Through Sorrow it brings Eternal Life

2 Corinthians 7:9-10

⁹ I now rejoice, not that you were made sorrowful, but that you were made sorrowful to the point of repentance; for you were made sorrowful according to the will of God, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us. ¹⁰ For the sorrow that is according to the will of God produces a repentance without regret, leading to salvation, but the sorrow of the world produces death.




What a Wonderful passage of scripture! How many of us can think back on a time as to when we were so offended by what the pastor preached, that it made us seek God and what he wanted out of us. As for me there have been many times and I have a feeling there will be many more times. I want to strive for holiness, however the closer I get to God, the harder it is for me to sit with my "christian" friends and allow them to continue down the path that is ultimately going to land them in Hell, if not careful.


I love as Paul is writing his letters to Cornith. He is very upset with those who have questioned his sincerity and being a True Apostle of Jesus. They were also having many issues with what were considered "okay" in the eyes of God, Paul then wrote letters to them they may have stepped on some toes and made them angry. In the passages I started with today, he began telling the church that he is now glad that he had wrote them such harsh letters but it made a difference because they were turning from those old fleshly ways.


Paul starts by saying he is joyful and not because they were sorrowful, no true christian wants to hurt someone.However, if it brings good results then sometimes we must tell them the Truth which can possible offend or grieve them. We know they may end up in Hell if we do not tell them the error of their ways. Soon, after Paul met up with Titus, Titus then revealed to Paul that his written letters to Cornith had brought much change. for the better. Although there were still a few who did want to believe in Paul's position. This made Paul a lot more comfortable addressing Cornith again, he had not known how converts had taken his previous letter. (Keep in mind, I am just summarzing the story).


We are going to replace some words with their definition in this passage to try to get a better grasp on the true meaning and intent of these scriptures.

⁹ I now rejoice, not that you were made offended or grieved, but that you were made offended to the point of reversal of your decisions; for you were offended or grieving according to the will of God, so that you might not suffer loss in anything through us. ¹⁰ For the grieving that is according to the will of God produces a reversal of your decisions without regret, leading to deliverance from sin and spiritual consequences making it into eternal life with Jesus, but the sorrow of the world produces death.

Did you notice Sorrow is meaning offending or grieving. Repentance means to reverse your decision. Salvation means to be delivered from sin and spiritual consequences and making it into eternal life with Jesus.  

Basically all those times we are afraid of offending our brother or sister (fellow Christian) with the Truth, we need not to be. It can set them free, not always, some will not listen and still will refuse as those who still did not believe Paul was a Apostle of Christ, and were obviously wrong in their thinking. Sometimes there are people who refuse to listen. It is our job to still tell them what God expects from his believers. 

Matthew 18:15-17

 “If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY FACT MAY BE CONFIRMED. If he refuses to listen to them,tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.

Titus 3:10-11

¹⁰ Reject a factious man after a first and second warning, ¹¹knowing that such a man is perverted and is sinning, being self-condemned.

The catch to doing these things is doing it in Love, not to hurt each other, but to make the Body of Christ stronger. Our friends who are calling themselves Christians should not take our advice from the Word of God as hateful or mean, although some will. We will know if they have listened and we shall see the fruit that follows. Once your friend does take on a reversal of decision, comfort them and love them as you always have so they do not feel condemned.

2 Corinthians 2:7-8

so you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So I beg you to reaffirm your love for him. 

I like to tell my friends Conviction comes from God and leads to Repentance (asking forgiveness, reversal of desion, turning away from your sin). Condemnation comes from the Devil, if you have repented of that sin then let it go and remember God has forgiven you already. The devil likes to make us feel worse, God only wants what is best.


Some will take this as an attack and want to point out all of your sins and issues, do not let this discourage you. However, if they do say something even in anger that made you realize you may have a log in you own eye, make sure you are sure to examine you own self. We all have issues, we need to examine ourselves daily. 

Matthew 7:3-5

³ Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ and behold, the log is in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.


I leave you with this last scripture because we need to remember to stay humble. We need to make sure we die daily to our fleshly desires and try our best to stay Holy, as we are respresentation of Jesus. Our bodies are temple and we need to treat them as just that. Before we go telling a brother or sister their wrongs make sure we have that log out of our own eye. Remember if you are the one being corrected or shown the way, do not take it as hostility but in Love, we want each other to make it into The Glory Land together! 


Have a another Blessed Day!

Who We Are.

