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And when you can do works that are greater than you can imagine, you are unstoppable for Jesus. Hey friends! Welcome to the show! I’m so honored you’re taking a few minutes to spend time with me today. I know your time is precious and very limited, but I hope that through this podcast, you will be reminded of how precious YOU are as a child of Christ and that by taking a few minutes to step away from your busy lives and invest in yourself spiritually and emotionally, you’ll be encouraged and strengthened to go throughout your day with less overwhelm with day-to-day obligations, and more intention to live the purpose the Lord created for your life. In the first episode, i gave some context as to who i am and how this podcast came about. So if you’re curious about either of those things, then i highly recommend you going back and listening to that episode. It’s only about 11 minutes so it doesn’t take up much of your time. But for the rest of the episodes I just want to jump straight in to sharing the Lord’s words that he’s speaking into my heart. So i want to start this off with sharing one of my absolute favorite verses in the Bible. It’s my favorite for many reasons because it’s so applicable in so many areas. And you’ll see why the Lord wants me to remind you of it today. Hebrews 12:1 says, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. Throw off and run, fixing our eyes on Jesus. There is such a strong purpose for your life that only you can fulfill, but if you’re bogged down by things that are hindering you and entangling you, then you can’t even take a step towards accomplishing your life’s purpose. As tough as your day might be, as overwhelming as life can get, as stretched-too-thin as you feel and as exhausted as you are, there is a strong purpose for your life that we cannot afford to lose sight of. God has a strong calling on your life, and if you’re continually stressed and overwhelmed, then something is out of alignment with God’s calling on your life, and we need to do something about it. This became so apparent to me last year during our church’s christmas eve service while we were singing christmas carols. They were songs i’ve sung possibly a thousand times, but this time singing them felt different as my I held my son. As I was singing the words “long lay the world in sin and error pining, til He appeared and the soul felt it’s worth. The thrill of hope, the weary world rejoices.” And i broke down in tears. I had been living in a weary world, exhausted by everything. And then i realized that my son, that our kids…and me and you … have as much purpose for my life as jesus did, like the song says. That the world rejoiced because HE was born because His purpose was something they so desperately needed. Now let me clarify this. I’m not comparing myself or my son to Jesus. We’re not saving the world by any means. But what I’m saying is that God made Jesus for a purpose, and He made us for a purpose. And it’s my job as as a mom, above all else, to help my son discover the purpose for his life and to encourage him to live it in the name of Jesus. And it’s my job to be an example of what it means to live your purpose each day, even when it’s tough, even when you don’t want to, even when you have 1 million other things on your to-do list. The laundry, the cooking, the cleaning, those all come second to first living your purpose each day. The enemy is very real in our daily lives and it’s our job to protect our kiddos from it, but also protect ourselves from it. Being overwhelmed, sometimes it’s a struggle to be a godly example for our children and often times it’s because the enemy can attack our minds and our hearts through our to-do list. He makes the greatest impact by making us too busy to focus on living out the purpose for our lives so that we fall victim to overwhelm, to depression, to being stretched-too-thin, to being stressed, and not living the purpose for our lives. We can’t be an example of the goodness and faithfulness of Jesus when we’re in oppression ourselves. The ultimate goal of the enemy is to push us over the edge into the valley of overwhelm so we can’t live out the purpose for our lives.   So here are four things the bible calls us to do when we’re overwhelmed: 1. Recognize what’s hindering you We can’t throw them off until we realize what’s holding us back. Take a few minutes over the course of the next week or so and write down everything you feel is hindering you from living your purpose. Is it your to-do list? Are you overcommitted? Is it your health–physical, mental or emotional health that isn’t aligned with God’s best for your life? Is it your finances? Is it your attitude? Is it lack of motivation or direction? What is holding you back from living your purpose in life? Or let me put it this way, what is distracting you from doing the works of Jesus? What is unnecessarily taking up time and effort in your life that you can replace with the works of Jesus. Because for the one who gives us everything, I know I personally don’t give him enough in return because I’m so caught up in something that is of this world and will pass aways. I need to recognize how I much time i spend on worldly matters that will pass away rather than the time i spend on investing in the treasure in heaven.   