Another Word of Hope

This is taken from Joyce Meyers:

Some people are afraid to hope because they have experienced so much hurt and disappointment that they don't think they can face any more pain. They refuse to hope so they won't be disappointed. Disappointment is painful! Rather than being hurt again, they simply refuse to hope that anything good will ever happen to them. This type of behavior sets up a negative lifestyle. Everything becomes negative because their thoughts are negative. Proverbs 23:7 says, For as he [a person] thinks in his heart, so is he....


(Okay, the above paragraph is totally ME. My prayers are hindered, I am torn because I have prayed & prayed & woken up with such wonderful expectation that things would turn around & then they wouldn't. When I have prayed the hardest it seems that the day would turn even more dire. I had eventually set myself up for disappointment. Also as my life has been filled with long hours & hard work I have set myself up to always believe I will never have anything to enjoy or have any fun. I have become a negative person through this long transformation whereas I used to be very happy & positive.)



More Joyce:

I needed to let go of the past and move into the future with hope, faith and trust in God. I had to get rid of the heaviness of despair, depression and discouragement. And I did, once I dug into the truth of God's Word! I found out that God is ...a shield for me, my glory, and the lifter of my head (Psalm 3:3). I began to turn my negative thoughts and words into positive ones! Now, I am not saying that you and I can get whatever we want by just thinking about it. God has a perfect plan for each of us, and we can't control Him with our thoughts and words. But we can think and speak in agreement with His will and plan for us. We can practice being positive in every situation that arises. Even if what is taking place in your life at the moment seems negative, expect God to bring good out of it as He has promised in His Word. You must understand that before your life can change, your attitude must change.

(My husband tells me this constantly. Jenn he says. You have to have more faith & just be happy. God has always come through for us, you can have bad moments but not bad days. He is right of course... it is hard to do, easy to say. But I must. An attitude change is a MUST.)


Another Joyce" Snipet":

All of God's promises are activated by faith


(Ay chi wa wa, that's a biggie! You mean I have to change my attitude first?)


More Joyce Wisdom:

If there is anything in this world that you can be sure of, it is change. Something is always changing. Why is it, then, that we find ourselves thinking, "Nothing will ever change... I'm always going to be like this... My situation will never change... He'll never change... She'll never change... I'm never going to be as good as so-and-so"? The only thing that will never change is God. For I am the Lord, I do not change... (Malachi 3:6). Everything else can change. If you have no hope of seeing change in your situation, change probably isn't going to come. We endure so many things emotionally that we really wouldn't have to suffer if we put our hope in God and stopped looking at all of the circumstances we can't control. We will never enjoy life unless we decide to! In order to live as God intends for us to live, we must truly believe that it is God's will for us to experience continual joy. Then we must decide to enter into that joy, which is essential to our physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health.

(She sure does have an awesome connection to God, that is one anointed lady. I always find wisdom in her words. I always find a reminder to put down my old self & become what God wants for me to be. Only God doesn't change, so that means everything has hope.)

God has been wonderful to me, He really has. I should already be evicted from my business but I asked them to help me out & wait until I could catch up on rent, they did not do that for the lady next door. They sued her & booted her out. When I asked they said okay & I am really behind...... I am still here. Surely that is God giving me a break. I am trying to be a good steward of my chance here. I am trying to give my customers good products & good prices. I am having sales & such.... but every one's broke & people are coming in like crazy comparison shopping & saying they are going with the lowest prices. I am nervous because I can discount like crazy but after the Holidays are over if I haven't made any money & sold the stuff for what it costs plus the shipping costs & the costs of the bag & tissue etc. Then I won't have any money to pay the rent etc. Then I will be booted out for sure. If something is 50% off, then the business is usually already losing money on something. It is hard to know what to do to get people to spend their money with me. I will just have to pray for God to bless me & if I give a good value then maybe He will predispose people to spend money with me. What more can I do? Anyway, I am so very grateful that my husband is now so busy with work he doesn't hardly know what to do with himself. If it wasn't for that stupid worker's comp insurance problem he would have already hired 2 or 3 more men. I hate that because that's 2 or 3 families that could have money coming in & don't. God will make a way for him, I know He will.