Day 182 - Fast FIRST

I love blogging on Sundays because I'm so full of inspirational ideas after attending church.  There has not been one Sunday since we began at Gateway Church in July for which I have not left to come home full and hungry for more.  I have always felt a deeper desire to use my "take-aways"  and put them to work in my life.

So today is the beginning of our FIRST conference as well as a start of a 21-day fast.  After hearing the message today I reflected on what The Lord was saying to me and how to fast?  Here is what I felt was my direction for the next few weeks:

Be purposefully driven, fear nothing God has spoken and walk with God, not ahead, not behind.
I am going to fast both in a physical and spiritual direction.  I am going to fast from sugar and dessert items while filling mself with increased deliberate prayer and listening more.  Both areas will allow me to be disciplined and improve.

To this end I am going to blog here, as a method of "transforming", everything I feel, hear, and act upon.  I hope to share with each of you my readers something which will help get your New Year off to a great start and keep it moving forward with hope, joy, peace and most of all love.

Lord, thank you for allowing me to be very open and share with my readers not only what you have for me but also what you can give each of them through me.  Amen

So as I move further along the path I am very careful to be more and more observant.  Paying close attention to hearing everything God is saying in my ears, heart, eyes and Spirit and disciplined to act on direction in trust without questioning His voice.  

I can't get the image out of my mind of the emerald colored new growth I found under the ugly debris on my path yesterday,  If I had not stopped, stooped to wipe away the ground cover, I would never have seen what was beginning to grow.  LIFE in brillant color.

My LIFE this year is the same.  I am wiping away the ugly 'brokenness" of my last year and years past so I can focus on the vibrant, fresh, tender newness God is fashioning and has in store for me since I was created.  The best FIRST start I can give Him is to do what I heard as a "take-away" from Pastor Jack Hayford today.

Trust and Obey--tune to His voice and keep tied in with His Word.  I need to be accountable for where God has me now at this stage of my life.  Through His fruit I will grow in joy and strength so I can grow more being productive as my life flows.  Then I can sow His fruit, others will grow in joy and strength along with me.  Relationships will be blessed.  The cylce will continue.

So I fillet my heart before The Lord to move in and through me.  Nothing hidden nothing harbored, everything open for the Master to massage and mold.  Gentle and smooth though fingers which cradle my dreams, with the voice which speaks hope and washed with the tears we have shed together.

I will count it ALL joy and be content come what may.  Stay tuned I have a feeling this next panaramic vista I'm marching toward is going to grasp the breathe away and leave us all in worshipful praise and awe.