Gratitude Archive

When someone explains something to me the simpler it is the quicker I will understand it.  While on this journey of 40 days to finding my purpose I have found a very simple explanation I would like to share with you.  I will easily explain what God wants from us to fulfill our purpose.  I want you to know these five things if you are on this journey too.

The first thing I learned was that God made each of us for His pleasure.  He wants us to know and love Him and do good.  He finds pleasure when we speak His word, are kind to others and we give all of ourselves to Him.

So then, my friends, because of God’s great mercy to us I appeal to you: Offer yourselves as a living sacrifice to God, dedicated to his service and pleasing to him. This is the true worship that you should offer.  Romans 12:1

So the first point to living your purpose in this life is to know and love God.  This means fully opening your heart to God and everything He stands for.  Practicing everyday love, kindness, goodness and forsaking all temptations and opportunities to sin.  This basically meeds living by His laws and not breaking them.

The next thing I learned was that God formed us to be a part of His family.  We of course are all God’s children and that means we are all part of His family as well.  Sometimes we don’t like our brothers and sisters in this huge family but we are called by God to love one another.

His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into his own family by sending Jesus Christ to die for us. And he did this because he wanted to! Ephesians 1:5

So our second purpose is to love one another.  I know there are several people in my own life I have to remind myself they are also God’s children.  Because God has also adopted them into His family I must be kind and loving.  I know as a human with judgement that I must stop myself and find the good in the people I have difficulties with.  I do this by finding three things to appreciate about them.  It may be tough and the things I find may be as simple as the person dressed nicely or maybe they buy coffee for the whole office.  It can be simple but do it as God asked, in a loving and kind way.

The message you heard from the very beginning is this: we must love one another. 

1 John 3:11

 

Thirdly God created me to become like Jesus.  What this means is to grow up spiritually.  Jesus has a very godly character and is very generous and humble.  We need to be silent about the things we have accomplished and not boast about them.  We need to not develop a “highlight” reel of our life on Facebook and Instagram.  Yes it is okay to show a fun moment with family and friends but in no way “sell yourself” as special or above others.

Therefore our third purpose is to grow spiritually mature and grow constantly.  This means reading the Bible, meditating to listen for God, share with others even through you may not have a lot to share, lift someone up verbally and share God’s Word.  All of these things will help you grow spiritually and strengthen your own faith.

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers. 

Psalm 1:1-3

Next I learned that God shaped me to serve Him.  You can use the acronym S.H.A.P.E. to remember how God shaped you to serve Him.

S-Spiritual Gifts

H-Heart

A-Abilities

P-Personality

E-Experiences

Lets look at these things.  God has given you spiritual gifts to use to be purposeful.  Here are 7 spiritual gifts in the Bible. Wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord.  These are good qualitities to utilize in your daily living.

God has also given you a good and pure heart.  Unfortunately daily we are exposed to things that muddy our heart and we have to constantly cleanse it to wash away the mud.  If you are having trouble having a kind heart then turn to God and ask for His help to purify it.

You also have abilities to do good.  You can serve as a greeter at church,  donate clothes to local charities or you can do something more skilled.  Say for example you are a nurse and you volunteer at a free innoculation clinic or maybe you are a great cook so you prepare bagged meals to hand out to the homeless.  Your abilities don’t have to be complicated with years of training to do good.  Good can be very simple.

Your personality can also be used for serving.  If you are outgoing you can read to seniors in a nursing home that it may be difficult for them to see print.  If you tend to be shy and quiet then why not work behind the scenes at a local charity stuffing envelopes or information packets.

Lastly you can use your experiences that you have overcome in life to minister to others.  For example maybe you are a cancer survivor and you know the uncertainty that comes with that diagnosis.  You can comfort and help someone who received a tough diagnosis too about the hope and strength that will come from this experience.   Or maybe you have been a slave to alcohol and are now sober, minister to those trying to obtain sobriety like you have successfully done.  Use whatever God had you walk through to strengthen others.  Remove the negativity of the experience to do good and serve.

So our fourth purpose is to serve God by serving others.  When we help others and don’t constantly think of ourselves, God is very pleased.

The last thing I want to talk about is that God made us for a mission.

