Its Time for an Update

Greetings, 

Well, my dear friends! It has been quite some time since I updated this website, and I'm sorry to say that. After the release of the first 10 Episodes of my next story, The Ephesus Pages, I began focusing on a secret project for my kids that requires a Pen Name, leaving everyone wondering where in the world I had gone. 

The Purpose of Pain- An Emotional Recovery

Greetings,

In my last post, The Purpose of Pain- An Emotional Reality, I shared about the reality of emotional pain. It is important to realize this reality but it is also important to realize that there is a road to recovery. I know what you're thinking, why on earth is he talking about recovery, I can deal with this reality in my own way and on my own time.

The Purpose of Pain- An Emotional Reality

Greetings,

I started this little series a while back, the first post is entitled, Thoughts on the purpose of pain. I've been thinking about it a lot more lately and thought I'd share a bit more.

I Am Sending You

Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” - John 20:21 NIV

  It is an interesting thought to believe in a statement such as this. To be truthful we don’t really see things like this in today’s world. I must admit, I miss hearing things like this on a daily basis.  In my college days we heard things like this everyday and we knew that it meant something to be sent by God, into a world or darkness as vessels of light. Our struggles in college were nothing like the struggles that we face today and that was only six years ago. My, how our perspectives change in such a short amount of time. 

  When we were younger things just seemed different, but the reality is that the world is always changing. As we live our lives we encounter many different experiences that impact who we are in that present moment. 

  Those experiences change the way we look at the world and teach us something about ourselves that we would not normally have the opportunity to learn. With each experience comes another step in our journey to becoming the person we were meant to be. I believe that this happens because of bold statements like the scripture passage above.

 

God has given each of us the ability to experience certain moments in life because they are meant to show us something of who we are meant to be. In essence, these experiences ‘send us’ into the world as witnesses of his glory, and soldiers of His heart. 

  As we embrace the experiences we encounter we grow and as we grow in God we become who we are meant to be. The peace that is promised in this passage only comes through the path God has set for us. God sends each and everyone of us into the world to share the wonder of His amazing grace with a broken world.

  God, the Father, sent Jesus into the world so that he could pave the way for us to be sent into all the world as the vessels of this amazing grace. As the vessels God has chosen to share this message, it is our calling to embrace each experience we encounter as a path towards peace, the peace that surpasses all understanding. 

 

This peace is part of our inheritance as the people of God and with it we can go forth into the world leaning on the everlasting power of God’s love. In the end, we are given a foundation of grace, growth, peace and of experience that we can use to spread His love. 

  Even though the world is changing before our eyes and becoming darker everyday, we are changing too. Just as the Father sent His Son, the Son has sent us into the world and given us the foundation to change the world. So, I encourage you today to go forth, embrace your experiences and become the change that truly does make the difference.

Blessings in Christ and Thanks again for visiting us at "The Gathering Room."

"Times of refreshing come from the presence of the Lord." 45.3.20

M.J. Elliott

A Vision Changed

Greetings Dear Readers, 

It feels like it has been a long time since I last wrote a post like this, but I've got the motivation today so I'm going for it. Lets see where it takes me.

First off, I have to admit something to you all. I've been struggling as of late. I know, I know, you struggling, unheard of, I don't believe it. Well, it's true and it's okay to believe it. :-). Its been an interesting month and a lot has happened in our lives since my last family update back in February. I won't bore you with all the details, so lets just say if you want the details just ask and I'll share them in another post.

Lets, get to the point. We are awaiting the birth of our 3rd child in a few months, I've been promoted, our kids have been learning and growing, our ministry website has began to build a following and God has been changing our hearts.  That about sums it all up so lets move on to the motivation behind this post.

Secondly, The struggle I've been working through has been one of identity. Yes, it's true, I've been searching deep with in, longing for God to show me who I am today, I've been searching for a new voice so to speak. I've been wondering what am I passionate about now that my spirit has changed. The time that my family and I have been here in California has given me an entirely new perspective on life, but where has all this change been leading?

To be honest, I still don't really know. To be completely upfront, I had given up on trying to figure it all out. However, I have experienced a few things recently that have given me motivation to begin the search again. I will bring you the details of these experiences in a post I will share later this week but for now I want to leave you with a new vision that I believe God has given me. It is posted on my updated author page on Facebook, but here it is for you today.

"Live your life to the fullest, embracing each refreshing moment that comes from the Lord. Be free to share God's encouraging love with any and all who will accept it and use what God has shown you as the vessel to do so."

Blessings in Christ and Thanks again for visiting us at "The Gathering Room."

"Times of refreshing come from the presence of the Lord." 45.3.20

M.J. Elliott

New Project; A Journey with Acts

Greetings Readers, 

It has been a while since my last post, other than the reflection I shared the other day, and I have been on a Journey.  Recently, I've been quite busy writing content for different ministry partners, with Finding Philemon, and working on a new book project with one of our writers from Love The Saints Ministries. (This will be a gift for all of the pastors we encounter through that ministry. It will focus on the story of Jacob and how his life can encourage pastors today.) 

This post, however, is about another project. This project is more of a personal project. You see, I'm been praying a lot recently about something I can do to engage my own faith a little more.  I love writing for my different clients for my freelance business and I love writing for our ministry partners, but I've been missing my own time with God more and more. 

The other day I told my wife, I needed to do something more for myself and that I'd been praying about it for some time. I am pleased to say I have come up with an idea, and I'd like to share it with everyone I can. So if you will take the next step with me, here is what I am feeling lead to pursue...

