Speaking from a wound.

1 Samuel 16:7
7 But the LORD said to Samuel, "Do not consider his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart."

(I am a little nervous over this post because I want it to come out right)...
I have thought about something all afternoon and all while I worked tonight. So of course, I will blog about it. I was reading a Christian speakers blog today and I read something that really bothered me that was addressed to the way women dress. It was her blog and she is free to say what she wants but as I read it I felt sorry that I had thought or said some of the same things about other women in the past. I taught in the singles ministry for a long time and I can remember seeing girls that would come in my class that were dressed very inappropriately and I would comment to myself at times and sometimes speak about how we as women can cause others to stumble by the way we dress (and I specifically meant that just for them...just so you will know the condition of my heart). I spoke those words not so much because I cared about them or even how they could cause another to stumble... but in some way they made me feel insecure so it would cut me to the core. Yes, as Christians we should care about how we dress and should care about not causing another to lust after us and etc. But as I read this woman's post I thought about how we tend to address (and she was speaking of a complete stranger) what someone should not be wearing when really it is an issue of the what's in their heart and not what is on the outside. It reminds me of the verses on our speech...it is not the word's we say but the condition of our heart where our words come from.

Matthew 15:18-20
18But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man 'unclean.' 19For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20These are what make a man 'unclean'; but eating with unwashed hands does not make him 'unclean.' "

That reminds me of the self-help trend where we focus on fixing the externals instead of having much needed heart surgery and getting to the core issue of our problems. Take an alcoholic for example. Yes, that is an addiction but usually at the root of the problem can beloneliness that needs to be filled by Christ, or maybe pain management...just drinking until you can't feel instead of dealing with your pain head on.

Women know that dressing in a seductive manner will draw attention and they will feel powerful. That is why they do it. I would say that when we dress to gain the attention of another man (that is not our husband...if you are married) that we are struggling with insecurity. Plain and simple we will use our body as a way to validate. Someone who is dressing to gain attention is seeking to be validated by the attention they get. But let me ask you this? Have you ever felt that same way? We are all tempted to yet we will so brutally look down on others. I am not agreeing with the immodest dress that is out there by any means. I am also not saying that you shouldn't be cute. There will always be someone thinner than us, prettier than us, younger looking than we are and that is just a fact. This is getting personal but one night there was a famous girl on television posing in a commercial and it was very much a commercial that was sexual in nature. I immediately shouted at the TV so Rod could hear me "She's a piece of trash!" Rod stopped me and said "Jenny, listen to yourself...she is made in the image of God whether she is living that way or not...you shouldn't call her a piece of trash." I immediately got defensive and felt like he was taking up for her. Do you know why I lashed out at the TV and her ad...it was because I felt like she could gain the attention of my man and that I was not good enough (I am not saying he was giving her attention either) so I wanted to lash out at the wrong she was doing and degrade her as a person because in some way it made me feel small and insecure. That is the truth. The Lord knows the condition of every heart and it is His kindness that leads us to repentance. Instead of picking up stones and casting them at people we need to pray for others that may not be in the same place that we are. And in the church we should teach in love regarding the way that a Christian woman should dress, because not everyone is in the same place that we are. We don't come out and throw stones of condemnation especially when we don't even know where someone is at with the Lord. How quick we are to label people instead of praying for them. I am so guilty of this. Especially as women how many times have we judged someone else based on appearance when we've never even had the first conversation with them.
I pray that the Lord will make you and I secure enough in our relationship with Him that we can love others and find our worth in Him. Also, I hope that we can pray for others instead of looking down on them. Don't you think that deep down when we lash out about another woman that in some way we really just want to cut her down to make ourselves feel better? These are just my opinions. I have dealt with insecurity so much and I have been hurt and betrayed in this life to...but I truly want to love and pray for people who do not treat their temple as holy instead of letting it shake me and make me feel insecure. Let's face it we will all have this problem until Christ comes to call us home. We can honor the Lord with our beauty, teach our children to dress modestly, and speak the truth in love but we can't control the rest.

