I say this often on my radio shows because I believe it's Bible truth!  I also want to remind myself as I'm reminding others that God always has a way of working stuff out.  

Have you ever looked at something in your life and thought, “I have no idea how I'm going to figure this out”? Maybe it's a financial situation, a relationship, a decision, a closed door, or simply an uncertain future.  I've learned that everything is figure-out-able when you serve a God of the impossible. That doesn't mean everything will happen the way we want it to. It means that even when we can't see a way forward, God can.

We often think we need to know the whole plan before we can take the next step. But faith doesn't require the entire map. “We live by faith, not by sight.” — 2 Corinthians 5:7. God may not show you step ten, but He will give you what you need for step one.  Think about Moses standing at the Red Sea. There was water in front of him and an army behind him. It looked impossible. But God was already making a way where Moses couldn't see one.
Maybe that's where you are today. You can't see the way out. You don't know how it's going to work. You don't have the answer yet. That doesn't mean God doesn't have a way.

Jesus said, “What is impossible with man is possible with God.” — Luke 18:27.  Perhaps there's a blessing waiting for us when we stop trying to solve tomorrow with today's strength. Take the next right step. Pray. Trust. Listen. Move when God says move, and wait when He says wait.  NEWS FLASH>>>>You don't have to have all the answers!  You just need to know the One who does.  Your situation may be impossible for you, but it is never impossible for God.  So take a breath. Trust Him with what you can't figure out. Because “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” — Matthew 19:26

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” — Matthew 11:28

I think I can trace my resistance to rest all the way back to kindergarten.  Every day, my teacher would have us lie down on little mats for 30 minutes.  Thirty minutes!  As a kindergartener, that seemed like an eternity. I didn't want to lie there. I didn't want to be still. I wanted to get up and do something.
Looking back, I realize something: maybe that's where my resistance to rest started.  
Of course, I didn't understand it then. But somewhere along the way, I began to associate being still with doing nothing—and doing nothing with wasting time.  And isn't that something many of us carry into adulthood?

We live in a culture that celebrates hard work, sacrifice, productivity and perseverance. We're taught to push through. Keep going. Don't quit. Work harder. Give more.  And there is certainly something biblical about diligence.  But what happens when you're tired?  When your body is saying, slow down.  When your mind is saying, I can't process one more thing.  When your soul is saying, I need Jesus.  When is less more?  What if rest isn't the opposite of productivity?  Maybe we've gotten this wrong.

We can be so committed to doing more that we forget that God intentionally created us with limits and put in us a need to rest.  There are only 24 hours in a day.  We need sleep.  We need quiet.  We need Sabbath.  We need moments when we're not producing, fixing, serving, solving or accomplishing.  Even Jesus rested.  In Mark 6:31, after the disciples had been pouring themselves out, Jesus said: “Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest.”
I love that Jesus didn't look at their exhaustion and tell them to try harder.  He invited them to come away and rest.
Jesus understood something we often forget: We are not machines.  We are human beings.  And sometimes the most faithful thing we can do is stop. We resist rest because we think everything depends on us, or maybe that's just me :D
I'll be honest. There were times when rest made me uncomfortable.  Because when I stop, I can see all the things that still need to be done.  The emails.  The responsibilities.  The people who need something.  The ideas swirling around in my head. The unfinished projects.  The things I thought I would have accomplished by now.  And that's when God gently reminds me:  “Julie, when did I ask you to carry the whole world?”

Maybe you need that reminder too.  The world doesn't depend on you.  Your ministry doesn't depend entirely on you.
Your family doesn't depend entirely on you.  Your future doesn't depend entirely on you.  God is still God when you take a day off.  He is still working when you're sleeping.  He is still moving when you're sitting still.  He is still providing when you're not striving.  Psalm 46:10 says:  “Be still, and know that I am God.”  Maybe being still is not wasted time.
Maybe it's where we remember who is actually in control.  We have made exhaustion look noble.  Somewhere along the way, we've started wearing exhaustion like a badge of honor.  “How are you?”  “Busy!”  "Tired!"  And we almost say it proudly.  But being constantly exhausted isn't necessarily evidence that we're doing God's will.  Sometimes it's evidence that we've forgotten our limits.  We can be doing good things and still be doing too much.  We can love people and still need boundaries.  We can serve God and still need sleep.  We can have a calling and still need a chair, a quiet room and a little time to breathe.

