what a relationship with the Lord will cost us. What will we have to give up? We focus on the one tree He says no to instead of all of the yeses that we have in Christ. There is no greater feeling to me than when I am just caught up in praise to Him. Even obedience, maybe sometimes a LONG obedience is freeing.
Here is a question that I can give a resounding answer to:
Romans 6:20-23
20When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. 21What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! 22But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. 23For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Seriously, though stop with me and ask yourself what stinking benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of?
I just shake my head and groan and some of the stupid “make Jenny happy” decisions that I have made, those decisions are the things that have cost me big time. They were damaging, shameful, and cost me a whole lot of pain. Following Christ may be costly but it is worth the cost. Leaving God for my own path is the biggest cost to my soul in all of life.
Today, I literally got all emotional over the fact that I have had a certain bible for 4 years this December and that it is time for me to get a new one. I almost bawled in Lifeway, but the girl working there was not ready for me to start crying. You have no idea what the Word of God has done for me or what all I have been through with the Lord in the last 4 years with that bible. It is so dear to me. I can hardly stand the thoughts of getting a new one but I know there will be completely new journeys with the next. Listen though I would be so far in a ditch without Jesus and His word and my church that it is not even funny. I praise Him for the blast that I get to have with Him and the way I get to know Him. Who are we that He is mindful of us? But He is. Crazy Love.

Bill @ Hardee's

This would be a picture of Rod with the number 53 on the table...
There is a funny story to this is why I am posting. It may have been one of those things that is just funny to you at the time but I am going to set the stage for you.
Rod, his brother, my niece, Morgan, and myself head "to town" yesterday to eat and make a trip to Wal-Mart. Rod hunts in one of the poorest counties in the United States. He has been hunting there for 20 something years. When I tell you it is in the sticks...I mean IT IS IN THE STICKS. Morgan gets so excited to go to "the hunting club Chevron". The shopper in her is just excited to have a place to shop even if it is the Chevron.
So, we decide on Hardee's for dinner. There was an elderly couple there and us, that is all. Bill is taking our order. He was so loud you would think he had to speak over the masses to get our order. At one point in the conversation I asked him if the cinnamon biscuit wholes with icing were good...because there was a big sign in my face and he says: "I don't know, I guess you will have to come back tomorrow morning and try them because we are not serving them." OKAY....
So, we place our orders and wait and wait and wait. Hey life is about waiting so I am OK with that. I. KID. YOU. NOT. Bill walks around the restaurant saying "number 53" and looking for us. I am like Oh number 53 that's us...the. only. ones. in. the. restaurant. that. do. not. have. their. food. US NUMBER FIFTY THREE. I seriously almost spit out my drink I thought it was so funny. What cracked me up even more is when he gave us the number and when he popped the question of "will you be dining with us this evening." Why yes. Yes we will be dining at Hardee's. I wish I had a picture of Bill. HE. WAS. HILARIOUS.

A few stories.

I am thinking that I am going to have to swap over to a .com or something. I am getting so much spam in my comments. It is about to drive me nuts!
I get my wisdom teeth out Monday. To say I am not looking forward to it would be an understatement.
I have been a SLACKER when it comes to my blog and it sure isn't for lack of things to say. =)

Tonight I was giving Morgan a bath and I said something to her and she replied by saying, "Mom, I am saying whatever in my heart."
I couldn't help but laugh since she is telling me that it is what she is saying "in her heart." Out of the heart the mouth speaks for sure! We can always look at our words and see what kind of condition our heart is in. I find myself constantly praying for a purified heart and one that is undivided.

Then, Morgan stayed with her MiMi and Pop this weekend and missed church. She was scrolling through my camera and about freaked out at the pictures of my friend Donna getting "babatized." a.k.a. baptized.
her: Mom why did she get babatized?
me: because she became a Christian and was letting everyone know that she was not ashamed of Christ and that she was going to follow Jesus. She was going to live for Jesus and not for herself.
her: Mom, I don't want you and dad to get babatized. How will you come back to life?
me: Morgan, we already got baptized.
her: mommy no! how did you come back to life????

She doesn't understand but I loved what she was saying because it really is symbolic of us dying to self and our sinfulness and following Christ. Death to our flesh and Life in the Spirit. She is sort of scared of all of it right now. I had to call Rod to get him to simplify it for her. I have a hard time trying to articulate things on a four year old level...very hard time.

Then, I was at the oral surgeon today and was chatting with the nurse and she told me that her little girl heard the preacher ask for prayers for "the bereaved families" and one day her girl asked her who in the world was the Bereaved family and why did they pray for this family all of the time that she has never met. I about died laughing!!!

Whom have I in heaven but You? And earth has none I desire besides You!

