Armour of God Cont.

It’s a little later than anticipated but as promised here is the rest of the armour of God.

 Warrior spirit

Gods say that he did not give us a spirit of cowardice or timidity and so we must learn to have the mindset of a warrior.

2 Timothy 1: 7 God didn't give us a spirit of timidity (of cowardice, of craven and cringing and fawning fear), but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of calm and well-balanced mind and discipline and self-control

Isaiah 54:17 No weapons formed against me shall prosper and every person who rises up against me in judgement I will show to be wrong - take authority over your day, don’t allow people to cast judgement over your day and what’s more don't rise to it, justice is Gods.

Psalms 18:32 - 39 I love this prayer as I feel really strong afterwards, this is great to pray for a warrior spirit as it reaffirms our strength in Christ

Luke 10:19 God says Behold I have given you authority to trample upon serpents and scorpions, and physical mental strength over all the ability the enemy possesses and nothing shall harm you.

Philippians 4:3 we have to remember that we are not independent of God, he created us to dwell in us and we can't do anything without him, this is a great scripture to remind ourselves of just that.

Peace

The peace of God is not to be underestimated, God peace is a supernatural, without God in your life there is no way you can experience this, it is unexplainable. It just is. The following scriptures are for peace.

Isaiah 26:3 you will guard him and keep him in constant peace whose mind [both its inclination and its character] is stayed on you

John 14:27 Peace I leave with you; My [own] peace I now leave give and bequeath to you.

The peace of God is one thing, but we must also strive to have peaceful relationships with each other, by stripping ourselves of our former natures as tackled in the above post we can learn to live harmoniously with others, not taking offence and curbing our tongues.

Matthew 5:9 blessed are the maker and maintainers of peace for they should be called Sons of God.

Romans 14:19 so let us then definitely aim for and eagerly pursue what makes for harmony and for mutual up building of one another.

Faith

Matthew 7:24 so everyone who hears these words of Mine and acts upon them will be like a sensible man who built his house upon the rock

God should be the rock in our lives and his words the foundations which we build our houses, so when the devils come to kill, steal and destroy we cannot be moved but stand firm in our faith..

Hebrews 11:6 But without faith it is impossible to please and be satisfactory to him. For whoever would come near to God must believe he exists.  

Hebrews 4: 12 for the word that God speaks is alive and full of power ....it is sharper than any two-edged sword.  I love to back this up with Luke 1:37 for with God nothing is ever impossible and no word from God shall be without power or impossible of fulfilment.

The most powerful prayer we can pray is the word of God, speak his words into existence and into your hearts.

I hope this blesses someone, of course these scriptures aren't for everyone and maybe there are others you would like to add to your armour, that is for you to decide and build on.

God Bless xx

Public Service Annoucement:

Calling all Christian Soldiers; are you armed?

We're living in the last days and time is running out, the bible says the devil is roaming this earth looking for people to seize upon and devour 1 Peter5:8, what are you doing to protect yourselves?

The armour of God is there for us to protect ourselves against attacks from the devil, we need to get a warrior mentality and realise this isn't a joke, Jesus is coming back but in the meatime we have to do all that we can to make sure we are living a ready lifestyle.

The armour of God teaches us to take authority over our day, below I have listed scriptures that I have been taught, it can take me between 45mins to over an hour depending on what God has laid on my heart, but as my Pastor says if this is the only thing you pray make sure you apply it.

If you want the basic armour just apply ephesians 6:10 - 18 once you have prayed that you can start thinking about getting deeper, I pray the following to deal with different parts of me. You will find along the way that you want to include a lot of other scriptures, but this is my outline.

Self:

The biggest stumbling block to my day is usually me, I take alot of time out to pray self, to deny every part of me and allow the holy spirit to dwell in me.

I start with 2 Corinthians 5:17 - I thank God that I am a new creation in Christ, I pray that I lose self, forget the old me and renew myself in the spirit.

Galations 2:20 backs this up, I have been crucified in Christ therefore the old me no longer lives but I have become one with Christ, I ask God to help me live a life pleasing to him.

Ephesians 4:22-24 Tells us to strip ourselves of our former nature to put off and discard our unrenewed self but be constantly renewed in the spirit of our mind putting on the new nature created in Gods image.

Roman 13:14: Clothes yourself as the Lord Jesus Christ the Messiah, making no provisions for the flesh.

Colossains 3: 12-14 Says clothes yourselves therefore as Gods own chosen one...by putting on behaviour marked by tender hearted pity mercy....

Ephesians 4:25 Reject all falsity being done with it, let everyone express truth with their neighbour

Ephesians 4:15 Backs up the previous scripture telling us to deal truly, live truly and speak truly.

