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i love that mark twain quote. it so resonates!
but i am sure that the next 3 most important days of our life are yesterday, today and tomorrow.
YESTERDAY: Your yesterday is part of you but doesn’t have to define you. Whatever happened, we are here. But being here doesn’t mean we have to stay here or that we will stay here.
TODAY: Today is a moment in time. As much as our yesterday is our yesterday, today is our today. Today is our reality. We often say THIS IS OUR MOMENT. And that’s right. THIS is our moment in time. 2011. today. This is it. This is our real life. How can we make the most of today? gratitude, be kind to ourself, love the people around you
TOMORROW: Build for tomorrow but live for today. "God guarantees that His Word will not return void. He doesn’t guarantee that the return will be immediate. Keep sowing." Steven Furtick
"My story is important not because it is mine, God knows, but because if I tell it anything like right, the chances are you will recognize that in many ways it is also yours. Maybe nothing is more important than that we keep track, you and I,of these stories of who we are and where we have come from and the people we have met along the way because it is precisely through these stories, in all their particularity,as I have long believed and often said, that God makes himself known to each of us most powerfully and personally." -Frederick Buechner from Welcome to my Brain
Extraordinary moves of God begin with ordinary acts of obedience! – Steven Furtick
if you buy new jeans
remove that sticker down the back of the leg
that says what size you are
and be grateful for friends who notice that BEFORE you head out shopping.
and tell you.
blush.
Today is a moment in time
As much as our yesterday is our yesterday, today is our today. Today is our reality. We often say THIS IS OUR MOMENT. And that’s right. THIS is our moment in time. 2011. today. This is it. This is our real life.
Making the most of today is determined by who you are and who you BE. Sounds like bad grammer right.
We can all wish that we WERE something else or someone else, but the reality is. I AM ME. YOU ARE YOU. God made you to be you not a carbon copy of someone else.
How often do we compare ourselves to someone else. I wish I could bake like billy from masterchef. Or sing like beyonace. Or keep a tidy house like my mother. Or have curly hair like a chick in our mainly music group. Or straighter hair. Or blonder hair. Or darker hair.
When i was growing up I was quite comfortable being short. It has its advantages. I can get my jeans hemmed instead of having my ankles show. I can push my way under elbows to get the better seat. The World Health Organization says short people live longer – that’s an advantage. Nothing was going to make me grow any taller. My sister tried some elaborate stretching exercises. But she is shorter than me, so perhaps they had the reverse effect.
I can’t change how tall I am. I CAN work on learning new things and being a better person, but at the core of my life I AM WHO I AM.
Created by God. Chosen by God. Loved by God. Designed by God. Purposed by God.
HIS is the voice you need to listen to when defining who you are.
He knows us inside out and upside down, how many hairs we have on our head and how many hairs we have on our toes.
And He loves us. Right now. Today. Knowing that and knowing His kindness can set you free to live, really live in the moment of today.
We are all in a state of flux, a state of change and transition. But life is not lived in tomorrow land. It is lived today.
So, how can we make the most of today?
- gratitude
When we’re living our lives with intentional gratitude we’re fixing our eyes upon Jesus and agreeing YES He is good and YES He is faithful and YES He is Lord and YES He is the one who loves us! Gratitude is an expression of faith
Optimism is the one quality more associated with success and happiness than any other. – Brian Tracy
I once heard a lady talking on the radio about how an attitude of gratitude changed her whole experience of life from “grrr” to “great”. She had a couple of kids and felt that her days were forever filled with the mundane and worse still, the repetitive mundane. Picking shoes up. Picking socks up. Her kids would get home and drop their shoes wherever. Even though they had a special place by the front door for shoes she would find htem in the kitchen, up the hall, in the bathroom, often one shoe here and another shoe at the other end of the house. She found herself grumbling about how inconsiderate her kids were. Until she had an attitude change. She intentionally looked for a reason to be grateful for the shoes. Glad that she had kids. Glad she had healthy kids that played sports and did ballet and had running shoes and school shoes. Glad they could afford shoes. All of a sudden the shoes were more than just shoes they were evidences of good things in her life. Things she was overlooking and diminishing because of her attitude.
Try it. Try it for a week. Make a note at the end of every day of things you are grateful for. Gratitude can turn your life around.
- Be kind to yourself – you’ve got to accept your human limitations. Our lives are like jars of clay. We can’t be all and do all. We are not superheroes.
Our God can work through means or above them. He that puts the treasure into earthen vessels often allows the vessels to be chipped and broken, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. ~ Robert Murray McCheyne
How often do we give someone else grace, but don’t extend it to ourselves.
In saying that, be a fan of yourself! Don’t underestimate your awesomeness. You are uniquely gifted. Only you can be you.
Whenever I would ring tony’s work, if he was busy, I would say to the guy who answered the phone, “oh its just Claire” and he, be rough roofer he was, would in his deep voice, “say there is no just claire. It’s Claire.” Seriously, he would tell me off. There is no “just” about it. You are the only you the world has. Irreplaceable.
