continued....

So, what did God speak to me?
He reminded me that He showed us exactly what He desires from our worship, the first thing being; it is about Him, not us.

Leviticus 9 tells the story of how God instructed Aaron and his sons to bring the sacrifice for the people.
It described in detail how they first had to atone for their own sins before putting on the priestly garments, which represented God's righteousness, then they could enter into the Holy of Holies without fear of God's wrath destroying them.
It then desribed how the Glory of God in the form of fire came down and consumed the sacrifice, the fire continued through the temple until it went out the doors of the tabernacle and the people saw it and celebrated and fell on their faces in worship.
There was much celebration which the sons of Aaron saw so they decided to go back into the Holy of Holies to offer more sacrifices.
God saw this as a profane sacrifice....so He destroyed them.
Then, God told Moses to tell Aaron that he must stay in the Tabernacle for 7 days and he was not to mourn, and so Aaron stayed.
How many times have I entered into worship without a second thought that I needed to confess my sins first.
I have not sought God's righteousness before coming to worship, but I sure have brought a profane sacrifice before the Lord....because I sought things that I thought would put me in a more "worshipful attitude", intead of simply coming to the Lord clean and on my knees in worship to Him who is the Lamb of God, the perfect sacrifice.
Then, He showed me that worship was not based on my emotions, just like Aaron stayed in the presence of God even though he had just lost his sons, he simply obeyed and worshipped.
I have made worship about me, and I am so ashamed, Father.
Forgive me.
Thank you for showing me how to truly worship you.
Our God is an awesome God!

A Holy Epiphany...

"What has God been showing you this week, Lori?" you ask.
Thanks for asking, You.
Where do I begin?
I think to explain where God has taken me I first need to tell you where I've been.....
Chapter One:

For the last couple of years, I have really struggled with the worship time at our church.
(I can't believe I am saying this out loud)
To be honest with you, the worship time, for me at least, truly has done very little for me as far as....moving me toward God, and as far as "equipping the saints" goes, I have learned more from personal BS and from some great bible teaching on CSN radio.
I think because of the 2 worship services and there being a time constraint and all that that nullifies the movement of the Holy Spirit because we have to out at precisely 12:00, and, uhhhhh...I hate that!
Corporate prayer if so important! and yet, when are we really able to allow the Holy Spirit to move? Are we in bondage to a clock and a schedule????
Anyway, it is NOT my intention to cause dissention and this has been, for the most part, a personal battle, however, I can assure you that I am not the only person struggling with this.
How I have dealt with this has been simply to acknowledge that it is NOT all about me
and that God has a purpose for placing us here and so I continue to seek to serve others joyfully without needing to be served.
Honestly, that has worked fine, because I know that worship before the Lord can be done anywhere, anytime, and I LOVE that! It doesn't have to occur on Sunday mornings, right?
I can look back over the years and see how God was moving in our midst by showing us the importance of loving others and being real with one another.
Goodness, I feel so blessed in the relationships that have been forged through the commitment of friendship and accountablility.
I feel blessed in that area!
All of that to say this:

I have NOT allowed God to speak TRUTH to me over this matter and I allowed my feelings/heart to dictate my actions. In other words, I put my FEELINGS ahead of FAITH and, we all know the heart is deceitful, in essence, I gave the enemy a foothold in my heart which it turned to discontentment over time and because I was not rooted in TRUTH I was virtually blind to it.
What a goober I am!!!!!!
This discontentment has pervaded our household and even my kids and I SAW it for the "first" time yesterday in the heart of my oldest, which broke my heart because I KNEW that I had caused it.
The enemy will take anything we give it, for me it took my "making the best of it" attitude and my "it's not about me" pep-talks, ran with it and almost literally ran me off the road, ALL because my actions were NOT rooted in God's TRUTH.

Chapter Two:

Yesterday, I heard from God.
He spoke TRUTH to me and.....I am no longer blind.
Thank you, Leslie, for your sensitivity to the Holy Spirit and for your passion for the Word.
God spoke through you to me and it was like honey in my soul.
It was the TRUTH that caused the scales to fall from my eyes so that I could acknowledge my sin; the sin of Pride.

continued.....

a prayer request or 2

Wow!
God is moving in our midst and showing/challenging me to ask myself how much I really love people.
Am I willing to love sacrificially?
I have had some really deep encounters with a couple of people who are REALLY hurting, which I believe is no cooincidence because God has asked me to love people through His eyes, not just through mine, and so, I truly have to wait on the Lord for guidance in these situations.
I covet your prayers as I go forward in love and come along side these wounded friends to show them that I love them and support them.
I pray for protection over these who are being attacked by the enemy who is seeking to destroy them.
I pray for wisdom and sensitivity to their needs.
I pray that they will know that only God can love them the way they need to be loved.
Thanks.
God bless you.

