GOOD NEWS DAILY – October 25

I am pressing on in life and ministry day by day despite great spiritual warfare and much challenge personally, and I give the Lord the glory for the strength and perseverance. I could quit all and everything in a heartbeat given the degree of challenge right now, but instead I walk forward by faith in the love of Christ for the glory of Christ.

Just this week, when I opened my heart and asked for prayer, a reader lashed out at me nastily making a rude and angry accusation essentially telling me what a horrible job I’m doing in my service to the Lord.

My prayer request today is that you would pray for her and all the people worldwide walking in darkness who need the light and love and mercy and forgiveness of the Lord Jesus Christ and who need to turn from their sins and place their faith in Him as Lord fully entrusting their hearts and lives to the Lord and His ways.

And, yes, please continue to pray for me and this ministry!

IF YOU NEED HELP BEGINNING OR PRESSING ON IN A FOREVER RELATIONSHIP WITH THE LORD JESUS CHRIST, PLEASE FEEL FREE TO REACH OUT AT 843-338-2219 OR lara@GoodNews.love

love & blessings,

lara

I just found a note I had written after the Lord had spoken to my heart not long ago. This is what He told me.

“I am not going to lessen your responsibilities because I am using your responsibilities to make you more like myself.”

If you read my writing on a regular basis, you’re well aware that the Lord has given me a great deal of responsibility in life and ministry. He also thus far has given me very little human help.

I’m on the road for Jesus full-time with 4 handicapped streets ministry doggies doing streets ministry and writing and publishing Gospel tracts, devotionals, and books that go out around the country with a bare-bones budget, no salary, no staff, just a bare few volunteers periodically, still very little financial support, and decades worth of personal brokenness and trials, tribulations, and tragic losses including just days ago.

So when I cry out to the Lord He’s given me too much responsibility and not enough help, surely He will give me all the help I need, right? Right and wrong! He does not give me all the help I THINK I need. He gives me the help I DO need. HIMSELF! And HIS PROVISION. IN HIS TIMING. FOR HIS GLORY!

And, as He told me that day, He uses my great deal of responsibilities to refine me. To mold me. To conform me to Himself. To teach me His ways. To test me. To grow me.

Friend, I encourage you to yield yourself utterly to the Lord as He is teaching me day by day to do. To trust Him and what He is doing in and through your life. To not resist Him but instead to yield yourself so entirely to Him moment by moment, day by day, that He draws you to Himself, that He changes and transforms you, that He conforms you to His glorious self! AMEN!

“My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.” James 1:2-4

love & blessings,

lara

DID YOU SHOOT THE MESSENGER?

“And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” Matthew 23:12

Ever heard the expression, “Don’t shoot the messenger”? It’s a worldly term, isn’t it? It’s not a biblical one, yet I have a question to ask you. Did you shoot the messenger?

From start to finish of the Bible, the Lord makes clear He uses both His Word and His children including the prophets to deliver warnings and messages to people so they turn from their evil ways and place their belief in Him as Lord whereby they genuinely commit their lives to Him.

Time and again in the Bible, some heed the warnings and turn to Him. Others rebel and turn or keep their backs on Him.

I have been on both side of the fence. I have received warnings and messages from followers of Christ. And I have been used by the Lord to deliver them. It hasn’t been easy on either side, to be honest. Sometimes it’s been downright hard. Many times when I received them, I rebelled. Over time, I learned to listen and obey the Lord. Many times, it’s felt virtually impossible to deliver warnings and messages. But the Lord has given me the strength.

Back to my question. Did you shoot the messenger? Is there anybody the Lord has sent to you to issue a warning or to deliver a message whom you turned away, lashed out at, hurt, etc.? And did you rebel against the Lord in response to the warning or message He sent you?

Friend, when the Lord shows us wrong, we need to seek His forgiveness and do what’s right. Including if and as He leads us to go to the people and seek their forgiveness.

What does this take? HUMILITY. And OBEDIENCE to Christ.

