Money & Character

“So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches?” ‭‭Luke‬ ‭16:11‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Our church is currently doing a series on coming out of finical denial. and Boy oh boy have I learned about the affects of poor money management over the past 9 months as I’ve been unemployed. When  I was employed I barely put money into my savings and although I was frugal and I tithed  the truth is  I wasn’t always careful of how I was spending money and money was just evaporating.

The last thing we need is more money to make mistakes at a greater level -Elder Courtney Harkness

While going through the process of looking for work and not being able to be financially where I want to be  it hit me like a ton of bricks that money won’t solve all your problems especially when you aren’t a good steward of what you currently have. I  have to change the way  I  maintain  God’s resources!

And I say God’s resources because often times  we have this thinking because  something is in our  possession that it is ours but this simply isn’t  true.  Everything that we have belongs to God and we are to  be good stewards of  His resources.

¹¹ Yours is the mighty power and glory and victory and majesty. Everything in the heavens and earth is yours, O Lord, and this is your kingdom. We adore you as being in control of everything. 1 Chronicles 29:11  (TLB)

God won’t bless you with more than your character can handle . – Elder Will Gravely

Yikes! So my character reveals  where my heart and  mind is when it comes to how I maintain the things I currently have and how  much God can trust me with in the future.  Living in discontentment, not appreciating  what I have or living beyond my means doesn’t show God that he can trust me with more. So how do I change this? By asking the Lord to rebuild my character and change my  thinking  so that He can trust me. I’m not asking to be super rich but what I am asking is to have more  discernment   with what  God blesses me with and live within my means.

Love, Lesli

Decrease To Increase

I am learning that doing the will of God takes the focus off of me  and allows me to totally plug into  Gods will.  The pressure of  taking my  life into my own hands is overwhelming  but  there is comfort in  knowing that if I am God led every plan and purpose  for my life has to  come to  fruition.  If it’s all about me then there’s no room for God to pour into me and no  growth. Minimizing (decreasing) ourselves doesn’t mean our value decreases, It means that we are a valuable part of Gods plan in the earth.  We  all have a role to play but we cannot successfully carry out the Lords plan if I we’re only seeking our own advantage.

He must increase and I must decrease.John‬ ‭3:30‬ ‭CEB‬‬

So we must first find out how God has shaped us/wired us and then use those gifts and resources to serve not just in the body of Christ but wherever He has placed us. The sooner we realize that our lives don’t revolve around us the sooner we will be free to live out our full potential using all the giftings that God has graciously given each one of us.

Q:  What comes  natural  to you and how can you use those gifts to serve? (i.e  encouragement, service, leaderships)

Love, Lesli

Complacent With Depressions?

A thought  occurred to  me today; Is it  possible to be comfortable in  depression/emotional pain because of it’s familiarity? Sounds  crazy  right? For me  I’ve  experienced  depression since  about  the  6th  grade,it’s something that I’ve always dealt with. So many of   my immediate  family members have   also experienced  depression  as well so I  just accepted it as something that ran in the  family. But I believe that God has  brought this  to my attention  because  I’ve  never  given  a lot of  thought  to  being  free from  depression I’ve adjusted to   putting a bandaid on the my issues instead of being free.

Is this  a form of  complacency?

Complacency is  apart of the  the issue but  it is also  fear.  Fear of  trying to  move  forward from depression because  we are worried that somehow   if something in life  knocks us down  we’ll  be back to where we started. This is an attitude that  says  why try, why  risk  disappointment?  The truth is  that  just because  something   has  been  one way for  so long  it doesn’t  mean that we  should  just accept it as our lot in  life.  God  has   infinite power.  infinite  wisdom, resources and love that He is  more than  willing to fill us  with so  why  stay in one place because of  familiarity?

