Have you ever reached a point in your life where you’ve hit the end of the road? The point where you literally have to choose to step out in faith and walk on water! Well I’ve hit it! And it’s scary at first but amazing and exhilarating to say the least. What’s so scary yet amazing is that this is the point where you completely give yourself over to God because it is only by His power alone that we can stand. It takes a lot of trust and courage to get to this point because Love is so awesome that we can feel afraid to approach Him. In our human brokenness it is easy to shy away from Love yet Love is our only way to life and freedom. We need Love in every way! Let me encourage you today… No matter what you may be facing currently in your life, you are not alone! You are loved and loved beyond measure! Don’t give up hope! Breakthroughs are on the way and closer than you think.
Let me pray for you:
Dear God, You are so faithful and loving. I come before your mercy seat and pray on behalf of the person reading this. Please forgive our sins and lead us into everlasting life. Lead us with You to walk on water and to live in complete freedom. Teach us to love you and love one another with all of our heart, soul, and mind. You are awesome and we love you! Please heal, deliver, and restore us. In Jesus name, Amen ❤
“When the pain of staying the same outweighs the pain of change – you’ll change!” ~Author unknown
There is never a dull moment on the journey of transformation when you’re hand in hand with the Creator of the universe. I believe that in order to truly change we need God’s power combined with our faith. There’s so much information available to us that tells us that we hold the power within ourselves, but faith apart from God is insufficient. Hence the Scriptures that tells us that “[we] can do all things THROUGH CHRIST who strengthens [us]” and that “greater is He that is in me than he that is in the world”.
I am on a journey towards living the life of my dreams with God – the dream giver Himself! My Hero has rescued me and has set me on the path of freedom to becoming who He created me to be – He created you and I to be GREAT! Did you know that you are created for greatness? Have you ever let lies that you believe to be true about yourself get in the way of believing that you are truly great? I certainly have and was faced with one today. I believed that I was not worthy of greatness or success! How sad is that… brought me to tears.
I realize that while the choices I made in the past may have been messed up, I am not the sum of my past mistakes. I am no longer who I was and not because of anything I’ve done, but because of what Jesus did for me. When He rescued me, he washed me clean of my sin and shame. The Bible says that all who are in Christ are a new creation. The work has already been done for me, now I just have to be transformed by the renewing of my mind. That is done by believing truth instead of the lies that try to keep us enslaved to the circumstances of our past.
Part of my journey involves healing and in doing so to discover my true worth. I’m excited to share this journey with you and hope that you may be inspired to allow God to lead you on your very own adventurous journey with Him on the path to greatness and living your dreams!
Prayer: Gracious God, Thank You so much for Your awesome power and truth that enables us to move the mountains in our lives that try to get in the way on our path to achieving our dreams. Thank You that in You our true worth is found. And thank You for everyone who reads this post. I pray especially for those that are hurting and in need of rescuing, please draw them close to You Lord where they can find strength and healing for their hearts. Make us humble Lord and help us to understand what it truly means to be great. We are created in Your image – what an honor. Thank You God 🙂 I pray that You would be glorified. In Jesus name, Amen ❤
“You have to dream before your dreams can come true!” ~A.P.J. Abdul Kalam
I love starting out each post with some food for thought that sets the stage… I know it’s a short quote and may even seem obvious when you first read it, but really and truly there is so much depth in the quote. It is profound. I encourage you to take a moment and just read it again. Notice that there is a process that takes place when it comes to actually realizing or achieving our dreams. We must dream in the first place! How many of us have buried dreams that are so near and dear to our hearts? How many of us have actually stopped dreaming altogether?
