God’s Love and Care in Action
For some time I have felt God’s Spirit talking to me about writing accounts of His wonders of grace and love in action into my life and the affects of these awesome generous acts of amazing realities of who He is.
I have a dear friend, whom I love so much, that often would say, “It’s not me, It is Jesus in me.” She also would say, “I belong to Jesus and Jesus belongs to me.”
My precious friend’s name is Monica. I met her in ministry at The Roc. (The Richmond Outreach Center) I am forever changed by her life.
I pray that God will inspire me to write what it is He wants me to write and that I put aside myself for His good and His glory only.
Holy Spirit please touch me now as I write, writing only your words and may these words enter those whom you have chosen to read these words. Touch the heart of the person who is reading this story about your love and grace. You are greater than any thing man can think. Without you we are dust and failures. But You, Oh God, are our Healer, Teacher, Restorer, and Savior of our costly souls. Because of You, we breathe.
I love to talk about God and what He does and the experiences He alone can do.
It is my favorite thing to do, is talk of Him and how awesome He is.
My Story is His story in my life. He told me that once, years ago.
I have struggled with sickness, weakness and fatigue for so long. I am no stranger to being sick and tired of being sick and tired.
Life is hard, but God is good all the time.
I have experienced Him in profound ways, deep and personal ways, only He can do.
If you really think on it…. So have you. You have something to tell, something only He did for you.
After all, Jesus is real and active and moving in great and mighty ways, deep and personal just for you.
I will tell you a story of an account of God in action.
In Spring 1999. I became pregnant with my 2nd child. On July 4th, I began to feel very sick…in an odd way, like something wasn’t right inside my womb.
I was about 4 months along. I began to bleed. I went to the hospital. Before I knew what was going on, a Chaplin came in to tell me how sorry she was at my loss. I became filled with anguish and felt very dizzy.
After that day, I was in a fog for a couple of days…worse yet, a DNC could not be performed until 4 days after that day at the hospital.
On the way home from the hospital, my husband and I went to a restaurant to get a quick bite, and to also try to compose our thoughts before going home to our 5 year old son, Jonathan.
Sitting there, overwhelmed, I couldn’t eat. My husband said something about how he felt.
I didn’t hear him. I barely could acknowledge myself sitting there.
I then saw the look of pain on his face, but didn’t dare accept it. I could not.
I told him, “You got to be a rock for me.” At that moment, He buried his grief and became strong for me. What I asked of him was something beyond my own comprehension. What it did inside of him, was hard. I saw it.
I knew I could not comfort him. I had nothing in me to give to him.
My Aunt Cindi came to be with me and my family for awhile to help take care of us and encourage us the best she could. I was grateful and felt like with her there, everyone would be okay and their needs met. I went to bed.
I was mad at God.
I went to bed, whispering to Him out loud, “How can you allow this to happen?” “I am mad at you.” “It is not fair.” “You are God, You can do anything you want.” “So why did you take my baby?”
Crying, I feel asleep.
I had a dream. A very real dream. Every detail was clear and still is.
I dreamt I was in a beautiful bed filled with white sheets and blankets and tall posts with white sashes blowing gently from the posts at each corner of the bed. All around me is the most beautiful lush green grass and plants. I was in the bed in the middle of all this. Beside the bed, Jesus is kneeling pulling up plants and replanting. I said to Him, “What are you doing?”
He said, “To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: A time to be born and a time to die; a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted.”
I said, “No Jesus, this is not fair.”
I woke up crying and ran into the kitchen…there in the kitchen was Cindi and my husband.
I said, “You will not believe what God just said to me.”
I told them about the dream. I was crying and shaking.
I said, “Who does He think He is, I am mad. He took my baby.”
Cindi looked me straight in the eyes and pointed her finger toward me and said, “Who do you think you are!” “Are you talking that way about your God?” “The God you tell me so many wonderful things about.” “The God you feel so highly for and love.”
