God knows me...

All of my talents, all of my gifts, everything that I have comes from the Lord.  Everything that I can do, and everything that I am called to do, it all comes from the Lord.  Even my strengths and my weaknesses, they come from the Lord!  

Everyone has something that they are good at and something they are not.  Everyone!  Yes, even YOU! 

The Lord has blessed me to be BOLD!!!  I can talk to anyone at any place and I do.  I love to talk!!!  I am also very creative, and I am very talented.  I am very independent, and I like solving my own problems.  

But some of my greatest strengths are also, some of my greatest weaknesses.  When you can talk a blue streak as I can, you often fail to really listen to others.  The saying, “Your ears don’t work, when your mouth is moving,” is very true.  Sometimes I do NOT think before I speak!  Whatever we do has to line up with The WORD. 

James 1:19 (CEV) ¹⁹My dear friends, you should be quick to listen and slow to speak or to get angry.
  
I don’t have anything that God didn’t give me.  The gift of HOLY BOLDNESS that I have and the gift of Ministering are both gifts that God has given me.  I can still remember the first time that I got up in front of people at a church, all by myself.  I was so scared, but God told me to get up and I got up.    

With God by my side, I found that I could get up in the house of God and tell of His goodness.  And I found that as long as I was obedient to HIM, and preached what He told me to preach, HE would anoint me to speak. 

Just as everything that I have comes from the Lord, so does everything that you have.  All of the areas that you do well in and all the ways in which you are so talented, GOD has gifted you in those areas.  

God created each of us and formed us.  He gave us life.  He chose us before the foundation of the earth.  

 

Ephesians 1:4 (AMP) Even as [in His love] He chose us [actually picked us out for Himself as His own] in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy (consecrated and set apart for Him) and blameless in His sight, even above reproach, before Him in love.

Psalm 100:3 (KJV) Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

He knew you and me before we were formed in our mothers' womb.  He knew us before we were even twinkles in our papas’ eye.

 

Isaiah 49:1 (KJV) …The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name.

Jeremiah 1:4-5 ⁴Then the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
⁵Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations.

So, before I was even a thought, the Lord knew who I was going to be, who HE designed me to be.  And He knew you and who you were going to be.

Psalm 139:13 (AMP) For You did form my inward parts; You did knit me together in my mother's womb.

14 (KJV) I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well.

15-17 (CEV) ¹⁵Nothing about me is hidden from you! I was secretly woven together deep in the earth below, ¹⁶but with your own eyes you saw my body being formed. Even before I was born, you had written in your book everything I would do. 

¹⁷Your thoughts are far beyond my understanding, much more than I could ever imagine.

So, God had it all planned out!!!  He had us all planned out!  Just think, God knew if we would short or tall, skinny or fat, blonde, brunette or auburn.  He knew if we would sunburn and peel, have freckles or tan and get golden brown.  He had our lives all planned out.       

According to verse 16, He NOT only knew and planned everything, but He has it written down.   

Wow!!!  Thank you, LORD!  The Lord just showed me something.  Let me see if I can explain it to you.  

So, because God already sees and knows everything, HE reveals to His Spirit, the things that He wants the Spirit to show us.  That is how the Spirit is able to show us things to come. John 16:13 

And because He shows His Spirit these things, His Spirit is also able to teach us all things. John 14:26

Here is how these scriptures apply to me and the experience that I had with my plumbing this week.  

If I had been sensitive to the Holy Ghost, I would have saved myself and my friend a lot of work by hearing HIS Voice and by seeing what He was trying to show me. 


The Holy Ghost will help us, if we will only listen to HIM when HE SPEAKS.  

Earlier this week, I had a water leak.  My friend fixed it and at my request, he replaced the cutoff valve.  What we did not know, was that the new cutoff that I had bought was faulty, so 2 days later I had no water. 

Now, I know that if I had asked the Lord whether or not to have my friend put the new valve in, He would have said, “NO!”  But did I ask?  “No, I did NOT!”  Ever heard this expression?  “BIG MISTAKE!!!” 

My friend had worked until 1 am two nights before to get my plumbing fixed, and had left the hole unfilled at my insistence.  Thank you, Lord that I had not gotten around to filling it. 