I was at a leadership seminar earlier this evening and the speakers shared a lot of helpful information about success and leadership, but what was most vital is that there is a beginning point to success and it begins with a dream. Tonight I was asked a question about what my childhood dream was and then I had the privilege of witnessing one of the speakers share how her childhood dream is now (many years later) coming true and that was so moving and inspiring. I was inspired to actually stop for a moment and reflect back on my childhood and ask myself what my dreams were. Sadly I thought about the fact that I didn’t really have any dreams of who I wanted to be or what I wanted to do when I grew up. I knew immediately why that was and realized that I did have a dream, but my dream was different, and maybe somebody reading this can relate. My dream was birthed from a broken heart. My dream was for my family – that my parents would stay together, be in love, and not get divorced. Sadly they did and not only was my heart broken but that also crushed my own dreams for family in the future. Failed relationship after failed relationship, then illness followed by depression only reinforced that the crushed dream was indeed impossible. Only recently has the dream that once seemed impossible to me actually start to seem possible again. I can’t speak for everyone, but I think it’s common among little girls to dream of having a family of their own one day. We play house with baby dolls, etc. I hear my little cousins say they can’t wait to have babies one day. I realize that I was actually envious of them because they were children and they had more confidence and belief than me when it came to having a family one day. On an even deeper level, a part of why that dream seemed impossible, is because I have struggled with fear of not being capable of being a good mom. The enemy used my childhood experiences to torment me and feed me lies. Thankfully God’s light is shinning where there once was darkness and the lies are being replaced with truth. I am being renewed daily and I’m so thankful to my sweet Lord for His awesome work in me.
Recently, I visited a sweepstakes giveaway dream home as a dream building exercise with my leadership team and we were asked how this experience inspired us. I wasn’t inspired by the fancy home, but instead, the dream that was buried so deep in me was beginning to be awakened and revived because I was inspired by the idea that a family could live in this home – my future family. So my childhood dream which is so near and dear to my heart is to have a loving family of my own.
Now, maybe you’re thinking well that that’s out of my control. If you are, you are absolutely right! My life is in God’s hands and He is in control of whether or not I live to get married and to whom and whether or not I could even have children, but I’m not worried because even though those events are not in my control, I do have control of whether or not I prepare myself for this dream becoming reality. If my mentality or mindset is one of scarcity instead of abundance, I won’t be prepared to receive the blessings God has for me. I do have the option to prepare for my dream but first I have to begin by dreaming it and believing that with God what seemed impossible to me is possible with Him. The Bible says to delight yourself in the Lord and he will grant you the desires of your heart. I’m trusting God in faith for this dream!
So now I turn the stage over to you… Did you have a childhood dream? What was it? What dream is near and dear to your heart? Let’s stop waiting and start taking steps, then strides, then leaps towards running this race of life toward living out our dreams and experiencing the live we’ve always wanted!
Don’t waste another moment! “Your chances of getting your goals and dreams in this life greatly diminish when you’re on the wrong side of the grass.” ~Tim Marks~
Dear God, Thank You for bringing back to life the dream that has been buried deeply for so long. Lord I surrender this dream to You and place it into Your hands knowing that You are indeed the author and finisher of my faith. You know the desires of my heart and I trust that as I delight in You, that You will grant them. I pray that Your will be done in my life. I also pray for every person who comes across this page and for those with dreams that need reviving, please help them Lord to look to You first for the hope that is needed to truly live a life of freedom and possibilities. You are awesome God and I love you. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen ❤
“Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.” ~Jeremiah 33:3
I’m not certain whether this has been your experience or not, but it certainly has been mine – to receive answers to my prayers in ways I did not expect. One of my heartfelt prayers is that God would change me for His glory, that I may be able to live the abundant life that He has offered me and in that share the hope and victory with others that if I can change and overcome through Christ than they can too.
I am no stranger to being a victim of defeat. Growing up I lacked in confidence, esteem, and worth. I grew up believing and feeling inadequate, incapable, unlovable, and of very little if any value to anyone. I suffered from undiagnosed depression and anxiety for many years. I was deeply hurt over life’s circumstances and felt completely abandoned, rejected, and alone. Things got so extreme that during my first psychotic break I almost took my life. If it wasn’t for God and His blessing of my mom, I wouldn’t be alive today to be able to share this with you. After the first of a few psychotic breaks which were followed by the worst depression I had ever experienced, after spending months in the hospital at a time, and after being diagnosed with a severe mental illness, I slowly started to hope again. I believe that God carried me through to a point of wellness where he could set me on my feet and I could finally begin to walk. It was by the power of His mighty love that I was brought back to life. During this time of strengthening I believe that God was preparing me to become the person that He created me to be and He knew that that would mean that I would have to change on every level but primarily my heart and my mind.
