Getting ahead of God!

The first school year came to a close. It had been a good year and God had provided and helped me with the students in my class. As I began to think about the summer months I had no idea what I was going to do. As it turned out I did not get a paycheck during summer, so I needed to find a summer job and quick! Unfortunately very few companies will hire you for 10 weeks and with the recession in full swing I was totally panicked!

I had spoken to a couple people on campus and told them to let me know if they heard of anyone hiring. One of my friends said, "he knew someone but was unsure of when the job would be available." I had a couple students who needed tutoring a few times a week so I started doing that, this gave me about $100 a week income (try living on that for very long), talk about stretching your money. Some of the weeks they would forget to pay or would cancel, so money I would plan on showed up late or not at all.

I had a couple people give me their tithes during this time, they said they felt the Lord would want them to help one of His own when they were in a tight spot. This money helped me stay caught up. I began to get desperate and didn't know what to do. I called the school and asked them if they had anything that I could do. They did......and now I know why the job was available. I had to call people to update the address list the school had on file, approximately 10,000 families. It was the most boring job I have ever had. A day after I started the job, I got the call that the summer job I had been wanting was now available and I could start immediately. If I would have just waited patiently on the Lord, I wouldn't now have 2 jobs!

As much as I am not someone to back out on something, I did the most uncomfortable thing in the world and quit the calling job. My impatience put me in a difficult, uncomfortable situation, all because I was not patient enough to wait for the Lord to provide. I found out from that specific situation to WAIT, the Lord always has a plan and each summer since He has provided. I have been able to keep that summer job even through the school year.

God has something huge planned for me, but if I do now what I did back then and try to "fix it" myself He'll have to come behind me and correct my mistakes. I have to learn to let my impatience not take over His master plan. If you're wondering if that job, spouse, money or whatever your need is will be coming in.....remember God really doesn't need your help to take care of it, He only needs your willingness to wait and be obedient in what He wants for your life!


Isiah 30:41 "But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint."

Learning how to pray

It's a difficult thing when a relationship ends, whether it be a spouse, friend, family member, co-workers, whatever the case it's never easy just to walk away from people and forget them. My first year at GBS God was trying to show me that I needed to put all my trust in Him. If I needed something financially, I needed to take it to Him. If I needed a friend, I needed to let Him know. When Montessa and I weren't seeing eye to eye, I had to leave the problem with Him.

This is a very difficult lesson to learn, especially for me. I'm a very controlling person. I like to have complete control of situations, my motto, "If you want something done right, do it yourself." Well I'll be the first to admit, that's not a good motto. At some point we will always need someone, we were placed here to help each other and God uses people to answer prayers. However, I believe there are times in our lives when God wants us to F.R.O.G. (Fully Rely On God)!

Over the months I would come to Him with issues or problems, like Lord, how am I gonna afford Christmas or my car insurance is due and I don't have the money. Lord I really want Montessa biological mother to get saved, she needs to know what it's like to serve you. Whatever my issue for the moment I was forced to take it to God. I shouldn't be surprised, but He came through every time.

I was thinking the other day about those times and my times as a Christian. All the prayers God has answered. I was talking to a friend and told him, "Every thing I have ever truly prayed for and needed, God has provided, honestly all my wants as well." He couldn't believe it, but it's true. I have had to trust Him in every aspect in my life.....financially, emotionally, physically, spiritually, and a lot of times even when I was lonely and I felt nobody else in the world cared. Now don't go getting all sad for me, I don't feel that way often and when I do I have learned to take it Jesus. He is the one person I can always go to, even when no physical human being is around.

This has helped me over the years to truly and honestly take the scripture, "Pray without ceasing",1 Thessalonians 5:17, to heart. I tell my students I pray all day, I'm constantly talking to God, even when they wouldn't suspect it. I believe that's what He wants from us, even before telling a friend about our problem, He wants us to tell Him.

It's not an easy thing to learn to pray, I remember growing up and even into my adulthood I used to pray the, "Now I lay me down to sleep, prayer", you know it. Throughout my last few years as a Christian I have really started learning how to pray, I believe God is honoring my prayers because when I pray about it I believe He will take care of it because He has never failed me!

