Think before you speak....

I have tried to make this my new motto: Always think before you speak because words you can never take back! Words have the power to destroy just as much as the power to edify - however, I think the destroy part has a greater effect on the person than the actual uplifting part. Be wise, think before you speak!!!! Did you ever wonder why God gave us 1 month and 2 ears? Perhaps, it's because we should listen twice as much as we speak. How often do we truly pay attention to the power of our words and the effect they have on others?

Life in a Poem

Yesterday no longer holds me against my will

I will kiss those days goodbye

with not so much a care as why

I do so with some sadness

But gladness fills my heart

Although many misjudged

I won't hold a grudge

I will not waste another tear

but rather I will hold dear the lessons I have learned

Even though some have tried to deceive

I never really fully believed

What was once a spark

Now seems all but dark

One can always try to deny

What’s the point to even try?

All that’s left to say is goodbye

I know I am not perfect

This goal is too lofty

But still something so softly whispers to my soul

To only but reach my goal

I really strive to do my best

Many times I am put to the test

I feel the pain and sorrow

But I often hope for a better tomorrow

Some say the world is a stage

That’s until you turn the page

What seems to be airy and light

Might not be quite right

Just because it seems good to you

Doesn’t mean it makes it true

Life is never trouble free

That at least was His decree

To take the road less traveled

May leave you feeling unraveled

Although this very much is true

He will always be there for you

No matter the type of suffering

His love is always covering

Just when you feel you can’t get through

That’s when you can become brand new

I want to stay on the path

No matter what the aftermath

Knowing that one day my savior and I will be face to face

I want to say I ran my race

To which I long reply: well done my good and faithful servant

You've really earned it!

Not because of works you see

All because He lives in me!

written by: ALD

Archive: Letter to the City

To the city, the one that God created and the one He loves, I want to take more of an interest in you and love you with a new found passion. I don’t want to continually take from you as I please but rather give back to you. I want to help your inhabitants and bring healing where there is hurt, bring joy where there is sorrow and love where there is hate. I want to devote my life to healing it by spreading the love of God so He can heal it from the inside out. Oh God have mercy on us – your sinful children - who have denied what you have called us to do and have strayed from you! Jesus, give us your passion, your heart and help us to bare your name wherever we go without shame. Lord, give us courage to come out of hiding and to take a stand for what is right and hate all that is wicked. Help us to grab a hold of all that pleases you and forsake our own selfish / sinful desires. With your help we can turn this city around. Forgive us Lord, for the times we prostitute the city for our own good, where we continually take from it and treat it as if it owed us something. It owes us nothing but we owe it our lives. So here it is to the city I commit my life to rebuilding its walls and its people. I knowingly make this vow to you oh city that I can’t do it alone but only with the help of Him who created you. Just as Jesus laid down His life for us to have a way to heaven so must we lay down our lives for the city. In doing so, it is our hope that “greater things are yet to come and greater things are still be done in this city” that she may be directed to Christ our savior in order that He might redeem us – a fallen and miserable people. It is my hope and prayer that we as a community of faith can bring others to an understanding of what God longs for us to do in our cities – it is after all, the great commission!

Archive: Embracing the Journey

As they say hind sight is always 20/20, I have a tendency to want to analyze and try to make sense out of chaos and in some crazy way this has been one aspect of survival that I found worked for me. I think there is a lot to be gained by looking at where you have been and where you come from to evaluate your current circumstances. However, it can also be very dangerous ground if you let your past dictate your future and allow it to paralyze you further from making necessary changes in your life. I began to dig deeply asking God why He had been silent in the midst of my storms; the answer I found was pretty profound. God was not silent I was simply not paying attention to what He was trying to tell me. The one thing I realized is that in order to be free from the pain of my past experiences I had to actually deal with them! In today’s society, it is so easy to be on some sort of mood stabilizing drug to help escape life's problems. How are  people expected to live happy holistic lives when they can’t or won’t take the time to deal with their pain? You always have the option of running away and taking the easy route but when looking at the long term picture: is that what is truly best for you? I guess in a lot of ways that was me! Although, I have never been on mood stabilizing drugs, I tried to take the easy way out by running away from my problems. I was talking to God like He was some giant genie in the sky and that he was going to make all my problems just – poof – disappear! That’s not reality and that’s not the way God operates. He wants us to be completely well not just gain a temporary fix!