Jesus Himself withdrew to quiet places to pray.  “But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.” — Luke 5:16
If Jesus intentionally stepped away, why do we think we should always be available?  When is less more?  That's the question I've been asking myself.  When is less actually more?  Maybe it's when another commitment would leave you with no margin.  Maybe it's when your calendar is so full that you have no room to hear God.  Maybe it's when you're saying yes to everyone else but continually saying no to your own need for rest.  Maybe it's when you're accomplishing a lot but enjoying very little.  Maybe it's when your body is present, but your mind and spirit are completely depleted.
There are seasons when God calls us to work hard.  There are seasons when He asks us to sacrifice.  There are seasons of pouring out.  But there are also seasons of being poured into.  We need both.

May I remind you that you are valuable even when you're not accomplishing anything.  Your worth isn't found in your calendar.  It isn't found in your job.  It isn't found in your ministry.  It isn't found in how many people need you.  Your worth is found in the fact that you are God's creation and deeply loved by Him.  Jesus didn't say, “Come to me, all who have everything figured out.”  He said: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”  

Come.  Take a nap without feeling guilty.  Give yourself permission to stop.  Put the phone down. Turn off the notifications.  Take a walk.  Sit quietly with God.  And, it's okay to leave something on tomorrow's to-do list.

Breathe.  And remember:  God doesn't need you to be exhausted to be faithful.  Perhaps Mrs. Niederwerder, my  kindergarten teacher was onto something.  Maybe those 30 minutes on a little mat weren't wasted time after all.  Maybe I was learning a lesson I would need for the rest of my life.  “Come to me… and I will give you rest.” — Matthew 11:28

​Disappointment does not disqualify you; it often deepens you. It creates space where honesty with God can grow, where prayer becomes less performative and more real. Scripture is full of faithful people who were disappointed—David, Elijah, even the disciples—yet God met them not with rebuke, but with presence. Your disappointment may feel like an ending, but God often uses it as a doorway into greater trust, surrender, and intimacy.

When you have settled into disappointment it can be debilitating. Instead of asking, “What did I do wrong?” you might ask, “What is God inviting me into here?”

Not every unanswered prayer is a denial; some are a delay, a redirection, or a refining. God is steady when your emotions are not. He is near when hope feels fragile. And even here—especially here—He is still at work, faithful to finish what He began in you. So look with intentionality to find the good in the disappointment. It will become more visible when you move past your emotions and after the disappointment.

Hello,
Do you ever feel left out?  Does it appear that everyone else is going, doing and being and you’re not included?  As I sit in the stillness of this morning, my mind wants to “go there.”  There, is that lonely place, that place that will convince you you’re not a part of something and you’re always alone.  That thinking leads you to a dark place.  And that place will relentlessly invite you to the even darker place of comparing yourself to other people.  I promise you from my own experiences, you will never come out ahead when you subscribe to the plan of comparison and it leaves you feeling emptiness and insecurity. 

It's when I am in that place, I must intentionally choose to not linger there for too long and not be consumed by those thoughts and feelings. I have learned that it’s better to acknowledge those things and not ignore them, but once I do that, and I need to work through the thought processes of them.  Then comes the choice to break the pattern and make intentions to leave that place.   One way I do that is by taking all of “it”, whatever I’m feeling and facing to my heavenly Father.  I rehearse what I’m feeling and how it appears to Him.  I lay it all out and often that feels like I have just been cut wide open because it’s a place of vulnerable, yet after a little while, I begin to feel better.  I begin to feel lighter, not as alone and I find myself more receptive to regain hope again.

Recently I felt led to share a Message on Sunday morning with our online church called God Abides.  I know I needed the message the most that morning and as I shared God’s faithfulness, I prayed that God would take my words of His Word and impart God confidence in their hearts, replacing the emptiness with hope!  At the same time, I asked God for my own heart to be strengthened.  When you’re in it, it’s not always easy to be vulnerable with God.  Keep trying again and again.  God’s love is patient with you and if you listen with your heart, you will hear the voice of Jesus calling you closer.

Maybe you’re in that spot of loneliness, or the trap of comparison is oh too familiar.  Maybe you feel left out, you’re not the first one nor will you be the last, because there are countless other people in the same situation.  Can you make a choice to trust God and lay your heart out before Him?  Tell Him again and again how you’re feeling, cry if you want to, but stay with Him through this.  God abides.  It’s who He is.  Soon, you will begin to feel better.  You will become lighter and those feelings of loneliness will lessen and then you will find yourself more receptive to regain hope again.
Be encouraged that God abides with you and through the seasons of your life, so talk with Him, lay it all out to Him.

