Lord Jesus is Born

A voice is being heard in the market square, Caesar Augustus has issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world.  Each person needs to go to his own town to register. 

As the crowds gathered to hear the message being proclaimed Joseph stood near the end of the market listening.  It was really interesting times; this would be the first census that will be taking place while Quirinius is governor of Syria.

Standing listing to the conversations of the people in the street at the Market Place, Joseph turned around and headed back home.  He needed prepare for their long trip from Nazareth in Galilee to Judea.  He walked over to Mary and they sat down under the tree in the back yard. 

“Mary how are you my love?”  Joseph greeted Mary by taking her hand lovingly into his own, placing a kiss on her hand.

“I am fine, what brings you here this morning?”  Mary answered Joseph.

“Caesar Augustus has issued a decree that a census be taken of the entire Roman world and we should return to our own towns to register.”  Joseph answered while looking at his beautiful bride to be.

“When do you want to leave?  What should I bring with me?”  Mary asked

“Take something to wear and bring some bread and fruit, I will see to the rest.  Oh, and something warm for the road.  It is cold at night.  I want to leave this evening.”  Joseph said as he stood up and turned to leave.

Mary stood up and walked with Joseph towards the front of the street.  People were walking past them.  Some had donkeys and others had some carriages with two or four slaves carrying them along.  The streets turned into a hive of people as they all were on their way to their towns.

Joseph came for Mary and they walked next to the donkey for as long as Mary could bear the walk.  Finally Joseph said “Mary, let me help you get onto the donkey.”  She didn't resist and as he helped her up onto the donkey.  It was a rocky ride, the stars were shining in the sky above them.  The air was crisp and they just started out.  Walking with other companions along the road made the trip seem that much easier.  Children were running up and down the trail, it seems they never seem to tire and old grannies and grandpas were just walking along quietly.  Not saying much as they felt this was a waste of time. 

People started move into different directions and Joseph and Mary continued, stopping to rest and refresh themselves they eat some boiled eggs, with bread and raisins.  Drinking a little wine and sitting down to relax for a short while, it would be nightfall before they come into the Town of Bethlehem tonight.  Joseph is pushing to make it before the gates are closed and hoping they are able to secure a place at the Inn.

Dusk and they were at the entrance of the city Bethlehem.  Walking through the gates Joseph let Mary sit on the donkey while he walked over to the guards.

“Good evening”  Joseph greeted

“Good evening.  How can I help you?” asked the guard

“We are from Nazareth and are looking for a place to stay the evening, my wife is with child.”  Joseph said while pointing to Mary sitting on the donkey.

“I can only suggest you speak to Mark, his the owner of the Inn but I know they have no place available.  Perhaps he can tell you of someone’s home.”  The guard pointed to the Inn and showed Joseph which entrance to use.

After speaking to Mark it was clear that there was space available in the city.  Joseph was taken to stalls where Mary came into labour.  As the little baby was born something happened in the fields and the shepherds saw the angels.

This evening the Shepherds were keeping watch over their flocks when something wonderful happened.  There appeared to them an angel of the Lord it was wonderful as they could see and experience the glory of the Lord that shone around them.  “Do not be afraid.  I bring good news of great joy that will be for all the people.  Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you;  he is Christ the Lord.  This will be a sign to you:  You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger.”

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying:

“Glory to God in the Highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favour rest.”  When the angels had left and gone into heaven the Shepherds said “Let’s go to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has told us about.’

They arrived in Bethlehem and found both Mary and Joseph with the little baby who was lying in the manger.  They spread the word about the baby and everybody was amazed at the news.  Yet Mary treasured up all these things and pondered on them in her heart.

Glory to God and thanks to the Lord Jesus for coming into our world to save each one of us.  May this Christmas be a blessing and may you never forget how wonderful the Lord Jesus really is.

Dream Big

It is my heart’s desire and yearning to travel overseas, I so want to travel to Israel and walk where the Lord Jesus walked.  I so want to go and see the different landmarks.  After travelling to Israel I would like to go to Egypt and also to America and not forgetting about England and Australia, this is my Big Big dream.

I think the Lord has given me the yearning and passion to write and it is my big dream to write a best-selling Daily Devotion.  It is my yearning and passion that what I write will impact people all over the world ~ not for the accolades of being a best-seller but so that I may be a vessel the Lord used to spread the word of God.