Are you trusting Him for all of your needs, or are you trying to control the situation before handing it off to Him to have to fix what you messed up? If it's given to Him first it will always be done the right way, the first time, God doesn't make mistakes!

Really Lord???

After returning home from Belize I was heading off to God's Bible School and College. I was so excited and looking forward to what was planned for the year, then I remembered, I only know 3 people at the school. My daughter and my pastor's wife Melissa who was also a teacher at the school (and I didn't even know her very well, I had just started attending their church)and Justin who referred me to the school in the first place, but I rarely saw him.

The first few weeks were an adjustment, new home, new employer, new way of living (in a fishbowl) and trying to stay out of Montessa's way so she could actually be a college student without mommy following her around.

I'm gonna be very honest here, by the end of the first month, I HATED IT!! I started questioning everything I thought I knew, what God's plans were for me and I felt alone and isolated. I felt like an 18 year old who dropped off in a foreign land and told to deal with it and make the best of it. Honestly, I was trying but nothing seemed to work. I started spending my weekends at my mom's house just so I didn't have to be on campus. I didn't know anyone real well and it was like walking into a new school as a kid and having to make friends all over. It was already a well oiled machine, these people didn't know me or anything about me and as a side note, I'm really bad at small talk. I find it difficult to just talk to people I don't know.

Again, God was trying to show me I needed to rely on Him and not myself. He always has a bigger plan than we can imagine. I remember praying one night that He would have to help me because as is, I wasn't going to make it. I went to school the next morning and asked Melissa to pray for me because I was miserable. For some reason, I don't know why it was easier to start my life over in Belize than it was just 40 minutes from my hometown.

Like the movie, Field of Dreams....you remember it, the one with Kevin Costner and the baseball players, "If you build it they will come." Well God said, "If you ask I will send you some friends" and He did! Answering prayers not only for me, but also the people He sent into my life at the time. It's all about timing, again I had to be reminded it's never my time, it's God's.

Should I stay or should I go?

Have you ever had a major decision to make and really no matter what happened you would be fine with the outcome? After being in Belize for about 5 months I started feeling like I needed to return to America. The problem was, come back to what? I didn't really have anything in America but my family. I love them all dearly but starting over completely, again, was not something I relished.

As the school year started to come to an end I felt like my purpose for being in Belize was accomplished. I began praying because I knew I didn't want to come home and work in a secular job,doing the same old, same old. My prayer was for the Lord to open up a job position at God's Bible School and College for me. If I was offered a position to teach there, then I would know for sure I was supposed to go back home.

I emailed the principal I had interviewed with in January and just asked him to keep me in mind if any positions opened up. He emailed me back a few days later and told me he had a teaching position for me for the next school year, if I was interested. I WAS INTERESTED! My prayer had been answered! I accepted the position and we purchased our plan tickets. Then it happened! Just when life is moving along smooth a big ole slap in the face. He contacted me again apologizing that my position had been given to someone else. Apparently, there was a lack of communication and two people were hiring someone for the same position. UGH!!! This was totally a test of my faith.

I came back to the apartment and told Aunt Carol what had happened and that I didn't have a position anymore. She said, "We are going home, one way or another you will be working for God's Bible School." She was right, within a few days I received another email stating the issue had been resolved and my position was available. I was on my way back to America.

God works in such mysterious ways. We left Belize headed back for America at the beginning of July, our time in Belize had been fulfilled. God had used us for the purpose we were sent for.

Sometimes our plans are long-term and Gods are short-term. We never know what He has in store of us, it's not our job to figure it out. It's only our job to do what He asks of us and let Him work our lives out, as He see fits!

What is a blessing?

Have you ever stopped to consider what a "blessing" actually is? A faithful man shall abound with blessings: but he that maketh haste to be rich shall not be innocent. Proverbs 28:20. All to often in our Christian world today people tend to think of a real blessing only in the sense of financial. How many times have we heard, "Oh the Lord blessed me with a little extra money." I'm not saying that blessings can't be monetary, but I would venture to guess the blessings the Lord really wants us to have are spiritual. Those things that help us or another person grow.

While in Belize I had a real burden for the teenagers there. Most of them had been in the school for many years. They were from all different religious backgrounds, Catholic, Seventh Day Adventist and so on. They had heard many different things throughout their life and really were a little confused. They were good kids and for the most part really wanted to do the right thing. I found out quickly they were just a little unsure of how to go about giving their lives to God.