I am calling it "A Journey with Acts", I know not my usual pray on names, but it shares what I want to get across. "A Journey with Acts" is gong to be a pretty intense project. I am planning to read, or watch, the book of acts word for word and write a short reflections on every verse I read. Then I'm going to share the reflection here, at "The Gathering Room" on a weekly basis. There may be some weeks in which I write on more that one verse, but the plan to get through them all. 

Now this project has been coming for a while and even though I've waited until now to share it with you. It's been in the works for a few months. It started as a small nudge in my heart, but has grown into something I really believe in doing. My prayer it that as it encourages me, It will do the same for those that read each Reflection.

Honestly, I know there are going to be weeks when I struggle, especially with everything else that is going on, but I am determined to keep going as long as it takes.  Then I will move on to another book and then another. Eventually, I want to make through the entire Bible, but we'll see how "A Journey with Acts" goes for now.

If you willing to join me on this Journey, I promise to pray for you and ask that you do the same for me. My hearts in this and I know that I'll need encouragement along the way. Don't worry though, when the Lords leads, there will still be a #DevotionalBlog for me to share. 

Well, that's all for now.  Keep your eyes open.

Blessings in Christ and thanks again for visiting us at "The Gathering Room"

 Stand Strong and continue to believe the teachings given to you... (2 Thes. 2:15b NCV),

M.E.

Reflections; The Peaceful Melody

Greetings Friends,

I wrote this a while back and thought I'd share it once more, I have been working on a new Series that I will share more on in the weeks ahead, so keep tight. I know your wondering whats going on. Take a step backwards with me though and share your thoughts on this Reflection Post. It still speaks volumes to me and I believe it can do the same for you dear reader. :-).

-----

Have you ever felt as though everything is going wrong?

Did you feel like no matter what you did you weren't doing anything right and that people were getting all over your case because of it?

It's not easy is it?  You do everything you can to do things the right way and the result is always the same (or at least it feels that way in the moment, right?).  For me, it's been like that for the past few days and I'll be honest, it’s been a bit hard to work through...

found on mykneeguide.com

There is no need to go into any details, but let me just say, It has gotten better and the hard moments made it possible for God to send me a Peaceful Melody of a reminder today...

I was on my lunch, reading my daily Jesus Calling Devotional, and I was reminded that I needed to focus on finding my quite place.

"I wait quietly before God, for my victory comes from Him" (Psalm 62:1 NLT).

In the Jesus Calling Devotion it stated to "Sit quietly in My (Gods) presence while I bless you." At first I refused, but as I continued to read it stated to "rest in My sufficiency as you consider the challenges this day presents." Talk about a rude awakening, as that moment all I could do was as the devotion instructed.

As I sat quietly, I began to think about the verse I just quoted from Psalm 62. In that moment I was encouraged by the fact that even though I could not see where God was in those harder moments, He was there, struggling to get my attention.  For me to realize this, I needed to find the peaceful melody of God’s grace in the midst of what was going on around me.  This realization changed my whole perspective on the past few days. It helped me find what was unseen in the chaos surrounding me.

I share this briefly, to encourage those that may read this post.  In the midst for the chaos surrounding you, seek to find the peaceful melody of God’s grace. Take a moment to breathe so that God may bestow a blessing upon you, I have no doubt that He will.

Blessings in Christ and thanks again for visiting us at "The Gathering Room"

Stand Strong and continue to believe the teachings given to you... (2 Thes. 2:15b NCV),

M.E.

What is the Balance

We've all had those weeks when we've felt like there was nothing really worth putting time and energy into right?

Sometimes it can feel like what we are doing really has no purpose and other times it can feel like no matter what we fail to complete what ever task we are working towards.  All to often these kinds of feelings can keep us from noticing what really matters. For example I posted one of my quotes to Facebook and twitter a few days ago what spelled a word wrong.  It was a simple mistake, purposefully posted for this very post, but no one really noticed it. Lets see if you can pick out the mistake now...

"Today is a great day to remind yourself that there is a reason that the tasks that seem meaninging actually mean the most."

 The mistake was in the word meaning, I added an extra 'ing' at the end of the word instead of a 'less'.  Here is the corrected quote, in case you want to share it it any one...

 "Today is a great day to remind yourself that there is a reason that the tasks that seem meaningless actually mean the most."

How does this connect with our feelings though? Well, the extra 'ing' does completely confuse the reader. It also places a pretty big damper on what I'm trying to get across in putting the quote out there in the first place. Sometimes there is more to the picture that what gets across.

"And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day." Genesis 1:31

One the surface, we may feel like we've really screwed up or that we really don't know why we are doing something, but what it comes down to is that with God we can never really see the full picture of what he has planned for us. It is the same with the quote.  The purpose of the quote was to remind the reader that sometimes what we do seems meaninging *Ha, got you again* meaningless. However, the reality is that the smallest detail can mean the most. 

Think about what ever you are going through today, 

For my family its getting the kids to sleep better at night, If I were to focus more on the fact that my kids aren't sleeping well, I might miss the reason why they aren't doing so... (IE, full diaper, bad dreams, itchy sunburn, stomach ache or many other possible things)

Instead of focusing so much on the bigger picture, as I tend to do, why not look for your purpose more in the details or in the smaller things, as my wife tends to do.  Don't get me wrong, it's important to look at both pictures but you also need to remember to find the balance between the two.

"A just balance and scales are the Lord's; all the weights in the bag are his work." Proverbs 16:1

Blessings in Christ and thanks again for visiting us at "The Gathering Room"

Stand Strong and continue to believe the teachings given to you... (2 Thes. 2:15b NCV),

M.E.