Tag: character

the magnetic pull of focus

Karla Lees

One day spent in Your house, this beautiful place of worship, beats thousands spent on Greek island beaches. I’d rather scrub floors in the house of my God than be honored as a guest in the palace of sin. Psalm 84:10 MSG

I love to worship. It is the one thing I like best after spending time in His Presence, and diving into the Word.

When I get really busy, I tend to rush through my day beginning with a quick devotional instead an unrushed time at His feet, focusing solely on Him.

This quick fix mentality opens me up to selfishness, hurry, and distraction. Spend too long with that crew, and the enemy begins to make his play.

When sin comes knocking, sometimes what looks good in the moment can appear better than what we know to be true. For the enemy was an angel of light, and very beautiful in the eye of the beholder. (2 Corinthians 11:12-15)

However, beauty is only skin deep, and the truth about all things will be revealed the more time we invest in it. A handsome man or gorgeous woman isn’t always so lovely once you get to know them when their personality becomes revealed.

Sin is the same.

Just because it looks good, doesn’t mean it is good.

If it sounds too good to be true, it may just be a lie.

Only God IS good, and so are His ways.

Nothing can ever beats being His, and being with Him.

●How we live magnifies our priorities.

●What we love reveals the desires of our hearts.

●What we focus on attracts more of the same….

If we zoom in on our lack or selfish desires, our mood will become increasingly dissatisfied and depressed. If we seek Him first and His Kingdom, its standards will be reflected within us.

What most appeals to His Beloved should be the things which most appeal to Him: community, truth, holiness, being with the one you love.

Lord, may we choose to regularly worship You, and keep our gaze focused on what is good, true, wholesome and pure. (Philippians 4:8) Be the fixed point of our devotion, and ever clarify our focus so we can see you better. Let Your character magnify our vision, and replicate itself within us.

May the gift of Presence be the one we unwrap the most, and may our heart align up with Your passions the more we spend time with You, and focus on what will last a lifetime instead of a fleeting moment.

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bedazzled? beware!

Karla Lees

Over coffee last night, a girl friend and I were sharing a bit of our backgrounds & story with one another….as new girlfriends are likely to do as part of our get to know each other chats (Right girlfriends ;D)

She mentioned how sometimes when something seems to good to be true, it is a warning.

You know…like how a little strategic decorating versus bedazzling the heck out of something appeal differently to our senses.

Sometimes we don’t take enough care to take a closer look at the bedazzling package in front of us.

True beauty is deeper than the surface beauty we often settle for.

I have found God’s gifts have a natural wonder which take my breath away in appreciation, but never glitters so much I can no longer clearly see His handiwork.

Years ago, pre-believing, I was very flattered by the attention of an older handsome man, and threw caution to the wind.  I found myself quickly over my head, and looking back now, just as quickly longed for a way out.  I was bedazzled by the outer exterior, but saw some glimpses of what was underneath, which wasn’t pretty at all. I still thank God that He got me out of that relationship as quickly as He did. 

Just coz it looks great, doesn’t mean it is great.

Ever since that experience, I look beyond the exterior into the interior character of people.  To me, the beauty of you is found in who you are, not the shell you are housed in.

I may be outwardly overweight, but inwardly I am way more attractive than I was when He found me!

Anger and rage have been tamed, with sarcasm wrestled & left at the foot of the cross….but what He left in their place is way more beautiful and dazzling than i could have imagined.

God moved in, and began to shine His Presence in such a way i startednto see the decor within might have been bedazzling on the surface, but was really tarnished underneath.  It was time to trade up!

Now i decorate within in the Vintage style which will last for eternity!

The beauty found in spending time with my Maker, who is continually making me new from the inside out.

So if you suspect something is too bedazzlingly wonderful to be true, ask Him to reveal what is really under the surface.

It may be the enemy is trying to decoy you away from where God really wants you, or God may have something better ahead than you ever believed possible, Beloved.

Being aware doesn’t mean we need to be scared. It simply means take a moment to ask God, “Is this what You have for me?” and awaiting His response.

May we cease being surface dwellers, and dig deep for the vintage eternal treasures He has waiting for us to unwrap & enjoy.

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God is…Faithful

Karla Lees

Faithful.

We don’t often see faithfulness as a quality to be admired in our culture today.

In our rush to satisfy our own needs, we forget how it honors God when we show honor and put one another first.

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In Joshua 2, we see how God proves faithful to His people, and how He is blessed when we are faithful with our words & our actions.

