God Will Send Reminders

I don't know about you but I had a wonderful week. Sarcasm included. The last few have been tough, but this week my health kicked in and the attack began.

I'm rheumatic, I've said that before, but, I will always continue to shout out about this disease. People need to know the reality of it. It's complex and ugly. Monday I will say I had a crash. Felt like I was on chemotherapy again. A depressed state hit and I could not get out of it. Unexplainable really. I started learning this new songcalled Do It Again by Elevation Worship and everytime I got to the second verse I just had to smile because it remembered it wasn't going to last.

As a homeschooler we have always included Bible study in our curriculum. In my opinion it is the most important curriculum. We memorized scripture. The year I was diagnosed we were memorizing James.

James 1:1 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trails of various kinds, for you know the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.

I was quite thankful I remember this word when I truly needed it. I forgot about it until tonight at church. Sometimes life doesn't go according to my plan but that doesn't mean God is going to fail, because he never has. I have to step from what I think should happen into how God intends things to be.

So if you're striggling this week, take a walk through James. Count it all joy! Not always easy but it's all about growth.

Love More and Hate Less

I started covering a secular song back in March. Stevie Wonder's Love's In Need of Love Today. Just watching the world made my heart hurt. I was schooled by Quakers so we were taught to respect others. To accept others. That doesn't necessarily mean you agree with their point of view, but you respect them enough to accept they think differently than you and love them anyway. Remember love is a verb. It's action. It is NOT a warm, fuzzy feeling.

I truly am growing weary of waking up to horrible news. It's been a difficult two months. I sleep with my tv on, I always have, my daughter does to. It acts as a filter for all other noise. It isn't so great when you wake up to horrible news. Yesterday was one of those days. I was sad. For so many reasons and it was hard to shake it the entire day. Love's in Need of Love Today. I heard that song all day and it inspired me to do something. Just to share a little happiness on a very sad day. My daughter and I went to Dunkin Donuts for coffee and donuts (and yes I know they are bad for you but a Edible Arrangement was outrageous) and took them over to our local police station. I met with one of our Officers and handed it off and told them we appreciate all that they do in our town. I know many policemen. They are great people. I am not anti-law enforcement. My father was a cop. My uncle was a cop.

Here's the tricky part that most people don't want to hear. Black Lives Matter does not mean other lives don't. It does not mean what happened in Dallas is acceptable. But since slavery time the life of black people has been treated differently. From being whipped because they didn't listen. To being raped because the master was on a power trip and had something to prove. To being lynched because a black man looked at at a white woman. Remember hoses being turned on peaceful protesters in the 1960's? Racial Profiling was big in my state. Actually lead to State Police having to retire and this is in NJ not KY. Whether you want to believe it or not this has always been in America. The difference now is everyone records everything!! Black Lives Matter is saying we are tired of the injustice. We are tired of being second class citizens. I fought my mother for years that things have changed. After all, my husband is white. We started dating in the 1980's when interracial dating was still new. We took a lot of flack from everywhere, including family. I still stood my ground that things have changed. My mother and father lived in Biloxi, Mississippi in 1954. My mother looked white and father black. He was in the Air Force. They shipped my mother down to Mississippi to keep my dad from fighting all the time. Surely what my mother saw was leftover from 1954. Not 1990 when I got married. Here's the thing, I wish my mother was still alive so I could tell her how wrong I was. Things haven't necessarily changed as much as they are more hidden. People who are my friends have reacted to the latest in lives lost by blaming the Liberal media. By posting articles of every wrong they victim has ever done as justification for a unarmed black man getting shot and killed. That shows complete lack of sympathy. That also hurts and it is coming from surprising people. This isn't a political problem yet it is being made one. Democrats against Republics. Its sickening. This is a morality problem.

I love what Law Enforcement do but in any community there is going to be bad people. I don't care if we are talking about Priests, Police, Military, Social Work, etc. People lose their way. It's pretty simple. Power corrupts, we all know that. So please keep an open mind to the plight of my people. There is validity to Black Lives Matter and to ignore it is inexcusable. Would you excuse lynching? Would you excuse slavery? Then please don't excuse that there's a race of people hurting and have truly had enough.

So my challenge for anyone reading this blog post is this.....share some love. Open your hearts and listen. Show some compassion. Do random acts of kindness. Say hello to people who pass you on the street. Smile more. Above all LOVE MORE.

1 Corinthians 13:13
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is LOVE.

FEAR - False Evidence Appearing Real

There have many times in my life when fear tends to get the best of me. Early in my faith there was a car accident. I didn't want to leave the safety of my house. I often didn't. I didn't have a child then so it was very easy to hole up in my house for a long period of time.

Then there was 9/11. I didn't want to leave the house again. I was pregnant with my daughter so I definitely couldn't always stay in but it was much easier than now.

I could write a book about the times I've been afraid to step out in faith because I worried. Worry can consume me.

There are many times I will go some place and somebody will tell me what I've done. I will stand there puzzled wondering how they knew. It was always facebook, or twitter, or instagram. I joked that I live a very public life.

I left ministry at a church in April. It was just time regardless of what was happening and I knew it. I fought it. However, before I was tied up every Sunday I had a ministry of special music and I loved that. Hearing different pastors every week. Meeting people and sharing together. I am thankful I get to do that again. As I opened up my public facebook page and started typing about this Sunday I started to think, what if.....

You see, I knew Christina Grimmie. Her mother was my Matron of Honor when I got married. She is the one who led me to the Lord and I will eternally be grateful. Her parents are my daughters Godparents. I won't pretend that I've seen Christina or her family since they moved to California, life just gets funny sometimes, but I still remember when she and her brother were born. Marcus and Christina are on my refrigerator from my daughters first birthday party. I know the family well and my heart is breaking for them. My heart broke. It still is. It still doesn't seem real. What happened to her was my "what if."

What if I post where I'm going to be or I check in and someone who hates Christians shows up. It's something I've struggled with the last few weeks. My very public life has gotten to be not so public. Sadly, it is because I've afraid.

The acronym for FEAR is False Evidence Appearing Real. It really is false. We can get so wrapped up in worry and fear and being scared we forget that we are doing Kingdom work and ultimately, regardless of anyone, God is still in control. He always has been and He alone will always be. I can worry or I can pray. I can be scared or I can live. I can fear and lose my faith in God being sovereign. The enemy longs to keep us so distracted and off balance that we forget what we are called in Christ to do.

I can't remember how many times in the Bible fear is referenced but here are a few:

Isaiah 35:4 say to those with fearful hearts, "Be strong, do not fear, your God will come, He will come with vengeance, with divine retribution he will come to save you.

Matthew 6:34 Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble.

Psalm 34:4 I sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears.

Psalm 118:8 The Lord is on my side. I will not fear. What can man do to me?


Does that mean that bad things won't happen. Of course not. I've already dealt with bad from losing both of my parents and being diagnosed with an incurable crippling disease, but, one thing has always been true and that will always remain, the Lord is with me always. Through anything. So if I leave my worries in prayer I can not be afraid of the fear in my head that comes from nothing good. That is not of the Lord.

Stand. Be Strong. Remember that you are a child of God. Remember that the Lord is always with you.

Blessings,
Jacqui