She Believes 3 Devotion – Page 3

Fruit of the Spirit October 1, 2025

Good Friends Are Like Medicine For The Soul

¹⁷A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity.
Proverbs 27:10
¹⁰Do not forsake your friend or a friend of your family, and do not go to your relative’s house when disaster strikes you—better a neighbor nearby than a relative far away.

Last Friday, I met two of my girlfriends at one of my favorite restaurants to celebrate our birthdays. These are ladies who have been my friends now for over thirty years. I feel sure that we have been getting together for at least half of the thirty years to do these Birthday celebrations.

I can’t tell you how refreshing it was to just sit there and laugh and catch up for three hours. Yes, I said three hours. The time literally just flew by. I work so much that to have this time with two of my favorite people on the planet was like sneaking away for a mini vacation. I left the restaurant thinking, boy, I could really use more of that in my life.

About six years ago, I was struck with an illness that literally hijacked my social life. My immune system was compromised, so I had to be very careful about going into public places. Although I still try to be very careful, I have now realized that the social aspect of our lives is so important for some resemblance of balance in our lives.

Friendships are key to a happy, well-rounded life. I truly believe that God wants us to have friendships and interaction with others, because trying to do life in your own little world apart from the others can lead to a miserable existence.

My friends have been such a blessing in my life that I don’t know what I would have done without their support. I am grateful for every single friend that God has brought into my life, and I truly cherish those friendships.

Sure, life gets busy, but on your deathbed, do you think you will be concerned about the deal that you didn’t close or your to-do list? I don’t think so. I think our thoughts will be about our family and friends. Our family members and friends are the true treasures that God has placed in our lives.

I love friends because, unlike relatives, we get to hand-pick them. Remember, you don’t need lots of friends; you just need three or four great friends. It’s not the quantity of friends that you have but the quality of those friendships.

A great question to ask yourself is, can I count on them if I really need them to come to my rescue? Another great question would be to ask yourself, could they count on the same from me?

You see, we not only need great friends, but we also need to be a great friend.

There is, however, one friend for sure that I know that we all can always count on, and that friend is God. He has given us the ultimate example of how to love others.

If you feel that you really don’t share a deep, lasting friendship with anyone, pray and ask God to bless you with some great Christian friends, and I can assure you that He will at just the right time.

May God bless you as you develop lasting and meaningful friendships, and may you always remember that a great friend is a gift from God.

²⁶The righteous choose their friends carefully, but the way of the wicked leads them astray.
Ecclesiastes 4:9-12
⁹Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor:
¹⁰If either of them falls down, one can help the other up.
But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.
¹¹Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone?
¹²Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

She Believes 3 Devotion September 22, 2025

God Is Still In Control

⁶Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
Psalm 22:28
²⁸for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations.
Psalm 125:2
²As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds his people both now and forevermore. for dominion belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations.
Deuteronomy 31:8
⁸The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.”

There is so much going on in our country right now that if you are not careful, you could easily become afraid of what the future holds. As followers of Christ we know that God holds ultimate power. We also know that He is sovereign and only what He allows will happen.

Yes, evil resides in this world and it will reside until Christ returns. The enemy will fight to draw as many to his army of hate as possible, but be clear he will never be able to stand against our Almighty God. So don’t be afraid of what’s going on all around you. Just keep your eyes pointed towards heaven and on God. Stay focused on Him and no matter how bad it looks, remember God does not sleep or slumber, He sees it all. Encourage others in your circle to trust God and His timing.

Don’t allow yourself to lose focus by the enemy’s distractions. Below are some practical tips to help you maintain your spiritual focus.

1. Seek God’s face every morning through prayer and Bible reading, and do the same right before bed. Also whisper prayers to God throughout the day if you need to. God loves hearing from us.

2. Memorize Don’t Be Afraid and Fear Not Scriptures. Write them on note cards and carry them in your purse until you have fully memorized them.

3. Limit your time on Social Media. You may need to even unfriend friends who make negative or hateful comments to protect your peace.