She began to quote parts of Job 38 and Job 39. With passion.
I could only stand there without words and listen with astonishment.
I said to her, “Do you know what you are saying!?” I ran and grabbed my Bible and showed her what she was saying.
She said, “I didn’t know that.” “I have never read that before, how can I know that?”
I went back to bed, feeling very different. Corrected and humbled. Asking God to forgive me of my attitude toward Him. Cindi and David went out on the back porch with the Bible, to talk about it and Jesus.
I rested well.
After about a week or so, Cindi went back to her home. I was still grieving, but with a different attitude toward God.
I decided to go to the Food Lion to get some thing for my family. I went in feeling sad and empty. I could literally feel the emptiness in my womb. I was walking down an aisle
And I said inside myself. “God I feel so sad still and empty.” “I need you.”
After a little while I was checking out at the register and I began to feel a magnetic pull toward the front door entrance of the store. There I saw a man and woman standing inside, straight in front of me. The man had on a pants suit and the woman a dress. Their hands were raised up in the air, in prayer. They were looking straight at me and praying. I couldn’t take my eyes off them. It seemed like time stopped. There was only that moment. I looked around to see if anybody else was seeing what I was seeing. Nope, no one, not a clue. I knew they were there just for me. Sent by God to pray for me. I felt my heart squeeze. I felt a little lighter, not so heavy or weary.
Later, about a couple of months go by…My husband’s parents hand long time family friends to visit them from New York. Charlie and Sharon.
They decided to drop by to see us on their way back home. Actually, what Charlie said was, God told him to stop at our house and pray for David; my husband.
We got in a circle and they began to pray for healing for David’s great sorrow over losing our baby. I saw my husband crumble and heave with tears. A snap went off in me like a fire cracker. I saw him. I saw my husband. With clear eyes.
I had forgot what I said to him, in the restaurant. Oh how it must have impacted him.
It replayed in the theater of my mind. I felt sorry, remorseful. I said to myself…what did I do to him?
I instantly felt compelled to comfort him and grieve with him.
I didn’t even allow myself to think of his grief before. I felt I couldn’t handle it before. I knew I could not have. But now I could and I would.
Later, David and I talked and prayed together. I asked him to forgive me for not being there for him. I told him I was proud of him and he was everything I needed him to be.
But I wasn’t there for him and I was sorry. We cried together and hugged.
I then got an idea. Our anniversary was coming up and David loves the beach…so we made plans to go to a hotel for the weekend over looking Va. Beach.
We wrote a letter together to our baby, whom we named Sparrow. A spiritual name, not a regular name. It comforted us to call the baby that. We knew too that the baby was a boy. We wrote a letter to him and went to the store and bought a big balloon and decided we would got to the beach shore and tie the note to the balloon and send it of to him. It was very healing for us. Together.
You know, to this day, whenever my husband thinks of our Sparrow, no matter where David is, if he is traveling, a Sparrow flies with him along side him and then crosses in front of him and goes upward and out of sight, at those times. If he is looking out a window or standing outside during those thoughtful times, a Sparrow will also come a and fly to him and land near him and then fly upward, out of sight.
Jesus loves you profoundly. He cares so much about your life and every detail concerning your life. You can tell Him anything and trust Him with everything.
He takes good care of His own.
Today will you let Him take good care of you?
Kim Wenrich
2 Corinthians 5:17
Psalms 139
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Gods-Girls-Most-Honorable-and-Beautiful-Among-All-Women/248867505178819
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Friday, July 9, 2010
The Garden
The Garden
What is in the garden of our heart?
That space in the pit of our heart?
That spot can be anything. Anger, resentment, jealously, spite, hatred, strife, blaming, pride, destructiveness, revenge, self-hatred, self-pity, manipulation, controlling, perversion, critical spirit, violence, abusive personality, rebellion, harshness, disobedience, judgmental, fear, self-rejection….Any one of us, who reads this can name at least one of these, that is in our heart.
