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                        Soaring Wings Ministries

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3/28/2014

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This morning I woke up early....just as the sun was coming up.  I slipped out of bed, grabbed my bathrobe and slippers and headed to the kitchen to make a cup of tea.  As the tea water was brewing, I grabbed my Bible and Bible study book.   There is nothing I love more than getting up early when the house is still quiet and spending time with God over a cup of hot tea. 

 As I was walked into the kitchen a sense of peace, joy and comfort came over me.  The kitchen was being bathed in the early morning sun and I looked out the window and saw three horses roaming the hillside while they peacefully grazed on grass.  To really appreciate the beauty of the horses on the hillside you need to know that in Colorado horses, and any livestock, are allowed to roam free with no fences. It really is a very beautiful thing to see.  I looked out another window and I saw the Rocky Mountains in the west being lit up from the sun coming up in the east.  As this sense of peace, joy and comfort came over me early this morning in our kitchen, I quickly realized that the reason why I felt peaceful, joyful and comfortable was because I felt at home!!!  This was such feeling was such a surprise to me because a few months ago I would have given my right arm to be back East.  I immediately thanked God for helping me get to this point where living on the plains of Colorado in a manufactured house, with no trees and occasionally some very fierce winds, could feel like home.  

So how did I get to this point? How did Colorado begin to feel like home instead of strange and foreign land?  How did I get through those awful months of feeling so lonely, homesick and desperate for familiar people and surroundings?  How could I stand in my kitchen this morning and feel at peace and joyful when we have been through some very trying times? 
 
The answer is very simple.  It was through prayer and keeping my eyes on Jesus.  So many of you have been praying for us and we truly can feel your prayers.  Because of your prayers and God's faithfulness we feel ourselves being lifted up on wings like eagles.  There were times during those hard months that I would have hit rock bottom if had I let myself focus on my loneliness and homesickness.  During those hard months I chose instead to keep my eyes focused on Jesus.  So what does that mean....to keep your eyes focused on Jesus?  It means to 
keep Jesus, His power and His love, in the foremost part of your mind.  It means to spend time praying.  It means to spend time reading God's word.  It means to spend a lot of time praising God for who He is in all His majesty and glory.  It means staying connected to Christians who can lift you up and encourage you. It means filling your mind and time with things that are pleasing to God rather than with junk.  

If you are feeling discouraged today, overwhelmed, homesick or lonely.....try keeping your eyes on Jesus.  He is there.  He cares.  He feels your pain.  He wants to lift you up on wings like eagles.  If you don't know where to start to keep your eyes on Jesus, I suggest you read Phillippians 4:8 and apply God's word to your life. "Finally brothers, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things".  

Our thoughts are powerful and WILL affect how we think or feel.  Filling our minds with things that are noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy will help us keep our eyes on Jesus.  

Jesus alone is my source of strength, peace and joy.  It was Jesus that brought me from homesickness and loneliness to standing in my kitchen with peace, joy and a sense of home.   I praise Him and thank Him for always being with me and never forsaking me.  I truly am blessed. Psalm 144: 15b "Blessed are the people whose God is the Lord." 


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God is STILL in Control! 

3/15/2014

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Many of you have heard that I have been diagnosed with a non-curable lung disease, Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis to be specific. It was not fun to hear that diagnosis, it throws you for a loop when you hear bad news when you have been praying so hard to not hear anything but that answer! Where is God? Why me? Why now? What about what You sent me out here to do? These were all my inadequate questions and concerns. I realized one late night as I struggled with what was happening, I was focusing on me and had allowed myself to lose the focus on the one true God. 

One of my favorite books of the Bible is Job, it is an odd choice for a favorite as it is not a "nice" story, or easy to read of this man's suffering. Yet it has drawn me for a long time. I will be honest and say it is not where I wanted to go when I was going through all the tests, the doctors' appointments, the specialists, the hospital. No I wanted to depend on me or my family or the strangers taking care of me, the nurses, doctors, technicians, they had the power and the answers! Oh sure. 

As I read devotions and my Bible I stayed away from Job but I always knew it was there and so was He! So I read it early one morning, 3 or 4 AM to be exact. I saw Job worship God in 1:21, when he says "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised." Wow, worshipping God when you just lost everything, I didn't focus on worship in my time of need.

I saw Job ask a key question in 2:10 when he asks, "Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" Hmmm, not what I thought about in that hospital bed! As I read the rest of the story, God talking to Job and Job to God I thought that I needed to do that more, pray, be honest with God with my questions and listen too. When I did some amazing things happened. 

I realized that God was STILL in control, He still loves me, He is still is with me, He still wants to use me and Soaring Wings Ministries is His, not mine. I will do what I can for as long as I can to build Soaring Wings Ministries, just like before I knew I was sick, I will do what I can with what God gives me, my time, my energy, my intelligence, my love for others, it is all His to use until He says it is time to stop. Isn't it the same for all of us?

Don't see an end to the pain and suffering you have or others you love? I have good news for you (and me), "And the God of all grace, who called you to His eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast" (1 Peter 5:10) "These troubles and sufferings of ours are, after all, quite small and won't last very long. Yet this short time of distress will result in God's richest blessing upon us forever and ever! So we do not look at what we can see right now, the troubles all around us, but we look froward to the joys in heaven which we have not yet seen. The troubles will soon be over but the joys to come will last forever" (2 Corinthians 417-18 LB)

One last scripture, the one we use as the verse for Soaring Wings Ministries, Isaiah 41:31 "but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."      AMEN!
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    Anita Rennells is writer of this blog.  She, along with her husband Ed, founded Soaring Wings Ministries to serve the homeless.  The purpose of the blog is to tell the story of Soaring Wings Ministries and to give glory to God. 

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