Prayer Monday: Purge Me

May27

I haven’t been doing so well lately. Something in me is restless. I found myself easily angered by stupid things. I found myself frustrated beyond belief unnecessarily. I found myself recently failing a trial. Today while driving home, I just poured my heart out. Sobbing to the One who can comfort me, I told Him just how much I was sorry for failing once again. I told Him how much I just wanted to be free of the things that seem to trip me up. I was torn up and broken before Him. In that time though, of truly allowing my heart to be open before Him, I found Him just going in and dumping out all the muck. He dug in, taking out the things that I have no power to take out on my own. As He did His work, I felt His incredible sorrow that I wrote about ME feeling for a friend of mine (in the post God’s Sorrow)… but His sorrow was just as deep and directed AT ME. Then… as I poured more of myself out, I felt Him opening up my heart and letting His light shine. To bring back life and hope. So that I could feel His forgiveness. To see His divine purpose. To realize that He had more things to burn away from my soul, but that everything is allowed in an effort so that I can be His light. So that I will be ready for the ministry He has in store for me.

So reader, if you feel led to, join me in this prayer:

Jesus,

I’m desperate for You. I’m longing for You. Come like a flood, purge me of myself, and saturate me now with You. You’re all I want. Clean out everything within me, burn out the bad in me, and make me whole and new in You. As my dad once prayed for me, give me a new bottle… all the different kinds of bottles that hold all the different kinds of promises- of family, of jobs, of friends, of ministry… give us all new bottles- ones filled with hope and YOUR blessings. Things that seem dead and stale in our lives and hearts, purge them, and replace them with YOU. Be everything in our lives. Fill every last crevice that was cleaned out as You purged us. Fill it with Your love, Your purpose, Your plan. Use us to share Your good news! You are alive! You want to give us good lives! Praise You Jesus! Praise You God!

Rebekah M.

P.S. Below I’ve put a video up of a song I recently put on facebook. This song is still resonating in my heart today, even stronger actually.

Restoration (Part III)

Apr30

“So David recovered all that the Amalekites had carried away, and David rescued his two wives. And nothing of theirs was lacking, either small or great, sons or daughters, spoil or anything which they had taken from them; David recovered all” (1 Samuel 30: 1-8, 18-19).

Four years ago I went through a very trying time in my faith. My spiritual family and I were hurt very deeply during this time. My godparents were falsely accused of many terrible things. Through much prayer, I eventually made the decision to leave that church and within a few days my god-parents were asked to leave as well. By the end of that year I had lost several close friends.

One of these was a dear friend to me that I had defended repeatedly in her time of trouble. Yet when my time of trouble came, she turned her back on me. She sent me disparaging emails, unfriended me on facebook, and disconnected from me socially and spiritually. I was heart-broken.

^“Even my close friend, someone I trusted, one who shared my bread, has turned against me” (Psalm 41:9).

All communication between us stopped – with one exception. Every year on her birthday I sent her a one line email wishing her a good year and a happy birthday. Occasionally, I also tried to encourage her in other more subtle ways; for example, leaving uplifting comments on a mutual friend’s post in reply to one of her comments. We were no longer “friends”, but by way of mutual contacts I knew that she could see some of those things. For the most part, my efforts were ignored.

I admit it was difficult for me. I was hurt that she rejected me. I was angry that she was judging me without knowing or understanding what had really happened at the church. I was sad that we were no longer friends. I missed her.

It took me some time, but eventually I forgave her. She was doing what she felt she had to. In shunning me, she was following the direction of her leadership. I understood that to go against the church leadership is rebellion; she was trying to do the right thing. Yes, I had defended her vehemently to that same leadership when they were falsely accusing her of things, but she never knew that. Yes, she believed the false reports spoken about us, but they were constructed in such a way as to be very convincing. In the end I felt badly for her that she was still in that situation when I had found my way to freedom.

