Don't Worry Be Happy.

One thing I use to pride myself on was that I did not worry that much about anything.  But as I have come to learn, the same things that you pride yourself on is the same thing that God is going to test you on the most.

It is easy not to worry about something when you know that you can handle it on your own.  For example, why worry about paying your bills when you have a high paying job?  Why worry about if you are going to get married when you are engaged? Why worry about the stability of your job when your company has been doing well for the past 30 years?

But happens when all that is taken away from you.  If you get laid off?  Have a pay cut or get fired?  What happens when your engagement is broken off and you are left to pick up the pieces?  What happens when there is nothing that you can do in your power to fix it.  What do you do?

Well some of these things have happened to me.  I have gotten laid off, received a pay cut, had an increase in expenses, and there was nothing that I could do to fix it.  And so I worried.  I worried a lot, and guess what, it got me know where.  Even more so, things were able to get done or paid one way or another, and it would have been that way no matter if I worried or not.

The point that I am trying to make is sometimes God will put us in positions so that we have no choice but to sit and depend on Him.  At first I resented this.  Why would I want to be broke? Why would I want to struggle?  This does not seem like the wonderful love of God that everyone is always speaking about.

But there is a reason for it all.  The things that matter to us are not the same things that matter to God.  God is sometimes just trying to show us that when you think that things are going to fall apart, and there is nothing you can do about it, all you have to do is surrender to Him and He will fix it.

It may mean that you are broke or struggling for several years.  God may not show up in the form of allowing you to win millions of dollars through a lottery ticket.  It may mean that you will have just barely enough to cover all of your expenses, so that you will learn not to worry.

If this confuses you let me explain it this way.  If your bills are $3000 a month and you are only bringing in $2000, then it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that you do not have enough.  Even though you may struggle as time goes by, some way some how everything is paid for and you do not go without anything you NEED, even though you may go without somethings you WANT.

The reason why God does this, is because He wants you to lean on Him for everything.  He wants you to know that He is in charge of everything and no matter what mountain is thrown your way, that you will be able to handle it with Him on your side.  When we struggle and we cannot get out of it on our own, and God somehow makes provision for us, it increases our faith in God.  It helps us understand that we cannot do anything without Him.

It sounds backwards doesn't it.  But God’s ways are not our ways (Isaiah 55:8).  He is going to do things that is not going to make sense to us but sometimes years later we start to understand why God allowed us to go through the struggle, pain, and hardship.  It is because once we face it and we know who has brought us out.  We know that no matter what we face, God somehow will bring us out time and time again, because He has done it in the past.

For me I used to worry a lot, when things went wrong.  Then I learned I could not control it and God would handle it.  And with that knowledge I learned not to worry so much.  As long as I was doing what I could do and not just sitting there like a bump on a log expecting God to fix everything, God worked everything out.  Not always in the way that I wanted or expected, but He did.

If you ever worry too much or start feeling sorry for yourself, think of it this way.  Jesus was walking around preaching to people.  He was homeless probably poorly dress.  But yet he did not feel sorry for himself and he was not in need for anything.  When he was hungry God provided for him in miraculous ways.  If he needed some place to stay, God worked it out.  If he needed a donkey to ride on, God worked that out too (Matthew 21).  He may not have been living on a mansion on a hill and clothed in silk, but he had what he needed and that was fine for him.  He did not worry about anything.


When the Israelites left Egypt, their clothes did not wear out for 40 years (Deuteronomy 8:4).  God provided them with food or (manna) from the sky, quail, and water from a rock (Exodus 16).  No it was not ideal, they complained about all the food they did not have and what they were missing.  But yet they did not go hungry and they knew that each and every day food was going to come.  Even if it was the same thing and they complained, they still knew they were going to get fed and not starve in the wilderness.

When Elijah fled and was wondering around in the woods.  God had a raven feed him and a poor widow give him her last bit of food.  So that he would be provided for (1 Kings 4).

The point I am trying to make is that in each of these situations, things may have not been ideal, they may have not been what they wanted, but they got the things they needed. Even in the midst of the wilderness or a hardship there was no need to worry.

In closing if you know God, then you know that God has your back.  You may be sitting in the dark with candles because your lights have been turned off.  You may not have any type of way to pay the bills that you have coming in.  You may have not even been able to buy yourself a new pair of shoes in the last 5 years.  You may be down and out about it and feel that God has forgotten about you.  But one way or the next, God will provide for you.  Pray and cast all of your burdens on Him and let Him do it.