Joshua sent two men into Jericho to spy in enemy territory ….reconnoitring the city & checking out competition before they attacked to take the land God had promised them.

How odd on one hand that these Israelites would have entered the home of a prostitute, but as travellers would always be welcome at such an establishment, it makes sense to enter the city this way. Less noticeable.

Except the king of Jericho also had well positioned spies, and word got back to him there were Israelites in town.

Why such a big deal?

Because word had been spreading, as we learn through Rahab’s conversation with the spies, that Israel’s God was faithful & strong, and terror was striking the inhabitants of the land they had not yet begun to conquer!

Only God could have stirred such a fear!

He not only told His people where to settle, but was causing fear of what had not yet happened to make their enemies quake with fear, before the physical battle had begun!

God was already keeping His promise to give them this land.

Rahab knew He was the real God, and in exchange for protecting the Israelite spies from capture, she wanted her family kept safe in the battle for Jericho.

I noticed the spies response was basically, “If you keep your word to us, we will keep ours to you.”

Put your word on display with a red cord, and we will honor our word to you.

Human faithfulness on display.

God IS faithful in His very core.
And keeps His word, even when we don’t.

This is true faithfulness at its purest.

God honored Rahab, not only for her actions in saving His spies, but for her faith.

She and her household were saved from the fall of Jericho’s walls, and the destruction of the city.

Israel lived up to its word.

Human faithfulness again.

And in Matthew 1:5-6, we get a glimpse of just how faithful God was in how He blessed Rahab for her actions:

…and Salmon the father of Boaz by Rahab, and Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, and Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David the king.

Rahab enters His family!
She becomes the mother of Boaz, one of the most compassionate of men & most honoring of his word,
the mother in law of Ruth,
and the great great grandmother of King David.

From whose blood line came Jesus!

God is SO faithful.

What we cannot see ahead is just how much more we will recognize Him as faithful when we look back on our lives, and see His faithfulness interwoven through the story of our lives!

Be encouraged. This same God is still as faithful today as He can be seen through out His Word & history.

For He never changes, and He is still as incredibly faithful towards us, right here and now.

Most often, His faithfulness is even beyond what we comprehend!

May we rise up to be women & men of our words, and live lives as faithful as the God who made us part of His forever family, regardless of what we may have done, just as Rahab!

your true character

Karla Lees

You know that under pressure,

your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors.

Let it do its work…James 1:2-4 (MSG)

I find the character of Joseph echoes throughout this verse, not just because colors are mentioned.

When Joseph was sold by his brothers into slavery, his true character was forced out into the open, for he did not have the luxury of hiding from his owners. And God’s favor clearly rested on him as Joseph kept strong in the faith.  He was with him, despite all the ups & downs Joseph faced.

When the storms and chaos comes, the faith you have within comes to the surface.

  • Is your faith deeply rooted?
  • Easily pulled up with the first gust of wind?
  • Well soaked so it can withstand a dry season?

Our character is shown through the pressures of life.

May yours, and mine, be a reflection of the God we adore as we dig down deep for all He has for us in this life.

Like Joseph, may we depend on God alone as our foundation when our identity has been stripped away, our hearts broken, ad the road ahead unclear.

James-1-2

go to the source

Karla Lees

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I am an avid learner, as I recently shared in my desire to keep taking courses. I like to study the Word, read how others interpret the Word, and grow through the process.

The image I am sharing today struck me as a great visual reminder of the three key ways to encounter truth, and become wise.

1. Search for It.

We don’t know what we know or don’t know until we begin to search for knowledge.

The world opens up to a child when they grasp the alphabet, and the lining up of letters to make words. Being able to read helps widen our search area for knowledge.

Being a knowledge seeker means we are searching for truth. We want to know the facts. We long to know what is true, in a world that likes to blur the edges of all it reveals to us.   But  real fact is based on truth, and will have a ring of the Holy in it as a result. For God is Truth, and all truth echoes back to its originator.

2. Make it Live.

Insight is living out the truth we now know, discovered through seeking out knowledge.  If something is true, and we know it, we live differently through encountering it.

As a very young child of 3-4, I broke my money out of my piggy bank and walked to the donut store behind where we lived to buy 6 donuts.  I ate them all fairly quickly to hide the evidence, and I learned very quickly that 6 donuts was way too much food for my childish frame. 

The truth I learned is if I want to do something in secret and am not comfortable telling someone else about it, it isn’t something I should be doing.  (And I will get sick from six full sized donuts!)

Applying the truth through what we learn takes it from being a just a fact to making it relevant to our lives.