Romans 12:2 says: “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.”
Right now I am going through some serious growing pains – change is not easy! Science even shows that biologically our bodies react to change by resisting it (I will link a video to support this point). God has offered me a way to achieve my dreams and make them a reality but the process has been challenging and has required me to stretch, grow, and change. This has caused me to feel pressured and stressed because I’m confronting the giants in my mind – the lies that kept me down and defeated most of my past. I was listening to an awesome speaker today named Orrin Woodward discussing that when coal is placed under pressure it becomes diamonds. When I heard that I immediately let out a sigh of relieve and frustration at the same time and thought, “I want to come out of this pressure that I’m feeling shining like a diamond!” I am on the journey and in the process of becoming who God created me to be – a woman with hope from, of faith to, and completely in love with Him -a woman who doesn’t give up on her God-given dreams.
If you have ever given up on your dreams or you are in the process and feel like giving up, I encourage you to be courageous and face the giants that try to defeat you. God will fight for you if you place your trust in Him.
Dear God, I pray for myself and all those who are struggling with growing pains as you take us through the process of change that you would please give us courage and help us to trust in Your strength and victory. For those who have given up I pray that you would resurrect their dreams and the hope in You and belief they need to pursue them. As we call upon you Lord please show us great and mighty things which we do not know. Thank you Lord. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen ❤
Have you ever been in the way of achieving your dreams? Have you tried to drive full speed ahead to realizing your dream only to be stopped by the car in front of you and you think its a roadblock but when you take a harder look its actually a mirror in the road and the car you are seeing is really yours? If you’ve answered YES, then you are certainly not alone! I’m right there with you.
Recently, before beginning this blog, I was inspired to make the choice to dream again. Dreaming is great, but achieving those dreams is awesome! I’ve come to realize however that on the road to making those dreams happen I need to make some personal changes otherwise my dreams will not be realized and they will just fade away into the darkness where nobody would’ve known that they even existed but me and God. I don’t know about you, but I want to do my part in making my dreams become reality. I’ve also realized it’s not going to be an easy ride, there are going to be obstacles along the way, and right now I’m the biggest one.
One of my dreams is to be a great person of influence – a leader! I desire to be able to practice what I preach and preach what I practice especially if my desire is to help others live the best life that they possibly can. In achieving this dream it’s apparent to me that before I can be used to help anyone, I need to be helped first. My heart needs changing, my mind needs to be renewed and I need to be stripped away of old habits. I’m overwhelmed and overtired, but I’ve resolved not to give up! I’m going to start by reading a book I recently purchased called Confidence of a Champion by Tim Marks. It a book that is aimed at helping you become who you were created to be by letting go of lies from the past. I’ve included a link to where you can purchase the book in case you maybe interested in joining me on this journey 🙂 Confidence of a Champion
I’m excited for the journey ahead and my prayer is that God will prepare you and me to receive and make use of every tool that He provides for my success and yours on this journey to achieving our God-given dreams. May His will be done in the name of Jesus. Amen ❤
Have you ever felt like you’ve fallen outside of God’s grace? You’ve messed up, done something wrong, sinned against your Everything, the very One who gives you your life and breath, your true love.
It can be difficult to get back up after you’ve fallen especially when you’ve tripped yourself. It’s easy to beat yourself up and start to believe the lies that the enemy wants you to believe. It’s easy to stay down because it’s comfortable, it takes no effort to stay down.
I’ve fallen, and I’ve stayed down long enough to realize that if I don’t get up and run back to the arms of my Saviour then I’m just giving up on everything that His Love has accomplished for me. I would be throwing away my inheritance. His free gift to me of His grace which He shed His very own blood to give me.