 Then He said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. Luke 9:23

God put us here to be His disciple (student) and then to become His apostle (teacher).  Our mission is to learn all we can about Him and share it to those that need to learn about Him.  We are not here for ourselves, we are here for God.

As I move through this journey and strengthen myself and my heart I pray you too feel God’s love, grace and mercy for a much better life.  My love and gratitude for you-LoLo

As I travel through this 40 day journey I am amazed at the basic information I should know in life that I don’t know. I guess if I had been raised attending church regularly I would know these things. I don’t fault my parents for not taking me to church. I fault myself for not learning about church until I was in my late twenties.

Today I will complete one full week of my journey and each day I spend reading and listening to Rick Warren on his audio presentation I feel my eyes open. My mind is absorbing every detail like a sponge and daily that imaginary light bulb goes off above my head light in the cartoons.

Many people look within themselves to find their purpose trying to discover on the inside what they should be doing with their life.  Others take the self-help approach by studying techniques to find their purpose only to end up creating a purpose.  There are those that take a philosophical approach which leads them to speculate about their purpose by overthinking.

There is only one method of finding the purpose for your life and that is through God.  The book says you need to turn to your Creator for the answer as to why He designed you and for what purpose.  It also says you have to read your owner’s manual which is the Bible.  The Bible tells you how to live a righteous life and walk on a straight path.  The simplicity of this blew me away.  Reading one book and talking to God would find my purpose.  Could it truly be that simple?

I also am learning how much I matter to God.  I don’t think many of us really recognize how much God loves us.  We know He loves us but do we truly recognize His love?  He loves us so much that He cares about every detail of our lives not just our good moments.  He cares about every moment.  He planned every one of my days before I was born, not just a few or random days but every day and He did it long ago.  Also He made me to last forever.  I will live this life and then move on to my eternal life.  I realized my purpose is to work for God’s purposes here on earth and the only way to fulfill His purposes is to get to know Him.

In order to find your purpose you must also find your personal peace.  In the Bible there is a reference to “Jehovah Shalom” which means “I am the God of Peace”.   You must set your mind to understand that God wants us to live with personal peace.  There will be ups and downs but you can remain at peace during these times if you remember a few things.

Remember this, you will have circumstances in your life that are uncontrollable, people who are unchangeable as well as unexplained problems.  The sooner we understand that we have no control over these three things the sooner we will find peace.  Allow yourself to let go of control and trust only in God to guide and correct these three times.  I know this is a biggie to let go of control and you will never totally be free of trying to control things but peace comes immediately when you hand everything over to God.  You only control yourself and God controls you if you let Him.

The easiest ways to give up control is to be obedient to God and you can do this by doing simply by reading the Serenity Prayer-the FULL Serenity Prayer.  Most of us think it is a few lines of prayer but it is not.  It has been shortened over the years.  Here is the full prayer to pray.

God, give us grace to accept with serenity
the things that cannot be changed,
Courage to change the things
which should be changed,
and the Wisdom to distinguish
the one from the other.

Living one day at a time,
Enjoying one moment at a time,
Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,
Taking, as Jesus did,
This sinful world as it is,
Not as I would have it,
Trusting that You will make all things right,
If I surrender to Your will,
So that I may be reasonably happy in this life,
And supremely happy with You forever in the next.

Amen.        

When I read the original prayer I feel so complete and more understanding as I giving up control.  I hope you do too.  Read it several times slowly to hear each word not only in your mind, but in your heart.

I have also learned that hope is essential to life and God is the source of hope.  Remember this short message, “You need hope to cope and God is hope.”  The way to get hope is to remember this; God is ALWAYS with me.  He never leaves my side. His presence is constantly watching over me and guiding me along the best path.  This bible verse is short, to the point and a great one to put on your bathroom mirror to never forgot how near God is to us.

“I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you.” Psalm 32:8

Another important point is that God is doing good things in my life and His purpose is working in me.  I try to sit silently and get to know God more deeply to see these good things in every situation, even the bad ones.  Sometimes we get too busy or are multitasking so we can’t tune into God and know these good things.  Slow down. Relax and sit still.

