Tag: repent

Categories
Believe present

God is with me ALL the time

Sunrise Christmas morning over my park December 2025 Photographed by myself

I was led in bed the other morning thinking about praying when a thought struck me. What if I really believed God was with me all the time? How would that change my thoughts?

It took me back to those thoughts around why organised religion likes the idea of Jesus being born in a stable away from the family so that one would have to go to him to worship him. But it is probably Jesus was born in a safe warm place with family around him. Yes the shepherds and wisemen went to him but for everyone else he was just there.

What if I believed that the Creator of the Universe was just here with me as promised?

The first thought is “I would behave ‘better'” whatever ‘better’ means.

But actually if I really believed that the Creator of the Universe was fully with me it would change my thoughts. How could I not like myself if God loves me? How could I think negative thoughts about myself when God wants to be with me? How could I regret the life I have if God is here with me?

That doesn’t mean my life is perfect, or for that matter has ever been perfect. I have made loads of mistakes, doing things I wish I hadn’t, had things done to me I wish hadn’t been done, but as and when those things cross my mind I repent and forgive – forgiving myself as much as others. Releasing myself and others from any hold that our pasts might have on us [and past can be in the last 10 minutes!!]

I am now working on getting my head round fully believing that God is with me all the time not in some place I have to go to; that I can talk with them all the time because they are here with me and not is some far off place.

I need to be aware of what I think and feel about myself then that good energy can go outwards and onward to others. Remembering always that we can only love others as we love ourselves, only forgive others as we forgive ourselves. And all this is possible because the Creator of the Universe is not just walking with us but is in bed with us, watching TV with us, eating with us, going to work with us, going for a walk with us, and even going to church with us. This not because they are some creepy voyeur but because they love us so much they cannot bear to be apart from us because we are AWESOME just as we are.

Categories
fickle gratitude

Easy To Be Ungrateful

Newborough Beach, Anglesey, June 2024

I had a free day and it had been warm for a few days so I decided to set off for my favourite beach within an hour from my home. But when I got there the wind was blowing wildly and it was cold and overcast. So I still did a stamp along the beach scowling into the wind. Then on the way back I thought I’d check out a coffee shop we’d been meaning to go to. I’d checked its reviews and I was sure it was dog friendly. So in I trot with the dog and was told by the very nice owner that they were not dog friendly inside but I was welcome to sit outside. I was cold and fed up after not having a fun walk on the beach and so did not want to get blown away outside. They sent me to another cafe they were sure were dog friendly which wasn’t!

So there I am in my car grumbling about what a waste of a morning I had had, made worse by the sun then coming out and one of my closer beaches looking blissfully sunny. But of course by then the dog had walked enough and was dozing on the back seat. Also I was grumpy and sullen.

But of course then the revelation came as to what an ungrateful person I was being. Firstly I had been able to drive all the way to this beach, had the time to do it as well as the money. I could afford to stop for a coffee without having to worry about money. So many things to be grateful for – not just the time and the money, but my super little car, my super little dog for company, being safe on the road. And all those things were just for that morning. Lunchtime I was meeting a friend who is one of those true friends who encourages, supports, reprimands and challenges, is open and kind and sharing too. And that doesn’t include all the other great people I have in my life and the great things in my life.

It is so easy to dip down that slipper slope of moaning and complaining, of seeing the negative and not the possible rather than being grateful.

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! [or in other versions “Rejoice in all things”]

Philippians 4:4

It doesn’t say just rejoice when things are going well but “always/ in all things”. But we are a fickle and perverse people and we very quickly go into grumble or worry mode.

But there is no reason to feel guilty because the amazing thing with God is we can repent/say we’re sorry and turn the other way. So at that moment in the car, when I got that revelation that I was being a grumpy, ungrateful mare, I said I was sorry and turned around [repented] and moved into being grateful not just for that morning but actually for the revelation that I was being ungrateful. Sometimes the revelation is as brilliant as the change of behaviour, I think.

But of course, because I am perverse and fickle I have had a few more times when I have been unnecessarily ungrateful when actually I should have “rejoiced” and let deep joy fill my heart. But again I repent and move. Again it is interesting how looking at the world with different eyes makes the world look different. It doesn’t change but I do!