Who are we?Are we just another person set forth in a motion that will just waste away as many others have chosen a path of destruction? I can tell you who we are. We are the children of the Most High God! I sit and think on this night in my home listening to heavenly soaking music from Soaking.net and ponder, Who Am I? What has been accomplished in my life. I will not ultimately know until I get to heaven but I want to give God all that I am. Since I have become a wife my focus has been primarily on that of my husband and children, no longer of God as much as before I married and had children. We are all guilty of it at times, however is that an excuse.

It should not be an excuse, God understands our limitations and our exhaustions, do I think I will go to Hell by not thinking of God all day long, No. I do think God knows what else you and I can do for him. How much more we can honor him and how much more he deserves it. I was raised in Church all of my life and was taught to pray and stay active for the Lord. However, upon becoming a wife and mother of twins, somehow I am no longer as active as I once was. I find the very energy I have to wake up is the same energy I barely have to fall asleep on. I know my job being a mother and wife is one that is not taken lightly and I try to do everything as if I were doing it unto the Lord. I feel this blog is a little piece of me that I can let out, Who Am I? I strive to be like Jesus. Perfect, AM I? No, but I want to be like JESUS and try to be more everyday!

 All of the wives and mothers who are going through the same season. I challenge you to find someway to let You be JESUS this week. Be kind to that elderly lady and put her groceries away for her, teach your children a new bible story about being a good neighbor, show Love to those who hurt you the most. LOVE is one of the most powerful things,  I believe, God gave us. I can be angry and hurt at a person but as soon as I feel Love, Forgiveness takes over. I want that LOVE to outshine the rest of me! Our sinful flesh would like to get us all upset but it makes us look foolish and ultimately hurts the Kingdom of Heaven.  We must Crucify the Flesh daily or the Flesh will Crucify us ultimately.

So who are we? We are servants of  the MOST HIGH GOD! We are to strive to be like Jesus. Many are called but few are chosen, Are You a Chosen One? Make God your goal and join me, take at least 10 minutes a day out of your busy schedule and see how much more you can be like Jesus. For wives and mothers, Proverbs 31 is my favorite. Military, Psalms 91. These are easy to understand and comforting! Join me in discovering more of our God and who we are truly meant to be! God Bless You!

The Path of Life

As I close the evening, I sit and reminisce on the last 4 years of my life serving my husband. It has truly been a path of much joy and pain. Joy always comes in the morning.Carrying our twin sons was very painful on the body but the joy of watching them grow, well there is no Greater joy. The pain and misery of the military life of giving long hours, lonely nights, and selflessness at times seems so pointless but yet we reap the benefits of Freedom. Freedom we must fight to obtain. Sometimes I think, Why Us? Then I think on all of those who were before us and realize its not about us its about you and the rest of the world. Just as Jesus saw all of us when he died on the cross. He wanted us to have the same freedom through him.

You see tomorrow will be our 4 year Anniversary. A Blessed 4 years at that. I see all the lows and highs and all of the in betweens and all I can do is sit back in amazement. God is truly amazing. When we first married 4 years ago we were fresh out of high school. I wanted to go to the Air Force Academy and I had attended a vocational school with JROTC where I received Air Force Certifications in Boroscoping F15 and F16 jet engines. My goals in life were very different than what they are today. I look back an smile on how different my life was when I allowed God to run it. I met my husband at a Southern Ohio Church of God Youth Camp the year previously while we were working it, I was an Assistant Counsellor and he was part of the Recreation staff. We grew up attending the same youth camp most of our lives never really speaking until that summer. I knew God had wanted me at this Camp that year for a reason not really knowing why. That same very week I made a statement "Guys and marriage were the last thing on my list of concerns" ,did God ever show me who was boss.

Within 6 months we were engaged and within a year married. Did I mention we lived 3 hours apart and saw each other less than 10 times in that year. People thought we were crazy but my father Married us on July 21st 2007. We found out a few weeks later we were having a honeymoon baby! Oh what joy! Neither of us wanted any children. Then 3 months later we found out we were having babies not a baby. We were told we were having twins. I remember thinking how are we ever going to manage! My husband was working a minimum wage job and only brought in less than $700/mth. We were quite worried. God never failed us though. We stayed faithful in our tithing and we always got our bills paid and our date was a shared ice cream fudge sundae at McDonalds every Sunday.

