Posts Tagged ‘Christian living ’

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by:  Staci Stallings

As you begin to sow Jesus Seeds in to lives around you, you will quickly come up against one of the biggest challenges of your life.

It’s kind of hard to put into words, but you will recognize it instantly.

It is summed up in two words being vs. not.

For example, let’s say that you are taking this whole Jesus Seed Sower to heart.  You are determined to sow some Jesus seed at work, let’s say.  Now at work there is a lot of strife–company strife, personal strife, and internal strife.  The company strife is due to pressures put on the company to remain competitive, to bring in new business, to serve current customers well, etc.  Personal strife might be the drama between co-workers.  You know the kind… this one doesn’t like that one, the other one did something three months ago that the other one is still mad about.

Then there’s internal strife–that’s the strife you carry around about yourself and your job performance, etc.

It can make for a very stressful situation.

However, you’ve decided to be a Sower.  So what to do?

The first thing is to learn to BE in yourself what you are not seeing in the world around you.  There is a very old song.  It says, “Let there be peace on earth, and let it begin with me.”  That’s great advice.  If you are not at peace, the situation can not be at peace.  And peace can’t start with the situation (okay, it can but it almost never does).  YOU have to BE the peace that you want to see.

It’s like when Jesus said, “These things I have spoken to you, so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33

We, as Sowers, have to learn to take Jesus into the situation with us and be at peace in Him even when there is no peace in the situation.

It’s like the other day.  I was editing for a friend of mine who was freaking out over a major deadline.  Now, I knew she was going to meet the deadline with ease (she did), but she didn’t know that.  I had agreed to edit for her and had been working on the manuscript for several days.  I told her I had made a goal of doing 50 pages a day, which I knew would have the book to her in plenty of time.

Then life stepped in.  One Wednesday everything conspired against me to get those 50 pages done.  It was nearly 10 p.m. when I finally got to the computer to work.  I got 25 pages done, and that was it.  So I sent her those pages and told her I would edit more the next day.

Now I didn’t know this until this afternoon, but she said, “You know, I watched you, and you didn’t freak out.  You didn’t make an excuse or step all over yourself to apologize.  You just said, ‘This is what happened.  I will get more to you tomorrow.  I was really inspired by that because you’re just at peace with whatever happens. You don’t freak out and make a huge deal out of it.  You just do your best and trust that that’s good enough.”

I didn’t know I was being watched.   But I do believe by BEING at peace and living at peace, I can show others how to do that much better than just telling them they should be at peace.

Oh, I’m not going to say it’s easy.  But you either are BEING or you’re NOT.  You’re either being at peace or you’re not.  You’re either BEING merciful or you’re NOT.  You’re either BEING kind or you’re NOT.

If you’re not, then as a Sower, you need to learn how to BE… grace-filled, forgiving, hopeful, kind, peaceful, loving, joyful…

And the way you learn that is to plant a lot of Jesus Seeds in your own life and nurture them.  Pray.  Go to church.  Have a conversation with God.  Put things in His hands.  Trust.

When you do that, you will BE more than you will NOT.  And people will begin to take notice and slowly but surely as you conquer this greatest of challenges, your world will begin to change.

*~*

COMING Wednesday & Thursday, AUG. 15 & 16…

FREE ON KINDLE TWO DAYS ONLY!

August 15 & 16

Staci’s “Amazing!” novel:

To Protect & Serve

 ”Reading To Protect & Serve, I’m taken away to another world, a world I want to be a part of and never leave. Staci’s characters are real with real everyday problems. I love that.

Oh, and the firemen in this story, they’re smokin’ hot! Especially the hero!”

–Debra, Amazon Reviewer

When control freak Lisa Matheson falls for handsome but shy firefighter, Jeff Taylor, it’s possible that life might just be going her way for a change. The only problem is she can’t control Jeff or the death wish he seems to have…

Will be Available as a free download from Amazon!

 Watch for more on Wednesday!

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