All posts tagged: faith

The Secret of the Stars: Reaching For Your Dream

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“No pessimist ever discovered the secret of the stars, or sailed to an uncharted land, or opened a new discovery for the human spirit.” ~HELEN KELLER The only ingredients that you need to fail in this life are Fear, Doubt, and Pessimism. All three of these are the poison that saps out our creative power and imagination. When Christ Jesus created the heavens and the earth, He did so by speaking. He spoke from His imagination. Proverbs 23:7 says as a man thinks in his heart, so is he. Proverbs further goes on to warn us that we will live by the fruit of our lips and above all else, to guard our hearts for out of it flows the source of our lives. (PROVERBS 12:14, PROVERBS 18:21, PROVERBS 4:23) When our hearts are filled with pessimism and doubt, we speak with negativity and bring forth the fruits of failure. But when we speak with faith, when we allow ourselves to dream, imagine, and do by faith, we are giving life to victory. We are …

A Time to Grow & A Time to Rest by Briana Lassiter

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This week I was having a conversation with the Lord and telling Him how sorry I was that I haven’t made a lot of progress in my life or grown much lately. It’s been a difficult few months and life has not felt full of sunshine and rainbows. He startled me with His response as He asked me “Why do you think you need to grow right now daughter?” Recently He’s told me how much He dislikes it when I answer without thinking about what He’s asking me so I stopped and thought carefully for a minute. I came up with nothing and finally answered, “I don’t know Lord.” “What season is it?” He responded. “Winter, Lord?” “Yes. It is winter. What is growing now child? Nothing. Nothing is growing right now because it is not the time for growing.” As I realized that day in my talk with Jesus, there is a season for everything, and sometimes you are not in a season of growing and it is time to do something else. Over …

Waging War with the Right Tools: A Word on Effective Advancement

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“There are many plans in a man’s heart, but the Lord’s counsel will prevail.” ~PROVERBS 19:21 Idon’t know what to do. I seriously don’t know what to do.” These were the words I recited more than a few times during the 2019 year. I don’t know about you, but last year was a year and season of gaining new territory, creatively, physically, mentally, relationally, and spiritually. These are all great places to take possession of land but I also felt like, not only was the year truly moving at an accelerated pace but that some of the difficulties, trials, and tests I was facing were far out of my realm of knowledge or understanding. My head was spinning. Though joyful and often times happy, I was overwhelmed. I was anxious. I was out of my element. None of my usual ‘go-to’s for success an any of the aforementioned categories were working. I literally told the Lord I didn’t know what to do and He was basically like, “Of course not. This is new territory AND …

Preparing to Prosper in What Looks Like a Drought

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Scrolling through the Stories feed on my author’s Instagram account, @candicecoateswrites, I came across a comedic meme that read, “So in the middle of the Civil War, someone was like “You know what this country needs? A delicious steak sauce.“.” If you are not familiar with what steak sauce I am talking about, it is good ole’ A1 Steak Sauce. Now here is the thing, the sauce, which started to get more widely known in 1862, was actually created by a European chef in Europe and wasn’t even introduced to America until 1895.** Although not American in origin, and actually created three decades before the Civil War, the idea and even deeper truth behind the comedic meme still stands.** What is that meaning? That we must be willing to create and pursue our vision even in the midst of tremulous times. We must have the faith to plan beyond the drought. NOT HINDERED BY THE MOUNTAINS A beautiful example of this can be found in the life and love story of Black American Nurse in …

Plan BIG!: A Word on Vision Casting

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“When God is your partner, make your plans big!” ~ D.L MOODY Plan BIG! You’d think that that exhortation would make every person who heard it celebrate with a motivated fire for action when in reality it makes a lot of people shrink back in fear and hide under the heavy blankets of safety and mediocrity. Dreaming is not so much of an issue for most of us. But dreaming big . . . well, that has the power to not only knock the wind out of many of our sails but sink our boats completely. Like me, I suppose you are wondering why that is. If we are honest with ourselves we would have to admit that insecurity and the scrutiny of others are what holds us back. The old ‘what will people think?’ phrase acts as the perfect glitch in our plans of action. The very thought of failing in front of others, especially those who’ve minimalized our former dreams with the constant song of ‘you can’t,’ strikes us immobile. Them witnessing our …

