PREACHING TO MYSELF

My uncle Dr. Eugene Woodson, an ordained minister said to his brother, my father once, when he was delivering a recent sermon he was preaching to himself. I didn’t understand that comment then and found it particular odd being he belonged to a decent church and the pews were usually full when he preached.
Sometime later my former Pastor, Rev Michael Rouse spoke on how it was difficult to deliver a sermon one Sunday, because God was talking to him as well as the congregation.
Early this week, in a conversation with my spiritual younger sister Tai, she said she was praying for strength to do all she had to do. I told her not to pray for the strength to do what she wanted to do, but instead to pray for God to reveal what His plan and what it was He wanted her to do.
We often want God to make it easier to do what it is we want to do, when sometimes that’s not in His plan for us.
After hanging up the phone almost immediately I could hear God saying, “Did you pay attention to the words that just came out of your mouth?”
I was like ouch and thought back to the conversation again with my uncle and dad.
I looked at writing this blog, as God using me to get His message to others through me & writing/ sharing my testimonies. Which I still believe the case to be but what I missed is He was using me sometimes to preached to myself as much and sometimes more than others.
My question or thought of the day is when someone comes to you for advise or even when you dispense advise to others tat are troubled even when your are not asked,
Do You Listen To The Words That Are Coming Out Of Your Mouth? Does God having you preaching to yourself? And are you listening? In a soft still voice sometimes God uses you to preach to yourself!

Have a blessed day!

Why Do Good People Struggle?

Shall we indeed accept good from God

and shall we not accept adversity

-Job 2:10

As I have been trying my best to turn my life around and live as righteous as possible it seems the closer I get the most adversity I see, and the more trials and tribulations I seem to go through. In talking to other brothers who are in the same position as myself, you find out we are all going through it. In a few conversation someone always ask, I don't know why we are all suffering. We are trying to live right, what are we doing wrong?

I think at sometime or another we have all struggled with the ago old question why do good people struggle. We all know that God promise, but we wonder why must His people struggle.
That reminds me of Job, he lived right but suffered the lost of everything for a period of time, even Jesus the most righteous of any man walking the face of the earth suffered more than we can humanly imagine for our sins and so we might have everlasting life. Paul was beaten and thrown in jail for spreading God's word and wrote half the New Testament in jail.

In times like this it is easy to blame or be mad at God for what we consider not being there for us. But this is the time we need to align ourselves more with the word of God and have more faith. God is not obligated to give us answers, but He promises us His grace. God didn't explain to Job what He was doing but said the He could be trusted to do right (Job 38-42)

These may not be the answers we want, but they are the answers we need to help us live with the age-old question of suffering.- Dennis De Haan

While I still find myself temporarily asking myself that question (The flesh is still sometimes weak) I am learning more each day to be thankful for the trials and tribulations and the lessons and blessings that follow!

CLEANING HOUSE FOR 2007!!!

I dont know who wrote this but it came to me in an email and I just wanted to share it with all of you, let me know what you think....

Last Week I threw out Worrying,
it was getting old and in the way.It kept me from being me;
I couldn't do things God's way.I threw out a book on MY PAST
(Didn't have time to read it anyway).

Replaced it with NEW GOALS, started reading it today.
I threw out hate and bad memories,
(Remember how I treasured them so)?
Got me a NEW PHILOSOPHY too, threw out the one from long ago.

Brought in some new books too,
called I CAN, I WILL, AND I MUST.
Threw out I might, I think and I ought.
WOW, you should've seen the dust.

I ran across an OLD FRIEND, I hadn't talked to in a while.
His name is GOD the Father, and I really like His style.
He helped me to do some cleaning
and added some things Himself.
Like PRAYER, HOPE, FAITH and LOVE,
Yes I placed them right on the shelf.

I picked up this special thing
and placed it at the front door.
I FOUND IT- its called PEACE.
Nothing gets me down anymore.

Yes, I've got my house looking nice.
Looks good around the place.
For things like Worry and Trouble
there just isn't any space.

It's good to do a little house cleaning,
Get rid of the things on the shelf.
It sure makes things brighter;
maybe you should TRY IT YOURSELF.

BE BLESSED AND BE A BLESSING TO SOMEONE ELSE!!!!
May the Lord open the windows of heaven and pour you out a blessing that you will not have room enough to receive it all.
Malachi 3:10.

May the Lord bless you exceedingly abundantly above all you could ever hope for.
Philippians 4:19.

Hearing The Sermon Again!

As I started to write this entry in my blog, I realized I had written a very similar entry once or twice before. My family and I are going through I particularly hard time, right now. Maybe the hardest we have ever faced and it cause me to almost question my faith. My theme is no matter what God has in store for us, we will pray our way through and continue to praise His name. The problem with writing these very words was I was just about to be tested even more to see if I can walk it like I talk it!

I was reminded a story I read in my devotional “Our Daily Bread” where a man preached an impressive sermon seeking to be the pastor of a new church. Everyone loved it and voted for him to become their new pastor. They were a bit surprised when he preached the same sermon his first Sunday as their new pastor. They were even more surprised when he preached the same sermon his second and third week. So much so the leaders of the church met with the new pastor and questioned him. The pastor assured, “I know what I’m doing. When you start living out this sermon, I’ll go on to the next one.”

I revisit this theme again because, once again I found myself just short of giving up, feeling spiritually and emotional burned out. But the entry in Our Daily Bread reminded me sometimes God has to put us through the same test over and over until we finally past the test. He needs to preach the same sermon to us until we start ‘living out the sermon.’

This time the difference is my wife and I have pulled together and we are working together and not separately, which is no different then working against each other. Blocking the blessings God has for my family.

A young lady who calls me her spiritual big brother told me this morning, after hearing what our current situation was, that she was so excited for me. I was a little confused and asked her to explain and she said she was so excited because she knew that God is about to shower my family with blessings and elevate us to another level, because of my faith. God was using her to tell me what he had used me to preach to her when she was down, and went on to tell me the very words I told her when she was down.

To make a long story short my advice for all that read this today is this: A SERMON ISN’T COMPLETE UNTIL ITS PUT INTO PRACTICE! So I share this recurring theme with you once more, because like some of you out there, I needed to hear the sermon again!

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