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“Trapped!!”

Trapped!

Have you ever felt trapped?  Maybe you feel trapped in an unhealthy marriage, friendship, family, or even your job.  What can make the difference?  We can’t always get out of situations that we are in but we can change how it feels.

I am reminded of something that just happened recently at my parents.  My mom called because a Bluebird had managed to make its way down their chimney into their stove.  Dad, who has a really bad shake, needed some help to get it out.  Mom is no help when it comes to things like this.  As a matter of fact, we told her to go outside while we did it.  She gets so freaked out.

My daughter (14) and I went over to help.  We took a plastic bag and taped it around the door and then opened the door with the bag.  We wanted to try to draw the bird into the bag.  But because the bag had to be black, in order to be big enough to go around the door, there was really no light to draw him.

So my daughter used the bag to go in and try to grab him.  The interesting part was that he did not try to fly all over to get away.  We thought that maybe he was injured or near death because he was not trying to get away.  It took a little bit because she could not see what she was doing, but she finally was able to get him.

Anticipation

We carefully closed the door and untapped the bag, closing it carefully in case the bird would get out of my daughter’s hand.  I was anticipating that we would have to maybe care for a bird that was injured or not well.

When we got outside and opened the bag and immediately he flew to the nearest tree.  As he flew out of the bag he started to sing.  Then he landed on a tree branch and sat there and sang and sang and sang.  We felt as if he was thanking us for helping him.  We realized that he had felt that we were trying to help him and that was why he cooperated with us.  And then to have him thank us with his singing was such a delight.

It made me long for heaven and the connection we will be able to have with the animals.  What it will be like to swim with the dolphins, pet and lay with the big lion, ride a horse without a saddle or reins, and even be able to have any bird sit on your finger or shoulder and sing and sing and sing.

Analogy

The trapped bird reminded me of how some of us feel trapped.  It doesn’t matter what it is.  It could be a debt hanging over your head, maybe you are trapped in yourself and can’t seem to reach out to others, but whatever, whenever, or where ever you feel trapped there is a solution.  Your situation may not change immediately but how you feel about it can.

Many times we are in the situations we are because of our own choices.  We may be in a bad marriage because we did not seek or even listen to the Lord or Godly counsel.  It also could be that we married before we gave our heart to the Lord and our spouse did not give their heart to God as we did.  Most of the time debt comes from our own bad choices and we have trapped ourselves in the “stove” of debt.  But even in our bad choices, there is a Helper.

When that bird went down the chimney she didn’t just happen to stumble in.  It has a special spark arrestor on the chimney so the bird would have had to actually go into it to fall down the chimney.  There are many times that we do the same thing.  We are walking along in life and we see a job, person, things that we feel we need or want and we don’t investigate thoroughly before we make the choice to dive in headfirst.  And then afterward, too late, we realize it was a big mistake, just like the bird realized too late.

There are other times that we are walking along and it is not something really obvious and we fall in.  But the solution for both is still the same.

I like to call it S U R R E N D E R

 

  • Start your day with God
  • Utter words in prayer
  • Read your Bible
  • Recite verses to memory
  • Encourage others
  • No criticizing words
  • Direct praise to God
  • End your day with God
  • Rest in God’s promises

 

The only way we can have success in our lives is to Start our day with God in Uttering words in prayer, Reading His Word, and Reciting His Word to memory.  When we have His Word in our hearts He can draw it to our memories in the day when we need encouragement or help with any temptation or decision.  Encouraging others always helps to get our minds off of ourselves.  And when we are speaking No words of criticism about people around us or even about ourselves, it draws us closer to God and away from that depressing feeling of being trapped.  It doesn’t help the other person or us when we criticize.  We should be Directing our praise to God each day for what He has done for us.  It may take some time for us to become grateful because we have been so negative but it can happen and what joy it brings.  Make sure to End your day with God.  Recite a verse you are memorizing and pray.  And then Rest in His promises.  If you do these things you will be able to sing a song of praise to God for His help of drawing you out of the “stove” (pit) of sin.

Excited

What I am most excited about is to be totally rescued from the “stove”.  Soon Jesus is coming to take us home, to take us out of this “stove” (world) of sin and sorrow.  When He comes and takes us to heaven that will be the ultimate joy.

I can just imagine myself singing as I ascend up to meet Him in the air, “For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first:  Then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air: and so shall we ever be with the Lord.  Wherefore comfort one another with these words” 1 Thessalonians 4:16-18.