Guess what…those are bad fruit, rotten fruit. Those kind of fruit, grow deep down with their roots. Intertwining with each other in our hearts. They make the heart hard….the spirit dark.
When you look at a garden…when the soil is fresh, moist, and has plenty of light and water…the plants that grow there flourish, thrive. You see butterflies around and birds near it. Life is drawn to it. Every now and then a rabbit takes refuge there and nibbles on something and you watch it hop away. You admire it. It makes you feel good to look at it and you may think, “Wow, this has really grown nice and big.” “I really enjoy looking at this and being apart of this.”
Beside it, there is another garden. It is dark, hard and has many rocks in it. It is so dry there. Hardly any light is on that area and it doesn’t get any water. Only thistles and weeds are growing out of that ground. There is no life there. Not even a bug or worm is there. They even said, “no thank you, that is no place for me.”
You think to yourself, “That looks so awful, I wonder if I can do anything about it, make it come alive.”
You bend over, reach out your hand and try to pull a few weeds out. You tug and pull and it just will not come up. You then decide, to use both your hands…this time with all your strength, with great effort, a weed pulls out. But you notice, that there are so many roots and you realize those roots are tied in with all the other roots. You may say then, “My God, how will I ever get all this out!”
You then wonder should you just give up on it. It is just too much work.
It is too hard. You can’t do it by yourself.
Here is the difference.
You don’t have to do it by yourself. See the garden is your heart. You do need help to get out all those bad roots. I know someone that can help you.
I had been talking to the Lord about the deep seeded pain and hurts in my life. I wanted to grow closer to my God and I wanted the junk, that bad fruit out of my heart. I wanted the Fruit of the Holy Spirit to be alive within me…but for that to happen the deep roots of the rotten fruit and weeds had to come out first. This was a process for me.
I learned that the rotten fruit and weeds are resentment, hurt, hatred, bitterness, anger, gossip, malice. Etc.
They grow wild and the roots mingle with each other, deep in your heart. How can good fruit grow in that? It can’t. It has to come out. Pulling out weeds hurts. But the results are incredible.
Here is my experience. I had to learn to trust God with my emotions, my thoughts and feelings. He gave all that to me, He created me. I needed to capture my thoughts and forgive. I asked God to please forgive me for harboring and feeding into the weeds in my heart. I asked Him to please help me get that junk out and grow the pretty things of Him instead. I had been used to complaining about my past and recent hurts. I needed to train myself to go to God instead.
So I began this journey.
I was put to the test right away. A person came over and was not kind to me at all. Said very hurtful things, that entered deep into my heart like a shooting dart, tipped with poison. Intentionally to cause pain. Normally my reaction is to go to my room for a few days, with a 2 liter bottle of Coke, 4 or 5 candy bars, (king size), a bag of chips and a pack of cigarettes and cry and cry. Damage upon damage.
At this particular incident, I had a choice. I remembered my conversation with God and I didn’t want this to add another twisted root into my heart.
As this person stood there, waiting for those mean spirited words to take effect in me…With tears building in my eyes, I turned, went straight to my room. I grabbed my Bible on the way. (no food, etc.)
Leaving that person standing there in that hurtful atmosphere and the linger of those hateful words in the air. I went in to my room, shut the door. This time, instead of eating, drinking, smoking and telling myself bad things….I talked to God.
I was crying. I talked to God out loud. “God, did you hear that???? That hurt me. I don’t want it to enter me. I don’t want to dwell on that and make that apart of me. Will you please help me get through this. Please take this hurt from me.”
Then it occurred to me to pray for that person. This was hard to do. Pray for those who hurt me????? I swallowed hard and gave it a try. I didn’t know what to say. I asked God to help with the words. I said, “God, please bless and keep “that person” I feel angry toward “that person” and I don’t want to pray for them. But because it is the right thing to do, from my heart, I ask you to bless them and keep them. That was it and that was all I said in that prayer. But I did it.