But there is still a key element missing to knowledge & truth, which leads me to point…

3. Seek the Source.
Real knowledge and truth comes from the Source of it all, God.
As He is truth, and all wisdom, He will reveal both to use when we ask for help. Discernment occurs when God reveals the truth in a way we could not have discovered ourselves without Him.  In times of heightened stress & emotions,  we can forget what we have learned and applied, and that is where drawing close to the Source is crucial. The eternal God has insight beyond our comprehension, which can reveal way more in one moment than we could spend a life time trying to learn for ourselves.

We will never find truth, knowledge & wisdom apart from God. He not only knows all, He is the starting place for all truth & wisdom. They are Him, integral characteristics of the Almighty amazing complex God we are drawn to.

Need wisdom?
Seeking truth?
Lacking insight?
Go to the Source!

A few nugget verses to check out from the Word about wisdom, truth & knowledge:

Proverbs 1:7; 8:11-21
James 1:5
Colossians 3:16
Romans 11:33

But more importantly….

 

I ask—ask the God of our Master, Jesus Christ, the God of glory—to make you intelligent and discerning in knowing him personally, your eyes focused and clear, so that you can see exactly what it is he is calling you to do, grasp the immensity of this glorious way of life he has for his followers, oh, the utter extravagance of his work in us who trust him—endless energy, boundless strength!

Ephesians 1:17-19

Reason #5 to Give Thanks: Because You Can

Karla Lees

The last my top 5 reasons to give thanks ends with:

Because You Can (also known as Why Not?)  🙂

If you are alive, you have a reason to give thanks.

If you have anyone on earth or in heaven who loves you, you have a reason to give thanks.

If you can eat, breathe, sleep, sing, walk, talk, create, move, see, hear….

you have a reason to give thanks.

The Word is full of verses about why to give thanks, but here are my fave four as to why we can, besides the fact we are alive (as I outlined above):

1. Because you are made by His hands:

Oh yes, You shaped me first inside, then out; You formed me in my mother’s womb. I thank you, High God—You’re breathtaking! Body and soul, I am marvelously made! I worship in adoration—what a creation! You know me inside and out, You know every bone in my body. You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit, how I was sculpted from nothing into something. Like an open book, You watched me grow from conception to birth; all the stages of my life were spread out before You; the days of my life all prepared before I’d even lived one day.

Psalm 139:13-16

2. Because He is the Only God!

I will give to the LORD the thanks due to his righteousness, and I will sing praise to the name of the LORD, the Most High.

Psalm 7:17

3. Because He is not only good, but He loves us FOREVER!

Give thanks to the LORD of hosts, for the LORD is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!

Jeremiah 33:11

4. Because of who He IS, Holy, Mighty, Awesome, Just, True, Good….

We give thanks to you, Lord God Almighty, who is and who was…

Revelation 11:17

Every day, we have a reason to thank God.

Every day, we can offer Him thanks, even on those days when almost everything seems to go downhill… 😉
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womb with a view

Karla Lees

This title would not let me go:
Womb with a view.

What else would you call it?

Jesus, one third of the Trinity,
enfolded His divinity
with the help of Holy Spirit
and became flesh,
bone & blood
in a virgin’s womb.

Wow.

Just that action, a flash of a nanomoment in human time, sent shockwaves out across the universe & heaven in an act intended to rock all known existence.

God with us, on His way.

That is mind boggling enough, but here is where I am drawn today…. and maybe, just maybe you might be too.

Jesus, full of Holy Spirit and yet fully human, in the womb.

Could He chat with God from in there?

Could He hear His Father’s voice in the womb?

If so, the womb takes on a whole new significance with Jesus within.

Children in the womb take on the mix of their parents’ traits while developing.

Was Jesus growing with any of Joseph’s physical traits?

Because I suspect after all the shock Joseph has already gone through, and might be up ahead as the father of the Messiah, God would have made Jesus look like Joseph.  Not 100%, as with any newborn, but enough that Joseph would wonder again at the miracle, and his heart would be melted towards His son.  Maybe his nose, or build…

Because God chose Joseph to raise His son, I have to believe His compassion would be for Jesus to resemble His earthly father, enough for tongues not to wag too much about His parenthood.

I wonder how much of Mary was already visible in the baby in her womb? Did He already have her heart for worship? Her eyes?

We know Jesus was fully human & God from the second that creation spark started Him growing in the womb.

We just don’t know what that looked like, really, as He grew there.

