Learning about God's Spirit and My Heart is Hurting a Little...

Good morning! The picture above was taken on a long walk a few days ago. If you look closely you can tell that aside from the beautiful yellow flowers which by the way of course grow where they want to that the rest of the green are weeds. I think that we can take even the hard parts of our lives, the failure parts that are not pretty and try to ruin us (like weeds do a lovely flower bed) and turn them into good for the benefit of helping others. If we let God heal and make new our failures- we can give praise for the weeds in our life.

We are going through a preacher transition.
The most important thing we are learning in the midst of trying to figure out who we are as a people and what we want to focus on and what kind of preacher we want, etc., etc., is the fact that this will not turn out the way we desire it to turn out unless we totally let go and let God be in charge.

Can I ask you a question?
Do you FEEL the Holy Spirit when assembling with your fellowship of believers?
I don't mean in any weird way at all.
It's like I feel that most of the time we just go to church in our nice clothes and are complacent or normal not expecting or waiting on God to move in any wonderful way at all. Not hoping or daring to ask Him for His Spirit to be in charge and to move us the way He wants us to move. Nope, we don't normally think that way.

We have an interim preacher that is really pushing us to see how we need to be led by the Spirit of God. Our search for our new preacher is happening differently than any I have ever heard of. Spirit led...and hopefully we will all learn a deeper meaning about God's Spirit that lives inside us.

Here are some great thoughts from "Lead Me, Holy Spirit" by Stormie Omartian.

She talks about her life before Jesus got a hold of her.
"I had been in different churches a few times before, but they always seemed dead to me, and I didn't want to get sucked into that deadness. They made me feel bad about myself, and I was already feeling good at that. So I never went back. But in this church I sensed something remarkable the first time I walked into the sanctuary.  I could not identify it at first.  But I soon learned it was the presence of the Holy Spirit of God.  And it was palpable."

"Nothing weird ever happened at church. There was no "What is that person doing?" because people didn't make themselves the center of attention.  The Holy Spirit was unmistakably the center of it all, and people soaked up His presence like sponges. It didn't make us strange- it made us normal. In His presence we shed tears of joy, happiness, gratefulness, repentance, freedom and relief.  His love does that to us."

The church and the Bible can only truly come alive by the Holy Spirit breathing life into them.
We must invite the Spirit of God to do what HE wants in our fellowship.

We fellowship with wonderful people at our church and I believe we do alot of good in our community and that we love well. Our former preacher was super and we all love him dearly. So when I say all of this I am not disrespecting anything that has happened in the past. But...it can be better. Since we have been thinking more about the Holy Spirit and asking God to find the right man and lead us in this, there is to me a feeling that is beginning to be palpable. It is an exciting, good, expectant and speed up your heart feeling. I believe that we are learning to let God led through His Spirit. May it be so.

Father, we invite You through Your Spirit to led us in this fellowship where you would have us to go.
Help us to please come to worship with expectant hearts to see You and be moved by You. Not only in worship together but in every moment of our days. Through Jesus we pray and thank You!

This is why my heart is hurting a little today. I fear it is only the beginning of a pretty good ache and I know that God is going to have to work us through it. Our oldest gentle giant and his girl (wife-how fun is that?!) are moving to Phoenix. Arizona. 17 hours worth of driving away. Praying for them and for their future and safety and blessing. Praying too for our hearts to be comforted. We will miss them very much.

But- there is hope and praise to be sung and spoken.
We are choosing praise for all they will do and people they will bless.
Look out Arizona!
Part of our heart will be there with you.
Treat them well.
May they be the hands and feet of Jesus.
I pray that they will be walking, talking and loving blessings of God to all the people they meet.