Testimony Tuesday - Perspective

Let us come before Him with thanksgiving and extol Him with music and song. (Psalm 95:2 NIV) 

I was sitting here thinking about all the things that I am thankful for, and God challenged me.

Find something in things that you are not happy with to be thankful about and see how your attitude toward it changes. 

I did, and those things were not as bad. It made me shift my focus off of the things that are wrong and focus on what He has done for me, and gave me hope for what He will do in the future, what he will do today. 

Example:We have a good size family and live in a small house, and some times it gets to me - I am thankful that we have 2 bathrooms and that we have a house we can afford to live in. When I focus on those things our house is not so bad.

Testimony Tuesday - We bring life!

I am writing to you and sending you this picture of this plant. It is a testimony to what happened after the women's retreat. I love how God just continues to reveal things to us. Lately I've been on a journey of breaking negative thought patterns. There are things I would love to change about myself but I realize it's because I have believed some things that reinforced these negative thoughts, behaviors and outcomes. This may seem small, but it is something God is also doing on a larger level with many things in my life. 

One of the lies I believed is that I wasn't really good at being a "life giver" I believed it wasn't "my thing."  I'm not really Martha Stewart in my home, I don't like crafts, I"m not very good at gardening… the list goes on and on regarding what I believed about my own heart and my own place as a woman. 

After the retreat the Lord began whispering and showing me all the ways I DO bring life to things. The joy I get when I decorate my home, the excitement I have for new things like cute hand towels, artwork, design and organization items.  I've always dubbed Bill the "gardener" he loves landscaping and mowing the lawn and growing vegetables. It was "his thing." Well, we have these plans on our window sill in our kitchen and for FOREVER they were not thriving, I  pretty much ignored trying to make them better because it was Bill's project.  After the retreat the Lord whispered me to breathe life into them. I kept arguing with him that it wasn't a big deal. They were just plants. He told me he wanted to show me what I was capable of when it came to bringing life.  Day after day when I came to the sink I'd water the plants, I switched them into new pots, I plucked off dead pieces and nurtured them.

The other day I picked this guy up and look what had happened. It used to be this brown wilted kind of yucky plant but it blossomed. For me this is a big deal. For me I needed to know that I didn't need to be a flower expert to breathe life into something. I just needed to trust God and do the "little things" he asks me to do and he will take care of the rest. I've also found a new passion for growing succulents!  God is so good!

Love, Jen