Sunday, May 9, 2010

Do you know my LORD???


Happy Mother's Day to all of you Mothers out there. I hope you have a blessed day and as you look ahead at the greatest responsibility in the world, that you are humbled with LOVE and Compassion toward your Children and see there need to know the Lord Jesus Christ.


This Mornings sermon was amazing and so convicting I just had to blog about it. I was so convicted on how casual our culture has become to the LORD Jesus Christ. The savior of the World. Yet He has not Changed. He is the same yesterday an today. The Bible clearly teaches this. So why is there so much Carnal Christianity in our Country? It is because we have taken our eyes off of Jesus Christ and directed then towards man. We have become so concerned about what others think of us that we have changed our ways of worship to fit the ways of the world. So we now have one foot in the Bible and the other in the world. However that is not true Christianity.


Jesus Christ is Righteous and we often forget this. We often paint his picture of what we think He should be and really we are just molding him into what we want so that we are comfortable with our life and our pet sins. God does not laugh at sin and he does not find any joy in it. In fact where sin is He wants no part of it. That is why when we come to Christ for Salvation we must first see ourselves as LOST. No person has ever gotten saved by just asking Jesus to save them and come into their heart. There must be repentance. All repentance is, is a change of Heart. Finally seeing how wicked you are before a Holy God and that you in no way can work your way to Heaven. That Jesus Christ had to suffer and shed is Holy, sinless blood on Calvary so that you and I a vile sinner could be made clean. Oh, you may want to get your Bible out. Just for reference!


In Matthew 21:12-13 we see the rebuke of Jesus. He took care of the sin that was being committed in the temple. He does not kindly tell them that he does not agree with what they are doing in His Holy place of worship. We see Him driving them out. If you read on you will see that he made a whip to chase them out. There are so many false profits. Which God warned against. I know it so hard to believe that anyone would lie. But so many Pastors have compromised. Why, I am not sure. They all have there own reasons. Maybe it was for numbers or they were just not having young people interested. But the Bible talks about how God does not change his methods. He is not going to be listening to Worldly music to bring people in. Why? Because that is the Beat of the World. And Jesus Christ can not yoke up with things of this world. He came to seek and to save that which was lost. (Matthew 10:16)(Matthew 10:24) He came to teach others how to enter into the Kingdom of God. Yet we see this ecumenical movement that says "We will just be like the world, and use worldly methods to bring people to Christ". But if there is no difference why would you or I even need it. One thing that I have learned in my 6 years with the LORD is that if the Bible sets a standard I do not have to be convicted about it. There is no praying about it. If God said it then that is how it is suppose to be. Therefore that is why my Family is trying to live as close to God's word as possible. Sure we have been called legalistic. But those who use that word fail to realize what it means. It means that you believe in working your way to heaven. Basically that my righteousness will get me there. Let me say we do not believe this at all. In fact we believe quite the contrary. My Righteousness is as filthy rags in the sight of my LORD and Saviour. Yet after I got saved I saw a ton of things that needed to change in my life. If God says it then I want to do it. I believe that Christians should have high standards. After all Christ did. And we are suppose to be Christ like. And there should be a definite different between you and the world and how you worship and how the world worships. If someone came to me and showed me that I was wrong because the Bible said so then I would gladly listen =)


Our Country is on a downward slid away from God. Christians have sat back and let the government run everything. We have not stood up for what God's Moral laws say. We have quietly watched our freedoms that were so hardly fought for be taken and yet we still do nothing. There are babies by the millions being aborted, fornication is laughed at, immorality is at an all time high. We need to take a stand for what the Bible Say's. Not for what some man tells us but for what God our creator tells us. If you are in a Church that preaches all feel good messages and nothing on Hell and SIN then you are probably sitting under a false profit. Sure God is Love and merciful, but God is jealous and will one day judge our sins. We need to be faithful to God and God alone. Joshua and I have often said if our Pastor stopped preaching the word of God then we would leave and find another Church. If he was preaching something contray to the word of God then we do not want to raise our Children there. I believe that everything that we believe we need to know why we and our families believe it. Not because someone told us, but because THUS SAITH THE LORD. We need to take a stand. We need the world to see that we have something they do not posses. (Matthew 10:34-39) If you have been duped by cultural Christianity then look to Jesus. He will carry you through. There should be a evidence in your life that you have been born again. It should be so evident to the people around you that they should say "wow, what happened to you." I remember, this was how it was after I was saved and then after my husband was saved. It is not something you grow into. It is something that happens immediately. And you will know. It is the most blessed comfort you will have in the depths of your soul. And you will want others to have it to.


