Walk Boldly With Jesus

Praise Series - Praise Is The Way Out Of The Darkness Psalm 150 “Praise the Lord! Praise God in his sanctuary; praise him in his mighty firmament! Praise him for his mighty deeds; praise him according to his exceeding greatness! Praise him with trumpet sound; praise him with lute and harp! Praise him with timbrel and dance; praise him with strings and pipe! Praise him with sounding cymbals; praise...

Today’s Witness Wednesday has two stories I read on Facebook. They are stories of people giving of themselves when they didn’t need to. The first one starts with one young girl's selfless acts and ends with a whole lot of people. The next one is about a man who made a lot of mistakes and yet at the end of his life does something remarkable for a little girl he didn’t even know. I pray that when yo...

Praise Series—God Provides In Mysterious Ways Psalm 145:14-18 “The Lord upholds all who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down.  The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food at the proper time. You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing.  The Lord is righteous in all his ways and faithful in all he does.  The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call...

Praise Series- Praising in the Wait Psalm 40:1 “I waited and waited and waited some more, patiently, knowing God would come through for me. Then, at last, he bent down and listened to my cry.” My friend gave me this verse above, and I instantly loved it. I love that it captures our reality at times and also captures the love of the Father. Sometimes, we feel like we are asking and asking the Lord...

Praise Series — God Is Not Punishing You! Psalm 103:8-10 , “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.” Praising the Lord when we are in a good place is one thing. It is a completely different story when we are struggling....

Praise Series-Sacrifice is the Heart of Worship Psalm 95:6-8 “O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker! For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture, and the sheep of his hand. O that today you would listen to his voice!” This verse was received at the prayer group yesterday, and when I read it this morning, I thought it would be a great one for today...

Today’s Witness is from a very dear friend of mine. It is her testimony of how she forgave someone who did the unthinkable to her. She is a wonderful woman who has such a strong love for Jesus. She is a mother of two kids and a wife. She is a photographer, a karate champion, and so much more! You can hear in her voice just how excited she is for this breakthrough. God is so good! We have all seen...

Matthew 18:21-22 “Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?” Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” A few of the ladies from my prayer group and I attended a bootcamp to teach us about the unbound method of deliverance.  Unbound is a method of setting people free from the t...

Come As You Are Series -- Mary Luke 1:38 “I am the Lord’s servant,” Mary answered. “May your word to me be fulfilled.” Then the angel left her.” I have been hesitant to talk about Mary in our Come As You Are series. I am not sure why. Part of it was that there was so much you could say about her. Another part of it was that we may feel we can't relate to Mary. She is amazing and so brave, and is t...

Though We Stumble, We Shall Not Fall Psalm 37:23-24 “Our steps are made firm by the Lord, when he delights in our way;  though we stumble, we shall not fall headlong, for the Lord holds us by the hand.” I have read that verse several times today and yet this time when I read it I got the image of toddler walking along the sidewalk while he is holding his daddy’s hand.  When we are just learning to...

Come As You Are Series - The Woman Who Anointed Jesus’ Feet Luke 7:47 "Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little.” I usually don’t have a scripture verse for these episodes in advance.  I usually ask God to give me one right before I write it, or I look in my Encounter Ministry notes, or my prayer group no...

Today's Witness Wednesday is from Chicken Soup for the Soul "A Book of Miracles" 101 True Stories of Healing, Faith, Divine Internvention, and Answered Prayers by Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen, and LeAnn Theiman. Today's witness is about a woman who found out she had 5 weeks to live and yet God had other plans. We have all seen God working in our lives. However, we might not all be aware it is...

Words Have Power to Bless or to Wound James 1:19 “You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger.” This verse really hit home with me this morning.  It was the subject of the daily devotional I am reading, “Jesus Calling.”  Actually, it wasn’t even today’s message.  I am behind because I was on vacation and I wasn’t doing my normal morning routi...

We Are More Than Conquerors Through Him Who Loved Us Romans 8:35-39 “Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?  As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all day long; we are accounted as sheep to be slaughtered.”  No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.  Fo...

Come As You Are Series - The Prodigal Son Luke 15:20-24 “So he set out for his father’s house. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion. He ran to him, threw his arms around him, and kissed him. Then the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’  “But the father said to his s...

Come As You Are Series - Bartimaeus Mark 10:46-52 “Then they came to Jericho. As Jesus and his disciples, together with a large crowd, were leaving the city, a blind man, Bartimaeus (which means “son of Timaeus”), was sitting by the roadside begging. When he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to shout, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Many rebuked him and told him to be quiet, b...

Today’s Witness Wednesday is about my trip to Ecuador. Let me explain in a bit more detail how and why I decided to go to Ecuador. My brother-in-law, Daniel’s best friend, has been in the hospital for a month now. He had a heart attack and then a stroke. Daniel sent me a message asking me to pray for his friend Anival. I then sent this prayer request out to all those I know who could pray for him....

Come As You Are Series - Ester Esther 4:14  For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”   I think the story of Esther is a good one for this series. Esther was a young Jewish woman who found favor with the...

Come As You Are Series - The Man With Leprosy Matthew 8:1-4 “When Jesus had come down from the mountain, great crowds followed him; and there was a leper  who came to him and knelt before him, saying, “Lord, if you choose, you can make me clean.”  He stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I do choose. Be made clean!” Immediately, his leprosy was cleansed.  Then Jesus said to him, “See th...

Come As You Are Series - The Broken Ones Are Beautiful Too! Romans 7:19-20 Paul said, “For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells within me.” God knows we are broken. He knows we struggle. He doesn’t get disappointed. Instead, He celebrates every time we don’t give in to temptation. Ev...

Come As You Are Series - Your Sin Did Not Cause Your Illness John 9:1-3 "As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”  Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.” Another reason we might struggle to come to the Lord is t...

Are We Underestimating Praise? 2 Chronicles 20:21-22 "After consulting the people, Jehoshaphat appointed men to sing to the Lord and to praise him for the splendor of his holiness as they went out at the head of the army, saying: “Give thanks to the Lord, for his love endures forever.”As they began to sing and praise, the Lord set ambushes against the men of Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir who were...

Come As You Are Series - Can A Leopard Change Its Spots? Jeremiah 13:23 “Can an Ethiopian change his skin or a leopard its spots? Neither can you do good who are accustomed to doing evil.” What really struck me when I read this was kind of like an aha moment: we tell ourselves we can't come to God until we have it all together. And yet, we can't get it all together without him. I think that's why...

Today, I am bringing you three witnesses from my prayer group. Each week, we take 10 minutes at the end of our prayer meeting, and we thank God for all he is doing in our lives. We share the various ways we have seen God show up in our lives. Each week, people share, and what is amazing is that He shows up in our lives in so many different ways. Sometimes healings, sometimes an outpouring of love...

Come As You Are Series - I Have Not Come To Call The Righteous Luke 5:30-32 “But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” The theme for the...