Indeed, while that was the most difficult time I have had to endure since becoming a Christian, it was also the catalyst for helping me to grow in Christ and to dig deeper into Him. I have been incredibly blessed in this last four years. I now attend a wonderfully loving church with very supportive leadership. I have been able to attend Bible College, coach the youth in Bible Quizzing, be involved in a Chinese Home Church and meet many wonderful new friends. Everything that I lost was restored to me and then some! Is the church I attend now a perfect church? No, of course not. But it is exactly what I need in my life and it has afforded me many opportunities that would have been closed to me at my old church.

“For I will restore health to you, and heal you of your wounds, says the Lord, because they called you an outcast saying: This is Zion; No one seeks her.” (Jeremiah 30:17).

I have learned that truly all things work together for good (Romans 8:28) and that going through that time helped to bring me to where I am now. I also have a greater love and appreciation for those around me because I understand that things can change at any time and I know what a blessing it is to have them in my life.

Today, my dear friend that I lost four years ago sent me a friend request on Facebook. This may seem like a small thing, but I assure you, this is no small thing! Tears instantly welled behind my eyes when I saw it. Perhaps we will never be able to recover a friendship like the one we used to have, but I gladly welcome her back into my life. I pray she is well and that God is blessing her.

We truly serve a God of restoration!

In His Love,
Rebekah L.

God’s Sorrow

Apr25

A few weeks ago a closer friend of mine was messing up. Calling me on the phone while she was drunk, she told me she was messing up. We kept talking and it was clear that she was driving while intoxicated. I felt SUCH sorrow like I have never felt before. It wasn’t even disappointment, it was just such a deep, loving sorrow because I knew that it was her fear of her current circumstances and doubt in God’s love and protection that drove her to the state she was in at the time. I didn’t judge her, I wasn’t angry, I was just deeply sorrowful that she was making these destructive choices for herself and worried for her safety. As I felt those feelings go through me, I felt SUCH kindship with how God must feel when we mess up. I cried on the phone as I continued to talk to her but felt compelled to ask God in my heart to forgive me…. realizing how I must have made Him feel like that when I was messing up with [the guy I was unofficially dating who is not in church] but on so much of a deeper level since God loves more than I ever could.

Are you doing something today that brings sorrow to God’s heart? Are you in a place where God is weeping over the choices you are making, not from anger or judgement, but because He knows you are only bringing yourself potential destruction? My friend, God watched over her. She made it home safe, she repented, she’s not gone back to any of that. More than that, God used that time to show her things that had never been fully understood by her before. Just as she allowed God to mold her time of fear and doubt into a faith building moment when everything was turned over in His light, let it be so for you as well! Turn from your actions! Don’t go back! You are stronger than all that THROUGH JESUS! Know that His love for you is unfailing, it is forever and without regret! Jesus Christ loves you with all His heart and what a mighty, vast heart it is!!!! There is no end to His love!!! You don’t have to try to find peace from the things of this world- for they will never bring you true peace and true happiness- it will only be found in Christ!!! Know that His love is SO deep and it is for YOU!

God bless you readers and may you feel the depths of His love today,

Rebekah M.

The Lord Fights Our Battles Pt 2

Apr20

About a year ago a guy messaged me multiple times trying to make a case for how I could not possibly be in the will of God because God would NEVER call anyone to do anything besides being a saint of Christ and that a woman’s place is in the home while her husband’s place is to work outside the home. That He would never call anyone to be doctors, lawyers, or policemen. He did this knowing that I was in medical school, soon to be a doctor, and unmarried. I posted about this a year ago and how he never responded when I said that God cares even about our professions for everything can be used as an opportunity to witness. Last night, I received an interesting message from him on Facebook:

I need to apologize to you for being judgemental and critical of you. I was wrong and I am sorry for that. Sorry to cause you any stress or anxiety. I hope you can forgive me and you don’t hate me.

My reply:

I don’t hate anyone and of course you’re forgiven. God’s Word says that we should pray that God would forgive us as we forgive others, so to be freely forgiven we must freely forgive. I do have a word of caution for you for the future though.

