Step by Step

Good Morning My Beloved Ones,

     I pray that when the weight of the world tries to bow your shoulders, you choose to bow your head and bend your knee.
     Today I want to talk to you about "Step by Step".  Right after I was saved and filled with the Holy Ghost, I was in a church service where a message was given in tongues.  Immediately, in my mind I heard the words, Thus saith the Lord.  I thought, "The Lord is giving me the interpretation of the message", and I waited for the rest to come.  And I waited.  And I waited.  Finally, I heard, Thus saith the Lord again.  I knew I was supposed to speak it out, but where was the rest?  I'd feel foolish if I said only that and nothing else, so I chose not to speak at all.  After the service, the Pastor came to me and said, "The Lord showed me He gave you the interpretation.  Why didn't you share it?"  I explained that I only had a few words and I was waiting for the rest.  The Pastor explained that when we've been found faithful with little, God will give us much.  The next week in service, the same thing happened and I heard Thus saith the Lord in my spirit and I silently pleaded with God to give it to someone else.  But when He repeated those 4 words again, I stood up and opened my mouth and out came, "Thus saith the Lord" followed by several sentences I didn't know I was going to say.  I found out later that the message ministered to several in the congregationwho needed to hear that exact word from the Lord.
     Psalm 119:105 says, "Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path."  The lamps used in those times were shallow clay bowls into which oil was poured and a wick was set that gave off just enough light on a dark, moonless night to illuminate the spot right in front of your foot where you would take your next step so you'd not step in a hole or stumble. 
     How much easier it would be to use a floodlight to navigate dark paths with, to be given a full message before you opened your mouth, or to know God's 5-year plan for your life.  But the Lord knows that if we knew everything that was to happen before it did, we'd probably not follow the path He's chosen.  In His wisdom, He chooses to lead us step by step.  That's why it says in Matthew 6:34 to take no thought for tomorrow for tomorrow will take care of itself.
     Let God's Word be a lamp unto your feet and a light unto your path, beloved ones.  Let it lead you step by step through this Christian walk.  If we are faithful to take one step, He will illuminate the next. 

Walking in the light as He is in the light,  Raelynn

Why Wait?

Good Morning My Beloved Ones,

     I pray you are soaking up all of God’s blessings, for it is His joy to bless His people.

   Today I want to talk to you about “Why Wait?”  Over 10 years ago, the Lord gave me a series of children’s stories to write.  I knew they were from Him because it had never entered my mind to write children’s stories, the words came quickly and easily and they taught Biblical principles on a child’s level.  After completing them, I tried to get them illustrated and published to no avail.  I felt the Lord telling me to put them away and in His timing He would use them.  So after they’ve been sitting in my closet for over ten years, I’ve now been asked to send my stories to a local Christian orphanage where they will be read to the children living there and sent home with the families when the children are adopted.  Praise God! But why did I have to wait so long to use the gift God had given me?

     The Sunday came when the Christian Family Care organization had a table set up in the foyer of our church.  They had flyers of children who needed families.  I am not in a position to foster/adopt so I would normally walk right past the display without a second glance.  But my life has changed dramatically in the last two years and the Lord prompted me to take a flyer of each child to pray over.  This led to a conversation with the administrator which led to them asking for my stories.  Prior to this time in my life, I loved the Lord and had served him, but I’d never been moved to pray for homeless children.  I was more focused on making a marriage work, on my job and on finances or the lack thereof.  It was not until I was spiritually available to the Lord’s prompting that I was ready for my gift to be used.

     I think about Abraham who had to wait so long for the arrival of his promised son, Isaac.  He, too, tried to bring the fulfillment of the promise about before its time.  If God had given Isaac to Abraham much earlier, do you think he’d have been in the spiritual condition necessary to be able to offer his son as a sacrifice when God called him to do it?  I don’t think so.  Abraham had a large family, indeed a whole nation to run.  He had to fight against kings to free his family who had been taken

captive.  His focus was on the demands of his daily responsibilities as a patriarch to a large clan. When he became spiritually available in his later years, God brought the promised son.

     Why wait for the things God has promised us?  Because He knows when we will be ready for them.  Are you waiting for a promise delayed, beloved one?  God hasn’t forgotten you and He isn’t withholding it as punishment for some sin or lack of faith.  When the promise is fulfilled in God’s timing, we receive joy, others are blessed and God gets the glory.

     Let Him continue to work in your life until the time has come that you are ready to receive the promise.

It’s Worth the Wait – your sister in Christ,  Raelynn

The Gravity of the Situation

Good Morning My Beloved Ones,

     I pray that your feet are firmly planted on the solid rock and you know beyond a doubt where you stand.

     Today I want to talk to you about “The Gravity of the Situation”.  In today’s ever-changing world, aren’t you glad that there are some things you can unequivocally count on to remain solid, steady, true and unchanging?  Gravity, for instance.

  Every morning you wake up, you can be certain that you won’t go flying off the edge of the earth because the law of gravity never fails to keep your feet firmly planted on this earth.  The same is true of the Word of God.  The same One who created the unfailing work of gravity placed other unfailing truths into a book for you and I that we can count on to keep us firmly planted when all around us is being moved and shaken.

     I’ve heard the Bible called “a fairy tale”, a “wish book”, an “archaic book of legend and poetry with no bearing upon the real world”.  I understand where these descriptions come from.  They come from people who don’t want to believe it’s true, because it doesn’t support the way they choose to live.  Mark Twain once said, “It’s not the parts of the Bible I don’t understand that disturb me – it’s the parts I do understand that disturb me.”

