From Whence I came....

Song - "You Are Life To Me" by: Clint Brown
This is where my kids and I lived after my divorce for about 3 years.  We stayed next to my parents house.  It was a hard time for the kids and I but we stuck together and God got us through it.

I hadn't worked outside the house in 11 years so it was slow going, getting back into the work force.  I applied for a government apartment and they let me get on the list even though I wasn't supposed to because I wasn't working yet.  But God.  He worked things out and we were able to move into our first apartment.

I was so blessed to have Pastors that loved me and encouraged me.  I couldn't have made it without their love and instruction.  They will always have a special place in my heart.  Pastor Janelle encouraged me to continue to sing on the worship team.  Her support kept me stable.  Pastor Vaughan, always listened, instructed and comforted me through the divorce.  God placed me under divine covering.
I was so blessed to sit under Pastor Randall Vaughan and Janelle Vaughan.  They left such a deep impression of God's love and word, that it made me want to do and be better. They were approachable, and always ready to listen, and be anointed Pastors to those who needed them. They never kept people from a distance but embraced them with a true Shepherd's heart.  I miss them dearly.  I always loved doing volunteer work in the office and making Pastor coffee.  He always had a word.  I pray blessings, favor and overflow for them and their families.

It was a big adjustment living in an apartment alone.  I had never lived out on my own, let alone with two kids.  I was scared to death.  It took me a while to be ok. lol  We didn't have any furniture.  I took the mattress from the travel trailer and we slept on it.  Momma and Daddy gave us a little TV.  So we started off with pretty much nothing.  When I was going through the divorce, my Ex, wanted to fight over everything and my Daddy finally said "Let'em have it all, God will replace all your stuff".  So I did.  I let him have the house and everything.  God used family and friends to donate furniture, beds. etc.... It was amazing how God worked.  I wasn't rich, but I was so blessed.  It was so wonderful to live in peace and be safe.
Song - "Keep Me" by: Patrick Dopson

I can look back at the places we've lived and the things we have gone through and now I can see God's hand always protecting, always providing.

Tonight I just want to say "Thank you Lord, for always walking with me, carrying me, providing for me, healing me and restoring me. I serve an amazing God.

I remember collapsing on the steps of that travel trailer and realizing it was all over.  He wasn't coming back. I was alone and all the abuse and hurt flooded me. I knew I shouldn't live in abuse but there was that thing that said "Something is better than nothing" and I didn't want to be alone.  It was so hard to except that I was going to have't to learn to stand alone and be healed before God could send anyone into my life.  It was in the darkest time of my life that a journey to healing started.  God made sure I got the book...Woman Thou Art Loosed book.  Then the book The Lady, Her Lover, Her Lord.  Then Daddy's Little Girl....all were written by: Bishop TD Jakes.  God is so amazing how he orchestrated my healing.  I

Song - "Woman Thou Art Loosed" by: Vicki Winan and Sheryl Brady

Book - Woman Thou Art Loosed by: Bishop TD Jakes

God can take you from nothingness, emptiness....to a life full of joy, peace and contentment. God changed me before he changed my circumstances. He worked out the bitterness and anger.  He let me walk through some fire to understand that he is God no matter where I am.

I know God's blessing are coming.  I know God's going to provide more than enough so that I can be a testimony of his restoration power and to help those in need.

My Story isn't over....it has only begun....I'm 49 and awaiting for that divine appointment.  Thank ya Lord.

I WILL WAIT.....

My niece, Nellyssa Saylor, has a CD coming out this Sunday.  It will also be available on iTunes.  You will want this to add to your collection.  She has an awesome voice.

WHAT ARE YOU FOCUSING ON?

Song - "I Trust You" by: James Fortune

The thing that we pay the most attention to, will be nurtured and grow.  If you feed your fears, doubts, faithlessness....it will enlarge. They grow because you are focused on it.  It will consume you if you don't catch yourself and change what you focus on.

That is why we are to be in God's word.  We are to not only read it, but study it.  Do research on it.  Apply it.  It will build our faith.  The things that stressed you and worried you so, will fade with time because your focus is on God's word and all HE SAYS.  

If you don't believe me, do an experiment.  Take two plants.  Put one to the side and ignore it.  Take the other and water it, make sure it has plenty of sun, but not too much.  Put your attention on it.  See which plant dies, and which grows and enlarges.

So if you are dwelling on negative things, make a conscience effort to put up scriptures and positive quotes where you can see and read them. Use sticky notes. Start reading God's word and things that are uplifting.  Declare to your day what it will be instead of,  letting it fall however.  

We can't always help being in an negative environment but we, ourselves can change our bubbled area with songs of praise, God's word, and positive outlook.

No matter how gloomy things may seem today, they can change in a second.  Hope is still there.  Reach for it.  Call for it.  Declare that God is going to turn your situations around. 

God has a plan for your life.  When you are able to look up and see that he isn't going to leave you where your at forever, hope will come back. 

Hope delayed maketh the heart sick.
Proverbs 13:12 
Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.
Clarke's Commentary on the Bible

Hope deferred maketh the heart sick - When once a good is discovered, want of it felt, strong desire for the possession excited, and the promise of attainment made on grounds unsuspected, so that the reality of the thing and the certainity of the promise are manifest, hope posts forward to realize the blessing. Delay in the gratification pains the mind; the increase of the delay prostrates and sickens the heart; and if delay sickens the heart, ultimate disappointment kills it. But when the thing desired, hoped for, and expected comes, it is a tree of life, עץ חיים ets chaiyim, "the tree of lives;" it comforts and invigorates both body and soul. To the tree of lives, in the midst of the gardens of paradise, how frequent are the allusions in the writings of Solomon, and in other parts of the Holy Scriptures! What deep, and perhaps yet unknown, mysteries were in this tree!