One of my best friends actually recently asked who you were since they noticed that we were linked on facebook and according to them, you were telling their cousin they were going to hell for liking sports. Whether or not that is Biblical, the biggest problem with all of that was that his 11 year old daughter was dying of cancer. He is now a heartbroken man because she died and yet in the middle of the time of her dying, it is said that you were telling him he was going to hell.

I honestly told them you were the same person who told me I wasn’t in God’s Will and my friend then wrote you off as judgmental and urged me to speak with [Bro. ____/Bro. ____] about you. They said that someone who would say something like that to a man who’s daughter was dying of cancer must be brought to the attention of the pastor. I did not feel like it was my place to say something to the pastors, but my family did put you on our prayer list for a week for God to give you more wisdom with your words.

We must be wise as serpents and harmless as doves. Use wisdom and love when seeking to help people on this path towards Christ. Remember that Paul said (I Cor 12:31) to “covet earnestly the best gifts [of the spirit]: and yet shew I unto you a more excellent way.” He then went into the love chapter (I Cor 13):

1.Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.

Your words will never be heard if you don’t temper your wording and timing with love. Christ does want us to be a witness to all, but we must make sure what we say is based on scriptures and can quote their locations in the Bible. We only drive others away from Christ when we forget to temper the truth in God’s Word with grace. For the Bible says that Jesus Himself was full of grace and truth (John 1:14) and we must follow His example.

He replied

Thank you for your forgiveness. I never said though that [the father of the girl who died of cancer recently] was going to hell. I never would tell anybody that. But I did write back to [him] as i did you and asked him also to forgive me for being judgemental and critical of him. I also wrote [his wife] also and asked her the same things. The Lord did show me I was wrong just as in your case. [He] said as you did that he also forgave me. So the Lord himself corrected me in the error of my ways.
And yes I also felt even worse because I knew his daughter was sick with cancer and he was going through alot then.
So I hope all is well with you concerning these things.
Also thank you for putting me on your prayerlist. That is very much appreciated.

It is amazing how God works. My friend was pushing me pretty hard at the time to say something so I started to say hello to this guy’s pastor’s wife and maybe say something, but no message would go through to her, THREE TIMES. I knew it was God saying to let Him do it. It’s amazing to see God convicted this man in His way in His timing. I’m kind of curious to hear the story but honestly, human as I am, I would rather just keep my interactions with him limited.

Thank You Jesus for fighting my battles for me- even if the fruit of the battle is seen a YEAR later!

Rebekah M.

https://beingrebekah.com/2012/05/28/judgement/

https://beingrebekah.com/2012/05/31/submitting-it-all/

https://beingrebekah.com/2012/06/04/the-lord-fights-our-battles/

https://beingrebekah.com/2012/08/20/a-call-to-christians-being-on-your-guard-part-2/

Prayer Monday: The Prayer Wheel- Our Debts

Apr8

After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.

~Matthew 6:9-13

This week we continue with the prayer wheel. We started off with worship, asked for His Will to be done, asked Him to provide our daily needs, and now we ask Him to forgive us as we forgive others. This is no small order. If we are to be forgiven of our sins, we must forgive those who have wronged us in the past. I know that for the longest time my Ex and his friends held me back so much because I just couldn’t forgive them. The gossip, the pain they all inflicted- people who claimed Christ and yet had been very un-Christ-like in their actions towards me. I was bitter (as I wrote about just recently in another post) and it hindered me from the blessings of God. This past Sunday the pastor spoke of how if we stick around the memorials of the past “in the wilderness,” we will never “cross over the Jordan into the Promised Land (promises of God).” A profound thought.

God doesn’t want us living in the past.

How can we expect God to forgive us if we hold grudges against others?

God is a perfect God and He cannot move in places where anger, bitterness and hatred live.

When you let go and forgive others, His love will come in like a flood and you will feel His amazing power heal you.

