IT IS OK TO NOT BE OK!!

We were not created to be isolated, so that is why this season of COVID-19 is so hard.   

The Bible actually warns against it: 

Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.  Ecclesiastes 4:12

Do you feel like you are being overpowered?

This week I have felt the feeling of - I'm not ok. 

So I stopped and thought about my actions and evaluated what I was feeling.

Here are some things I discovered:

1. There is a grieving process we have to allow ourselves to go through.

Things are changing and we will never go back to the way it was.  Sometimes that is a hard reality. It is like 911 only more far-reaching around our world.  Our world did change after 911. It never went back to what we knew.  

However, change can make us stronger and better.  

I did a sermon at one of our Sisterhood Nights and I talked about change and...

As I write this blog we are in the middle of Covid-19.   All over the world, schools and businesses are closed, people are fearful, and the future looks bad.  We are having to meet on zoom calls and stay 6 feet away from each other and quarantine ourselves.   

President Trump has called for a day of prayer. United714.com is asking that we pray twice a day all over the world.  We are believing that we will be able to have church together for Easter.  (That would be a huge miracle.) 

As I thought of this scenario, it reminded me of the children of Israel.  They were in bondage and wanted to worship God together. They wanted to leave Egypt and go to the desert to offer sacrifices to God.  Psalm 105 summarizes the story.

Just as they were in bondage and wanted to go and worship God, we are in lockdown and we want to meet together to worship God, especially on Easter.

Psalm105

³⁷ Then He brought Israel out with silver and gold. And...

The book of Proverbs is known as a book of wisdom.  In chapter 15, it gives us wisdom on how to take care of our heart.

The Hebrew understanding of "the heart" included the emotions, but it also involved the mind, the conscious and the will.  It means everything that is going on inside of you.  

The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked.
Who really knows how bad it is?  But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives.  (1)

Only God sees and knows the heart of every human being. (2)

We don't even know what all is in our hearts and therefore, we don't know all that we are capable of, good or bad.  However, in Proverbs 15, it does tell us 2 things we can do to take care of our hearts. 

1.  Seek knowledge.  

Do you seek knowledge or do you wait for it to come to you?

Do you have a strategy or game-plan to help you seek knowledge?

So many people just go through...

Did you know that "numbers" can cause you to sin?   At least that is what happened to King David.

Now, hear me out... don't stop reading!

Satan was able to use numbers or the counting of people to cause David to sin.  Satan can do the same thing in our lives.

1 Chronicles 21:1  Satan rose up against Israel and incited David to take a census.

Taking a census, counting people, is not sinful in and of itself.  However, when David went to count people he was replacing trust in God with statistics.  

21:10 David was conscience-stricken after he had counted the fighting men, and he said to the Lord, “I have sinned greatly in what I have done. Now, Lord, I beg you, take away the guilt of your servant. I have done a very foolish thing.”

How many times have numbers caused us to distrust God and what He has to say to us and about us?

• The number of likes on social media.  We can get our self-worth from numbers, not...

Which of these phrases sounds more like you?  There are two phrases with each number.  I want you to print this off and highlight or circle the phrase that most sounds like you.   

1. Remember that I’ll be praying for you today.  Or, hope you have a good day.
2. I love spending time with you. Or, how long is this going to take?
3. I really want to hear what you have to say. Or, are you through talking, I have something to say.
4. Jesus loves you and so do I.  Or you say nothing, you hardly ever, if ever, say I love you.
5. You’re such a problem solver!  Or, here let me do that, you're not doing it right.
6. I’m proud of you and who you’re becoming.  Or, you can't do anything right.
7. You are God’s workmanship.  Or,  you are a mistake.
8. Our family wouldn’t be the same without you. Or, you are the Blacksheep of the family.
9. You inspire me in so many ways. Or, you don't motivate me, I have to do things myself.
10. ...

I did a Facebook Live on how to overcome addiction, shame, and guilt based on a teaching by Dr. Caroline Leaf.  

