“A hard worker has plenty of food, but a person who chases fantasies has no sense.” – Proverbs 12:11
Food for thought today: Your dreams are as real as the work you are willing to put into them. Stop fantasizing! Wake up and start to pursue! Thank God for the strength, ask Him for this wisdom, and MOVE!
Always a pleasure,
-rcs
So this is me a few months ago, hosting a This’l concert/community outreach in Fort Lauderdale. It was amazing! Hundreds of people, great food, and uber-awesome talent. Notice that totally hot t-shirt I’m wearing? Wondering what it means? Well I’d tell you, but the originator of this truly awesome idea, does a much better job, so I’ll let him do the talking.
Click the link below to check out Juan Pierre, major league baseball great, world series champ, known as the king of stolen bases, and currently playing for the Phillies, as he tells you all about what it means to live in BEAST MODE, 24-7-365! It’s serious!!!
Juan Pierre promotes Beast Mode for Christ
Don’t forget to like Beast Mode for Christ on facebook, and while you’re at it, help promote it with a totally hot t-shirt of your own! Spread the word!
Always a pleasure,
RCS
Have you ever wondered if God cares about your passion? About the thing that drives you? That wakes you up in the middle of night and clogs up your mind all day? Have you wondered if He’s ever going to give you the go ahead to step out and do it? Have you wondered if He plans to help you be successful? The answer is YES!! He is so excited about you walking in your passion that He’s already decided that you will succeed. He’s already picked the people who will walk the road with you, support you, prayer for you, encourage you. He stays up day and night preparing YOU for YOUR PASSION. He’s actively engaged in making your dream come true. So you ask, what’s the hold up, then?
Well it’s simple. No matter how ready you think you are, until God says move, He knows that you’re not ready yet. His foresight is infinite, His wisdom, unparalleled. He knows how desperately you still need to prepare, physically, financially, and most importantly, spiritually. He knows that you have things to let go and things to pick up, to be ready for the awesome work and wonder of YOUR PASSION. Do not despair. Don’t give up hope. Instead, spend time with Jesus. Talk to Him. Ask Him to reveal Himself to you. He loves to abide with us. Before you know, your dream will blossom in front of you in ways that you didn’t even imagine before. It’s going to be breath-taking!
Always a pleasure,
Rachel
As far as household chores go, washing the dishes used to rank among my least favorites; right up there with folding laundry…ugggh! Lately though, something quite eye-opening hit me. Every time I say to my husband, “I’m gonna clean the kitchen,” and I actually make the walk over to the sink and start washing things up, Jesus meets me there. I don’t know why He chooses to meet me in the kitchen, but I do know that once we get to talking over the dirty dishes, he imparts truth to me and a strange peace and joy fill my heart. I never expected the look of a clean kitchen to feel so good!
Truthfully, I really can’t think of a time that I engaged in manual labour of any kind, when God didn’t come to talk with me. Or perhaps, He was already there, at the work scene and I’m the one who eventually makes it to the right place at the right time. Morgan Freeman’s “God” character in Bruce Almighty said, “Nothin’ wrong with rollin’ up your sleeves, son. People underestimate the benefits of good ‘ol manual labor. There’s freedom in it. Happiest people in the world stink like hell at the end of the day.”
We often expect God to speak to us in a big, bright majestic way, and sometimes He chooses to do so. In my life though, I’d have to conclude that God has spoken to me far more frequently in simple, quiet times. Nothing fancy, no big lightening bolts crashing through the sky. Just simple, quiet times, like when I’m doing my dishes.
‘The LORD said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by.” Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper.’ – I Kings 19:11-12
Always a pleasure,
Rachel
Would you take a moment to help change lives forever? Please help my friend Casandra Roache on her quest to INSPIRE MANY!! Spare a moment and please vote! Check out the link below!! THANK YOU!!
http://www.refresheverything.com/inspiremany
Always a pleasure,
Rachel
Greetings!
In the spirit of this beautiful and awesome season, I’ve decided to share some of my favorite Chirstmas music and videos with you! I do hope you enjoy them, and most importantly I hope that if you haven’t yet, you’ll open your heart to receive the love of an incredible Savior, who wanted so badly to be with you forever, that He became a baby, lived in this world, and then chose to die for you, There is no love like His. Merry Christmas!!!
Always a pleasure,
Rachel
1. Jennifer Hudson – O Holy Night
2. Whitney Houston – Joy to the World
3. Mariah Carey- Jesus Born on This Day
4. Trans-Siberian Orchestra – carol of the Bells
5. Hillsong- Emmanuel
6. Kari Jobe- Breath of Heaven
7. Josh Groban- Ave Maria
8. The Katinas- O Come, O Come Emmanuel
9. Kirk Franklin – The Night When Christ Was Born
10. Brian McKnight & Christina Auilera- Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
11. Tom Inglis- Who Is There Like You
12. Matthew West & Mandisa – Sometimes Christmas Makes Me Cry
13. Bebe Winans – My Christmas Prayer
14. Whitney Houston – Who Could Imagaine A King
“But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” – Matthew 6:33
So you may not know this about me, but one of my life’s passions is to own and operate my own business. I’ve been working towards it for quite a while and many pieces of my business are finally coming together. I do a lot of reading on entrepreneurship, small-business building, growing your business, building your brand, etc. There’s so much information out there….some useful, some useless. What I have learned is this: Every time you open your mouth, interact with others, post on facebook, send a tweet, return an email or voicemail, walk out the door to take on the day, you’re building your reputation as a business person. So longterm success is really equivalent with short term, day to day habits and practices. What you say via your online platforms, how you interact with your co-workers, what people notice first about you….all of these are of utmost importance, when creating a reputation as a business person. People don’t engage with, or develop any loyalty to a brand they cannot rely on.