And then when I am actually in the city the joy will be so overwhelming I will burst out with singing praises to the One that has made it possible for me to be there.  I will sing my gratitude of praise to Jesus, “…. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing” Revelation 5:12.   What a glorious day that will be.  And I don’t know about you but I don’t want the things of this world to destroy that moment.  I want to surrender all my life to Jesus.

Dear Father,

“Take my life, and let it be

Consecrated, Lord, to Thee;

Take my hands, and let them move

At the impulse of Thy love;

At the impulse of Thy love;

 

Take my feet, and let them be

Swift and beautiful for Thee.

Take my voice, and let me sing

Always, only, for my King;

Always, only, for my King;

 

Take my lips, and let them be

Filled with messages from Thee.

Take my silver and my gold:

Not a mite would I withhold;

Not a mite would I withhold.

 

Take my will, and make it Thine,

It shall be no longer mine;

Take my heart, it is Thine own,

It shall be Thy royal throne.

It shall be Thy royal throne.

 

Take my love, my Lord, I pour

At Thy feet its treasure store;

Take myself, and I will be,

Ever, only, all for Thee.

Ever, only, all for Thee.”

— Frances Ridley Havergal

In Jesus Name,

Amen

Surrender all to Jesus today.  He will help make your path straight and bring you joy and peace no matter what situation you face.

Love you all.

Do you have a nature story you can tell?  I love to hear nature stories.  Share what you learned from your experience.

 

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“I Made a Commitment, Now What?!!!”

Have you ever made a commitment to do something?  Maybe you committed to meet with a friend.  Or maybe you committed to doing something with your son or daughter.  Or maybe you have committed to giving money to someone or even God.  How well do you keep your commitments?

We need to be cautious about making commitments.  I think it is important to really think through the commitments that we plan to make because what we commit to we should follow through with.  The other thing is that when we make a commitment we need to leave self out of it.  Are we committing to this for us or for them, or for some advantage or maybe even a blessing?

It makes me think about tithe paying.  I have a conviction to pay tithe and offerings through my local church.  It helps to pay my pastor, help missionaries, pay for Christian teachers, etc.  But why do I do it?  Do I do it because I want the Lord to bless me?  Or do I do it because I love the Lord and I want to support His cause to save souls?  The motive is so important.  I want to be motivated by love for God.

The reason I do pay is that God has asked me to.  Yes, I want to be blessed as well but I realize that His blessing may not be monetary, which I am perfectly happy with.  I also realize that obeying the Lord does not always bring “peace”.  I want to clarify.  We can have peace in obeying God but we may not have “peace”.  When we obey God, Satan does not like it and he is going to bring trials and storms our way.  But the blessing is that, as we trust God we can have peace knowing that we are in harmony with God and His Word as we go through the storms.

We have been struggling financially for quite a few years.  During that time we got ourselves into a lot of credit card debt.  Last year we went to a Dave Ramsey Seminar for the second time.  This time my husband really got on board.  We have been doing the Snowball Method for our debt, which has been working very slowly.  There are also those bills that end up “falling below the line”; if you have been through Dave Ramsey’s Seminar you know what I am talking about.

We also owed a lot of taxes this year.  When you get into a lot of credit card debt the government doesn’t take that into account.  So you work hard to make more money in order to pay off the credit cards and the government considers you making more so they charge you more taxes and the vicious cycle goes on.  So this year we owed more taxes and had to put in an extension.  We finally filed Oct. 15 and paid what we could toward the taxes.  We had to step out in faith because we really did not have the money to pay and still pay our bills.

We have recently started another business.  It is a water loss business.  The basics are, you get a leak that floods your house or business, we come in and extract and dry it out.  Right after we stepped out in faith to pay the majority of our taxes we got a big water job call.  Praise the Lord!  We are still praying in Faith that we will get paid right away for the job.  These insurance jobs can take up to 4 months to be paid but we know God can make it quicker.  We have seen Him do it.

There is another thing that I stepped out in faith and did a couple of weeks ago.  I received my check from where I work.  I work part-time and I have mostly been using that money for anything you would buy at a store, food and such, whatever the household needs are.  As I shared above I have a commitment to paying tithe and offering.  I also decided to commit the same percentage that I give to the Lord to put toward my smallest credit card to get it paid off, the Snowball Method.  So I figured it all out and submitted the payment to my church for the Lord and paid an extra amount toward my lowest credit card.  A few days later my boss called me in to talk to me and let me know he was giving me a dollar raise.  Wow!  The blessings of the Lord are so wonderful.