I had one student in particular that I had a heavy burden for. I had a burden for them all but this one was different. I prayed consistently for him to give his life to the Lord. It seemed the more I prayed the more dead set against it he was. He would say, "Oh, don't waste your prayers on me Miss, I have no interest in being a Christian." It would break my heart knowing that God had this master plan for this young man and he just couldn't see it. For months I'd pray and we would talk to him about the Lord, but to no avail. Sometimes children get things in their head that make them think that they have done so much wrong God could never forgive them. If He did forgive them, they would have to go make up to everyone they had ever wronged and have their forgiveness also. Unfortunately, that's how this young man felt.

I kept trying to think of ways to let the teenagers know that God's forgiveness was all we needed. To take our sins to Jesus and ask Him to forgive us, for some reason it was almost as if that was too easy and they didn't really trust that was all it took. Then it dawned on me one evening, the song by Casting Crowns, East to West. The words are so profound in that song, God cast our sins as far as the East is to the West, forgiven and forgotten. I brought the words to that song to Sunday school on one Sunday morning and had the children read them out loud. Then we talked about what they really meant.

Honestly, I can't really remember the exact time frame but at some point after the young man asked me to pray that the Lord would give him a desire to give his life over to him. Of course, I immediately went home and Aunt Carol and I prayed for him. God is so very faithful, before leaving Belize 4 of my teenagers gave their heart to Christ. To this day, 3 years later, they are all still serving Him and very soon will be attending Bible Colleges in the United States.

The young man who didn't want me to pray for him because he had his own plans for his life, he wanted to be a pilot, will be attending college this fall and getting his degree in Missionary Aviation. To God be the glory!

I say all that to say this, blessings in the form of money will NEVER top spiritual blessings for me and shouldn't for any Christian! Now I'm not going to turn away any money the Lord gives me, but it's not what keeps me going. The fact that I can influence a young person to turn their life over to Christ will always be more of a motivation and blessing for me!

God's healing power

We all have a purpose in this life and sometimes it's a little difficult to figure out what it is. While in Belize I was really trying to figure that out. The funny thing is we don't see ourselves as others see us. One of the things I grab a hold of early on in my Christian walk was the faith that God still wants to heal us. Whether from heartache or physical pain.

I had read some older books about true stories of God healing people of physical illness. One that I would suggest is "Healing Divine", it's about 100 years old, however the stories people tell are truly powerful. I also did a lot of studying on the topic in the Bible. So my belief in healing grew. Over the first couple years of my Christian walk whenever I would get sick, (which wasn't often), I would have the church pray over me and God would heal me. Now that being said, I didn't usually ask for prayer unless it was something that I would have gone to the doctor for.

The evening before I left for Belize I broke my toe. My mom tried to wrap it and the pain was so unbearable when she touched it I screamed. I know that there is not much a doctor or hospital could do for a broken toe. All I could keep thinking was how was I going to travel all that distance the next day with a broken toe. Later that evening while I was lying in bed it hit me, have Aunt Carol pray over it. So I called for her and asked her to pray over my toe. She laughed and said, "I was wondering how long it was going to take you to ask." The next morning I woke up with no pain or swelling in my foot, I was completely healed.

On another occasion while in Belize, I was woken up at 2 a.m. with the worst pain ever in my side. I had never felt that type of pain and didn't know what it was. I was crying horribly and no matter how I laid, it would not go away. I didn't want to wake Aunt Carol up because it was so late, I really feel like the Lord spoke to me and told me to wake her up to pray. I argued back and forth with Him in my head because I thought it was too late to wake her. Finally, I could not take the pain anymore, I grabbed my little bottle of oil I had purchased in Israel and went in and woke her up. Through my sobs I told her what was happening and asked her to pray for me. She anointed me, half asleep and prayed, then I went back to my bedroom. I feel asleep immediately, the next morning I woke up with no pain. She said she had laid there listening for me because I had been crying so badly, but never heard me after I went back to my bedroom. A few years later that same pain returned and this time I recognized it, I had a kidney stone. God took complete care of me in that situation as well.