4. Pray for our country and the leaders of our country.

5. Listen to Praise and Worship music. It is great for bringing our focus back into alignment with God.

6. Journal your fears and feelings. Writing is very good to help you process your feelings and emotions.

7. Remember Philippians 4:8 tells us to think on these things, whatever is true, honorable, right, pure, and lovely. It’s hard to get confused or fearful when we filter things through the lens of Philippians 4:8.

8. When the climate in your life changes, look to the One who never changes. Take comfort in the fact that He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. You can lean and depend on Him and His promises.

May God continue to bless you as you strengthen your walk with Him each day.

Psalm 115:3

³Our God is in heen he does whatever pleases him.
Isaiah 14:24
²⁴The Lord Almighty has sworn,“Surely, as I have planned, so it will be, and as I have purposed, so it will happen
.Isaiah 45:7
⁷I form the light and create darkness, I bring prosperity and create disaster; I, the Lord, do all these things.
Philippians 4:6
⁶Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.

Prayers September 14, 2025

Have you Stopped To Smell The Roses?

⁹What do people really get for all their hard work? ¹⁰I have seen the burden God has placed on us all. ¹¹Yet God has made everything beautiful for its own time. He has planted eternity in the human heart, but even so, people cannot see the whole scope of God’s work from beginning to end. ¹²So I concluded there is nothing better than to be happy and enjoy ourselves as long as we can. ¹³And people should eat and drink and enjoy the fruits of their labor, for these are gifts from God.

Have you noticed that in this crazy world that we live in, everyone is always busy rushing around? I know that recently I had a day where I just felt overwhelmed

with all that I was trying to accomplish in a short amount of time. I was starting to feel a little anxiety and stress creeping in. I knew that I needed to stop and breathe.

It is truly amazing what just inhaling and exhaling slowly can do for us. It helps us to reset physically as well as mentally.

Life gets so hectic at times that we forget to schedule a time to enjoy the simple things that bring us joy.

By the way what brings you joy, may be totally different from what brings me joy. Only you know what elevates your joy scale.

You see, what I have come to realize is that life is rolling by quickly and I have spent most of most of my life working. Most of you have probably done the same. I have also come to the realize that I don’t want to die without having lived. I want to have some moments and even days and weeks where I intentionally and purposely stop and take time to smell the roses.

So here’s my advice and this is something that I actually plan to do. I want to encourage you to make a list of things that you can do in just a few minutes of your day. This list should have things on it that will help you to escape the mundane and quickly get you into your joy zone. You may consider making several lists of things that you can do within different time frames. It will be a Bucket List of sorts of the things that make you feel like you have taken a few minutes to smell the roses.

When you are free from work for two or three weeks, plan a trip or visit a friend who is dear to you, that you haven’t seen in a long time. Maybe plan a road trip instead of flying so that you can really enjoy all of the wonderful sites along the way. If that’s too costly for you right now, take an afternoon and go to your favorite park. Go see a great movie. Dine with a friend at your favorite restaurant. Take a bubble bath or schedule a massage. Go buy yourself a beautiful bouquet of flowers. Eat the chocolate. Do something that brings you joy and do not feel guilty for loving and taking care of you.

I truly believe that God did not intend for us to walk around overworked and stressed out all of the time. He wants us to enjoy life. Sure there will be hard and stressful days and even hard seasons from time to time but overworked and stressed out should not be our lifestyle. Let’s take a break and go have some fun! Don’t forget to smell the roses along the way, afterall their fragrant smell is for our enjoyment.

²²A cheerful heart is good medicine,
but a broken spirit saps a person’s strength.
Ecclesiastes 9:7
⁷So go ahead. Eat your food with joy, and drink your wine with a happy heart, for God approves of this!

She Believes 3 Devotion September 1, 2025

Pray With Great Expectation

Mark 11:24

²⁴Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.
1 John 5:14-15
¹⁴This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. ¹⁵And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.

I had a sales goal that I really wanted to reach this week with my work. Based on the contest requirements I only had a seven day time frame in which to reach my goal. During my prayer time I shared with God how much I wanted to sell to achieve this goal. I asked God if He would bless me to reach my goal and guess what, He did.

