Thoughts For Today: Recent Episodes
Thoughts for today
Listen to Thoughts for Today if you want an encouraging message with a biblical backing. The Bible is still relatable, even in 2020 AD — I promise you! Take a leap, and listen here.
Two things that go hand in hand are impatience and complaining. We’ve all experienced both and yet neither of them changes the actual experience. It just causes us to feel better about letting our emotions do the talking. 😤 God, in his infinite wisdom and sovereignty, allows us to experience moments of difficult that cause impatience and complaining to groom us into the character that best reflects Him. It’s par for the course!
Discipline feels like a dirty word, but the reality is that in its truest form, it’s a benefit to us. God is completely in our corner and any correction we receive is truly a gift that allows us to move back in the right direction.
Forgiving those who’ve hurt you sounds easier said than done, however the command comes with the knowledge that people are invaluable to the Lord, it’s the spirit they operate in that we war against.
We don’t know what the future holds, but we know Who holds the future. I’m choosing to focus on Him and fully allow Him to direct my path this year (Proverbs 3:5-6). While a verse was not included today, the one that has impacted me most as of late comes from Luke 10:42, included further below. I encourage you to read the chapter fully, and choose to do the greater thing as Mary did, sit at His feet and listen to the Lord’s teaching… “but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”
The end of one year, and the beginning of another begets the natural desire for new goals, new challenges, a new you. However, more important than a new you, is a known you. “Well done my good and faithful servant,” is the response to a life well lived.
It would be better for us to stick our head in the ground, the way of the ostrich, than to know what everyone else is up to. More often than not, that knowledge can cause us to question God’s goodness, justice, mercy… we feel slighted or maligned by God for not attaining, or receiving more or better than our peers, especially when we factor in the timing of God. But God’s ways and thoughts are higher and greater than our own. He doesn’t consider fairness in the same way we do. Trust that He knows what’s best for you.
It’s easy to go the way most traveled and live according to the world’s standards but if we’re honest, can we see how doing life the world’s way has lead to regret, pain, stress, anxiety and the like? Don’t lose your soul in the process of becoming who God has called you to be.
“On the 24th day of the ninth month…” Times and seasons are not beyond God. Everything is ordered exactly as it should be. The sun knows when to come up and go down, as well as the moon. Everything in nature is well orchestrated to the tune of God’s design yet we as His creation, with free-will choose to go our own way, are full of mistrust for the truth and goodness behind His words. He always provides us with a choice. “Choose you this day who you will serve,” Joshua 24:15. Those who choose Him and His ways are blessed.
It’s easy to doubt or question God when things aren’t going our way, or when we expected Him to move on our behalf. While those tendencies to question and doubt come naturally to us it’s important to remember who God really is— not a liar, but faithful and true, and what God does. God is a creator. He doesn’t do things the way we expect Him to or in the timing we expect them in. He’s a “thinks outside of the box” God who was brilliant enough to create you, me, and everything including the kitchen sink! Trust Him.
Have you wondered whether where you’re at is really what God has in store for you? You followed His lead, and yet where He’s led you feels foreign and overcome with obstacles— well you’re not alone. Let’s discuss!
Like so many of us, Gideon struggled with insecurity and uncertainty in the area that God called him to. He even tried to talk God out of thinking so highly of him, but God didn’t change His mind about the plan He had for Gideon, and the same goes for you.
When it is in your power to act, have you stood up for a neighbor? Have you given if your time or resources in a way that edifies another? Doing good goes beyond our feelings most of the time but it allows us to stretch and strengthen that faith muscle in a way that truly glorifies God.
Pain is not the problem. You’re not alone in feeling down, depressed, and otherwise pained. But how you walk through that season will echo into the next. Choose carefully how you’ll master those feelings, and know that you’re never alone.
Making Jesus the Lord of your life requires a daily reckoning that you’re not the big man or woman on campus, He is. Allow Him to be your influencer this month and beyond and see how different your life becomes.
Do you ever wonder what God wants for your life, and how you can get out of your own way (and out of your own head and emotions) to make good and sound decisions for your life? Then I encourage you to listen here, and challenge you to experience the difference for yourself.
Happy New Year! Happy is the operative word as we trust that God is going to restore and provide all that we’ve believed for in 2022. Goodness is on the horizon and He wants you to thrive in the life He died to give you.
Having a bad day? It’s okay to feel the weight of your world, but it’s more important to cast your cares on Him— there’s no restraining order or mandate against leaving your cares at the door of heaven.
Happy one year of Thoughts for Today! Given this seemingly unprecedented year we’ve all had, it’s easy to consider life as we know it to be much more stressful than ever before. Listen here for an opportunity to challenge that notion.
Can you imagine a time where you’re so overwhelmed that you feel… surrounded? Surrounded by worry, anxiety, negative and dark thoughts, naysayers, accusers, etc. Listen here to know the great benefit being at war in any capacity while knowing God.
Fear talks but faith walks— faith puts into action what you’re believing for. Faith is a posture of assurance that God’s got this and God’s got you. Like sitting on a chair you didn’t create (or screw tightly together) you can trust that God won’t let you fall. He’ll always work things out for your good. So here’s to less “talking” and speaking in fear, more walking and trusting in God.
It’s so easy to want to give up and give in to the temptation of going back to what’s familiar, feeling defeated, or of staying stagnant, complacent and even paralyzed to the idea of moving forward in a difficult season. Jesus knows the agony and vulnerability, and teaches by example on how to overcome.
There are times where being “delighted” can feel like a far-fetched adjective to describe our emotional state. We want things to change, we aspire to accomplish forward movement and we are otherwise dissatisfied and disappointed with our status quo. Learn how I overcame that constant struggle and know there’s hope for you too!
Your grin for the win! 😃 There are moments we don’t feel very happy but in Christ, happiness is in fact our portion. Listen for more on turning that frown upside down, and being confident in the elation that is yours for the taking!
If God is for you, who can be against you? (Romans 8:31) If you are experiencing some kind of emotional or physical turmoil or upheaval, you’re not alone. But I can assure you that with God, you have the opportunity to come out of it unscathed.
Take a temperature check on your level of trust. Can you trust a friend or family member’s words? How about a total stranger’s? Learn from a Roman Centurion on the level of trust we ought to have in the God we claim to know and trust.
Happy 2021! Now that we’ve moved past the 2020 hurdle, let’s jump right into 2021 with the confidence that God is good. God is for you. God has never, and will never leave you. I encourage you to seek His goodness, in the land of the living!
Fear, the feeling we feel at first glance at or thought of doing something out of the ordinary. In this episode, I challenge you, and therefore challenge myself, to step out into the unknown and using our unique gifts and talents, let’s move forward into doing the seemingly impossible, and usually uncomfortable. Listen here for my thoughts on the “little pebble” that is fear!
Hi everyone! This is episode #1. What an exciting time to be alive - 2020! That was somewhat rhetorical, we all know life has been stressful, but is that the crux of the story? How can we live beyond what’s going on in the natural? Tune in for a, longer than anticipated, response!