A baby step to something bigger.
I felt my heart squeeze with goodness as I prayed. Like bad was squeezing out and it felt plumped up with something good in place. I could actually feel this in me.
I stayed in my room until this person left. Protecting myself from more possible hurt.
Later that week, I was washing dishes and thinking about God. An image came across my mind. Something from my past. Something that I buried deep inside. It came across my mind’s eye like a short movie clip. I could feel the reality of it. The full impact of the emotions and pain it caused me. It took my breath away and I fell to my knees. I cried. God said, “What are you going to do with this Kim?” “Are you going to keep this or give it to me?”
I bowed my head in tears and I said, “God I give this to you, it hurts too much to keep, I want you to take the hurt of this away from me.”
I felt something strange inside my heart, even in the core of me.”
I felt a tingle, and I felt my heart squeeze like before, like something letting go and then plump up. I could fill a release and a fill up.
I knew God was doing this and working on me. I was grateful and thanked God for it. Moments like this went on from time to time and still happen.
God shows me things that need to be out of me and He gives me the choice to hold on to it or let it go. Not every pain has brought me to my knees or to tears. But He is a gentleman and a great healer, full of compassion and love. Sometimes, it is a simple as my saying, “I give that to you God and I forgive.”
Sometimes he shows me things that are so hidden and deep, things I had buried to forget. But even though it is buried deep in me, God doesn’t want it there. He wants to get it all out and not to be a part of me. He loves and cares for me that much.
Pain and hurt, causes a reaction in our personality, it effects how we have relationships, how we conduct our lives daily. We should never live for tomorrow or in the past.
We need to walk in today, in the moment. It is a gift.
God is not, I was or I will be; He is I AM. This is what I am learning. The Holy Spirit guides and directs me. Teaching me and revealing to me the deeps things of God. Drawing me into a love relationship with our Heavenly Father.
I fail…so much…..I fail….But God never fails me.
People can tell me what God thinks, feels and wants from me. I can learn from that…But what I love the most, what I value the most…is when God is in action personally in my life.
It is not always easy, to work on my heart’s garden. In fact, not once has it been easy. God doesn’t play. He gets to it. He is serious about me. He is not superficial or just sitting there with a big stick ready to pound my every fault. I have learned He loves me even in correction. He doesn’t abuse or press me down. He lifts up and draws me close to His side, never letting me go. Unconditional love.
God replaces that bad, rotten fruit with His fruit…The Fruit of the Spirit.
Galatians 5: 22, 23
The Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance.
Other good fruit: (some of which are the same as above) kindness, faithfulness, self-control, good works, fruitfulness, forgiving, non-judgmental, accepting, humility, wisdom, servant’s heart, contentment, encourager, happiness, obedience to God’s Word, caring, loves to read and study the Bible, love for the truth, prayerfulness, cheerfulness, strong faith, hopefulness, sweetness, integrity.
For every bad fruit, you and God work on to get out of the garden of your heart…He replaces it with a good fruit.
Try it. Ask God to do this. Be open to His personal, special touch into your heart.
Ask Jesus to open your heart and mind to receive His healing, His love into your life.
Thank Him. No one can do for you like He can. Let Him cradle you close to His side, and tend to the garden of your heart, today.
Kimberly Wenrich
Two Wolves
An old Cherokee Legend
An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.
“It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves.
One is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.”
He continued, “The other is good. He is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith. The same fight is going on inside you, and inside every other person, too.”
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grand-father, “Which wolf will win?”
The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Gods-Girls-Most-Honorable-and-Beautiful-Among-All-Women/248867505178819
What is in the garden of our heart?
That space in the pit of our heart?
