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What Are You Lacking?

~ authorlasharnda ~ 2 Comments

those who seek the lord lacks nothingAre you like me and once you have attained one thing, you are on to the next?  Is your life about one accomplishment after the other?

I sometimes sit back and look at all that I have accumulated over the years. I think about my successes. I dream about where I came from and where God has brought me to. I contemplate all the challenges that I have had to face over time and I am overwhelmed and I am grateful.

Taking inventory in an exercise that I believe many of us can benefit from.  When I take the time to reflect on all that I have, all that I have accomplished and all my blessings, I immediately feel stupid asking God to bless me with anything else. Shouldn’t I stop asking for stuff and just start thanking Him for all that I have right now? How can I get up and walk out looking for the next thing when He has blessed me with so many things already? I lack nothing.

Then there are times that I stop and think about faith; my faith.  I love that I have it.  My faith has guided my life for a long time. At times I have wondered if one of the reasons I am so serious about what I believe and in how I practice what I believe, is due to how blessed my life has been. One might think that I have had it easy but you would be wrong. I have had my share of troubles too. However, I have learned some valuable lessons from those troubles; I have learned that they built my faith.

I believe that’s the point of the difficulties and challenges.  We can either collapse under the weight or we can stand tall, believing in God and trusting in ourselves and our abilities because He is with us. Difficulties and challenges don’t always create a lack of something, instead it fulfills a divine purpose; we grow stronger and stronger with each challenge.

Without challenges and difficulties we become weak like a muscle that hasn’t been exercised in a while. If you exercise everyday, you have probably noticed that by doing so you get stronger and depending on the type of exercise, like running, your stamina increases.  The more you do whatever you do, the better you become at it. When I first started running, I could barely run a mile but now, after doing it for a while and doing it consistently, it is easy for me to run 6 miles a day. Why? I have stamina.

faithFaith has to be exercised too. If it is never tried or tested, you don’t have a need to use it.  You will lack strength. Some say that they have faith until something happens, but that’s when the real test of your faith begins. That’s when you can see what you are made of. You can figure out quickly if you can go the miles that it might take.

We freak out when we are tested because whatever it is we are facing there is this fear of lack. We think that we cannot face it because we lack the capabilities or the capacity to handle the test.

I have good news for you, we don’t have to fear lack. God has everything we need.Our part is to trust Him and to have faith that He will deliver. The only way you can build faith is to exercise it. How do you do that? Pray, Read your Bible and surround yourself with others who may be more disciplined, more consistent and more positive. Then practice trusting God. I trust that He will work things out as they should be. Don’t you?

 

New Beginnings…

~ authorlasharnda ~ Leave a comment
yournewbeginningCan you feel it in the air?  I can.  There is something new and fresh that is about to happen and I can just feel it.
I get excited when I think about all of the blessings of the past, but I am
excited about what the future holds.
As I have thought about this year of new beginnings, the scripture in Isaiah comes to mind. God says that He is about to do something new; it can be a new life, a new relationship, vision, hope, dreams or opportunities.  Will you be ready?
As you enter this year, are you entering it with an attitude of optimistic expectations or are you locked into your past, holding onto all the disappointments that you experienced?  Will you walk into this year with the attitude that says to anyone near you that you are going to move mountains, live out your dreams and take a more positive and assertive position in pursuing God’s will for your life or have you decided that whatever happens to you is God’s will and what will be will be?  Are you bent on holding onto negative attitudes? Are you comfortable with being passive, waiting for life to hand you your dreams?
11690912-attitude-is-everything-text-written-with-chalk-on-a-blackboardI don’t know which of these descriptions describe you, but I do know that you don’t have to let anyone lock you into a box. If the latter has been you in the past, it doesn’t matter and you do not have to continue that way.  You can decide to change the channel of your life.
I have gained great insight into the psyche of people over the years. I can almost intuitively figure out those who are just talk versus the ones who are a little envious of others. I can even tell the ones who will say they are going to do something and will get it is  done no matter what versus those who say the same thing and will never make one move toward doing anything.
Success, whether in our personal or professional lives, can be measured by our attitudes. God tells us that He has a plan and purpose for each of us, do we believe Him? He also says that He is about to do something new, do we optimistically look forward to it? Or do we brush it off as just historical sayings or stories of Old Testament Prophets?  I am crazy enough to believe Him and maybe that’s why my life seems to experience abundant blessings.  I not only believe Him, I expect Him to do something new. Heck, it’s already starting.
Don’t allow your blessings to slip away because you want to hold onto a pessimistic and naysayer-type attitude.  Look for opportunities that may be right in front of you if you would look for them.  A new thing is going to happen for you. Not because of magic or anything like that. A new thing will happen if you move towards thinking  positive, speaking positive, and acting in a way that will attract the positive things you rightly deserve in life.  Hey, He is about to do a new thing, can’t you feel it?

When Your Faith is Tested

~ authorlasharnda ~ Leave a comment

Embrace-Gods-Grace1“There will be times in your life when your faith will be tested.” Throughout my life that phrase has popped up too many times than I want to remember.

 

Believe it or not, each time I am faced with the testing of my faith, I wonder if I can stand the test.

I am a person of faith and I truly believe in positive mental attitude and all that stuff, but in the face of some of the knock-outs I have had in life, sometimes I have weakened at my knees.  I have found myself questioning if my decisions had been the right ones, if I could have done something better or at least different. I wondered how I could have been a better mother, wife, daughter or just a better person. I have wondered about all the things I had done in my life to bring me to this place of testing.

