How to Raise a Hope-filled Hallelujah

Lord, I raise a hope-filled Hallelujah!

Honestly, I often find it difficult to raise any kind of Hallelujah! Especially when hope seems to have skipped town.

But there’s something you and I must know. We are never far from hope. And we are never far from a hope-filled Hallelujah.

Because who doesn’t need hope? Multiple times in life, I felt all hope was lost. 

(1.) Like my difficult childhood leading to issues in my adulthood.

(2.) When the good job and steady income suddenly ended.

(3.) When our second baby died in utero, leaving me with an empty womb and heart.

(4.) During my father’s month-long hospital stay and his passing away five days before Christmas.

Now, my family is currently walking through a dark valley where it feels like hope hides in the darkness.

Hope-less or Hope-filled

Yet, the false forms of hope the world always offered me in the past, faded and fizzled. They made me hope-less instead of hope-filled. 

So, I went on a search to find the kind of hope still standing when all else falls away. It needed a foundation in something other than this world—true substance and measure.

Although hope seems intangible in how it’s not seen or touched, it is something we can know exists and then grab ahold of. Therefore, the perfect place to search is God’s Word. 

A Promise: God Crowns the Year With Goodness

Crowns.

I imagine the three kings of Orient in a Christmas play. My mind’s eye pictures inauguration ceremonies of royal monarchs.

Perhaps we envision crowning moments of beauty pageants. Or, iconic Disney princesses displayed in crowns that dazzle.

I even think of paper crowns from Burger King. And plastic versions adorned with jewels…the finishing touch to a little girl’s costume.

God’s Promise of Goodness

But tucked inside God’s Word we find a unique meaning for crown. The action verb used to describe a calendar year.

“You crown the year with Your goodness, And Your paths drip with abundance” (Psalm 65:11 NKJV).

Sparks from New Year’s fireworks spark our intentions to make this year, the new year, better than ever. Still, what if we went into 2020 trusting in God’s promise of goodness?

Then, regardless of plans or goals or dreams, our ultimate hope lies in God’s goodness. Because we don’t always know what tomorrow holds, even after we’ve planned. None of us knew what last year would bring. So there’s not a sure-fire way to know what will transpire this year.

The Real Crowned King

But we can know this: God doesn’t change. He’s the real crowned King, the only promise-keeper who always keeps His promises.

What If I Let God Be God This year?

We just embarked on a brand new year. Besides parties, fireworks, and count downs to midnight, the term “brand-new” conjures up all kinds of hopes and dreams.

Although a new year brings excitement about what lies ahead. It may also bring uneasiness about what’s expected of us. Or, what we expect of ourselves.

For instance, I wonder, Do people presume I will do great things? 

Likewise, do you ever sense this kind of unrealistic pressure?

Then we make grandiose resolutions and plans and dream bigger and bigger with each passing year trying to top the previous one. 

But if you have followed this blog for a while, you know I never make resolutions. There’s too much burden in making, keeping, measuring, and probable failing at my resolve to change or better myself or an area of my life.

Yet, I like to reflect on the preceding year. Reflection helps me process areas of my life, and consider how to pursue my passions with a passion in the upcoming twelve months.

Still, I realized any new year is not all about me. Or even if I do great things. Instead, it requires roots in something or someone greater than me. And so during my contemplation, a thought would not let go of me: 

What if I let God be God this year? 

What will the new year hold if I simply let God do His job as God? And what if I let the Almighty reign over my decisions, circumstances, dreams, and life? 

Most importantly, isn’t He the only One who perfectly fills the role as God? No other person or god meets the requirements like our heavenly Father. He’s the most qualified and the most trustworthy. 

Therefore, I’m noting 3 ways we let God be G.O.D. this year.

A Christmas Series: The Gift of Grace

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. (James 1:17, NIV)

Christmas is only days away. And even though this marks the end of our series, I pray all 3 gifts (forgiveness, encouragement, and grace) continue to impact our lives in Christ. 

I chose gifts money cannot buy, yet are very valuable. In fact, these gifts are priceless. Also, I spent time asking the Lord which gifts to highlight. 

But this week, instead of waiting on God, I began researching an entirely different gift. Because I felt grace is widely discussed and covered.

