Daily Devotional – 12/30/13 “That’s enough!”

Yea, it’s one of those mornings where I don’t really have a topic to write about and if the truth shall be revealed, I don’t feel like writing but who am I? Since leaving church on yesterday I’ve been in this funk because it blows my mind that folk will get up on a Sunday morning, get dressed, drive to church only to get there and not have church. I mean, how can you honestly sit on your praises when God has kept all His promises? How can you be ashamed to shout when it was God that you sought? How can you not give Him thanks even in the midst of your storm when He’s been the one keeping you safe from harm? Yea, I know that your enemies seem to have you surrounded but they haven’t stopped you yet. Your checking account is in the negative but it’s not closed. Your bills are behind and you still have a month before tax time but don’t you still have a roof over your head, lights and running water? Didn’t you wake up, in your right mind, with a reasonable portion of strength, with a little food to eat or the means to get it and the ability to check Facebook or email which means either your phone bill or your internet is still on? Then why are you mad at God? Why are you questioning Him? He wasn’t the one that told you to get out there and accumulate all those bills, you did that on your own yet God is keeping you. You’re mad because folk keep talking about, lying on, throwing rocks and hiding their hands and wishing bad over your life yet everything they’ve tried hasn’t worked because God says, although their weapons are formed against you, they won’t prosper.

Ok, so you’re wondering why you have to be the one who’s sick but baby can’t just anybody rock a bald head from chemo or that scar from surgery. Everybody can’t handle the pain, medicine or dialysis. Everybody can’t overcome drug or alcohol addiction. Can’t the average person testify on how God raised from your sick bed when you should have been buried in that dusty grave, how that bullet should have blown your brains out but it grazed you instead, how that car should have claimed your life but it left you with only bruises from the seatbelt, how that abusive husband should have snatched your life but instead he made you strong for the husband that God was waiting on you to see or how that job thought they had defeated you when they said no but they were simply moving out the way for your career. Maybe, no scratch that, you’re going through whatever it is you’re facing simply because it’s meant for you. You need to know at this very moment that you’re greater than whatever is against you because you shall live and not die, prosper instead of perish, overcome instead of being overthrown and be victorious and not a victim and you will win and not lose! How do I know? I’ve been promised by a King and that’s enough.

Daily Devotional – 12/27/13 “But God!”

Have you ever had a “but God” moment? A moment when you realized that no one could have brought you out the situation that you were in or fixed a problem that you were having but God? See, but is a word that is used in the middle or the beginning of a sentence to introduce something that is true even though it is different to what was just said. You know when your teenager asks if they can borrow your car and you say “Yes, but not now.” Or when you ask God if He can give you this and He answers, “Yes, but not now.” See, when God places but at the end of the sentence it has more of a profound effect and He’s simply saying yes BUT in my time. Yes, I’ll heal you but in my time. Yes, I’ll deliver you but in my time. Yes, I’ll fix what you’ve messed up but in my time. Yea, you’ll get that promotion but in my time. Yea, I make your enemies your footstool but in my time. I’ll even move your mountain but in my time.

Oh, you know that when you were in the world doing any and everything that you were bad enough to do; it was God that kept you. When you were drinking out of other folks bottles and passing cigarettes around from person to person, it was God that kept you from diseases. When you were sleeping with any and everybody, God kept you from STDs and HIV. When you sit back and think about some of the things you use to do and realize that you shouldn’t be alive that’s your but God moment. When that heart attack or stroke should have claimed your life, God is saying I’m only laying you on your back but I’ll soon raise you. When man said no, God is saying, you thought that was for you but I have something greater. When folks scandalize your name, God is saying they can talk but I have the last say. Folk said you wouldn’t amount to nothing but God is saying they may think that now but watch me work. When the doctor said cancer, chemo, dialysis, radiation or surgery; God is saying, this is what you have to go through but I’m simply cleaning you up. Yea, when you keep trying to figure out how you manage to make the ends meet with the amount of money you’re bringing home; God is saying, you may not have much but such as I have I’ll give unto you. When your gas light is on and payday is tomorrow, God is saying, don’t focus on that light but focus on me. When your husband or wife left and you didn’t think the hurt would heal, God is saying, it may hurt now but your heart I’ll mend. Oh, I’m going to leave this alone but somebody needed to know that no matter what you’re facing at this very moment, you’re not alone because when all the friends are gone, phone isn’t vibrating anymore, the house is quiet; God is saying, you may not see me but I’m here, you may not hear me but I’m talking and you may not feel me but my arms are holding you tight. When it’s all said and done, it’s but God!

“The wicked band together against the righteous and condemn the innocent to death But the LORD has become my fortress, and my God the rock in whom I take refuge.” Psalm 94:21-22<

Writing isn’t for Wimps!

Whew! You read this right, “Writing isn’t for wimps.” See, it takes time to write anything from a blog post to most definitely a book so it isn’t for the faint at heart. Writing takes determination because you have to be determined to get your name out. Writing takes hard work because who will be able to sell your book better than you? Oh, a publicist can but if you’re like me, you’re not a millionaire; hell you’re not even a thousandaire so the publicist is you which means, writing is hard work. Writing takes patience because not everyone will like your book simply because you think they will so you have to be patient in getting a publishing company to pick it up. Writing takes courage because you will have strangers picking it up or downloading what you’ve put your hard work into and there are some avid readers who will comb through every word and scene with a fine tooth comb. Writing, also, takes thick skin because again, not everyone will like your book but for the few who don’t, hundreds will.