When we put our hopes in God's word then we can have Great Hope.  No matter what the situations around us look like we can know that God has a better plan for our lives.

I am not going to lie, I have had some rough spots when I felt down, and my heart sick but I had to get up, shake it off, change my garments into praise and start reaching for hope. God's word has given me hope, life, and a new start, many times. My inheritance lies in God.  My future, and anything good lies in God.  So when I put my focus on God....I know it is much brighter than my today.

I pray that you learn to focus, and nurture good things in your life, and let go of the negative and damaging things that try to plague you.

“A merry heart does good, like medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones.” – Proverbs 17:22 (New King James Version)

Laughter - by: Jesses Duplantis

CLOTHED IN YESTERDAYS GARMENTS FOR TODAYS BLESSINGS!

Song - "The King in You" by: Donald Lawrence

Did you know that when it is a new season, you will find out that you have outgrown many things.  Some small, some big, some times you have outgrown people.

This is officially a new season, and new year according to God's calendar.  So this is a time to examine your spiritual closet, friends, involvment, habits....etc...to see what you may have out grown. Begin to celebrate.

Now it is time for celebration.  God wants to clothe you in a new wardrobe.  A new life.

It is like a coat, as you grow, you will no longer be able to squeeze into it.  You will have't to forward it on to someone else who may need.  It is not that you aren't appreciative of the time you wore it and had. but when the NEW season comes....you won't be able to fit youGod has new garments of war, worship, praise, truth,  and ministry for you to take on. You will have't to allow God to take off, strip off yesterdays decisions, plans, failures,  company you kept, places you went....

Song - "Seasons" by: Donald Lawrence

Clothing matters.  God wants to clothed you with the right clothing to represent him for the Kingdom

We are called to put on a new wardrobe.  

The clothing industry has made huge inroads into the pocketbooks of consumers.  If you don’t believe that to be the case, just think of your own familiarity with some of the following mottos:

You are what you wear.

Clothes make the man.

Dress for success.

To the degree that thanksgiving is present in your life, it is to that degree that you have realized and appropriated and appreciated the grace of God.  Show me someone who has no heart for thanksgiving toward God and I will show you someone who has lost sight of God.

SUMMARY

We have been speaking of the new clothes the Christian is called to wear -- the clothing of...

- Truth-     Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, 10 and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him  11 ‑‑ a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, but Christ is all, and in all. (Colossians 3:9-11).

- Kindness- And so, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; 13 bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. (Colossians 3:12-13).

- Unity-And beyond all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. 15 And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful. (Colossians 3:14-15).

- Thanksgiving- And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful. (Colossians 3:15).

You remember the story.  The sisters of Lazarus had sent word to Jesus that their brother was sick.  They had asked for Jesus to come and to heal their brother.  But Jesus had not come in time.  By the time He did arrive, Lazarus was not only dead, but the funeral was over and he had been buried in a tomb.

Jesus ordered that the tomb be opened and then He called for Lazarus to come out.  John 11:43 tells us that he who had died came forth, bound hand and foot with wrappings; and his face was wrapped around with a cloth. Jesus said to them, "Unbind him, and let him go."

Do you see it?  He was dressed in grave clothes.  He was dressed in that which represents death and rot and decay.  Those clothes had been perfectly appropriate to his state.  He was dead and that is what dead people wore.  But then life came and those grave clothes were no longer appropriate.

How about you?  Have you come to the new life that is in Christ?  If you have not, then it will do not good to change the clothes of your outward life.  It would be like putting new clothes on a corpse.  You need to trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, appropriating through faith what was accomplished upon the cross.  You can trust in Him and enter into new life.

Most of you have already done that.  You have been walking with the Lord for some time.  But there are perhaps some of those old grave clothes still in place.

- Immorality

- Impurity

- Evil desires

- Greed, which is just another name for idolatry

Paul gives these as representative samplings back in verse 5 of our passage and perhaps some of those continue to adorn your life.  I want to give you notice -- they CLASH with your identity in Christ.  Time for a change of clothing.

Let’s do that right now.  We are going to have a time of silent prayer.  I want you to take that part of your life that has been clashing with your Christly character and I want you to take it to the cross.  You are not telling God anything He does not already know.  Just as He called out to Adam and Eve in the cool of the Garden, saying, “Where are you?”  He is calling today.  He is calling you to see your spiritual nakedness and to come to Him and to be clothed in that which He has prepared for you.

No-one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. If he does, the new piece will pull away from the old, making the tear worse. And no-one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the wineskins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wineskins.' (Mark 2:21–22)

Zechariah 3:4

American Standard Version
And he answered and spake unto those that stood before him, saying, Take the filthy garments from off him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with rich apparel.

Isaiah 61:3

To grant to those who mourn in Zion— to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of theLord, that he may be glorified.

Isaiah 11:2-5 

And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord. And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord. He shall not judge by what his eyes see, or decide disputes by what his ears hear, but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth; and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked. Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist, and faithfulness the belt of his loins.