Cheers To a New Year and a New You!

The new year is finally here! Good-bye 2012 and Hello 2013! Oh and where are my manners?!? HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU AND YOURS!!!!!

Over the last several weeks and days, I have heard many people make different new year resolutions. "This year I'm going to drop 20lbs...This year I'm going to spend more time with God...This year I'm going to start my business...This year I'm going to budget my money and operate in obedience to God..." Those are just a few promises that people may have made as the clock struck midnight this morning. 

Suffering in Silence (A small portion of my testimony)

Alot of people have asked to hear my testimony. Well, there is so much to it that I have to break it up into different blog posts.  I have decided to focus this first blog post on my health and how God has truly been good to me. Here it goes...I am a 27 year old, single mom, living with Rheumatoid Arthritis and lupus.

At the age of 15 years old, I was diagnosed with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis (JRA). JRA is a term used to describe a common type of arthritis in children.  It is a long-term (chronic) disease resulting in joint pain and swelling.  At the time of my diagnosis, JRA was not a common disease known in children so it took a while for the doctors to properly diagnose it.  Once diagnosed, JRA cannot be cured.  It may become dormant and can even be maintained but it is not a disease with a cure as of yet.  Once a patient with JRA reaches the age of 18 years old, the diagnosis is then changed to Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA) which is a chronic autoimmune disease that causes chronic inflammation of the joints in adults.

Dating Out of Desperation

"Dating out of desperation is like going grocery shopping on an empty stomach."

When our eyes are bigger than our stomachs, we have a tendency to make bad choices and end up with things that we do not need. EVERYTHING looks good when we are hungry. At that moment in time, all we are looking for is something to fill us up and take away the hunger that we feel. We end up putting things in our cart that we neither need nor really want but because the hunger that we posses distort the reality of what we truly need, we are temporarily blinded and side tracked. We will even pay a higher price to fill our hunger that is out of control. However, at the end of the day, because we only settled for a "quick fix" we still will not be satisfied.

GOD IS...

When I feel like crying, God is my comforter.
When I feel unwanted or need love, God is love.

When I am weak, God is my strength.
When I am sick or hurt, God is my healer.
When I am feeling down, God is there to lift me up.

When there is chaos all around me, God is my peace.

When I have a need, God is my provider.
When the enemy attacks, God is my protector.

When I am friendless, God is a friend that sticks closer than a brother.

Seven Simple Rules From God

1. Wake Up!!!...Decide to have a good day.

"Today is the day the Lord hath made; let us rejoice and be glad in it" ~Psalms 118:24

2. Dress Up!!!...The best way to dress up is to put on a smile. A smile is an inexpensive way to improve your looks.

"The Lord does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at outward appearance; but the Lord looks at the heart." ~I Samuel 16:7

3. Shut Up!!!...Say nice things and learn to listen. God gave us two ears and one mouth, so He must have meant for us to do twice as much listening as talking.

"He who guards his lips guards his soul." ~Proverbs 13:3

Giving Your Heart to GOD!

"A woman's heart should be so hidden in God that a man has to seek Him just to find her."  Many of us are familiar with this quote through either Max Lucado or Maya Angelou but what exactly is this quote saying?!? Simply put, GIVE YOUR HEART TO GOD!

As women, we naturally have a place and a desire in our hearts to love and to be loved.  Michelle McKinney Hammond's book, The Power of Being a Woman, suggests that this overwhelming desire for love was placed in woman in the Garden of Eden after Adam and Eve ate from the Tree of Knowledge