WHAT ARE YOU CARRYING?

Matthew 11:28-30 NIV “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

I wonder if you’re like me and try to figure everything out before hand? We add up the figures, we imagine how it could be done, we rerun conversations in our heads and try to think how to make things work out. Then we second guess ourselves and go round in circles! Anyone identify or is it just me?😊 

Or maybe you’re still carrying a burden of shame or guilt about something and forget Jesus has already carried it for you and it’s time to let it go.

Jesus knows us all so very well and He’s always miles ahead of us but He told us what to do when we feel worn down with our problems or situations. He invites us to come to Him, to cast all those cares over on to Him because He has all the answers and He knows the big picture. God’s purposes will come to pass when we believe His promises!

So often we can only see a small bit of the path ahead and things can seem impossible, so unlikely, and life may appear so unpredictable, but not with God. When we feel harassed or anxious we need to come back to that place of rest, of knowing we’re in the palm of God’s hand and He is in control of our lives when we put our trust in Him.

If our heart is to follow Him, to please Him, then He will make our crooked paths straight, He will go ahead of us and surround us with His favour so that we meet the people we should meet, and be in the right place at the right time, so that His plans can come to pass in our lives. Closed doors are just as much a blessing as open ones sometimes!

If we’re feeling weary or weighed down with our burdens, or the burdens of others, then we’re carrying burdens we weren’t meant to carry! We’re meant to pass them over to God  in prayer so He can take care of them.😊

God is reminding us it’s time to come back to Matthew 11:28-30 and sit there for a while with Him, and do what it says; give it all to Him, and let God do what only He can do in His own time. Amen.

Photo by Mahendra Putra on Unsplash

THE POSITIVE GAME

Mark 11:23-24 NKJV For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says. Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them.

I wonder if you remember the story of a little girl called Pollyanna who played the “Glad Game’, where she had to think of something to be glad about, even when things had gone wrong? As we were out walking yesterday, the thought popped in my head to make it the ‘Positive Game’, where we have to think of something positive that God has said or promised, and declare it over our lives. I realised I was needing to inject some lightheartedness into things and as I started speaking positively I began to feel brighter!😊

When circumstances look negative, or when things are not working out the way we thought, we have to start taking our faith out and polishing it up! On purpose we need to declare things over our lives that will lift our spirits, believing we can have what we say based on God’s word, just like Jesus said.

For instance we can say, ‘I declare that my future is bright because God promised not to harm me but to give me a future and a hope to bless me. I declare that my faith is going to make a difference to my decisions this week and expect the best not the worst case scenario! I declare that all things are going to work out for our good according to God’s promise. I declare God’s goodness and mercy are overtaking me, so it will be a good day. I declare I’m surrounded by the amazing favour of God wherever I go this week.”

I hope you’re entering into this.😊 Try bouncing off somebody with it. Challenge them to think of something positive to counteract the doom and glooms, to lift the atmosphere in order to deliberately put some lightness into it, so hope rises up again instead of defeat.😊

Jesus told us to cheer up because He has overcome the world and what is it that overcomes the world? - our faith, which is fired up by positive God inspired thoughts and words. Woohoo! Come on, stir it up!

As you begin this new week, I challenge you to think of something positive that makes you feel better, based on a promise of God, write it down, pin it up on the fridge if it helps, but speak it out to somebody, or text it! Go on - whether you’re by yourself or with someone - be a faith person! Don’t say anything negative for quarter of an hour (or longer if you can) but keep coming back to saying something positive, agree with God and see what happens!😊Amen.

Photo by Yuliia Martsynkevych on Unsplash