REMEMBER

So, I have been told, that God has given me a good memory. I can remember names, sermons, encouraging words...but not just good things. If I am not careful, and watching my heart, I can really remember offenses and instances of where I have been hurt, and I have had to learn to LET GO! Anyway, so, I was thinking about the memory thing. Lord, if every good and perfect gift comes from above, (James 1:17) then what is this gift of a good memory for? God gives gifts to edify the Body of Christ. Then I got to thinking, why did God give us a memory in the first place? Because memory, is tied to RELATIONSHIP. Think about it...people who can't remember your name or who you are, don't have relationship or HISTORY with you. Or, you didn't make that much of an impact on their life for them to remember you. Think about the families who have a parent or grandparent suffering from Alzheimer's. How painful it is for the families not to be recognized by their loved one. All the points of reference for their relationship...gone. Suddenly dear loved ones, become suspicious strangers. How awful. Then I thought, how passionate our God is, to want RELATIONSHIP with US, that HE GAVE our brains the ABILITY to REMEMBER. He WANTS to have HISTORY with us. If we DIDN'T have the ability to remember, we would have NO HISTORY with people. No memory of shared experiences to build on. Often in hard times, it is a MEMORY of a word spoken, promise given, or dream, that gives us the STRENGTH to KEEP going. If we didn't have a memory, we would just be BLANK! Never able to accomplish anything, because without memory, you don't know what you are doing. You would never KNOW people. You would meet them, then forget. You would share an experience, and then it would be gone. Without memory, there is no RELATIONSHIP. How awesome and passionate for us, is our God that in His wisdom, He gave use the ability to REMEMBER HIM. To share experience with Hom, and not lose it. No wonder all throughout the Bible, God instructed the Israelites to REMEMBER HIM and what He had done! He charged them to SET UP MEMORIALS (Josh 4:1-8 one example) and FEASTS (Ex. 12, the Passover) to remember His deliverance and miracles, generations after. And just as I did this morning, Jesus instructed us TO REMEMBER HIM (I Corn. 11)through Communion. Remember what HE HAS DONE. Remember His promises. REMEMBER where He has brought you from! Even we make effort to preserve memories, with scrapbooks, photo albums, journals, home videos, etc. Why? Because memories = experiences with loved ones, or important lessons that if we forget, it could be detrimental to us. So, thank you LORD for our memories!

Everyday musing: ONE in the SAME

The word integrity, as we know, comes from the word INTEGER...which in math we learned means WHOLE..whole numbers. ONE. No fractions. Intergrity: being whole and undivided. So, for us to have integrity, we are to BE ONE-our words and actions are to be ONE. Not two different things. What we say, is what we do, and what we do is what we say. They aren't two DIFFERENT things. Lord, let my words be my actions, and my actions be my words.

GOD SIZED OPPORTUNITY

Truly, God does not call the equipped, but He equips the called. When God called me, I faced the decision, would I surrender the plans I built for my life (college, the "American Dream", security) for what He had for me? Thankful, by His grace, I did, and today, I find it ironic, that God would have someone like me, with no college degree, speak to university students over 4,000 miles away from home. When we live our lives for God, He brings GOD sized opportunity!

TGM TOUR

Ok so, it has been 36 days since TGM embarked on our Missions Tour throughout the Midwest-Southern states! What an adventure! We flew in to Missouri, mobilized, and since then, have ministered in Taneyville, MO; El Dorado, KS; Muldrow, OK; Shiloam Springs, OK; Vernon, TX; Arlington, TX and tomorrow, we head to Dallas! We head East in a few days, to Florida, Georgia and where ever God leads in between!