Because there were about three more days of the qualification period left when my goal was achieved, I prayed again and I asked God to help me achieve what would be another level on the scoreboard, and He did.

I must say that I am in awe of the God that we serve. Not only does He hear our prayers, but he also responds by answering our requests. Not always the way we want, but He answers . Sometimes He surprises us with more than we can ask or imagine and that is what He has done for me this week. He’s that kind of Father.

Now you may be thinking, I have prayed and He did not answer me. You may be thinking He did not give me what I prayed for. Maybe you have been praying for something for months or even years and you have not heard back from God. Just know that God always answers prayers, so don’t stop praying. Always pray with a great expectation of hearing back from God. Have unwavering faith in His ability to move mountains on your behalf.

Here are the four ways that God answers prays:

1. God answers prayers according to His will.

2. God says Yes.

3. God says Wait.

4. God says No.

Remember that when we pray we are on God’s time frame, not our own. His timing and purposes are different from ours. A great prayer life requires patience.

Trust that no matter how God answers you, in time you will come to realize that it was what was best. He will always only do what is best for us. Never ever stop praying, because a life well prayed over is a blessed life!

Matthew 7:7-11

⁷“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. ⁸For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
⁹“Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? ¹⁰Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? ¹¹If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!
Philippians 4:6-7
⁶Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
James 5:16
¹⁶Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.

Relationships August 25, 2025

Encouragements and Support Matters

²⁴And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds, ²⁵not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.
1 Thessalonians 5:11
¹¹Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.

I was so blessed to have the world’s greatest parents. Parents who were always so encouraging and supportive of my goals and dreams. I also have siblings who are very encouraging and supportive, and I know that this is the example they witnessed just as I did growing up in the same household.

Just as I was encouraged I like to encourage others which turns out to be great since I have been blessed with the gift of encouragement. I love it, because I have seen people’s countenance and mindset actually change when sharing a few positive words of hope. It’s amazing just how much weight our words carry and how much of an impact our words can make. We can actually bring blessings or cursing with our words.

We have the power with our words to actually bring sunshine to someone’s cloudy day. When someone is considering giving up just a little bit of encouragement can be a huge difference maker.

I have a question for you. When someone comes to you with a plan that they think is a great idea, are you supportive of their dream? Do you encourage them to go for it, or are you the person who tells them every reason why it will fail. If that’s the way you respond, you may not even know that you are breaking their heart by throwing a wet blanket on their excitement with lots of negative comments?

Today I would like to challenge you to encourage others when you see that it is needed. It may not be your gift and it may not come to you naturally but you can certainly choose to be an encouragement to others by the words that you impart to them.

Our encouragement and our support matters. Most importantly it matters to the person that you may encounter.

Sometimes we can encourage others without even knowing it. Years ago I had started attending a church that had a really great Women’s Bible Class.

For weeks I had attended but never really said anything. One Sunday I decided to get involved in the discussion and I shared a portion of my story with the ladies in the class, because it tied in with our discussion.

Everyone was stunned when I shared what I had been through. Afterwards the ministers wife came up to me and said you have got to speak at our Women’s Retreat. More women need to hear your story.

I didn’t know it at that very moment, but that would be the beginning of me speaking at Women’s Conferences from churches to even a University. God used her words of encouragement as a confidence booster.

You see that Sunday what the minister’s wife was saying to me was more women needed to hear my story, but what I heard was my story mattered and I mattered.

Because of the few seeds of encouragement that she planted in me that day many women have been blessed.

Just her words of encouragement made a difference in my life that day, your words can also make a difference in the lives of others.

Who will you choose to encourage today?
Romans 15:5
⁵May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you the same attitude of mind toward each other that Christ Jesus had,
Galatians 6:2
²Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ.

Relationships August 19, 2025

A New School Year

³Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him.
Psalm 46:1
¹God is our refuge and strength, always ready to help in times of trouble.

This week was the beginning of a new school year for a lot of families. Some parents will have children entering kindergarten or first grade for the first time. And I can tell you firsthand that it is heartbreaking for a mom to leave her sweet little one for the first time.

