Abundantly Pardoned

“December”

Every December I wish for stillness.
I wish that the earth would stop
Spinning for one month and
Set still upon the nothingness
Of space.
Every December I wish for quietness
And solitude.
I wish that I could spend Christmas Eve
And Christmas Day in a soup kitchen
In a big city,
Bringing cheer to the poor and
Homeless.
I wish for a silent peacefulness
That is like a gentle snowfall
On a winter night,
Wrapping me in its’ touch.
How can I thank You, Jesus?
How can I thank You
In the noise, in the rush,
In the busyness that surrounds me?
How can I give You my love
While I’m being tugged in every
Direction?
You are the Prince of Peace, and yet
December is far from peaceful.

-for my Jesus
from Keneta-

“If you are holding on to your past, it’s because there is something about your past that you think you still need.” “Don’t allow a guilt trip from the past to strangle you or cling to you or trip you up. Cut the cord!” “Cut the cord that ties you to the old mudholes of your past.” “Put that addiction…that abortion…that sickness…that divorce…that failure…that loss…behind you! Pronounce your own benediction on your former life. Pronounce your own last rites on your failures. Conduct your own funeral for the ‘old person’ you were before you were saved. Declare that old you—the you who existed before God found you and cleaned you up and grew you up to be His woman—is dead. She doesn’t exist anymore.” “Declare that you are a new creature in Christ Jesus. The old you has died and has been buried. The new you is being resurrected!” “Being born again means you are out of the womb of sin. Cut the ties that will seek to draw you back into darkness.” “When people reject you, it’s very difficult for you to feel good about yourself. You start thinking, ‘Well, if they don’t think I’m worth anything, I must not be worth anything. If they are willing to throw me aside, I must be of no value.’ Never allow another person’s actions to control how you see yourself. That’s too much power to give to another human being.” “Refuse to accept the loathing of other people. Don’t allow their opinion to creep into your inner person. Refuse to loathe yourself.” “There comes a time when you must say, ‘That was then. Now is now. I used to do that. Now I do this. I used to be that. Now I am this.”" “God declares that thing to be dead in your life. It’s time for you to bury it so you can get on with the resurrection He has planned for you. Make a decision today to bury anything that has pulled you down, held you back, kept you in despair, limited you, deceived you, or made you vulnerable. Throw it into the coffin. Lower it into the ground. Declare it over in your life. Everything you can’t change and can’t fix…every childhood trauma…every secret disgrace…every memory of abuse…every instance of rejection…every addiction…every fear…every failure…Must be buried in Christ Jesus! Commit those things to the Lord once and for all. Give them to Him. Seal them up in a grave forever. And rise up. You have been cleaned up…feed….and raised to maturity in Christ.” Draw a line between who you were and what you are—and step over into the NOW!”

clips from Liz Curtis Higgs’ “Embrace Grace:”
“To say that you’re willing to accept God’s forgiveness but cannot forgive yourself is to say you value your opinion above God’s.” “I now realize that guilt over my past come from Satan—not God.” “Guilt is an unwanted gift from below. Grace is a much-needed gift from above.” “A woman who embraces grace with both arms, who stops fretting over her sins and begins focusing on her Savior, who dries her tears so she can see others who are hurting—oh, this is some kind of woman. The kind who can turn the world right side up.” “The only time a grace-filled woman feels completely at peace is when she’s being used by God for His glory.” Whatever experiences reside in our past or present, God can use them to mold a brighter future for others.” “Real freedom comes when you discover that your own weaknesses are your strongest areas of ministry. God never wastes anything, especially not pain.” “No need to visit that worthiness question, sis. God is indeed using you—further proof of your value to Him. Besides, the Lord loves to use the least likely among us.” “‘Here’s where I’m weak.’ Such transparence is the mark of a confident Christian. Especially when your next sentence declares, ‘And here’s where God is strong.” “Even though I may have done things that I’m not proud of, God can turn it around and use my experiences to show His love and forgiveness to those around me.”

by Maya Angelou: “A woman’s heart should be so hidden in Christ that a man should have to seek Him first to find her.”

