good stuff =]

ok, so i haven't exactly been on a mountaintop lately, but God has been showing me some important lessons. When he seems far away, He may be testing to see how your faith will hold out. but, don't ever stop!

something good i read last night -


“Did not our heart burn within us …?” (Luke 24:32).

We need to learn this secret of the burning heart. Suddenly Jesus appears to us, fires are set ablaze, and we are given wonderful visions; but then we must learn to maintain the secret of the burning heart—a heart that can go through anything. It is the simple, dreary day, with its commonplace duties and people, that smothers the burning heart—unless we have learned the secret of abiding in Jesus.

This is so true! So often I get these visions of how i can serve Christ, and I have that burning desire to do his will, but when I get back to everyday life i forget, and ignore those things. We must learn to abide in Jesus at all times! That will take quite a bit of work, i pray we don't ever lose that desire!

another thing i read =] -

“He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30).

When you begin to see that person in the middle of a difficult and painful struggle, don’t try to prevent it, but pray that his difficulty will grow even ten times stronger, until no power on earth or in hell could hold him away from Jesus Christ. Over and over again, we try to be amateur Providences in someone’s life. We are indeed amateurs, coming in and actually preventing God’s will and saying, “This person should not have to experience this difficulty.” Instead of being friends of the Bridegroom, our sympathy gets in the way. One day that person will say to us, “You are a thief; you stole my desire to follow Jesus, and because of you I lost sight of Him.”

So often I look at somebody who is struggling and say "why would God allow that?" and we pray that he will take the pain away, but we must realize that God knows what is happening, and he not only knows what is happening, but what WILL happen in the future, he has it all under control. God uses tough situations so that people can do nothing but run to him!

Anyways, i just thought I'd share what i had been learning, I hope that was helpful to you as well!
praying for you!
Rachel