Some parents will have children entering Junior High or High School for the first time.

And then there are also the parents who have done something very brave, by driving their children miles away to drop them off at college for the very first time. There are many first times in a child’s life, and each first time is a big deal for the parents too.

From the time our children come into this world, our main focus is on protecting them and making sure that their every need is met. We would do anything in this world to protect our children, and with each first comes the awareness that they are getting closer and closer to leaving the nest that we have so carefully prepared for them.

One of the ways that we can keep our children safe is by praying for them, and the school year that they are about to embark upon.

Below, I have listed some things that may be helpful to pray for this school year.

This year, our children will form new friendships. Let’s pray that God will bless our children to be a part of a good, healthy circle of friends, and that our children will not be negatively influenced.
Pray that they will learn easily and even be excited to do their homework.
Pray that if they are not clear or if they don’t understand what they are supposed to be learning, they will be brave enough to seek out help.
Pray that they don’t struggle with peer pressure.
Pray that God will bless them with good Christian friends.
Pray for their safety as they go to school, pray for their safety at school and when they return home.
Pray that they will be willing to listen to the advice that you may give them throughout the school year.
Pray for their teachers, the cafeteria workers, the Principal, and administrative staff members. And most importantly, pray that your child gets the teachers that is best for he or her.
Pray for all of the students. Pray that everyone will be blessed with a great school year.
Pray that God will give you and your spouse an extra measure of strength for those moments that may be challenging this year.
Pray over your child each morning before they get out of your car.
Pray that your child’s school has a peaceful learning environment.

1 John 5:14

¹⁴And we are confident that he hears us whenever we ask for anything that pleases him.
Matthew 18:20
²⁰For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”

Prayers August 10, 2025

Are You Afraid

Has God ever asked you to do something that was absolutely scary to you? Maybe it was something that would require a great sacrifice on your part, or maybe it was something that would take you way out of your comfort zone. It could have been something that you just felt totally inadequate to achieve. And honestly,

sometimes we simply feel overwhelmed by the magnitude of the assignment God gives us.

Our Bible gives us a great example of this when we look at the life of Moses. I venture to say that Moses experienced several situations where fear could have easily shut him down. Below are a few situations that are shared in scripture.

Sacrifice

Moses would have to sacrifice the comforts of life, to be a leader for a group of people who spent most of the time being very ungrateful and complaining a lot.

Numbers 11:1-9
11 Now the people complained about their hardships in the hearing of the Lord, and when he heard them his anger was aroused. Then fire from the Lord burned among them and consumed some of the outskirts of the camp. ²When the people cried out to Moses, he prayed to the Lord and the fire died down. ³So that place was called Taberah,^[a] because fire from the Lord had burned among them.

⁴The rabble with them began to crave other food, and again the Israelites started wailing and said, “If only we had meat to eat! ⁵We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost—also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic. ⁶But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!”

⁷The manna was like coriander seed and looked like resin. ⁸The people went around gathering it, and then ground it in a hand mill or crushed it in a mortar. They cooked it in a pot or made it into loaves. And it tasted like something made with olive oil. ⁹When the dew settled on the camp at night, the manna also came down.

Moses’s response to God asking him to lead His people, revealed that it would definitely be out of his comfort zone and that he also felt inadequate to lead them.

Exodus 4:1
4 Moses answered, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me and say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?”

Exodus 4:10-17
¹⁰Moses said to the Lord, “Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”¹¹The Lord said to him, “Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? ¹²Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”¹³But Moses said, “Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.”¹⁴Then the Lord’s anger burned against Moses and he said, “What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and he will be glad to see you. ¹⁵You shall speak to him and put words in his mouth; I will help both of you speak and will teach you what to do. ¹⁶He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. ¹⁷But take this staff in your hand so you can perform the signs with it.”
Moses felt that the load was too heavy to bear.
Numbers 11:14
¹⁴I cannot carry all these people by myself; the burden is too heavy for me.
Each time that Moses came to God with a problem, God did not change the assignment that He had given him, nor did He let Moses off the hook. He simply arranged for him to have help for the situation. Many times when we are afraid or when things get hard, we want to give up. During those times we must remember that just as God had answers for Moses, He also has the perfect solution for our problems and insecurities as well.