2. Throw them off, or how I like to say it in my own life, lay them at the feet of Jesus and walk away. For me, my attitude hinders me from living my purpose. I either feel like I’m not good enough to do what I know I should be doing, or I start doing it and get distracted by something else. Distraction, by the way, is a ploy of the enemy to pull you further from God. I also just get very discouraged and want to give up when i come across a trial. Because it feels like when we’re doing something for the Lord it should be easy. We forget that that’s when we’re opening up ourselves to even more attacks of the enemy because he doesn’t want us accomplishing our purpose, he wants to stop us. So he will try everything he can to stop us. That’s why it’s so important to recognize what will hinder us from living our our purpose, then lay them at the feet of Jesus, because when our hindrances are in the presence of Jesus they are in his power, and I no longer have to worry about my own strength carrying me through because the hindrances are no longer over me. They’re at the feet of Jesus. Now I know what i’d be thinking if i was listening to this right now, and it’s… Kristen, how am i supposed to “throw off” the hinderance of doing chores around the home. Things HAVE to be done. Laundry HAS to be done, dishes HAVE to be done. How am I supposed to throw those off? God has not called you to do the laundry or the dishes, or wash the windows or mirrors, swiffer the floors or vacuum the crackers off the carpet yet again. Yes, He understands that at least in my house, i’m the leader of the home in maintaining the cleanliness of the home, but that is not what he calls me to do with my life, with my time and with my efforts each day. They are a small part of my day, but they are not the most important parts of my day. He calls me to use my time, my efforts and my life for the things that are eternal. The things that will not pass away. And while maintaining the organization or cleanliness of my home is part of taking care of the blessings He’s provided my family, if it’s separating me from what I need to do to honor God by taking a step towards the purpose that He’s created for me, then I’m disobeying. And disobedience is a sin. When he’s calling you to do something in His sweet, quiet voice, it’s very easy to not hear what he’s saying in a world of busy chaos that always seems to need your attention. Friends, the enemy is using the familiarity of everyday tasks to pull you away from obeying the Lord without you realizing that he’s doing it. Because every day you wake up and start checking off items on your to- do list without taking some time with the Lord to first see what HE wants you to do with your day, is a day that’s open to the enemy. Or, a day that you know you need to do something the Lord wants you to do like, check in with a friend, volunteer your time serving your church or an organization, inviting friends over for dinner so you can speak life into them, but you put off what he’s calling you to do to work on things that are not eternal, then that’s disobedience. If the enemy can’t make you bad, he’ll make you busy. And how is he most effective in making you busy? By adding insignificant items on your to-do list. And telling you that you can do what God wants you to do AFTER you do these things first. I’m honestly calling myself out right now because when I felt the call of the lord almost a year ago to start this podcast I KNEW that’s what he wanted me to do. But instead I found 100000 other things that seemed more pressing at the time and needed my immediate attention and I kept putting this podcast on the backburner. When in reality I look back at those days between when I first heard the Lord telling me to start a podcast and when my podcast actually launched and i have no idea how I spent all that time. Scrolling on facebook, probably. And for so long I was disobedient to the best things that God has planned for this season of my life because I was settling for good things. And i did a lot of good things. But they were just good, they weren’t the best. They weren’t necessarily bad, they just weren’t necessary. AND…they took up too much of my time. Scrolling on facebook is fine, but not if it’s holding me back from doing the works of the Lord. Washing the windows of your house is good, but don’t use it as an excuse for what God wants you to do.   3. Run. Run with perseverance. There will be bumps in the road, you will come to a halting stop, you will have seasons where you feel like you’re running as fast as you can yet you’re not going anywhere, but run with perseverance with the intention of every step to take one step closer to living your purpose each day. Paul tells us in 1 corinthians “So I run with purpose in every step.” And maybe you’re thinking, “Kristen, I don’t know what the purpose of my life is. I don’t know what I want to do with my life.” Or like some people say, “I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.” I’m excited to cover this process in a few episodes, but for right now I just encourage you to think of this this way… imagine yourself at the end of your life looking back on where you’re at right now. What do you hope to have accomplished between now and then? What does that look like for you? What does it feel like? What goal sets your heart on fire to run with perseverance? But most importantly, does it align with scripture? Is it something that you will be able to feel God’s blessings to help make it happen? Then do it. Run towards it. Persevere.   4. Finally, focus on Jesus. When we keep our eyes focused, laser focused on Jesus we can accomplish what we first thought was impossible. Because we’re always keeping our eyes on the one who provides, and keeping our eyes on what is true, excellent and praiseworthy, we know that our plans are being established in the name of Jesus, but without Him, our plans may fail.   In Matthew 14 when Jesus is walking on water, he calls Peter to walk on the water towards him, and he did, peter did walk on water. But he only walked on water while he was laser focused on Jesus. The moment he shifted his eyes to look at his surroundings he began to sink. But when he was laser focused on the pioneer and perfecter of our faith, he was doing the impossible.  I don’t want to live a life that when Jesus is performing a miracle I begin to sink because I’m too distracted by the storm of everything else around me! We are called to walk by faith and not by sight, because while we can’t see the finish line of the path we’re walking down, you must hold on to faith, and keeping your eyes on Jesus keeps you holding on to your faith. And you can the works God has always known you can do but you never realized you could. And when you can do works that are greater than you can imagine, you are unstoppable for Jesus. The impact your life can make in your family and in the world when you’re not bogged down by the hindrances of the every day…Satan won’t be able to hold you down. Because you’re eyes are on Jesus and you are RUNNING with perseverance. You will be limitless. Throw off. Run. Focus on Jesus.