So much of the real deep healing I’ve done has been about turning around and going the other way, of seeing situations in a different light.

Categories
Ash wednesday Valentines Day

Ash Wednesday/Valentine’s Day

kissclipart-ash-wednesday-2017-clipart-lent-ash-wednesday-holy-6287a2d08c995d91

After writing yesterday’s post I got thinking about how this year Valentine’s Day falls on Ash Wednesday [or visa versa] and what that could signify or how it could be brought into something tangible.

So yesterday I talked about how Valentine sacrificed himself for love and really that is what Ash Wednesday starts to ask the Christian Church to look at; 40+ days of moving towards and preparing our hearts towards Christ’s sacrifice on the cross. So there is a time of repentance, a time of reflection, a time of being still and just being. I wondered what that would be like in our relationships, especially our married ones.

Do we ever really take time off to repent, to reflect, to just be still as couples? We give flowers, chocolates, cards, presents, go out for meals, have holidays together, but do we really do what is encouraged from Ash Wednesday – and really delve into those relationships?

So concentrating on the Ash Wednesday/Valentine’s Day connection – how often do we take any regular time out to look at our marriages, to be honest about our marriages, to really repent and really forgive for the hurts we’ve given and received over the however many years we’ve been together?

But then I do wonder if even as Christians we do that whole repenting, pondering, etc stuff of Lent in a superficial way. Or is that just me??

Categories
repent Trust God

Natural Order

I’ve ponder the idea that there is a natural order to things on You Don’t Need To Do It and a bit in Trust Is The Key. And I think this is the same for repentance.

Before I met with God I did many things that were not good – out of survival, though my own wounds, through self-centeredness, fear. Probably fear was a lot of the reason. So when I had this big encounter with God – which really needs to be heard rather than read! – I wanted to dive into this whole repentance thing. I got a friend to show me all the verses in the Bible that mentioned sin so I could make sure I repented of everything. I was amazed at how many I needed to repent of one way or another.

Although this was before I found this lovely prayer in the Anglican service

we have left undone those things which we ought to
have done,
and we have done those things which we ought not to
have done

That really does cover most of our lives!

But I thought even then, even in my zeal for meeting with God, there was a natural order of how it worked for me.

Firstly I was accepted by this group of lovely human beings who had got together to evangelise the housing estate I was living on. I was accepted [belonged] to their coffee morning before I went to their Sunday church.

Secondly I had to meet with God and realise how much God loved me unconditionally. And boy was it an amazing encounter. Only then could I start on this journey of repentance. So I had to trust God, believe in and about God and Jesus, and feel I was important to God, special. If I’d been told on that first coffee morning I ever attended that I had to repent and believe I would have high tailed it out of there.

Thirdly though I had to believe and trust that God and Jesus had forgiven me. Actually that was the easiest bit of it. The hardest was going through the journey of forgiving myself because I had done things that had hurt others a lot. But I know I did it because I trusted in Jesus and God to walk with me and leave me high and dry.

Also the whole repentance/forgiveness thing is a totally ongoing thing, which is probably the fourth part. If I believed it was a one off thing and I couldn’t keep coming back to God again and again and again and again and saying sorry and forgiving other people then, I think, I would be a disappointed person.

So daily I ask forgiveness for “those things which I ought to have done, and I have done those things which we ought not to have done” and I am truly sorry. And I forgive those who hurt and upset me whether they did it on purpose or by accident.

But I cannot do those things if God and Jesus are central part of my life, if I don’t trust them moment by moment, don’t rely on them moment by moment.

I do think that repentance and forgiveness should be much a part of our lives that we don’t need to say it but it is in our actions. It is seen when we don’t bitch about people, don’t hold a grudge, don’t worry about things, aren’t fearful, etc. As I explored a while ago, looking at how sinning is really just missing God’s mark, just missing God’s best for us. And anything for holding a grudge and saying bad stuff about people to fit in with others through to worrying and being fearful are the “sins” most of us do. Very few of us murder or steal, but too many of us don’t trust.

I believe we shouldn’t need to tell people but we should be living it day by day – which is what I felt my youth group were trying to tell me and which I shared in Trust Is The Key

Natural order – Trust that God is there for you and loves you unconditionally then repentance and forgiveness will just flow naturally. Or at least I think so.