Category: Entrée

Entrée

God Is Your Shield

The Manna Chef

This morning, I read Genesis 15:1b (ESV), “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.”  I then looked at Genesis 15:1 (AMP), “After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; Your reward [for obedience] shall be very great.”

I took a moment to really think about what it means to have the Lord as my Shield.  First, I thought about the shield of faith (part of the whole armor of God) that is mentioned in Ephesians 6:16 (AMP), “Above all, lift up the [protective] shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.”  I have the responsibility to choose to lift up the shield of faith, above all, and that very shield can extinguish what the enemy throws at me.  How many times have felt like the blows were coming from every direction?  Use your shield, Sisters!  Why don’t we choose the armor of God daily when He promises results if we exercise our faith in Him?

Then I looked back at Genesis 15:1, where God told Abram, “You don’t have to be afraid because I am your shield.”  God is your Shield, Sisters.  Think about what that means.  The Lord is your Protector, and He is your ultimate Defense.  He covers you every day.  You need not even respond when others seek to attack your character, your job performance, your reputation, or even your name.  God is your Shield.  And sometimes that protection requires us to be hidden from ordinary observation.  (Read Psalm 91 when you have a moment.)  You don’t need to be afraid of the arrows of the enemy.  As a matter of fact, God can prevent those arrows from even reaching you. 

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Entrée

The First Pick

The Manna Chef

This morning, I had an opportunity to reminisce about my childhood days, when we played outside all day—literally.  We played all kinds of games, and we danced, sang, and giggled all day long, too.  Oh, those really were the days!  I thought about the team sports in which we competed, including baseball, kickball, and our world-famous relay races.  (Okay, they weren’t actually world famous, but at the time, we thought they were.) 

The team captains were usually the most athletic in the bunch.  There was such a feeling of respect when you were the team captain, but there was also a sense of pride in being the team captain’s first pick.  As opposing captains selected their teammates one after the other, the process sometimes became painful as the captains reached the last pick for each team.  Awkwardness grew when the first team captain (admittedly, sometimes me) would apologetically get to their last pick, and the other captain would, by default, receive the least athletic kid on their team.  Sometimes the process was brutal.

To anyone who endured that experience as the last choice, forgive me if I’ve brought up a painful memory.  I painted that particular picture because we often choose God that way—dead last.  We go to every option before it even occurs to us to seek Him.  I’m not sure if we even realize it throughout an ordinary day, but we choose Him last quite often.

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Entrée

Stop Looking!

The Manna Chef

Today I want to encourage you to stop looking back at the graves in your past.  You may not call them graves, but you are familiar with many of them.  They include the graves of shame, fear, sickness, unforgiveness, struggle, low self-esteem, and mediocrity, to name but a few.  Let’s look at Luke 24:1-6a (NKJV) for a moment:

Now on the first day of the week, very early in the morning, they, and certain other women with them, came to the tomb bringing the spices which they had prepared.  But they found the stone rolled away from the tomb.  Then they went in and did not find the body of the Lord Jesus.  And it happened, as they were greatly perplexed about this, that behold, two men stood by them in shining garments.  Then, as they were afraid and bowed their faces to the earth, they said to them, “Why do you seek the living among the dead?  He is not here, but is risen!”

So, you may be asking, “How does that verse apply to the challenges in my life?”  Well, I’m glad you asked that question!  I wonder if we, the daughters of the Most High God, really understand that we carry that same Resurrection power on the inside of us. 

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Entrée

Restore

The Manna Chef

I asked God for a word today, and I was determined to be still until He answered.  I didn’t ask Him for a Scripture; I asked for a word because I knew that word would send me right to the Word.  I waited for quite some time, and then I heard today’s word in a small, still voice:  RESTORE.

Those who know me personally know that I happen to love words!  So, I went right to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary to look at all of the literal meanings of the word restore.  Here’s what I found:

  1. To give back, return
  2. To put or bring back into existence or use
  3. To bring back to or put back into a former or original state; renew
  4. To put again in possession of something

All of those definitions give us a glimpse of just what it means to restore.  But let’s look deeper, because God Himself promised to restore His people.  And I need restoration in my life today, don’t you? 

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Entrée

Don’t Forget

The Manna Chef

How many times has the Lord come through for you?  If you really begin to think about that in sincerity, that list will go on and on.  Today, I encourage you to focus on God’s faithfulness to you—even when you may have struggled to be faithful to Him.  God always comes through for His children—not sometimes, always! 

Sisters, I am well aware that sometimes life throws you a curve ball that may catch you by surprise, but God is never caught off guard.  He knows what you need before you even need it.  Isn’t that amazing?  Think about those times when you didn’t exactly know how a need would be met, and then God showed up right on time.  I recently experienced His supernatural move!  God told me that He was taking care of every detail in a matter, and He most certainly did—in grand fashion too!  It left me asking, “Who wouldn’t serve a God like this?” 

When I was younger, my mother used to sing “Jesus, I’ll Never Forget” during testimony service.  (She loved that song!)

Jesus, I’ll never forget what You’ve done for me.  Jesus, I’ll never forget how You set me free.  Jesus, I’ll never forget how You brought me out.  Jesus, I’ll never forget, no, never…

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