I woke up this morning feeling pain. My first thought was thank you Lord that I can feel. So I spoke it out loud. Then I rolled over Lupus, Fibro, and RA and got out of bed. I am growing. What you think and do really affects the way you feel, spiritually and scientifically it has been proven! My name is not what I have been diagnosed with, my name is Curleen. I am a child of God. My Father says I can have what I say. Therefore I say; I have eternal and abundant life. I walk in complete and total health, prosperity and wholeness. Disorder and confusion are bound from me and my steps, thoughts, and words are ordered of the Lord. I am calm and full of peace. I have the spirit of boldness and follow God not man. The Holy Spirit and angels are with me and order things in my life for good. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me and victory is mine! That is what I say. What do you say?

I look at my life in chapters, for example my life before my mother’s stroke and my life as her caregiver after the stroke. Looking back I know God sustained me even then, but that is not the chapter I want to talk about now. I want to talk about my life after my wilderness experience. I came out of the wilderness a better person. One of the blessings I have now that I did not have before and during the wilderness is peace. This peace I have now I would not trade for anything. It has changed my life. I believe the secret of peace is our relationship with Jesus Christ. To trust in Jesus is peace. This peace goes beyond logic and understanding. I had heard that before and now I am experiencing it. It is an awesome feeling! You have that inner confidence that God is in control. Things like sickness, financial difficulties, or danger may be present, but peace reassures you that God holds our life in His hands and we can trust things will work together for good. My prayer for everyone today is that as the apostle Paul said, “May the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times and in every way.”

Sometimes the battle is in our mind. It doesn’t matter what emotional battles we face, when we tap into the wisdom of the Word of God and power into the Holy Spirit, we are guaranteed to win! We do not have to be victims of emotional outrage, jealousy, hate, pride, to name a few. None of these things are of Christ. We are more than conquerors because of Christ’s great love for us. God wants us to conquer our emotional issues. If we wallow in the anger or depression, we miss out on the gift that we have been created to be. We have to be committed to being the best you that you can be. God needs us to be a living testimony of joy and peace when the world is falling apart. We have to realize that our life is not about us; our life is about serving God and revealing HIS character to the world.

The Bible gives us the way of salvation. You will not get through your Christian walk of faith without studying the Bible. Studying the scriptures will help you with everyday life and temptations with sin. Everything you need in life is in God’s Word. The Holy Spirit gives us eyes to see and accept and appreciate the salvation. Christians grow in grace as they read and study the Bible. They accept by faith and by reason, the truth of its teachings about God, man, sin, and the Savior. Our hope should come from God, not from people or our circumstances. I am thankful for God’s Word which helps me maneuver through this journey called life.

We have opportunities before us to live our lives as women with freedom, independence and strength. If telling my story helps one woman, then I am thankful to God for allowing me to tell it. I cannot limit the Holy Spirit by deciding who or who may not need a word from God. We are to send God’s word into lives by faith, and trust the Holy Spirit to do the teaching and imparting. We are as fisherman; we throw the rod out but let God reel them in. The Lord promised to put His laws in our minds and write them on our hearts. We as believers know His requirements and feel the conviction of the Holy Spirit when we fail to meet them. God said all shall know him, from the least to the greatest. I am so thankful that I know him.

I shared with you on yesterday how God watched over me while I drove my car for over a year with rotten tires. It is so amazing how one moment you are in the wilderness and you see no way out, and then finally, you give in. You don’t give up but you give in to God. And that is when God began to deliver and restore me from the wilderness. I began to trust God and worry less. So when I received notice it was time to renew my tags and pay car taxes, I didn’t worry. Even though to do that it had to pass inspection and I didn’t have money for tags, taxes or inspection. I needed a little over seven hundred dollars to make that happen. I had none of it. But what I did have, what I received during my time in the wilderness was peace and knowledge of God’s Word. He said he would take care of my needs; and he had kept that car with the rotten tires for over a year and me safe in it. I had no doubt that he would work it out. So I prayed about it and trusted Him to fix it. It’s called faith. Being in the wilderness increased my faith.

