"but the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. against such things there is no law."
galatians5//22-23
Every week on Monday or Tuesday, I get an online devotional. Sometimes, they're exceptionally fabulous and I share them with people. This would be one of them. At this point in time, life is threatening to swamp me with everything. But I know I'll get through it alive and not drowned. :)
WARNING: Christian. If this offends you, stop reading now.
EFFORTS CROWNED WITH SUCCESS
"In everything you do, put God first, and He will direct you and crown your efforts with success." Proverbs 3:6 TLB
One of the first things I learned when I began to get serious about my relationship with the Lord is that He earnestly desires to be involved in every aspect of our lives--including our work. No job is too small or insignificant to pray about. I rejoiced when I discovered Proverbs 3:6 in the Living Bible Translation: "In everything you do, put God first, and He will direct you and crown your efforts with success." Before I tackled a task, I often prayed, "Lord, crown my efforts with success." Then one day I sensed the Spirit of God telling me, "You're missing something." As I sought the Lord about it, He revealed to me that in order for Him to crown my efforts with success, I had to "put Him first" by asking Him to "direct" them. By doing this, I was putting the task in His hands, and depending on His wisdom and power to complete it with success. Now before I begin my work, I often pray, "Lord, direct my efforts, and crown them with success."
One of the first scriptural promises that I claim each morning is Proverbs 16:3 (AMP): "Roll your works upon the Lord [commit and trust them wholly to Him; He will cause your thoughts to become agreeable to His will, and] so shall your plans be established and succeed." When we commit our endeavors to the Lord, He begins to work on our thought life. Not only does He give us creative ideas we never would have thought of on our own, but He directs us in the paths of "His will"--which is where our blessings, rewards, and opportunities are. Each time we approach a task, we have to remember that there's our way of doing it, and there's God's way. If we humbly and prayerfully give it to God, He becomes responsible for seeing that it succeeds. If we go ahead with it on our own, God is not obligated to direct our efforts, or to cause them to prosper. And this is a recipe for frustration and failure.
David wrote: "Commit everything you do to the Lord. Trust Him to help you do it and He will." (Psalm 37:5 TLB) I want you to focus on the words, "trust Him," in this verse for a moment. No matter what task you may be facing now, God wants you to approach it in faith. He wants you to give it to Him, and believe with all your heart that He's going to help you with it. You can't approach an undertaking with fear and doubt and expect to achieve the same results that you would if you tackled it in faith. As the Bible says, without faith it's impossible to please God, and it's only faith that He rewards. (Hebrews 11:6) Do you want your work to please God? Then get Him intimately involved with it each and every time. Before I sat down to write this message, I prayed Deuteronomy 33:11 (NIV): "Bless all [my] skills, O Lord, and be pleased with the work of [my] hands." Whether I'm using my writing skills, my ministry skills, my cooking skills, or my driving skills--I depend on the Lord to bless them and to cause them to succeed for His glory.
God has a plan for your success in every endeavor you undertake, and you can lay hold of that plan as you commit your work to Him, and trust Him to direct your efforts. Large or small, I'm committing all of my tasks to the Lord. How about you?
My computer is playing Mendelssohn's Ein Sommernachtstraum - Hochzeitsmarsch, more commonly known as The Wedding March. And it's driving me spare. I'm mostly ok with this whole marriage business, but there are times when the residual bitter hag-ness creeps up and covers my heart with black complainy spots. Those times are getting less and less, thank goodness.
I could turn it off, but I suppose I like to torture myself. ^_^ You learn something new every day.
I've been online lots. That's an invitation for you to talk to me if it's important. NOT for you to small talk in my ear because I firmly dislike it. Unless you're new. Then you can small talk all you like until we find something we can talk about for hours.
This week's going to be crazy, so don't even TALK to me about social activities before Easter. Ain't going to happen.
p.s. Everyone visit Dot's shiny new tehillah-caacc.blogspot.com!
Hi everyone! I just want to say that I'm not dead (yet) and that being back at uni's fine. Lotsa work to do, though, and I'm so not used to reading anything other than the light, fluffy stuff or the serious crying stuff that I was reading over the summer. But I suppose I'll get the hang of it soon.
Lots to do this week and next week (and possibly the week after), so I should jet now. Take care, everyone.
p.s. I'm looking at ditching and setting up an lj account (once I have time to figure the code out), probably next summer, hein?
p.p.s. Anyone want to help me write a French oral?
