PROCLAIM HIS BLESSINGS!

---

Love joyfully celebrates honesty and finds no delight in what is wrong. Love is a safe place of shelter, for it never stops believing the best for others. Love never takes failure as defeat, for it never gives up.
1 Corinthians 13:6-7 TPT

---

Recently I heard someone speaking on a topic that hit so close to home, in so many seasons I've walked through.  Have you found yourself in a season of life, or maybe a long season of years that look so opposite to what the Lord has promised you.  In fact, it doesn't even resemble any of the vision He gave you, or the word He gave you.  You may have held onto that word or promise for years, and here you are just barely able to remember what it looked like.  All that promise, all those joyful moments that you experienced with the Lord, and all you see is pain and you may not even recognize who you've become after all this time.  My friend, I know what that looks like and I've lived that too. 

I'm not here to tell you that you aren't supposed to be in those trials, or that we don't go through struggles, because the Bible talks about these.  Going through a trial doesn't mean you are doing something wrong, or have missed something, but the Bible talks about how these kinds of trials change us and grow us.

If you can relate, I want to encourage you further.

Remember, I said there was something I heard recently that hit close to home?  Well, it was one of those moments that stays with you.  There was a friend speaking about God's goodness, and he shared about David in the Bible.  Do you remember how God anointed David to be king, and instead of his life beginning down this road, he was running for his life.  David had a an army of men that traveled with him, and helped him.  Apparently, they stayed in a camp with the men's wives and children as they moved around.  Now these men believed in David, and he needed that.  Imagine this, they arrived back at camp one evening to find that all the wives and children had been captured, and the camp is burned and gone.  Suddenly, all these men who had stood with David were fed up.  I mean there was no one on David's side at this point.  He was alone, and completely rejected.  That is such a hard place. 

We know what rejection feels like, and loss.  How many times have words come from our mouths that sound like, "God, this isn't right," or "Why is this happening Lord," or "God ..." and some form of painful complaint follows.  He does know our hearts, and every pain we ever go through, and He's literally walking through the pain with us.  However, guess what David did?

He didn't say, "God, I don't get it.  You gave me this amazing promise, and now even these men who have walked alongside of me are all turned against me.  What am I supposed to do?  Lord, why is this happening to me?"  David instead encouraged himself in the Lord.  I know we've heard that phrase before, but how did he do that?  He began to recount the blessings of the Lord.  He began to remind himself of all the good things that God had done, and all the good things that God was presently doing. 

What I was encouraged with recently is to do this very thing.  Yes, pray and ask the Lord for what you need.  Then recount all the goodness of the Lord, and share it!!  Share His blessings and all the wonderful things He's done in your life and others with friends and family.  Why not do that as a family daily?  Let's remember as a family all the miracles and supernatural amazing things that God has done.  Let it out of your mouths and proclaim His goodness and just watch breakthrough happen for you.  What we think about and what we speak changes our entire environment, as well as changes our outlook.  It's like goodness is drawn to goodness.  

Today I was reading in Psalm 78 how when the Israelites refused to believe, and continued to complain and grumble and not remember all the amazing  and beautiful things God had already done for them that it caused them to live in doubt and fear.  It talked about how it was because of their refusal to believe God could take care of them that God was unable to bless them.  What we believe and what we declare changes so much my friend. 

Let's walk in faith, trusting the Lord for His goodness in the midst of the trial, and recount His blessings!!  He is so amazing!! We can even walk with one another in each other's trials and help each other by recounting the goodness of the Lord in their lives, and speaking life!  Let's walk in His abundance and find that joy my friend. 

---

MISTY L. CHLADEK
​OWNER/FOUNDER OF COMMUNITY OF CHRISTIAN CREATIVES

@communityofchristiancreatives
Watercolor artist, author, wife, lover of plants and the outdoors, daughter of the King of Kings. 
​She is a community builder on Instagram @communityofchristiancreatives and continues her artwork at @mistyleacreations.  Her book Love Letters of Jesus, which can be found on most online stores and her website, is the story about how God healed her of severe childhood diseases and is a testimony to God's goodness through the struggles.