Lord Let Us Be Thankful For Our Many Blessings!

 God not only gives us many blessings in our lives but he also expects us to be a blessing to those we encounter. How can we be a blessing to others if we are always consumed with our overwhelming burdens and the burdens of our loved ones? Times are very troubling right now with everyone I know it seems, there are so many things we are dealing with.... the death of loved ones, cancer, sickness and pain, loss of jobs and financial burdens, marriages falling apart and the list goes on and on. The burdens seem to outweigh the blessings... but that is a lie from the enemy, if we begin to count our blessings we may find that they in fact outweigh our burdens. The devil wants us to be distracted, discouraged, and hopeless about the trials and tribulations we face, he wants us to focus our attention on our problems instead of being grateful for all that is going right in our lives.

 If we would spend more time thanking God for our blessings we might find our focus turning from all our burdens. We might spend less time feeling anxious, overwhelmed, depressed, sorry for ourselves, bitter or angry. Although, we should be concerned about all the tragedy, craziness and sadness that we might have to experience or others we love have to face.... we should not let it take control of our thoughts and actions and keep us from what is truly important to God. God wants us to fix our eyes on him and turn to him for our comfort, strength and hope.

We need to remember God is in control and HE will work it all out in HIS timing and HIS way and we may not understand why he allows the pain and suffering to happen but we also need to remember he has given so much to us... maybe we should be thanking him continuously for our many blessings instead of grumbling, complaining and worrying about all of our burdens! He wants us to pray about them, not worry about them and he wants us to deal with situations we face in a manner that would honor him. 

I want to share with you some of my MANY blessings.... I took time to thank God for them today... now I just need to practice doing this everyday! And I want to encourage you to count your blessings daily as well... we have so much to be thankful for!

 I would like to thank my cousin Georgie Brossman for inspiring this blog today! Thank you for reminding me of my blessings and that all my worry about everyone's burdens is not doing them or myself any good!

May God Richly Bless You All,
Angie Goucher

My relationship with My Lord and Savior ( the assurance of getting to go to Heaven someday and all the burdens will be no more!)
My wonderful husband
My beautiful sweet daughter and her love for God
My precious twin boys (surprise blessings) The blessing of the doctors and nurses that took care of them, nursing them to life when they were born premature
My loving Son Mitch
My memories of my Mom and Dad
My Father and Mother Inn law and Marty's wonderful family
My Brothers
My Sister and Brother Inn Laws
My Nieces and Nephews and their beautiful families
My whole Family-I love them all
My AWESOME job
My co-workers and volunteers
My friends I've meet at or through SNR
My friends outside of SNR
My beautiful home
My car I drive
My health
My food I get to eat
My clothes I get to wear
My luxury items I get to enjoy
SO MANY BLESSINGS!!! THANK YOU LORD!

................................................................................................................................................................

          I have so many blessings that it is impossible to count them but here are a  few of them!


Well first I have a wonderful God that loves me and my beautiful family, I have wonderful  friends, and a wonderful puppy, a house that has AC and a bed and food,  a four wheeler, a safe neighborhood, good teachers every year. A trampoline, school, clothes, getting baptized, church, the preacher, bible study, bible, Positive Life Radio, for life, devotionals, and so much more.

God bless,
Mariah Goucher

Lord Let Us Seek Self -Control!

Why do you think God says we should work to have self- control in our lives? Without self -control all kinds of evil desires can come over us. Self -control is a wall of protection against these evils that can take over our lives. The Lord says we should not be mastered or under the power of bondage to anything. An out of control area in our lives leaves room for the enemy-Satan to come in. If he knows you have a certain weakness he will attack you with that weakness. We all need to be more aware of areas that are out of control in our lives. We need to seek accountability-Admit the struggle or sin out loud to others and God because if you hide it the Devil will just make you feel horrible about it, he will cause you to be anxious, depressed, ashamed, feel inadequate or that you are worthless because you can't seem to break free from it. We need to pray about self- control in the areas we struggle with. We need to ask others to pray for us in these areas. We need to read about what God says about self- control. We need to have Faith that God will heal us from this lack of control in our lives. We need to avoid situations that may tempt us.
 
Having a lack of self -control can harm not only us but can hold you back from living the abundant life God wants for you. It can destroy friendships, marriages, your children's lives, jobs, your health, your self esteem and self worth, and most importantly hinder and hurt your relationship with God.
 
To be honest I have a lack of self- control in many areas and it is harming and hindering me in many ways...What areas do you struggle with self- control in your life? Spending money, overeating or lack of taking care of yourself, material possessions, lust, tobacco, alcohol, addictions, controlling your tongue, talking or acting inappropriately, cussing, taking the Lord's name vain, disrespecting others and or your spouse, anger, violence, backstabbing or gossip? There are many areas in our lives we should gain control over and we can but we can't do it alone and we certainly need to want to change.
 
Scripture tells us self- control is a gift. We need to accept it! Lord won't you help us have some self-control!
 
May God Bless You,
Angie Goucher
_________________________________________________________________________________
But the Fruit of the Spirit is Love, Joy, Peace, Patience Kindness, Goodness, Faithfulness, Gentleness and Self-Control. Galatians 5:22-23

2 Peter 1:5-7
For this very reason make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge and to knowledge, self-control and to self control, perseverance, and to perseverance, godliness and to godliness mutual affection and to mutual affection, love.

God Bless,
Mariah Goucher