Today is the start of a new week, but not the New Year. We are four days into 2016 and many people have posted their New Year’s resolutions on social media outlets. I gave up New Year’s resolutions simply because every resolution I make seems to be the same as the year before.
This year I decided to set detailed goals that were concrete and attainable for all areas of my life, physically, emotionally, mentally and most important spiritually.
One of my goals was to be more consistent with my writing. That seems like a broad goal but God showed me some ways I needed to break that down into concrete attainable goals. I need to be more consistent with blog posts. My goal is three posts per week unless God leads me otherwise.
Over the last 6 months I have asked God to reveal to me the purpose of this blog. I love that God is faithful to answer our prayers when we come to Him with a humble heart and truly seek His will.
Psalm 37:4 “Take delight in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart.”
My heart’s desire is speak Truth that will encourage people (I have a heart to minister to women) to seek God with all their heart, soul, mind and strength. I desire to inspire people to become all that God created them to be and then allow God to use them in mighty ways. I desire to impact people’s lives in a way that brings glory to God. I desire that God uses me as His vessel and mouth piece to touch people in a way I could never imagine.
I have developed a love for studying God’s Word and am so encouraged by the Truth and wisdom I glean from my time with Him. My heart’s desire is to share the encouragement I receive from God’s Word so that it too can encourage others. God confirmed that is part of the purpose of this blog.
God also revealed to me that being personal, vulnerable and transparent is another way to encourage, inspire and impact people’s lives. This revelation is a big challenge, one that I will only be able to accomplish through the Holy Spirit’s leading. God laid it upon my heart that one of my weekly posts was to be personal, vulnerable and transparent.
Here it goes…
Every year one of my “resolutions” or “goals” is losing weight and getting healthy. This is a great goal but too general. By the end of the first week I always feel like I have blown it.
This year I decided that my goal was simply to be intentional about moving my body every day, whether it is an intense workout at the gym or a gentle hour of yoga. I also decided that I would be intentional about listening to my body when it came to my eating habits. I want to feed my body what it needs in order for it to function properly and feel good. I don’t want to just feed my taste buds.
Since today is Monday it was a clean slate day. My intentions yesterday were to walk the nearby park twice and do an hour of yoga. When my alarm went off at 5:30 this morning I was greeted with the sound of raindrops on our bedroom window. (yep, you can hear the excuses already, can’t you?)
I decided to skip the walk in the cold, dark, rainy morning and just do my yoga. I figured it was still intentional movement of my body and that counted! I put the video in and of course being the tech genius that I am, I could not get our DVD to work.
So, here I am faced with a choice. I have no video to work out to BUT I do know that video by heart. I made the decision to do my one hour of yoga from memory.
By the time I was finished I saw the rain had stopped. Once again I am faced with another choice. I really did not want to get out in the dampness and the cold but I knew I “should”, so I DID! I am so grateful that I did. Due to cloud coverage it was not cold outside. The air was fragrant with fresh rain and freshly mowed grass (my favorite!!). The morning sunrise was peeking through the fluffy grey clouds. Oh the beauty I would have missed if I had made a different choice.
God reminded me that every day we are faced with choices. Every choice we make has great impact, not just in the here-and-now, but also in the future.
I could have chosen to skip the yoga because I didn’t have the video to follow and skipped the walk because it had rained and I would have missed out on some much needed stretching and exercise for my body. I would have also missed out on the beauty God had created this morning. Instead, I chose to move my body and that means I am one day into a journey that could indeed have a great impact on my overall health.
I asked God to give me a verse that I could meditate on throughout this journey with Him. It is a very well-known verse (in fact I sort of argued with God about the verse He laid on my heart, hoping He would give me something a little less “known” and “used” but still had an awe factor to it-just being personal, vulnerable and transparent here) that God used to speak to my heart and say “but this is what you need”.
Thank you Lord for giving me what I need and not necessarily what I want.
Philippians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”
Lord I ask that I work out of your strength and not mine. The task You have called me to is greater than my strength and resolve, but through You I know I can do it.