Daily Devotional – 10/23/15 “I pray right now…”

Riding into work this morning, listening to 95.7 and the St. Jude stories; I cannot even begin to imagine. Listening to the parents who have suffered and those still suffering through watching their children fight cancer, makes me realize that it could be me! I don’t know how it feels to lose a child, I don’t know what it feels like to have a child hospitalized, I don’t know what it’s like to hear the doctor say your child may not survive, I don’t know what it feels like to watch my child suffer and there’s nothing I can do … I don’t know! But I do know that God is able. So while you are crying because your bae walked out on you again, while you are mad because you had a flat tire, while you are angry at some stuff that happened 15 years ago, while you are finding it hard to forgive, while you are wasting precious time; it could be worse. As a matter of fact, if you were to look back over your life, you’ll quickly find that with all the hell you used to raise; it should be worse. Yet, God has spared us one more time! Just to know that God doesn’t treat us how we treat Him is enough to stir something in your spirit. To understand that no matter what we face, we have what we need to come out victorious should be enough for you to lift your unworthy hands and tell the Lord thank you!

Oh, I know God is able and even after listening to the stories from the parents of patients at St. Jude; I still have renewed hope that nothing we go through is for our bad. I pray today for every child at St. Jude, for every parent that has to rock a child after dealing with a rough dose of chemo, radiation or even surgery. I pray now for the parents, who themselves, may be dealing with cancer, sickness or disease. I pray, at this very moment, for the parents who’ve had to bury a child for whatever reason. I pray, at the throne of God for comfort, peace, understanding and an extra dose of strength for all those dealing with whatever it is. I’m even praying for you who are reading this for whatever it is you’re dealing with. And my prayer is simple, “Lord, I need you to have your way! Amen.” If that isn’t enough then pray this one, “Lord, do it! Amen.” If that isn’t enough then pray this one, “Lord, I surrender! Amen.”

It doesn’t take much to get God’s attention. All you need to do is call Him and He’ll answer. Stop saying won’t he do it because he probably won’t but I know without a doubt that God will. Won’t God do it? Yes, each and every time!

Daily Devotional – 10/21/15 “Wake up like …”

It doesn’t matter that you laid down crying from a broken heart. It doesn’t matter that you may be temporarily out of funds. It doesn’t matter that you’re in the midst of your storm. It doesn’t matter that you don’t have all you think you have. It matters that you woke up like this! What’s this? You woke up! If you’re reading this, you’re in your right mind with the activity of your limbs. Yea, you may be in pain, you may be worrying about that, you might be still trying to figure out last month’s bills with this month’s added on, you may be looking for a job, trying to understand how you ended up in that valley or pit, trying to figure out how to feed the children dinner, trying to get somewhere with no car and no reliably friends but you woke up! Baby, you may not have the house you want but you didn’t wake up outside or in a homeless shelter. You may want steak but only have ground beef budget but you have food. You may not have the job you want but you’re surviving.

Chile, wake up like this! What this? Baby, wake up appreciating the blessing of seeing a new day. Wake up thanking God that He allowed the death angel to bypass your name and your house. Wake up with a praise on your lips instead of pity. Wake up expecting greater instead of gossiping. Wake up feeling like the royalty you are. Wake up walking in the favor you’ve been filled with. Wake up acknowledging the anointing you’ve been allowed to achieve. Wake up blessed because you are! Wake up grateful because you should be. Wake up thankful because you ought to be. However you woke up, you woke up!

Daily Devotional – 10/20/15 “Do you know your enemy?”

I am not big on sports however I would assume that before any team takes on an opponent, they study them first. They study them in an effort to assess their strengths and weaknesses, to see what moves they usually make to try to win and in order to be able to defeat them when it comes time to play. I would imagine this is the same for boxing as it would be beneficial, in my opinion, to study your opponent before stepping in a ring with him or her. Then you can know what hand is their dominant hand, what steps they make to avoid being hit and their signature moves that have proved successful in the pass to weaken or to knock out their opponent. You study your opponent to get the upper hand. Why did I share all of this? Well, because as Saints of God we’ve been slacking on our jobs. We’ve been allowing the enemy to knock us down on our posts, count us out in our assignments and deem us unfit for harvesting all because we don’t know who were up against. Yea, Saints of God; we are losing because we don’t study our opponent, the devil.