LTU #1

Love theme update(thanks Kim and Jill):

I called my mother-in-law and had a great conversation about the Inaugaration and life in general. Not an easy thing for me to do with her cuz we've had some "history", but I do love her and I want her to know that she is important to our family.
I am also trying to love the Obamas through God's eyes, more to the point, to quote a saying from a great book I'm reading, I am "CHOOSING FAITH OVER FEELING".
God has commanded me to love one another...in spite of how I feel.
That's all I got.
Tune in next week for more Love Theme Updates......(hopefully).

Inauguration red-white-and-blues......

What an interesting day.....
To watch the swearing in of the next VPOTUS and POTUS, whom neither received my allegiance nor my vote, has filled me with such mixed emotions.
On the one hand, I weep for our outgoing President and the legacy of integrity, sense of security, and pride in this country that he will leave behind, and I fear what is to come with this new commander-in-chief, not really fear, but, rather I feel so much uncertainty for the future.
On the other hand, I know that I serve a sovereign God that has everything under His control.
I trust that, I really do...
So, why can't I stop crying when I think about what this day stands for?
I don't know....all that I do know is that somehow this day is very important, in fact, I believe that it is bigger than any of us realize and that is probably what I am reacting to.
I did have an epiphany yesterday as I was watching the news speak about the settling-in-process for the Obama's.
They were talking about what church the Obamas would attend now that they are living in a new town and the problems of security and how their attendance would affect the church etc,.
It got me thinking: how would our church respond if the Obamas walked through our doors????
Of course, we would embrace them and love on them and treat them as any new family coming into our midst, and that sort of "humanized" them for me, they are, after all, just people who need the Lord, and so I have mentally embraced them as folks who are on the "long-term prayer list", folks who have moved into a new neighborhood and are striving to make a home for themselves and their daughters, folks who literally have the weight of the world on their shoulders.
They deserve my respect and someday, hopefully, my admiration, but until then.....I will offer my unclenched fist toward their outstretched hands.
And I pray God's will be done.

seeking a theme....

Thanks, Jill, for being my only reader.
Apparently, this one's for you.(feelin' the love?)

So, I had a VERY interesting conversation this morning with my friend , Dana, about her jewlery party she had last night.
I called her to ask how she did and we ended up talking about all the people who SHOWED UP!.
I mean to say there was 10-15 people there that I, for the most part, knew none of them.
They were her neighbors and co-workers and they came to support their friend.
We talked about how very different they all are and how diverse their backgrounds, and yet, they all like each other, they were obviously enjoying themselves.
It was neat.
Her neighbors, I mean 3-5 families get together on a regular basis to share a meal, to play games, to fix the neighbor's gate, to help a friend build a workbench, to help take down a Christmas tree and decorations, have a surprise bday party.....etc.
They are the very definition of family/community.
They genuinely care for each other and it shows through acts of kindness.
They genuinely like each other and it shows through the time they spend with each other.
I have never seen a neighborhood like that.
For that matter, I've never seen a church like that.
What brings these people together????
What is the common thread that drives the need for community????
It's not that they have so much in common because they really don't.
They are all very different.
I asked Dana if she could identify what was the catalyst that started this phenomenon????
She thinks that it is her next door neighbors, Frank and Pat, that have been very purposeful about reaching out to the neighbors, they have even gone so far as to build a "man-cave" for the men of the neighborhood to come and hangout in.
Get this; there is even a neon OPEN/CLOSE sign out front.
Isn't that great?
They invite the neighbors over all the time to eat, and if you happen to be out in your yard and they see you, they will say "come on over".
It is amazing!
They are people of faith who love the Lord and have been given the gift of friendship to spread to all those around them and, guess what? it has caught on!
I'm sure it has taken some time and effort to build those relationships, but they did it sacrificially and they have been blessed.
Guess what else?
The neighbors they have reached are not Christians, they are their neighbors.
They didn't pick and choose who they would have in their home, they have everybody!
They know one another and they bear one another's burdens.
They are doing it right and I am humbled to my core.
It is not a polite suggestion to love your neighbor, it's a command.
To love we must reach out beyond our comfort zone and sacrificially invest in others.
I'm with you, Jill, It's all about love, the verb, not a feeling.
It started with 2 people who had a passion for loving people, and now it has spread to an entire neighborhood who loves one another.
What made the difference?
They were invested in people and they gave their time sacrificially to others.
They didn't say, "my house isn't clean anough", they said "come in".
They didn't say, "I don't have enough to share", they shared what they had.
They didn't say, " I don't like that person", they got to know them and realized they were people who were hurting and they simply listened.
They loved them like Jesus