Well I am having problems with not being able to copy and paste any of the verses that I want to share. Nothing is working and my other computer bit the dust today!!



My birthday is exactly a month from today! Another one. I am not really looking forward to them anymore. I sort of feel like I am running out of time...you know? There have been so many things I have wanted to share and can't get my blog issues worked out. Anyway, this time of year can bring up so many things in ones heart and mind. At times I know that peoples bodies (hearts) just ache from loneliness. It could be the loss of a loved one, or the death of a relationship yet the person is still living, division with a family member, distance between friends. The list is endless. We just long to be whole, not lacking anything. I pray that when you feel that ache in your heart that you will turn to Christ and ask Him to fill you. I was reading these verses tonight and could just sense the passion in the writers voice. He loves the LORD because the LORD heard his voice. He heard his cry for mercy. The word in the Hebrew for heard is a word meaning to pay attention to, to hear, to give undivided attention. In a world where we are literally in competition for any ones attention, praise God that He hears us. That the God that IS, WAS, and IS TO COME, who never had a beginning, who is infinitely wise and Holy, God Creator of heaven and earth---HEARS you and me. Little you and little me. When we call out to God for mercy He hears us! It amazes me.
Nothing against Rod but it is just plain hard to get the mans attention. I will never forget one morning several years ago I was still in my jammies and I was finishing any remaining thoughts that I had on my lesson for Sunday School. Nothing excites me and makes me nervous at the same time like teaching. So, I rush upstairs to get ready knowing that this was going to have to be one of the quickest showers of my life to make it to church on time. So, Rod says to me, "babe, you look nice today." I replied, "Rod did you even look at me? I am still in my pjs?" Rod then says, "WHAT! You aren't ready yet!?! You need to hurry!"
Then, there are times where I just want him to look me in the stinking eyes when he is talking to me (LISTEN with your eyes I say!). Eye contact is so important to me that I have a mirror on my visor that I pull down while I am talking to Morgan so I can look at her. There are times when he is on the computer, on his phone, reading something or watching TV, and I just don't want to have to compete to tell a simple story that should take two minutes and not 30. Now let me throw my dad under the bus for a minute. I will be talking to him then I know there is a point where he is no longer listening and I say, "dad I need you to repeat what I just said." He will tell me he doesn't know. God love him he just can't focus on conversation past 2 minutes. PRAISE THE LORD that He will never grow weary in our prayers to Him. We literally have His undivided attention. What a great and awesome omnipresent God we have... Seriously...that He can be attentive to you and to me at the same time and completely undivided.
Another phrase I was reading about the word heard is that He knows. He knows what we are saying when we don't even have the words to say it because He knows our hearts. Let's face it women are a complicated gender that I love! We want to be known and loved and desired. I love the woman at the well in John 4 (since I can't paste you will have to click on John 4). The woman says in verse 29 "Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?" He knew her, baggage and all, Jesus knew the cry of that woman's heart and met her there. What a relief to be loved by God when He knows everything we have ever done or will do. Just like when we can't get on with forgiving ourselves over something that we have truly been repentant over, yet Christ knew before the foundation of the world that we would commit that sin. He was the Lamb slain before the foundation of the world, yet we wallow in unbelief and scorn the forgiveness that comes from the Cross of Christ for our sins past, present, and future.
Then I love the woman who had been bleeding for 12 years reaching out in a desperate attempt to find healing. Can you just imagine how anemic this woman was? She had exhausted all of her resources trying to find healing. I am sure she was sort of an outcast. You can see some self-righteous people that probably wondered what grave sin she committed to be bleeding like that for so many years. I am sure she was judged beyond belief and under the levitical law was considered "unclean." Then she just throws herself at the Lord Jesus and touches His garment and is healed. CLICK HERE.
So my point is that God knows us. He longs for us to come to Him and allow Him to bind up our wounds and take rest in Him, find healing for our souls in Him. In our own personal desperation for whatever it is let us find our longings fulfilled in Him. Let's thank people and the world for letting us down because if they had not maybe we wouldn't have found Jesus and known Him in the way that we do or can. Why He is mindful of us I will never understand. When we have finished this race and fought the good fight I pray that all along all of our weaknesses would beckon us to know this to be true: Psalm 73:23-26
This world may let us down but let it be that there is none that compares to Him. None that we desire besides Him. He is our strength and our portion and no other will do.

2 years ago

THIS POST is from 2 years ago. I can't believe it! I have loved nothing more than being a mom to morgan! She is a ball of joy and has a "happy heart" as she calls it!!

I am having posting problems. I am trying to test.

I am so small yet He thinks of me

If God is for us who can be against us?

Isaiah 59:2 (New International Version)
2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.


