***Quick Note***

I will have no computer access this weekend and will be unable to forward Daily Verses or Weekly Thoughts.  I pray that if you are celebrating Easter this weekend than your celebration may be blessed and filled with God's holy, loving presence.  I will email some belated thoughts late Sunday or early Monday.

Love through Christ,

Niki

Called To Live A Holy Life

I Thessalonians 4:7 "For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life."

 

We've all heard it..."No one ever said life would be easy"...and giving up all impurities is hard work!  However, how rewarding would it be to watch God work in our lives more and more as we let go of the things that separate us from Him?  We'll never be perfect, only God can accomplish that...but we can sure work hard to limit the bad choices we make, right?  My impurities seem endless when I forget that God's already forgiven me of them.  The ones I know I need to work on the most are able to be overcome when I re-shift my focus and let God take control of all of my life.  Have I gotten to that point in my life where I am living a holy life?  No, I'm not there yet, yet I think the first step in changing anything in our lives is to admit we need to change, the second step is to truly desire that change and the third step is to give the controls over to God and keep them in His hands.  He is calling us to lead a holy life, to dedicate our lives to Him and to His work...that is our purpose, that is what it's all about...not the hokey-pokey, not the bigger house or better job it is about living for Him and He is calling us to do so...He's given us the instruction manual, we just need to get in there and read, absorb and take action!  Are you with me?  Let's dive in together!  Please pray with me:

 

Heavenly Father,

We come to You in humble thankfulness for all You have given us.  Your grace, mercy and blessings overflow even though we will never come close to deserving them.  We repent this day of our sins, our impurities which separate us from You.  We ask that You forgive us these sins and cleanse ours souls from all impurities.  Please take control of our lives Lord and lead us to live a holy life for You.  Father we continually thank and praise You for our clergy. We ask that You may please keep them in Your blessing that they may continue to rightly teach us Your Word.  God we also ask that You please grant Your extraordinary protection and supernatural blessings to our service men and women who put their lives on the line every day to protect us from those who would harm us...please grant that Your favor may go before them and completely surround them daily.  Lord, we are fully aware that Your healing is the true and only healing that we need.  We've come to realize there are many who we love and cherish that are in special need of Your miraculous healing hand for physical, emotional and spiritual healing.  We come to You today and ask that You may grant Your healing to Summer, Sharon, Melissa, Morgan, Phyllis, Carolyn, Randy, Emily, Brenda, Mr & Mrs Jones, Darlene, Nancy, Fran, Rob, Cathy, Alex, Melissa, Benjamin, Michelle, Heidi and all those who we individually name to you now...  Please wrap them each in a Spiritual hug of Your comfort and peace.  Finally, we lift up to You Mike, Deanna and Lauren and ask that You please grant Mike & Deanna peace and hope as they await Lauren's birth and also please grant Lauren a safe arrival and a healthy, long life devoted to You.  We ask all these things may be done yet not according to our wants but according to Your will.  In Jesus name.  Amen. 

 

For those of you who are celebrating your holy week this week I wish you a week filled with the Spirit of God as you reflect on the last week of His life before the cross and a most blessed Palm Sunday.  As an Orthodox Christian my family and I will not celebrate this week as our church calendar works out a little differently for the Easter celebration.

 

Have a blessed weekend and week ahead!!

Love through Christ,

Niki

Need a Reminder? I do!

Psalm 3:3-4, 8 "But You are a shield around me, O Lord, my Glorious One, who lifts up my head.  To the Lord I cry aloud, and He answers me from His holy hill...From the Lord comes deliverance.  May Your blessing be on Your people."