     When you are about to give your testimony in a court of law,

what do you do?  You swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, don’t you?  Do you think it’s a coincidence that the Bible is made up of the Old and New TESTAMENT?  That’s right, it’s the same word.  The Bible is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

     A recent Gallup poll showed that 67% of people in the world today deny that absolute truth exists.  I don’t think they really believe that.  I’m sure every one of them believes in the truth of gravity.  So they believe in absolute truth.  Like Mark Twain, they are just disturbed by how that truth would affect them so it’s easier to deny it.

     Don’t let anyone convince you that the Word of God is less than 100% absolute truth, beloved ones.  It is a life-giving, life-changing firm foundation that is just as sure and faithful as gravity to keep our feet on solid ground.  That the majority believes otherwise is indeed the gravity of the situation.

Standing firm on the unchanging truth, your sister, Raelynn

Broken Wings

Good Morning My Beloved Ones,

     I pray you choose the narrow path that leads to life.

      Today I want to talk to you about “Broken Wings”.

  I’d like to share a quote by Drs. Jerry and Carol Robeson.
  “Prayer and the Word of God are like the two wings of a bird.  With only one wing, the bird would fly in circles.  With both intact, the bird flies directly to his destination."

     Do you ever feel like you are flying around in circles?  Perhaps you’ve got a broken wing.  Are you praying for the needs of others and for God’s will and direction in your life?  Maybe that wing is strong and it’s the other that is damaged.  Are you ingesting the truths of God’s Word on a regular basis and standing upon His promises?

     How does a baby bird learn how to fly?  Its mother pushes it out of the nest and it flaps its weak little wings until they strengthen enough to support and lift him.  How’s your altitude, beloved ones?  Would like to be flying a little higher?  Then you’ve got to strengthen the wings of prayer and the Word of God in your life.

  

   Don’t fly around in circles, my friends.  Fly straight and high on strong wings to the destination your Father has prepared for you.

On a wing and a prayer, Raelynn

     

Holy Cow

Good Morning My Beloved Ones,

     I pray that your first thought in the morning and your last thought at night are of the One who gave you life.

    Today I want to talk to you about “Holy Cow”.  Psalm 1:2 says “Blessed (supremely happy) is the man who delights in the law of the Lord, who meditates in it day and night.”  When is the last time you meditated on the word of God day and night? 

 Most of us crack our Bibles open on Sunday when the preacher tells us to or rush through our chapter a day, skipping over the genealogies so we can say we spent time in the Word.  Is it any wonder we aren’t as blessed (supremely happy) as we could be?

     What does it mean to meditate on the Word day and night?  When I hear the word “meditate” I picture a bald man in a white robe sitting cross-legged on the floor, palms

up on his knees, fingers making an “o” with the middle finger and thumb, chanting “ohm…”.  Is that what God wants us to do?

     Actually, the word meditate used in this scripture comes from the Hebrew word that means, “to chew the cud”. 

Instead of a bald swami, picture a cow

chewing grass, swallowing it into one of his four stomachs, then regurgitating it later to chew on it some more.  We could rewrite the scripture this way: “Supremely happy is the man who delights in the Word of God, who takes it in, chews it over, gets all the flavor out of it, then lets it remain deep inside him, but later brings that truth back up to think on it some more”.  That’s Biblical meditation.

     Psalm 119:11 says, “Thy Word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against thee.”  When we think about our heart, we usually picture the blood-pumping muscle in our chest or the center of our emotions (as in, “I love you with all my heart”), don’t we?  The Hebrew word for heart used here actually means “bowels”, or the place where digestion takes place.

     We aren’t just to crack open our bibles and follow along with preacher once a week or race through a passage so we can read the Bible cover to cover in a year.  We are to chew on it, think it over, squeeze all the goodness out of it, swallow it, hiding it in our heart, where we can digest it and let its nutrients give life to our being.  We are called, beloved ones, to be a holy cow – not the kind they worship in India – but one that meditates on the Word of God day and night.

May you be supremely happy, Raelynn

And I am not

 June 30, 2014

Good Morning My Beloved Ones,

     I pray you are submitting yourselves unto God and resisting the devil and making him flee.

     Today I want to talk to you about “And I am not”.  I was sitting at the bus stop the other morning, alone, feeling the

cool breeze that would precede a hot, muggy day, looking up and seeing the majesty of the clouds and a multi-colored sky and had the thought: “You are Creator, and I am not.”  That thought led to “You are all-knowing, all-powerful, you are truth, you are love, you are wholly good…and I am not.”

     James 4:10 tells us to humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord and He will lift us up.  In the world we live in, it is so hard to keep our focus on anything but ourselves, our needs, our desires, our plans, our overwhelming circumstances.  But to be lifted above these things, we must humble ourselves in the sight of the Lord.    

People have some strange ideas about humility.  Some think

it means being a doormat letting others walk all over them.  Some think it means belittling themselves and making themselves of no value.  Others think it means taking abuse without complaint.  None of these things are humility and none of them please God.

    Humility is simply seeing God for who He is and recognizing ourselves as we are in relation to Him.  I am many things:  I am saved, I am forgiven, I am much loved, I am blessed, I am highly favored.  With all that I am, I must recognize what I am not.  True humility, my friends, comes when you can say and mean, “You are Lord, You are Master, You are God…and I am not.”

Allowing Him to lift me up, your sister in Christ, Raelynn