I have a YouTube video for you guys to watch. It's Chris Tomlin who is made of AWESOME. And you know what? It was Nay that introduced me to him. *snuggles her* And now I'm all wistful for the old days. I hope the video clip works for you.
I'm ba-ack! Singapore and Hong Kong were great (at times). Shopping was... mediocre. Eating was fantastic (except for the fact that my uncle stuffed my face).
Umm... yeah. That's about it. Market Day soon. EXCITEMENT! Can't wait for Gen to get back. ^____^ We had awesome fun in Singapore. Photos may go up if I'm not too lazy. xxx
Yeah, I was going to do a Proper Post, but then I got distracted over at the old el-jay and now it's 10.15 and Lynn's coming in 45 mins and I need to shower.
So I'm just telling you, I'm alive and if I don't post before Sunday, I'll see you all in FEB! Enjoy your holidays and eat bad food for me this week because I can't!
I was being whingy but I've decided that whingy has no place in my life. Especially near Christmas. And since I'm doing everything for love, I shouldn't be whinging at all. *stinks out tongue*
People keep saying I'm turning into James. And maybe it's because he says it so much, but I'm starting to be really scared since I've heard it so often. What if I am?
Do you know how hard it is to do anything without the proper equipment? My mum fried my hand mixer a couple of years ago while making banana bread. I have a gorgeous food processor now but it just doesn't whip. So, I have to whisk by hand. Which is good, I suppose. For reducing flab and the like. But it's manageable. I mean, people in the olden days used to do it. A lot.
But what if you take out the essential tool in something? Like the oven? (Which is why people didn't get Christmas cookies last year, by the way) What would happen? I'd get dough instead of cookie. So... what if you took God out of a Christian relationship? What would you get? How much is involving God in the relationship? Why don't they write detailed descriptions for these things? Why can't I be a robot?
Since Sunny is obviously epitome of cool, Dot and I decided to follow suit and get a coffee machine from Big W for $30. The coffee bit doesn't fit on. *chucks fit* But it's coffee, right? And if we can get it fixed, it'd be good... right?
Last minute change of plans. *headdesk* Chocolate has its place in every Christmas gift. Must find something with that in it.
Right. Here's the plan for tomorrow. Insanely early for a girl who's going to sleep at 3 - Unleash the artistic Von. 8:30 - anything with cocoa is cool 9:30 - breakfast with Dot. wake Daniel up. shower. 10:00-10:30 - leave for Woden. SHOPSHOPSHOP. 12:00 - lunch (we might have rice? otherwise, i'm craving pasta. let's go with salad for me and something yummy for the rest) 1:00 - gingerbread baking. YAY! *is excited* 3:00 - clock off Daniel-duty. walk and take a break. with Bible because Von needs a time out. 5:00 - do chores. 6:00 - dinner. 7:00 - clean up. gingerbread house assembling! 9:00 - Carols by Candlelight on Channel Nine. write Christmas cards while watching and supervising gingerbread-ness. Send off e-cards. 1:00 latest - sleep. 8:00 - wake up. panic. read Christmas cards! 10:00 - church!
And then on Christmas night, I will be in bed by 10:30. If I don't crash before. In 24 hours, I will rest good!
*hopes* ...Why do I care about my weight so much anyway? Is it a female thing? Or *gasp* is it a Grammar thing like Nick likes to think? Or is it just me? Either way. I like this for the lies they tell me. Who cares if it's true or not? It's not like my BMI's really gonna change anymore. *shrug*
Yvonne a.k.a. Von, Mum, Che [姐](Dot), Dada[大大] (Dan), Vonnie, Yv (Ling), Vonnles (which is how Trudy spells it), Vonnals (which is how Jasmine spells it), Von Bon (Ann), Bon Bon (my grandma), Mommy (Nick, who is not very subtle with his hinting), ィヴォン, ボンボンちゃん
O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory. Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. I will praise you as long as I live, in your name I will lift up my hands
psalm63.1-4
:: brown hair :: brown eyes :: asian skin :: asian eyes :: asian glasses :: short :: short :: short :: shy :: paranoid :: noisy :: bouncy when i want to be :: gullible :: procrastinator :: perfectionist :: maker-of-dodgy-cookies :: writer-of-dodgy-songs :: dodgy-singer-of-good-songs :: eater-of-almost-everything :: reader-of-almost-everything :: writer-of-almost-nothing :: daughter :: big sister :: little sister :: mum :: friend :: doll ::