 

I know sometimes I seem to be going back to the same type of message over and over...I do worry about sounding like a broken record.  However, then I think if I need to be reminded constantly that God is our deliverance, our shield and He is always with us through it all, then maybe {hopefully} you do not get tired of reading this...hopefully, you need to be reminded of this as well.  I think that is part of why it is said so many places and so many ways throughout His precious Word because He knows we are "weak" and in need of His help and His comforting presence.  I know too often a lot of us try to take on the world on our own and compared to us alone it's a big world and it can become quickly overwhelming.  But when we rely on our God, when we tell our problem, situation, etc. how big our God is and let Him take care of the rest than we can focus our energy on Him and on listening to Him for the right direction for our lives.  God will lift up our heads and bless us beyond our imaginations if we do not limit Him by having faith only in ourselves.  Please pray with me:

Dear Lord,

We know You will and do deliver us from all we encounter according to Your will.  We also know in our hearts that Your are always with us no matter where we go and no matter what we are going through.  Please continue to remind us that You will answer us, lift us up and bless us.  Father we continually thank and praise You for our clergy. We ask that You may please keep them in Your blessing that they may continue to rightly teach us Your Word.  God we also ask that You please grant Your extraordinary protection and supernatural blessings to our service men and women who put their lives on the line every day to protect us from those who would harm us...please grant that Your favormay go before them and completely surround them daily.  Lord, we are fully aware that Your healing is the true and only healing that we need.  We've come to realize there are many who we love and cherish that are in special need of Your miraculous healing hand for physical, emotional and spiritual healing.  We come to You today and ask that You may grant Your healing to Summer, Sharon, Melissa, Morgan, Phyllis, Carolyn, Randy, Emily, Brenda, Sheila, Mr & Mrs Jones, Darlene, Brandy's Mom, Nancy, Fran, Rob, Cathy, Alex, Melissa, Benjamin, The Wood family and all those who we individually name to you now...  Please wrap them each in a Spiritual hug of Your comfort and peace.  Finally, we lift up to You Mike, Deanna and Lauren and ask that You please grant Mike & Deanna peace and hope as they await Lauren's birth and also please grant Lauren a safe arrival and a healthy, long life devoted to You.  We ask all these things may be done yet not according to our wants but according to Your will.  In Jesus name.  Amen. 

Have a blessed week ahead!

Love through Christ,

Niki

Priceless Sacrifice

John 3:16--17 "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.  For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through Him."

 

I think the verse John 3:16 holds a special place in most of our hearts, we've probably heard it hundreds of times since our first experience with Christ.  I really like reading it together with the 17th verse though because here it really reinforces the concept that He takes us just as we are.  God does not want to condemn us and His new blood covenant with us is through the blood of His Lamb, His one and only Son, and all He asks from us is to believe.  Okay, so when we believe than we usually want to act in a more pleasing way for God, we acknowledge that we need to repent of our wicked ways so He may forgive us our sins and wash us clean by the power of that blood...but God has really done all the work, it is not work that makes us His children, it is faith.  Faith that He loved us, His adopted and chosen people, enough to send His one and only Son to suffer and die as a man so that we may all be reunited with Him in heaven when He calls us home.  Faith that He has a plan to prosper our lives and give us a hope and a future in Him.  Faith that His Son died on that cross to saves us from certain death without condemnation.  Faith that no matter how hard we fall away He will always accept our humble repentance and fold us back into His arms as He washes our sins away and wipes the slate clean so that we can start anew, blameless as His Lamb.  This amazing gift driven by a love deeper than we can fathom is the ultimate "MasterCard commercial"...Priceless!  I cannot help but get excited and humbled all over again every time I read these verses.  It reignites my faith over and over again to know that God does not condemn me, He is saddened by my mistakes but He has already taken care of them and He sees me as His new creation all over again when I repent and believe.  Please join me in prayer:

 