It rained the following weekend so I did not go out until Monday morning. The first thing I saw was this wet paper stuck under my wipers. I removed it and two notes had been left there. I could barely read them they were so wet. Someone had hit my car backing out. I had to look really hard to see the small dent and scratch on the passenger side. Those who know me no I’m not into cars so it was no big deal to me. I was impressed that this person had left not one but two notes! I called to thank them for letting me know (some would not have). This lady wanted my information for her insurance company. In a couple of days the adjuster came out to look at the car. I’m thinking, ok, it’s not going to be much for this little damage. The adjuster said I would receive a check that week. The amount would be seven hundred and something (don’t remember the change amount). I’m not kidding when I say my mouth opened and tears came to my eyes. The adjuster kept asking me what’s wrong and I told her that was the exact amount I needed. I told her my car story and we both cried and praised God, yes right there in my parking lot! When I received that check and me and my car went to handle business, believe me I had no problem telling anybody that would listen, God gave me this money and this is what I got to work with! Some laughed and some probably thought I was crazy. All I know is that when we seek God’s presence and request him to intervene in our situation; we can trust that he will. I believe in miracles!  (Mark 11:24)

When I was in the wilderness I drove my car for over a year with the engine light on and all the tires rotten. When the tires needed air, sometimes every day, I would stop and have air put in. I usually stopped at the same place and each time the guy would say “Ma’am you need tires”. It was embarrassing but most of the time I would say to myself, I know, just put air in the tire! I mean I was not driving around like that because I thought it was cute. At that point the tires were my least worry. It seemed everything around me was rotten, I myself felt like I needed air just to take the next breathe and keep going! I think back and I know God was with me because it really was dangerous. God does not stop being God because we are in the wilderness. He does not stop being a God of goodness and kindness because we are disappointed or it seems we have lost everything. I can see things now that I could not see then. There is limited vision in the wilderness and you are not able to see beyond your current circumstances. When you are in the wilderness or valley as some call it, it is there where you grow. It is there where the fruits of the spirit began to emerge. You can gain patience, perseverance, and humility. But most importantly it’s an opportunity to connect and snuggle into God’s presence. God wants us to be a Christian who never blames but always blesses. God wants us to be a believer who bears fruit in the wilderness. Tune in tomorrow and I will tell you how God delivered my car. It was a miracle!

As believers, we have a choice to either magnify our pain and our disappointing circumstances or magnify our God in spite of our pain. Our hearts are the dwelling places of God. We have to be careful of the kind of atmosphere that we create for the Lord to live in. Our disappointment does not have the power to disappoint us but may actually place us in a strategic position to be used by God. Meditate on that. Enjoy the awesome weekend you will have!

Sometimes the injustices of life make me want to scream. So I do. The good news is I don’t go around screaming like I have lost my mind, I have found out how to scream in a way that releases my frustration and anger and also do my part to fight injustice. Of course the first step is to pray. There is power in prayer. The next step is to take action. I have heard one person cannot change the world, I disagree and I believe one person can make a difference. Whatever it is that makes you want to scream, that you are passionate about, do something. I detest Alzheimer’s, so I belong to the Alzheimer’s association and participate in the walk to end Alzheimer’s. It makes me angry when I think of how the elderly in this country is neglected so I try to advocate for them in any way I can. Don’t get me started on the homeless, hungry and healthcare in this county! You get my point. Educate yourself, research, protest or demonstration, use social media, and volunteer your time. If each of us does our part, things will change. Let’s all scream!!!!

Sometimes do you look in the mirror and all you can see are your insecurities and flaws? If you ever consider yourself unremarkable or even ordinary, you are not seeing yourself as a result of God’s divine creation. The next time you look in the mirror, see yourself as God does, fearfully and wonderfully made, designed to love God with all your heart, soul, and mind.

They will judge you, Let them.

They will misunderstand you, Let them.

They will Gossip about you, Let them.

Their opinions are not your problem,

You stay kind, committed to love, to the

freedom of being you. And no matter what they

say, don’t you doubt your worth and let them

convince you that you are not beautiful.

j.e. cano