When God says no...

There is usually a reason for it. My dad taught me once that when we ask the Lord for something, He always answers. His answer is either “yes”, “no” or “not now”.
My dad was a true prophet. He was never wrong-not even once when asked a question about anything. He sought the Lord, and the Lord always gave him the right answer. But you’d better be prepared to hear it because it was always a word from the Lord. My father once 3000 miles away and with no word from anyone but the Lord cried at 7:15 pm one evening and spoke of the exact moment a woman passed away that so many were praying for and, in faith, had complete confidence she would recover. I lived down the street from this woman and none of us near her even knew she passed away for three more days. Once told she had died, the time my dad knew she passed was the time she passed.
A friend of mine called him, again miles and miles away and a couple of long years before the real-estate market fell, and he asked my dad about his job with a commercial realtor. He was not happy and my dad told him if he stayed he would become unhappier because real estate would crash and not return for a while. Believe me my dad was not an investor and had no crystal ball, he just heard from the Lord when anyone was hurting and he just knew what was coming. His photo is found just above this story...
My husband and I had so many trials along the way of getting our music into the right hands. My husband had tried since the 1980’s and had not been signed-so when the two of us tried, older, broken and discouraged we thought many times we were out of our minds, but my dad said to keep going we would do fine, just fine and in fact well. We signed a contract this last year. The CD will be releasing next month. My husband and I are retired now. Our producer said to us first thing, he did not want to work with older rock and rollers who still thought they had a chance!
He instead did work with us and became a strong supporter and fan of our music after starting this process with the music the Lord gave us. Yes, it took us longer than many, but the songs don’t show anything but the glory of God and the CD it’s called “Glory and Grace”.            
When the Lord puts you on a path you can always count on Him to finish the race.

        What about when the Lord says to you, ‘dear one that path, desire, open door, opportunity, request is not my will’…and He does to all of us at one time or another-what then? Sometimes that can be a severe disappointment. A life long dream shattered. He says He loves us and we can ask anything according to His will and He will answer us, right?

What about in the area of having our own children?

     I know I grew up just expecting the day to come when I too would have my little bundle of blessing in my arms. I put in my time helping others do this very normal adult activity. I was an advance practice labor and delivery nurse and I had not one incident in all my years of practice that did not lead to a safe birth. God blessed that because I know, a lot can go wrong. That may have happened to you. Something went wrong. 

Here you are, fully expecting to expect and you either did and lost the baby, or you can’t conceive at all. Wam, bam, thank you mam!

It happened to me too. I never thought that would be my fate.  If you are suffering in this area, I feel your pain. You may not feel like a whole person yet, let alone a woman. A couple of scriptures I want to share with you. Psalm 13:1-6 says: “How long will You forget me, O Lord? For ever? How long will you hide Your face from me? How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? How long shall my enemies be exalted over me? Consider and hear me, O Lord my God. Lighten my eyes lest I sleep the sleep of death. Lest my enemies say I have prevailed against him and those that trouble me rejoice when my tears and fears move me. But I have trusted in Thy mercy, my heart shall rejoice in Thy salvation. I will sing unto the Lord because He hath dealt bountifully with me”. Bountifully? Yes, hang in there.

      Psalm 113:9 says, “He makes the barren woman to keep house, and to be a joyful mother of children. Praise the Lord!”

       I know He did for me. After the infertility, with no help even with the most sophisticated treatments, and then a devastating divorce from that man for that reason, I had to accept “not my plan” from the Lord and expect He would make me a joyful mother some other way. He make it clear, the answer was “no” to having them as I had planned.

So, lets examine the “no” from the Lord. Why on earth would God say “no”? Why? It is probably in your best interest. God sees the whole picture. You see in part. It is not His will. You can step into his permissive will-but that won’t do you as much good as His desired will. We are living the permissive will of God-how is that going for you so far?I don’t know about any of you, but this life can be so hard. He did not intend for any of this to happen. His desired will for man was to live in the Garden free from the knowledge of good and evil, free from pain, free from sickness, barrenness and death. So, anytime you want to step out of the desired plan of the Lord, He will not abandon you but things will not go has He had planned, and there is not one thing He can do to spare you once you’ve exited His will. Can you imagine what would have happened to us if His one and only innocent son said “no” to God’s will for His life?

I can think of three times I got on my knees and pleaded with the Lord to say “yes” or open a door I wanted to walk through and if He had listened to me, I would be in deep trouble right about now. Has He said “no” to something that really was important to you? I understand, now what has He said, “yes” to instead?

He will open another door if you just keep moving forward. Often His “yes “includes helping others along with you. Sometimes the deepest pit you fall into moves you so much it becomes a driving force behind a ministry, path or new job. You’ve got one chance at your life to follow God’s plan and you can put your passion into it. His grace is all you need. His power works best in your weakness. When you are weak and think you are trough, all that is, is exactly when you need to lean on the Lord and when you do, you will see that in your weakness He can use you. Your strength, pride or determination out of His way now; His will can be done. He can lead you. Imagine your world in the perfect will of God? It is never God’s will for us to just mechanize or simply go through the motions.

God’s will is not like that. When you start living it, it changes everything. A life without regrets. Nothing missing, nothing broken. Maybe not what you had imagined your life to be, the journey with Jesus is really up in the air everyday.

You can’t plan it. What you do instead is simply fall on your knees everyday and say “Lord this day belongs to you, use me as You choose, Your will be done”.

He will use you, everyday in the most interesting ways. Unplanned, unexpected and all that you can do is go with the flow of the Holy Spirit. When your life has not gone as you had planed…He will allow you to grieve, recover and then He will restore you. His Word says in Job, double for your trouble.

My testimony is growing and has not finished yet, but in God’s will for my life I remarried and inherited my husbands children-four and four grandchildren! That is all well and good-many times, something I did discover is that it is tough to be a parent-what I was so desperate for I sometimes wonder!? But the...grandkids-they are the cream on the coffee. The best. But my story continues because I have a heart for orphans and now I have an ability to help in that area. One of our songs from our new CD has already hit the #1 spot. It is called “Father are You listening” and it is our prayer for orphans. I have also been blessed with the position of Charity Oversight Director of Worthy Charities at Indie Gospel Artists and it has placed us in a position to do something about those that have none and want to find those that want one. With all proceeds of that #1 song dedicated to orphans everywhere I get to make a difference in more lives than I ever imagined I would. I love what I do. I would love to know about you…my deepest prayer is that you will not be discouraged for long and have to courage to say simply this: “No Lord”, “OK then, what’s next”? 

“I’m ready”.