The more you worry, the more nothing is getting accomplished.  The only person that worrying effects is you.  Can anyone tell me something good that has come out of worrying too much?  I would love to hear it.  So since nothing is getting accomplished by you worrying.  Then you mind as well not do it.

The Bible teaches us

“Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?

And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you—you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” Matthew 6:26-34 (NIV)

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You Are Single For A Reason.

For anybody dying to be in a relationship, I think it is important to reflect why you want to be in a relationship.

Are you doing it because you do not want to be lonely?
 For financial gain?  What?

I know many people have heard this but being single is not a curse, it can actually be a blessing.  If you are like who I was, I know you are saying that you do not want to hear that right now.  You are lonely and you do not understand how being single can be a blessing.

I will explain it this way.  Have you ever seen someone jump from relationship to relationship, and depending on who they are with, it determines who they are?  For example if they are with someone who likes cars then they like cars, if they are with someone that is a Muslim then they are a Muslim, if they are with someone who likes partying then they like partying.  And then when they are no longer with that person their interests change when they get with someone else.

There is a danger to this.  This is also why sometimes it is a blessing as to why being single is important.  Being single is first about getting to know yourself, your wants, your purpose, and your life path.  When you grow to be comfortable with yourself this is when you can go into a successful relationship.

Once on Facebook a friend of mind posted something that was interesting.  She said that it was not about finding the right one, but making it work with the one that you are with.  I disagree with this whole heartily.  I think it is about finding the right one (see my blog here).  But the key to finding the right one is knowing what to look for.  The person that you look for comes with knowing yourself and your purpose in life.  This way you are able to recognize what person will go good with you and help you in your purpose versus what person would just hold you back.

If by chance you want to be a preacher, it is not going to behoove you to get with someone that is a stripper.  This is because your congregation is not going to have respect for you.  They are going to find it very hard to respect you to lead them in spiritual guidance and your wife is out there swinging on a pole.

I am sure that before our President, or any president for that matter got into politics they knew someday they wanted to be president.  They also knew they had to choose woman and first lady that was going to coincide with their purpose.  This is why our current first lady is a lawyer herself.  As a first lady he knew his wife would have obligations and would need to serve as a role model.  Do you think he could have won the presidency if he had a wife who was a drug addict?

I once had a male friend that has been married for 10 years.  He and his wife were having a lot of trouble.  The reason being is because he married young.  Through the course of his marriage his wife was into other women and like to swing with other  couples.  At first this may have seemed cute to him when he first got married.  But as you get older and have children, this type of behavior is not very becoming on a mother.  He told me after 10 years that if he was the person that he was now he would have never married her.  This is why it is so important to know yourself and not to rush into marriage or a relationships.

If you are the type of person that is interested in only what your partner is interested in, then you do not know yourself.  You are simply faking the funk so that you can get the ring.  But sooner or later the real you is going to come out in the wash.  If you convert to being a Muslim and you really believe in being a Christian, then how long are you going to be able to go to the mosque and worship Allah, before you feel convicted?

I once dated a Muslim.  I knew right away this would not work.  I am a Christian to the bone and I am not bowing down to any other God.  I am not converting, I am not covering my head, and I am not risking me salvation.  He told me many times that he wanted to get married, but I knew that it simply would not work.  We are too different people on to different life paths.  To be with him would compromise everything that I am and what I belive.  It would set me off my life path.  And the fact that he wanted to marry me was not worth it to me.  It was not me worth giving up my religion or the things that God called me to do.

But it took me to being strong and understanding these things on my own.  I am sure many women would have taken him up on his offer only to be dissatisfied in the end.

I know many women who are married now because they wanted a husband, a two income household, the right to be called a wife, and many other minor reasons.  Now they are miserable.  Because once the wedding is over guess what? You have to live and be with that person for the rest of your life.  If when you were dating he told you that he wanted to stay at home and have you work and you went long with this, then why would he change when you are married?

If when you were dating he wanted you to swing with other men and women and once you got married he continued on with this, even as you have children, then this is your fault?  You changed yourself and what you believed based on someone else.  Because you wanted to be called a wife.

So being single is not the worse thing in the world.  It is better than bending to become something your not just to appease the person you are with.  It is better to get to know yourself, this way yo know what you look for, and when you know what yo look for you know who to marry, and the person you should marry should compliment you.  But you can never get to that point if you do not know who you are.

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You Can't Make Him Love You

I am a huge fan of reality shows, more so because I like to look at the nature of people.  This is not going to be a blog about reality shows, but rather how when viewing other people’s relationships you can see how the roles of men have certainly changed.