I talked with my “sister” on Sunday about how, from now on, every time I start to “revisit the memorials of the past” that I was going to claim “I’m crossing the Jordan to my promises!!” So do it with me readers!!! Forgive those in your past and shed the weight they hold on your life! Claim your future promises every time the things of your past (and the anger, hurt, and/or bitterness) try to haunt you. When you are looking unto Jesus and the things He has for you, you cannot help but shed the past! For in Him is all fullness of joy. In Him we find peace. In Him nothing is impossible! Forgive those who have wronged you and find His love sweep over you as He freely forgives you of all you’ve done wrong! 🙂

Jesus,

Thank You that Your principals are always for our good. We cannot enjoy the blessings you want for us if we are weighed down by the past. Anger, hurt, bitterness, and shame only harm the blessings You want to put into our lives. I am learning that sometimes You withhold blessings because we are not ready to receive them yet and would only break them like a baby would if given a priceless crystal vase. Thank You that You want to help us be ready for our blessings and will even help us forgive others if we just ask (in prayer!). You are a mighty, wonderful God and I love You so much Jesus.

Rebekah M.

Part 1: https://beingrebekah.com/2013/03/11/prayer-monday-the-prayer-wheel-part-1-praise/

Part 2: https://beingrebekah.com/2013/03/18/prayer-monday-the-prayer-wheel-his-will/

Part 3: https://beingrebekah.com/2013/04/01/prayer-monday-the-prayer-wheel-daily-needs/

Part 4: https://beingrebekah.com/2013/04/08/prayer-monday-the-prayer-wheel-our-debts/

Bitterness: A Spiritual Abscess

Apr2

When something gets infected, sometimes instead of healing the right way, puss builds up in a pocket and as the pressure builds, the patient feels increasing amounts of pain. The area becomes red, hot, and can even ooze a little. Sometimes it will finally burst open.

This past winter when I was working the ER, there were multiple patients that I had to help perform an I&D on (incision and drainage- cutting it open and getting all the muck out). The ER doctor said to me “THE definitive treatment of an abscess is an I&D. You can give them all the antibiotics you want, but unless you go in there and get that infection out, most will come back with it again. And you can’t just cut it a little and push on it a little, you have to give it a good cut, use an instrument to break up the locules (little pockets), and really squeeze hard to make sure you get EVERYTHING out or else you’ve done nothing for them.”

When we are injured in life- be it from family, friends, people from church, or various circumstances- we either heal the right way (which can take some time), heal with deep scars, or even end up with a deep root of bitterness in our heart. As the bitterness festers, the anger, hatred, and dark feelings grow and grow. It can overflow a little here and there but ultimately, when it is bad enough, God needs to go in and do surgery on our hearts. He had to do so on me once before. For those who have been following along with my journey, over a year and a half ago, my first boyfriend broke my heart to pieces and even though God did help me heal some, I had a root of bitterness that had grown in deep. The cut was so deep within my soul, and I hid it away for so long, that it took visiting my brother and sister in law in California with my parents and two guest preachers working in sync with the Spirit to get God to muck out much of it. I wrote about the experience in a post but that was not the only time God has worked on me.

Sometimes it feels like we are being torn up from the inside out. It feels like our souls are being mucked out, pushed, prodded, and broken up in ways we never imagined. This process though, can be of God to help break up the walls that have been created that hide the infection of bitterness, anger, and hatred. As time has gone on, God has continued to break down the walls I have against my ex and his friends. I am MUCH improved but I know God is making me go to the city of our (and also my.. as in ever in my life) first kiss for residency to help make sure that the last walls are broken down. I cannot be fully ready to accept my future “Isaac” unless every last wall and pocket of bitterness/anger/pain is broken down and cleaned out.

What do you have festering in your heart today? Is there anything that God needs to go in and muck out? Are there pockets hiding away in your heart built up to protect you from things in your past? Do you see that all those walls are doing only keeps pain/bitterness in your heart? Let it go! Let God work on you! He will heal you more completely than you could ever imagine. He will bind you up with His love and give you a new heart. Just trust His process and see that He truly is the great physician!