Planning Your Future With Godly Direction

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“I had big plans for the future, but the future had bigger plans for me.” ~CANDICE COATES The book of Proverbs tells us that man makes plans but God’s purpose is what stands (PROVERBS 19:21). In the book of Jeremiah, the Lord states that He knows the thoughts and plans He has for our future, thoughts to prosper us and give us hope and a good end (JEREMIAH 29:11). Knowing these things it’s easy to take your stance on one of two sides of a coin; either to plan without including God or to make no plan at all and expect Him to do all the work. What Proverbs and Jeremiah are saying together is that yes, we should make plans but we have to leave room for God to do His thing in us too. We have to let Him lead and edit our steps for the best results. Isaiah even says that His Spirit will instruct us in the way to walk in (ISAIAH 30:21). Ephesians agrees with this notion, that when we share our plans …

Chase the Birds of Prey: Word on Harvests

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On July 11, 2018, the Lord Jesus in His goodness, gave me a word of encouragement about attacks that come during the times His children are supposed to be bringing in their harvests. And recently He encouraged me to share this with you all, even as I encourage myself. When the word had first been given, it had not even been a full twenty-four hours before the enemy began attacking me concerning faith for a move of God that was coming within a certain amount of time. Almost instantly FAMILIAR spirits of heaviness started to press upon me and pollute my thoughts with the intent to rob me of my peace. I began to confess my fear and shaking faith in the Lord and then I asked Him for understanding. When I asked, immediately He brought the image of the familiar spirits to my mind. WHY? Because He had to remind me that every thought and every feeling is not my own. That the enemy is a deceiver and will do his darndest to rob us …

Not Just Favored, But the Favorite by Briana Lassiter

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It’s God’s deep desire for us to know who we are to Him. We are the dreams from His heart that He brought to life, we are not just inheritors of all His promises and blessings, we are not just in a covenant familial relationship with almighty God; we are more than that. Each one of us is His favorite. In case you are questioning your place with Him today, or maybe you just don’t know what you are to Him or your place in His heart, I want you to know that there’s nothing He does not know about you, there’s nothing that is hidden from Him. He does not view you from your frame of reference, He sees you from His, everything you’ve ever been, and everything you will be, He sees. He treasures every moment you’ve made Him proud, and He cheers you on when you are struggling. He has never been passive toward you. No matter what you have seen or what your frame of reference has been, I want you …

Thanksgiving in Every Step

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“The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord And He delights in his way.” ~PSALM 37:23 The beauty of living our lives to the glory of Christ is that we can rest in the full assurance that no matter where our foot may fall, whether circumstances seem good, bad, or neutral, that our steps are ordered by God our Father. Now don’t misunderstand. This doesn’t mean that we, in our ‘good intentions’ can’t get ourselves off track and go places God never ordained or intended, because the truth is that we all have. What it means is that, if we find that we have made a bad step, the Lord is not only able but faithful to work that step to our good (ROMANS 8:28). He is able to turn what our own misguided direction wrought into something good. Let us give thanks for that! Let us give thanks that because we are now His righteousness through faith (II COR. 5:21, we are assured of always gaining victory. Let us give thanks that our repentance, turning …

The Triumph in the Trial by Briana Lassiter

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When trials come at us it feels very overwhelming in the midst of it, and the unpredictability of whether or not we will make it through can try to weigh on us and make it feel impossible to ever come through at all, much less successfully. However before we ever even entered the trial, we have the predicted outcome already set, as it says in 2 Corinthians 2:14, “Now thanks be to God, which always causes us to triumph in Christ, and makes manifest the aroma of his knowledge by us in every place.” We can trust Him no matter what we are dealing with today, that in every situation He has an outcome of triumph for us. We can trust Him that whatever impossible situations we may face, nothing is impossible for Him, and He works all things together for our good because He loves us and has called us according to His purposes. Trust Him today to get you to your triumph, and allow the truth of what He Himself said to wash …