I'm Thankful For 2004 (or today!) - 11/28/13 and 11/29/13 (updated!)

All day today, I have been singing a jacked up version of Ruben Studdard's "hit" - but replacing Sorry with Thankful.... I'm thankful for 2004! Bizarre, right? Especially because 2004 is almost 10 years ago and why am I thankful for that year? Idk, you know me and music....

Here is truly what I'm thankful for....  

I'm thankful for the basics! It's almost a gospel cliche... I'm thankful for the roof over my head, the shoes on my feet, the clothes on my back, and the food on my table. And while it may sound pedestrian, I'm thankful for even the tiniest blessings in my life! I'm thankful for the car I own now, and I'm thankful in advance for the much less expensive car I will own in the future.

I'm thankful for decent health! I was able to get out of bed today in my right mind! Cue the hallelujahs! But again, with my family's medical history, I could be dealing with a lot more than bad sinuses and migraines! God has been so good!

(Everything below was completed after I woke up at midnight LOL)

I'm thankful for my job. The stressful times, the busy times, the almost-nonexistent laid back times (smile), I'm grateful for a job that needs me so much! I'm also grateful to be part of my team. We freakin' rock. I'm thankful for my boss's health. This time last year, I remember being very worried. I'm thankful for the office where I was born, raised, and promoted. I'm extremely thankful that it will be moving in upcoming months... (For real, this time!)
I'm also thankful for my other "jobs" - my ministries at church and my responsibilities in Zeta. I love service!

I'm grateful for my family - family has always been a loose definition for me and has never just been defined by blood. But I'm super thankful for my sorors and Sigma brothers, every single one of my friends (shoutout to the bffs), my pastor(s) and all of the Bidwell family, my YaYas, my non-biological family (all the "aunts" and their families), and my real family (the Formleys, the Blackwells, the Gilliams). I'm thankful for my Daddy. God bless and keep him for becoming a single parent at 71 and thinking he would have it easy. Ha!
I'm thankful for those who I had the chance to know and love but have since gone on - Calvin, Uncle Tim, Aunt Rose, Armon, among others.
Finally, I'm so very thankful for being placed in the womb of Madelyn. My mom was an outstanding woman of God and I can only hope to be described similarly by my progeny someday....

I'm thankful for my relationship with the Triune God! Yup, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit all get a shoutout bc I need them (Thee) every hour, oh how I do... There's so much to say and not say in this juncture....
To God who knew me when I was but a zygote and called me His, THANK YOU!!!
To God who has great purpose for me and is patiently waiting for me to get it together... THANK YOU!!!
To God who planted me where I needed to be but still manages to put up with my silly requests every day... THANK YOU!!!

Scripture:
Psalm 100
"Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness; come before Him with joyful songs. Know that the Lord is God. It is He who made us, and we are His, we are His people, the sheep of his pasture. Enter His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise; give thanks to Him and praise His name. For the Lord is good and His love endures forever; His faithfulness continues through all generations."

Videos:

Thank You - Richard Smallwood

Thank You - Daryl Coley

Still Gotta Say Thank You - Smokie Norful

Until later,
Blue Lady

Honesty, Transparency, God Sees Us! - 11/26/13

Last week, while I was driving somewhere, I started thinking about possible blog topics, almost like a confessional series about things that people probably don’t know or don’t realize about me, such as how self-centered I am or what worries I have... but then I thought nah because while this blog is about me, it’s really about God’s work in me and that should be my focus, not me. Then, my Pastor preached on Sunday from the book of Ezekiel, Chapter 8, verses 1-13. I’m not going to transcribe it here, but the essence is this – there’s a hole in the wall of the temple that reveals the secret doorway to the room where people who are supposed to be holy are doing things they have no business doing in secret, but God sees it and it is detestable to Him! As she preached, I just shook my head because wow, confession is admitting what was done in secret. So, this confessional series is probably right on track, but what I wanted to confess (the easy, surface stuff) is probably not what I need to confess… Whoo! I’m not even ready for this confessional series, but it’s probably coming soon. So, in the meantime (and given the fact that my time was limited this morning), I’m going to put in my virtual crockpot and let it stew. So far, it’s got the base ingredient in it – Pastor’s word from Sunday. Let’s see what other scriptures I can find about transparency, honesty, secrecy in the Word…

Proverbs 12:17 “A truthful witness gives honest testimony, but a false witness tells lies.” 

