Song of the Day – Hold Fast – MercyMe

Hold Fast by MercyMe

I heard today’s song while driving to work this morning. It is Hold Fast by MercyMe. It’s one of those songs that reaches into your heart and helps lift out some of the pain, stress or weakness when you are in the middle of a tough season of life. Sometimes it feels as the song says like the season will never pass. Perhaps you are in the middle of a long, desperate time that feels like you will never reach summer where abundance and joy flows. Hold fast to the strength of your spirit, reach out to others who can help encourage you to live on through the challenging times. Reach out to God and ask for help, guidance and understanding for what is going on in your life right now. Help is always around you when you ask for it. Allow yourself to reach out and overcome your pride that keeps you from receiving help and encouragement.

Remember, you are not alone and that no one could possibly know or understand what is happening in your life. When you reach out, you will be amazed at how others will respond to your true vulnerability with overflowing love, concern and support. Ask God to bring people into your life to help you find your way, help booster your self esteem and help you to hold fast until a new day dawn’s with the promises of love, hope and abundance in all things.

You are loved beyond measure.
You are a masterpiece.
You are an important part of God’s plan.
You are not junk, a mistake or a loser.
You are God in Action!

Walk by Faith

Try to walk by faith, even when you cannot see.  There is a plan and a purpose to your life, even if you do not fully realize why you are taking the steps you are in the moment.  Have faith that it is all leading to something better and greater than you can imagine right now.  Perhaps pain and fears are keeping you from seeing the true picture and scope of your life.  Work to let go of the fears, doubts and anger you may feel in moments where you have lost control of your life.  Simple ways to let go of fears are to meditate, pray and do activities that help relieve your stress.  It is hard when faced with challenges to see that beyond today there is a brighter future ahead.  Try to visualize a positive future for yourself, breathing in the hope and truth that God has infinite ways to bless your life and that you can open to receiving them by staying at peace in each moment.  Accept that life has challenges but that each challenge prepares you for something greater. 

My husband and I set out on our walk of faith when we moved down to Florida.  In our minds and hearts we thought we were coming to Florida for  purpose and goal we already had in our mind.  Things have turned out quite differently than either of us has imagined, with struggles, challenges and delayed dreams.  At first, we were both very angry with God and wondering why on Earth were we drawn to Florida especially when problems started to occur and finances grew tight.  With the economy on a downward spiral at the moment we arrived in Florida, it was a bleak sight ahead without jobs or other means to support ourselves.  As we continued to walk with faith, we helped others to heal and feel empowered. 

While not necessarily achieving the goals we had in mind, we were able to still continue to help others while we struggled.  This helped to broaden our own awareness and keep the focus off of our own challenges.  Taking your mind off of yourself and your own life helps you to realize that there is more going on and that you aren’t as helpless as you pretend to be.  Your mind and fears want to trap you in feeling helpless so that your soul and light don’t shine. 

Over a year ago, we could not have understood the paths that God was laying out for us or why there would have been new roads placed that weren’t on the map.  These new roads are allowing for greater opportunities and chances for growth both professionally and personally.  While we may have mastered many of the tools we use for healing others, there is still a lot to learn and prepare for in order to help the maximum amount of people.  By expanding ourselves in the way God has planned, we find new blessings, new purpose and new dreams. 

It is not always about what you have planned, it is about the higher plan that can’t always been seen.  Allow your heart and spirit to expand outward to embrace the unseen plan.  Embrace the path that is unseen with faith, hope and assurance that you do not walk your path alone.  God is always with you, by your side, holding your hand with reassurance that you are fully supported, fully covered in love and there are miracles and blessings in store that you cannot imagine yet.

Life’s Twists and Turns

Life takes many twists and turns. Often times leading us in places we never knew we would go and other times leading us down roads we never thought we could go even if we wanted to.  It is amazing to me to see the roads my life has gone down, many times by choice and other times not at all by choice.  Currently it feels like I am being lead down a completely different road with even more choices to rise above and push through walls and circumstances that I never thought I would enter.

 

So many others are feeling the same way, coming up against walls of built out of fears that they don’t have enough, feelings of insecurity that they don’t have the funds to meet every day expenses, let alone emergencies.  The fear that is surrounding so many communities is palatable; you could almost cut it with a nice.  It is a feeling of depression and failure that men and women can’t support their families and that no amount of success in the past even measures up to the current status of their lives where the years they may have put into a job or learning a career don’t mean anything. 