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart, your soul, your mind, and your strength.
And love your neighbor as yourself."

I'm pretty sure this is my theme, too.

Please pray that Carole's sight is restored!

We heard today that Carole has been seeing colors and shadows.
Hallelujah!
Her doctors are still saying that she is "seeing" things she's remembered, however, her family is convinced she is really seeing.
We were talking about all of this on the way home from the game and Lacey's response was, "What if this is God's way of saying; I'm not through yet!"
Then she said, "we need to pray and fast that God will restore her sight."
Out of the mouths of babes.....
So tomorrow we will fast and pray for Carole....
Please join us if you can.

my testimony....

Did you'all read Kim's blog?
In it she was talking about coming up with a theme for 2009.
I think that is a great idea and so I am asking the Lord to show me what that should be.
Will you prayerfully consider adopting a theme for the new year and then share it on your blog?
I am excited to see what the Lord will do with us bloggers....
In the meantime I have been "surfing" other christian blogs and found one in which she shared her testimony and I thought to myself: I've never really written my testimony down(except for FAITH-but that doesn't really count cuz it has too many restrictions in it).
So, I thought that I would share my testimony with you'all....maybe you'll share yours, too????

When I was 7 years old I lost my mother.
It was a confusing time for me.
I remember the "movements" around me during that time.....my dad showing up at school in the middle of the day, hearing a kid in my class say that he wished his mom would die so he could get out of school early, me wondering who's mom died?, the drive home which I remember everything being fuzzy and inaudible(looking back I realize I was in shock), sitting in Linda Kay's yard across the street wondering why all those people are coming over to our house?, seeing my sister Karen drive up and run into my dad's arms crying and I didn't know why, the funeral....
None of it seemed real to me.
I don't remember anyone sitting me down and explaining what happened to my mom and that she would never be able to come back.
During that time I just went through the motions....I experienced the tragedy but I didn't feel anything.
The next thing I really remember about that time was being in my bed looking out of my window and wishing I could see my mommy again all the while I was feeling like something was pushing against me, not in an uncomfortable way, but just enough that my breath was affected and I also remember the incredible peace that surrounded me.
This went on for some time....
Our lives went back to some sense of normalcy, I guess, we went to church every Sunday and I remember people saying to me that someday I would see my mommy again in heaven.
I didn't really understand the concept of heaven other than it was a place where my mommy was and I knew that I wanted to be there with her.
One particular Sunday the pastor was talking about that very thing and something about hell and something about salvation and something about sin, but all that I heard was that I could go to Heaven if I gave my heart and life to Jesus.
Being a very practical 7 year old who had an end goal in mind, I jumped at that opportunity!!!!!
I gave my heart and my life to Jesus and He became My Lord and Savior even though I thought it was for one reason, to see my mother again, He drew me to Himself through that horrible tragedy and showed me the need I had for Him.
I was 7 years old...what did I know about sin????( that came later)
He gave me hope where there was darkness.
He gave me love where there was despair.
He gave me faith where there was longing.
He gave everything to me where there was nothing.
He even showed me that He was there beside me all along.....while I was aching and longing to see my mother He was holding me...that was what I felt....God was hugging me.
Humble beginnings.....not necessarily the text-book story for coming to the Lord, but what I love about God is that He meets us where we are at the point of our need, and He shows His love for us, His plans that are good, He slips in some Hope, Truth, and asks for nothing in return save our devotion to Him and Him alone.
I have spent the last 35+ years(yikes!) doing just that.
I have not always devoted myself to just God, sometimes I devoted myself to...self.
That was a drag.
I've learned not to do that.
Sometimes I devoted myself to Church.....equally a drag.
He doesn't want our works...He wants our devotion.
He wants all of us; our hearts, our souls, our minds.
He wants relationship with us so He can speak to us and we can hear Him.
I am so thankful to God for saving me from myself and for showing me His more excellent way.
The sacrifice that He made for us....Jesus...says to me: I would rather die for you than ever live a day without you!
How can anyone escape that much love??????

thank you.....