Psalm 44:20-21 “If we had forgotten the name of our God or spread out our hands to a foreign god, would not God have discovered it, since He knows the secrets of the heart?” 

Psalm 51 (all of it!) 51:3-6 “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me. Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge. Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me. Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.” 

1 John 1:5b—8 “…God is light; in Him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with Him yet walk in the darkness, we life and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” 

Luke 12:2-3 There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the intter rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.” 

 Yikes, help me Holy Spirit. As I add these words to the crockpot, Lord, stir the pot and keep it hot in my heart until it's time to served. In Jesus’ name, Amen

Had to leave you a song (of course) Walk in the Light (1987) – an old hymn that Aretha did in 1987.
 It starts around 0:50 Enjoy!
 
Here’s the lyrics:
Walk in the light, beautiful light, come where the dewdrops of mercy shine bright.
Oh shine all around us by day and by night, Jesus is, Jesus is the light of the world;
Oh we shall walk in the light, beautiful light, come where the dewdrops of mercy shine bright.
Oh shine all around us by day and by night, Jesus is , Jesus is the light of the world;

Verse 1:
No need to worry, no need to fret, all of my needs, the man named Jesus has met. His love protects me from hurt and from harm, Jesus is, Jesus is the light of the world.

Verse 2: If the gospel be hid, it's hid from the lost, my Jesus is waiting to look past your faults. Arise and shine, your light has come, Jesus is, I know that He is the only light of this world.

Vamp:
Sopranos: Jesus is the light, light of the world.
Tenors: Jesus is the light, light of the world.
Altos: Jesus is the light, light of the world.
All: He's ever shining in my soul.

Fall Fashion/ Photoshoot Friday - 11/22/13

On Saturday, November 2nd, I entered a blog giveaway from one of my social media friends, @Dawn GT, for this beautiful black infinity scarf. A week later I found out, I had won! Well, yesterday, my scarf arrived and here is the part where I rock the heck out of it! My thanks and appreciation to Dawn! The scarf is fabulous! Click here and check out her blog - Simply Sassy's Style Blog!

Seeking Him --> Bills to Decrease.. Blessings to Increase! - 11/22/13

Dear Lord,

Thank you for your Word that illumines me. Thank you for using it to speak to me, to encourage me, to chastise me. Thank you for everything! When I l start to look at what I don’t have, I can’t help but praise you for all that I do have. Thank you Lord for sustaining me. Lord, these bills! But all I can say is “Hallelujah Anyhow”. You’ve been with me so far, and I know you are always right beside me. You’ll never leave nor forsake me...

Y’know, for me, there is nothing more depressing than waking up on payday and having less than you thought you would have…. I’m not putting all of my business out there, but let’s just say that money is tight! So, this morning, as soon as I saw my balance, I wanted to run to the bank and take everything out that was left! But before I could actually stand up, I was convicted to not go anywhere. No, God, I’ll trust you. The situation may look bleak, but I have to trust God with it.

Matthew 6:25; 33-34a

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes?” “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself…”

But as I’m trusting God, I’m also have work to do. I can’t continually jump off the cliff then say “Help!!! I’m drowning!” every month.  I also have to make some smarter decisions with my money. That being said, I’ve pretty much decided DECIDED to turn my car back in. I absolutely adore my car, but the reality is, I can’t afford that car note while living on my own. See, when I bought her, I was on my own, but I had a lot in savings. So I was able to afford my bills, but only because I was able to dip into my savings… and when the savings were depleted…  yeah, I’ve been treading water ever since.  And it has to stop. So, in the next couple of weeks, I have to call my financier and voluntarily repossess her, push up on PATricia for a little while, then buy an affordable car that runs! And the most important feature of this car will not be its automatic windows or CD player. The only thing this car absolutely must have is NO NOTE ATTACHED! I’ve been thinking about doing this for months now, but I kept putting it off. Putting it off is just extending the issue.  It has to happen now in the next couple of weeks, because I am not taking this drama into 2014.  Of course, it would have made sense to do this before winter struck, but hey, it is what it is. Why am I telling the world? Because I’m going to follow through with it and written words have power.

