I’m following up on my post from last week, and also providing the text from it if you don’t want to watch the video.

Let’s continue to encourage one another.

Here’s the text from video:

“Hi everyone.  I hope your day is going well.

I just wanted to jump in here and talk a little bit about my blog post from last week called What Would I Tell Her? It was about my 20-year-old self. If I could go back and talk to myself, then what would I say? Would I even listen to me? Would my 20-year-old self listen to me now? I’m not so sure. But I ended the post with what I would tell her to be bold and go out and live her life. I had referred to a passage from Psalm 138 about having a strength in her soul and to be bold. But I didn’t want that to be misconstrued or taken out of context.

We need to be bold in Christ. We need to have the strength in our soul that comes from Christ. It is not our own strength, and it’s not being bold to just do anything we want.

Yesterday’s encouragement, if you saw that, is kind of a continuation of this discussion I’m having. And yesterday’s encouragement was from Jeremiah, chapter 29 verses 12 through 13. And it says, “Then you will call upon me and come and pray to Me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.”

I always like to talk about these verses from Jeremiah because they follow a very popular verse which is Jeremiah 29:11, which talks about the plans God has for us that are for good, not for evil. You’re probably all familiar with it. I have it up on my wall. But I think we can’t take that out of context either. I think we need to continue what Jeremiah 29:11 is saying and follow it up with verses 12 and 13. That we need to call upon the Lord, and then he will hear us. We need to seek the Lord, and guess what, we’ll find him, but we have to seek Him with all our heart.

While we need to be bold, we need to have a strength, again, the strength that only comes from God. Being bold through God’s teaching and God’s word when we talk about the plans of Jeremiah 29:11. Which is great. We know God has good stuff for us, but we need to be in His Word and praying about our path and seeking Him. He’s going to hear us. Yes. And we’re going to be able to find him, because we’re seeking Him with all our heart.

So, I can’t go back and talk to my 20-year-old self. But I can keep seeking God and know that his plans are good, because I know I learned a lot from my accident when I was 20 years old. I know I’ve learned a lot through my cancer journeys. I’ve learned a lot through divorce. I’ve learned a lot by being a step-parent and a parent, and so some of those things that are not so good in life can lead to the best things like remarriage after divorce, when you’re marrying the one that God has for you, and guess what, you get the bonus kids with it, with that marriage.

Keep seeking God, keep trusting Him. Bad things are going to happen. We know that as Christians, but we know God hears us, and we know God’s walking with us, and we know God’s going to give us that strength in our soul. We’re going to find him if we seek Him with all our hearts.

I just wanted to share that today. I wanted to make sure my message from last week was clear.

Anyway, I wish y’all a great day. Let’s continue to encourage one another. Let me know if you have any questions, concerns, or comments, I’d love to hear from you. Take care.”

See you next week!