When I feel that I can’t take anymore or when I feel that I am failing the test of believing and trusting God; when I am drowning in my tears and feel that I can barely tread water, I hear a whisper that says, “My grace is sufficient for you, LaSharnda.” I cry anyway.

god's graceWhat does that mean anyway God? is the question I ask.  I know that scripture and I try to ignore the whisper because I want to cry some more; I want to feel sorry for myself a little more; I want to hurt because I have somehow made a mess of my life and that’s why I am having the problems I am having is what I tell myself.  Again, I hear the whisper of the scripture I try to ignore say to me “My grace is sufficient for you, LaSharnda.”

I cry “Lord, please help me! Please Jesus, help me. Please, please, please” and I am so desperate that I can’t hear the voice whisper anymore. I have allowed my desperation to drown out His voice. I have allowed my fear to overshadow His presence. I recognize that I need His help and that I am in total reliance on Him. I am not in control and that cause me to panic!

All of a sudden,  I stop in the midst of my tears and recognize that maybe that is the point. Maybe I need to leave my desperation, my fear, my need to control all with Him. Maybe, just maybe, He is trying to whisper to me to depend on Him and not on myself. Maybe, just maybe, if I stop with the crying, the pleading, and the begging, and if I would turn my back on those things that somehow becomes so big and overwhelming, He will control both the situation I am facing and me. Maybe.

So I dry my face, get up and try to move forward. I can’t promise you that I won’t go through all of the same emotions again.  Whether I do or don’t, He understands what I am going through and He will be there for me when I am ready and that’s the important part of trusting and believing.

“Each time he said, “My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.” So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me.” 2 Corinthians 12:9

God Is Faithful…

~ authorlasharnda ~ Leave a comment

faithful-god-results-dayDo you believe that God keeps His promises? Do you have problems believing that? Is it particularly hard to believe that when you have unanswered prayers.

These are questions that I know we all have struggled with at some point, but I am here to assure you that without a doubt, God keeps His promises.

I am sure you have had challenges in your life. If you haven’t, just wait. No, I am not going to speak anything negative over your life, but just living will offer each of us some challenge at some point. Some reason to wonder if God cares enough about us that He will do something about whatever it is that maybe consuming us.

Over the last month or so, I have experienced one challenge after another. I am not complaining and that’s probably why they haven’t overtaken me; nonetheless, I have had them. My stress level has been very high. Many days I have had to remind myself that I need to stop and take a break away from everything. You see even with those who may be strong Believers, we can still become overcome with stress and anxiety.

I was thinking about all that has gone on in my life over the last couple of months and all of a sudden, I felt that God spoke to my heart,“ God is faithful.” Those words were powerful and stuck with me. They stuck with me because things were about to turn from dark days to days of sunshine even as a tornado was about to pound upon this part of Texas.

The Word of God says, “All things work together for good to those who love God.” If we aren’t careful, those familiar verses can become ordinary; they can become just common sayings for Believers, but I want to caution against taking familiar passages for granted. God is God and we can count on Him. He has proved his faithfulness over and over again. He was faithful from the time I was born, through relationship issues, self -doubt, mistakes, through my illness in 2011 and through too many other challenges I have faced in my life. He will be faithful to you too. His faithfulness isn’t just for someone special because to Him, we are all very special.

Whatever you go through, whether it is a super duper surprise or something that was coming for a while, nothing is a surprise, nor is it so huge that it will overtake Him. Things happen in our lives, good and bad, to help mature us. Other times, things will happen to test us and at other times things happen to help us learn to

A Pentecostal Perspective …

~ authorlasharnda ~ 2 Comments

Jesus-is-Lord-Manila-1

I am a Proud Pentecostal.  I am a Positive Pentecostal too. Pentecostals are known for being charismatic and excitable people. We show emotion in our worship and some may think that we are weird. When I was a little girl, I was thought of as weird for sure.  We were the people in the church where people were “dancing in the Spirit” and No, we were not snake handlers!

Many people meet me and don’t believe that I would buy-in to this type of religious group.  You know, they think I am too intellectual, too smart, too informed and educated, to be a part of such a group. I am!

I love being Pentecostal.I love the excitement and the emotion expressed in our worship. I would not want to be identified with any other group. I am devoted to my faith.

My faith influences every part of my life!  My faith has not only informed my life, it has been the key element in me believing in myself and in the creation on my ideal life. I believe in prayer, Bible reading and a relationship with Jesus Christ. Because I am a follower of Jesus and believe strongly in the tenets of my faith, I don’t think that I am supposed to live a life of negativity, pessimism nor poverty. The Bible says, “All things are possible” and I truly believe that all things are. I believe in hope; my faith tells me that I have a blessed hope.  My faith also helps me overcome my fears, helps me to believe in myself and has enabled me to take risks that I may not have ever taken had I not believed in what my Bible tells me about me.

You may ask, how does religion help you to live your ideal life? For me, it certainly gave me self-confidence, which of course affected my self-esteem. I don’t see myself as less than anyone. I don’t feel inferior, I don’t feel inadequate. That’s how my faith has helped me move forward and why I have achieved so much. I am not afraid to try. I hope you won’t be afraid either, ever.