But my favourite scripture during this prayer is Matthew 16:24 Jesus says if anyone desires to be his desciple let him deny himself, lose sight of his own interest and take up his cross and follow him, conforming wholly to his example in living and if need be in dying also.

The more I pray over self the more I realise that the only good in me is God, I truly desire for the spirit to have its way in me and to lead and guide and convict me in everything I do, I desire to be like Jesus, I ask God to humble me and allow a serving spirit to dwell in me, I thank God that I am a new creation.

This has turned into a long rambling post so I will continue this in sections, over the week I will be giving the remaining scriptures for  a warrior spirit, peace, forgiveness and faith, plus the love walk.

God bless xx

Increase in me o lord

If someone asked me to list traits about myself what would I say, I would probably say I am determined, that I am stubborn and strong willed and when I set my mind to something I know I can do it.

I was thinking the other day about my past and my life before God, there were times when I was so broke I was just about paying my bills, but if any of my friends said hey lets go on holiday, thats it I would be there.
I would make a plan to save and put so much away and before I knew it I had money for the holiday, spending money and enough for new holiday clothes, thats what determination and strong will can do for you.

I have always had this belief that if I wanted something I could have it, I have never deprived myself of anything, and If I say i'm going to do something then I just do it no discussions, I said I wanted to go back to university late in my life and I did, so imagine my surprise when I  give my life to God and it didn't come as easy as everything else.

I am not sure what I expected, maybe a dramatic moment when I would fall to the ground shaking and when I came to I would suddenly be talking in tongues, or that someone would just walk up to me one day and hand me my salvation.

But God has shown me these last few weeks that If I want him I have to desire him more than anything else in my life and go after him with the same tanacity that I have everything else in my life, the only difference with God is not only do I have to put my mind to it, but my heart as well, God is a god of hearts and he has to know that the desires of my heart is to live a life pleasing to him.

Lately I have been really praying to God to increase my desire for him in my life, my favourite scripture for this is Psalms 63:1 O God, You are my God, earnestly will I seek you; my inner self thirsts for you, my flesh longs for you, in dry and weary lands where no water is.

God says that we should seek and inquire him, that we should require him as a vital necessity, like the air I breath, or my heart, if any were to be removed I couldn't live, and the more I come to know God the more I know I can't do anything without him, when we look back at our lives before God how can any of us think we don't need him?

Ever since I swapped my secular music for gospel I have discovered so many new and talented artists who are glorifying God, but sometimes oldies are goodies and this month I have rediscovered Hillsongs.

Hillsongs praise and worship albums just have a way of speaking straight to my heart and spirit, the songs are sang with such beauty and so heartfelt that I have literally been moved to tears, usually whilst riding the bus to work which isn’t always great.

If you’re not familiar with Hillsongs, although I am sure most of you are, but still...I will put it like this, Hillsongs do for praise and worship what Mariah Carey does for the ballad; they just seem to know exactly what I’m feeling and exactly what I want to say, only they can articulate it a lot more eloquently than I can.

Being able to relate to a song is so important to me, ever since I came to God I just can’t have the same feeling for “worldly” music because its just not my life anymore, my life is about finding God, this is what I relate to so when Hillsongs sings “And I will open up my heart And let the Healer set me free” that’s exactly how I feel. Sometimes when I don’t have the words to pray I just throw on one of their albums and I know I will find what I need.

This is my favourite at the moment, enjoy

Lyrics:

Over the mountains and the sea
Your river runs with love for me
And I will open up my heart
And let the Healer set me free
I'm happy to be in the truth
And I will daily lift my hands
For I will always sing
Of when Your love came down

I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever

Oh I feel like dancing
It's foolishness I know
But when the world has seen the light
They will dance with joy like we're dancing now

I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever
I could sing of Your love forever

Learning to carry each other

Wednesday evenings for me are usually assigned to my church bible study class, but this week we were blessed to have had a visitor in the form of Night Watch, a charity which supports local homeless people in the community.

Our church started supporting Night Watch after hearing about a harvest festival being organised by the charity. We started to donate food and clothing on a regular basis and have continued to support the charity ever since.

Night Watch was founded in 1976 after the death of a homeless man in one of the coldest winters the area had ever witnessed, after hearing of the death the community came together and decided something needed to be done and so the charity began.

A group of volunteers go out every evening to a regular meeting point where they minister to the homeless, dishing out food, clothing and toiletries. The organisation depends upon the volunteers who donate there time, and the communities who donate food and money and other required items.

What really struck me during the talk was the stories of the people Night Watch ministered to, as well as the usual donations of food and clothing that people came for, what a lot of the homeless needed was something as simple as someone to talk to, just having a familiar and regular presence who show genuine care was the only thing needed.