If God is for us who can be against us? But what if God is not for us because we have set ourselves up in opposition to Him with willful unrepentant sin?
God is love, but He is completely Holy, and we have been saved from His wrath if we are in Christ. He desires our holiness (1 Peter 1:16) because He is holy. No ego problem there He knows that sanctification means less harm to our souls.
Take it from me, please take it from me. I went through one of the worst seasons of sifting that I have had in my entire life. I DO NOT EVER want to go there again. The Lord allowed the enemy to come against me and sift me like wheat. Why? Because I had some junk that needed to go. He will always give us a chance to humble ourselves. Out of His great love He will discipline His child if they persist in disobedience. The other day I was telling Morgan something she needed to do and she was being so stubborn. I looked at her and said, "CHILD, I am not talking to hear myself speak!" Don't you know God is saying that over us at times? He is telling us through His word, and the Holy Spirit, and maybe even other people something that we need to flat out QUIT for our good and others and He is not just telling us to hear Himself talk.
I have been reading about King Uzziah you can read it for yourself in 2 Chronicles 26. He becomes king at the age of 16 and reigns for more than a few decades. As long as he seeks the LORD, God gives him success. Yet we see later where his pride leads to his downfall. As most of you know he becomes proud. Most likely he bought into his own press and really believed he was "the king." He clearly loses sight of any accountability. Even the most powerful leader needs accountability. We all need it, but how many of us have anyone that is in our life that is calling us to run harder after Jesus and someone who calls us out or doesn't let us get away with the status quo? That doesn't mean getting in someones face necessarily but more like friends that are both living before the face of God together, doing life together, praying together.
So check out Uzziah in verse 16:
16 But after Uzziah became powerful, his pride led to his downfall. He was unfaithful to the LORD his God, and entered the temple of the LORD to burn incense on the altar of incense.
80 priests rush in to confront him and he becomes angry. His attitude was one that truly felt he was above reproach. No one was going to tell him anything. ....BUT God...
The Lord afflicted him with leprosy and it says that indeed he was eager to leave the sanctuary. He then leaved alone with leprosy. Then this was what was remembered of him: "for people said, "He had leprosy."
As humans we have a tendency to dwell on the bad and the falls that people have in life instead of any good that they did.
Bottom line pride led to his fall. I could go on with examples but I am running out of time.
I can't stand when people try to argue that the Old Testament is not relevant. What in the world? How could we even glimpse the holiness of God without the Old Testament!
So, God's word says that He opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble:
1 Peter 5:5-9

5Young men, in the same way be submissive to those who are older. All of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because, "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble." 6Humble yourselves, therefore, under God's mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. 7Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.
8Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. 9Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that your brothers throughout the world are undergoing the same kind of sufferings.

Really quick the part of submission in verse 5 means to willfully submit, and the word for humility means in the greek to think in correct estimation of oneself. We are so often in opposition in competition to one another even among Christians...strife, envy, jealousy it is all so rampant. So, we are told in Phil 2 to in humility consider one another better than ourselves. Jesus Christ was equal with God but did not consider equality with God something to be grasped. He took on the humble position of a slave and humbled Himself and became obedient to death on a criminals cross. The Lord of Glory, the spotless Lamb. How much more should we humble ourselves?
So, God opposes the proud. This is a greek word where God really arranges Himself in battle against the proud and arrogant. Um, if you are in battle with God who do you think is going to win? Not you. The greek for proud here means arrogant, proud, or the rejection of God. How often to we deny or scorn His counsel merely hearing the word but not obeying willfully. That is pride and must be dealt with. The passage goes on to say that He gives grace to the humble. Humble means lowly of mind, poor, and piety toward God. Reverence toward God. He will fight our battles for us and alongside of us but not if we are going at it on our own. So verse six tells us to humble ourselves under God's mighty hand, that He may lift us up in due time. The greek word for humble there means to humble, to bring yourself low. Get on your face for crying out loud! Repent of your pride. PRAY for godly sorrow that leads to repentance. Willful submission to God. So there we have it. He is a gentleman and will give us a chance to humble ourselves but if we do not He, out of great love will humble us. Oh Lord, let it be that we choose to bend the knee to Him. He is worthy. Just like in Deut. 30:19 This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live. He is not a glorified puppet master. He gives us a choice. Choose Him. I promise nothing good comes from going your own way. We desperately need God's presence to go with us. What else will distinguish us from everyone else? Just like God's chosen people were in captivity so many of us are to. God intends for greater things and victorious living in the life of His children.

Love-



ps I am having trouble posting and I have had a lot going on along with some migraines. Please pray for me as I seek to serve others in the word through teaching. Also, please pray for my health as well. =)