Illustrated Truths continued...

Psalm 56

Lord, have mercy on me; all day long the enemy troops press in.

So many are proud to fight against me; how they long to conquer me.

^3-4 But when I am afraid, I will put my confidence in you.

Yes, I will trust the promises of God. And since I am trusting him,

what can mere man do to me? ⁵ They are always twisting what I say.

All their thoughts are how to harm me. 

⁶ They meet together to perfect their plans;

they hide beside the trail, listening for my steps, waiting to kill me.

 ⁷ They expect to get away with it. Don’t let them, Lord. In anger cast them to the ground.

⁸ You have seen me tossing and turning through the night.

You have collected all my tears and preserved them in your bottle!

You have recorded every one in your book.

⁹ The very day I call for help, the tide of battle turns.

My enemies flee! This one thing I know: God is for me! 

 ^10-11 I am trusting God—oh, praise his promises!

I am not afraid of anything mere man can do to me! Yes, praise his promises.

 ¹² I will surely do what I have promised, Lord, and thank you for your help. 

¹³ For you have saved me from death and my feet from slipping,

so that I can walk before the Lord in the land of the living.

 

1 Peter 3:3-4

New International Version (NIV)

Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as elaborate hairstyles and the wearing of gold jewelry or fine clothes.Rather, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.

I love this quote from Kid President.

It is similar to others I have heard.

 

"Nobody cares about how much you know,

until the know how much you care."

 

and

 

"It's nice to be important,

It's more important to be nice."

 

It all reminds me of what The Bible taught us...

 

Philippians 2:3-5

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.

 Let each of you look not only to his own interests,

but also to the interests of others.

Have this mind among yourselves,

which is yours in Christ Jesus,

A Servant's Praises

Song of inspiration

"Pour my Love on You"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5fJgKyeS1c

Over this 4 years, I have learned a lot about God's will for me and His will for His people.

Faith is a spiritual muscle that only grows stronger with the weight being added. When circumstances in our lives change, we can decide to grow closer to Christ or turn away. If we turn away, our faith weakens. If we turn to Him, thanking Him and praising Him through the storm, the act of believing in what we cannot see grows stronger. Our grip on His hand gets tighter. Our dependence on Him gets deeper. Our eyes of faith, the ability to see the unseen, grows stronger. Our spiritual senses get sharper.

As Christ takes us along our adventure of faith, we grow more mature in Him. As we grow stronger, we can handle more weight and responsibility in the Kingdom. Our vision grows grander, beyond ourselves and into a bigger family of faith. We are pushed to take our personal relationship and testimony and share it to grow the Kingdom, the Church, the Bride of Christ.

I am finding out in my journey, that God WILL give us more that we can handle. Look at the assignment he gave to Moses! And Jonah! Neither of these men felt capable to do the will God had set before them. But it's through our weakness He shows His strength. It's through our lack of knowledge He shows His infinite wisdoms. It is a false promise (not in the Bible) that "God will never give you more than you can handle." In fact, I believe that is the whole point of Christ's existence is for Him to carry our burdens to the cross so that we don't carry them
To the grave.  When we carry more weight than we can handle, we realize  how weak we are beneath it. We realize our need for something stronger than ourselves! That is FAITH!

THE REAL PROMISE IS...

He gives Rest for the Weary

Matthew 11:28-30

²⁸ “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” He wants you to come to Him, surrender control of what's weighing you down and to give you peace in exchange.

After the death of my best friend and husband, Shannon Seaton, over three years ago, I have realized the truth of what is around us. There is more around than what we "see" with our eyes. We believers here on earth are being cheered on in this race of life by the witnesses in the Heavens. I believe they look at us and are entertained by our praise and worship in the midst of our struggles to finish. I believe they want us to be aware of their joy when we grow the Father's Kingdom here on Earth. They applaud souls coming to Christ.

" Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, ² fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before him he endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. ³ Consider him who endured such opposition from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart."

Hebrews 12

Whatever it is that we are doing to grow the Kingdom (teaching, preaching, serving, creating), keep doing it! Do not grow weary or weak. Keep running the race towards the finish line, the cross. Don't let your circumstances or disappointments slow you down or weaken your faith. It is the greatest sacrifice to Praise God when it's hard to see His hand. Push through.

Isaiah 40:30-31

³⁰ Even youths grow tired and weary,
    and young men stumble and fall;
³¹ but those who hope in the Lord
    will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
    they will run and not grow weary,
    they will walk and not be faint.

Image Created by Tabitha Morgan for a friend of faith growing the Kingdom

(inspired by http://elementaryartfun.blogspot.com/2016/11/feather-wings-mural.html)

There have been times where I felt like I was living my life doing the best I could to do what I thought God's will was for my life. I pray before my every step in life for fear of falling. I need Him to show me the way. I'm lost without His light on my path. So, why does the path we run sometime lead to unfairness? I struggled with this. I know God is on my side... (Romans 8:31), so why was I feeling so let down? Where did I go wrong?

