Author Archives: Notes of Joy

Always Rejoicing

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Happy Thanksgiving!

Here are some of the things I am thankful for:

-I am a Christian and the Christian people in my life.

-my gift of music

-kindness of others

-family, and friends who like like family (they know who they are)

1 Thessalonians 5:18 says “Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”

Philippians 4:4 says “Rejoice in the Lord Always.”

As Christians it is possible to be thankful every day of the year, other then just when thanksgiving is marked on the calendar.

We are called to be thankful in every season. We will always have many reasons to be grateful to God. We can rejoice and be thankful at all times. We are called to praise Him during the calm season of our lives, and during the seasons of storms.

Whether everything is calm or whether you’re going through a storm. There’s always something to be thankful for.

-Unknown

Trusting God enables us to remain hopeful, joyful, and thankful no matter what we are going through.

Genesis 50:20 says “But as for you, you meant it for evil against me; but God meant it for good”
So when life is going exactly the way you want it to, praise God. When life seems to be completely falling apart, even though it will be hard, still praise Him.

Here are 10 things as Christian we can be thankful for 365 days a year.

1. Our salvation and everlasting life in heaven! (John 3:16)

2. The forgiveness of our ALL our sins! (Psalm 103:12)

3. God’s unconditional love for us! (Romans 8:38-39)

4. God’s promises being yes and amen! (2 Corinthians 1:20)

5. Radical deliverance from addictions and freedom from bondage! (John 8:36)

6. The loved ones God has blessed us with! (Psalm 68:6)

7. The places we are able to call our homes and being supplied all that we need! (Philippians 4:19)

8. The fact that we were chosen by God before the foundations of the world! (John 15:16)

9. God’s presence, direct access, protection and faithfulness to answer our prayers. (Hebrews 4:6)

10. God’s comfort, perfect peace, Holy Spirit, Son Jesus Christ and unchanging, infallible Word! (John 1:1)

I encourage you to make these next 12 months at time of thanksgiving, not only today. Let’s be people that seek the Lord, and run the race God has for us with endurance until we cross the finish line.

Quotes From September

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Here are some quotes that I Like and that I have recently seen:

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos into order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend.

-Melody Beattie

The grass may look greener on the other side but it still has to be mowed

-Unknown

If we have a lot of shame that we carry around inside of us, it’s going to overflow accidentally onto the people around us. If we’re filled with love, then that’s what’s going to overflow.

-Dr. Kelly Flanagan

People are made to be loved and things are made to be used. The confusion in the world is that people are being used and things are being loved.

-Unknown

I stopped venting and started praying cause I don’t need sympathy. I need strength.

-Unknown

JOurneY

It is in the journey

-Unknown

Not everything that can be faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed that is not faced.

-James Baldwin

August Quotes

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Here are some quotes that I like and that I have recently seen:

People with humility don’t think less of themselves, they think of themselves less and appreciate others more.

-Tricia Goyer

If you are persistent, you will get it. If you are consistent, you will keep it.

-Unknown

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to feel beautiful and be attractive to certain people, but it’s also important to recognize that you don’t owe thinness or beauty to anyone. That isn’t your job … You have so much more to offer the world than how you look.

-Daniell Koepke

Two conflicting forces cannot exist in one human heart. When doubt reigns, faith cannot abide. Where hatred rules, love is crowded out. Where selfishness rules, there love cannot dwell. When worry is present, trust cannot crowd its way in.

-Billy Graham

True forgiveness is when you can say, “Thank you for that experience.”

-Oprah Winfrey

Your greatest message will be spoken by your life, not your lips.

-Steven Furtick

There are two ways to have enough: One is to continue to accumulate more and more. The other is to desire less.

-G.K. Chesterton

The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion.

-Paulo Coelho

My Trip to Red Deer and Sylvan Lake in July 2018

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From July 11-16 I went to Red Deer for the Canadian Gospel Music Celebration. I also went to Sylvan Lake for the day to see my friend Emma.

July 11, we drove to Red Deer. For those of you who don’t know. Regina is a 9 hour drive to Red Deer which takes up all of the day.

July 12, in the morning we went to Kennedy’s Parables, and I was able to get a new piano book. The Canadian Gospel Music Celebration started at 6pm. For the 2nd part of the 1st half Dr David Jeremiah spoke. That was so cool. He spoke on David and Goliath. A quote that I liked that he said was “The story of David and Goliath teaches us to fight our battles head on.” Before and after he spoke there was singing from multiple different groups.

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On July 13, I got together with my friend Emma from Sylvan Lake. We went to a music store and drove around Red Deer. We then drove to Sylvan Lake where she lives. We went minigolfing. We went to the beach to look around. We also went to her house. For lunch we went to Lokal. If you are in Sylvan Lake I would highly recommend you go there for a meal.

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Emma is so dear to my heart.

We went back to Emma’s house, and then we went back to Red Deer, and her mom came with us for the Canadian Gospel Music Celebration. I was able to meet the Season 1 Winner of Amazing Race Canada, Tim Hague Sr. There were also numerous groups that were singing.

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On July 14, in the morning we went to chapel, and heard 11th hour sing. In the afternoon we went to a hymn sing. I had never been to a hymn sing before and it was something I greatly enjoyed. There were many groups that sung that night as well, and the Canadian Gospel Music Celebration ended with all the groups doing another hymn sing together. After the Canadian Gospel Music Celebration was over we went with our friends Lori and Ray from Leduc to Dennys. I stayed with them in February 2018 for 10 days. And that is where I met Emma.

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Not a picture from Red Deer. But Lori is so dear to my heart.