My hopes and dreams are to leave a legacy for my children and my grandchildren.  I want them to have something to build on going forward in their own lives.  I want my entire family to love the Lord and all to be saved.

# 5 Mind Changing Tactics

# 1 Stay Positive

Every morning when I wake up, the first thing I do is pray and in my prayers I say thank you Lord for a new day.  While I still lie in my bed I think of the day ahead of me and dedicate each member in my family into Gods Hand.

Staying Positive is one of my basic needs and requirements for each day, I read my daily devotion and focus on a passage to help me turn to the Lord when I feel hurt, distressed or disappointed.

Verse I focus on:  Isaiah 30: 18 ‘Yet the LORD longs to be gracious to you; he rises to show you compassion.  For the LORD is a God of justice.  Blessed are all who wait for him!’

# 2 Get dressed

The most basic thing to do to stay focused on changing your mind set, you need to do normal day-to-day things.  Just because you are retired, a stay at home mom, student does not mean you should stay in your pyjama’s all day long.  No, take a shower, wash your hair, brush your teeth and dress for the day.

I feel better once I have done my hair, dressed into my favourite jeans and top.  Now I can face anything. 

Verse I focus on:  Colossians 1: 27 ‘To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentile the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.’

#3 Stay connected

It is important to stay connected with people outside your little home.  Make friends with your neighbours and get out for a coffee at least once a week.  Do not isolate yourself from the rest of the world.  It is important to keep a network of friends so that you can grow in your own way.  People tend to give ~ you ideas, share feelings and help you see things in another perspective.  Writing your blog and sharing your thoughts over the net is also a great way to expand your friendships.

Verse I focus on: Psalm 27: 10 ‘Though my father and mother forsake me, the LORD will receive me.’

#4 Take a short break

I clean my own home and it does take all day long, I want things to be just right.  I have been so consumed with making sure everything is in place a sometimes forget to take a short break.  This results in me being grumpy and irritable.  I then started taking a short break in between washing one load of washing and hanging clothes on the line.  My day didn’t turn out longer it was actually going faster.  I had more energy and I was more focused.  I found in a small 10 minute break I was building my strength and feeling more positive about myself and what I was accomplishing.

Verse I focus on:  Proverbs 3: 6 ‘in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.’

# 5 Show appreciations

I have step children and it is important to show them appreciation at times, this always makes them happy and lets me feel good about myself.  To show appreciation helps me realise that I am able to be grateful about my life and situation.  It helps me realise that I am part of a family unit and that we all work together towards the same goal.

Verse I focus on:  Psalm 34: 2 ‘My soul will boast in the LORD; let the afflicted hear and rejoice.’

Conclusion

Each day I work on my attitude, I find that when I am around people that have a negative attitude it does affect my view point.  When I get home and think about their behaviour it makes me realise that they really are struggling with a bad attitude and should actually try changing their minds.  It is not easy, I am a negative person and I have been working really hard on my behaviour.  I really have to give myself pep talks on a regular basis.  I use my own little mind tactics to become a better me.  Why not try my way and see if you too can grow mentally and spiritually.  We need to really focus on the word, this is a lamp for our way forward.  God Bless You, You are a blessing in my life!

Why me?

Job 42: 1 – 2

“Then Job replied to the LORD:  ‘I know that YOU can do all things; no plan of Yours can be thwarted.’

Each day comes with its own challenges and normal day to day living brings its own challenges.  I think of the story of this man named Job.  He was wealthy and had great children, then to change things up a little disaster struck him, his family and even in his body.

As I think of my life I recall something Job said to his wife Job 2: 10 But Job replied, “You talk like a foolish woman.  Should we accept only good things from the hand of God and never anything bad?”  So in all this, Job said nothing wrong.

Sitting here I ask the question, Why me?  Why do I suffer and why do I have pain, why is it that everything I put my hand to just doesn't work out the way I think it should.  I look at my surrounding and see the people around me, plain sailing. 

I am working and the job am doing isn't plain sailing, and there is no respect between the people I work with.  I feel like I have been thrown into a snake pit full of vipers and they are showing me their fangs.  The general feel and do of this position is negative, the people gossip and talk ill of others, I am constantly hearing bad reports and I am sure that when I leave they will say the same about me.  I feel the negativity around me.  I turn my face to the LORD my GOD, please help me.  Please show me another way.