 

It is at these moments when life seems darkest and most fearful that we have to reach deep inside and reflect on what is truly important in life.  Reflect on what it is that we truly want to create with our lives.  Perhaps what we most desire has to be released so we can welcome in something new that we were meant to be. 

 

Right now for me, it is amazing and odd to be seeing what new possibilities can come out of going back to work at a university after spending so many months trying to create a healing practice.  Along the way, I have learned so much and realize there is still so much more to learn that it isn’t the end yet of that dream.  That dream continues to be reshaped as it is bigger than me and what my own vision can hold.  While working at the university, I will be able to return to get a master’s degree and pursue a different way of helping others.  I am still unsure where this path is going and it is often frustrating that things aren’t going how I planned them to be. 

 

As I look at all the broken pieces, I am rearranging them into a new picture, perhaps something stronger and more detailed than what it had been before.  Often when I am most frustrated I find the words that help not only myself but help others to find that inner strength and courage to keep pushing forward, too.  There is so much darkness surrounding the world right now, it takes every ounce of courage within each of us to shine our light out, to shine the love we have inside to help bring about something greater than we had dreamed of. 

 

I am confident that in each person I talk to that each one has something special to share, something important and vital that is waiting to be shined out.  Right now, while I am cursing the walls around me, I am also grateful for the insight they have given me.  It is a reminder that within me is something greater than just the day to day challenges of life.  That inner spark is more powerful than the world around me can drown out.  I will tend to my spark and hope it helps light the way for another to shine brighter.  Cause God just isn’t finished with any of us yet! 

 

Continue to have faith in your heart and shine your light.  When in doubt of your true worth, reach out to those who have loved you, who have stood beside you no matter what – without judgment of who you truly are.  Remember you are loved, that your love is important for someone else in your life.  Shine your light!

Where Does God Go?

Where Does God Go?

Alicia M. Erchul

 

Pain rises wave upon wave.

Filling the mind and breaking the heart.

Pain increases making every moment torture.

Breaking the body and depressing the spirit.

 

How can the world be filled with so much pain?

How can one body be filled with so much fear that it has forgotten its soul?

How can one go on day after day when they are all the same?

How can one live when they are all alone?

 

Where does God go when the body is in pain?

Where does God go when the mind is filled with disease?

Where does God go when the heart weeps in despair?

Where does God go when the world keeps spinning without any peace?

 

Does God run and hide away,

Waiting for another day to come out and play?

Does God turn away,

Hiding behind the clouds like the sun?

 

There is never a day when God hides from you.

There is never a moment so dark that God would leave your side.

God stands ever faithful, by your side, in your heart and all around you.

With a helping hand and a loving embrace, God is there to help you go on.

 

God is there, when you are crying.

God is there, when you are in pain.

God is there, when you are weary.

God is there, when you are in despair.

 

Let God release the pain.

Let God come and fill your heart with gladness.

Let God step in and lift your pain away.

Let God’s radiant light surround you till the darkness is but a memory.

 

God’s light is there to lift your spirits.

God’s hand is there to heal your pain.

God’s love is there to bring you back to health.

God’s faith is there when your own faith thinks life is impossible.

 

Find hope in God’s promise that you are never alone and always loved.

Find joy in God’s creation that each day is truly brand new.

Find peace in God’s grace that you are forgiven and healed of all pain.

Find strength in God’s faith that there are infinite possibilities for your life.

 

One in a Million ~09.20.07

One in a Million

~ Alicia Crystalus

When the world frustrates and angers you, take a moment to step back.
In that moment, focus your attention inward to find your flicker of light.
Let that flicker of light grow and spread until it fills your entire being.
Let the light flow out to the rest of the world.

Let your light bathe the rest of the world in golden white light.
Shining brightly onto every street, every house, and every city around the world.
See the world cleansed, refreshed and renewed with the light you are sharing.
See the world as a place that brings you joy and happiness.

Let the light carry with it a message of peace and love.
Not only for yourself and those you love.
But for the entire world, especially the ones who anger and frustrate you.
Carry that message on to those who bring fear and darkness into this world.

Let your light shine so others can be free of the fear and darkness.
Create the world as you would like to see it.
Regain the power you have so long set aside to others
Who is better able to design a world filled with joy than you?

When you regain your power, you will not have to react with anger.
Instead you will be able to react from a place of love, light and power.
Never underestimate the power of love to change the world.
Each moment spent in love is one less moment spent in fear.

Even if love only changes you and your perspective
The world as we know it will have been changed forever.
One living in love outweigh millions who are living in deep seated fear and anger.
Be the one in a million and share your love, light and peace with the world.