Get Out of God's Way...

My encouragement to you this week is to get out of God's way if you want change. God can't fulfill a promise to those who won't stand on His promise. Believe with your whole heart God can make a difference. Turn it over to God. He has YOUR solution!

Get out of God's way. Some of us don't even realize that we are in God's way but our unbelief is the problem. I said it above, if you can't believe in a promise for God please don't expect God to fulfill it for those who can't believe. Don't get me wrong, God performs MIRACLES at our lowest when we can't see a way out. That is by His grace. However, if you want the best of what God has to offer, then get out of the way with unbelief. We have tried and tried to fix ourselves and it hasn't worked. So we do the wrong thing and say, " God if I can't do it, nothing can be done." I am not saying we do this overtly but take a look at our actions. We get despondent, discouraged, angry, and a slew of other negative emotions. We profess the greatness of God. But can't live it when trouble comes. We become the barrier to God. We become the barrier to change we are waiting on that hasn't come yet. In the Bible it says James 1:6-8 "But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. ⁷ That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. ⁸ Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do." But this world constantly stirs us up. Makes us want to fix things our way- brings troubles that seem so huge and overwhelming- I feel like just standing by leaves me helpless. We want to do, and to act- and yet sometimes the most powerful act can simply be to lay all our cares and concerns at the feet of our Savior. Sometimes we get so busy doing- fixing- we forget to seek God first.  To come to Him for guidance and strength- to hear what He has to say. That is probably best thing that we can do to get out of God’s way. Just let Him take the lead!

Here are some things we can do to get out of God's way. We must learn to truly rely on God. We must learn to really want to see God at work. The most important part of getting out of God's way is trust God. Faith is more than positive thinking. Positive thinking will NOT produce faith. Faith is trust in God, and the only way to develop faith is to learn to know God. Since He is trustworthy, as we learn to know Him, we spontaneously learn to trust Him. Faith is trusting God when things don't turn out the way we expect. God rewards those who really seek Him. Trust will allow you to say, God "I can't but I know you can." Another aspect is staying in prayer.  it is important to focus.  If you loose focus, even for a millisecond, a flip can become very dangerous.  Walking in faith is equally demanding.  When you choose to follow Jesus, you have to discipline your mind, focus your thinking, feed your faith.  You have to keep your mind’s eye focused on where God called you to. Prayer helps with that immensely! Another thing to do is for each of us needs to develop a discerning spirit, rooted in a strong relationship with the Lord and the knowledge of right and wrong. We must also ask God to show us how to apply His truth to our lives so we can live in obedience to His Word. The truth of the matter is that the right thing to do is to let the Spirit move you. Move you out the way. Move you to submission. Move you to trust in God the way we are called to do. Next, we can accept God's correction. When someone hears of correction, he may wonder how such a subject can be a “blessing” as our title has it.  But if God has given us a great amount of instruction on how to correct others and much instruction on how to respond to the correction of others, we can know that God considers admonishment, reproof, rebuke, and correction to be vital to our life and work as Christians.  Others can be blessed through our correction of them and we can be greatly blessed in rightly responding to others’ correction of our own faults and failings. Correction hurts at times BUT it changes us. And we may need that to move out of God's way. We see that God is showing us where we are wrong and we must recognize God's voice. The most problematic part of hearing God is the fact that it takes time to learn to distinguish God's voice -- and it takes a humble heart. Jeremiah 29:12-13 says, "Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart." We can't make demands on Almighty God. We can't shake our fist at the sky and say, 'all right God, let me hear you.' But we can ask, seek, and knock, and the Bible promises that God will open the door. God will expose Himself to those who humbly search for Him. Lastly, KNOW GOD IS YOUR BEST FRIEND.  God wants to be YOUR best friend! No matter what qualities you look for in a friend, God is overflowing with all the qualities that make best friends the best!God listens – “In the morning, O Lord, you hear my voice; in the morning I lay my requests before you and wait in expectation” – Psalm 5:3.God is honest – “A faith and knowledge resting on the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time” – Titus 1:2. God is encouraging – “’For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future’” – Jeremiah 29:11. God enjoys spending time with us– “This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” – 1 Timothy 2:3-4. God loves us even when we make mistakes – “But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” – Romans 5:8. No better friend is he!

