Tag: prosperity

What are you waiting for?

by Souls Full Filled, posted in Guidance, Inspire, spirituality, Uncategorized

Are you waiting for something? A fulfillment of a dream or goal? A new relationship or financial opportunity? A solution to a difficult problem or help for challenging circumstances? Are you waiting for things to change to give you something you do not have in your life or free you from something you do not want in your life? What do you do while you are waiting?


Waiting is usually not a pleasant activity for people. We hate waiting in lines, in offices and airports, in traffic, for a needed package to arrive. We often get aggravated, impatient, sometimes worried or even depressed. While waiting we usually have less control, or at least it seems that way. When things are moving, we feel action taking us towards a goal, moving towards something we want or need or to the experience of something better than where we are or have been.

Our culture wants us to keep moving, take the next step, achieve the next goal. Waiting seems to be counterproductive and an obstacle to success and prosperity. I always feel better when things are moving. I have the perception of getting somewhere, anywhere. The times I have had to wait have been brutal. Having chronic illness for almost 3 decades kept me waiting in doctors’ offices a lot and waiting for the next alternative approach to diminish my symptoms, to give me relief from unbearable pain, fatigue and limiting immobility. While my health deteriorated I grew weary of waiting for some improvement or just not to get worse. During difficult times while alone I grew depressed waiting for a phone call or text from busy friends who had lot of things to keep moving towards. I found myself homebound alone for months waiting for something to change. It became almost unbearable. 

I had practiced acceptance for many years to improve the experience of having chronic illness. I learned to focus on gratitude for the things I had instead of focusing on my pain and immobility. When total isolation set in, it moved to another level more difficult than anything I had known. Death seemed welcomed, even attractive, like the early days of my diagnoses that told me I had no hope for anything but deterioration of my condition and worsening intolerable symptoms. 

Fortunately I was in a study of the books of the bible written by Moses about the struggling of the Israelites for 40 years in the desert waiting to get to the land promised for their nation which had been set free from the bondage of slavery in Egypt. They struggled along the way grumbling and complaining about what they wanted that they did not have. All their needs were met but not their wants. There were stories of death from rebellion and stories of mercy and healing, even abundance of food and fresh flowing water, with clothing and shoes that never wore out. They followed a cloud by day and a fire by night representing the presence of God leading them to start, move, stop and wait. Today we have the opportunity to have the presence of God through the Holy Spirit within us similarly leading us to start, move, stop and wait. 

Over many years of waiting, I had learned how to listen to God while studying the bible. It works for innumerable people around the world since the times of ancient rabbis practicing meditating on the Word of God. Meditation is reflection, reading, praying for inspiration and listening in the mind, heart and spirit. There was a part of my study where God revealed the Israelites were being prepared to learn to follow and have faith in God to prepare them to conquer the Canaanites and take possession of the land they were promised. They could not do it on their own. They needed to listen and follow God’s wisdom, direction, timing and power. Otherwise they would have been destroyed in their first battle. 

 I heard God speaking to me  from that passage. I had always been self or other directed, but not directed by God. I believed in God, loved God and wanted to obey God in morals but not in leading me day by day through my life. For many reasons I did not think it God’s job to lead me or that I could follow if He did, or that I did not want to go wherever God might be leading me. I only surrendered when I was in crisis with no other options like I was at the time I was all alone with my condition worsening. I turned it over completely without complaining or any expectations of what the result might be and God lifted me out with a miracle as had happened several times before in my life, enough to make me believe more than ever that God could and would lead me to good things.

Through this revelation from my bible study, I found acceptance of circumstances I judged unfair, oppressive, beyond my tolerance. Since that time, I have been learning to follow God more closely like the Israelites had to do every day, accepting all things that I cannot change and praying for wisdom through prayer, quiet time with God and meditation and study of the Bible, letting the Holy Spirit guide me like the cloud by day and the fire by night. My life has slowly improved, picking up speed as my faith grows and my ability to keep following and trusting in God’s love and goodness towards me when I am waiting. 

My life took a big turn the last few months as I moved ahead more rapidly with health improvement, mobility and healing. I loved the pace I was moving at. I started this blog and website to share everything I have learned along the long journey I have traveled to a life of much peace, joy and fulfillment, even if things are not going the way I would want or circumstances get painful or challenging. 

The last few days I was hit with some unexpected painful experiences. I wanted to bounce back right away and keep moving. But God had me waiting and I had nothing to write on my blog. I am still learning to wait when I need to and do the things that I think are not as rewarding or as important in my mind as writing this blog. But along the way I see I am still in ‘training’ to be victorious in whatever battles I might face and to help others to face their own challenges and battles while following and trusting God to lead when and how to move.

