One advantage of starting my day early -

Devotions - and today...it blew me away

Here it is -

If you get up in the morning in a terrible mood, the best thing you can do is find a place and spend some time with the Lord. Being in His presence transforms us. We can change the course of a day that Satan has negative plans for by learning to seek God quickly when we sense any attitude or behavior that is not Christlike.

"Apart from Him, we can do nothing (John 4:13),

but with and through Him, we can do all things (Philippians 4:13)."

What if someone offends us or hurts our feelings? The Bible says we are not to be easily offended our touchy. We are all commanded to quickly forgive those who hurt us. We may want to do what is right but find the doing of it difficult. That is when we need to take time to pray, spend some time with God, go to His Word and let our hearts meditate on a few scriptures that deal with what we are going through. As a result, you and I will find strength to do the right thing. Remember, we are in a war; we are soldiers in God's army, and we must be ready at any time to use our weapons.

-Joyce Meyer

After a joyful break - we finally jumped back into Lifeline. With a weak voice, the strong words from D.C. really got the ball rolling for the new year. The night was about prayer and how vital it is when strengthening your relationship with Christ. You don't have to be a Christian in order to pray, fact! There are no bad prayers - in fact it's sometimes even hard for me to realize that I don't have to know everything in order to feel like my prayer will be heard. Sometimes it's all about being raw; showing up with questions, uncertainties, humility, arrogance... and being able to openly profess your feelings to God. For me, being able to come to the table so vulnerable and full of questions makes me feel free. It frees me from having to figure it all out by myself, and being okay with not always being right. Being free: free to talk, think, share, question, engage....Could that be the reason for always coming back to GCC? I think that's it! I can walk into that place and be a little broken, a tad lost, and horribly confused on things, and be okay with it. Knowing that if I want to talk to someone, I can, or if I just want to sit back and lean in on the Words given, I can do that to. There isn't a pressure to fit in or stand tall - I can just be me.

Did I just completely fall off the train - - that has really nothing to do with the devotion...whoops!

Here's where I wanted to go...

If you know me at all you know that I don't eat breakfast - and I like my days of sleeping in. When I have to get up early for work...it's a quick shower - gel in the hair...and off to work I go. But lately I've been hearing a little voice in my head telling me that there is more to life than all of that. So for the new year I've decided to hand my mornings over to God, eat some breakfast and enjoy a cup (or two....or the entire pot) of coffee.

So far - so good!

It's incredible - and I've never felt more in tune with my life. It's been interesting to see how each devotion seems to fit with how I'm feeling. The devotion for today was about not being too touchy or offended by others. All of that hit me like a ton of bricks this morning because of a few things that happened yesterday. It made me realize that when my feelings are hurt that's the time to fall on my knees and pray. Talk to God and have him help me trudge through it. What happened yesterday wasn't even that bad, but it's been a while since I've had my feelings hurt - that I almost forgot what it felt like. For some reason, it feels different than before. Maybe it's because God's been working in me, and being able to have a different way to cope with my feelings. So I challenge you to turn towards Him. In moments of struggle, brokenness, heartache or just when someone says something that pulls at your heart (even if it's something small, like what happened to me last night) - ask Him. Talk to Him. It's all about the questions...He can and will make it easier for you to understand. He's not so direct, but then again...who is???

Well...wait...I guess it all sort of makes sense in the end....strange* Thanks God!