I came to God in my quiet time with this question...

He gave me a vision of the cross. His Son Jesus followed Him without fail. He always gave up His desires for those of His Father's... but it lead him where? The cross. Is that fair? No.

Peter and John, faithful disciples that followed Christ landed in prison for healing in HIs name...

is that fair? No.

Job lost almost everything he had been blessed with after being obedient to God... not fair.

But God showed me His plan... That the path does not end where the earthly eye can see. The plan is to strengthen & perfect the runner along the way... to make me and the faithful ones as much like Christ as possible. That means following Him to places that lead to unfair circumstances. These are our crosses to bear.

"And whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple."

Luke 14:27

Jesus told us, "In the world you will have trouble..But take heart! I have overcome the world"

John 16:33

He told us to expect unfairness.

(Matthew 5:11-12, 44; 10:23, 13:21; Mark 10:30; John 15:20).

He told us that the world would hate us (John 15:18-19).

            

 After God shared this knowledge with me, I had to let it soak into my soul. IN time he showed me this verse to help it make sense...

(His emphasis to me was on verse 13)

Ephesians 4:11-16

 ^"So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, ¹² to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up

¹³ until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

¹⁴ Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. ¹⁵ Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. ¹⁶ From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. "

God was telling me that in order to move forward in my walk of faith, I must grow up. He has grown my for a greater purpose, to lead others to the Grand Finish. It's not all about me and my life walk being fair! It's about my life walk reflecting His. It's about my life walk being used to lead others to

The Cross. To show them the place where they can lay it all down at His feet.  I either had to grow stronger for the walk or go Another path. God has a way of putting us in our place of humbleness with His loving words of truth.

Satan has a way of leading us to a life of pride with pretty lies too...

Here is where I had a flashback of my infant faith...

Flashback of my life in 2008

This wasn't the first time God had brought the subject of "infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind" to me. I had heard it years before when doubting the faith I was raised. I was just about to attend a conference with my Christian friend Micah. It was an event that would totally alter my future faith...See here if interested in reading my non-current testimony in the autobiographical comic, SuperTab

http://thelostsocklife.blogspot.com/2013/03/supertab-autobiographical-comic-of-my.html

(above, Page of Adult doubt from SuperTab...)

After letting all of this soak into my spirit... I came out with the first drawing you see above.

It is of the church at Jesus's feet. The notes of praise, worship and thanksgiving are opening the Heavens for God to take pleasure in the aroma of sweet sacrifice. 

What I have learned is that Worship is an act of humbling ourselves before Christ and submitting to His will. The true place of humility is as a servant at their Master's feet. Jesus showed us this at the Last Supper.

He said, “Do you understand what I have done for you?” He asked them. “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord.’ You are right. That is what I am. I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet. So you also should wash one another’s feet. I have given you an example. You should do as I have done for you. John 13

Also, when the sinful woman came to see Jesus, she went to his feet sacrificing tears of shame, her finest perfume and wiped his feet with her hair. Luke 7:36-50

Mary, the sister of Martha was also found listening intently at the feet of Jesus. Jesus told Martha in her business and worry, that Mary was at the better place. Luke 10:38-42

This is the place to let go of what we think we deserve and give the Savior what he deserves. Once we let go of ourselves, our flesh, we find our Spirit... this is where we can find Him in true worship

John 4:24. "God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth."

The church should be at His feet in true worship. From the church should come Praises and Thanksgiving. These are like sweet fragrances of sacrifice to the Lord. The Heaven's open up pleased by the sounds of the Church praising the King. Heaven and Earth are joined in one accord as Christ had taught. "Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven!" Let the Heavens and all the angels, the witnesses in the clouds (Hebrew 12:1), open up when we Praise the King on earth as it is done in Heaven.

Psalms 100:4 Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful to him, and bless his name.

Hebrews 13:15 By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name.

I hope these images, words and scriptures have blessed you in your present faith. May God bless you for reading the truth. May you hear the Heaven's singing "Christ" this Christmas beyond all the noise of this world drowning it out.

Tabitha Morgan

The Guarded Path

So many times when we are walking in faith, we are tempted to just take the easy wide road... Cause everybody else is, right? Nobody's looking, right?

Whether everyone is doing it or nobody on earth will see you... Father Above will!

The same for doing good things. We may refrain from doing something nice too because nobody is there to give us praise. So, we just don't do it. 

The bible says that God sees everything, good or bad. The good that we do without getting earthly praise is actually the good that matters eternally. The earthly praise we get will be just that, earthly. 

Trust God! When you walk by faith, you do not walk by sight! It's not about the praise we see here or consequences for the unseen wrongs we choose to do. 

It's about God seeing, Heaven's perspective of our earthly life. 

In the end, if we are choosing the right way, God promises in His word that He will guard the path for us. So, if sneaky snakes are hiding in the bushes then trust God has it in His hands. You can walk with ease. 

