Greetings all!
We are celebrating the chance to change around here. At our next Power Meeting (Wednesday August 19, 2015 – Please join us at Life Works at 6 pm – Rear Parking Lot) we will discuss possible changes to our Bylaws, to a few of our Annual Events and consider shutting down our Community Resource Database, since we don’t have resources to maintain it or the calls it receives.
We are in desperate need of a Vice President and Treasurer, as well as Committee Members and even a few volunteers. This is the perfect opportunity to help form this group into a community minded support group…or whatever we are needed to be. You do not have to be a church member or a Christian to be part of our group – You just need to love people and want to help (Please read the Bylaws to see other considerations).
Possible jobs for people would be to facilitate and support community events, help recruit volunteers for local non-profits or even help maintain our online presence…and any other job you might want to create. (Just a note: there are no paid jobs at Living Ministries, all positions are volunteer)
I have increasingly had an issue on my heart for the last few months and I wanted to share with you a blog I posted on my personal blog at GoodTimesAlways.com. I hope you hear the message I hoped for.
Your Anger is Killing You
My heart was aching before I wrote this.
Shootings, accusations, harboring un-forgiveness and hatred, gossiping; all these things bombard us in the news, in the shows we watch for entertainment, Facebook News Feeds (and all the other Social Networking sites), conversations with friends and in our minds.
With all the anger that we are surrounded with, it is no wonder that children are raised with no conscious or social graces, why people have no knowledge of important things like how their family members are doing but they know what celebrities are up to, and why situations that would be handled with honesty, grace and a hand shake in the past, now cause huge fiascos and are drawn out and shared online and in newscasts to anyone that wants to enter into the victim’s anger with you because they too have been victimized and they want to relive the emotions with someone because they are too heavy to carry alone.
People want to blame anyone they can for their bad feelings. This is natural. I have been guilty of this too; I will probably have to repent for it again at some point. But when you don’t forgive and when you don’t encourage others to forgive and even help them mix their anger into a greater fury, you are grieving the Lord and killing yourself.
We walk around with so many transgressions we haven’t truly forgiven or repented for. It plays out in our faces and spills out to our neighbors so that the next time another person makes a mistake, whether it affects you or not, we want to join in with the residue from the past and make it even bigger than it needs to be.
My fellow human being, if Jesus dealt with us fairly we would all be going to hell!
All God asks is that you set down and confess all of it, how you feel, how you felt, how you can’t forgive, why it was unfair, using words to describe your frustration, feelings of betrayal and being a victim, why you didn’t deserve this…and about this point God will begin to change your heart and soon the words will turn into how you care about the person that hurt you and you know He loves them and wants to help them not do this again. He will remind you that He didn’t give them the right to do this to you.
Eventually you will feel peace, that someone heard you, someone who loves you, who enjoys you, who wants the best for you and knows what that is. At this point you can repent for harboring anything that wasn’t love, grace, mercy or joy and ask that Jesus bless those who hurt you. Sometimes this process takes more than one prayer. Sometimes this takes more than one year of prayers. But as you hand your weaknesses and feelings over to Him, He will be the blessing and healing you can’t be, all while you become more like Him and more reliant on Him.
Plus…Jesus will also do everything He can to encourage reconciliation. When you see the person that hurt you, you will be free to let Jesus love them and not blast them with remembrances of your rage and victimization. Even if you say nothing, because you are still in the forgiveness process, you won’t hurt them back..because vengeance belongs to the Lord; not us.
Let the world take care of itself. That’s what laws are for, to police people that have not given their hearts to Jesus or forgotten they did that, in a moment of desperation, where you jumped back into what the world taught you before Jesus made you brand new, and you knew it.
Do I sound like Pollyanna? I hope so. She saw things so simply. She looked for the good in people because as her father shared the words of Abraham Lincoln, she believed, “If you look for the bad in people, hoping to find it, you most surely will.”
I am praying for you.
My name is Summer. That is how you can call me. I hope that I am a blessing to you. I am not perfect. I will fall again. But I am forgiven.
Do you know Jesus? Do want the Holy Spirit to fill you and give you understanding and salvation? Ask Him. Want someone to pray with you? Contact me.
If you would like to know Jesus as your friend, but want to make this amazing commitment by yourself please pray something like this:
Thank you Jesus that You are the Son of God, the God that created heaven and earth. Thank you Jesus that You came to earth in the form of a man so that You would be able to empathize with my humanity. Thank You that You did this in order to fulfill the promises You made at the foundation of the world.
I realize that I am a sinner and do things that hurt myself and keep myself away from you. Thank You that You died for my sins so that You could defeat death and bring me into Your life. Please forgive me.
I ask You to be Lord of my life. I ask you to heal my hurts and show me what my new life, empowered by You looks like. Thank You for Your mercy.
Amen
The Lord is with you always.
