Category Archives: Uncategorized

I had the not so great privilege of seeing my doctor last week as a follow up to my surgery. 

I was expecting to hear good news, because I thought that the worst part had been over. Instead I found out that the ordeal that I had gone through had not completely addressed the problem.

Hearing this news really took me by surprise. I had spent months in prayer. Friends had spent months in prayer. 

God was supposed to answer. 

After I received the news, I sat in my car. Overwhelmed with other things in my life, I didn’t really have time to process this bad news. 

In fact, all I wanted was to get myself an ice cream blizzard to make all the nonsense go away. 

But this was reality. 

Out of weariness I found myself praying the only thing I could: “Lord,show yourself strong”. 

What do you do when you’ve fought all you could fight and the problem still exists or doesn’t go away as it should? 

 

What do you do when you’ve prayed and prayed and you’re really feeling “all prayed out”? 

 

What do you do when feel as if God has let you down? 

 

In the worst case scenarios, we have to not lose hope, not lose faith, not lose our perspective of who God is. 

For a moment, I sat in the car, feeling ready to give up. Perhaps I should just go ahead and have the hysterectomy. Perhaps this was my ‘plot’ in life. 

But when the enemy comes in like a flood, we need to know when to raise up a standard against him. 

It doesn’t matter how tired we feel, we have to fight back. Fighting back has nothing to do with the way we feel. It is a decision to not let the enemy win. 

And so with my weary soul, I began to mutter on my drive home “how great is our God” 

I  began to remind myself “is there anything too hard for God (Jer 32: 27). 

I began to remind myself of all the great victories that He has accomplished in my life.

This was the beginning of me fighting back. 

The rest is warfare. I have to charge into the enemy’s camp and take back what God has already given me.

I cannot give in. I know that that’s what the enemy wants. But God’s word is “yay and amen”.

So I will stand on His Word that He came to heal, deliver and set me free from every affliction. I will stand on His word that “By His Stripes I am healed.”

Although the season may not appear to be over in your life, stand on His word, that it will be over.

Although it seems like you are not winning, Stand on His word.

Although you may have received a bad report. Stand on His word.

That He will heal you and deliver you and set you free. 

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized

When I used to live in Guyana, everyone walked like snails! I mean, people walked to their own beat and if that beat was a slow jam, you’d bet your bottom dollar that you would be late for where you were going if you walked behind a group of people like that. When I lived there, I too had that slow jam beat going on. Even if you are working, you move at your own pace. Having lived in Canada for a while, I had to change my pace. This was a fast paced culture. It was either I ‘got with it’ or return to Guyana.

Well I adjusted alright. But on my next visit back to my native land, I had no patience for slow people. I am not sure if I was in a sad state, or if it was them.

I realize that in this fast paced culture, ‘ain’t nobody got time for anything really. Let alone prayer. I mean, I’ve noticed that sometimes when I am praying with my friends, they basically just plunge right into asking for what they want and then say “In Jesus Name, Amen”. 

I think this too has become a habit of mine and it’s probably why I lost my “oh” factor. 

But as I began to think about this fast pacedness that we indulge in this era, I wonder about how effective my prayer life will be if I keep going like this.

You see, I was taught that even before I begin piling my requests on God, to just thank Him for thinks and worship Him for who He is. Then I might ask Him for stuff. But after that, there is a part of my prayer that is dedicated to listening to Him answer.

You see, what good is it, if we approach a mighty God for things and then we don’t wait to hear Him answer?

I mean, have you ever asked your parents for something and then just walked away without them responding? How do you know what their response will be? How do you know if they will give you directions to meet your requests? 

It’s for this reason that I think that when we pray, we need to take time to listen. 

Listen for God to respond to what we are asking for. 

Listen for Him to instruct us on how to go on with our day. 

Listen to Him so that He can fill our hearts with Promises and Encouragement. 

Take time to listen. 

Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction
    and do not forsake your mother’s teaching.
⁹ They are a garland to grace your head
    and a chain to adorn your neck. -Proverbs 1:8-9

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized

Well I have returned to work!

My schedule has once again changed and I am trying to find myself some balance so that I can start writing again.

I won’t lie.With these changes, I’ve dropped the ball on writing…and I know fully why. I thrive on having sharpeners around me. And for the last few weeks all of my sharpeners have been unstable in my life.

I haven’t had time to read in depth as I would want to. And I haven’t had time to worship in depth as I want to. To make matters worse, those people who have always been in my life to discuss the Word of God in detail, and to stir my Rhema-ness, are no longer around. And so I’ve found myself in a slump. In a drain.

It’s this slump that I am writing you from now.

Does anyone identify with what I am going through? That slump is the place where you find yourself floating between hot and cold. but you are neither. It’s the place where you read the Word of God but all that it is, is Logos. And even that is a struggle to maintain.

That slump is when you have lost a certain “OH-ness” about your relationship with God.

I say “Oh-ness”, Because “oh” is an exclamation of desire. It’s that sound that you utter when you bite into a Cold Stone Ice Cream cup, Or when you taste the pinch of the sun in the perfect angle as you lie on the beach.