I believe He would have had a sensitivity to learning about His earthly parents while inside.  Prayed for them on the hard days, rejoiced with them in the moments of celebration.

I wonder if He tried not to kick Mary too hard as they traveled to Bethlehem.

I wonder if He prayed for a smooth delivery, for God to be with Him in the shock of entering the world, for angelic protection as He did.

All we know: Jesus was fully human, and fully God, all in one miraculous present.

And somehow, God would have worked out all those details of human appearance intertwining with Godly character in the arrival of Jesus.

Who is still in the womb on His way to Bethlehem.

While we may wonder at the view He had in the womb, how He was born of Mary and all God all rolled into one tiny baby is a fact!

#AdventuresinAdvent continue 😉

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weards

Karla Lees

I made up a word today.
Weards.
(I may not have actually, but for the purposes of today’s post, let’s pretend I did for how I am about to use it!)
By my definition, weards are words meant to be heard:

words/heard
w starts us off
ear reflects hearing
d to show the word’s almost done
s to show more than one.

At least, that’s the way I see it.

Today was a rollercoaster of words that were heard:

Word words
Constructive words
Encouraging words
Complaining words
Words spoken in pain
Funny words
Grateful words
Poignant words

There were a few that impacted me most of all, the words God meant for me to hear.

The caution in an area I need to stand firm in.

Genuine thanks for a job well done.

An encouraging email from a new sister I recently met (same Father)

A written reminder in my lunch how God loves me with an everlasting love.

When we depend on God’s Words to lead us, speak to us and guide us…we will be confident when God asks us to share them with others…. for when the Word is spoken, then the Word truly comes alive.

God spoke. The world & all it contains, human and creature, came to be.

Words have the power to build up.

The enemy, counterfeit that he is, tries to get us to use our words to tear one another down, dividing & wounding us.

Words have the power to hurt.

God reminds me through His Word and through His people who I am, how much He cared for me, and the type is person He has designed me to be.

Words have the power to release life.

May your words uplift and bless.
May they always be worth being g heard, these weards!

waterfall

Karla Lees

There is a waterfall up ahead.

How wet you get depends on how close you get to the water.

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God’s love
runs deeper than we can fathom
higher than our eye can see
stronger than death or illness
wider than the horizon is off afar
a tap missing a shut off valve, it keeps going and going and going
forever
without end

A lover of all things water related, the choice of using a waterfall to explain God’s love is an instant snapshot for me.

Usually beautiful,
as immense torrents of water pour down to plummet into the still deep pool waiting below
Majestic
Wild
Strong
Natural
Raging with purpose

Waterfalls become places where humanity find themselves drawn to. Fascinated with the falls,
Captivated by the power,
Yet somehow
at the same time
there is an underlying current at work.

God’s love is the same.
Fascinatingly directed on a collision course for our hearts
Waiting to pour in an abundance of love, peace, joy, hope, strength, grace
As we reach outstretched arms
for Him to touch us.

May you, down to your very soul, be soaked in the spray of His downpour as you draw close to Him.

His water is the only one that truly satisfies.

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(If you are musically inclined like me, to catch a glimpse of the awesomeness of God’s love in song, listen to:
Make Me Brave; Anchor- Bethel Music
Rain Down- Martin Smith, Jesus Culture
Let it Rain, All Consuming Fire- Jesus Culture
Cornerstone; Oceans- Hillsong
And my new fave, the words of which are added below:)

Waterfall – Chris Tomlin

Oh God, my God I seek You
I wanna move when You move
You’re more than I could long for
I thirst for You

You’re an ocean to my soul
To my soul

Your love is like a waterfall, waterfall
Running wild and free
You hear my heart when I call, when I call
Deep calls to deep
Your love is like a waterfall, waterfall
Raining down on me

Waterfall, waterfall

Oh God, my God I seek You
In this dry and desert land
You lead me to streams of mercy
Once again

You’re an ocean to my soul
To my soul

Your love is like a waterfall, waterfall
Running wild and free
You hear my heart when I call, when I call
Deep calls to deep
Your love is like a waterfall, waterfall
Raining down on me

Waterfall, waterfall

It’s coming like a flood
I’m dancing in the rain
Everything I’ve done
Is covered in rivers of grace, amazing

It’s coming like a flood
I’m dancing in the rain
I lift up my hands
Your love never changes, amazing

Your love is like a waterfall, waterfall
Running wild and free
You hear my heart when I call, when I call
Deep calls to deep
Your love is like a waterfall, waterfall
Raining down on me

Waterfall, waterfall