The bible says that the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy. I realize that while I may have messed up, he jumped on that opportunity to steal my joy and excitement and to kill my dreams and destroy my relationship with God. I refuse to give up and instead I give in and surrender to Jesus and I cry out to Him and ask Him for a hand to help me get back up. I don’t need to stay down – it’s a choice – I choose to trust in the love and forgiveness of God. I don’t even have to get back up by myself because He is there to give me a hand and through His strength I am able to get back up and move forward.
If you’ve fallen and need a hand getting back up please join me in this prayer:
Dear God,
You are awesome and faithful. You are love and I am so thankful for your mercy and grace. Father I cry out to you in repentance for the sins that I have committed. Jesus I believe in my heart and I confess with my mouth that you are Lord and you alone have the power to save me and set me free from sin and death. Please have mercy on me and forgive me for my sins. Please create a clean heart in me and restore my fellowship with you. Please fill me with your Holy Spirit and help me to walk in your will for my life. Lord I surrender all of me to you including my emotions, my guilt, my shame and I ask that you renew me. Please restore my joy and excitement so that I may live life with anticipation of your goodness while trusting in your promises. I love you Lord and I thank you for your forgiveness and salvation. Please draw me closer to you Lord and please protect me from the enemy and help me to sin no more. Thank you Lord. In the precious name of Jesus I pray, Amen ❤
“And she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed to the Lord and wept in anguish.” (1Samuel1:10)
The above passage of Scripture refers to a woman named Hannah who grieved over her inability to have a child. Today I related to Hannah in her bitterness of soul as I prayed to the Lord and wept in anguish. While my circumstances may differ from Hannah’s, in that my sadness has nothing to do with not being able to bear a child, I can certainly relate to her heart. When I turned my pain over to the Lord today, my question was “How long is this going to hurt?” In trying to understand my pain, and why I was hurting so much, I realized that I was grieving a loss. Nobody physically died, but I did lose someone that I had invested a great deal of myself in, and suddenly this person is gone from my life. It hurt a lot! But thank God for His precious love for me. God is so faithful! As I was in prayer, the Lord led me to a scripture in my bible: “And she said, “Let your maidservant find favor in your sight.” So the woman went her way and ate, and her face was no longer sad.” (1Samuel1:18) The life lessons note in my bible regarding this specific Scripture says the following: “Hannah left behind her grief, not when her circumstances changed – they hadn’t – but after she poured out her soul to the Lord. Because of her grief, she connected with the Lord on a level she had never known.” ~Charles Stanley. This was a huge act of faith on the part of Hannah! She had stopped eating because of her grief and sadness but here in this Scripture she went away after her prayer and ate and was no longer sad. She had placed her faith in God and trusted that He would grant her the desire of her heart. In Hannah’s prayer for a son, she also vowed to dedicate her son to the service of the Lord which was a selfless act on her part. That was her sacrifice onto the Lord. Later Hannah conceived and bore a son!
I was so encouraged by this today and I hope that you will be too. Nothing is too big for God and He can certainly make your dreams come to pass when you put your trust in Him. Let your fear become your fuel for faith. Turn to God in prayer and pour your soul out to Him. This isn’t the first time I’ve turned to God and in the past He has always been faithful even when the answer wasn’t what I expected.
Proverbs 3:5-6 says, “Trust in the Lord with all of your heart; Lean not on your own understandings. Acknowledge the Lord in all that you do and He will direct your paths.”
