Time with God

I have been learning a few things recently...yesterday, I was reading the book Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World and the chapter I was reading was talking about spending time with God and this has changed my perspective.

Joanna Weaver used the example in which Robert Boyd Munger describes how he showed Christ around the house of his heart and described each room.  The drawing room was a place Christ seemed pleased with and suggested that they met there often and had fellowship there and promised that each morning he would be there and they would start the day together.  Munger describes that morning after morning he would come down stairs and spend time reading the bible together and that Christ would tell him of its riches and unfold to him its truths and that they were wonderful hours spent together.  But...little by little the time got shortened and he began to miss a day and then began to miss it two days in a row or more.  Then, one morning he walked past the drawing room and saw that the door was ajar and he saw the Lord sitting there and asked if he had been there all the mornings he had missed.  Christ replied that he had had been there and told him he had said he would be there every morning.  Munger describes that he felt even more ashamed since He had been faithful in spite of his faithlessness and asked for His forgiveness.  The part that really spoke to me was this:

"He said, "The trouble with you is this:  You have been thinking of the quiet time, of the Bible study and prayer time, as a factor in your own spiritual progress, but you have forgotten that this hour means something to Me also.""

I have learnt that not only do I need to spend time with God for me to grow spiritually but also that God wants to spend time with me and the time I spend with him means something to him too.

I have also been reading about spending time with God in my daily readings this week.  On Wednesday it was talking about worship as a way of life, focussing on Romans 12:1:

"Take your everyday, ordinary life - your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life - and place it before God as an offering." (The Message). 

The Word 4u 2day explains that you love someone by spending quality time with them, by taking an interest, by sharing secrets, desires, ups and downs and that falling in love with God is the same.  Then , on Thursday, it talks about how Jesus managed to keep his cool during the stresses and strains of life and quotes Mark 1:35:

"Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where He prayed."

It states that Jesus lived in solitude as much as he did in the limelight and suggests that spending time alone with God is an essential prescription against stress.

I have realised recently that I am not very good at spending time alone with God but the combination of everything I have read this week has made me realise how important it is to ensure that I have space in my everyday life to spend time talking with God about anything and everything...not only is he concerned about any big decisions I have to make but also in the little things that I might think are insignificant.

Over the next two weeks, I have been challenged to spend some time meditating on a bible verse that relates to my barriers to intimacy with God and hope that doing this will develop in to a more regular time that I spend with God.

Update

Since my last post, I have had an appointment with the consultant and pain clinic confirmed for 4th April so prayers that it goes well would be very much appreciated.

I have also had some encouraging conversations with people and meet up every 2 weeks with a group of lovely girls to encourage one another, build relationship with one another and support one another. I feel I have already benefitted from meeting up like this.

I spent last weekend with my sister and brother in law and we attended their church on the Sunday morning where the pastor was talking about the church and that it should not just be for the middle classes but for everyone. This is so true and I really believe that church needs to engage with the community around it.

I went to Kerith on Sunday evening and we have just started a series on the Old Testament starting with Genesis 1 and 2 and that it is not so fundamental how God created but why he created. God created so that there is a place where we can share community with Him and so that we can know what it is to love and be loved.

Relentless

On Sunday, Simon spoke about reviving dreams and dreaming big and taking the next step in making our dreams happen. This really spoke to me as this is what I had done in September when I started studying to become a Legal Executive specialising in Employment Law.

I had previously looked in to doing a legal qualification as I had always enjoyed the employment law side of working in Human Resources but had put this to one side as it did not feel right at the time. When I was on holiday in August, I was prompted to look again at this and I signed up to a distance learning course which means that I can fit my studying around when I feel up to it and have no weekly tutorials at college but access to tutors during the working day who are there to support and answer queries that come up whilst studying and I also have the forum where I can chat with other students so I know I am not alone.

I submitted my first study exercise in October and achieved 90% which I was extremely suprised at and pleased with. My second study exercise was submitted in December and I achieved 86% for that one which again I was extremely pleased with. I then sat my first exams last week but have to wait until the end of March for the results.

Getting to my first exam was not without problems though. I got to Waterloo with no problem, found my way to the entrance to the Jubilee line which was closed and I was directed to another entrance to the underground to be greeted by a long queue for the Jubilee line. I then went the long way round, nearly getting 'cattle hearded' in to the Waterloo & City line and finally made it to the platform. An announcement then came over the tannoy system that there were severe delays on the Jubilee line and to find an alternative route. It was approximately 8.35am at this point.

I eventually made it to Farringdon station at about 9.05am but managed to turn the wrong way at the end of the road and spoke to a policewoman at 9.15am who advised me that I needed to go back to where I had come from and keep going. After that, I began my walk, crying and praying as I knew there was no way I could walk that distance in time. I got back to the road I had originally come out of and asked again for directions and was given very helpful directions. I arrived at the exam centre at 9.20am. I know God intervened as I looked again on the Wednesday and there is no way I could have walked that distance in 5 minutes even if I did not have knee problems!

I am still at the start of living out my dream of becoming an Employment Lawyer but in taking the next steps, God has been revealing the next one to me as I go along.  I know that as I follow God's guidance, he will reveal more of His plan for my life to me.

Since Sunday, I have had the word 'relentless' in my thoughts.  I found a wristband with this word on in a drawer on Saturday and then on Sunday evening at church began thinking about what it meant.  I have come to the conclusion that I need to be relentless in pursuing the dreams God has given me and persevering even when things seem too difficult.  I need to not let any obstacles get in the way of me pursuing what God has for me.

