What God Wants for You

It has been said that a life watered by the tears of tragedy and suffering often becomes the most fertile soil for spiritual growth. Decades after his own brothers sold him into slavery, Joseph was able to say to them, "You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good to accomplish what is now being done." (Gen. 50:20)

Can you say that? If not, I encourage you to press in closer to the One who intends only good toward you, and has the power to redeem and restore and transform anything. As we pray more, immerse ourselves further in prayer, seek out others who have emerged from tragedy and disaster stronger and wiser and happier, we can grow out of feeling victimized and into triumph by His Spirit. I've been there, and I know.

So if you are not there yet, and despair of ever getting there, be encouraged. There is life, full and lovely, on the other side of whatever you've been through. Believe it!

(For more on recovering from trauma, you might want to check out Welcome to the Fresh-Squeezed Life Cafe. You can find it on Amazon. It is a guide to journal your way to wellness, both emotional and spiritual.)

What God Says

Whatever is in your past, whatever challenges or disasters have plagued you in this past year or years, as we close out 2010, stop listening to despairing thoughts and fearful refrains. Listen instead to what God says:

"But this is a people plundered and looted; they are all of them trapped in holes and hidden in prisons; they have become plunder with none to rescue, spoil with none to say,

'Restore!'"

Isa. 42:22

"But forget all that...It is nothing compared to what I am going to do.

For I am about to do something new.

See, I have already begun! Do you not see it?

I will make a pathway through the wilderness.

I will create rivers in the dry wasteland."

Isa. 43:18,19

"Nothing is impossible with God."

Lk. 1:37

Nothing!

New Book: Welcome to the Fresh-Squeezed Life Cafe

If you are looking for the book, Welcome to the Fresh-Squeezed Life Cafe, by Brynn Taylor Ashford, put in the author's name as a search term, and check out the online bookstores listed; you will find the best current price for the book.

If you have read the book and you liked it, please take the time to leave a review on the site where you purchased it!

Courage

"Whatever you do, you need courage. There is always someone to tell you, you are wrong. To map out a course of action, and follow it to an end, requires some of the same courage which a soldier needs." (Ralph Waldo Emerson)