“By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.”  1 John 4:13
​Pastor Julie
​

Opposition will come.  And it comes in various ways and through various people, maybe the same people that you live with or maybe the same people who you work with, or maybe a complete stranger.  Opposition can manifest in your life through other people’s opinions of you, your ideas or character that are different than yours.   Perhaps those people intentionally know what they’re doing to try to demean you or discourage you, or maybe they’re unaware, ignorant of their ill expression of their opinions toward you.  Either way, opposition will come. 

There are so many negative ways to handle opposition, and, personally, I have to work through those ways in my head and heart by eliminating them one at a time, regardless of how appealing they seem.  I'm sure there are phycological reasons why a negative has so much weight, but for me, it takes intention to get out from under those thoughts taking root and detaining me.  When, you're facing opposition, taking a stand of authority over your flesh and feeling will center your mind on God and progress, rather than your hurts. When the fog of betrayal, hurt and injured pride lifts, you can begin to see the good ways to response to opposition. 

Opposition can fortify you, your ideas and your character.  In order for it to accomplish this in your life, you must take the road of humility.  That’s when you take your attention off of the person that has brought the opposition and put it on you.  You begin to listen to what was said and weight the opposition against yourself.  If there is any truth in what was said, if so, or if you don't know...you admit that to God and ask for His rescue or input.  If there’s no truth and the opposition was their own manifestation of their short comings or insecurities, you carry on and release the person from the offense. 
​
What comes next is a reassurance of you, your idea or character.  That God is the source of all things great in your life and because of Him, you can have confidence that He’s with you and He’s got you.  The enemy of opposition can be used for good in you.  Romans 8:28.  It’s going to be ok, at the minimum, and on those heavy days of opposition and you can’t see the rainbow, that doesn’t mean there isn’t a rainbow...it just may not be visible, YET. 😊

Giving all honor to God, who is the Head of my life…when I  allow Him to be!

The truth is that God is sovereign and is the head of all things.  God is the creator, The Great I AM and nothing was created except by Him and nothing can be sustained without God.  In those truths; God has created life.  God has allowed life.  And in that life, we are afforded many opportunities, victories, successes, trials and hardships.  In that life, we are allowed suffering and happiness.

It causes me wonderment at the amazing life experiences that God affords us.  I think if only we could see what He sees.  If only we could know what He knows, I’m sure we would be different and I’m sure we would behave differently.  I’m even sure we would think different as we see only partial revelation, yet we continue learning, embracing, growing glowing. 

I decided to take a few minutes out of this ordinary day and search for life lessons that I would probably pass up if I didn’t take the time to think intentionally about seeing them.
​
Life Lessons:

• Fear is a big deal to God because fear causes me to live in disobedience.
• The initial report doesn’t have to be the official report.
• Good can come out of bad things and difficult relationships.
• If I don’t know the answer; it’s because God hasn’t allowed me to know it yet.
• In spite of everything-I need to continue doing what I know to do concerning God.
• My weaknesses, sin and less than good behavior doesn’t deflate God’s love for me.
• I’m important.
• My contribution, however big or small is necessary.
• It takes faith to finish an assignment.
• God hopes I will learn and be available to learn.
• From learning comes growth.  From growth come opportunities.  From opportunities come experiences.  From experiences comes testimony. 
• There are times when the biggest step of faith I can take is to remain and continue.
• If I don’t know the answer, ask.  And if I’ve been asking, and I still don’t have the answer, it’s not for me to know.  So I just need to carry on and make peace with not knowing. 

A few life lessons that God is showing me. I invite you to take a few intentional moments and ask, “God what are you showing me right now in my life?”  “What life lessons are before me that I’ve been too busy to notice?”  Write them down for yourself and email them to me if you'd like to share them.  Chances are, I will benefit from your life lessons too!  God is good like that.  

As always, God loves you and has an awesome plan for your life!  That's life lesson worth learning :D
Pastor Julie

A phrase we've said and heard countless times before.  Lately I have heard the response, “I don’t care” repeatedly.  Each time, I’m invited to become a bit “miffed” at the person who is saying it.  I think, why don’t you care?  But I read online earlier, that when I attempt to take nothing personal, I will be in a better place.  So, I didn’t RSVP to the invitation to be “miffed”.   SN:  miffed means irritated or upset.  So, I started thinking about why the “I don’t care” answer and attitude.    In my opinion, there are some common intentions or attitudes related to the response of “I don’t care.”

1.
I don’t care because I’m impartial and indifferent.  I’m willing to accept whatever because it doesn’t matter to me.  I have no vested interest in the situation or circumstance, so whatever happens is irrelevant.  This attitude carries a detached motive of nothing vested and nothing gained, NEXT, I’m over it.  This breeds a life of aloofness. 
 
2.
I don’t care because I have given up hope.  The hope I once had has disappointed me and leaves me feeling defeated, maybe forgotten or rejected.  This carries a heavy negative connotation of defeat and depression.  And can affect one’s well-being.  Maybe it’s rooted in fear, fear of being disappointed again and so the person can’t and won’t take the gamble to find out.  So instead, they abandon their life to an attitude of whatever in a defeated and a victim.
 
3.
I don’t care because I trust God.  In every situation and circumstance, this person has disciplined themselves to surrender and submit to the Lord because He is sovereign, and they know that He wants what is best for them.  So, they can say I don’t care with full assurance that whatever God desires it will happen and they willingly are accepting and ok with that.  In this situation, I don’t care means I am living in a place of surrender.  My vested interest is in God and God alone.  Amen, this is a peaceful way to live.
4. 
I don’t care because I’m too lazy to decide.  LOL, this could be my motive for my I don’t care.  However, due to our humanness, when we answer from the comfort place of laziness, it’s short lived and it turns out that we really do care.  That’s proven from our complaining about what happened after we were too lazy to give input or share our desires. This attitude leaves one with regrets and should have’s.

About number 4: I’m discovering that when I don’t offer my opinion or preference, it could be that I’m just being lazy or tired, but it could also be that I don’t value myself enough to think that my opinion or input matters.  Or it could be a little bit of both.  Nevertheless, I do matter and so do you, and so does our input and opinions.  Can I remind you to be confident and fully convinced that you matter.  God has his signature on you and that’s why you matter.  Psalm 139 in the Bible is my go-to when I’m feeling anything less than lovely about myself.

Psalm 139 (NLT)
For the choir director: A psalm of David.
1 O Lord, you have examined my heart
    and know everything about me.
2 You know when I sit down or stand up.
    You know my thoughts even when I’m far away.
3 You see me when I travel
    and when I rest at home.
    You know everything I do.
4 You know what I am going to say
    even before I say it, Lord.
5 You go before me and follow me.
    You place your hand of blessing on my head.
6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
    too great for me to understand!
7 I can never escape from your Spirit!
    I can never get away from your presence!
8 If I go up to heaven, you are there;
    if I go down to the grave,[a] you are there.
9 If I ride the wings of the morning,
    if I dwell by the farthest oceans,
10 even there your hand will guide me,
    and your strength will support me.
11 I could ask the darkness to hide me
    and the light around me to become night--
12     but even in darkness I cannot hide from you.
To you the night shines as bright as day.
    Darkness and light are the same to you.
13 You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body
    and knit me together in my mother’s womb.
14 Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex!
    Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.
15 You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion,
    as I was woven together in the dark of the womb.
16 You saw me before I was born.
    Every day of my life was recorded in your book.
Every moment was laid out
    before a single day had passed.
17 How precious are your thoughts about me,[b] O God.
    They cannot be numbered!
18 I can’t even count them;
    they outnumber the grains of sand!
And when I wake up,
    you are still with me!
19 O God, if only you would destroy the wicked!
    Get out of my life, you murderers!
20 They blaspheme you;
    your enemies misuse your name.
21 O Lord, shouldn’t I hate those who hate you?
    Shouldn’t I despise those who oppose you?
22 Yes, I hate them with total hatred,
    for your enemies are my enemies.
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart;
    test me and know my anxious thoughts.
24 Point out anything in me that offends you,
    and lead me along the path of everlasting life.

When I asked the person why they didn’t care, they responded, “I wanted to know you cared when I didn’t.”  WOW, I’ve added a 5.
​
5.
I don’t care are words from a weary soul that needs to know you care about them.  So, tell them that you care about them.  Reaffirm them that they matter and that you’re right there with them in the “I don’t care” season they are in.  Be a friend.  Be kind.  Be reliable.  Be a listening ear.  Be the helper.  Be the one who cares.

"I care about you."
Pastor Julie

“Don’t worry, your time is coming…keep praying, keep preparing, keep planning.”  These words stood out to me as I half-heartingly scrolled through the plethora of emails in my inbox.  I read the words a few times, hoping they would be infused into my spirit and mind, as there seems to be a continual raging war between those two things within me as of late. 

When the season is daunting and you want to give up, or in my case, want to ignore the vision that lacks recent confirmation.  God allows something as simple as a few words to show up in my inbox to penetrate the dormancy of the vision as a reminder to keep going, and a nudge to keep hope alive.  My faith challenges me to believe it’s a love tap from the Lord that lets me know He’s not finished yet, so I shouldn’t be either.

Keep praying.  The Bible has a lot to say about prayer.  So, with confidence, you can be assured that praying is the preferred method of the Lord for us to reach Him.  Prayer is the means that enlightens us to understand His ways and His Word.  With that, I want to focus on prayers that were answered in the Bible.  From the beginning of creation prayer has been in existence.  Imagine, the vastness of God that He hears the prayers of His people.  WOW!  We can reach the Father’s ear and He is kind enough to reply to our words or tears.   Yes, tears are wordless prayers.

In the Bible, we read of testimonies of answered prayers.  In 2 Kings 20:1-6, Hezekiah was very sick, and the prophet Isaiah came to tell him, “Dude, with all due respect, you’re not gonna make it out of this sickness.” The King prayed by turning his face to the wall and reminding God of their relationship and how he was with him from the time of his youth.  He asked God for additional life.  God answered his prayer and gave Hezekiah another 15 years of life. 

1 Samuel 1 gives us another answered prayer testimony.  This time, it was Hannah who was in despair and needed hope.  She was childless and her “sister wife” wasn’t.  Apparently, the other wife seemed to find great pleasure in rubbing Hannah’s empty womb in her face.  Yet, Hannah continued to be faithful to the Lord be going up to the house of the Lord yearly.  Fast forward, God heard her tears and answered her prayers to have a child. God is a prayer answering God!  Always keep praying.

If you’re vision isn’t happening, it appears your prayers aren’t being answered, and your faith is wobbly, keep praying. I'd like to share with you that I think praying puts you in a position for God to answer your needs, desires, dreams and so much more. So keep praying.

Back to the original email that sparked this blog.  It read keep praying and keep preparing.  I take this to encourage and instruct me in the middle of the nothingness, I’m not to get lazy and do nothing.  In the “it’s not happening” of the vision, that’s when you prepare even more than if something was happening.  Think about it, when things do start happening, you won’t have time to prepare, and you’ll be unprepared.  So, thank God for the time to prepare.  It’s difficult and counterculture to prepare for something when nothing is happening.  But that’s faith in action!
It's in the no movement that you’ll need to be creative and innovative in your preparing to stay motivated in your preparing.  But preparing yourself will benefit you when it’s time!  Being prepared allows you to fully engage in the arrival and ride of the wave when it happens.

The third directive listed in the email to keep your vision and passion alive is to keep planning.  Planning is different from preparing.  Preparing is conditioning so that you are ready.  Planning is action.  What you will do when it happens, what’s next, step by step.  Your preparation will impact your plan and vice versa. While these two things are distantly related, they are unique in their impact.

This last directive is one that I added to help myself.  Keep pressing!  Pressing is left up to one’s own interpretation and one’s own capacity.  My most committed pressing might be mild in your scope of pressing or vice versa.  So, figure out how you press and to what capacity in your own life. 

Pressing denotes consistent work and effort.  Press on!  Keep going!  Keep the work moving.  In Luke 8 and in Mark 5, we read of the woman who kept pressing.  She had a debilitating condition and she heard about Dr Jesus!  Due to the culture of that time, her condition hindered her from having a normal life.  Despite, she pressed!  She pressed through the crowd to get to Jesus.  Not even to see Jesus’ face but to get close to his feet, specifically the hem of his clothing.  Her pressing involved groundwork.  She pressed until she got behind Jesus in the crowd confident that her contact with Him would be all she needed.  Jesus answered her prayer.  Her pressing paid off.  Interestingly, I don’t know her name, as she was only referred to as the woman with the issue of blood, but she pressed, and Jesus answered her prayers. 
Today, keep praying.  Today, keep preparing.  Today, keep planning.  Today, keep pressing.  Just for today.  Then if the Lord wakes you up tomorrow, repeat until it’s your glory time and you are seeing Jesus, face to face!

Jeremiah 29:11 For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.