The wall

Have you ever encountered an obstacle that seemed unsurmountable?  Its called “hitting the wall.”  What’s been your wall? 

“Walk the wall!” A scene from “An Officer and a Gentleman”

Statistics was the wall I came up against, a paper I had to pass to qualify for a Diploma of Business.  We had four weeks to complete it.  I just couldn’t do it, I hadn’t been able to understand maths since the age of ten.  When I prayed about it, I knew I had to “throw my heart over the bar”.

Years before, I had won a major spiritual battle against bad thoughts.  After I’d got rid of the worry and hate, God wanted me to fill my mind with positive thoughts, so I read a book my Norman Vincent Peale, “The power of positive thinking.”

One of the things Norman Vincent Peale said was this;

“Throw your heart over the bar and your body will follow.  Throw your faith over your difficulty, throw your affirmation over every barrier, throw your visualisation over your obstacles.  Fire the heart with where you want to go and what you want to be.  Get it so deeply fixed in your unconscious that you will not take no for an answer, then your entire personality will follow where your heart leads.”     

It reminds me of a scene from the movie “An Officer and a Gentleman” that came out in 1982 with the hit song “Up where we belong.”  Anyway, the scene I am talking about is where the only female cadet on the course has a wall she has to scale.  The hero wouldn’t let her give up.  He coached her over the wall; “Walk the wall! Seeger! Seeger, walk! Seeger! Don’t you let go! You walk that wall! Pull! Pull! Pull, Candidate Seeger!”  

Have you ever hit the wall?  If you can’t seem to get over, consult God before you give up.  He will know whether you can do it or not.  He and my husband helped me scale the wall, just like the hero in the movie.

Did I pass Statistics at College?  I did, I never used it in my business – but I have used Statistics in a major revelation about the 153 fish.

The Gate Keeper

We’re in a war, and it involves our homes.  I should know.  I come from four generations of broken homes on my mother’s side.  I never knew my own grandmother.

The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down.  Proverbs 14:1

I repeated the broken home pattern myself, but unlike my maternal grandmother I refused to abandon my children.

My children did not have an ideal home as the father was missing, but unlike the previous generations, I turned to God and he turned this family around.  He gave me strength, self worth, boundaries and a lot of practical help.  When the children reached their teenage years I was given a second chance at marriage.  The man I married is a good man who loves my children like they are his own.

I put two things on hold while I was raising the children on my own – dating and a career.

Did I earn as much money?  No. Did I have any romance?  No, just temptation.

Was it worth it?  Yes!  I still got to where I wanted to go, my children have safely reached adulthood,  happy and well adjusted.  They are navigating life for themselves now.  I pray to God that the unhappy pattern of divorces has been broken, to be replaced with happy marriages.

I now respect the home maker profession more than any other.  Although I’ve had two careers and now I’m a self employed business woman, I realise it is the most important job you ever get to do.

Satan targets women as they run the most important place – the home.   Mothers have the most influence on children – if a mother is broken and can’t raise her sons and daughters, he wins.

He will look for where you are most vulnerable, and tempt you there.  Be careful what you let into your home.

There are lots of sharks swimming in the sea of life, and you don’t always see their fins.

2 Timothy 3:1-9 gives you a list of them.

Here are some I encountered;

1) The narcissist who wormed his way into my home with charm, and destroyed it.

2) Religious wolves dressed as sheep – having a form of godliness but denying its power.  The ones that are easy to spot are the ones who turn up on your doorstep holding Bibles.  Not so easy to spot are the “apostles” who want a percentage of your income as “tithes”.

3) A friend of my daughter who was disobedient to her parents, unholy, and ungrateful.  She tried to get my daughter to shop lift.

4) A gossip who slandered a loved one.  Covered in an earlier post.

1) I invited in, 2) I did not invite in 3) My daughter invited her in 4) Got invited in with a group of people

Have nothing to do with them.