By the time the end of December rolled around I was placed on complete bedrest and we moved in with his parents so they could help take care of me, while we maintained the other home, Josh renovated a bedroom for the twins to have when they were born. Before having a Cesarean Section to two wonderful baby boys in March, I was placed in the hospital 8 times and thanked God for keeping us all safe. The boys were pretty healthy preemies at Birth other than some things we won't even get started in. They spent their first Easter under Billiruben lights. By the next Easter they were celebrating it in the Army away from home sweet home Ohio.

When the twins were 4 months old, Josh decided to join the Army and join the fight for our Safety and Freedom. It was his dream since he was a small child to join the military, so he did. It was one of the hardest times of our lives seeing him go away and leaving me with two small infants, I was terrified and without my family, I relied on his and God. I went through the next 5 months without him and by Christmas he was back home celebrating the twins 1st Christmas. Through the next year we moved to Fort Leonard Wood, MO and spent numerous lonely nights and days while he trained for his Deployment in Feb.2010 overseas for a year. In a years time we went from fresh High school Graduates to being Married, to Parenting Twins, and joining the Army. Then a deployment. I thought Lord when is there a break! We have to remember GOD is our BREAK! We take time our for him he takes it out for us.

So now, here we are 4 years later happier than ever. Now working on 5 years! The way I look at this life is if God has us going through all of this with constantly adjusting and learning then he must have something in store later down this road that can help someone else or even ourselves. Why not embrace this to full impact and let God do his awesomeness. Its so hard at times when we military wives feel all alone and hopeless antod its all we can do to try and stand firm in our Faith but what else do we really have other than Faith. Faith is what we have to obtain in order to trust God with our Military Men, our homes, our children, and our lives! We must take the scales off of our eyes in order to see the real picture, the spiritual picture of the ultimate goalpersuade you of his Greatness but allow him to Comfort you this day. I will leave you with one of my Favorite passages of scriptures... John 14:15-20
  
¹⁵“If you love me, you will obey my commandments. ¹⁶I will ask the Father, and he will give you another helper who will be with you forever. ¹⁷That helper is the Spirit of Truth. The world cannot accept him, because it doesn’t see or know him. You know him, because he lives with you and will be in you.
 ¹⁸“I will not leave you all alone. I will come back to you. ¹⁹In a little while the world will no longer see me, but you will see me. You will live because I live. ²⁰On that day you will know that I am in my Father and that you are in me and that I am in you. ²¹Whoever knows and obeys my commandments is the person who loves me. Those who love me will have my Father’s love, and I, too, will love them and show myself to them.”


If you do not know him I invite you to get to know him. Confess your sins to him and ask him for forgiveness and believe that he died for you. Its that simple and the deeper you dig into his word, the more you want to be like him. Try Jesus. He never fails.

Who are They? Really...

As many know by now my husband finally returned from his Year long tour in Iraq. He has been home a week and I forgot the Fullness of being a Christian Wife and Mother in the Military. I am so blessed by the honor given to me. I am humbled by the many men and women serving along side of me who has also endured Deployments and Military Life. As I looked around at the Welcome Home Ceremony I saw so many familiar faces and many new faces. I also so so much joy and sorrow at the same time. Many had no family awaiting their arrival and some had all of their family greeting them. My heart broke for some but I was so full of joy to see my own it was hard to sympathize very long. God has opened my eyes to a new way of Life. I once would look at the Cheater, the Alcoholic, and the Abuser as a piece of life wasted, now I look at them and my heart breaks. I see a soul lost so deep into sin and yet searching for fulfillment they can't seem to find. They have been  accepted into a crowd of people who will accept anybody but then they turn into something they never thought. They are now that Cheater, Alcoholic or Abuser they tried to run from. Why do we just sit there? Why do we complain about it as Christians and slander them? Shouldn't we Pray instead? Now, I am not a perfect example of praying for every woman who walks by me in an immodest manner, I may think a few things to myself and not pray at all. However, wouldn't it be wonderful  if we prayed for all of those people who offend us.Afterall what does the bible say about those... But I tell you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. Matthew 5: 44  How much more would be accomplished in the Kingdom of Heaven? I look around me on our Military Post and as my eyes are being opened I see some who I literally just walk up to and pray with now. My heart is breaking for those who just want to be loved and told they are loved and needed. The wives who have cheating husbands but are staying for the sake of their family and reputation, the mothers who have teenagers rebelling but feel no hope is left for their child, and the single parent raising their child on their own who just wants a break.I want you to know I see your pain but God knows your sees and knows your pain. He wants you to tell him all about it and for all of us walking past you that you see, we are praying. How Blessed are We that we know this wonderful Love and Savior! Share our Lord! My heart is so full of aches for all of the lost souls. If you need prayer, we are hear for you.
Confess to one another therefore your faults (your slips, your false steps, your offenses, your sins) and pray [also] for one another, that you may be healed and restored [to a spiritual tone of mind and heart]. The earnest (heartfelt, continued) prayer of a righteous man makes tremendous power available [dynamic in its working]. James 5:16 
So too the [Holy] Spirit comes to our aid and bears us up in our weakness; for we do not know what prayer to offer nor how to offer it worthily as we ought, but the Spirit Himself goes to meet our supplication and pleads in our behalf with unspeakable yearnings and groanings too deep for utterance. Romans 8: 26