- The life you live today is lived with people – Love is spelt T I M E. Not many people get to the end of their lives and wish they had spent more time at work, more time advancing their career. They regret the missed opportunities with people, with family. Invest in your family. Invest in your marriage. Invest in your friendships. Do life with each other.
there’s just something about this song that resonates in my heart. it often gets stuck in my head, and its one of those songs i am glad to have stuck there.
it declares grace.
it declares love.
it declares freedom.
it reminds me of 1 john 4:9-11 – This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.
let me connect the dots. God loved me first. He demonstrated His grace to me. and i live to respond to His love and i want everyone to know that!
Here I am before you
Falling in love and seeking your truth
Knowing that your perfect grace
Has brought me to this place
Because of you I freely live
My life to you, oh God, I give
So I stand before You God
I lift my voice because you set me free
So I shout out your name from the rooftops I proclaim
That I am Yours, I am yours
All the good You’ve done for me
I lift up my hand up hand for all to see
You’re the only one
Who brings me to my knees
To share this love across the earth
The beauty of Your Holy Word
So I kneel before You God
I lift my voice because you set me free
So I shout out your name from the rooftops I proclaim
That I am Yours, I am Yours
All that I am I place into Your loving hands
And I am Yours, I am Yours
Here I am, I stand with arms wide open
To the one, the Son, the everlasting God (2x)
Your yesterday is part of you but doesn’t have to define you
We all have a yesterday. We all have a past. And our past shapes us. We see the evidence of our past in our today, how we think, how we live, how we relate to people, how we feel about things.
My family moved round heaps – I moved every 2 years. It shaped who I am, I can make friends quickly – or rather I can meet new people and connect quickly. I learned to enjoy my own company and to rely on myself, because you know. I was going to move soon. If I didn’t make friends there was always the next place.
Our past can be a powerful indicator of who we are. We are no one without a yesterday.
BUT.
There is a but.
Who knows that life is like Auckland weather… 4 seasons in one day vs the blissful balm perfect sunshine of a tropical retreat. Aka. There are moments in our life that are painful, difficult, hard, frustrating, testing and worse than any bad hair day we can imagine.
Often we devalue ourselves based on the past. We think less of ourselves based on something that has happened to us or a decision we made or a mistake we did. Isn’t it funny how when evaluating the past we have amnesia of all the good things we did, thought, said, accomplished… or is that just me?
But my past doesn’t limit me or define me.
You are not the sum total of x + X = Y
Whatever happened, we are here. But being here doesn’t mean we have to stay here or that we will stay here.
And I say that knowing that I don’t know your backstory. But I know that God does. He has seen all and knows all and His promise is that you are not defined by the pain of the past but that you are defined by His love and grace.
But your attitude to those things WILL have a massive effect on how you see yourself and how you live.
What if we are not the sum of our past… what if we am not defined by our yesterday… what would our tomorrow look like?
What if we didn’t assume that past failures are who we are? Perhaps we’d believe, just for a second, that we could be successful, that we could live the dream.
What if we chose to let the past be the past? Perhaps we’d see the possibilities of the future and take the opportunities that we CAN take and that we are WORTH taking those good things.
How do we change our perspective of the past?
- Make a choice. Choose how you see it. It’s amazing how a change of perspective can make a difference. Invite God in to help with the mind shift. The Bible says when we become a Christian that the old is gone and that it is a new day, the new has come. It doesn’t remove the pain of the past but it can remove the stain of the past on our heart. We are all flawed. We are all imperfect. We are all human. But that’s okay. Make a choice, invite God to help.
- Forgive. Forgive the people who have hurt us, intentionally or unintentionally, through what they did or didn’t do. Forgiveness is such a key to unlock our hearts from hurt.
- Remove the voice of the past from the way you think today. How often does the past or things people have said from the past reach through time to try and define us? Sometimes we need to pull out the tape and replace it with a more positive soundtrack. Focus on the promises. Focus on the positivity. Focus on the possibility. Focus on the potentiality.
The good thing is that you don’t have to do any of those 3 things by yourself. Look around you. There are good people beside you. Talk to someone. Talk to God. Now that last one might be someone that you’re not used to doing. It might be something unfamiliar. You might have come here not knowing anything about God or Christianity or church or the bible. That’s okay. Once upon a time we were all like that!
One of the things I really appreciate about God is that He doesn’t label me or limit me based on my mistakes or my humanity or my experiences.
His promise is that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. In other words, God can turn it around. God can bring the good out of the painful times. He can bring the strength out of the weakness. You do not have to be defined by yesterday.
i half like this quote. just half. actually in rereading perhaps only a quarter.
it popped up today on fb but my heart didn’t agree with it enough to give it a like.