I want to encourage you today to be ok with feeling fear. It is absolutely normal to feel fear when God asks you to do something that is totally out of your comfort zone or sphere of experience. Be very clear, where God guides He provides. God will never ask you to do something that He will not provide either the people or resources for it to be accomplished. All you have to do is show up with belief and faith. Trust me when I tell you that He will have everything else to make it happen. So no more fear, doubt and excuses, because with God’s help you are more than capable.

So if you know that God has given you an assignment and you have been reluctant to move forward, I want to encourage you to go be great, because God and the world are waiting on you! Blessings for a life of obedience and stepping out in faith when the Master beckons you to do so.

Moses was concerned about his ability to speak and God allowed his brother Aaron to be his voice piece.

—

Relationships July 22, 2025

Cuddles And Snuggles

³Children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from him.
⁴Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are children born in one’s youth.
⁵Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them.
They will not be put to shame when they contend with their opponents in court.

A few days ago I was standing in line behind a lady who was holding her precious new born baby. I asked her how old her baby was and she told me that she was ten days old. I asked her if this was her first child and she told me that she had two sons also, so this was number three.

Seeing this little baby brought back a flood of memories of when my daughter was a little girl. She is an adult now and I can truly say that I have enjoyed her immensely at every stage of her life.

Today I would just like to encourage all of the young moms out there to just hang in there. First of all, be very clear, moms have the most important job on the planet and it is by far the most difficult one as well. But I must also add that it is also the most rewarding job on the planet.

There will be days when you are totally exhausted from running five thousand different directions all in the course of one day or times when you have been up all night because your sweet little one has been running a 101 fever. There will also be nights when you are too tired to even think about doing the dishes before bed or days when you are still in your PJ”s at 3:00 in the afternoon.

There will be periods of time when you may not get to eat a warm meal for months. This is because by the time you take care of everyone else your food is cold, but you will gladly do it over and over again for your family. I don’t recommend eating cold food, but it just tends to happen this way.

There will be football, basketball, and baseball games or cheer and dance practices. Although a good nap would certainly come in handy on many days, you will feel the need to attend these events. So you will sacrifice what energy and time you have left to support your children.

You will stand in a kitchen barely holding it together to make one more healthy meal, instead of running through a Fast Food restaurant, because you want your family to eat healthy.

You may be asking, why am I sharing all of this, and the answer is, because I have been there. I have been frazzled and hanging on by a thread and I want you to know that you are not the only mom walking through life tired and needing a break.

I want you to also know that God sees you and although you may not know how you are going to get through all that is ahead of you, God has a perfect plan and His grace is sufficient. Part of His perfect plan is that we take one day at a time. Even if you are falling asleep praying each night, continue going before God asking Him to give you strength for each new day and He will. I am a living witness that He will equip and give you strength to keep going.

Most importantly remember that your children are truly a gift from God and nothing that you will ever do in this life will be more important than raising your

children and being the steward over them that God has called you to be. Enjoy your children. Make sweet memories with them.

They will be graduating and going off to college before you know it and when that happens, you will wonder where in the world did the years go. So for sanity sake, sneak in a long bubble bath every now and then but enjoy those sweet blessings that heaven has sent you and cherish every cuddle and snuggle. Because one day the cuddle and snuggle phase will be gone and you will miss those precious years. May God bless all of you sweet moms out there!

¹⁵But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead; he will surely take me to himself.

She Believes 3 Devotion July 10, 2025

God Is The Great Physician

Jeremiah 17:14

¹⁴Heal me, Lord, and I will be healed; save me and I will be saved, for you are the one I praise.
Isaiah 53:5
⁵But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed.
Psalm 103:2-3
²Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all his benefits—
³who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases,
1 Peter 2:24-25
²⁴“He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.” ²⁵For “you were like sheep going astray,”^[a] but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls.