Related Verses: 

Matthew 7:14 "But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."

Hebrew 4:13 "Nothing in all creation is hidden from God's sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of him to whom we must give account."

Romans 12:2 "Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will"

Matthew 6:2-4“So when you [a]give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be honored by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. 3 But when you [b]give to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing,4 so that your [c]giving will be in secret; and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.

2 Corinthians 5:6- "So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord"

Thank God... I know the truth.

 

Thank God I Know the Truth

by Tabitha Seaton

  inspired by God's Word and Roy Lichtenstein

 This world is full of fake people, lies, sneaky snakes, wolves in sheep's clothing, users, abuser, bullies, meanies.. (take a breath)... or people that just get scared of being sincere, 

so they just get jaded and lazy.

When you go through a tragedy people show up out of nowhere to be your "friend". 

Some are real, helpful, and stick around even after the storm.

Some were gravitated to you because you were "in the spotlight' and they want some of it for themselves. Only time will tell what kind of "friend" they really are. 

I have learned this the hard way. 

In case you are a new reader, you need to know that 5 months ago 

my wonderful husband  of 10 blessed years, Shannon Seaton, 

passed at the young age of 35 unexpectedly.

In my grieving state... the nights are the hardest.

I look forward to being "alone" after working all day with 100 art students with raging hormones, then coming home to 2 little girls that fight, whine and complain 

(sometimes they are nice though... no, they are really sweet, just take LOTS of energy!).

But when the night does come, and they girls are down... 

things get lonely in a whole new form.

It is hard... challenging... it....SUCKS STINKY SOCKS!

Night after night I am finding myself making a choice.

I can either 

A.) Let Satan steal my joy & fill my head with lies, cry in bed alone feeling sorry for my lonely self,

pig out on a giant tub of cheese puffs and Blue Bell banana pudding ice cream

while tell myself that I am an ugly slobbish loser that is going nowhere but old and wrinkly 

and will never find love or be happy ever again, 

& ignore God cause I am mad at him for all he has taken away.

-OR-

B.) Believe in God's truth, rest under warm cozy blankets with my creamy Chai Tea singing praises and thanks, reading the Promises of Christ, while using my talents to help others see Him more clearly, focus on my blessings, pray for my dreams, think about all God has brought me through so far, and know the truth...

that I am beautifully, intricately, perfectly and wonderfully designed by the master of all creation. 

I am a child of His..

I can believe the lies or know the truth!

Listen to this song, Child of Mine by Mark Schultz

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64Fnm11TIAU

I will choose to listen to the voice of truth!

Listen to this song, Voice of Truth by Casting Crowns

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaVg0cWkgAw

I have done mostly "B", but a little of "A" as well. I much prefer the "B", because it just feels better.

As a young widow though, I have realized not every night can be a "B". Some nights you have to scream as loud as you can into a pillow, cry out to the dark night, stomp your feet like a toddler, and  just let it go. As long as this is not done for too long or becomes habit, I think it is perfectly natural.

I am doing my best here. I hate being fake. I am the most honest person you will meet.

BUT, here lately I feel like I have to "fake" happy, just to eventually believe it myself. I think it is better to be positive than it is to complain. 

We must speak Life! We must be a light of hope to the hopeless.

Too much of lonely night option "A" will not allow us to do this. 

If we believe His word, it is perfect. God has proven faithful. Go look in the Bible for His promises and test Him to prove it wrong.

“Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the LORD Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it. I will prevent pests from devouring your crops, and the vines in your fields will not cast their fruit,” says the LORD Almighty. “Then all the nations will call you blessed, for yours will be a delightful land,” says the LORD Almighty.”

Malachi 3:10-12

 God has never lied or broken a promise! His word is the only thing we can believe. 

It is the only thing that can protect us from lies of the world.

He is my refuge when I feel like this world is a jerk!

He is the only thing I can fully trust...

"Every word of God proves true. He is a shield to all who come to him for protection."

Proverbs 30:5 

If you don't understand a promise... TELL HIM!

Ask Him to show you what it means. I have...

He always answers me, but the key is being aware of the clues around you. 

He will never deny you if you ask him a question...

 He will not deny you the answer, He is your FATHER and desires to give you knowledge of His ways.

Luke 11:11-13 
“If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? 
Or if he shall ask for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion?

If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your heavenly Father give the holy Spirit to them that ask Him?”

 I just thank God every night, even on the Plan "A" nights after my fit is thrown, 
for the truth of His word. That it is something I can depend on for my future. I know He is taking care of me in my hard times and only His word is the only real place i can find hope. 
I pray that you can turn to Him too and see the truth. 

Go taste the truth of this daily bread and see how sweet it really is...

Psalm 34:8
^"O taste and see that the Lord is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him."


FOR MORE of my WIDOW BLOG POSTS... 
go here
http://thelostsocklife.blogspot.com/2013/08/diary-of-young-widow.html