Thank You Jesus. Thank You for Your amazing ways. Help us be wiling to go through Your “I&Ds.” Help us trust that even if it hurts at the time, it is for our good. I love You Jesus.

Rebekah M.

https://beingrebekah.com/2012/10/07/forgiveness-and-renewal-revisited/

Confident in His Love

Mar19

A few weeks ago one of the other Rebekahs wrote A Daddy’s Chastisement about how she was messing up and what the Lord did to pull her out of that situation. His chastisement, while difficult at the time, turned out to be exactly what she needed in order to fully restore a right relationship with Him. In the end that chastisement catapulted her into a great blessing.

This weekend I found myself in a similar situation where I was doing something totally out of God’s will and while I was doing wrong of my own choice, God still swept in to rescue me before I made a bad situation worse. With the help of some God-timed technological quirks, through my god-sister and godparents I was given my “way of escape” (1 Corinthians 10:13) to get out of the situation I was in. Like Rebekah M. felt when her parents found out what was going on with her, I was also mortified to have my godparents find out about the circumstance I had gotten myself into, but experiencing their love and acceptance at a time like that has shown me something I would not have seen otherwise.

My god-sister is in one state, my godparents live in a second state and I live in a third state. None of that stopped them from coming together to help me. Recently I confessed in my Rooted and Grounded post that I have difficulty believing that anyone could actually care for me and I struggle to trust God and accept His love. God used the situation this past weekend to show me that even when I’m messing up, even when I sin, even when I’m outside of His will, I am never outside of His love.

Would you believe my god-parents got up in the middle of the night and drove all the way to where I was in order to bring me to the safety of their home? Would you believe that my god-sister stayed on the phone with me until after two o’clock in the morning? She didn’t let me go until she knew her parents had arrived and I was safe in their care. When I checked my cell phone history to see how many phone calls they all made to try to reach me there were 36 (most of them went unanswered). Between my godparents and my god-sister there were 36 different attempts to contact me! The devil has lied to me; he tells me no one loves me, but people who don’t care just don’t do that. Someone acting out of an intent other than love might make one or two token attempts at contacting me, but only genuine care and concern can motivate someone to make dozens of phone calls in the wee hours of the morning.

Do you believe that God uses people to show His love for us?

Back at my godparents house they didn’t show any anger for dragging them out of bed in the middle of the night and they didn’t show judgment for the predicament I found myself in. They wrapped me in their love. My mind is completely blown thinking about it. They had every reason to treat me poorly, but they treated me with the love and mercy of the Lord.

My godfather wrote the following in an email to me today: “Amen to what you said about confidence in the love of God individually. We all should remind ourselves from time to time that Jesus died for MY sins and rose for MY living. He is always close to ME and He cares about ME, always. And it is not because I’m big headed (someone special), but just because HE is (His nature)!

Where I expected to feel the crush of condemnation, I instead felt the embrace of Jesus’ love. It amazes me how merciful our God is. He is constantly reaching out to us, seeking to restore us to a right relationship with Him. Over and over, I fail Him, and yet His mercy endures. His love offers us another chance. The Lord used the people in my life to show me that I am loved. Truly, despite all my fears and failures, God loves me.

Dear Reader,

If you’ve messed up, don’t give up! If you repent, God is faithful to forgive you! He loves you more than you know. He is reaching out to you, just as He reached out to me; in love. He was willing to suffer the cross for you, and He wants you to have confidence in His love for you as an individual. He doesn’t just love us collectively as part of humanity; He loves us individually – where we are right now, flaws and all. He is a wonderful, merciful, amazing God!

In His Love,

Rebekah L.

Guest Spot: MJ- “Unable to Pray”

Feb24

Editor’s Note: Our weekly guest spot is our effort to help our reading community connect with each other. MJ’s loss of prayer in her daily life is such a comment occurrence. Many of us have multiple things to juggle and falling out of daily prayer can happen so quietly that we don’t see it until it’s been months. Thank God for His wonderful mercy and grace that He just loves us and hugs us when we start communing with Him again! Read on for her journey- and thank you for sharing MJ! ~Rebekah M.