So many people, if not all of us, are addicted to something.  There is some habit or stronghold that we struggle with. It could be food, social media,  gaming or a very damaging addiction such as alcohol, drugs, pornography and things like this.  Addiction is defined as being consumed with something.  So what is it that consumes you?

Addictions happen when we try to avoid or suppress hurts or trauma.  We don't want to deal with the hurts, so we keep doing things that we think will help us feel better.  However, the addictions we develop by trying to ignore our hurts can be worse than the trauma we went through. If I could encourage you to do anything, it would be to deal with your issues.   

Why is dealing with our hurts, abuse, and addictions so difficult?  Because when we avoid, suppress and use substances, the goal...

Every January, we do 21 Days of Prayer of Fasting. This time, I didn't do the Daniel's Fast, I did a water-only fast. Now, to be totally honest, I did have superfood greens, bone broth, and herbal teas.  Other than those things, it was water.

Some of you may be saying..." biblically, are you suppose to be telling us?"  I am not telling you to brag, I am sharing with you like others have done for me, to let you know this is possible and you can do more than you think you can.  

This was Prayer and Fasting.  If you just fast there are some benefits, but prayer and fasting are for spiritual reasons.  

What surprised me.

In the first week, I had unbelievable energy. I was up early and going strong all day.  My Church,  C3Church.com, met every morning for prayer during the 21 days.

The second week, my energy dropped a little and I felt more of the detox happening.  I know that as your body detoxes, it also detoxes emotionally.  So as...

During the 21 Days of Prayer and Fasting, many of you began to detox because you took sugar and meat out of your diet.  Detox is defined as a regimen or treatment intended to remove toxins and impurities from the body. 

Toxins accumulate in our bodies from all of the pesticides that are used around us and the antibiotics put in animals and chemicals. They are in our beauty products and additives in our foods.  And every once in a while we need to help our bodies get rid of these toxins. 

One of your body systems that need help detoxing is your lymphatic system. 

Unlike your blood that moves when your heart beats,  your lymphatic system needs a little help to get the toxins moving and to not get stuck.  Your lymphatic system is stimulated by gravity, muscle contraction and activities that stimulate natural drainage.  

Your lymph system is like a network of highways in your body.  Imagine a traffic jam that occurs on a highway,...

Fasting is defined as - to abstain from all food; to eat only sparingly or of certain kinds of food, especially as a religious observance.

Fasting can be great for your overall health spiritually, physically and emotionally. 

Here are 5 benefits to fasting:

1.  It is great for your body physically.

It gives your body a chance to reset and detoxify.  Our bodies are bombarded with all sorts of toxins and chemicals in the food that we eat and the things that we drink.  Toxins are even in the environment and the air we breathe.

Fasting can be great for the liver, heart, colon, and stomach.  It can help to lower blood pressure and lower cholesterol.  When your body isn’t being bombarded with salts, colorants, sugars, alcohol and artificial chemicals, it gets a chance to rest – and your body gets a chance to process and get rid of all the harmful chemicals.

2. Fasting can even help in stabilizing your Emotions.

The chemicals that...

I know that giving thanks and being thankful is so good for you.  

When Jesus healed 10 lepers, only one came back to gave thanks and the Bible says he was made whole.

Everywhere I turn, I'm reading about being thankful and living with gratitude.  So I did some research to see if there were any studies on the power of gratitude.  And there is. 

Robert A. Emmons, Ph.D., a psychology professor at the University of California, Davis, and author of Gratitude Works!:  A 21-Day Program for Creating Emotional Prosperity set out to discover why is gratitude so powerful.  

“For too long, the concept of gratitude had been ignored,” said Emmons, director of the university’s Emmons Lab, which creates and shares scientific data on gratitude, its causes, and its potential effects on human health and well-being. He calls it “the forgotten factor in the science of well-being."

Emmons set out to research the ways that...