God is our refuge and our strength, A very present help in trouble. (Psalm 46:1)

We, as people often get beside ourselves when we go through trials, or just when life decides to throw us a curve ball. Often we begin to panic and wonder, what to do. The Bible tells us in Psalm 46 that God will be there for us at any time or place. In psalms when God is referred to as a refuge and strength, the writer is actually referring to God as an impenetrable force.
If you remember correctly, in Jesus' day the cities had huge walls that would protect them from attacks and other mishaps. However, we also no that none of the walls were impenetrable. The walls of Jericho were close, but not quite impenetrable. Of course, it was with the help of God that the walls of Jericho fell, but thats another story for another day.
But you see even in their time of need God helped his children and came to their rescue once again. They were in trouble and God told them to quietly march around the walls for six days and on the seventh day to shout and dance and praise God. When God's children obeyed him the walls fell as if they were nothing more than cardboard walls stuck outside the city.
Next time you feel alone and every where you look you feel as if you are surrounded by trouble. Remember God will come to your aid, you are his child. God will never forsake you or leave you to fight your battles alone. God is a strength for the weak, boldness for the meek, and any and everything we need him to be.

And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity. (1 Corinthians 13:13)

In this verse the word charity is a synonym to that of love. Charity and love are the same thing, according to this verse. Often times we consider charity as giving to the poor, performing some sort of community service. Don't get me wrong these are forms of charity/ love, but you can also do these things without love. We take advantage of love.
Paul was writing to the church at Corinth and elaborating that you must have love in all you do. God gives us other attributes such as faith and hope, but without love nothing matters. Paul is explaining that of the three of the great attributes the greatest of these three is love.
The Bible also says that you can worship, clap your hands, shout, speak in tongues, dance, and pray for people and act like an extremely holy person. But, if you do all these things without love in your heart, it is nothing but a bunch of noise to God. All it is, is a big show and an insult to God. It only becomes an insult to God if you have no love in your heart.
I pray that God keeps my heart filled with love and continues to make my love for people grow. As a child of God I want to have a burden for people and be able to reach out to those who need God. I want to be able to help those that need me and at the same time show them that I am doing this out of the love that God has helped me sustain. God loves us, sand he loves everyone. If God can love everyone, doesn't that mean we should find it in our hearts to love each other also. God wants us to be like him, and if God does it then it just requires us to do it so much more.
Remember to love people, you don't have to get alnog with them or especially like being around them or like their ways, but you MUST love them.

"Behold, the days are coming," says the Lord God, "That I will send a famine on the land, Not a famine of bread, Nor a thirst for water, But of hearing the words of the Lord." (Amos 8:11)

We as children of God take advantage of being able to go to church every Wednesday and Sunday and having the word feed to us by our pastors. We often go to church and get to hear the word of God and don't take the time to read our Bibles at home. In this scripture God talks about sending a famine to the land, and not a famine of food or water, but of hearing the preached word of God.
But, as God's children, this should not affect us they way it will the common, unsaved man. Why, shouldn't it affect as bad? Because we should know enough of the word of God that we can get what we need for that day. We should, as the Bible states, have the word of God hidden in our hearts. When you hide the word of God in your heart, no man can take it from you. If Bibles were to become non-existant, then we should still be able to quote scripture after scripture. We need to dwell more on the study of God's word and getting it instilled in us. Rather than taking it for advantage and putting off the reading of our Bibles. the more we study our Bible, the more we know and the stronger we are as Christians. The stronger we become as Christians the harder it becomes to "shake" or have our faith in God waivered.
Continue to read and study the Bible and grow in God. When we no longer need to grow in God we need to become worried about ourselves, because we will never be able to know enough to stop learning about God and what he can and will do in our lives.

Be sober,be vigilant; because your adversary the devil,as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour. (1 Peter 5:8)

If you have ever been camping, and I'm sure we all have been on at least one camping trip during our lives. What is one of the first things you do when you get to the campsite? Build a fire, right? Do you know why we build fires at campsites? Not only to keep warm during the night, or cook food; but we build fires to keep away the pests, and other wildlife. Such as a bear, lion, raccoon, and others. Throughout the night you wake up every few hours to make sure the fire is still burning and stoke it some more. As long as that fire burns the wildlife stays away or at least stays in the shadows. But, the minute that fire goes out and you leave it alone here they come to invade your camp.
Well, Christians are the same way. We have a fire burning inside of us, "the fire of God," there are things we do to keep it up too. But, why do we keep up our fire? As long as we keep feeding our fire and stoking our fire, the enemy, Satan stays away, mostly. He lurks in the shadows, when we let our fire die down just a little bit and the shadows begin to get closer to our fire, then the enemy begins to get closer. When we let our fire burn completely out then, Satan invades our camp and makes it one HUGE mess, and attacks us.
As Christians we need to keep our fire inside of us nice and strong stoking it everyday, read the Bible, 5 min. of prayer time, whatever it takes to keep your fire going, you need to make time during the day to do that. The more we feed our fire and stoke our fire the harder it is for it to die down or be extinguished. But, the more we allow ourselves to slip and become unfaithful to these things the easier it is for an attack to happen and the easier it is to get knocked down. Sometimes, it also makes it extremely hard to get back up and keep fighting. Be on the safe side, don't let your fire die down even the slightest little bit, if it does anything, it should be getting stronger and harder to extinguish.

Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. (Psalm 46:10)

Most of the time we act on impulse and don't think about what to do in situations that frustrate or upset us. Often the situation would turn out better and in our favor if we would take the time to remember this one small verse. It is no question in our mind as Christians that God, is God. But, we sometime put limits on God. We don't limit him on purpose, it's just human nature that we fall subject to.
To "be still" in this verse is not meaning in order for some preparation to take place, it is talking about getting ready for judgement, that is why the rest of the verse goes on to say "I will be exalted among heathen, I will be exalted in the earth." When Judgement day comes everyone and everything is going to realize that God is God and in that moment they will begin to realize that God is one to be exalted, praised, and worshipped.
But, in those times when we get upset or frustrated if we would stand still and listen for the voice of God, our circumstances would change. Instead of jumping to conclusions and acting on impulse, give God a chance to tell you what to do in your circumstance. Let God lead and guide you in the way he wants you to go.
Why waste our time running in circles and not getting anywhere, don't limit God. Don't just allow God to move just when you go to church or prayer ask God to move in every aspect of your life. Allow him to move at you job, in your car, in your house while you clean or watch t.v., allow him to move at anytime or place in your life.
If we would listen more carefully and talk less, God would be able to speak more clearly and understandably in our lives. Listen twice as much as you talk. I found it works a lot better than talking,and talking, and not listening to what God has to say. Next time circumstances get rough or you get upset or frustrated, take a deep breath, be still, know God is God, and listen for his voice.

Saying, "Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm." (1 Chronicles 16:22)

Have you ever done something you knew was dangerous, or could become dangerous? I can honeslty say I have. It was only the hand of God that kept me from being seriously injured, while doing the "not so smart" things.
This scripture is a warning, the writer, is sending a warning from God about doing anything that may harm, hurt, or hinder his anointed. In this scripture the anointed are the servants of God. Those people who have dedicated their will and life to God.
Hurting those who are anointed by God, is like sticking your hand to a hot stove, you can feel the heat, and you know it's going to hurt, so don't do it. God repremands those who harm the anointed of God. Harming God's anointed is a very dangerous thing. We need to encourage and stand by those who are anointed by God. If you notice in the Bible any time a king or someone wronged one of God's anointed, God removed them from the king or wrong doer from their place of power.
Let's stand behind, up lift, and encourage those anointed by God. Instead of trying to tear them down, or analyzing everything they do, just trying to catch them doing something wrong. That should not be the mind set of God's people. We should try to encourage and lift each other up. The old saying somes to mind United, we stand, divided we fall. Lets stand united as God's people instead of trying to seperate ourselves and see what we can accomplish. We would be able to accomplish a lot more for God.

For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, of love, and of a sound mind. (2 Timothy 1:7)

I have come to appreciate this scripture more and more as I have gotten older. Thanks to a certain lady that I hold in very high regard, this scripture has been drilled into me over and over again. I never knew that when scared quoting a scripture would give me peace of mind, but it has tremendously. Any time I feel the slightest bit afraid, I quote this scripture, until fear subsides. I don't just say it to myself though. I quote the scripture out loud, for a few reasons. The first reason being fear is a spirit that is not of God. Spirits that aren't of God can't read your mind, so unless you verbalize what you think, then they have no way of knowing. The second reason being that in the Bible it talks about having faith, and it says that if you have the smallest ounce of faith you can say to your mountain move and it will move away from you. The Bible didn't say if you thought the word move or if you said the word move in your mind, or subconscious. The Bible said if you SAY move, you have to verbalize once again.
So next time when you feel frightened, scared, confused, or upset; try quoting this scripture and see if it doesn't help. Don't forget to say it out loud when you quote it otherwise the spirit of fear, confusion, etc. has no clue what you are thinking and therefore won't be affected as much as if you said it out loud.

and said, "Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven."

Jesus was talking to the people and telling them "become as little children." I never really understood this growing up, I couldn't figure out why Jesus would want adults to be like little children. As I read the scripture again as a teenager/ young adult, I realized why Jesus told them to "become as little children."
Little children have greater faith than adults, we have great faith as a child, but the older we get the less faith we tend to have. As children we believe in the tooth fairy, santa, the Easter bunny, and all sorts of stuff that we never can "see". Children don't question what they can't see most of the time because the tend to have a greater faith. Some children have seen angels, and other supernatural things we as adults can't see. My cousins little boy saw and angel and when his mom turned around she saw nothing and this was a 2 yr. old child at the time, who thought he was seeing his daddy after his daddy had left and gone to work. I saw things when I was a small child. My little sisters saw angels as children. We as adults aren't in tune with our faith enough. Small children walk by faith and not by sight better than adults. That's why Jesus was telling the people "become as little children." We as adults and the people of God need to learn to better ourselves at walking by faith and not by sight.

Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you: (1 Peter 4:12)

Many times we, as human beigns have the tendency to question why we go through trials. Even as men and women of God we often wonder why we go through the things we do. After reading this scrpiture over and over again I have become to understand why I go through things each and everyday.I hope what I have found helps you as much as it does me.
In this scripture, the people that Peter wrote this letter to are wondering why God is allowing them to go through trials. I can only imagine that some of them were thinking, "has God forsaken us, or does he just not care about us anymore." Because as people we naturally think the worst of things. But, in the letter Peter is explaining that even the beloved people of God go through trial and tests. When he refers to a fiery trial, he is making a refernce to that of a metal worker. Take for instance a Goldsmith. A gold smith has to take the gold he wants to use to make something and put it through extremely heat to make it malleable enough to bend it and shape it the way he wants it. It alos goes through extreme heat to purify it. God puts us through trials so that he can make us better. He allows us to go through tough times to get all of the impurities out and make us malleable, so that he can shape us and use us the way he wants to.
So, next time you or I go through a trail let's remember to thank God and allow him to put us through that "extreme" heat to get out the impurities and allow him to shape us and use us into what he wants us to be.