 Cast your burden upon the Lord and He will sustain you; He will never allow the righteous to be shaken. Psalm 55:22 (NASB)

Now  please don’t misunderstand me,  I’m not  insinuating  that  everyone’s  depression is the same, that we  choose to be depressed , that we  don’t need counseling  or  even  medical care.   No, what I am  saying  is that we  don’t  have to  be afraid to seek  God’s  help and guidance to  be FREE from  the  things that have keep us in emotional bondage.  We should   pray with  broader  expectations of God and what  He can do in our lives.  Taking  steps to move away from what we’ve always  known  and  trusting that  we  can  be healed even when ” life happens ”  doesn’t mean  we  have to  forfeit  the works that God has done when  hard times arise but  it means  that we  can  draw from those experiences  and thrive because we  know the  Lord is with us!

Love,Lesli

Purge..Process.. Release

The  Lord sure does have  a way of  bringing you around and  shaking up your  world. I have  been praying over the past few weeks here in there that God  would help me to  let go of things that  have  gotten in the way of my  progress. So over the past  week my perspective has drastically changed. To give you a little background  I’m  someone who is really into social media,  I am on  all the basic  SNS  platforms  facebook, Instagram, snapchat and I was  even on some  korean apps (because I’m really into the culture and I’m casually  learning the language). All of this  isn’t bad in of  itself but  God has  brought it to my attention that I  was relying more on those things and less on  Him; I was   using  all these things as  a means of escapism and  my reliance  on  Him had  diminished.

So  I begun to get  rid of  the apps,I started to unfollow people on  instagram  even the  cute guys I followed  just because they were cute (don’t act like you haven’t done it..lol).  For longer than I care to admit I have been  glued to SNS and  believe  me it may not seem like a big deal to  let go of those  habits  but  it  has definitely  been VERY hard for  me to let go.  I’ve  used  all of these  things as a  coping  mechanism to push down my  depression, anxiety  and  a means  to avoid thinking about my current  circumstance.

I’ve  written all these post about seeking and spending  time with God  but I wasn’t completely   following my  own advice.  Putting things and  people  before God is  a  form of idolatry  and I want no  part of that,  my  mind should be on things that are eternal  so  when I  come  face to face with the Lord I’ll  be empty of  myself, more full of  Him  and confident that I gave it my  all and I relied on Christ to fill in the gaps.  My desire is to be Christ led and  that the things that I have been battling  with so long won’t  continue to have me  going in the  same  cycles over and over again.  I want to be  free so that  God can use me and  fill my  life so much that I don’t seek other things because I have surrendered  all of  me to Him.

What are some things you need to let go of?  Let’s share and  support each other in this process. It isn’t easy and we need each other so comment  below and let’s connect.

3 Reasons Why Assumption Is Dangerous

All pictures belong to Lesli Does Life unless otherwise stated.

Assumptions   will  of  others will make a fool of you.  Have  you ever caught yourself creating  scenarios in your mind and before you know it  you’ve  completely  villainized  them to the point that without any actual facts your assumptions  turn into your  truth about them.

Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment. John 7:24  (KJV)

So  why is  assumption dangerous?…

1.You are  judging  someone on the basis of your  own insecurities.  They look like an ex that cheated on you,  they remind you of  a  friend who let you down, or  a  bully that  harassed you in school. So essentially  you’ve  labeled them based on bitterness that you’re  still carrying in your heart.

2.The  grass is NOT always greener on the other side. In fact  your  perception of   the  perfect  life, nice  home,  or that amazing relationship  that you’ve romanticized in your mind  may be far grander than  what they  actually have. The truth is no ones life  is perfect  and  even if what they  have now is  great you have no clue what they went through to get there.

3.While you’ve  been writing a script of someone else’s life you could be cultivating the life that you want. God  has  given  each of us a  dream, giftings and purpose. It is  pointless to covet what someone else has when  God has  trusted you to utilize what He has  uniquely   given you.

In short  don’t  allow   your  assumptions  rob you of truly  living , meeting someone who could potentially have an amazing impact on your  life (or vise versa).   Refuse to  feed  your  discontentment, live your life  stay in your  lane.  Trust that what God has placed in you in is  valuable. 

Love, Lesli