You know you’ve lost it, when you sit in church, giving lip service in worship, gazing at the person next to you when the minister is preaching. I don’t think I am that far gone. But I’ve seen it.

I’m writing. But I hope that someone can identify with this. Have you lost your Oh?

The enemy comes to take away that desire from us whenever he pleases.

But the good news, is that God makes a way of escape…if we will take it.

You see you may have lost your desire for God. But it is not impossible to get it back.

That’s because while the enemy may have taken away your desire for God, He cannot take away God’s desire for you.

Right there is something that we have to go on.

When you find yourself in a place of lukewarmness, think of how much God loves you and what He has done for you. Think of how much He dances over you. And how much He has sacrificed for you.

When you can look back at that, it’s almost inevitable that you will say “Oh how He loves me”

I am on my way up again… Pray for me.

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized

High Healed Delivered….

So if any of you have been following the news, the History Channel has decided to air a series called “The Bible” this year,for nine straight weeks.This is a big deal, because for the first time the secular world is giving an opportunity to the Christian world.

I was able to watch the premiere last Sunday…and while I was really trying to see if the show stuck to the script, I found myself really into one particular scene…- the part where Lot’s Wife turned into a pillar of salt. 

I think I may have written about this before. But while doing my devotions sometime this week, I began to revisit the story of Lot…in my head. 

Why did this woman look back? The city was being destroyed…They had a command to run and never look back. Why did she have to look back? If she hadn’t look back, she could have saved herself and her loved ones a lot of grief. 

Lot’s wife is only known for looking back and turning into a pillar of salt. But how many of us suffer from the same ‘sin’ that she did.

I realized as I was praying, that in my own life, things fell out of sync every time I looked back. I am talking about times when I reminisced on my past relationships wishing that the other person was still with me, or times when I remembered what my life was like before. I realize that every time I look back on those times, not only do I create a bit of nostalgia, but I also create an opportunity to compare my present with my past, and to be discontented with my life. 

On the other hand, when I look ahead and keep looking ahead, things go well. 

I think this is why Paul says

but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, (Phil3:13)

Every time we look back at what we used to have, we are likely to compare what was with what is. But what we need to remind ourselves, that if what was was supposed to be what is, it would never have become what was. 

I suppose many of you reading this might be thinking that I am talking about my ex, or about something major. But I am not. 

I am talking about reminiscing on simple things. Like…how your husband or wife used to love you. Or how much money you used to make when you were at your last job. How much fun you had when you visited a certain place last year. 

How different things were when you were living in another city. How good your mom’s cooking used to taste. 

It’s all the same. Each case is about looking back. And every time we look back, we create this expectation of what our present and future should be. 

Expectations are no doubt good to have. But if they cause us to compare our lives to our past and then become discontent with God for where we are and will be….you get the point. 

I encourage you. Don’t be like Lot’s wife. Don’t look back. As much as you think there is something in the past…God’s future for you is greater than your past. And you can enjoy this future if you keep looking forward instead of behind. 

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized

Hunger. 

If we are not careful, we can easily fall into the plot of losing our hunger for God. 

Last week, I realized something. There is always something, or someone vying for our time. Always. Sometimes there are things which demand our time and offer good results. Other times, there are things which demand our time but offer negative results. 

I was recently talking to someone the other day, that had been spending so much time with her child, that she had failed to spend time with God. 

And yet again, I spoke to someone whose first thing to do in the morning was to check his facebook profile. 

I have got no problem with any of these things. But as I was driving to London over the weekend, I thought to myself, how did I let myself become so focused on other things that I lost sight of my relationship with God. 

The answer came to me in a still small voice: I became hungry for other things. 

Do you notice that hunger changes…?

One minute you could be hungry for something sweet…and the other you could be hungry for something salty. 

In some way my hunger pangs had switched…lessened…whatever, from desiring to be in the Word, to desiring other things. These things were not exactly good or bad. They just were. Desire to sleep more. Desire to eat more. Desire to be on Facebook more. Or talk more on the phone. 

The more we hunger for other things, the less we hunger for God. I don’t mean “Godly things”. Because it’s easy to think that “well, I go to church every Sunday” and “I spend 5 minutes in the morning with God” and think that “God understands”. But I am wondering now…Does He? I mean does He really understand that we have stop hungering after Him and more on things…that often have nothing to do with Him?

Often, I feel that our ability to live whole, trouble free, peaceful lives, is wrapped up in our ability to have a relationship with this wonderful God. When I say relationship, I mean this ‘desire’ that we have when someone new comes into our lives and we want nothing more than to talk to them for 24 hours a day. This desire that we want to know the other person…everything about them. We want to know what they feel, how they feel, why they feel the way they feel. When we get saved…our relationship with God starts out that way…but why does it not stay that way?

Hunger.

After meditating on that, I had to question myself…am I still hungry for Him?

And so I don’t know about you. But I feel this yearning desire (and a further desire to keep desiring ) to find God again. 

You see…none of us can ever say that we know everything about Him. There is always something more to learn. Hence why…we need to keep hungering after Him. We need to turn our hunger pangs back to Him 

Posted by schadah in Uncategorized