That spot can be anything. Anger, resentment, jealously, spite, hatred, strife, blaming, pride, destructiveness, revenge, self-hatred, self-pity, manipulation, controlling, perversion, critical spirit, violence, abusive personality, rebellion, harshness, disobedience, judgmental, fear, self-rejection….Any one of us, who reads this can name at least one of these, that is in our heart.
Guess what…those are bad fruit, rotten fruit. Those kind of fruit, grow deep down with their roots. Intertwining with each other in our hearts. They make the heart hard….the spirit dark.
When you look at a garden…when the soil is fresh, moist, and has plenty of light and water…the plants that grow there flourish, thrive. You see butterflies around and birds near it. Life is drawn to it. Every now and then a rabbit takes refuge there and nibbles on something and you watch it hop away. You admire it. It makes you feel good to look at it and you may think, “Wow, this has really grown nice and big.” “I really enjoy looking at this and being apart of this.”
Beside it, there is another garden. It is dark, hard and has many rocks in it. It is so dry there. Hardly any light is on that area and it doesn’t get any water. Only thistles and weeds are growing out of that ground. There is no life there. Not even a bug or worm is there. They even said, “no thank you, that is no place for me.”
You think to yourself, “That looks so awful, I wonder if I can do anything about it, make it come alive.”
You bend over, reach out your hand and try to pull a few weeds out. You tug and pull and it just will not come up. You then decide, to use both your hands…this time with all your strength, with great effort, a weed pulls out. But you notice, that there are so many roots and you realize those roots are tied in with all the other roots. You may say then, “My God, how will I ever get all this out!”
You then wonder should you just give up on it. It is just too much work.
It is too hard. You can’t do it by yourself.
Here is the difference.
You don’t have to do it by yourself. See the garden is your heart. You do need help to get out all those bad roots. I know someone that can help you.
I had been talking to the Lord about the deep seeded pain and hurts in my life. I wanted to grow closer to my God and I wanted the junk, that bad fruit out of my heart. I wanted the Fruit of the Holy Spirit to be alive within me…but for that to happen the deep roots of the rotten fruit and weeds had to come out first. This was a process for me.
I learned that the rotten fruit and weeds are resentment, hurt, hatred, bitterness, anger, gossip, malice. Etc.
They grow wild and the roots mingle with each other, deep in your heart. How can good fruit grow in that? It can’t. It has to come out. Pulling out weeds hurts. But the results are incredible.
Here is my experience. I had to learn to trust God with my emotions, my thoughts and feelings. He gave all that to me, He created me. I needed to capture my thoughts and forgive. I asked God to please forgive me for harboring and feeding into the weeds in my heart. I asked Him to please help me get that junk out and grow the pretty things of Him instead. I had been used to complaining about my past and recent hurts. I needed to train myself to go to God instead.
So I began this journey.
I was put to the test right away. A person came over and was not kind to me at all. Said very hurtful things, that entered deep into my heart like a shooting dart, tipped with poison. Intentionally to cause pain. Normally my reaction is to go to my room for a few days, with a 2 liter bottle of Coke, 4 or 5 candy bars, (king size), a bag of chips and a pack of cigarettes and cry and cry. Damage upon damage.
At this particular incident, I had a choice. I remembered my conversation with God and I didn’t want this to add another twisted root into my heart.
As this person stood there, waiting for those mean spirited words to take effect in me…With tears building in my eyes, I turned, went straight to my room. I grabbed my Bible on the way. (no food, etc.)
Leaving that person standing there in that hurtful atmosphere and the linger of those hateful words in the air. I went in to my room, shut the door. This time, instead of eating, drinking, smoking and telling myself bad things….I talked to God.
I was crying. I talked to God out loud. “God, did you hear that???? That hurt me. I don’t want it to enter me. I don’t want to dwell on that and make that apart of me. Will you please help me get through this. Please take this hurt from me.”