Then, the Lord captured my attention when He whispered to my heart: 

Karen, grace is the greatest gift, a good and perfect gift (James 1:17) that came down from Me to you as my Son the first Christmas.

Grace Defined

(1.) Google defines grace as “courteous goodwill.” So I find it interesting how grace plays a major role in the Christmas story along with goodwill (desire to do good to others, act of kindness, charitable gift). 

An angel announced the Savior’s birth to shepherds, “And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying: ‘Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, goodwill toward men!’” (Luke 2:13-14, NKJV, emphasis mine) 

The Savior embodies God’s grace and desire to do good to us and offer us kindness. And Jesus Christ remains the greatest act of charity (spiritually needy) known to mankind.

A Christmas Series: The Gift of Encouragement

Welcome to our second week on gifts. For this series, I imagined someone asked me to make a list of the top presents money cannot buy, but that I enjoy receiving from others. These gifts are intangible, yet they often gift us with the most important parts of life. Such as the gift of forgiveness we discussed last week. We continue with another valuable gift to both receive and give, encouragement.

Google defines it as, “the action of giving someone support, confidence, or hope.” And dictionary.com explains it as “to inspire with courage, spirit, or confidence.”

So on the flip side, discouragement means “a loss of confidence or enthusiasm; dispiritedness” (Google).

Recently, this hit close to home. Discouragement knocked on my heart’s door and attempted to enter as a house guest through unkind words.

Encouragement to the rescue! My sweet husband spoke encouraging words, cheering me on with the truth and lifting my spirits. Then my stepfather came to town relaying words of life and hope, redirecting my heart and kicking discouragement to the curb.

Encouragement gifts us with the support, inspiration, confidence, hope, and courage we need. And when we need it the most. 

Powerful Quotes on Encouragement

Look at how this gift really makes a difference in our lives. 

A Christmas Series: The Gift of Forgiveness

When we think of Christmas gifts, our thoughts ponder what to buy that family member who has everything. Or, the person who is particular in their taste. Perhaps we wonder what treasures lay under the tree for us.

Over the next 3 weeks until Christmas, we are embarking on a series about gifts. These are not the typical gifts we imagine at Christmastime. Yet, each gift offers some of the most glorious things in life. 

We begin with the gift of forgiveness. And to be gut-honest, my tendency is to only see it as a gift when I receive it. Because forgiveness is a difficult present to hand out. Especially if the hurt runs deep and the offense cuts into our soul.

Starting in my childhood, a person has inflicted injury upon injury to my heart. Even threatening the unthinkable just two years ago, and causing a recent emotional wounding.

Still, God gave me the power and ability to truly and fully forgive her. Although our relationship remains in a less than whole state. And her patterns of behavior haven’t changed. I am living in wholeness and walking in freedom by giving her this gift. 

Why? Refusing to forgive places us behind bars—imprisoning our hearts and shackling our souls. Forgiving unlocks the prison cell, making us free!

Sometimes forgiveness neither restores a relationship nor is the best or healthy result. But it restores us.

However, this gift comes with a warning label: Offering it with a limited warranty or an expiration date renders it unacceptable.

Gift Description

Let’s look closer at our gift through these definitions and wisdom.

(1.) “To cease to feel resentment against (an offender): PARDON: forgive one’s enemies” (Merriam-Webster).

A Life of Sincere ThanksGiving by ThanksLiving

Every year, I look forward to November’s main holiday, Thanksgiving. But I really desire to live a life of ThanksGiving to God by ThanksLiving for Him year-round.

Although Christmas is one of my favorite holidays, I enjoy celebrating the time set aside for giving thanks.

Maybe you’re one of those people who already has your home Christmas-ready. That’s awesome for you. I say, To each her own.

Yet, it’s not my cup of tea. Not even holiday spiced tea. For me, I like both feet firmly planted in our thankful holiday before moving on. But the weekend after giving thanks? Then, I’m all about hanging ornaments, positioning blinking lights, and spreading Christmas cheer.

You see, I’m a straight lines kind of girl. So I never like to blur the lines of one holiday and cross over into another one at the same time.

Further, my family knows how much rule-keeping runs through my veins. Perhaps, this plays a role. Regardless of the reason, celebrating holidays distinctly, separately, and in chronological order remains my thing. 