I have asked people to help me and I am disappointed by their reactions, people I supposed were friends.  People in high powered positions and people I thought were Christians, man was I mistaken.

Just brings me back to one focal point in my own life, I cannot trust people, they will disappointment me on a regular basis.  They are not God, they cannot help me.  I cannot depend on people to come up for me.  Only God can and all in good time.

So it’s not ‘Why me?’  Its ‘Why not me’.

LORD JESUS please send Your angels to protect me, I pray place a hedge around me and guide me Help me face tomorrow.  In Jesus Name Amen

Daily Devotion

Please pray with me and help me identify the right name for my Daily Devotion book I am currently writing.  I need God's, wisdom and insight and most of all understanding.  I want to ask that you will pray with me, asking God to reveal to me What the name of my book should be and also that it will be words of wisdom, that God wants to reveal through me to you and other people.

Prayer
Abba Father, Lord God, You know my hearts desires and Lord You know what is best for me, I pray and with friends on Blogger I am asking You, Lord please guide me and show me what the name of my Daily Devotion should be.  This I pray humbly in the Name of the Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen

Lord! Help me not to sit with scornful people!

 “If you love someone, you will … always believe in him.”  1 Corinthians 13: 7

David a young shepherded boy came to see his brothers who were in battle against the Philistines.  David believed in God and I felt so sure that God would help him stand up against Goliath.

Now David’s brother Eliab was upset that this youngster came along, being full of himself he must have thought.  Telling everybody that he (David) was going to get this Philistine, and Eliab confronted David saying “Why have you come down?  And with whom have you left those few sheep in the wilderness?  I know your insolence and the wickedness of your heart; for you have come down in order to see the battle.’

Eliab’s name actually means “God is my Father” so in actual fact I believe Eliab has great authority over the Philistine, he just didn’t believe that it was the case.  David on the other had felt he was circumcised and because of the covenant with God, David knew that God would be on David’s side.

This whole episode reminds us of knowing who we are in Christ, we should make it our business to find out what it means to be a true Christian.  We should study God’s Word.  We could sit around like Eliab and know that we are Christians but not act on it because we struggle with cynicisms, believing that most people are generally selfish and dishonest.   The problem with cynics is that once one person’s chimes off the rest will follow suit.

Turning a positive situation quickly into a negative which ends badly, now be careful you don’t become the cynic.

Prayer

Abba Father, Lord we pray that You will strengthen us as we face a new day, guiding us and teaching us.  Most of all Lord God, take our lives and renew our minds to become true Christians.  Help us not to sit in the seats with scornful people but to be courageous as David and to stand on Your Word, the Bible.  We pray in Jesus Name, Amen.

"Thorn in my side"

As I sit here today I am thinking about a famous person someone you also know, perhaps even better than I do.  The Apostle Paul, and as I think about this man who done so many wonderful things and wonders in the name of the Lord Jesus I am reminded of something he had to deal with on a daily basis.  “The thorn in his side”, we do not know what the so called “thorn” was, but we do know it kept Paul on his knees.  https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2+Corinthians+12%3A+9&version=TLB

Each person’s life is different and we do not know the journey we need to take in getting to our destination.  My journey right now is really not that easy, I seem to embark on the most difficult of tasks and so many times very humbling too. 

My “thorn” right now is really a part time job I have taken to supplement my income.  I have seen and it is really funny how God has been working miracles for me each day.  The one thing I am sure of is that God keeps His eye on me.  Some days I find that this job really tests my patience and other days I stand amazed at how things move around to accommodate me.

If you pray for patience, be sure God is going to take you on a trip you will never forget and you will learn patience.  If you pray for humility, hmmmm be sure God is going to teach you to become humble.

My weakest link right now is my humility and patience and I am learning to deal with these to issue and as time goes I find I am able to work through each one of these lessons.

I was praying the other morning asking the Lord what it was that He wanted me to do?  The answer was Psalm 150, Praise the Lord God.  https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Psalm+150&version=TLB

Well in facing all the difficulty, humbling situations I find myself in and the constant waiting on people that disregard me.  I want to say thank You Lord, I will praise You for I believe that You will open the right doors at the right time.

It is my desire to say as the Apostle Paul said ‘I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.’