Then it occurred to me to pray for that person. This was hard to do. Pray for those who hurt me????? I swallowed hard and gave it a try. I didn’t know what to say. I asked God to help with the words. I said, “God, please bless and keep “that person” I feel angry toward “that person” and I don’t want to pray for them. But because it is the right thing to do, from my heart, I ask you to bless them and keep them. That was it and that was all I said in that prayer. But I did it.
A baby step to something bigger.
I felt my heart squeeze with goodness as I prayed. Like bad was squeezing out and it felt plumped up with something good in place. I could actually feel this in me.
I stayed in my room until this person left. Protecting myself from more possible hurt.
Later that week, I was washing dishes and thinking about God. An image came across my mind. Something from my past. Something that I buried deep inside. It came across my mind’s eye like a short movie clip. I could feel the reality of it. The full impact of the emotions and pain it caused me. It took my breath away and I fell to my knees. I cried. God said, “What are you going to do with this Kim?” “Are you going to keep this or give it to me?”
I bowed my head in tears and I said, “God I give this to you, it hurts too much to keep, I want you to take the hurt of this away from me.”
I felt something strange inside my heart, even in the core of me.”
I felt a tingle, and I felt my heart squeeze like before, like something letting go and then plump up. I could fill a release and a fill up.
I knew God was doing this and working on me. I was grateful and thanked God for it. Moments like this went on from time to time and still happen.
God shows me things that need to be out of me and He gives me the choice to hold on to it or let it go. Not every pain has brought me to my knees or to tears. But He is a gentleman and a great healer, full of compassion and love. Sometimes, it is a simple as my saying, “I give that to you God and I forgive.”
Sometimes he shows me things that are so hidden and deep, things I had buried to forget. But even though it is buried deep in me, God doesn’t want it there. He wants to get it all out and not to be a part of me. He loves and cares for me that much.
Pain and hurt, causes a reaction in our personality, it effects how we have relationships, how we conduct our lives daily. We should never live for tomorrow or in the past.
We need to walk in today, in the moment. It is a gift.
God is not, I was or I will be; He is I AM. This is what I am learning. The Holy Spirit guides and directs me. Teaching me and revealing to me the deeps things of God. Drawing me into a love relationship with our Heavenly Father.
I fail…so much…..I fail….But God never fails me.
People can tell me what God thinks, feels and wants from me. I can learn from that…But what I love the most, what I value the most…is when God is in action personally in my life.
It is not always easy, to work on my heart’s garden. In fact, not once has it been easy. God doesn’t play. He gets to it. He is serious about me. He is not superficial or just sitting there with a big stick ready to pound my every fault. I have learned He loves me even in correction. He doesn’t abuse or press me down. He lifts up and draws me close to His side, never letting me go. Unconditional love.
God replaces that bad, rotten fruit with His fruit…The Fruit of the Spirit.
Galatians 5: 22, 23
The Fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, and temperance.
Other good fruit: (some of which are the same as above) kindness, faithfulness, self-control, good works, fruitfulness, forgiving, non-judgmental, accepting, humility, wisdom, servant’s heart, contentment, encourager, happiness, obedience to God’s Word, caring, loves to read and study the Bible, love for the truth, prayerfulness, cheerfulness, strong faith, hopefulness, sweetness, integrity.
For every bad fruit, you and God work on to get out of the garden of your heart…He replaces it with a good fruit.
Try it. Ask God to do this. Be open to His personal, special touch into your heart.
Ask Jesus to open your heart and mind to receive His healing, His love into your life.
Thank Him. No one can do for you like He can. Let Him cradle you close to His side, and tend to the garden of your heart, today.
Kimberly Wenrich
Two Wolves
An old Cherokee Legend
An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.
“It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves.
One is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.”
He continued, “The other is good. He is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion and faith. The same fight is going on inside you, and inside every other person, too.”
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grand-father, “Which wolf will win?”
The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Gods-Girls-Most-Honorable-and-Beautiful-Among-All-Women/248867505178819
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