“This is my command: Love each other.” ~Jesus Christ (John 15:17)
Have you ever felt so incapacitated when it comes to love, especially the ability to truly love others? …without expecting anything in return? Have you ever felt sick and tired of being sick and tired? …being stuck in a vicious cycle? Well if your answer is Yes, then know that I feel you! I can certainly understand what it feels like to feel incapacitated and to be sick and tired of allowing that to rob me of pursing my God-given dreams. One of the dreams I had before I even entered into a relationship with Jesus was to be able to experience true unconditional love and then to express that love to others. Interestingly enough the two greatest commandments are to first love God and second love others. Tonight God gave me a bit of a reality check in the sense that I’ve realized that I can be a selfish person at times. Most of the time I’m consumed with “me”. Consumed with what’s going on in my life, what going to go on in my future, what I look like, how I’m feeling, how I’m growing and maturing in my faith, how I can keep myself busy so that God-forbid I don’t risk being/feeling alone, blah, blah, blah, me, me, me… I’m not saying that it’s wrong to think or reflect on oneself but even in that it should be done do the glory of God. I’m realizing that I’m way to consumed with myself. Please excuse me if I come off as being hard on myself it’s just that I’m writing from that place of “sick and tired”. I want change, I need change. I want to stop caring so much about myself and what others think of me and start thinking more and caring more about others. The good news is that I’m at a place in my life now where I can finally be free to live out my dream. Not only have I been introduced to true unconditional love, but now as a grateful believer in Jesus Christ I have God’s Holy Spirit living on the inside of me which empowers me to not only love God, but to love others as well. God has loved me so much that he sent Jesus to die for me and now through the awareness of that love, I’m willing to die to my selfish ways so that I could love God first and then others for His glory. It is His love in me that enables me to express it to others, it is not of my own power or ability. I’m excited to step outside of myself and allow God to use me to share His love with others and to share the reason for my hope. I’ve already started looking at volunteer opportunities in my area. I’d love to actually go on a missions trip at some point in the future when the timing is right, but for now I want to start right here where God has placed me, serving in my everyday life.
If you have a desire to love and help others, but you just haven’t reached out yet, maybe out of fear or insecurities or even selfishness then I encourage you to take the focus off of yourself and to place it on God. Look upward and not inward. Step outside of yourself and ask the God of the universe to show you His love and then to show you how to love like He’s loved you. Don’t sell yourself short of the life that God has planned for you and don’t give up on your dreams.
My prayer tonight is taken from the song lyrics of Hosanna:
Dear Lord, I come before you and confess my selfishness and pray for your forgiveness and mercy. I thank you in faith and ask that You would change me Lord for your glory. I pray that you would show me where and how I can love and serve others and that Your will be done. I also ask the following prayer in the name of Jesus:
Heal my heart and make it clean
Open up my eyes to the things unseen
Show me how to love like you have loved me
Break my heart for what breaks yours
Everything I am for Your kingdom’s cause
As I walk from earth into eternity
Amen ❤
I’ve included an awesome remix to Hosanna! Hope you enjoy…
“We are the women who make our lives about the cause of Christ, not the applause of men, live to express the Gospel, not to impress the Jones’, live not to make our absence felt, but to make Christ’s presence known. We are the women who know it’s not about us and all about Glory.” ~Ann Voskamp (The Song For All The Women)~
God is very much present and active in our relationship with Him. I’m in complete awe at His mighty works. I had a brush with the fear of death tonight. For a long minute, this fear came over me that God was going to take my life because maybe He no longer has a purpose for me being here any longer. Honestly my first thought was a selfish one – will “I” be missed? I couldn’t quite understand why this fear suddenly came over me, but after some prayer, I opened my book (Love Idol by Jennifer Dukes Lee) and God answered through the quote above written by Ann Voskamp. When I read the words “live not to make our absence felt, but to make Christ’s presence known. We are the women who know it’s not about us and all about Glory.”, it all made sense. God revealed His truth to me in a real way that I could understand. We are to offer ourselves as living sacrifices to God. Romans 12:1 says, “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God…” 1Cor6:19-20 says, “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”
Once again, God is teaching me that it’s not about me, my very life is not about me but about Glory – His Glory ❤
Matthew 10:39 says, “He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it.”
When I read that quote earlier my first thought was in the form of a dream – a dream to be the woman this quote speaks of. To die to me, myself, and I and live for the glory of God through Christ Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit.