“God has given the church a great call, and therefore it takes great people to accomplish it. If we fail to see our greatness, we will fall short of our call.” ~Kris Vallotton
here’s why.
yes the call is great.
and YES you and i are awesome because we’re breathing.
but our awesomeness isn’t in ourselves.
my awesomness is because of Jesus.
any good in me is because of Him.
i give God all kudos and credit for anything that is accomplished in my and through my life.
because it is HIS work. not my greatness.
its not my greatness that will accomplish anything for His Kingdom but HIS GREATNESS THROUGH ME.
it actually takes ordinary flawed human beings who put their hand up to say YES that and allow the greatness of God to work through them that do the call and do great things for God.
Our God can work through means or above them. He that puts the treasure into earthen vessels often allows the vessels to be chipped and broken, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and not of us. ~ Robert Murray McCheyne
so today was brows day. less than 2 minutes. seriously.
wham bam thank ya!
and also b12 injection day.
i had a blood test last week after having a rather spectacular faint.
results were uber low b12 and uber low iron. combined with low blood pressure ment i was feeling rather dizzy all week! and after using google to look up a bit more it explained some other weird stuff my body was doing. yeah okay, i confess, havent been making time to look after this body too well lately.
so back to that injection.
i’m not good with needles.
aka i have natural births so that i dont need any needles. pushing a baby out is preferable than having an injection.
so i was trying to be brave all day.
the nurse picked up on that.
she was really nice.
so she had me lie down on the bed.
comfy.
the kids leaned in for a look. only appt i could get for today was with the kids. good incentive to be braver!
i felt a wee prick. that wasnt too bad i said. not like how i had expected. or heard. thanks for everyone who told me their horror b12 stories.
well, said the nice nurse, its not the prick that hurts, but the… (as she pushes the thingy down)… stuff in the vial that makes it sting.
by golly.
and it still hurts.
my whole arm and shoulder and right side down my back really hurts.
ouchy.
looking forward to bed. with a wheat bag.
(oh if you want to read fully prepared 1 – HERE IT IS)
Daniel 1:4-7 In the third year that Jehoiakim was king of Judah, King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia attacked Jerusalem. The Lord let Nebuchadnezzar capture Jehoiakim and take away some of the things used in God’s temple. And when the king returned to Babylonia, he put these things in the temple of his own god. One day the king ordered Ashpenaz, his highest palace official, to choose some young men from the royal family of Judah and from other leading Jewish families. The king said, “They must be healthy, handsome, smart, wise, educated, and fit to serve in the royal palace. Teach them how to speak and write our language and give them the same food and wine that I am served. Train them for three years, and then they can become court officials.” Four of the young Jews chosen were Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, all from the tribe of Judah. But the king’s chief official gave them Babylonian names: Daniel became Belteshazzar, Hananiah became Shadrach, Mishael became Meshach, and Azariah became Abednego.
we have an enemy… and paul says we are not ignorant of his schemes. one of his schemes is to assimilate us into his culture – in to the world. we can see him operating to do that to the young jewish leaders in daniels day. we are of the world but not of the world. while there are many wonderful things in our day there is also things that we should separate ourselves from. i’m not talking separatist life here but holy life. don’t compromise and be permissive. stand true to what you know God has said.
the enemy tried to change the names of daniel and his friends. he tries to change our destiny and our calling – he tries to cover up the truth with a lie and a falsehood.
Names and their meaning:
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Hananiah – God has favoured – to Shadrach – “of Shach”, which was a name of a god or goddess of the Chaldeans, they worshipped
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Mishael – who God is – to Meshach – “the messenger the sun”
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Azariah – God has helped – to Abendego – “a servant, or worshipper of Nego”. The word signifies “shining brightness”: which some understand of fire worshipped by them; others of the bright planet Venus; and others of Lucifer
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Daniel – judge of God – to Belteshazzar – Bel hath hid and treasured (Bel is a idol)
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Don’t let anyone cover up your destiny. Don’t let anyone hold you back. don’t let anyone define who you are. listen to the ONE VOICE that can speak into your life and say who you are. God’s voice.
Daniel 1:8 Daniel made up his mind to eat and drink only what God had approved for his people to eat. And he asked the king’s chief official for permission not to eat the food and wine served in the royal palace.
Daniel decided to obey God and live counter culture. He made up his mind to obey God. He resolved himself to obedience and while we know the end of the story, that he was tested and found to be more healthy and prosperous than his contemporaries who ate all the rich (and maybe idol offered) and unclean food, it could of led to his execution. He preferred death and punishment to disobedience.
He stood up and he stood out.
Will you make a stand for the ways of God and his righteousness today?
lets not compromise and fit in. Let us instead shine like stars in the darkness.
Philippians 2:12-16 My dear friends, you always obeyed when I was with you. Now that I am away, you should obey even more. So work with fear and trembling to discover what it really means to be saved. God is working in you to make you willing and able to obey him. Do everything without grumbling or arguing. Then you will be the pure and innocent children of God. You live among people who are crooked and evil, but you must not do anything that they can say is wrong. Try to shine as lights among the people of this world, as you hold firmly to the message that gives life.
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