Turn it over to God! He has your solution. Whatever you are going through God has your answer. Every problem already has an answer. I know things can look dark and you might not can see your way out, but there is a way out. God had the answer before you had the problem and his answer will deal with the problem. For instance, a centurion came to Jesus for his servant he was seriously ill. He came to Jesus to heal his servant, but on the way there he said "Speak the word only and my servant shall be healed" Frank Broom says it so well," God says in Hosea 4:6 "My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge". Notice it's not the problem that destroys you, but your lack of knowledge of the answer. Notice "Lack of knowledge" so God already has a solution. Sometimes we can get so focused on the problem, but 2Corinthians says "While we look not at things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporal(temporary), but the things which are not seen are eternal". So your problem can change. Notice in each instance they were full of the answer and not the problem. You may not know the answer, but ask God to show you the answer and He will guide you into all truth by his spirit (John 16:13) or by his word which is a lamp unto your feet and a light unto your path (Psalm 119:105). For He is your shepherd(not just your shepherd, but the good shepherd that laid down his life for his sheep). So be encouraged your path out is already made you just have to find it and walk it...Be Blessed...

Let God Make You Whole

My encouragement to you this stop looking for everything else but God to fill the voids in your life. Your peace comes from His grace and His love. Depend on God to make you whole. This decision is LIFE CHANGING with no regrets!

1 Peter 5:10 HCSB

Now the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory  in Christ Jesus, will personally  restore, establish, strengthen, and support you after you have suffered a little.

Our God is full of grace. Our God is so full of love. Our God is full of all the things that we need to make us happy. He is full of all the things we need to he successful. Alas, we still look for all of our needs to be filled elsewhere. We look for a new activity, a new person, a new job, new clothes, a new habit, etc to fill the voids of our life. Half of the time, we can't even communicate effectively how these things are going to fulfill us. People look for a new activity to fill their time in their time of trouble rather than focus that time on fixing the real issue. We may struggle with our self-esteem but feel buying things will make us feel better about ourselves. We are looking for direction in our professional lives and want God to move us into a new job just to remain unfulfilled. We try to convince ourselves this is what God wants us to do. Or we look for people to fill the voids of our unhappiness. If you're unhappy alone, can you provide happiness to another person? You have no peace but look to find peace in someone who may have their own problems. How wise it that?

Saints, the Bible says it in 1 Peter 5:10, our God who is full of grace will restore and establish us! How awesome is that? Our peace and happiness is only found in God. There is no debate and no discussion. Think about when you have prayed and prayed for God to make a change in your life that happens? Doesn't it feel like a burden has just been removed? I know when that happens for me I can't stop smiling. I can't stop praising. I feel at so much peace. Man can't do that for me. Because man will fail you. But our God never fails. He will never let us down. He is our source of peace.

God wants you WHOLE, complete, nothing missing nothing broken! Physically, spiritually, emotionally, mentally, financially, etc. The Bible talks about wholeness as something that starts in the center of our being and organizes our lives rightly from the inside out. It works through our basic relatedness to self, to life, to others, and to God. It begins with coming into a right relationship with God. You must depend on God. Lean on The Bible. Trust in His promises. Cast your cares on God. You may have heard this a million times, but are you even doing that?!?!  Know that God wants you to be a whole person. If you can get physical health, do it. But if you can't, remember that God can make you a whole person in spite of a physical illness. An amputee has to discover that he or she can be a whole person without the limb that has been lost. A divorcee must discover that he or she can be a whole person without the former partner. An unemployed person must discover that he or she can be a whole person even though unemployed. God wants you to be a whole person and God is working to help you become one. Work with God. Depend on Him in a way you know you  should! We ALL can do better!

You will never regret this decision. Never ever! It will change your life. Think if you depended on God just to lead your as much as you do to take care of your mess, would you regret that? Think of the feeling you get when He acts on your behalf. It is such a rewarding feeling. You deserve NOTHING but God wants to give and be your everything. Are we so foolish to deny Him that? Are we so foolish to deny ourselves that? Let us really change our lives. We really want to see God, then let God fill our voids. We want to feel God at all times, invite Him at all times. Life won't be perfect. Life won't always be happy. But you know that He is there and He will restore you again. He will establish you again. He will strengthen you again...Be Blessed...