One of my favorite parables is about the Christian realm. You can find it in Matthew 13:24-30

He is talking about the wheat and the tares. he goes on to explain what the parable means. I am sobered by this thought. For I know that there was a point in my life that I was a tare. That I thought I was a Christian, I went to Church I tried to be good. I knew about Jesus Christ. But on that night in September when I saw that I did not have a relationship with Christ and that I needed to be born again. It was like blinders were taken off my eyes. I saw my sin for what it really was and I saw me how God saw me. A wicked Hell bound sinner that needed him and the blood he shed on Calvary. Praise the Lord I yielded to his call and have never been the same. I do not desire the old life. For the Old is passed away and behold all things are made new. Joshua and I have some very strong stands that we have taken with our family, in dress, music, worship, movie houses, dancing, a mans role and a wife's role, schooling our Children and so on and so on. But these are not to show what kind of a Christian we are or to impress God. He is not impressed that we attend Church every time the Doors are opened neither is he impressed by the standards we have. Why, you ask. Because he expects them. He expects his people to have a certain walk and certain standards.


Pastor Scheving used an example of a frog. There was a man out camping and he stared a fire and put a pot on the fire with some water while he went out to gather some more sticks. A frog came along and jumped in the pot. At first it was chilly, and cold. Then the water got a little warmer and the frog liked it, then a little warmer and the frog was really enjoying himself. Then the water came to a boil and the camper came back to a dead frog in his pot of water. Isn't that what is happening in so many Christian circles. The gospel has gotten so watered down. There is no preaching on sin and separation. We have changed our stands so that we will be more readily accepted by the world. And are comfortable. We are not viewed any different. What would are fore fathers who died for the faith think of our Christianity. We think that we are persecuted because someone says something about the way we live. But we do not know the half of it. We have not had to watch loved ones be burnt at the stake or tortured or fed to lions. We need a real reality check. I am talking to myself on all of this also. Yet we are pushing further and further away from our Creator and our God.


I was so humbled this morning as I listened to the message. I thought what are we teaching our Children? How is this country going to be for them to raise their Children. What kind of Christian heritage are we leaving them. You know we are to be separated unto Christ but live in the world. If we are just staying one step behind the world and think we are okay because we are just tailing them, we have missed the point. Because God never moves. So if we are tailing the world we are not separated unto Christ. We have already moved. I want to live my life for the LORD. I want him to be seen in me. I want most of all my Children to see that if God's word says it then that is how are family is going to do it. There is no compromise. God's way is always the right way. OH how I pray that we as Christians would open our eyes to the battle that is ragging about us. That we would take our stand and hold our banner high. That we would proclaim to all the world the LOVE of Jesus Christ and the Blood he shed on that old rugged tree. May we all be challenged (MY SELF) included to look at why we are living the way we are living. And make sure that we line up with the Bible... The Bible say's that there will be a great falling away before the return of Christ, and to always have a ready answer. Stay strong in your personal walk with the LORD and make sure that you are solely seeking to please and worship him in your everyday life...

p.s, I know some of this may seem kind of harsh. But please know I say it all out of LOVE...It was just as hard for me to be reminded. But faithful are the wounds of a friend =)
Because of Christ,

Brittany

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Take a Journey with me...


One of my desires of starting this blog was to discuss health and beauty in God's eyes. I as many Christian women have struggled with my weight. Most of all I believe that I have struggled with my appearance and what others think of me. How do I look, am I pretty enough or am I thin enough. I think that if most of us were honest, we could say that we have had these thoughts in one form or another. But does it even matter what man thinks of us? The Bible says that we should not seek the approval of men but of God.


When I was a teenage girl, I struggled with a serious eating disorder. I saw dietitian after dietitian and doctor after doctor. What none of them ever told me was that it was a sin to be the way I was. That my eating disorder was an abomination to the God who had created me. I was counseled on what had happened to me in my childhood and what I could not control in my life. I was never told that gluttony was a sin. and that being so wasteful of the food that God had given me could be so wicked. I was so caught up in how skinny I could become and what others thought about my appearance. I was so focused on myself and the real need I had was for the Lord to free me from my pride and selfishness.