But let me leave you with this piece of advice, don’t allow anyone to detour your dreams. It doesn’t matter how old you are, how pretty you look, how you dress and even who your folks are that can determine who you are. God made you exactly who YOU are, so go for whatever it is you’re passionate about. Writing for me is a passion and its one gift that God saw fit for me to be blessed with so I use it every day to ensure that it glorifies Him. Yea, it’s hard being an author but it’s even harder becoming a published author with a book no one reads. Writing isn’t for wimps because after the book has been written, edited and made available for purchase; the real work begins. You are your best advocate. Make damn sure everyone knows!

Daily Devotional – 12/26/13 “Start now!”

It’s a few days before the New Year and you’re probably already making “resolutions” for 2014, right? I am going to start a new diet and stick to it. I am going to get on a budget and stick to it. I am going to church every Sunday and I’m going to pay my tithes right. I am going to let go of all the bull crap this year because it is a new year and new me! I am not going to let folks use me this year, I am not going to let my baby daddy walk all over me and I’m going to start treating folks better. But my question is, “Why wait until the New Year?” All of these things can be done, right now, can’t they? Why are you making those lies to God when, after all, He knows your heart? I find it sad that God has to, sometimes, lay us on our back before we look up to him and He has to knock us to our knees before we reach out to him. It isn’t enough that He’s given you another day, another chance and another opportunity to kick the dirt on the ground instead of still taken life for granted? For some, yesterday was another day to get high, drunk and act a fool but when will you get tired of that? When will you get tired of spending all of your money on material things that are probably still in the floor from yesterday? When will you get tired of trying to keep up with folks, who (if the truth shall be told), is one paycheck away from bankruptcy too? When will grown folk start acting like grown folk so that children can act like children? Don’t you realize, by now, that the devil is busier than ever in the lives of our children? More kids are dying every day and most don’t even have a church home to be eulogized in because the parents don’t. When will we start taking our children to God’s house instead of dropping them off at Grandma’s house? When will we start acting we might not see tomorrow because, get this, we might not. When will we decide to do better than yesterday, to let go of the past, to release all of the anger and to do exactly what you said you’d do. All I’m saying is stop waiting to get yourself together. Stop waiting until the New Year to make resolutions that you know won’t last. Start now getting it right!

“I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me. No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the end of the race and receive the heavenly prize for which God, through Christ Jesus, is calling us. Let all who are spiritually mature agree on these things. If you disagree on some point, I believe God will make it plain to you. Only let us hold true to what we have attained. Philippians 3:12-16”

Daily Devotional – 12/24/13 “Birth your blessing”

On this day many years ago, I can only imagine Mary, 9 months pregnant with God’s only Son. Mary, whose feet were probably swollen, stomach was big, back was hurting yet she had somewhere to be. Mary a regular girl, chosen by God to do something irregular and who went on to birth her blessing. Yea, she labored through the pain to push out a Prophet. She accepted the mess folks talked about her to birth a Messiah. She endured just so that she could birth Emmanuel. Oh, I can only imagine the joy she felt when she looked upon His face, the emotions running through her as she shared with others, the blessing she had just birthed in a stable for animals without even a place to lie. Yet, here we are today, living in a world with limitless possibilities and were too scared to even carry a blessing yet alone birth it. Yea, God gives us a gift and we’re so afraid of failure that we won’t even use it. We’d walk around pregnant with an expectant blessing yet we won’t birth it. WTF? Where’s the faith?

See, it doesn’t matter about the location of our birth or even the surroundings of our living that determines our gift because we, too, are destined for greatness for in Jeremiah 1:5 God tells me “I knew you before I formed you in your mother’s womb. Before you were born I set you apart and appointed you as my prophet to the nations.” Oh, you thought your past arrest record would hinder you but it won’t. You thought your past addiction would stop you from prospering but it can’t. You thought that old disease was going to take you out and you even thought all of the hell you’ve been through would break you down but it shall not. No, because it doesn’t matter about your location, whether you’re up or down and it doesn’t really matter about your circumstances because God doesn’t call the qualified but he qualifies those he calls. Don’t you know by now that He can take you; a drug addict, alcoholic, whoremonger, adulterer, liar, backbiter and sinner; pick you up, put you through the fire to erase everything you’ve done in the past and bring you out shining like pure gold? Psalm 71:20 says, “You have allowed me to suffer much hardship, but you will restore me to life again and lift me up from the depths of the earth.”

God isn’t worried about where you used to be as long as you birth that which He has put on the inside of you. I know your journey may have some bumps called haters to go over, some potholes called enemies to go around, some ice called lies to slide on and some dead-ends called mistakes that make you want to turn around but go on because it’s your journey! God is in the renewing business and once you’ve been renewed, you’ll be refreshed and with refreshing comes restoration and with restoring comes a new shine that’ll make you look brand new then all of the old things won’t matter because if you’re in Christ, you’re a new creature and all of the old things are passed away (2 Corinthians 5:17). It doesn’t matter that you were abused, because God can heal you. It doesn’t matter if you use to steal because God will forgive you. It doesn’t matter about what folks say because God already has you’re future planned and not even the devil can change that. So, stop allowing stuff to hinder the blessing that you’ve been holding. In other words, use your gift that’s growing on the inside of you! Birth your blessing and then raise it so that it makes room for you!