I am now wearing the wristband as it is a constant reminder of this and when things begin to feel too much, I just need to look to God to help me through and trust that he will never leave me.

I'm Back

Well, it has been about six months since I last posted and since then, I have been on two holidays, had hospital appointments, become a student again and Christmas has been and gone.

My knee problems are still ongoing and recently, it has been particularly painful. In September, I went back to see the physio who advised that I am doing the right things by working on maintaining the progress I made whilst in hospital in June but that at the moment, there is not a lot more she can advise until the consultant decides what the next step is.

I saw the consultant in November and he has advised that he wants a meeting with me and the pain team to discuss whether there is any more the pain team can do for me and if not, he will resurface my knee cap. He has told me that the damage in my knee is limited to my knee cap and the rest of my knee is fine. I am currently waiting for this appointment to come through but am hoping that it will be sometime before the end of February.

In September, I started studying for an employment law qualification. This decision came from a car journey on holiday when I suddenly, completely out of the blue, had a thought that I should look in to doing a legal qualification again (I will go in to more detail in my next post.). I took my first two exams last week and will get the results at the end of March.

I think that is about everything up to date, so will leave it there for this post but definitely will not leave it six months before my next one.

Psalm 1

We were challenged at church this week to make time during the week to spend 15 minutes reflecting on Psalm 1 and I thought I'd share some of what I got from it here.

Verse 1 - I need to be looking at the people I take advice from.  Are they people who will seek to build me and encourage me or are they people who will take me down?  Do they help me to draw closer to God or do they put barriers in the way of me drawing closer to God?

Verse 2 - 'Day and night' - all the time - he lives it - it's constant!  This challenges me because often spending time reading my bible and chatting with God feels like a chore...it shouldn't be like this...I should be including God in my everyday. He wants to be a part of all my life, not just some of it! In Ephesians 6 verse 18 it says:

"And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests."

Verse 3 - To me, this speaks of living where there is life.  The tree is planted by the river and can therefore drink of that source of water in order to grow.  I think this is the same for us.  If we are spending time reading the bible and communicating with God, we are living by the source of life.  We shouldn't be waiting for sunday preaches but spending time with God on a constant basis.  In some ways, this is a repetition of verse 2 but using a different way of getting the point across.

When I was looking at this Psalm, I read it in both the NIV and NCV and for this verse, I liked that the NCV said 'succeed' at the end of the verse rather than 'prosper'.  Prosper for me immediately makes me think of financial prosperity but this is not what the writer is saying.  Prosperity can come in many ways, emotional prosperity, spiritual prosperity, as well as financial.  When we spend time in God's word, we will prosper spiritually and we will succeed at what we do as we will be learning what pleases God and doing those things rather than following our own agendas.

Verses 4-6 - I'm not going to comment too much on these verses except to say that God is a God of justice and that his ways are perfect.  If we decide to live according to his purposes then our lives will bear fruit and God will be watching over us, guiding and protecting us.

This Psalm is particularly relevant to me at the moment as I beginning a new chapter in my life and it has encouraged me to be studying my bible and talking to God about my hopes and dreams for the future and asking Him to reveal his plans and purposes to me so that I will succeed and prosper.

It has been a couple of months since I last posted and a lot can happen in that time.  I have spent two weeks in hospital having physio and hydro and meeting people on the ward who were so encouraging and supportive of each other that I couldn't have asked for more and have come away from it having made some great new friends.

A couple of weeks ago at church, Sola spoke on 'Faith for a life of victory'.  When I re-listened to this last week, I got a blank sheet of paper and started to think about what I saw in my future and I was reminded of dreams I'd had in the past that I'd put on the back burner and made my knee the excuse for why they weren't happening.  Something Sola said has stuck with me:

"You don't have to settle for what you have right now because God can rescue your situation and your circumstance."

So, no more excuses, I'm going to believe for these things and tune in to God's frequency so that when He says 'jump' I will jump!

I still have no idea how this is all going to work out but know that God sees the bigger picture even when I don't.  Please join me on this journey of faith.

Limitations & Intentions

I recently finished reading The Shack and since then, this quote from Papa (God) to Mack has stuck with me:

"A bird's not defined by being grounded but by his ability to fly. Remember this, humans are not defined by their limitations but by the intentions that I have for them; not by what they seem to be, but by everything it means to be created in my image."

I have been meaning to post about this for a while but have been putting it off because I'm not quite sure what I want to say about it so, I'm just going to write and see what happens!

In my previous posts, I have often mentioned that I need to know where my limitations are with regard to my knee and ensuring that I don't push myself too hard and end up paying for it later. This challenges that. God knows that I have limitations, yet he still wants to use me. He doesn't see my limitations, he sees the potential I have to fulfil his purposes.

Last week was tough. I was in a lot of pain with my knee as well as being exhausted. I had pushed myself too far and was paying for it. I have tried to cut down on how much I've been doing this week but it feels as though I've been busier than I was last week.

This week was different though as I feel I have been more productive and I have done somethings that have been outside of my comfort zone and that is good as I learn that there are things that I may not be confident in doing at first but once I get going, I can do them. In doing things that are outside of my comfort zone, I learn not to rely on my own confidence and ability but on God and that he will provide the confidence I need in order to complete the task.

There are still things I need to learn though. I need to learn to look at what I can do and not at what I can't and I need to learn that although I may currently have my knee problems, God doesn't discount me so why should I discount myself. I may feel rubbish and useless, but God sees that I although I have weaknesses, he can use them for his good.

Apologies for rambling on and if I've repeated myself, it is good to think these things through and I wanted to share some of my thoughts about them with you.