ThanksGiving Around the Table

This makes the third year to host my immediate family (kids and grandkids) and part of my husband’s family in our home for ThanksGiving. I enjoy everything about it: gathering with loved ones, decorating the table with my little pilgrims and a few pumpkins, and doing a portion of the cooking with my guests bringing dishes to add to our spread.

Six Steps to Effective Prayer and Giveaway

My guest this week is a sweet lady I met at a writers conference. Her new book on prayer releases November 18. And she’s giving a copy away on this blog post.

By Penny Cooke

“In this manner, therefore, pray…” (Matthew 6:9a NKJV)

Do you ever find it difficult to pray, to remember or find time to pray? If so, you are not alone. We are all busy.

Even when we have good intentions, we can end up discouraged as the craziness of life takes over so often.  

If I’m not prepared, my cell phone will chime, my to-do list will nag, and my stomach will growl in duet with the dog begging to go out (and in, and out…).

I begin to question, When can I go to meet with You, God? (Psalm 42:2)

Jesus gave us instructions for prayer in Matthew 6:9-13 (The Lord’s Prayer). If we look carefully, we’ll see He covered specific elements of prayer. Perhaps He didn’t mean it to be a rote prayer, but a guide. After all, He had just told the disciples not to recite vain repetitions (Matthew 6:7).

What are these elements? Here is an acrostic for prayer that explains the elements Jesus taught.

P – Proactively Pursue Prayer.

Jesus left us an example of intentionally getting away from it all to pray (Mark 1:35, Luke 5:16, 6:12, 9:28). Scripture urges us repeatedly to proactively pursue prayer (Matthew 26:41, Luke 18:1, Ephesians 6:18, 1 Thessalonians 5:17, and 1 Timothy 2:1). Besides spontaneous prayers we may pray throughout the day, it is essential to take the time to be alone with God to pray fervently (James 5:16). 

In today’s busyness, we need to be proactive about a lot of things if we’re going to get everything done. It is no different with prayer. And if we have so much to do, shouldn’t prayer be on the top of our list? 

The Gratitude Dare: Cultivating Grateful Hearts

It’s that time of year. We know how the season is supposed to go down. Besides pumpkin pie and turkey, we are encouraged to cultivate attitudes of gratitude.

Such as these 4 attitudes.

Count our blessings.

Be thankful.

Express our gratefulness.

Show our generosity.

And maybe we do and are these things during Thanksgiving. Perhaps some of us manage to pull it off most of November or even the entire year. 

But when we look at this list, do we think of our lives, our family, and more importantly, our God?

Because sometimes I epitomize these attitudes and other times not so much. A few years ago, as I reflected on gratitude, God spoke to my heart. 

Grateful people are generous people. Generous people are grateful people. 

It proves true with me. When gratefulness rises in my heart, I’m more generous with my money and time and service. Likewise, when my generosity bubbles over on others, gratefulness swells in my soul.

Then, I express gratitude for what the Lord has given me and for the great things He has done. I realize I’m blessed beyond measure.

Yet, how do we cultivate attitudes of gratitude in all the areas of our lives, for the people in our lives, and for the God who gives us life? Even further, are gratitude, generosity, and thanksgiving possible January through December—not just during November or on Thanksgiving Day?

And where do we start? Let’s use the list in the introduction and unpack each one.

Don’t Like Religion? Neither Did Jesus!

Please welcome my guest, Doris, as she discusses religion versus a relationship with God.

By Doris Homan

Do you dislike hypocrites? So did Jesus. Do you think religion is empty and those who play the game or go through the motions are fake? You’re in good company. 

Man-made Religion

Jesus had some very harsh words for the religious leaders of His day. He called them “blind” and “whitewashed tombs beautiful on the outside but on the inside full of dead men’s bones and full of uncleanness” (Matthew 23:16, 27).

Christ said they were blind guides leading the people into more legalism and not leading them to God. Because they looked good on the outside but were dead spiritually on the inside (see Matthew 23).

In Psalm 50:7-15, the Lord rebuked the religious practices of the Old Testament in making sacrifices. But He rebuked the practice only because people were completing the act without the right heart attitude of worshipping God. Instead they were simply going through the motions. 

Faith Versus Religion

There is a difference between faith and religion. Faith comes from God but religion is fabricated. Religion is man’s invention and attempt to appease God.