Dear Heavenly Father,

Thank You for Your ultimate sacrifice, Your one and only, blameless Son.  Thank You for the grace of salvation through Him and forgiveness by His blood.  We truly praise Your holy name for this incomprehensible love and mercy that You have given to us.  Please help us to remember that You did this solely from that love and not to condemn us but to save us.  Please also help us to remember that if we feel like we are falling away from You and Your perfect plan for our lives that we need to come to You in complete repentance so that You can wash us clean in the blood of the Lamb.  Lord, we are continually thankful for those You have blessed to lead us in our spiritual journeys, our priests and clergy.  Please persevere Your favor and guidance in their lives so that they may rightly maintain the path of leading us to You.  God, may You please also remember those who serve us in the military, police, fire rescue and armed forces.  They offer protection to us in our times of need and we pray that You daily grant them Your supernatural protection.  Father You are the ultimate healer and Your healing is the only true healing.  We know many who need Your healing, spiritually, physically and emotionally, please grant this especially to Summer, Sharon, Melissa, Morgan, Phyllis, Carolyn, Randy, Emily, Brenda, Sheila, Mr & Mrs Jones, Darlene, Brandy's Mom, Nancy, Fran, Rob, Cathy, Alex, Melissa, Benjamin and all those who we individually name to you now... Please wrap them each in a Spiritual hug of Your comfort and peace allowing them rest in Your strong and loving arms.  Finally, we lift up to You Mike, Deanna and Lauren and ask that You please grant Mike & Deanna peace and hope as they await Lauren's birth and also please grant Lauren a safe arrival and a healthy, long life devoted to You.  We ask all these things may be done yet not according to our will rather be it done according to Yours.  In Jesus name.  Amen. 

 

Love through Christ,

Niki

Our Seriously Secure Anchor

I want to thank you each for all of your prayers and patience as I have not been able to get to all this typing lately.  I am still working with only 9 digits however I have gotten somewhat better at it.  For those who did not know what had happened, two weeks ago, I slammed my thumb in our mini vault at work and they had to take me to the ER for x-rays and stitches on my right thumb which I had sliced open pretty good...I was a mess, in shock and close to hyper ventilating but thank the good Lord it was not worse...the doctor said the skin was cut down to the tissue but it did not cut into the tissue, did not hit a nerve and missed the nail bed!   I went home that Thursday afternoon (the 7th) and took the antibiotics and pain killers and laid out on the couch with my hand elevated for two or three days straight and went back to work last Monday (the 11th).   I got the stitches out on this past Monday (18th).  The outer skin has died and so I will need to keep it very clean while new skin grows into its place and the old sloughs off.  It is still a bit sensitive and since I work with money all day I need to keep it covered well but in time it will heal.  Again, I thank you for your prayers, they mean a lot to me and to my family.

 

Hebrews 6:19 "We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure.  It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain." 

 

This second half of chapter 6 is talking about God's promises.  Since I spent many of my summers growing up around boats I love the comparison to an anchor here!  I can really grasp this concept...when you wish to stop the boat and just stay put where you are, whether it be to jump off the back and swim around or maybe to "park" in the evening din for a 4th of July fireworks show, boaters will keep an anchor to secure their vessel to the bottom of the ocean or lake.  A really good anchor will hold you securely even in somewhat tumultuous waters, a lot like how God holds us securely even as the world thrashes around us.  The devil may come upon us as giant wave after giant wave but if we have our hope secured in God then our souls are anchored firm and secure.  The next time things look bleek, it seems a storm has snuck up on you and you can't make it back to shore where things are calmer then remember to set your hope anchor in God and feel Him hold you firmly and securely.  He may not always deliver us when we want deliverance however He will always cling tight to us.  Our good Lord will not forsake us, He has promised He will always be with us and we can rely on His promises even more surely than boaters can rely on their anchors.  Please join me in prayer:

 

Dearest heavenly Father,

We thank You for Your secure promises which anchor our souls in the hope and knowledge that You are always with us.  Please help us to always remember that You are our anchor and You will hold onto us even when we've let go of You.  Father we continually thank and praise You for our clergy. We ask that You may please keep them in Your blessing that they may continue to rightly teach us Your Word.  God we also ask that You please grant Your extraordinary protection and supernatural blessings to our service men and women who put their lives on the line every day to protect us from those who would harm us...please grant that Your favor may go before them and completely surround them daily.  Lord, we are fully aware that Your healing is the true and only healing that we need.  We've come to realize there are many who we love and cherish that are in special need of Your miraculous healing hand.  We come to You today and ask that You may grant Your healing to Summer, Sharon, Melissa, Morgan, Phyllis, Carolyn, Randy, Emily, Brenda, Sheila, Mr & Mrs Jones, Darlene, Brandy's Mom, Nancy and to all those we individually name to You in our hearts now.   Please wrap them each in a Spiritual hug of Your comfort and peace.  Finally, we lift up to You Mike, Deanna and Lauren and ask that You please grant Mike & Deanna peace and hope as they await Lauren's birth and also please grant Lauren a safe arrival and a healthy, long life devoted to You.  We ask all these things may be done yet not according to our wants but according to Your will.  In Jesus name.  Amen. 