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My prayer for YOU!

by Souls Full Filled, posted in Faith, Prayer, spirituality


Ephesians 1:17-19 “God of our Lord Jesus the Anointed, Father of Glory: I call out to You on behalf of Your people. Give them minds ready to receive wisdom and revelation so they will truly know You. Open the eyes of their hearts, and let the light of Your truth flood in. Shine Your light on the hope You are calling them to embrace. Reveal to them the glorious riches You are preparing as their inheritance. Let them see the full extent of Your power that is at work in those of us who believe, and may it be done according to Your might and power. ”

AMEN

Replace the words ‘their’ & ‘them’ with ‘mine’ & ‘me’ and make this prayer your own. I challenge you to try praying this every day for a month or more and watch what happens! Believe and receive! Trust in God’s goodness, power and love for you or just be open to find more!  

Matthew 7:7-8 “Now Jesus returns to prayer, an important and sometimes difficult topic. Here He gives the very essence of prayer. ‘Just ask and it will be given to you; seek after it and you will find. Continue to knock and the door will be opened for you. All who ask receive. Those who seek, find what they seek. And he who knocks, will have the door opened. ‘ ”

What are you laboring for?

by Souls Full Filled, posted in Faith, Inspire, Uncategorized

On this Labor Day in the United States, I was reflecting on labor. I am thankful that my health has improved so much from when a few weeks and months ago, I could hardly labor at all. I am thanking God for healing when doctors and medications could not work. I have labored in seeking help in any way I could, with doctors, medications, alternative healing techniques and trying all kinds of remedies, while my health worsened over the last few years, worse than it had been for a long time, being told a few years ago my doctor did not think I would survive a simple infection that should have cleared up in a month. 

More than 25 years ago I was diagnosed with a chronic illness coming from childhood trauma to my brain and neurological system which had deteriorated the various systems in my body. I am told there is no cure since it came from brain damage and that part of the brain is inoperable. I was told I would eventually be in a wheel chair for life. My primary care physician said she was so sorry because although I would want to die, the condition would not kill me, especially if I sought emergency care when having seizures which could come unexpectedly at any time, shutting down various neurological signals that keep me breathing, standing, my heart beating, my body moving and fighting off toxins and disease that normal neurological and immune systems do naturally, automatically. 

I turned to spirituality and labored to find tools and techniques to ease pain, alleviate symptoms and developed prayer practices to get closer to God, the Great Physician and Healer. I had some successes along the way but ultimately disabling symptoms would return and got worse the last few years, no matter what I labored to do. Medical expenses had emptied all my savings and retirement funds and put me in tremendous debt I could not manage month to month without moving balances around to new credit cards and cutting all unnecessary expenses. Just when I thought I would lose my home heavily mortgaged, avenues of funding and free resources would appear, including free plumbing and roof repair. I had exhausted all the avenues open to me. But I continued to labor to keep alive, even though I really wanted to die. One by one people left my life, a life that moved increasingly to being homebound and immobile. My solitude and isolation increased. But I continued to labor on to find a purpose for still being alive. I studied a lot about healing. I learned more about what it means to follow Christ. It was not about labor or doing things to be good, to labor at spiritual practices and devotions, or even long periods of prayer. But it did mean learning about God and what we have in Christ. It did mean slowly but increasingly submitting my life to God in Christ by cooperating with the Holy Spirit.

The rest of the story will be revealed over time, perhaps in a book. The bottom line is I learned that life and healing, whatever you might define as happiness, success, prosperity and fulfillment, do not just come from labor, planning, research, determination and faith. Abundant life and prosperity are offered as gifts through what God offers out of His love for all people. It comes from what Jesus Christ has done to give us this gift of grace, eternal life and salvation, which defined in the Greek original word, SOZO, means prosperity in all areas of our lives, now and eternally. It is received as a gift, not by Laboring to earn it or manifest it in our own strength, intelligence or devices. Just like money deposited in our bank account, we just have to make withdrawals. We have to prove our identity as defined in Christ by faith, which is not even anything we work to have. It is a gift and a mystery, a marvelous mystery that only manifests when we turn it all over and come to the giver of the gift through the avenue the giver chooses, Jesus Christ, following him as a disciple, and then the road becomes narrow but ultimately easier and surer than any other road we might choose on our own or by following the advice of others. 

Matthew 11:28-30 “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavily burdened by labors that provide no peace, and I will give you rest refreshing your souls with salvation. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me following Me as My disciple, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest, renewal, and blessed quiet for your souls. For My yoke is easy to bear and My burden is light.”