In 2 Timothy 3:1-9 they are described as “the kind who worm their way into homes and gain control over weak-willed women, who are loaded down with sins and are swayed by all kinds of evil desires …”

Ouch, ouch ouch.  I asked myself some tough questions in the next chapter of my story.

Weak willed?  If they gain control, you have been weak willed.

Loaded down with sins?  Is there stuff in your life or family of origin stuff that hasn’t been dealt with?

Evil desires?  Just look at what is on your TV that may sway you, or your child.

So watch yourself.   If you are a mother, you are the gate keeper of the home.  Its dangerous times we’re living in.

Psalm 101 is a great piece of scripture for a gate keeper.  My advice is make it intentional.  Learn it, memorise it, and use it.  If you put it into effect, it will save you a lot of grief.

Also, Gate Keepers need discernment.  You can ask God for this gift.

 

Trouble

Trouble.  This world guarantees it.
Job, a just man who was severely tested, wrote
“Man is born for trouble, as surely as sparks fly upwards.”  Job 5:7

Trouble can be caused by bad people.  The book of Proverbs from the Bible, says;

Do not set foot on the path of the wicked
or walk in the way of evildoers.
 Avoid it, do not travel on it;
turn from it and go on your way.
 For they cannot rest until they do evil;
they are robbed of sleep till they make someone stumble.
 They eat the bread of wickedness
and drink the wine of violence.  Proverbs 4:14

Trouble, the funny version

Taylor Swift sings about it here in her song “Trouble”.   Here’s a 25 sec clip, which my daughter showed to me.  It’s the funny version.

I have warned about bad people in a post called
“Here be Dragons”.

But what if we can’t avoid them, like at work?  Jesus understands trouble.  He was born for it.

He promised “In the world you will have trouble. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”  Sometimes He’ll take us through it – to test us, or teach us.  And sometimes He’ll take us around it.

My advice; fear God more than man.  By fear I mean “have concern for”.

I sought the Lord, and he answered me;
    he delivered me from all my fears.

Taste and see that the LORD is good;
blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.
Fear the LORD, you his saints,
for those who fear him lack nothing.  Psalm 34:4-8

This is true, I sought the Lord, and He answered me.  He led me through a bad place, promising it would be a door of hope.  The story is told in my book where I travelled through the Valley of Achor.  Achor means trouble.  Its a place that people on pilgrimage had to go through to get to Zion.  You don’t have to travel it alone.

Big promises, small beginnings

I once made God a big promise;  that if He lifted me out of my circumstances, I would put no restrictions on Him – the sky would be the limit.  I hadn’t factored in what He’d want to do with me. 

When I made this extravagant promise I was living in small town New Zealand, after having lived in Sydney.  After Sydney, I despised the town I was living in.  All I wanted to do was get back to Australia.  For a few months my dream was realised.  I lived in Canberra, Australia’s capital.

But like a boomerang I ended up back in New Zealand, again.  I asked God how can the sky be the limit back in a small town of a small country?

He told me not to despise the day of small things.

I have learned since then that what matters is its not where we live but what we live.

Did I overcome the small town limitations that I chafed against?  My book tells the story.

Laugh and the world laughs with you …

Image from rainingtruthsmallrain.wordpress.com

My Gran once recited part of a poem to me by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, which I never forgot. 

“Laugh and the world laughs with you
Weep and you weep alone
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth
But has troubles enough of its own.”    

It almost stopped me getting help from a friend when I really needed it.

This would have been a popular poem in her time.  Weep, and you weep alone.  In our family, it became a truth.  That’s the world’s wisdom.

But it was not THE truth.

In the Kingdom, it’s the other way around.

“Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.” Romans 12:15

Which is better?

Man of sorrows

The shortest verse of the Bible is “Jesus wept”.  He wept even though He knew that He was going to bring Lazarus back from the dead.  He wept for the sisters that lost their brother.  He wept for those who weep.   

In Isaiah 53, a prophecy about the King written about 700 years before His birth, He is described as “a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief.”

He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us.  2 Corinthians 1:4

We are not alone.