Not Knowing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxTc98K9OeU&list=RDuxTc98K9OeU&t=4

Here as in Heaven ~ Elevation Worship

And now, compelled by the Spirit, I am going to Jerusalem, not knowing what will happen to me there. ~ Acts 20:22 NIV

One Sunday morning, in January 2006, I was compelled to find my friend Nichole. She went to some church called Bayside. I didn’t know what I would encounter when I arrived at her church, but I went. I found my friend, but also healing, fulfillment, and many friendships that would shape our family.

In 2010, God called us to join a team preparing to launch Bayside’s first satellite campus. At first, I didn’t want to go. I had found my niche and didn’t think I needed anything else. But then God’s Spirit touched our hearts, and we went.

Then in 2015, as Bayside was preparing to launch its fifth satellite campus, Brad asked us to pray about going. I didn’t want to pray, because I didn’t want God to move me. We’d established deep relationships, our girls had the perfect pastor, and I felt like this was where we belonged. But Holy Spirit touched me, and we went.

And in 2017, God told us to pack and prepare. We did, not knowing where we were going, until God spoke to Brad and said we were Wisconsin-bound. I didn’t want to go. This was our home, the one God had established for us. But Holy Spirit touched us, and we went, not knowing what would happen to us there. We rolled into town extremely late on July 24, 2017. The year has been filled with many hardships. But also love. God established and re-established many relationships, people with whom we’d walk through each other’s joyous and hard times. Then exactly one year after we arrived in town, my Grandpa Hayes passed away. But he left behind him a legacy of love, prayer, and faithfulness to God and his family.

I don’t know what the next year or years will hold for us. But compelled by the Spirit, we will go and do as God directs in love, prayer, and faithfulness to God and our family.

©Heather Potts 2018

Just As I Am

And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. ~ Ephesians 3:17-19 NIV

When we are filled with experiential wisdom—the knowing that surpasses knowledge—nothing can take that away from us. When what we experience is unconditional love, it sets us free. And not just free for the sake of freedom, but free to be ourselves—to be comfortable with our individual uniqueness, just as God designed.

I don't wear make-up.

I don't buy "trendy" clothes.

I don't own a closet-full of shoes.

I cannot take a selfie that’s not up my nose.

I do my hair to match my day or my mood.

I scream louder than the boys for my favorite football team.

I’m highly competitive and love to play card and board games.

If I can’t see it, I can’t write it.

I love to dance and sing and laugh in my Father’s house!

This is just me.

And that’s the way my husband says he loves me:

Just as I am.

When we experience the unconditional love of our Father, then we are free to share it with others, through marriage and through relationships with our brothers and sisters in Christ. If you don’t feel free to be you, ask God to allow you to experience His unconditional love for you.

©Heather Potts 2016

Follow in Your Footsteps

God’s answer: “Because they abandoned my plain teaching. They wouldn’t listen to anything I said, refused to live the way I told them to. Instead they lived any way they wanted and took up with the Baal gods, who they thought would give them what they wanted—following the example of their parents.”  ~ Jeremiah 9:13-14 MSG

Just before Elizabeth was born, Savannah was obsessed with puppies, to the point that if she found a show with puppies, we would watch it over and over and over and over and over and over and over until we begged her to watch something else.  Beethoven became one of her favorites.  We didn’t mind her watching it until we heard her using the word “stupid.”  After realizing it came from the show, not only did we find something better for her to watch, we also had to go through the work of correcting her language.

Today’s scripture says it’s the parents’ example that caused the children’s hearts to be turned from listening to God’s Word and following in His ways.  Parents can’t be held liable for all of a child’s choices and mistakes.  But as parents, we must choose a life that exemplifies Christ, which is a product of an ever deepening relationship with Him. Children watch, listen and then do, not necessarily as they’re told, but what they’ve observed.

Joshua 24:15 says to choose for yourselves whom you will serve. Serving results from relationship, out of really knowing and understanding someone. When you have a relationship Father God, His Son Jesus, and Holy Spirit, you will want to know all you can about them, including how to serve them.

Father, help us not to just tell our children about You and Your love for them. Help us to demonstrate it through our relationship with You, reflected in our relationship with them. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

©Heather Potts 2016

Just Like You

Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.” ~ Matthew 19:14 NIV

Our Elizabeth wants to do everything her big sister does, so she’s already started potty-training.  Because she’s watched her sister do the routine enough times, Elizabeth knows every step. She loves to wear “love socks” just like her big sister, as well as her sister’s shoes.

Our Savannah is much more of a processer than her sister—very much like her daddy. When she enters a new situation, Savannah concentrates on it a long time, often watching others to learn how to do it. But sometimes, she comes up with her own creative solution, like when she was learning to stand, she would often use her mouth as a “third hand.”  

One day, Savannah said to me, “I want to be like you.” That’s both mind-blowing and attention-grabbing. What does she see when she sees me? What am I demonstrating? Who am I exemplifying for her?

Jesus said to let the little children come to Him. Just as our children want to be like us, we are to be like little children, observing and then replicating what Jesus does, in our thoughts, words, and actions.

Father, help me to keep my eyes fixed on Jesus, so that not only I, but my girls also, will become more and more like Him. In Jesus’ Name I pray, Amen.

©Heather Potts 2016