The reason I give you my life examples is because while in Belize God used our belief in healing to teach others. Really He used Aunt Carol, she has a much stronger faith than I do when it comes to God's power to heal. Sister Wade, the wife of the principal had been dealing with cancer for a few years. She was only able to work for a couple hours without needing rest. She was only in her forties. She was on a regimen of natural medications and diet which eased some of her pain, but still did not take care of the cancer. She had also had surgery at one time that didn't cure it. Aunt Carol did a lot of things in Belize, but the real reason God sent her was to teach Sister and Brother Wade about the power of healing. Sister Wade was anointed by the church and prayed for and she was healed! Her children to this day have written letters of how God healed their mother and how well she is doing, she is even working in the school now. Junior their youngest said,"if we came to Belize for no other reason it was for his mother to be healed."

I understand that it's not easy to believe God still heals today, but there are too many people who truly experience His healing power and not enough talking about it. It's not what we believe in our head. Lets face it, God can do anything, but it's what we believe in our hearts, "will He heal me!" That's what we have to believe, that He will heal. Don't take my word for it or even the stories I've told, test God. If you have a relationship with Him, He will show you what He can do. Just believe in your heart that what His word says is true. In James 5:13-15 God's word says this about what we have to do to be healed. "Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms. Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him."

A Humble Heart Will Do Wonders

Have you ever felt like you really need to speak to someone about how you have treated them? You don't understand why they just don't respect you. Yet when you really think about it do you give them the same respect you're wanting from them? I found out that respect is not always deserved, it must be earned, especially when we aren't doing our part in respecting the other person.

While teaching in Belize I had a young man who I would literally pray would not be at school on some days. He was such a handful and drove me insane quite often. This in turn caused me to be very short and impatient with him. On one occasion out of pure disrespect he ate the detention slip I had given him in front of me and the entire student body.

This particular young man was Leroy. He was a 14 year old boy, who lived in a not so caring home. One evening while at home the Lord clearly spoke to me and told me, "You will not win him until you apologize." I was so taken aback, I didn't feel I had anything to apologize for, but the words were spoken again. I told the Lord I would apologize the next day. The day came and went and I didn't apologize. Over the weekend I was feeling very overwhelmed in my spirit because I had not done what I told the Lord I would do. So I decided on Sunday evening the first thing in the morning Monday I would talk to Leroy. Would you know it Monday came and Leroy did not show up for school. As a matter of fact, he was very ill, he had a very serious kidney problem that he could die from. He had been taken to the hospital on Sunday with a 102 fever and an infection in his kidney. I immediately thought he could die and I would not have been able to apologize to him, although I was still unsure as to what I was apologizing for. I prayed night and day for him to return to school and each day he didn't show up. He was not in a hospital that I could go visit either due to the location.

After many days I was so upset, I began begging the Lord to help him to get better so that I might be able to speak to him. A week later he walked into the school building. I had never been so happy to see him in my life! I jumped up from my desk and ran over and hugged him and told him, "I was happy for him to be back." All the while he was looking at me as though I had lost my mind. I let him settle into his day and at lunch I called him outside. I proceeded to tell him my story and how the Lord had spoken to me and I needed to apologize and at that moment the Lord told me what for, it was as if a light bulb went off in my head. I cried and asked him to forgive me because my behavior was no better than his. I would allow myself to get upset with him and be just as disrespectful to him as I felt he was to me. I spoke to him about his spiritual and physical well being. I told him I loved him and from that point on I would be treating him with a different attitude. He never looked at me but accepted my apology and went on his way.

God truly works in mysterious ways. From that day on I never had another problem out of Leroy. He would bring me mango's from his mango tree (they are my favorite) and always treated me with utmost respect. He is one of the many students I will never forget. I learned a valuable lesson from him that semester about respect and how to obtain it. As far as I am aware Leroy has not given his heart to the Lord and I'm not sure what is going on with his health. I just pray the Lord will continue to work with him and not give up on him till He has won him over.

I do not tell you this so that you might see where I lack but so that you might see that the Lord can humble even the teacher to the student for His glory alone. Is there someone you need to humble yourself before? If you haven't already humbled yourself to Christ, that would be the first place to start. He will help you with anyone else from that point on.

"Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven." Matthew 18:4