1 Peter 3:2-4
when they see the purity and reverence of your lives. 3Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. 4Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight.

Psalm 45:11
11 The king is enthralled by your beauty; honor him, for he is your lord.

Guarding your heart, retraining your mind.

Dear blogosphere,

What might have been doesn't exist. 

Going back in the past to change something isn't going to happen.  

I love a Hebrew word picture of the word know...it is a man in a canoe rowing backwards in the future but very much focused on the past. The apostle Paul is taken out of context when he says, "forgetting what is behind..."  God never tells us to amputate our history from our present reality. That's stupid.  But the whole, "what might have been..." Is a game of the enemy aimed at the mind to rob you of contentment. If you allow it to fester it will resurrect a stronghold in your mind and keep you stuck! I know this one. We are so wise to learn from our past. Look at our nation...we clearly have forgotten that to forget history is for history to repeat itself. Paul was speaking of forgetting past achievements. We can't live off of yesterday's relationship with The Lord or just forget some of the field trips we have taken and learned the hard way that God was right and He can be trusted. The only prescription for tearing down a stronghold is not with carnal methods but divine ones. Namely the Word of God, fasting, prayer, and choices to retrain your thinking. Learn and your do over will be not repeating the same stuff the next time. As a dog returns to his vomit so a fool returns to his folly. I remember our dogs eating grass, puking, and then eating their vomit.  Hate to ruin anyone's breakfast. I would stand slack jawed and yell how sick!!!! Yet that's what we do when we refuse to learn and choose differently. Some of you have been pining away over a person, place, or thing and in essence you are wandering in the wilderness spiritually speaking. Yet The Lord has called you out of darkness that He might bring you into a good and spacious place. Yet there is a mountain in front of you that won't move. You've got to go around it (deut 1 and 2). You didn't get where you are overnight and being free isn't for the faint of heart. You are going to have to go after it but as you do...you will find a liberation in your soul and a knowing of Jesus that's not words on a page. How bad do you really want to be free?  For me it's meant intense time in the word and The Lord performing heart surgery while I was wide awake with no anesthesia!!! His word works. That's all I know. He may not change your circumstance but He will set you free. He invites each of us to come and drink for free...even though it was so costly for Christ. He instructs us to not spend ourselves on what doesn't satisfy (isa 55). He is proved right always...this I know.  You have to make some choices, drive some stakes in the ground, and set your face like flint determined to do His will. You can't phone this one in. I've been the biggest fool on the planet...you can't out school me there. 

Obama Care, Marxism, and a quick rant

It really bothers me when we elect someone for an office based on the color of skin. I'm one that believes that we should embrace our different races instead of trying to act like we aren't different and try to be color blind. Why can't we appreciate and embrace the fact that God made us in His image and news flash: Jesus wasn't a butt white dude. He was Hebrew and dark skinned. Hello!?!? It doesn't take rocket science. Anyway, with that being said, I say this about our president...so many that say they are believers voted for a man based on race and not on moral values. Like the sanctity of life. That's a big deal to God. We live in a culture of great moral decline and animals have more press and rights then unborn babies. Well, I get made fun of for my love of history, but if you studied you'd see Obama and Obama care is nothing more than Marxism. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxism

Please tell me you read "Animal Farm" and it wasn't just a requirement for honors english?! 

We are headed down a path of decline of major proportions...yet because of our own dumbed down society and a turn from Creator God to an anything goes tolerant nation. We didn't arrive here overnight. Churches have mass-marketed Jesus in the West and have failed to make disciples as long as they can have big numbers and appeal to the seeker friendly crowd, using carnal methods to attract people instead of the exaltation of Christ alone! And we wonder why peoples lives are falling apart left and right. Because we are created to worship and without becoming a disciple of Christ we will worship anything. But we are closer now than when we first believed.  It's going to be a scary day when the Great and powerful Shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. Yet I long for the Rock that smashes the statue of World Empires in the book of Daniel!  The government will be upon His shoulders. Come Lord Jesus!!