Let’s follow the Lord – and do what’s right. For Christ’s sake, YES!

365 BLESSINGS is a devotional book I recently wrote that will soon be available in print by the grace of the Lord for the glory of the Lord! 

Blessing #175

“You are my King, O God;…” Psalm 44:4

How utterly blessed we are that we who follow Jesus have a personal, glorious, wonderful, marvelous, loving, gracious, generous, almighty, all powerful, yes, all knowing, righteous, holy, giving, forgiving, merciful, tender, gentle, but stern and firm and stronger than imaginable, everlasting KING. King of Kings, Lord of Lords. He will reign FOREVER! Our blessed King, oh bless the Lord, how blessed we are – to have Jesus as FOREVER KING! Hallelujah!

I can’t believe a precious friend had the audacity after a long wonderful powerful conversation to all of a sudden abruptly without any warning get off the phone. A couple of quick sentences, a quick, “I love you”, maybe a few other words, another quick “I love you” in response to my “I love you,” then boom. Gone. Conversation ended. How selfish! How wrong! How – AMAZINGLY WONDERFULLY REFRESHINGLY INSPIRING! Not wrong! Not selfish! Absolutely INCREDIBLE – and GLORIFYING TO THE LORD!

How so? My friend had a sudden strong realization in his heart that the Lord wanted his full attention and wanted him off the phone so he could focus on HIM. Yes, HIM. Yes, the Lord. And my friend wasn’t concerned about my feelings. He was concerned about the Lord’s call to him to give his ear and heart and eyes TO THE LORD! So off he went to Jesus.

Friend, there should be NOTHING and NOBODY as important in the ENTIRE WORLD than THE LORD JESUS CHRIST! He should be our NUMBER ONE how often? ALL THE TIME! When He desires us to fellowship with people, we should. When He wants us to minister to people, we should. When He wants us to go to work, we should. When He wants us to talk on the phone, we should. WHEN HE WANTS US TO STEP AWAY FROM EVERYTHING AND EVERYONE, WE SHOULD!

Need some alone time with Jesus? Need to step away from your everyday life and spend time with Jesus and the Bible? This is something we should do every single day – and every single time the Lord calls us to even if it’s multiple times a day or even in the middle of the night. Always, always, always we should be totally devoted to the Lord Jesus Christ. Filled with His Spirit and led by His Spirit living to bring love, honor, praise, joy, pleasure and glory to His holy most precious forever blessed everlasting name! AMEN!

Today, I had the privilege, honor, and, uh, honestly, the big scary task of being used by the Lord to deliver both a warning and message to one of His children. I went against my flesh and submitted to Christ. I obeyed, picked up the phone, and in His love by His grace in His mercy and strength did what He asked me to do. This time around, unlike so many other times, I wasn’t met with hatred and rejection. I was met with love and an open, humble heart. So very many times over the years, the response I received was bad. Even awful. But I learned something vital along the way.

We need to fear the Lord. We need to not fear the people. We need to obey the Lord. We need to not obey our flesh. We need to humble ourselves before the Lord God almighty, seek Him, be filled with His Spirit, be led by His Spirit, and speak the messages and words He gives us.

Two people I loved dearly hated me for speaking the truth in love to them so much so they turned away from me before they died. Yes, you read that right. They didn’t want to hear what the Lord gave me to tell them. They wanted to be loved and patted on the back and comforted and encouraged – but they didn’t want the truth along with it.

When we serve Jesus in our everyday lives, we may well have times the Lord desires to use us to confront people with the truth in His love. Their responses may be painful, hurtful, even devastating. But at the end of the day, when our lives are over, and we stand before the Lord and have to give an account, we will be held responsible for the times we obeyed Him and delivered the messages He gave us – and responsible for the times we did not.

Let’s take responsibility now. Let’s be faithful when we calls us to deliver messages in love to people. Let’s remember whom we serve. The Lord! The Lord who deserves praise, honor, glory, worship, service – and OBEDIENCE.

Yes, let’s obey the Lord in all things!