I know you are used to what folk call him but who do you know him to be? I know you are comfortable with who grandma told you he was but have you studied him for yourself? How can you defeat someone if you don’t know what he looks like? 2 Corinthians 11:14 say he disguises himself as an angel of light. 1 Peter 5:8 say he prowls like a roaring lion. Mark 4:15 say he’s a taker of God’s word. But how would you know this, if you didn’t study? This is why you need to get to know who your enemy is in order to properly defeat him. Once you know who he is, James 4:7 say submit yourself to God and then resist the enemy. Ephesians 6:11 say put on the full armor of God and get ready and then 1 Peter 5:8 (again) say stay sober and alert. Oh, another way to defeat the enemy, forgive folk who hurt you. Don’t believe me? Read 2 Corinthians 2:10-11. Baby, don’t you know when you hold on to hurt and anger, the enemy uses that to creep into your life. Don’t take me at my word but Ephesians 4:27 say, “For anger gives a foothold to the devil.” This is why we have to know our enemy. What’s the point of going into battle without first having a strategy of defeat? We, as Saints of God, can defeat the enemy; we just need to know him or who he uses! Do you know your enemy?

Daily Devotional – 10/19/15 “What are your intentions?”

Are you tired of playing yet? With your spirituality, I mean. Aren’t you tired of playing with the Holy Spirit that is imbedded in your spirit? Aren’t you tired of going to church playing with this thang? You do know at some point, the playing will have to cease whether it be my choice or force. Yea, there are only so many times you’ll be allowed to act like you’re shouting before the Holy Spirit intervenes and it’ll blow your entire mind. Think about it for a few seconds. When you don’t give your all to something, how does it turn out? If someone challenged you to a game and you go in without the intentions of winning, you might lose. Then you’d probably say, ok let me get serious about this. And when you get serious, you have a better chance of getting better results. Well, when you stop playing with this thing called spirituality, you’ll have a greater chance of getting greater results. What are your spiritual intentions, Saint of God?

When you go to worship with the intentions to worship, you get worship. However, if you step into God’s house simply because it looks like the right thing to do, you’ll leave saying, “Pastor didn’t preach worth nothing.” When the truth of the matter is, your intentions weren’t worth nothing. This is why you have to grow up and stop playing. This is why you have to get to a point in your life when you get out of the playtime mentality, the “I have time” thinking and the “God knows my heart” mess! At some point, you’ve got to get out of your childish thinking about your spirituality and grow up. There’s work to do, kingdom work and it takes a mature mind to deal with what comes along with it. There are souls to save and having an immature mind can’t do it. This is why Hebrews 6:1-3 says, “So let us stop going over the basic teachings about Christ again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding. Surely we don’t need to start again with the fundamental importance of repenting from evil deeds and placing our faith in God. You don’t need further instruction about baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead and eternal judgment. And so, God willing, we will move forward to further understanding.” It’s time we move into a new realm of teaching and preaching because the enemy has moved to a new realm of destroying God’s people. It’s time we grow up spiritually in order to get what we need in the spirit! What are you intentions on this journey?

Daily Devotional – 10/16/15 “Who are you proving it too?”

Why do we spend the majority of our time trying to please folk and then give God the sloppy parts that’s left? I mean, some of us (I’m using us because this thang is about everybody) get up every day to post pictures of our relationship because we want to prove to social media it’s as good as you say it is. Yet, we aren’t trying to make it so and prove to God that it is. We are so worried with how folk will see us on the outside that we forget about the fact that God is looking on the inside. We take more time arguing with folk about our spirituality yet we don’t spend any time with God accepting His anointing. Yea, we post spiritual messages but how’s your life outside of social media? Does it match? We upload picture after picture of a smiling face but at home we’re drinking tears for water. Who are you trying to prove it too that you’re happy? Maybe if we spent more time trying to be happy, we wouldn’t have to put on a show for the world because then we’d actually be happy.

I’m only asking the question … who are you trying to prove it too? You do know that folk will talk about you no matter what you do, right? Then why are you concerned about them when you need to be concerned with God, who you barely speak too. Baby, you’ll never do it right for everybody because somebody in the group will find something wrong with you, your appearance, your relationship, what you say, the job you have, the car or house you stay in or what you did yesterday. Some of the folks you’re friends with on social media don’t like you anyway, they are simply waiting for something drastic to happen in your life so they can run and tell. Why are you trying to entertain them? You won’t talk about God out of fear of what folk might say. You won’t come to bible study because you don’t want folk to know you ready/study God’s word. You don’t go to Sunday school because then folk may ask who you’re changing for. You barely go to worship because then folk might call you holy. Well, I suggest you stop worrying about “them” because they can’t put you in Heaven or hell. Stop trying to please folk, you can’t! Ask yourself this question, “Am I now trying to win the approval of human beings, or of God? Or am I trying to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a servant of Christ. (Galatians 1:10)”