FOR I KNOW THE PLANS I HAVE FOR YOU...

"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for [your] welfare, not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. You will call to Me and come and pray to Me and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you....." Jeremiah 29:11-13


When God tenderly formed us in our mother's womb, He had a plan. Each life has God's fingerprints upon it. Each of us is a unique creation, fashioned by the Master's hand to accomplish the purpose for which we were designed.


Along the journey we call LIFE, God brings many circumstances to bear upon our life that will chart the course of our direction. IF we are cooperating with Him, He will lead us and show us HIS way. And, even when we are NOT listening, He still has His hand upon us, often pulling us out of messes we have gotten ourselves into or rescuing us from poor decisions and giving us second, third, and fourth chances to get it right.


From the time I was a child, God has been a very real part of my life. How I thank Him for that! Not that I have always done everything He wanted me to. Not by a long shot! But...at the center of my heart has been a desire to please Him, to serve Him and to obey Him.


When I read through the PUROSE DRIVE LIFE by Rick Warren the first time, one of the things that struck me was one of the last chapters entitled SHARING YOUR LIFE MESSAGE. In this chapter Warren writes, "You have a storehouse of experiences that God wants to use to bring others into His family." He further stated that those experiences included four specific areas:

* Your Testimony
* Your Life Lessons
* Your Godly Passions
*The Good News of Jesus Christ


He encouraged the reader to think back over their life at the experiences that they had had and see how God had brought them to this particular moment. As I did that, I was suddenly awestruck to see how God had used one experience to build upon another throughout my entire life. Two things stood out....writing and speaking!


Looking back I can see how God has put me in different situations that required me to both write and speak or teach. I had never seen them all together, but as I looked down the corridors of my life I began to see that God was teaching me, molding me, expanding my horizons and stretching me with each new experience. I was amazed at how each experience along this journey had equipped me for the next.

When my "nest" became empty a few years ago, I began to seek the Lord about how He would choose to use me during this last quarter of my life. That was just the time I read Warren’s book. I began to get a vision for writing and speaking. Slowly it seems, God is opening doors and shedding light upon His way for me along this path. Do I know the final destination? No, but I seem to hear Him constantly whisper to me "Just take the next step, Beloved", and so I do.


Now the next step could POSSIBLY be a trip to North Carolina to the Proverbs 31 Ministries She Speaks Conference to be held in June of this year!! Only I will HAVE to have a scholarship to go! The exciting part is that one is being offered by Lysa Terkeurst and Proverbs 31 Ministries and I am certainly hoping to win it! Please check out the link under Don’t Miss the Blessing on the side column of this blog to read more about this amazing conference. Not only is this year’s conference for writers and speakers, it is also for BLOGGERS!!! So even if you do not see yourself pursuing a writing or speaking career, God can use you through a blog!


I think one of the reasons I have never seriously pursued a writing career is because it seemed egotistical to me to think that anyone would want to read what I wrote! However, I do recognize that whatever talent or abilities I have are God’s. He has lit this passion in me for a reason and I believe that reason is to glorify Him and to "write His answer". (Habakkkuk 2:2)


In her wonderful devotional for writers, WRITE HIS ANSWER, Marlene Bagnull made a statement that reverberated through my heart and soul "We are literature missionaries! While we me may never go more than a few hundred miles from our homes, our written words can go around the world and make a great difference for all eternity." If one word that I write or one lesson that I teach can bring someone to know the all encompassing love of Jesus Christ then my purpose on this earth will have been fulfilled.


My desire is to write His answer in a way that will please Him and draw others to Him.