On July 15, we went home. A 9 hour drive again. But we stopped in Davidson at the biggest coffee cup and coffee pot in the world.

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I’m so thankful that these two ladies are in my life!

If God Is with Me, Why Did This Happen? Part 1

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I recently read an article called If God Is with Me, Why Did This Happen? It was written by Vaneetha Rendall Risner. In the article she mentions the many things that have happened to her. Just to name a few, she was a polio survivor and constantly in and out of the hospital, her son died, and her husband left her. And as I write this I have just put her book on hold at the library that is mentioned at the end of the article.

I will discuss the parts of this article that stand out to me.

“If the Lord is with us, why then has all this happened to us?” (Judges 6:13).

Gideon asked the question thousands of years ago, and we have been asking it ever since. Haven’t we all asked that question secretly, if not out loud, at some point in suffering?

A lot of times the people in the bible are our heros, but they are just like us. They want to know why God is causing them hard times in their life, just like why we want to know why God causes us to go through hard times.

Why did this Happen?

I wondered why hard things happened when a loving God was supposedly in control. When people told me that God loved me, I thought, If God loves me, then why did this happen to me?

But when I was 16, God in his mercy answered that lifelong question through John 9. His answer was simple and direct: “that the works of God might be displayed” (John 9:3). And with that revelation, my world shifted.

Vaneetha had wondered her whole life why God allowed her to go through hardships, and at 16 God answer her question.

If we go through hardships with our eyes on God and not turning away from Him, the works of God will be displayed in our life for all to see. But if we complain, people will see that as well. If the works of God are displayed for all to see, doesn’t/shouldn’t that change our view on how we walk through life/trials?

One Little Word

I took comfort in the truth that God was with me and could use my suffering to demonstrate his glory, but when new struggles surfaced, sometimes I would return to that familiar question: If the Lord is with me, then why did all this happen?

Those questions must have delighted Satan. Satan turns truth into doubt with that little word: if. Satan’s temptation of Jesus began with the words “If you are the Son of God” (Matthew 4:3).

God is always with us, but when new difficulties come up we can sometimes forget that, and start using that word of “if”. By why do we use that word?

The Lord IS With You

Satan tempts us in the same way. When our prayers seemingly go unanswered, Satan wants us to mistrust God and question his promises. Satan wants us to doubt God’s goodness and demand proof of his love, inciting us to ask, “If God loves me, then why am I suffering?” Or as Gideon asked, “If the Lord is with us, then why has this happened?”

If the Lord is with us? If God loves me? Those statements should never have an “if” before them. God’s presence and love are guaranteed to those in Christ. When Satan tempts us to question God’s character, we must stand firmly on the truth of Scripture.

In Christ we know that God is always with us. Jesus says, “Behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). He will never fail us or forsake us.

We use the word “if” because Satan is trying to get us to doubt that God is always with us. There are so many references in Scripture that says that God will never leave us, so even though Satan tries to get us to doubt God, if we know scripture there will be no need to doubt God.

Recieving Trials With Faith

With this new perspective, believing by faith that my trials are given out of love, I can deliberately look for the good that God is bringing from my suffering.

Sometimes the good is hard to see. And the little I do see can feel insignificant in comparison to the pain I’m enduring. It is then that I must remind myself that my afflictions are producing “an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison” (2 Corinthians 4:17). And God has a purpose in each of them.

While we may not learn the specific purpose behind each struggle, we do know that God uses suffering to increase our dependence on him. To deepen our faith and draw us closer to him. To refine our character, to prepare us for ministry, to comfort others with the comfort we’ve received.

The good can be extremely hard to see. And sometimes we may never find the specific reason why God causes us pain, but we just have to continue to trust Him.

God Doesn’t Love Suffering

God doesn’t love your suffering. He loves you. He will walk with you through the darkest valleys and will never ever leave you.

When God brings trials into your life, don’t question his love or turn away. God is doing something breathtaking in you, for you, and through you. Because the Lord is with you, and because the Lord loves you, everything that happens to you is filled with divine purpose. Every trial you endure has passed through God’s loving hands.

Just keep trusting God through it all!

July Quotes

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Here are some quotes that I like and that I have recently seen:

If you can trust a puzzle company to make sure every piece is in the box to complete the puzzle, then why can’t you trust God that every piece of your life is there, too?

-Unknown

Pain, if sanctified, creates tenderness towards others.

-C. H. Surgeon

The optimist says the cup is half full. The pessimist says the cup is half empty. The child of God says My cup runneth over.

-Unknown

Believe that you are bigger than your difficulties, for you are, indeed.

-Unknown

The lust for comfort murders the passion of the soul.

-Khalil Gibran

God did not remove the red sea, He opened it; He will help us fine a way through our problems as well.

-Brad Wilcox

June Quotes

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Here are some quotes that I like and that I have recently seen:

You must either modify your dreams, or magnify your skills.

-Unknown

When the light comes the darkness cannot stand in its presence.

-R. C. Sproul

Success is never owned; it is only rented – and the rent is due every day.

-Rory Vaden

On disappointment: Don’t immediately brush it off. Feel it first, and then it will leave you quicker. Here’s the thing about broken glass: it needs to be acknowledged and swept up so you don’t step on it later.

-Victoria Erickson

If you believe in a God who controls the big things, you have to believe in a God who controls the little things. It is we of course, to whom things look little or big.

-Elisabeth Elliot

Confidence is not “They will like me”. Confidence is “I’ll be fine if they don’t.”

-Unknown

Paul and Silas didn’t wait until God had delivered them from prison before the began to praise Him. And we shouldn’t wait until God delivers us before we worship Him.

-Unknown