It can be hard to step out in faith not knowing the outcome.  And we still don’t know how we will make it for the next day, week, or month.  Is it scary? Yes!  But as I continue to give it to the Lord and let Him work out the details, is so much better than trying to make it happen myself.  As long as we are doing our part we have to let God do the rest or it will destroy us physically, emotionally, spiritually, and maybe even financially.

Dear Father,

Thank You for Your blessings.   To be honest it is really a struggle to trust You.  Thank You for Your patience with us.  Continue to guide and lead us.

In Jesus Name,

Amen

Do your part today and give the rest to God.  He will see you through.

Do you have a story to share?  How has God blessed you when you stepped out in faith?  I would love to hear your story.  It is always encouraging to hear others faith stories.

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“Financial Disaster!!”

Have you experienced financial disaster at some time through your life?  I am sure most of us probably have.  There can be so many different reasons why we get into these situations.  You may have school bills that are eating you up, or maybe you have had a sick loved one or a loved one that has passed away and you are left with all the hospital bills, or maybe it has been just because of your own foolishness.  It really doesn’t matter so much how you got there but now the question is what to do about it.

All the time I have been married we have had financial difficulty.  It has been better at some times than others.  I remember when I got pregnant with our third child I cried, “We can’t afford this.”  But after she was born and losing her five weeks later, I learned that money is not everything.

But then again we do have to figure out how to make it in this world and when we don’t do things right it can be a disaster.  When you ignore things and hope they will go away, it does not work, I am speaking from experience.  The one thing about the banks, they will keep giving you credit cards and more credit until you are in big trouble.  There is no bank out there that is really interested in your good.  They are interested in making money.

One of the hardest things is when you and your spouse are not together on your finances.  That was our experience.  Sometimes you, along with the family, have to suffer until there is change.  But sometimes that is what it takes for some people to get to the bottom.  Financial Disaster!  When I told my husband it was looking like we were going to have to bankrupt he finally started to listen and wake up.

Are you feeling overwhelmed right now with your situation and wondering what you should do?  I am going to give you some steps that we have taken.  I hope this encourages you to make the step.

  1. Start with your local Bank. I went to our bank.  We had credit cards, lines of credit, and a personal loan.  Some banks are not as workable, as I discovered but our main bank was, on most accounts.  Most of our accounts, with our request, lowered the interest rates for the life of the loan, which lowered the payments and made it more affordable to pay.
  2. Contact all other credit cards or loans. After working with our local bank I called each of our other cards from other banks and lenders.  Most of them were workable also.  But there were a few that did not work with me.  I pay all those that worked with me first and if I don’t have enough to pay the ones that did not work with me, I either don’t pay them or pay what I can.  I have had them call me and be willing to lower the interest some after they did not receive full minimum payments.  It isn’t easy but you have to make a plan.
  3. Do the snowball plan. If any of you are familiar with Dave Ramsey you know all about the snowball plan.  You list all your credit cards and loans down, starting with the one you owe the least on.  Pay the minimum on each one and as you pay one-off add that minimum to the next one bill in the list and so on.  It is amazing on how it works.  I did use this method once before in our life and got us completely out of debt.  It does work.
  4. Take on extra work. We have been running our own family business for many years, which I have been a part of.  But at this point I went out and got an outside job.  The Lord provided me with just the right job for me.
  5. Trust in the Lord! I believe starting with asking the Lord for His forgiveness for our wrong choices is definitely a start, if we have brought this upon ourselves.  We can’t just ask forgiveness and sit back and wait for God to do something.  But as we step forward to make efforts, He will come along side us and help us.  I found that to be so true when I was looking for a job.  Not only did He provide me a job, as I was looking, but He also provided a job that will come to me at His bidding.  Where I work they call me in when they have extra work.  So my prayer has been that God will provide the work that He knows that I need to have.  I have had to trust Him because sometimes there has been a lot of work and other times there has not been.  But I have a job and I leave it to Him to bring in the work through that Job.  I do understand why He has given me some slack time, which I can’t get into here but I have learned that I can trust Him.

There are many other things that can be done that I will be sharing in coming blogs but for now this is a few steps that has led us along the way.  We have not arrived at the debt free status but we are heading in that direction.

Dear Father,

There are many that are suffering financially.  You know their need and I pray that You will provide wisdom and strength.  Give us peace as we do Your will.  Thank You for Your help and guidance.

In Jesus Name,

Amen

Remember to trust God through the hard times and He will guide you through.  Take the steps that you need to take a He will provide.

Love you all.

Have you had financial difficulty?  What steps have you taken to get financially free?