The world we live in is a rough one. Each day it runs over us like a huge bulldozer, plowing into our hearts and ripping into our souls. There are people who don’t care that they’re hurting us or breaking our hearts or making us cry. But there are also people who love us and tend to our spiritual wounds like a physician dressing a physical wound. Those people are brothers and sisters in Christ. As Jesus tells us in John 15, God is the Gardener, Jesus is the Vine, and we are the branches, all of us joined together. If we stray from the Vine, we shrivel-up in the blistering meanness and anger of this world, but if we stay attached to the Vine, we will bear fruit. Sweet Jesus is our sustenance. We cannot survive without Him.

Sometimes it’s harder to forgive ourselves of something than it is to forgive someone who has hurt us. But God forgives us, so why shouldn’t we forgive ourselves? People in life will hurt us deeply, and that hurt will hurt us the rest of our lives if we don’t allow God to deal with it. When someone hurts a child of God, they hurt God. We must let Him deal with that hurt. When someone hurts us, He feels it. He weeps over us. Yes, God weeps over us. In Genesis 6:6, it says, “The Lord was grieved that He had made man on the earth, and His heart was filled with pain.” The Hebrew word for “grieved” means, “expression of drawing breath and groaning as one would do while sobbing in grief.” God was sobbing over the sins of man. Our loving Father sobs when we are hurt by sinful man. It literally breaks His heart. For a long time I felt so hurt and confused after several people deliberately hurt me emotionally over and over. I finally realized that by their actions they were hurting the Lord, and so I turned it over to Him. He can deal with it a lot better than I can. After all, He is God, hallelujah! /!

Christmas. It’s all about Him. It’s about bringing His love, His grace, His light to a dark, cold, lost, spiritually hungry world. Do we show these wonderful gifts of His to others during the Christmas season (and all year long?). Do we give cards with scripture, smiles and hugs? Do we help others experience Jesus in ways that reflect Him? Are we putting Christ in Christmas each and every day? Are we celebrating “Holy-days” instead of “holidays?” It’s not “Merry Christmas,” it’s “Holy Christmas.” People don’t know what to do with Christmas. The world has changed it into a way to make money, a thing that makes people feel depressed and useless, even more lost and confused. People are believing the hype and the commercialism. They believing it’s all about snow, crackling fires, reindeer, receiving presents instead of giving love. They’re believing it’s about trimming trees, outdoing their neighbors with too many lights and lawn ornaments. They’re believing it’s about drinking alcohol-laced eggnog and attending parties geared toward physical gratification and spiritual degradation. Let’s give Christ to the world. Let’s show the world Who He is: the Savior; the Messiah; the Son of God; Immanuel (“God With Us”!); the Shepherd; the Way, the Truth and the Life (the only Way, Truth and Life!); Redeemer; the Lamb; Mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6); He Who should be our One True Love. Let us fill our hearts with Christ and open them to the world, exposing and deposing a Christmas created by mankind. “And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God; we have waited for Him, and He will save us: this is the Lord; we have waited for Him, we will be glad and rejoice in His salvation.” (Isaiah 25:9).

I wrote this for Christ because He is my One True Love, My Lamb, My Savior, My Redeemer. Dear world, I give you Christ Jesus, the reason I celebrate Christmas. I give you Christ Jesus, because He is love, and He loves you. As you celebrate Christmas, remember to celebrate Christ. Let Him into your hearts. Let Him into your lives. Let Him celebrate you! Keneta Kinney Wolfenbarger, Christ Follower. Visit me at Facebook.

I am abundantly pardoned, hallelujah! Come to the Living Water and be abundantly pardoned, too! Jesus loves you so much!!!!! You are truly loved!!

Like the the version of the song “Amazing Grace” by Chris Tomlin says: “My chains are gone, I’ve been set free, my God my Savior has ransomed me, and like a flood His mercy rains, unending love, amazing grace.” Please know: no matter how unworthy you feel, no matter what you’ve done, if you repent and ask God to forgive you, He will! His grace truly is amazing! Give your life to Jesus and be amazed at the changes that will take place. You’ll be born anew, a brand new creation in Christ, oh, hallelujah!! Please give up your sins to Him, and allow Him to wash you clean. He loves you!

Matthew 5:6 from “The Message”: “You’re blessed when you’ve worked up a good appetitie for God. He’s food and drink in the best meal you’ll ever eat.”

Do we work up a good appetite for God every day? Do we have to think about doing it, or is it as natural to us as breathing?