My prayer tonight:
Dear God, thank You dearly for this revelation and for teaching me that truly Jesus You are the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Please forgive me for my selfish response to the fear of death and thank you for showing me that I need not to hold on to my own life but instead to turn it over to you and hold on to You for life. Lord I offer myself to you as a living sacrifice and I ask that You would grant the desire of my heart to walk in Your freedom. Lord thank You that Your perfect love casts out fear. Father for every day, hour, minute, second that you bless me with life I pray that You would be glorified. I pray that fully knowing that I am not perfect but that even when I stumble or fall, in my failures and mistakes that even in that Lord You will be glorified. Help me to live every second free from fear and regret and enjoy the abundant life that You have intended for me. I pray that You will bless me with a teachable spirit so that I can continue to learn and grow in You. I love You Jesus & I thank You for fulfilling Your Word & Your promises. In the precious name of Jesus I pray. Amen ❤
WoW! Where do I begin… I could write a book to share this story, but I’ll do my best to keep it short & sweet 🙂
As long as I can remember I’ve always dreamt of finding true love. I was for most of my life a hopeless romantic looking for love, acceptance and security in all the wrong places. I hurt myself and others along the way trying hard to get my fill. On this quest to find true love I thought a man was the answer, my knight in shining armour, my prince, my hero. When failed relationship after failed relationship and feelings of rejection and abandonment resurfaced over and over I started to look elsewhere. I needed answers and at the time the world was giving me the wrong one by telling me that the answer was ME… I had to first love myself before I could really find true love or that true love was loving myself?? huh?? So I tried to love and accept myself and provide myself a false sense of security that I so desperately needed. I failed miserably! Who am I apart from God who is Love Himself to be able in my own strength to provide anything for myself. I am an imperfect human being created to be loved and cared for by my Creator. Only I was so lost so far away from the truth, yet He never failed in His pursuit for me. I was so far gone, so far from Him but I was desperate for His love. I was lovesick in need of a Saviour and a cure. In fact I was so lovesick that I became mentally sick. Aside from having suffered with undiagnosed anxiety and depression most of my life, I then developed a mental illness called Psychosis for which I was hospitalized on numerous occasions for having had multiple episodes and relapses for which now the diagnoses is Schizoaffective Disorder. Unlike most people with this disorder, I am high functioning and by the grace of God doing well and relapse free for almost 3 years. Undergoing these psychotic episodes was the most terrifying experience of my life. I literally thought that I had died and gone to hell….but Jesus! Yes, Jesus came to my rescue! I cried out to Him and called on the God of this universe and begged Him to rescue me and He did. He answered and my life has never been the same since. He was the answer to my greatest dream and my greatest desire to be loved, accepted, and secure. He is True Love. True Love found me! I came across a passage of Scripture today from Psalm 12:5 that reads,
“FOR THE OPPRESSION OF THE POOR, FOR THE SIGHING OF THE NEEDY, NOW I WILL ARISE,” SAYS THE LORD, “I WILL SET HIM IN THE SAFETY FOR WHICH HE YEARNS.”
That’s me! I was the oppressed poor person sighing in need to be rescued – to be loved and secured. God performed His word and He did rise up and set me in the safety for which I yearned. You see God is so faithful, even when we aren’t, He is. It has been 3 years since True Love has found me and I’ve wandered so many times still looking for love in all the wrong places, but He never gives up on me. He pursues me daily bringing me back to Him – my first love. I feel like finally now I’m waking up to the reality that it isn’t just a dream anymore – now it’s a dream come true and I am safe and able to fall freely in love with my Saviour, my Hero, my Knight in shining armour, my Prince…
Thank You Jesus… I love You 🙂
Disclaimer: Please know that I’m not discounting the importance of human love and affection. In fact it’s the second greatest commandment which is to love one another. I’m just acknowledging God as the primary source of love since He is Love itself and we cannot love or be loved without first getting it and giving it through Him. First and greatest commandment is to love God:)
P.S. I’ve included a worship song that is dear to my heart and in keeping with the theme of this post. I hope that you enjoy it! If you have already been rescued by our Lord & Saviour Jesus Christ then my prayer is that you will continue to fall in love with Him more deeply and follow Him more closely. If you happen to be reading this and you haven’t personally called out to Jesus to rescue you then I encourage you to take a leap of faith and call out to Him and He will answer and rescue you. You are loved and accepted! God Bless 🙂
hopetodreamagain 