We are living in a broken and damaged world today.  Our views of the world tend to be negative and depressing.  Our media outlets have become slighted, cynical and driven by sensationalism  with their stories instead of stories peppered with  happiness and kindness.  We are influenced daily by these views and they tear our lives down and pull us away from God.  Ideas have consequences so our ideas need to be pure and Bible based.  Jesus said in the Bible, “you have heard it said, but I tell you this-”  This means your are hearing things from others but Jesus has instructed us on what is true. 

There are several ways to form your views and in the US these tend to be the ways we develop our views by using one of the following ideologies.

The first is by materialism ideas such as “The one that has the most toys wins.”  Some think that if you have a lot of money (or credit to buy things) and buy lots of “stuff” that shows your success.  They think that having more gets you farther in life.  Not true.

Another thought is, “I have to think of ME first.” which is individualism.  Worrying only about how the outcome of every situation will effect you causes for a very shallow life.  It also causes much anxiety and worry because you will always be focused on you and what will happen to you.  If you need a good example of individualism, here is quick clip you can watch.

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/discriminating-gentlemen/2861312

 

 

There is another thought process called hedonism.  This is when you have the idea to do only what feels good for you.   This is a very bad idea path since it usually has bad consequences and takes in many of the deadly sins like lust, greed, etc.  When you follow this thought process you usually shirk responsibilities, party, you’re out of control and put your own needs ahead of any Bible processes.  You can read about the bad effects of hedonism in the Bible.

Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.   Galatians 5:19-21

I also need to mention the idea of pragmatism.  Pragmatism is when you practice the “whatever works for you” approach.  This is anyone who claim that a proposition is true if it works satisfactorily.  Meaning if it has worked in the past then go with it, why change what isn’t broken as your guide to decisions and views?  This idea keeps people stagnant and in the same place.  When you only do what you know, you are limiting yourself to one place in your thinking.

Next lets look at the idea of those that think God doesn’t exist or matter.  This is called naturalism or atheism.  These people who think the world was created spontaneously with no Divine intervention.  Amazing how all the perfect things in the world can just randomly appear and work for the good of all without Supreme help.  That’s a head scratcher to me.  Even great cosmologist and physicists like Stephen Hawking and Albert Einstein had to concede that there had to be a creator to make all this happen. They only said said it briefly but I am including it in this blog.  Although they did not have the true understanding of God because of their immersion in science and probability they did say this:

I want to know how God created this world.-Albert Einstein

If we find the answer to that, it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason—for then we would know the mind of God. -Stephen Hawking

Lastly the idea of humanism blows me away.  Humanist beliefs stress the potential value and goodness of human beings, emphasized by common human needs, and seeking solely rational ways of solving human problems.  There is no room or regard to God in this idea. It is all human based on human needs and thoughts. I am human and in no way do I think I have the answers.

Lets now  visit the one and only ideology we should use to form our views and that is theism.

Theism is the belief in one God as the transcendent creator and ruler of the universe.  This is the correct method of ideology.  Believing in God and knowing God is and as our Creator is what we are to know and trust when forming our views in this world.  Not only will theism cause us peace, joy and happiness but it also shuts out any enemies that may prey on us since they know we have the Almighty and Powerful Father watching over us.

Before I end this blog I want to reinforce what the Bible tells us on how to form our views and practices.

But in your hearts revere Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect. 1 Peter 3:15

I am so grateful you are coming along on this journey with me.  This book and walk is taking me places I have never been and placing God so deeply in my heart every day.  I pray that you gain knowledge from this blog as I have learned a great deal this past week.

May God bless you and give you peace in your heart.-LoLo

 

 

 

It’s funny how God places things in your life to open your eyes and make you sit up and take notice.  A book was published in 2002 called “The Purpose Driven Life” by Pastor Rick Warren.  A book that was so successful over 54 million copies were sold.  I totally missed this book until this week.  It took me 17 years to hear about this treasure.

Earlier this week I was preparing for our monthly inspiration meeting when I saw a video in my church sermon archives teaching about your life’s purpose.  I watched the ten minute video with our senior pastor speaking on our purpose in life.  He mentioned a book that Rick Warren had written several years back that focused just on this topic.

I immediately went to Amazon to get more information on this book.  Let me preface this a little by saying for the last three weeks I have been looking for a spiritual book on growth to read.  Every time I searched for recommendations I came up empty.  None of the book titles I searched touched me as a book my soul craved for or needed.  That is until I looked at this book.