Prayer

Abba Father, Lord each one of us has a ‘thorn’ in our sides, we all have difficulties that we need to deal with.  Give each one of us the courage and strength to face it each day, let us never forget to humble ourselves before You and know that You are still in control.  Lord we will praise and worshop at Your feet.  We know that You will open the right doors at the right time.  In the Holy and wonderful Name of Jesus Christ.  Amen

Pray like Hannah

1 Samuel 1:11 Amplified Bible (AMP)

¹¹ She vowed, saying, O Lord of hosts, if You will indeed look on the affliction of Your handmaid and [earnestly] remember, and not forget Your handmaid but will give me a son, I will give him to the Lord all his life; no razor shall touch his head.

How serious are your prayers?  How desperately do you want the Father God Almighty to answer your prayers?  We who are blessed with children would not know the anguish and pain that Hannah had when she prayed for a child.  It was her heart’s desire to have a child; a son of her own.  She was prepared to give her child back to the Lord to serve Him so sincere and desperately she wanted a son.

The real truth I believe is that the Lord God sees each and every persons heart and intention, He knows what your motives are.  Are you able to pray sincerely and believe that God answers prayers?  Will you pray for the things you desperately want?  I pray that the Lord God will give you the wisdom and understanding and knowledge to pray earnestly for your needs in the Holy Name of the Lord Jesus Christ.

You are a Blessing!

Do Not Grieve the Holy Spirit of God

Ephesians 4: 30 - 32
"And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption, get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.  Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as Christ God forgave you."

In life we all experience different kinds of pains, while living and growing up in your parents house it is normal things that takes place.  Then you start your own adult life and people start to disappoint you.  You find that people tend to lie and gossip and they are saying hurtful things about you.

Before you know it you are tending a garden filled with bitterness, growing your rage and anger, and out of these couple of fruits brawling and slander obviously sneaks in.  Its not long before there are signs of all kinds of malice growing too.

The first signs of becoming bitter is when you cannot drop something, a friend, husband or relative has done.  You just cannot believe these things can happen, now it starts to take root and you keep feeding on it.  Going back to the day something happened, you keep nursing it and before long you have grown a tree of bitterness, the best part is the rest follows suit as it all started with that little seed.

It is my hearts desire to get rid of any bitterness I may have in my own life and I pray the Holy Spirit of God will come and show me what I should be confessing.  Do yourself a favor and do some in-depth soul searching and see what you need to confess to become Holy and pure before the Lord today.

Holy Spirit I pray that each person reading this devotional today will look into their own hearts and find the seeds and trees that are clouding their minds.  Praying and confessing it aloud and asking for forgiveness in the most wonderful name in this world, Jesus Christ.  Amen

You are a blessing to me, may the Lord Jesus Bless You today!

Pray for your Pastor

Ephesians 6: 19 (AMP)

¹⁹ And [pray] also for me, that [freedom of] utterance may be given me, that I may open my mouth to proclaim boldly the mystery of the good news (the Gospel),

Paul asks the believers in Ephesus to “Pray for me, that freedom of utterance may be given me, that I may open my mouth to proclaim boldly the mystery of the good news ~ the Gospel.”

Do you ever think of praying for your Pastor?  I never thought about it until our Pastor asked the congregation to please pray for him.

As time went by a couple of old people were praying for our Pastor.  He mentioned that he felt his preaching was made a little easier.  The Pastor then asked that the congregation come to church during the week and pray for our church as well as for the Pastor.

Prayer Father God we pray that our Pastors will have the freedom of utterance to open their mouths in proclaiming boldly the mysteries of the good news to us and the world.  In Jesus Name we pray, Amen!

The Secret of the Lord

Psalm 25:14 (AMP)

¹⁴ The secret [of the sweet, satisfying companionship] of the Lord have they who fear (revere and worship) Him, and He will show them His covenant and reveal to them its [deep, inner] meaning.

            My BFF (Best Friend Forever) normally is in on all my secrets, how I feel, if I’m sad and when I’m really happy.  The thing to think about is do you only go to the LORD your God with all your sad secrets?  Or do you take the good things that happen to you, and share them with the LORD?

            Can you too come to the Lord Jesus in prayer and say “Lord Jesus; Your will be done.” Yes, you can when you have a relationship with the Lord.  By trusting that the Lord Jesus will help you in everything you do.

            Prayer Thank You Lord, it amazes me when You answer so many of my little desires, without my even asking.  Lord thank You for You loving kindness and companionship in my life.  In the Holy Name of Jesus, Amen!