We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us…if it is to encourage, then encourage. Romans 12: 6,8

I’m going through a season.  A season of sifting.  It’s been nine months tomorrow since my last visit to Aruba, and I feel like I’m having spiritual birthing pains.  I’ve come with expectancy that God is about to move, and am trying very hard not to just “expect” as though He owes me something.  No, He doesn’t owe me anything. But He promised me everything.  He said if I’m here I have purpose, and my primary purpose is to glorify Him.  His glory for our good.

I hurt something fierce.  I know I was created with purpose, and I believe in part He’s absolutely called me to encouragement.  It’s who I am and something I’m coming to realize is IN me.  My constant prayer is that He use me, for His glory and the ultimate good of His people.  Love God, love people, serve.

This spiritual attack that’s been going on for over two years is coming to a head.  It has to. I can’t anymore.

In my prayer time this morning, God showed me a cactus flower I’d snapped the day before.  I began thanking Him for making me the first brilliant red flower opening due to significant rain and storms.  It’s beautiful and even enhanced photos don’t do the splendor of this flower justice.

But…wow.  The pickers.  The thorny vessel it grows on.  How does the brilliant flower encourage the other flowers to open even as she blooms alone among the thorns?

I’m SO tired of blooming alone.  But…the rains come.  And there are other flowers out there, I just have to find them.  And…if He calls me to the other flowers He WILL lead me to them, and them to me.

The pickers tell me to stop trying.  They tell me it’s no use trying to bloom around them, and even sometimes that there is something wrong with the way I bloom.  But I hear the other blooms’ muffled cries.  Their need for encouragement.  I must overcome.  And I can ONLY do it in Him….matter of fact, I can’t do it at all.  But HE can.

Lord, please show me how to bloom among the thorns.  If I get hurt, and I know sometimes I will, you said so, please don’t let me respond in-kind.  Please remind me of my beauty even as the thorns in my life tell me subtly or overtly I won’t ever measure up.  I am wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14), I know it full well, and I pray as fervently as I know how that you expose immediately the attacks of the evil one when he uses people against me and my fragile heart. Please Lord, overcome on my behalf, I’m SO tired.

You’ve called me.  I’m grateful.  I want to express my gratitude to you in leading others to a realization of the same unique beauty that lives inside of them.  Please, make me strong without losing my softness when the attacks come.  You’ve literally never let me down before, and you aren’t starting now.  Thanks be to God and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen and amen.

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”  John 16:33