How Do You Use Your Tongue?

The Tongue: 

A Fighting Sword or 

A Word of Encouragement?

Proverbs 12:22 (NIV)

²² The Lord detests lying lips,
    but he delights in people who are trustworthy.

We’re over the top sometimes when we speak.

Just keep it simple and tell the truth.

When we distort the truth by a deceitful tongue, a flattering tongue, a half-truth tongue or an exaggeration tongue, we are not putting our faith in God.

Sometimes the truth is brutal.  But you can deny the brutal truth when the facts line up.
Some things are better "unsaid" than "said."  If you have to exaggerate, flatter, lie or deceive; then it's not worth being in the atmosphere.

For whatever the reason we choose to lie, know that God is not pleased with lying practices.

God is a God of truth.  Just speak the truth.

Truth is freedom.  Truth is confidence.  Truth is integrity.  Truth pleases God, our Father.

30 Days to Taming Your Tongue: What You Say (and Don't Say) Can Improve Your Relationships

By: Deborah Smith Pegues

Just Get Through It...Glory is Victory!

Glory Awaits...Just Get Through It!

2 Corinthians 4:17 NIV
For our light affliction, which is just for a moment,
Is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.

Trouble doesn’t last always.
Count each set back as a set up for God to push you into your purpose.
God has greater for us and satan doesn’t want us to have it.
It’s easier for satan to get into our minds and permeate thoughts of negativity, sadness, ugliness to distract us from our faith in God.
But, stand on the promises of God.  See His hand at work. 
Pray for understanding and discernment of what you’re going through.
Don’t let afflictions overshadow your affirmations of abundant living.
Greater is our reward from THE ONE who holds our future in His hands.

Glory is victory.

COURAGE IN THE SPIRIT OF EXCELLENCE

COURAGE IN THE SPIRIT OF EXCELLENCE

Colossians 3:23 ESV

Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not men

Galatians 3:28  ESV

There is neither Jew or Gentile, there is neither slave or free, there is no male or female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.     

Jesus Christ was diligent and dedicated to the task God assigned him.  He did so with valor and obedience.  Despite the haters, naysayers and the scornful, He knew that he had work to do.  He was sent to save sinners from their sins.  He was sent to give the gift of salvation.  He was sent to offer repentance.  He was sent to offer hope and faith to believers.

In remembering Dr. King, his legacy and his fight for justice, know that the climate of division, hatred, racism and injustice in which we live today is not what Jesus stood for.  It's not what Dr. King fought for.  It's not what Jesus lived for.  

Live a life that upholds the principles of The Lord, let your work ethics depict Colossians 3:23 and let your deeds depict 

Galatians 3:28. 

TO BE REAL

GOT TO BE REAL

Matthew 15:1-3; 7-9 NIV

Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked,

 ² “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”

³ Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition?

⁷ You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:

⁸ “‘These people honor me with their lips,
    but their hearts are far from me.
⁹ They worship me in vain;
    their teachings are merely human rules.’^[c]”

Psalm 42:1-2 NIV

¹ As the deer pants for streams of water,
    so my soul pants for you, my God.
² My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
    When can I go and meet with God?

 

Authenticity.  God is looking for real people, real saints and real Christians today.

Check your heart.  Do you really have a heart for God and the things of God?

Are you just giving lip service, but your heart believes and behaves differently?

You have a chance to start anew, reflect and refresh.

What God has for us is better than what we can give ourselves.

Ask God to search your heart and help you be real.

HE'S A KEEPER

MY HELP COMES FROM THE LORD

Psalm 121:1-2 (NKJV)

I will lift up my eyes to the hills—

From whence comes my help?

My help comes from the Lord,

Who made heaven and earth.

Just in case you don’t know the Lord, know that He is our almighty helper and keeper.

In this new year, this new season, we have another opportunity to get right with God.

Get to know Him.  Get to know His works. 

Give reverence to His sovereignty in all things.

Start with a new mindset and make yourself available to what God is capable of doing in your life. 

Keep these lyrics in your heart…“Lord, whatever you’re doing in this season, don’t do it without me.”  I want to be under your covering, your anointing, your blessings and your love.

A NEW THING

A NEW THING!

Isaiah 43:18-19  NIV

¹⁸ “Forget the former things;
    do not dwell on the past.
¹⁹ See, I am doing a new thing!
    Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
    and streams in the wasteland.

Trust God to do what you cannot do. He is able.

Embark upon a new year with gratitude and expectation.

Be grateful for 2018 and its experience.  Be watchful for what’s about to come in 2019.

God is doing a new thing, raising up new leaders,

moving you into new networks, placing the right people in your path, bringing forth  better ideas,

making you stronger in your faith and elevating the unexpected. 

He’s making a way out of no way…making a way out of unknown ways.

He’s bringing things to past that we haven’t conceived in our thoughts, because we don’t have the capacity to do so.

All for His glory.

THE CRACKED POT

http://www.inspirationpeak.com/cgi-bin/stories.cgi?record=20

Happy New Year 2019!

BLESSED AND HIGHLY FAVORED

HIGHLY FAVORED

By Denise Delaine

Luke 1:26-28 KJV

Being Highly Favored:  To be raised from a lowly estate to a place of honour 

In the sixth month, God sent the angel Gabriel to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin pledged in marriage to a man named Joseph, who was of the house of David. And the virgin’s name was Mary. The angel appeared to her and said, “Greetings, you who are highly favored! The Lord is with you.”

Luke 1:26-28

Recently, while attendin worship service at Abyssinian Church in Harlem, the pastor shared the familiar story in Luke 1 regarding the angels appearing to Mary and Joseph and their subsequent marriage.  In those days,  women did not have status such as we have today nor was it acceptable as it is today to have a child out of wedlock.  Yet, God orchestrated every activity unimaginable to man to carry out His divine plan for the Son of God to be born through a young unmarried virgin.  In Luke 1, we see what was normally frowned upon as a woman, God has now established respect that women deserve. Here, we see God also setting the stage for us.

Consider how God has raised us from a lowly estate as an individual woman and as a group of women. And that we have discovered God was in the midst of it all. The songstress, Betty Wright said in a song, “Think back!” Compare your childhood, teenage, or young adult years with where you are today spiritually, mentally, physically, economically, educationally, and/or professionally. Consider major accomplishments of women in our society and the hurdles they had to overcome to get there.  Now, do you feel highly favored? If so, sing the song, or recite the lyrics, or write it in a journal, “Look where He has brought me from. He brought me out of darkness, into the marvellous light. Look where He brought me from!”

Let us first encourage ourselves and then one to another in having the favor of God in our lives. And let us remind one another, regardless of where we are or what is happening to us or around us, as the Angel said unto Mary, it also applies to us, “The LORD is with you!”

Soror Rosa Denise Delaine