Hurricane Helene

I’m sitting in North Florida right now awaiting Hurricane Helene. It’s strange to look out my second-floor window at the trees across from me that are barely moving. It is an overcast grey day but other than that it looks like any other normal rainy Florida day.

If it weren’t for the barrage of weather reports one would never know what is looming just miles away. A storm with a magnitude of over 120 mile-an-hour angry winds accompanied by a deluge of water ready to be dumped upon our coastline is imminent.

We know that it’s coming. It will not be a surprise to anyone once it reaches our state.

It’s making me think about the proverbial calm before the storm right this moment or other times in my life when there was an approaching personal storm that I didn’t see coming. Life has a way of doing that to all of us. The last one I went through was health-related. But as you can see—I’m still here.

I weathered the storm of a year’s worth of winds and rain assaulting my body. As we often view the results of the aftermath of hurricanes, there is always widespread damage, and the landscape is sometimes permanently altered.

Life events that come upon us unawares can also leave us permanently altered, but they can also leave us better for their coming. That’s my case. I learned about the close abiding presence of the Holy Spirit. I knew His voice and had experienced His comfort numerous times before. But there’s an even closer awareness one experiences in times of complete dependency.

I’m a needy person. I admit that with no shame. I understand the Word in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 where Paul says that his weakness is really his greatest strength. I know that might sound confusing but until you experience it personally it does sound like a contradiction.

There’s nothing like waking up in the middle of the night feeling so overwhelmed that you can hardly breathe, and the Holy Spirit softly comforts you enabling you to fall back to sleep. The truth is that no matter if we are facing an external weather-induced storm or a personal physical, mental, or emotional storm that seems that it will overtake us—there is a place of refuge in God.

Few people know that until something hits their life. Some people will never take advantage of the reality of a loving God who longs to embrace their life. I don’t know what their thoughts could be to turn down the promise of Eternal life and the comforter coming to abide within us.

But sadly, the landscape of Florida and other states will be altered in a few short hours. And there will be reports of people who didn’t take this storm seriously and suffered loss, some even their lives.

My viewers are few, but I still feel the need to offer a lifeline that is sure and secure. May God watch over Florida today and protect all that call upon His name.

I bless you

 

 

Muddy Faith

This might sound like a strange thing to compare your faith in the Lord with—mud.

But that’s where mine was attached to when I went through my health issue over two years ago. I wish that I could say that I had the “Just speak the Word,” kind of faith but I’m not there.

But thank God that even if we can’t have faith so strong to just believe the Word of healing over our lives, we still can be healed. 

That was my path to healing. The Lord spoke to me very clearly that I was to trust Him and that he would overrule all the systems of the world on my behalf. I held to the example of Jesus putting mud on the eyes of the blind man and telling him to go to the pool of Siloam and wash it off. This man had to walk a distance in faith to receive his healing.

I believed that I was healed the minute the Lord spoke to me the night my issue started. But I had to walk to my pool of healing. I believe that it was due to the Lord knowing my level of faith.

I want to encourage anyone reading here, that God knows where you are in your faith. He also knows if you haven’t yet accepted the Gift of salvation through believing in the Blood of Jesus who died for your sins and have asked Him to come into your life as Lord and Savior.

Of everything I could post here, that’s the greatest thing I can offer you. If you are alive and breathing, it doesn’t take a great deal of common sense on anyone’s part to know that the world is in a mess. I haven’t known a time like this in my seventy-five years that I woke up every day wondering what tragic event had happened overnight. It would be alarming if it wasn’t for my trust in the Lord. Even if it’s a muddy faith.

God loves us so much that He lives within us at the level of faith we have. He spoke something to my spirit the other day while I was praying about the current matters at hand that really made me stop and think about what He said.

I had read a devotional about not giving up on prayer. Even when it doesn’t seem that God is working it doesn’t mean that He isn’t. This scripture came to mind. 2 Timothy 2:13 If we are faithless, He remains faithful (true to His word and His righteous character) for He cannot deny Himself.

God spoke very softly to me, “I have too much invested in you to give up on you; not that that will ever happen anyway.”

Maybe you don’t believe that you can have a real conversation with Almighty God. I know, it’s an amazing thing to even think about. But that’s the mystery and beauty of knowing God as your Savior, Friend, Lord, and Lover of your soul.

I can’t understand why anyone wouldn’t accept this incredible gift of God. But sadly, many won’t.

If you are interested in reading about my Muddy Faith. You can buy a copy here.

I bless you.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C2SCNWCX?ref_=ast_author_ofdp