I did not pray for almost four months. I did not consciously decide to stop praying, I just did.I was pregnant with my first child, and at 28 weeks I was placed on complete and total bed-rest. I.e., Isolation City. I was very compliant but still I was induced at 36 weeks and my son spent the first week of his life in the NICU. Afterwards they told me not to take him out for two more months. Translation = four months of Isolation City.

You would think that with all that extra time I would have had dynamic prayer times, but somehow I could not bring myself to pray. Maybe I was angry at God because it had taken me so long to get pregnant and when I finally did, I got preeclampsia. All the other pregnant women I knew could eat whatever they wanted. But me, I am placed on a strict diet, and still gained 75 pounds; 14 of those pounds being gained in just one week. Maybe I was depressed from all the isolation. In reality the reason itself does not matter, it just matters that I stopped praying.

A few months later I began to pray again, little by little. At first I would just read aloud a prewritten prayer from “The Divine Hours”, a fixed-hour prayer book (link below). It would take me literally 3 minutes, and it really was a struggle to give those 3 minutes. But God took those 3 minutes and used them to draw me to Himself.

6 months after I gave birth, I decide to do a Bible Study on the book of Acts. If you have ever read the book of Acts, you can guess what happened next. Maybe I subconsciously knew and that is why I choose that particular study. But let’s just say the Holy Spirit woke me up!It was as if scales fell out of my eyes, and for the first time I was able to REALLY understand the Bible. The more I read, the more I craved to read the Word, I could not get enough.

I remember saying a prayer when I was 12 that went something like this: “Lord, no matter how far I go, no matter what I do, always bring me back to You, as my biggest desire is to follow You.” And God has been good on His end of the bargain. Once again He brought me back to Himself.

If you are foreign to the concept of personal prayer, don’t worry, God does not despise small beginnings. He will take what you have to give and draw you to Himself. He can use even a 3 minute prewritten prayer to transform a life.

“Of all the seeds it (the mustard seed) is the smallest, but when it has grown it is the largest of the garden herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and find shelter in its branches.” (Matthew 13:32)

Just Show Up

Jan11

“You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent. Lord my God, I will praise you forever.” ~Psalm 30:11-12

“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.” ~ 1 John 4:18

Well, God has done it again. I’ve posted earlier this week about needing to regain my focus. And about shame – how the farther you slide, the more tempting it is to hide your face from Christ who is so perfect and righteous.

And God has been doing a work in my heart today, telling me yet again how much He just desires us. He doesn’t desire the ideal of us, the ‘us’ that we’re supposed to be – flawless and righteous all the time. He desires us as we are; no matter how tainted, soiled, dirty we are, we are beautiful in the eyes of God. He knows our hearts and our struggles and our shortcomings even better than we do; He desires us anyway.

The Bible is very clear about being called to be holy and to live a righteous life and to not sin. And those directives are not to be discounted. We are indeed given the tools to be perfect, and we’re told to be. And we try to be. And that is great. That’s how it should be, in fact.

But for those times when that’s not how it is, when we are very much less than perfect and righteous and when we have in fact sinned, do we then hide our faces, knowing that we were told to behave a certain way and failed to do so? No we don’t. Because the punishment will never outweigh the love. And I’m pretty sure that our idea of ‘punishment’ is a worldly definition anyway, not necessarily a spiritual one. God isn’t about judgement and punishment. He is about growing us, and He’s patient with us until we get there. 2 Peter 3:9 even tells us, “The Lord is not slow in keeping His promise, as some understand slowness. Instead He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentence.” Because when you think about it, it’s not about following the rules. It’s about desiring Him so deeply and being so attuned and led by the Holy Spirit within that our desires are the same as His. It’s about getting our hearts to the place where we love what He loves and detest what He detests and desire what He desires. Getting to the place where things we’d call ‘sin’ aren’t even appealing to us anymore. It takes a lot of growing and a lot of shedding of oneself to get there.