Perspective

 

Thank you all for your patience with me - I was sick the past several days and spent a better portion of them in bed...I appreciate you and thought often of you praying that you would not miss my messages too much.

 

Colossians 3:17 "And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him."

 

Sometimes all we need is a new perspective...if we are doing something "because we have to" then we may resent it and grudge our way through it.  But if we do all things in the name of the Lord Jesus than it's no longer about us and this new perspective can help us smile through work, chores, traffic or any other number of things we do every day.

 

Dear Lord,  Thank You for giving us the ultimate perspective on life and all that we do day in and day out.  Please help us to keep You in mind as we accomplish tasks and help us to remember to do all things in Your name and to Your glory.  Amen.

Choosing To Run A Good Race

Galatians 5:7-9 "You were running a good race.  Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth?  That kind of persuasion does not come from the One who calls you. "A little yeast works through the whole batch of dough.""

 

As much as we would love for happiness and hope to be the most contagious attitudes, the sad truth is that in many cases negativity and defeat can be much more lethal.  It is a hard task to be the positive one who infects an atmosphere, especially if we put that load on our own shoulders.  However, if we remember that with our Lord all things are possible that burden becomes a little lighter...and then if we devote ourselves to God and keep Him at the forefront of our minds, hearts and soul through the whole day it becomes possible for us to cut in on the negativity and become the ray of Son-shine in the midst of those around us.  If we let ourselves take "it all" on ourselves then it is most likely that we will no longer be running a good race.  But when we choose to let God guide us, to let God persuade our attitudes than I think we may just find ourselves being good yeast than can and will work its way through the dough of those surrounding us.  Making choices like this are essential to growing with God and delighting in His ways.  Making choices like this will help us to serve God and follow His path for our lives.  On the contrary, if we make the wrong choice, we may not only find ourselves being cut in on and disobeying the truth but we may eventually even become part of the problem.  I have learned this lesson the hard way!  But I challenge you to join me and making a new start every day and choosing to let God persuade you to getting back on track, running a good race and being positive "yeast."  Please join me in prayer:

 

Dearest Father,

We come to You and offer our thanks for Your positive persuasion in our lives.  We praise Your holy name for all You do is amazing and Your grace and mercy are beyond our full comprehension.  We ask You today dear Lord to please guide our lives, our footsteps, our choices and our attitudes so that through Your power and love we may inspire hopeful attitudes in those around us and that Your Son may shine through us.  Father we want to continually thank and praise You for our clergy and ask that You may please keep them in Your blessing that they may continue to rightly teach us Your ways.  Lord we ask that You please grant special protection and blessings to those who put their lives on the line every day to protect us from those who would harm us...please grant that Your favor may go before and completely surround our troops and our service men and women.  God we are in constant reminder that Your healing is the true and only healing that we need, we realize there are many who we love and cherish that are in special need of Your miraculous healing hand, we come to You today and ask that You may grant this healing to Summer, Sharon, Melissa, Morgan, Phyllis, Carolyn, Randy, Emily, Brenda, Sheila, Mr & Mrs Jones, Darlene, Brandy's Mom, Nancy and to all those we individually name to You in our hearts now.   Please wrap them each in a Spiritual hug of Your comfort and peace.  Finally, we lift up to You Mike, Deanna and Lauren and ask that You please grant Mike & Deanna peace and hope as they await Lauren's birth and also please grant Lauren a safe arrival and a healthy, long life devoted to You.  We ask all these things may be done according to Your will and in Jesus name.  Amen. 

 

Have a blessed weekend and week ahead!

Love through Christ,

Niki