Thank you, Lindsey, for sharing that verse with me and you are right!
Here's another the Lord has given me:

...we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing;
persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed.....

Thank you for your prayers, my friends, I feel victory is at hand!!!!!
Isn't it interesting when we go through "momentary light affliction" that, for me, when I for just a moment take my eyes off the Lord, that is precisely when the enemy swoops in for the kill.
I hate that.
It is such foolishness and I am so guilty of that, however, I am also being delivered and for that I feel blessed.
Thank you, Father, for never leaving me nor forsaking me.
Thank you for the blessing me with friends who never let me go and who love me enough to pray for me when I am in need.

I need you.....

I have a situation....and I am wondering what your thoughts on it might be.
For the last 3 nights I have had extremely vivid, disturbing dreams with a reoccurring theme: death.
The first one was of me experiencing death by earthquake/volcano and I even felt the sensation of the heat as I was burned to death, all the while in my mind I was talking to the Lord about my imminent departure to His presence. Next, I was in "heaven" and I was celebrating with my loved ones and looking for others to clebrate with, etc. It felt SO REAL.
Then the dog poked me......I woke up and said out loud, "Oh, It WAS a dream."
I felt tricked and desperate...so I got up and read my bible and prayed that the enemy would stay out of my head during my sleep(when I am most vulnerable).
The next night, I dreamed I was killed by someone suffocating me.
The next night, I dreamed that Nevada died.
The joke last night was that Lacey was next and stay tuned to see how she dies in my dreams.(not really funny, but,better than being freaked out, I guess.)
This morning I am happy so report that Lacey is alive and well in and out of my dreams and than noone else died.
Thank you, Jesus.
Combined with the fact that my truck is not running and the heat in half of our house does not work because the Direct TV guy must have knocked something loose and we are experiencing electrical problems that causes the breakers to blow when we plug in the heaters that we purchased to get through the frigid weekend and the dog now has a definate limp!!!!
What is going on?????
Any of these problems by themselves would be a pain to deal with, but ALL at the same time?????
Not to mention that fact that I have an eye infection that WILL NOT GO AWAY!!!!!
I feel that this family is under attack!!!!
What do you think?????
To me it is one of those "holy duh" moments but, unfortunately, I am not at my finest and I'm struggling with discernment.
I covet your prayers and in fact I would love it if our closest friends would come over to pray with us, over us, for us.
We do not do that enough for one another and I am committing to be the prayer warrior/barbarian that God has called us to be.
If you are in need of prayer, call out to those who hold you up.
I will be there....
For now, we need that.

Happy New Year....

It's fun to catch up with everyone and see what the new year sparks in people's minds.
Makes me ponder what sparking in my own mind for the new year....
Hmmm.....
One thing, last night we brought in the new year with some of our very favorite people and we played a great "get to know you game" called "take your pick".
EAch round you picked three traits that you believe a certain person has and as we played for many rounds we began to get repeat trait cards.
One of them was: Believe it or See it????
Leslie made the observation that all the people chose "See it".
Interesting, she said, that our faith compels us to "believe it" but our first response was "see it".
So, what kind of person am I?
Do I need to see things before I believe them or do I possess the "child-like" faith that the bible talks about?
Do I trust that God has the "best laid plans" for me or do I occasionally say to
God," I got this one" and then set aside my faith for my flesh???
Hmmm.....
My hope and prayer for this New year is that I will allow my faith to pervade every area in my life and that I will trust in the Lord and lean not on my own understanding.
I want to LIVE OUT LOUD for JESUS at the grocery store as well as at church.
I want to WORSHIP THE LORD with all my heart and soul and mind at Starbucks as well as at church.
I want to SHARE MY FAITH with hurting people who cross my path as well as with my neighbors who I see everyday.
I want to SHOW THE LOVE OF CHRIST to my friends and family as well as to the unlovable people that I encounter everyday in this fallen world.
I want all of the dear people that travel this sod with me to know how much I adore you and how blessed I feel to be part of your life.
You know who you are.....;0)
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
May the Lord come.....