Looking back, Looking forward

I have had the opportunity in the last three weeks to really reflect on the events that shaped how I see God and how I see my walk with Him.  I set a milestone on that path on Sunday May 20th by being baptized.  It was an extremely moving time for me and I get a bit choked up thinking back about how I, for the first time, really stood before a group of people and professed what I believe.  The few weeks running up to that day, I spent hours working on my testimony and what God really wanted me to say.  I only finished working on it just hours before the Sunday service seeing that I tend to be a bit of a perfectionist when I write.
    I looked back at my time in high school, that I seemed so on fire for Christ. 
    The time a friend called me from college because she wanted me to be the first to know that she accepted Christ as her personal savior, that I had had a huge impact on her during high school.
    I reflect on the times in early adulthood I spent so depressed that ending my life seemed to be the only answer.
    Memories of the deaths of two friends.
    YEARS of asking God why I was born the way I was.
     I turned to the thoughts of when I turned away from God.  I turned to an unbelieving faith.

I remembered the moment that it all turned around for me.

I struggled for a long time about why God had allowed me to be transgendered, how my years were filled with doubt, fear, and loneliness.  It wasn't until God put a woman in my life that told me to stop asking God 'why' and start asking God 'how'.  How can God be glorified through everything I have been through? She reminded me that God knows the path he has chosen for me.  It is up to me to follow him on that path.  He is a light unto our feet.  All we need to do is to follow that light.  I may choose my steps I take each day, but it is God who has set out a detailed road.

In recent months I felt God's prodding to go further with my faith than I have ever before. He is calling me to be bold  in what I believe,  be strong with my trust in Christ, to show love like I have never done before.  Ever since I made the decision to be baptized, I have had a boldness I have rarely known.  I never want this feeling to subside.  I want to continue to grow and follow even closer.  I want to be a woman after Gods' own heart.

 Show me your ways, Lord,
    teach me your paths.

Guide me in your truth and teach me,
    for you are God my Savior,
    and my hope is in you all day long.

Psalms 25:4-5

Keep Calm and Carry On

Keep Calm and Carry On!  This was one of the mottoes of Great Brittan's propaganda posters in the late 1930's during World War II, though this particular poster was never seen by the public until over 50 years later.  Owners of a used book store in the northern part of England discovered it in a box of dusty books they bought at auction.  After Framing it and hanging it in the shop, it has drawn world wide notability.  Reproduced thousands if not millions of times on posters, greeting cards, coffee mugs and key chains.  

My question to you is why, over a half century later, is this simple two tone orange poster so popular? Is it the color? Is it the five words?  

Our lives have gotten so complex and so busy that when event happen in our lives that disrupt our natural flow, we tend to become entirely too stressed.  When these posters were originally made, Great Brittan was under daily threat of invasion.  Bombs all over England were destroy their way of life.  But England wanted to bolster the resilience of its people.  Many people were spending night after night in the tunnels of the London Underground, trying to stay safe from the bombs over head.

Today, not everyone has exploding bombs going off in their back yards, but sometimes events in our lives do explode and destroy what we have come to know as 'normal'.  Recent natural disasters here in the U.S. have proven this to a tee.  When tornadoes ripped through Joplin, Tuscaloosa, and other cities across the south, lives were lost, homes and businesses destroyed.  Some people ask themselves what they would do if that ever happened to them.  We really can't answer that until we experience it first hand.  

It reminds me a bit of when the Israelites had escaped Egypt and had just made it to the far side of the Red Sea.  The Egyptian Army, lead by the Pharaoh himself, was now chasing them through the dry land in the Red Sea they themselves had just crossed.  God told Moses to "Be still and know that I am God."  That God himself would destroy the army.  

How similar is this statement from God to the poster from WWII.  When life seems to be coming at us from all sides, when we feel like the bombs are raining down on us, when like life will never get back to normal, all we have to do is put our trust in the One that can move mountains, the one who calms the raging sea, the one that loves you so much, he is ready to gather you up as a hen gathers her chicks.  All we have to do is let him.  There are times we God calls us to action, but often all we need  is to be still and Know He is God. 

Prayer Life?

I have been thinking a lot about my priorities.  I have been asking a lot of questions about my prayer life.  What is a prayer life?  My Bible defines prayer as 'talking to God'. Is it really that simple?  We just talk to God?  So a prayer life is just talking to God all of the time.  Sounds pretty simple to me.  Then I ask why don't we do it? 

With the advent of social media, many of us talk to our friends constantly via Facebook, Twitter, texting, Skype, and the old fashion phone call.  In the Old Testiment, Abraham was called God's friend.  So if we are sons and daughters of Abraham, it makes sense that God is our friend.  So why don't we talk to our friend?

At some time in each of our lives, we have had at least one boss.  A boss and employee must communicate to each other so that the necessary work is completed. 2 Timothy 3:17 says ". . so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work."  God is our boss and we are his employees or servants.  So, why don't we talk to our boss?

I love having Skype.  Wow! What a great tool.  I can now talk to my mom and dad a lot more often without running up the minutes on my phone.  There are weeks I talk to them nearly everyday and usually about nothing at all. I just want to talk.  If  God is our Heavenly father, Why don't we talk to him?

One of the most important relationships many of us have or have had, is our relationship with our wife or husband.  I have several friends that are in a marriage where the husband and wife talk about EVERYTHING.  I  mean everything, from their fears to their quirks.  Every facet of their lives is an open book to their spouse.  Christ called himself the Bridegroom and we are his bride.  We long for the day we are united with him, but does that mean we don't communicate with him?

I have been awed by the number of my friends that have had to seek medical advise and intervention for a variety of ailments in the recent months.  We go to the doctor for medicine, for healing.  Through out the Bible, there are countless accounts of God healing the sick and lame.  If God is the Great Physician,  why are we not talking to our doctor?

Everyday through work, school and even shopping, we encounter people from a variety of different facets of life.  Many of these are struggling in areas that we can not begin to fathom.  In Matthew 25:40 Jesus tells us, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’  If we just took the time to talk to the people God brings in our lives, we are talking to God.

All of these people; Friends, bosses, family, spouses, ets. take up our day.  We talk to people all day long.  Are you talking to God all day long?

So, how's your prayer life?