 *Deep Sigh* I’ll be okay though.

#billstodecrease #blessingstoincrease  

In Jesus’ Name,  Amen

p.s. Happy Friday!

p.p.s. *waving at my readers* Thank you for reading! It encourages me greatly!

p.p.s. Of course, there’s a video! Let’s make it two!

 I’ll Trust You by Richard Smallwood

I Trust You by James Fortune and F.I.Y.A.

p.p.p.s. One more! Different, but related!
Richard Smallwood flipped the proverbial script and did a song called "Trust Me"

Re-prioritize – Putting God First (Part One) - 11/21/13

My church’s theme is The Year of Recovery and every month we focus on a word that starts with an R. Off the top of my head, I can’t remember what this month is, but that’s because I was in Virginia on 1^st Sunday, Rev (our other pastor) preached 2^nd Sunday, and we had a guest last Sunday. Anyway, yesterday, Pastor challenged me to a new R word… Re-Prioritize. She asked me to spend time thinking about my current priorities and re-order them. I think she also expects some stuff to get kicked off of the list altogether :-/

So, this morning, allow me to start thinking about it, writing about it, praying about it, so I can be prepared to receive what God has to say about it.

First, let’s backtrack. When people would ask any of the normal questions (How are you? What are you up to?), my answer would always be Work, Church, Sorority. I listed them thus because I felt time-wise, I literally spent the most time at work (something I have to do), then at church (at least 3 days per week because of the ministries I’m involved in), then my sorority because I just fit it in where I could. Then something changed, perhaps it was because I became an officer… I began to work on sorority stuff during free time at work, which at that time was a majority of the time. Then, this year, sorority stuff, by proxy began to take up more time but I think this was just happenstance. When your soror joins your church and becomes one of your best friends, I think sorority stuff tends to come to the forefront. Thus, my priorities became Sorority, Work, Church.

Which brings us back to the new beginning for this blog, where Pastor challenged me to stop focusing on what I was doing for who and actually spend some time with God every day.  Thus began the reading of His Word and the blogging. And it took me awhile to figure it out, but I can say that God is now the head of my priorities. But what about the rest of the list? Well, work has been downright crazy and I can’t even get Sorority stuff done there anymore (how dare they expect me to work at work? :-p) But in the sorority, I am holding different positions which mandate me to attend certain events. I have also renewed my commitment to the ministries that I’m in at church. So, as of today, right now at 6:15AM, I can say my priorities are God, Work, Sorority, and Church (Sorority only comes before church because of the mandatory events).

Here are some follow-up questions which I intend to answer in later posts:

What about Me Time? What about my family and friends?  How am I going to meet, maintain a relationship with, and eventually marry  my future husband with all of this going on? Why am I so committed to my sorority?

Lord, Your name is above all names. Forgive me for being so wrapped up in myself that I could barely see you. Thank you for gifting me with a way to put You first. Please continue to convict me so that I remain faithful in my daily devotions to you. Please help me to re-prioritize my life. Amen.

I guess today’s scripture is easy, right?  Seek ye first the Kingdom of God… But in checking my friend, the concordance, I found some other good ones. This was the first one listed under “Seek”.

1 Chronicles 28:8b-9

“Be careful to follow all the commands of the Lord your God, that you may possess this good land and pass it on as an inheritance to your descendants forever. And you, my son Solomon, acknowledge the God of your father, and serve him with wholehearted devotion and with a willing mind, for the Lord searches every heart and understands every motive behind the thoughts. If you seek Him, He will be found by you; but if you forsake Him, He will reject you forever.”

OUCH! Conviction hurts. Post to be continued y’all. I gotta get dressed now. Driving out to Greentree every day sucks is not fun at all!

-BlueLady

P.S. Gotta give you a video. This song jumped in my head!
J. Moss - God First

While I'm Trying to Submit, Lord, Have Your Way! - 11/20/13

I just woke up from some kinda strange dreams. One of the dreams featured Mommy, but she was sick and was starting to exhibit the symptoms that would have probably come along If God hadn’t called her home as quickly as He did… So waking up, I’m just thankful for God’s Will being pervasive in her life and in my own.

Now, back to the topic at hand, Submission... In the midst of one of the training sessions that I’m “coaching” this week, I thought about how bobby pins tying my hair down does not equate submission. While me using bobby pins to get the hair back under control may be similar to God working in my life to try to get me on the path, there is one key factor missing – free will.