A little over three weeks ago I had a tonsillectomy. I had heard horrendous things about having a tonsillectomy as an adult. I was told by several people that the recovery was so much worse for adults than for children. Several weeks before my surgery, I even had one doctor tell me that I was going to experience the worst sore throat of my life. Everyone was so encouraging, that I could hardly wait for this painful journey to get started. By the way, that’s a joke! And unfortunately, the truth is that all of these people were 110% correct! I can without a doubt report that it was no fun at all!

However, the beauty in all of this is how day after day I noticed God’s healing power on display. Going from a throat that was so swollen inside that I could only have a liquid diet, to being able to eat a hamburger straight off the grill last night. Not only that, but by God’s healing hand I went from experiencing the most severe pain ever, to three weeks later feeling no pain at all.

Yahweh Rapha means God who heals and He certainly does just that.

Another aspect of healing is rest. I had been working so many hours the last few months and pushing a lot harder than normal, and my body just needed to rest. Through this healing process God also provided a time to rest my body. His timing was perfect.

The good news is that just as God healed me physically, He also heals spiritually. Are you in need of healing today? Well let me tell you God is the Great Physician. Allow Him to heal you. If you are in need of spiritual healing, just surrender your will to His. He will heal and transform you. You will never regret your surrender, because with surrender comes healing and definitely a peace that will surpass all understanding.

Blessings to you on your new health journey, whether physical or spiritual, just a touch of His garment will bring divine healing from the one Who heals, Yahweh Rapha!

Mark 5:24-34

²⁴So Jesus went with him.

A large crowd followed and pressed around him. ²⁵And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. ²⁶She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. ²⁷When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, ²⁸because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” ²⁹Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.
³⁰At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my clothes?”

³¹“You see the people crowding against you,” his disciples answered, “and yet you can ask, ‘Who touched me?’ ”

³²But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. ³³Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. ³⁴He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

Faith June 29, 2025

The Refiner’s Fire

²⁴Then King Nebuchadnezzar leaped to his feet in amazement and asked his advisers, “Weren’t there three men that we tied up and threw into the fire?”
They replied, “Certainly, Your Majesty.”
²⁵He said, “Look! I see four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed, and the fourth looks like a son of the gods.”
²⁶Nebuchadnezzar then approached the opening of the blazing furnace and shouted, “Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out! Come here!”
So Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out of the fire
Psalm 66:10
¹⁰For you, God, tested us;  you refined us like silver.
Zechariah 13:9
⁹This third I will put into the fire;
  I will refine them like silver and test them like gold.
They will call on my name and I will answer them;
I will say, ‘They are my people,’ and they will say, ‘The Lord is our God.’”
Isaiah 48:10
¹⁰See, I have refined you, though not as silver;
  I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.
Proverbs 17:3
³The crucible for silver and the furnace for gold, but the Lord tests the heart.
Isaiah 43:2
²When you pass through the waters,  I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,  you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.

Have you ever wondered why life can be so hard at times? Maybe you feel like you have had more than your fair share of trials and tribulations. Some of you may feel like life just keeps on dealing you a bad hand.

Well today I am here to encourage you. When we go through trials it is for purpose. God uses trials and difficult circumstances to refine us and to grow our faith in His ability to get us through any and everything that life throws our way. He also uses the trials we go through to encourage those who are watching our journey.

Trials are difficult because, we don’t want the pressure and uncertainties that come with them. You may ask what uncertainties? The main one is how long? We don’t want to be uncomfortable or to suffer any longer than we have to. We want to get out of the refiner’s fire as quickly as possible.

God is our personal refiner. A refiner is a person that removes unwanted impurities to improve the quality of that which he is working on, and to make it more suitable for use.

Guess what? When God keeps us in the fire of trials and frustration, He is making us more suitable for His use and for His kingdom purposes.

The good news is that we never enter the fire alone. He goes before us and He is in the fire with us. He is our fourth man in the fire. (Daniel 3:24-26)

We are not consumed by the fiery flames of trials and tribulations. At the perfect time He will remove us from the fire and our likeness will be more like His and at that moment we will look back and see that it will have been worth it all. To be more like God should always be our goal.