I was watching 90 day fiance.  And a couple really stuck my attention.  Just to give you a brief overview, a woman found a man from another country.  She spend massive amounts of money on him which has put her into debt.  The presenting problems of their relationships is now that he is in America, she has come clean about her financial issues to him.  The woman revealed that she did not want to come clean before because she felt that if she told him the truth then he would leave and not want to marry her.  In the recent episode she was laid off from her job and the man stated that would have to reflect on if he would marry her or not because she was already in financial ruin and now she has lost her job which would put them more in financial ruin.

I am going to make some points regarding their relationships that I feel we all can take away.

First, a women should not be going bankrupt over a man.  If he is not helping you financially then he is not a man and he will not make a good husband.  This behavior will continue once married.

The Bible states

"If a man does not choose to work, neither shall he eat."  2 Thessalonians 3:10

Second, if you are worried that if you tell a man the truth about your situation they will leave, then this does not signify love.  It says that they are basing the fact that they love you on if you can offer them something or not.

Third, if a man is willing to leave you when things get hard this should tell you something.  Marriage is not easy and will have ups and down.  When martial vows say “for better or for worse” or “richer or poorer” this should be taken to heart.  If you are in are going to marry someone, you must be prepared to stay with someone through the hard times.

I want to say that if you are not stable financially then you should not be getting married.  But if you really love someone then you should seek be in a good place and work on it together before you get married.  In this case, the woman was trying and trying to provide for their lifestyle and the man was not doing anything significant.

I hate to sound old school but I cannot subscribe to the idea of men just sitting there doing nothing sucking up all the income of the household.  And when all the money is gone there are ready to leave.  What type of mess is this?

I wrote a blog (see here) on men understanding the value on women.  There I used the metaphor of a women being worth more than rubies (Proverbs 3:15).  When you think about the idea of an engagement ring, it is a ring to symbolize that a man wants to marry you.  Men typically work really hard in order to afford the ring that they feel their fiance deserves.  This is because real men want to tell the world that this woman is their women, by the ring.  So that when their women is out and about, the ring can serve as a representation of him. Real men work hard to get the rings that their woman wants because when other men see it, they will know that this woman is taken and how good her man is because of how hard he must have worked to get her that ring.

No real men that had worked so hard for something so beautiful such as an engagement ring, and then once they get it will abuse it throw it down in the dirt and stomp on it.  This is because the ring has value.  It is something that he has worked so hard for in order to prove his love to his woman and he wants it to be as perfect as possible.

So why women if you are a gem, are you allowing men to thrown you in the dirt and hurt you?  I think he says that he does not value you at all if he is willing to treat you, his gem, any type of way?

The Bible teaches

“Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless.” Ephesians 5: 25-27

I often reflected what this means.

But I think it is like the idea of a women being a gem.  To take care of a gem a man should want to keep it clean, take care of it, and keep it in its best condition so that he like the engagement ring it can be a representative of him.  He should want his wife to be an extension of him.  And if he would not hurt or harm himself, then why would he do this to his wife or future wife.

The Bible says

“In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.  After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body” Ephesians 5: 28-29

Even if you are dating, you can tell how serious a man is about you based on how they treat you.  Do they treat you like a gem? Or like a pebble in the dirt that he throws around and has blatant disregard for?  If the answer is the pebble, then please know that this will not change once you get married.

How a man treats you before marriage is a good indicator on how he feels about you and how he will treat you after marriage.  You cannot buy a man, make him love you, or try to convince him to treat you better.  If as a man he does not want to do these things, then he just isn't a real man.  Or at least he is not your man.

It is better for women to recognize what attributes to look for in a man as oppose to just going for any man in hope to make it work.  So many people are trapped in marriage where men treat them like crap.

I once dated a man and had a God sent dream about him, literally.  The dream was that we were married and him and I were at home.  I recall to this day that in the dream he treated me awful.  I remember thinking that now that the wedding is over I am stuck with this man forever, and the thought of that was terrible.  In the real world he treated me like crap and I felt like I overtime could change his mind.  So many people get caught up in the idea of the weeding that they never think what it would be like after.  This is how my dream was.  I remembering in my dream that now that the wedding is over, life with this man is forever and is terrible.  Because he treated me terrible.

After this dream I quickly got out of this relationships and moved on.  Women must learn to recognize the good man and the bad men.  And see the signs as to when they need to let go or not even get into a relationship altogether.  This poor women on the reality show, need to know that God is doing her a favor.  He is showing her who this man really is before they get married.  She can choose to listen or stay in which would lead her into a life of the same type of behavior.  Just because you can get a man to marry you, does not mean he is going to change.

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