When my problems did not disappear I began to get frustrated with God, as I mentioned earlier. I did not understand why this was happening to me as I had lived the way I knew God wanted me to, I had done everything in my power to do the right thing ( of course failing many many many times but that is what’s called – grace!) and tried to be a good person. In a moment of desperation, I was praying and in this still small voice God was asking me to let all of the hurt go because He was going to help me with it. I had been trying to carry all of my own burdens as if they were my cross to bear never fully understanding that I could actually be healed from the inside out. Once I opened my heart, the opportunities for true healing finally started to come – yes, admittedly there were times where I thought I couldn’t bare where God was taking me but He somehow gave me the strength I lacked. I now can look back and say why didn’t I do this sooner! I have felt so free and God has given me the ability to start to open up my heart to others when I thought I would never be able to. I had been hurt many times that it seemed easier to keep everyone at a distance that way I could protect myself. However, it began to be clear to me I was living in my own form of prison and was not happy with my own solution to the problem because it only isolated me further from where I truly longed to be.

It is so vital to our survival to understand that we cannot do anything all by ourselves and that there is a loving and caring God who loves us and wants us to live in His freedom. Of course, this path is never the easy way, but it is the path of greatest fulfillment and healing. As I gave everything over to Christ, I watched as my load became lighter and the wounds were merely becoming scars to only serve as a reminder of where I had been. Now, I needed to be willing to reach out to others who are hurting. How can we help others when we ourselves aren’t well? We can’t, if we are always running from our own problems, pain and wounds that plague us. The thing I learned was to give it to my creator – let it all go – everything! Embrace the journey by surrendering it all over to Christ, I can now live in His freedom and have the ability to be healed. We are in a “quick fix” generation where we say we want it RIGHT NOW! - if not yesterday! Can we really apply this way of thinking to our own emotional well being and deceive ourselves into thinking that it’s taking care of the problem? Unfortunately, too many people are buying it and it’s pretty apparent when you open your eyes and look around at all the destruction that is present in people’s lives.

Archive: An Amazing Display of Love

For those of us who are Christians, I wonder how many of us ever truly think about Jesus and the price that He paid for us. The price for sin is death and God chose to send His only Son to die the most horrific death – for us! I don’t know about you but it is really hard for me to imagine or to even comprehend this kind of love. In my own humanity, I would never be able to love a complete stranger in this manner! I think I can say with certainty that God’s love far surpasses our comprehension! God gave His perfect, sinless Son and placed Him the hands of self righteous, hateful, brutal human beings. Jesus, knowing the condition of our hearts and all the sins we have done and will ever do was still willing to carry out His Father’s will and die on our behalf! It is difficult to imagine Jesus on that cross but let’s make this personal for a second. Let your mind wonder to that moment where Jesus was beaten so badly that he barely looked human and then think that while He was nailed to that tree He was thinking about you and me! He was thinking about every hateful word, every evil deed and anything that would keep us from our Holy Creator. By Jesus’ obedience to His Father’s will He provided a bridge by which we can cross over into heaven because His blood covers all our imperfections. I have asked myself why do I deserve this- why do we deserve this? What have any of us done that is so good to gain God’s absolute AMAZING love? NOTHING- we have done nothing! Throughout the Bible God has put His love for us on display and through this free gift of love He shows us that He is faithful, caring and at the same time just. There is a penalty for imperfection which has to be paid - so what does God do? He gave us His Son to pay that penalty and in return has only asked that we accept His payment for sin! How much easier could God have made this for us?!!!! Yet, there are so many who simply don’t see, don’t confess and don’t accept this free gift. Why would we want to spend eternity without this kind of love? Why do you think God gave so much for us – could it be because He knew how horrible eternal damnation would be and as a result God went through great lengths to make it easier for us? I would say that this is a rhetorical question. As I believe this could be answered simply by looking at the very nature of God and who He is! We as humans are confined to the physical world – what we can see, feel, hear, and touch – if something is outside this realm it becomes a bit obscure almost to the point where we would assume it’s not real. I would like to challenge this misconception – sometimes it is necessary to look outside the box because the answers may not be found in the world in which God has created. Rather seeking after God himself for answers He will be faithful to reveal Himself as being true and real! Does the world we live in offer the kind of flawless, sacrificial love that Christ offers us? NO! This requires some seeking outside the box.

Today, as it is Easter Sunday – I am reminded of all the suffering, death and the resurrection my beloved Savior went through to show that He has all power and all authority. I acknowledge that Jesus is/was perfect, He is my atonement for sin, He is the Son of God, He defied death, He was raised to life and in doing so provided a way for us to live victoriously in Him! AMEN!!!
~ALD