All posts tagged: faith

Start with a Seed: Start Here pt 1

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“…Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.” -MATTHEW 20:17b When a person sets out to give life to their dream or vision, or even to undertake a project that is relevant for that season of their life, one thing they do without fail is to take stock of what they have in hand. Our Master and Savior, the King Creator, actually instructs us in His Word that a wise man takes inventory of what he has before he begins, lest when he starts he finds he is unable to finish (LUKE 14:28-29). The one thing that many of us find paralyzing about this is that when we do actually take inventory of what we have, we tend to lean on our own understanding, often stifling the voice of the Lord that is telling us to begin, in favor of believing what our eyes and logic …

Recapture the Wonder by Briana Lassiter

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In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. It’s such a crazy thing to think about, but it can cease to be astonishing if this has been something we learned about as a child and have known for some time. Sometimes it’s easy for us to forget the wonder of our faith. A couple months ago I was praying with a friend and she said something that really startled me, she said: “Briana He wants you to know that He is God.” I was a bit taken aback because of course, He is, I thought! But later on as I began to think deeply about what that meant for me, what that meant for my circumstances that I was praying about and what that meant about the outcome He had promised, the wonder of it all returned as I realized fully that there is nothing too big for God and nothing He won’t do for me. Friends if you are experiencing a struggle or difficulty that God has promised you He will heal, fix …

It’s Worth the Mess: 3 Reasons to Keep Creating

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Anything worth doing is worth doing poorly . . . until you can learn to do it well.” ~Zig Ziglar I have always been a believer that anything worth having is definitely worth fighting for. Having healthy relationships? Worth fighting for. Having security? Worth fighting for. Having victory in maintaining faith? Worth fighting for. I could go on and I am sure that you could add several things to the ‘worth fighting for’ list. But one thing I have often lost the fight in (because I didn’t show up) was in learning new avenues of creating. Why? Because more times than not I was afraid of failure. I wonder if you can relate. The thing about being a creative person–the thing about being human–is that the beginnings of all of our successes begin in a mess. We don’t begin walking with elegant or confident gaits. We fall and we scuff our hands and knees. The same is true for each and every creative venture that we embark upon. Our first drafts will likely be, well, garbage …

Start Here: Starting Right From the Heart Series Intro

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Do you have a vision? Do you have an ember of hope for something different burning inside you? Have you found yourself frustrated with the predictability of the ‘usual’ and often slip into the imaginative world created by the dream in you? That is fantastic! Christ has given us all seeds or ‘talents’ to work with, but oftentimes we find ourselves lost in the fog of ‘how’. How do we get from where we are to where we dream we can be doing the very thing that Christ has branded in our hearts to do? We start. And we start here, right where we are. This new series, Start Here, will explore what it means to take the first step of faith to go toward your vision, dream, call, or destiny. Sometimes you have to start in the dark, sometimes the mess, but the glory is starting in faith, right where you are. It begins with the heart and the matters that lie within and go to places beyond our imagining. Join us for this …

He Holds It All Together: A Scripture & Song

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*Revised from September 2, 2016 “The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.  For in Him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. And He is the Head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything He might have the supremacy.  For God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him, and through Him to reconcile to Himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through His blood, shed on the cross.” ~Colossians 1:15-20 It is my pleasure to speak of Messiah Yeshua, Christ Jesus, the God of Creation, the Beloved King and lover of my soul. When it seems my world is falling apart or even just shaking so much that my vision is …

Enthusiasm Equals Greatness: A Quote & Encouragement

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*Revised from May 6, 2016 “Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.” ~RALPH WALDO EMERSON Whatever you set your mind to do be sure to do it with enthusiasm. People appreciate the spirit in which something is done more so than the actual doing. And in that shared spirit is true greatness. “The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.”     ~II COR. 9:6-7 The Word of God instructs us to be cheerful givers and to sow with purpose from our hearts. Great or small, a simple act of kindness, a story written, a picture painted, or even a glass of water, give it with enthusiasm. It is out of little seeds of enthusiasm sown that fruitful trees of greatness grow. *Photo by Caleb Woods on Unsplash ~Dream. Imagine. Believe. Do. CONQUER!

A Merry Heart: The Gift of Laughter

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*Revised from May 20, 2016 “The most wasted of all days is the one without laughter.” ~E.E CUMMINGS Laughter, like food, is the one other universal language that every person on this planet not only enjoys but needs to survive. Laughter is the music that is never out of tune. It is the one song that we all can sing, and find ourselves singing along with even if we can’t explain why. Laughter is a gift, a precious gift given to us from Christ Jesus and one that we can give to others. It is a fire that burns nothing but calories! And who doesn’t like that? Laughter is priceless. Be sure to treasure it and share it with those around you. No day or heart is complete without it. “A merry heart does good like medicine…” ~PROVERBS 17:22 ~Dream. Imagine. Believe. Do. CONQUER!

Renewing Your Vision

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*Revised from April 15, 2016 “Worse than being blind is to see and have no vision” ~HELEN KELLER Proverbs 29:18 says, “Where there is no VISION the people PERISH…” (Emphasis mine) To be able to see is one thing, to have a vision is another. Vision is the driving force that calls us to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Vision is the crown that causes us to press even in the face of repeated failure because it’s given you hope for the future. To be a person who has lived and not simply existed, you must have a vision–a goal. Although vision and sight are different, they are not mutually exclusive. To maintain your vision you must keep it ever before you (Habakkuk 2:2) Put it down in the simplest of words as a reminder of what you are aiming for. It is very easy to allow the challenges of life to stifle our vision. In faith, in Christ Jesus, we are called to ‘renew’ or minds, that we not be conformed to the …

Inevitable Change: Encouragement in Transition

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Revised from August 18, 2015 “Change is inevitable, Growth is optional.”~JOHN C. MAXWELL Change. The only time that most people search out change and willingly run with it is when unsavory circumstances have begun to dim the light and joy form their life and they are desperate to get it back. Otherwise, change is seen as the unwelcome guest who showed up at your perfectly numbered dinner party, uninvited. Change requires sacrifice, which generally goes hand and hand with discomfort and for some of us, discombobulation. But change is necessary. It is going to happen whether we like it or not, whether we are prepared or not. Think about an infant in their mother’s womb. Change comes and is without a doubt a straining shock to everything within the infant and around them. But what awaits them at the end of their travailing journey is something far greater. Consider the caterpillar who crawls through life, knowing in the core of their being that they are meant for greater heights. They must burn with the urge to …

A Word to the Waiting: by Briana Lassiter

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Have you received promises from the Lord that your breakthrough will come this year? Has He given you specific impartations, specific instructions and specific direction about what to look forward to? Have you received attack on attack? Have you felt in a fog? Have your promises seemed untrue? Has the voice of the Lord–however He speaks to you–grown dim and hard to hear? Have you experienced pain and hindrances like never before? Beloved, we are shifting. We are moving. We are coming out and we are breaking forth in a historical move of God. We are like waves crashing on the shore, sometimes being pulled back, but gaining in momentum and power and height with each crash. We feel as if we are walking alone at times, we feel blindsided and oppressed by the enemy. We may carry the fear of being hindered and fear that we will forfeit the promises by how we are getting through this time. But we are being called forth in a new glorious way. We are being called out …