See, my hair is just naturally rebellious. It’s just behaving the way it was created to behave. Me, on the other hand? While naturally rebellious due to original sin (anybody remember TULIP?), I actually  have the ability of choice. I can choose to submit or I can choose not to submit.

Galatians 5:13, 16-17, 25

“You, my brothers, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the sinful nature; rather, serve one another in love.” “So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature. For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature. They are in conflict with each other, so that you do not do what you want.” “Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.”

So I have been made free, but in that freedom, I continue to have a choice. Our sinful nature alone causes us to be rebellious, but I can choose to live by the Spirit instead.

This walk that I’m on is my attempt to not let my sinful nature take over. The challenge of studying God’s Word every day and blogging about it is not easy, but I have to keep trying. Every time I open the word of God, It’s a victory, even if it’s a small one.   

Thank you Lord for convicting me about submission.

Today’s song is kinda related, but kinda not. While I'm working on being obedient and submitting to God's Will, I'm asking that He take control. It's an old hymn that we used to sing and an old favorite “Have Thine Own Way”

Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine own way!
Thou art the Potter, I am the clay.
Mold me and make me after Thy will,
While I am waiting, yielded and still.

Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine own way!
Search me and try me, Master, today!
Whiter than snow, Lord, wash me just now,
As in Thy presence humbly I bow.

Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine own way!
Wounded and weary, help me, I pray!
Power, all power, surely is Thine!
Touch me and heal me, Savior divine.

Have Thine own way, Lord! Have Thine own way!
Hold o’er my being absolute sway!
Fill with Thy Spirit ’till all shall see
Christ only, always, living in me.

Here is a video of Morgan State Choir singing it…

Enjoy your day!

-BlueLady

Bobby Pins = Submission - 11/17/13

So, I haven't blogged in a week, and even though I didn't post anything, here's one of the topics that assaulted my mind.. Submission... See it started with my hair. My locs are in a really unruly state right now. At any given moment, they're liable to be doing their best Alfalfa impression, and each individual strand joins the act and it's just not right :-\ All that to say, I've been fighting with them for weeks now. Scarf or no scarf, product or no product, nothing really helped... Until I remembered my friend the bobby pin...
The bobby pin has been my friend and my confidant over the years, but never have I used so many as I do now. Nowadays, it is not uncommon for me to have 10 pins in my head to make 12 locs behave. This morning, I decided to wash the front of my hair (psoriasis, oy!) and when I started thinking "now what?", I began to comb it all to one side. Then I started re-twisting strands and pinning them down, and before you know it, I had a little side-swoop action going on. I non-verbally told my locs who was in charge. Yes I did! But why all this hair talk? Whelp, it struck me, that the owner of these here locs needs to submit too. Yup, I run around doing what I want to do thinking that I'm in charge, when I'm truly not. Here's what the Word says...

James 4:2b-3; 7-8a; 10
"You do not have, because you do not ask God. When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures." "Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God and He will come near to you." "Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up."

I had to lay all of that out because it puts the whole thing in context... Allow me to paraphrase for myself... You want stuff, but don't get it and wonder why. It's because you don't act right. So stop fighting and surrender to God.

I struggled all week long with not blogging. Part of me wanted to do it, a bigger part of me didn't feel like it. And while somewhere out there, I have a reader or two, at the end of the day, I'm blogging for me. God gave me this tool so I have to be obedient with it. Blogging everyday keeps me in my Word and focused on Him.  I get caught up working for God through my church and my sorority, but when it comes to spending time with God, I want to find 53 other things to do. Submitting my will to God's will is really hard.

So, how do I do it? Honestly, I'm not sure. And to be completely honest, blogging at night is difficult. My mind is processing everything I saw, did, said, and experienced, so it's hard to do this, but I wanted to post tonight and not wait until the morning. I have to admit to myself that the desire to have my own way is a daily struggle. Every day, I need to admit my hardheadedness and pray for God to help me with it.

And this week, while I blog daily, I'm going to continue to marinate on it and I'll just have to go from there. One step at a time, until I can say "Here I am Lord, send me..." and really mean it!

Good night everyone!
-BlueLady