The first words I read were “It all starts with God.  It’s not about you.”  These nine little words had me hook, line and sinker.  I feel these two statements and preach them often.  I had to look further into this book.  I had to see why God put this book in my path now and not seventeen years ago.

The first thing I loved about this book was it had very short chapters.  I have a very short attention span with difficult reading comprehension so short chapters are music to my ears.  I also noticed there were daily videos and outlines to follow.  Okay so I could read a short chapter then move to an teaching video focused only on that chapter and email myself an outline to remind me of the daily teaching.  I swear God knew how many reinforcements I needed to comprehend and He provided them all to me.

The message does take 40-60 minutes to listen to but I have been enthralled in the words and the time flies by.  Rick Warren is a great storyteller that uses simple words and many bible translations to help make learning easy.

The outlines are outstanding for me because again they are short sentences and supported by beautiful bible verses that apply to that day’s learning.  These have a box that you can enter your email address and have them delivered to your inbox or push print and have them print for you. Here is an example.

As I move through this book I will be blogging about the journey.  I will be telling you how the book impacts my life and relationship with God towards finding my purpose and path. I am committing time each day for 40 days to work on me. As Rick Warren states, “This process takes about 48 hours in total. That is 2 days of your life in hours to learn how to live a purposeful life.” That is a very small commitment when you think on average a person living to age 75 roughly lives 657,000 hours. 48 hours is a tiny amount of that time to live a better life.

I have learned so much already on Day 1.  The first thing I learned was that God wanted me to connect to Him.  He wants me to center my life around Him and become comfortable putting Him first in my life.  This of course is something I have done.  I do turn to God with all my concerns and problems trusting only in His answers.  I also thank Him for all my blessings. I know this is very difficult for many people so just reading the first chapter will help you.

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart …and soul and mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.” Mt. 22:37-38 

I know this is the first commandment and we constantly need to be reminded to put God first.  Basic but critical.

Next God wants me to connect to other believers.  The bible says we are to congregate with other believers.   Church attendance is of high importance. It is a place we can all come together to worship, be encouraged, and learn from God’s words for spiritual growth.  This means actually go to church and walking among other faithful people regularly.

“Let us not give up the habit of meeting together… instead let us encourage one another.”Heb. 10:25 

Next God wants me to cultivate my spirituality.  I need to learn and understand God’s words so I can teach others and lift them up when they need lifted.  This means reading the bible daily to constantly gain knowledge and understanding. To hear and feel the stories in the bible is imperative to growth.

“Let us go on… and become mature in our understanding, as strong Christians ought to be.”Heb. 6:1 

God gave me this beautiful life to give back.  We all have special talents that God designed for us to use here on this earth for good.  I am a good problem solver and have a compassionate heart.  This leads me to give others assistance with their problem but I recognize that God is beginning to show me His designed talent for me may be different.  I am quietly waiting and listening for Him to show me fully what I am to do in service for His purpose.  I feel He will reveal that talent to me soon.

“God has given each of you some special abilities; be sure to use them to help each other.”1 Peter 4:10

The last thing I learned on day one is that God wants me to communicate His love to others.  This is our mission.  We need to reach out to others to show them the peace they can receive by accepting God’s love for us.  I have felt this peace and continue to feel it daily.  A heart at peace leads to a life at peace.  Peace can only come from God. This peace can only come from knowing God sent His only son, Jesus Christ to die on the cross for us for forgiveness of our sins.

“Through Christ, God has made peace between us and Himself, and He gave us the work of telling everyone about the peace we can have with Him… So we have been sent to speak for Christ!”2 Cor. 5:18, 20

If you feel in this New Year you need refreshing or to come back to God or need to feel God’s love more deeply I encourage you to read this book.  Rediscover your faith, strengthen your faith or just come to know God more deeply with this 40 day journey.  I have been touched by just reading and absorbing one day of this book.  I am looking for God’s help in locating the purpose He designed and put within me for His purposes.  I am remembering those first words.  It all starts with God.  It is not about me.

I pray you grow in God daily and feel peace in your heart with God’s love for you. This picture below is so touching and I feel the hug depicted in the picture. I hope you do too.

My love and gratitude for you, LoLo

 

Our podcast that relates to this blog

http://gratefulgratitude.libsyn.com/finding-your-purpose

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