So my prayer partner and I today laid our fear and burdens down, and sought Him together. We knew we might be in a little bit of trouble for losing perspective, but we needed Him. Hiding isn’t particularly helpful, by the way; if we muck up enough to lose focus in the first place, and that is with God’s guidance, we are most certainly going to muck up everything we try to do without Him. And so it was. And truth be told, we missed Him. So we chatted for a bit, bolstered each other, broke down a wall or two of self-denial and self-justification, and then we prayed. We sought God. We waited on Him. We worshiped Him. We loved Him, and we let Him love us again.

And what I found was not judgement or wrath, but rather a “I’ve missed you and I’ve had so much to tell you and I’m so glad you’re here”. As we were praying, both of us well aware of certain mistakes we’ve been making in our lives and simultaneously praying for others who we think needed it, something cool happened. I was praying over one of her friends, and instead of hearing her own friend’s name, she heard my friend Scott’s name. Scott has Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy and recently came home after a scary period of time in the hospital. Anyway, she corrected me. And I said, “what? I didn’t say Scott.” “You definitely did because I definitely heard his name.” “Nope definitely not, Scott’s doing fine and I haven’t really been thinking of him during this prayer time.” SO, rather than figure out whether I misspoke or she misheard, we decided that Scott had been thoroughly inserted into our conversation and so it was best to pray for him too. So we did. And it got a little bit intercessory. It was a little odd, but this certainly isn’t the first time this has happened to us, so we went with it and prayed for Scott. Hard. Then, about an hour later, my roommate (Scott’s best friend of 30 years) came home from work and said, “I have an update on Scott. He’s not doing well.”

So, we were called to pray without even knowing why. And this, my friends, is the God we serve. Not a God who seeks to punish for punishment’s sake, but a God who seeks to spiritually grow us. Sometimes that involves consequences; sometimes it involves mercy. Either way, we are never tarnished enough to dull His desire for us. His love is pure and His plan perfect. This time around, God sent us a very clear message: We don’t always have to be cleansed to come before Him; we don’t have to be perfect vessels to show up in His presence and be used. We just have to show up.

God bless!

~Rebekah A

He Shall be Called

Dec25

^“For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.” -Isaiah 9:6

Merry Christmas Everyone! Today is that Blessed day that we celebrate the wonderful coming of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! Although we know He likely wasn’t born on this particular day in history, we can use this day to reflect on the amazing gift He gave us. Our God loved us so much that He was willing to humble Himself and become a man. A little baby was born over 2000 years ago for the purpose of becoming a sacrifice for our sins so that we might be reconciled to HIM! It brings tears to my eyes just thinking about it. It’s all in Him. Life and death is all in His hands and He paid it all for us!

He is not just a high and lofty deity somewhere out in the heavens. He is the child that was born, the Son that was given. He is Wonderful. He is Counselor. He is the mighty God. He is the everlasting Father. He is the Prince of Peace! It’s all in HIM!! This baby was called for this purpose!

What purpose are you called for today? Be assured that God has a purpose for your life! If you live for Him and walk with Him, your life will have purpose. That purpose will bring glory to God!

Thank you, Jesus for giving me this amazing life. Thank you for your love and care. Most of all, thank you for your sacrifice. Thank you for loving sinful man so much that you gave yourself so that we might live. We are so blessed and I am moved with appreciation!

Much love,

Rebekah L.

Being Rebekah

A journey towards excellence for Christ

Archives

Prayer Monday: Purge Me

Restoration (Part III)

God’s Sorrow

The Lord Fights Our Battles Pt 2

Prayer Monday: The Prayer Wheel- Our Debts

Bitterness: A Spiritual Abscess

Confident in His Love

Guest Spot: MJ- “Unable to Pray”

Just Show Up

He Shall be Called