As Night Watch continued to speak I just wanted to give God thanks because he saw fit to deliver me from this kind of situation, we can often take our lives for granted but we will never know just how close any one of us are to being homeless, and its by Gods grace that I have a warm home, a family I can talk to and that I am able to buy so much as a meal without even giving it a second thought.

We were told a story about a successful Graphic designer who worked in the city. He had a champagne lifestyle and was an occasional drug user, this however, turned into frequent drug use and alcohol abuse, after tragically dealing with the death of a beloved pet he began to spiral out of control, occasional drug use turned to dependency and soon he was homeless. This is a testament to just how fickle life can be, and the only real thing we can be sure of is our salvation through Christ.

I really want to this post to encourage us to carry peoples burdens. I am going to donate my time as well as food to Night Watch  and I encourage people to do the same by finding out about something going on local to your area.

Gods says in Galatians 6:2 Bear (endure, carry,) one another’s burdens and troublesome moral faults, and in this way fulfil and observe perfectly the law of Christ (the messiah) and complete what is lacking [in your obedience to it].

No one is above the works of God and we should really learn to humble ourselves and remember, God exalts the lowly and so someone you might over look in this life could be a mighty person in the kingdom of God.

God bless xx

Night Watch: http://www.croydonnightwatch.org.uk/HomelessCommunity.htm

Review: Love Sax and all that Jazz

The valentines weekend could have gone one of two ways for you, if your part of a couple you will undoubtedly be enjoying the giving and receiving of gifts, but if you’re single  you will probably be looking around at all the smug happy couples whilst muttering to yourself about the commercialisation of these so called hallmark occasions.

For me, I was able to find light relief in the form of Love Sax and all that Jazz, a stage show written by and featuring poet Alan Charles.

Within five minutes of the show getting going my attention was locked as I was treated to a poem which spoke straight to my heart entitled “singleness is not a crime”, within moment of hearing it I knew this was just the show I needed to see.

The play was set around the lives of a group of female friends dealing with the everyday troubles of marriage and singlehood, a kind of Sex and the City vibe, although more relatable for the Christian viewer.

From the issue of domestic violence, to the dangers of idle gossip and fornication, each subject was tackled with humour and deep sincerity.

The combination of cleverly written dialogue delivered through poetry and songs which drew from scriptures, and a fantastic cast who’s fast paced delivery and audience interaction, ensured there was never a dull moment.

Particular highlights presented themselves in the form of the “All New Shiny Black Man” a poem recited by Alan Charles himself, which undoubtedly pricked the ears of a few males in the audience, as well as a few single ladies like myself hoping to find out where we might meet one; this was rounded off nicely by the empowering "My Body is a Temple" a reaffirmation for women everywhere encouraging us not to defile ourselves but to wait on God.

This modern day stage play was packed full of revelations, heart warming and thought provoking moments, and a message which stays with you long after you have left the warmth of the theatre seat.

Unfortunately Love Sax and all that Jazz was only showing for this weekend, however keep your diary free for 26^th June as Alan Charles returns with his next show Shoulda Coulda Woulda.

Prayer

Forgive me I haven’t written in a few days, just seem to be so busy at the moment.

I wanted to come and give a quick message of encouragement in regards to prayer life as it’s something that God has been dealing with in me.

This is an area where I have struggled over the last few months, especially coming to the end of last year, things just seem to get in the way and wrongly I was looking at prayer as something I was obligated to do rather than a time of enjoyment between me and God.

I always wondered why I couldn't get close to God and why I felt my prayer time was so under attack, but I realised there were things getting in the way - which I will go into in later posts.

The last few weeks God has really brought a lot of clarity to my life, I realised that in order to function the way I really wanted to I needed to create a relationship with God, cherishing the time we have together.

God really helped me deal with the issues that were hindering our relationship and now I feel so blessed to finally feel like I can talk to God, my heart is completely open and prayer time is now a time of peace and joy for me, I never want to be far from God and to feel like that is such a huge blessing in my life.

I really encourage people to persevere in their prayer life and hold on to the time you have with God. A scripture was given to me for this very purpose - Colossions 4:2 tells us to be earnest, unwearied and steadfast in our prayer life, God constantly focuses on the importance of prayer in the bible, 1 Thessalonians 5:17 says we should be unceasing in prayer, and Psalms 141:2 says let my prayer be set forth as incense before you, the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice. This is how we should aim to pray to God, straight from the heart making a joyful sound unto the lord, giving thanks and glorifying his name. And even when you don’t feel like praying, just get up and give God thanks anyway because you never know where it could lead.

God bless xx