I was not saved until I was nineteen. When I got married I had stopped binging and would only vomit on occasion. I thought I was doing so much better. Until I saw my sin for what it was after I received the LORD as my savior and gave my life to him. Only a few times after that blessed night in September did I gorge and vomit. I was so convicted each time of how sinful it was before my GOD.


Now I have three beautiful children. To which I would not trade anything for. However through my pregnancies I gained an enormous amount of weight. With my first daughter Tatum I had preaclmapsia and gained 80 some pounds. As you can guess I really struggled with this because of my past. But I knew I could not go back to where God had brought me so far from. Then 3 months after I had our beautiful daughter I found out that I was going to have another precious child. I bet you can guess that I had not even lost half of the weight I had gained. Nope I put another 45 or so on top of it. Then with Titus I did pretty good at only gaining around 30 pounds. However I still weighed in at 212 every time I went in to deliver my babies. Mind you I am only 5'1... After I had Titus and I knew that I could not have any more children I knew that something had to be done. When I started my journey on weight watchers I weighed 180. I had already lost 12 pounds on my own. I knew that I was going to need help, and I had some friends that did weight watchers and it worked so great for them I thought that I would give it a try.


When I started my goal was to be skinny again. I wanted to look like I did when I got married and before I had children. Little did I know I was not seeing the big picture. After a few months I learned that this was going to be a life long commitment and it was not to being skinny it was to being healthy. That is when the LORD showed me some amazing things. He showed me that it is not his will for his children to be over weight or to have the health problems that we could prevent if we remember why we were created. We were created to serve the LORD and so many times are health cuts our journey short. I am not saying that you can not be overweight and be used of the LORD. I am just saying that it is the LORDS will for us to keep our bodies as healthy as possible so we could have a long journey and a good run before Him. I saw that I needed to make some permanent changes for my family and my self. I needed to be healthy for my family that the LORD has given me to take care of. I was looking at my journey in a whole new light.


But how quickly we sometimes loose sight of what the LORD has for us and slip back into our old ways. As I reach my goal weight I have struggled more than ever. I know that it is because I had taken my eyes off of Christ in this area. I once again was worrying about how I appeared to man and not to Christ. I was focused on self instead of others. I started to obsess again over my weight and what I looked like. I am so thankful that the LORD has given me one friend who will be completely honest with me about things. She mentioned to me one night when we were out to dinner that I constantly was talking about how much I weigh or how many calories are in what I am eating, or that I should not have eaten that. It was hard to hear. But it was what I needed to hear. I have two beautiful little girls who I do not want them to ever struggle with what I have struggled with. I want them to not view food as their enemy but I do not want them to learn just to eat for pleasure either. I believe the LORD gave us food to eat to live. It is okay to enjoy it but it is another thing to be totally consumed by it. It can become an idol. I know, kind of a crazy thought, but true.


I am stepping back where I started when the LORD showed me that there is a weight that I should be at that is healthy and pleasing to him. That there is a way that I need to eat and feed my family that is pleasing to him. I am excited about the beginning of my new journey. I want to help others that may struggle in these areas that I struggle in. I want us as Christian women to set the example to the world not them dictate and set our examples on what beauty is. There is no beauty that is more beautiful than that of a Christan woman, wife, or mother that shows that she walks with the LORD and is seeking to please him in every aspect of her life.


Now to me I see that what I put into my body will affect my service for the LORD. There is a cause and affect for everything. If I am constantly focused on my self then I will not be able to give my self to others that are dieing lost with out a saviour. And if I am not healthy then how will I be able to raise the children that the LORD has given me or take care of my sweet Joshua. I am praying that the LORD will help me on this journey as I seek to beautiful and healthy before him and him alone. And as I turn away form Satan and this world and what they say to us, (even as christian women) is beautiful. I do not want their beauty. I want so much more. I want a beauty that shines far above all others one that the world will look at and say "that is the essence of beauty I want what she has". I want everything that I do and everything I am from my inner most being to my otter layer to point back to my LORD and savior Jesus Christ.


Thanks for letting me share my heart.

Brittany