Interestingly, there are spiritual implications to this business principle. As a Christian, everything I do and say either witnesses Christ or brings disgrace to my testimony of Him. Do people see Him in my talk, in my tweets? Do they hear Him when they listen to my voice messages or read my emails? Do they notice Him in the way I work? Do they see Him when I pull up at the stop sign?
More important than being a future business-owner, I’m a present Christ follower. I’m not only building my brand, I’m spreading the Jesus brand, and that’s infinitely more important.
Always a pleasure,
Rachel
1 Thessalonians 5:18 “Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”
In the movie, America’s Sweethearts, starring Julia Roberts, Billy Crystal, John Cussack and Catherine Zeta-Jones, Cussack’s character Eddie rides an emotional roller coaster in both his personal and professional life (and if you’ve seen the movie, you know that the two are one and the same). At the end of it all, once all the drama sort of settles out, and he’s able to see himself more clearly, he realizes that his entire life experience boiled down to his choice of attitude. He determined from then on to choose to be thankful. In this moment, Cussack speaks one of the movie’s most memorable lines, as he looks deeply into the eyes of Julia Roberts’ character, Kiki and says, “In all of the world, the thing that I’m most grateful for is you.”
Every time I remember this line, I am forced to think about the things, people, and experiences that I am most grateful for. In the spirit of thanksgiving, many will likely engage in the same kind of thinking. I wonder though, how can we make this thankfulness last longer than one day? It’s easy to be thankful when everyone is being thankful. You just say what everyone else says….”I’m thankful for my mom, my house, my family, my job….” blah, blah, blah. It’s a bit more challenging though to stir up gratitude in the face of difficulty, or even in the face of the mundane. Are we thankful in the checkout line at the grocery store, for the clerk? Are we thankful for the waste management folks who make sure rats don’t take over our city? What else are we thankful for? Today may be a good day to think about and even write down, what you’re thankful for and maybe even go the extra mile to express gratitude to people who you would otherwise overlook. Have a wonderful thanksgiving!
Always a pleasure,
Rachel
“Be careful of your thoughts, they may become your words at any moment.” – Ira Gassen
What verses come to your mind when you think of the phrase, “power in words?” I tend to think of “The tongue can bring death or life; those who love to talk will reap the consequences.” Proverbs 18:21 (NLV). I also think of, “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.” – Matthew 12:34. Scripture teaches us that there is tremendous power in the words that proceed from our mouths. It also admonishes that our mouths can only speak that which already abides within our hearts. That means, that when we speak, we are in fact showing the rest of the world exactly who we are. Whether we speak truth or untruth, we are laying ourselves bare before a watching world and exposing our true nature. Either the truth resides in us and overflows from our mouths, or we are vessels of untruth and our mouths are used to spread deceit and doubt.
I’ve heard people say over and over that our mouths can be used to “speak things that are not, as though they were,’ or “to speak our desire into existence.” So for example, if I desire is to own a business, but it’s not yet in existence, I can speak this business into existence and it will come to pass. I believe there is some truth to that statement. But I believe, even more strongly, that God isn’t in the business of granting wishes, simply because we “speak it.” As His word portrays, God is strategic and purposeful in all His ways. There is a reason why he admonishes us to “guard our heart, for out of it flows the issues of life.” Follow this train of thought with me: Out of our heart flows the issues of life, and out of the abundance of this same heart, our mouth speaks. Lastly, life and death are in the power of our tongue (the words of our mouth). It seems as though God is really saying, “If you take heed to my word, and abide in Me, so that my Word can take up residence in your heart, then your heart will be filled with my Word and my will, so that when your mouth speaks, my Word and my will, will come out; and because I am God, I am willing to give you the desire of your heart, because your desire and mine are one and the same.”
So it makes sense then, that we should fill up on His word, so much so, that our every word sounds like Him. Positive confession is more than something we teach ourselves to do; it’s more than “big faith talk”. We needn’t cook up fancy, spiritually-sounding confessions to try to force God into granting our desires. We simply do what He said: Guard our heart and watch our mouth. God isn’t with-holding blessing from us because He’s unwilling or unable to grant what we desire. He’s more interested in our heart’s condition than anything else. The real issue is not, “will God grant me the desires of my heart?” The real is, “Does my heart’s desire match God’s desire?” When our desires match God’s we don’t engage in “small, faithless talk.” Our words are laden in possibility, the power of the unseen, the unsurpassed greatness of the God we serve. Our thoughts are renewed, our walk is confident. We don’t complain that our job isn’t what we want, or that our children aren’t where we want them spiritually, or that our co-workers are too unsaved. Instead we tell God what our desire for each of these situations are and we change our talk! We thank Him for our new job, our saved co-workers, our faithful children. That’s what power in words really means; because words that come straight from the heart of God can never be powerless.
Always a pleasure,
Rachel