So, here I am, sitting outside in my yard in a muddy hole with water still in it.  And I am trying NOT to end up covered in mud and plumbing glue.  I had already cut out the faulty valve and had tried to leave as much of the good plumbing as possible. 

I had already measured the area where the new pipe and the old valve had to fit at least 3 times.  You see, I kept having this funny feeling that I was going to cut the pipe too short, if I cut it in the place where I had it marked.   

What I did not know was that there had been 2 leaks instead of one and that the 2nd leaky connector was still glued to the old valve that I was fixing to reuse. 

I can even remember now, asking my friend if that connector was leaking. So, the Lord had already showed me that it was leaking, but I had forgotten.

You see, the thought kept coming to me over and over again, if you cut it there, it will be too short.  I know now that it was the Holy Spirit whispering that thought to me!!! 

He was trying to teach me and show me things to come.  If I had of listened to HIM, I could have saved well over an hour of my time.  By allowing Him to lead me, I could have fixed the plumbing one time and would not have had to redo it. 


So because I failed to realize that the Holy Spirit was speaking to me, I ended up cutting the pipe too short.  When I had to remove the bad connector, I had needed a longer piece of pipe to reconnect the plumbing. 

I realize now that the words, “if you cut it there,” should have made me realize that GOD was speaking to me! 

Any time, you keep having a thought come to you, you need to stop and pray!!!  I sure wish I had! 

To end this story, I will tell you, that finally with the Lord’s help and in the end, lots of prayer, I finally pieced together the plumbing and reinstalled the old valve.   

And everything, including the old valve, works fine and I filled the hole.  I have no more leaks and everything is working fine!!!  “It may not look pretty, but it works!!!”   

To sum it up, I do make mistakes and I don’t always hear the Lord, but I am working on it!!!  And I can truthfully say that life is getting better and better.  NOT listening to the Lord makes my life TOO HARD!!!  So, I do try to listen to HIM and not solve my own problems without consulting HIM.    

I can truthfully say that every time I do things my way, I regret it, but when I do things God’s way, they always turn out great!!!  You know, it is NOT that ALL of our plans are unwise.  What is unwise is NOT taking them to God for approval before trying to do them. 

I wonder how many of us can say, “We did it GOD’S WAY” and He is well pleased!!!  Or would we have to say, I did it my way?

Are you doing the things that God designed you to do?  Are you using your God-given gifts and talents?  Are you who God created YOU to be?  Are you living life to the fullest???  Or are you just spinning your wheels? 

I ask you today to double check your life.  If you can’t answer these questions or you get this funny or uneasy feeling, then make some time for GOD!!!  He knows exactly what you need!!!  Why not ask HIM? 

I can tell you this.  If God isn’t getting the glory out of what you are doing, then you have a problem.  I can’t say that you are or are NOT doing the right things with your life, but I know that God created all of us to glorify HIM. 

Afterall, God gave us life and then He gave us free will!!!  That means we get to choose, and we get to decide, what to do with our lives and how to live our lives.  But in the end, there will be a day where we stand before the LORD!   

2 Corinthians 5:10 (AMP) ¹⁰For we must all appear and be revealed as we are before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive [his pay] according to what he has done in the body, whether good or evil [considering what his purpose and motive have been, and what he has achieved, been busy with, and given himself and his attention to accomplishing].

 

And NO ONE, NO MAN, NOT EVEN JESUS, knows what day or hour Christ shall return!!!  I don’t care who prophesies or says otherwise.  They are deceived.  If God isn’t telling Jesus, then He isn’t telling anyone else!!!

 

Mark 13:32-33 (CEV) ³²No one knows the day or the time. The angels in heaven don't know, and the Son himself doesn't know. Only the Father knows. ³³So watch out and be ready! You don't know when the time will come.

Has God been trying to speak to you through His Holy Spirit?  The Holy Spirit is a gentleman!  He will never force himself on anyone.          

1 Kings 19:11-12 (KJV)  ¹¹And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake:

¹²And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.
 
Are you ignoring that still small voice that keeps speaking to you?