ReDeployment Back Home

Its been almost an Entire Year! Where has time gone? Our Soldiers' return seems so close that its almost surreal. Many Army Wives have been through it but now it's my turn. I have dreamed of his return several times, what is it going to be like? In the beginning of the Deployment, I pictured all of the wives in a line with our arms out, so excited to see them but it seems like reality has kicked in recently. Nothing has seemed to go as planned and of course that is Normal, Right? Army Life, Normal, Ha! I think that may be an oxymoron. As I spoke to my mother-in-law tonight, we laughed at life even possibly being normal. She was a previous Air Force Wife of 10 years with 3 kids in the mix, so she has had her share of " The Normal Military Life" as well.

I was so full of excitement for this time to come and boy oh' boy it came fast! In the beginning, I would cringe at those wonderful, loving, and all-knowing people who would say "It will go by so fast". Now those words are true. Now don't get me wrong, those days were long but the months went by so quickly. I recommend you staying busy! Have an agenda, get a hobby, or make Christian friends. I emphasize Christian because they will lift you up, not tear you down.I encourage all military wives to make at least one Christian military friend  (wife/girlfriend)  to talk to in the Unit your Soldier is attached to during the deployment. They not only hold you accountable but pray with  and encourage you. They are going through the same emotional roller coaster ride as you. Its not good for you to hang out with the single ladies or non believers because they do not understand our Duty as Godly wives. Not all are like this but many are, its better to stick with married, if you are married. I have saw too many lose their marriages this way and not only in the military world.

I was designating the end of this Deployment to Only God, I was planning on setting myself aside for him and I, and when you make up your mind to do something for God, then Satan will try to destroy it. In the last two weeks I have been busier than this entire deployment. With sick twin toddlers, last get-togethers with the families in the unit, running errands, and all of the above. Now add a blizzard in the mix! Satan really is trying. So for all of you out there who really are trying, just know God knows your hearts! Last night as I was at my wits end, with high-fever-non-eating-screaming toddlers, I decided to get on my knees and cry out to God. Can you believe what happend? God wrapped his arms around me and spoke so softly "I'm Here". As I lay there God spoke to me about many things in my life and not in that loud audible voice as the movies portray but to my heart where only I know its coming from him, because I know I wouldn't think these things. God wants all of you to know he is there too!

God wants you to know he wants you to feel Loved. He wants you to know he is here for you and will walk with you in everything but he gives you and I that choice. Its a Choice and last night I made a choice to Cry out to him, in those times of Desperation, when we are dry, barren and Empty on the inside, God knows it.  God wants to wrap his Arms around you. I felt like a child all over again getting my Daddy's hugs. I remember starting to cry out to God and something (being the Devil) told me, he's not listening because you have not spent as much time with him as you said you would. Then I recalled a simple yet wonderful Scripture John 3:16 "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." Thats all it requires of me for God to hear me, I am a child of his. I trust him and his word.

I once heard something that I will never forget from my Father-in-Law: When you have reached the top of the mountain and look around its cold and nothing grows there but as you look down the mountain on both sides their is lots of life, so remember life is much like this. As your climbing the mountain its tough but as you come back down there is life again.

You may just be waiting on God to Instruct you on which path to take back down the mountain, but wait on him. Isaiah 40:31 says it best: But those who wait for the Lord [who expect, look for, and hope in Him] shall change and renew their strength and power; they shall lift their wings and mount up [close to God] as eagles [mount up to the sun]; they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint or become tired. I don't know what this Life has to throw at me next but I do know that I am waiting on the Lord, during this season. Rather than I doing the instructing, he is instructing. I think sometimes he just has to remind us " He is in Control" and we need to relax.
So if your Soldier is soon to arrive, just relax, let God take the pen and notepad, so that he can write down the instructions for you to follow. Its hard to do but what better timing, than right before the "Head of our House" arrives back home.

Joshua 24:15 .. but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD