By the word of our testimony...

Revelation 12:11

They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony;

they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.

Skeptics may debate the validity of Scripture or argue the existence of God, but no one can deny your personal experiences with him. When you tell your story of how God has worked a miracle in your life, or how he has blessed you, transformed you, lifted and encouraged you, perhaps even broken and healed you, no one can argue or debate it. You go beyond the realm of knowledge into the realm of relationship with God (christianity.about.com/od/testimonies/a/howtotestimony.htm).

Every day is unique and different but yet looking back they all seem to blend together, life becomes a blur, and before we know it time passes us by and we quickly forget the journey that took place to get us to where we are.

Just recently I have witnessed God’s hand in my life, His grace, blessings, providence, and purpose. Some days I have felt him so close that I was consumed by His presence, in awe of His glory; and then there are other days where I am consumed by worry, anxiety, and my own earthly desires. We all have a doubting Thomas within us, how quickly we forget and how quickly we allow God’s awesomeness to be overshadowed by our fears of earthly defeat.

Civilizations build statues to commemorate significant moments in history, time capsules are accumulated to show generations to come what was once important, documentaries are made to tell of one’s life and accomplishments, and books are written in hopes of capturing feelings and emotions that will one day describe to an audience what was felt, seen, and heard.

We are a nation that is quick to forget, a nation that relies on these statues, capsules, documentaries, and books to remind us of where we once were, how far we’ve come, what sacrifices were once made, and what examples we can use from the experiences before us.

We rely on scriptures to enforce the values that we experience today, we use the words of men and women, inspired by God, to draw encouragement and hope from. How many times do we search for articles or messages from others of faith to help us along in our journey? We all possess the ability to encourage, to give hope, and to enforce God’s presence among us because God is at work in all of us. He is not just the God of ancient history, but a God that is so evident and working in His creation today that each one of us can write a testimony proving the existence of God and the unique experiences we have encountered in developing a personal relationship with Him. We can not only encourage those who will one day read our testimony to draw encouragement from, but we can also remind ourselves again and again of God’s faithfulness in our lives, His divine design for us and that He is continually working within us.

How quickly we can forget, how often we need reminded, but each one of us posses the proof that God is at work in each of us. We all have a testimony and it is with that testimony that we can overcome.

In the hands of the potter...

I went and had the opportunity to watch a man shape and create pottery. He sat behind his spinning wheel, with the clay spinning round and round, and his hand the only instrument in shaping and creating his vessel of choice. He made it seem easy as he gently added pressure and took away pressure in creating just the right shape, thickness, and functionality to this piece of pottery. He took out a measuring device to make sure that the thickness of the pot was just right, but after so many years of creating these vessels, he knew by sight what was right. It seemed to take no time at all to see this pot take shape, and to see it from start to finish beginning as a simple lump of clay and ending as a piece ready to be of function.

This of course brought to mind the scriptures where God is the potter and we are the clay. Such a simple analogy but yet deep in its application and thought provoking lessons.

Isaiah 64:8
Yet, O LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.

Romans 9:20-21
But who are you, a human being, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use?

Jeremiah 18:5-6
Then the word of the LORD came to me saying, “Can I not, O house of Israel, deal with you as the potter does?” declares the LORD. “Behold, like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.”

Clay is an inadament object, it does not have free-will, and it does not have emotions or physical abilities to move on its own. It’s fun to watch the potter at work because he has complete control of the clay. It is the potter’s own will and his own physical ability to shape the clay and the clay is formed by his complete control.

We are the clay but we have free-will, we have the ability to wiggle, to move, to resist the potter’s shaping. God often has us on the wheel, He has his hands on us, shaping us, forming us, creating us to be something of beauty and of use. We always want to move, always want to get off of His wheel, trying to avoid His hands. Our movements create weakness within the clay, His perfect shaping is made weak not by his own hands but by our desire to move away from his shaping. Like any good potter, he then has to start over because the integrity of the entire vessel is compromised by weakness in one area of the vessel.

How many times do we disrupt the beauty of the potter, the awe of His creativity by compromising His work and by making him begin anew in breaking us down, re-forming us and then re-shaping us. How patient is he that he does not just throw us aside and begin working on a new lump of clay, one that is more cooperative and willing to be shaped and formed. It is my own weakness that often creates the delays in life that I see as struggles but it is God’s patience and creativity that continually re-shapes me, strengthens me, and works within me to begin again and again stronger than the time before.

Encouraged by Community

Christianity is a sense of community, a body of believers; their purpose other then ultimately following and worshiping God together is to encourage, strengthen, and uphold one another in the values and truth's of God's word.  Sometimes we are the ones speaking the truths and forming the words to encourage others, but other times it is the word of a Christian brother or sister who encourages us and strengthens us and roots us again in God's promises and truths.  While, these words I'm about to share are not uniquely mine, they are from God because they are the words my heart has been needing to hear.  My hope in sharing these is to pass along the encouragement and truth of God working in His children, in His Church, and in His body of believers.

J. Hampton Keathley III writes in his article Waiting on the Lord...

The essence of waiting is trust or faith in the nature and character of God.  No one can wait on the Lord if he or she does not truely trust in God as the rock of their strength and refuge in all of life.  Waiting means claiming God's promises by faith and resting in what God is doing in our lives so we can faithfully follow God's principles and keep his values, priorities, and pursuits.

 The opposite of waiting and resting by faith is turning to our solutions of self-protection because of anger, fear, and jealousy.  We fret, we moan and groan, we withdraw or run from the problem.  We may try to control others, call attention to ourselves to bolster our feelings of inadequacy or to defend ourselves against the comments of others.  Out of fear of failure or loss, we may compromise our convictions or what we know is right.  But fear, which has displaced faith in the Lord, causes us to lean on the arm of the flesh.

Lamentations 3:25 The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, To the person who seeks Him.

Psalm 62:5-8 My soul, wait in silence for God only, For my hope is from Him. He only is my rock and my salvation, My stronghold; I shall not be shaken.  On God my salvation and my glory rest; The rock of my strength, my refuge is God. Trust in Him at all times, O people; Pour out your heart before Him; God is a refuge for us. Selah.

Isaiah 8:17 I will wait for the LORD, who is hiding his face from the house of Jacob.  I will put my trust in him.

In Finding Your Identity...

The biggest lesson God is teaching me in finding my own identity and in understanding who I am as a person is that it’s not always about me. This was a shocking realization because for so long I had been under the mindset that if I just better understood who I was then I’d be better able to handle the world around me, not let it have such a strong affect on me, and find my confidence to stand within it.


In finding our own identity, we often only find selfishness. It becomes all about me, my wants, my desires, my needs and my world grows smaller and smaller as I become the center of its universe. If you can take a step back, focus on someone else for a moment, you will then learn that who you are grows more in the light of those around then in the spotlight of your own stage. Too much light does not allow for growth, it blinds us to all that is around us, and it magnifies our own flaws. While the spot light seems warm and inviting, it is a lonely place. Character is developed in adapting, growing, and responding to situations beyond our own control. It is in better understanding others that we can then understand ourselves.

My attitude has been adjusted, my focus shifted, and I am learning that finding my own identity means less about me and more about those God has put around me. It’s not always about me. ..and for that I am thankful!

The Deep Desire for Change...

Change is in the air…

Change is going to come…

Change is just around the corner…

We put our hope in change, in the mindset that things will not always be like this. We often think that if pain or hardship or uncomfortable circumstances come, that God will be quick to bring a change into our lives to rid us of our pain, to take us from our hardship, and to change our circumstances. How often do we find ourselves in a battle with God because His timing is not our timing and because we get frustrated that He hasn’t brought the change that we prayed desperately for. I’ve had circumstances change overnight, some in mere hours, but then there have been hard times that have lasted for months and even years. I found that I battled with my belief in God over how quickly he delivered me from those hardships.

The lesson that I leaned in all of it is, that more often than not, the change that God brings into our lives is a change of heart and not of circumstance.

If we ran from every pain, every hardship, every unpleasant circumstance—we’d spend our lives running. God, however, teaches us, grows us, and helps us to become mature not only in our faith but in our strengths and weaknesses. When we change what is on the inside then we can see what is around us differently. More often than not, the problem is not in the circumstances around us, but in our own hearts. God is a God of strength and growth and while He promises that if we ask we shall receive, he also states that His ways are not our ways and that we often do not even know what to ask for. God pushes us beyond our comfort zone, changing us from the inside out.

So next time you pray for change, remember that more often than not, the change will begin in you.