Compliments of the Season!

The yuletide is a time of self-reflection and evaluation.

How did the year go? What did you achieve?

 But apart from looking back at the past 11 months, there’s the anticipation building in your heart about the next 12 months of the new year.

What will you do? What will you repeat and what will you change?

Don’t get bogged down with worries that you will repeat mistakes. Don’t make plans to stay the way you have been. Growth is so natural that you can’t feel yourself getting taller. You only know it has happened when you measure yourself against the wall and see just how much growing has gone on since you last checked.

Growth is natural. All you can do is enhance your growth. Do this by reading materials that help develop you. For women, one book I will recommend is my devotional: Conversations with Jesus.

This devotional took me four years to complete. It resulted from a long and continuous conversation with the Lord, and it was quite the journey.

It is a 21-day devotional that studies the interactions between Jesus and some special women in the Bible. These women had one-on-one interactions with Jesus and their ages and life situations were so varied that I doubt there would be a woman (or man) who would not find someone they can identify with.

This devotional will encourage you and help you build your communication with Jesus as you come into the new year.

As my gift to you this Christmas, here is an excerpt below. I hope you enjoy the read and get a copy for yourself and someone who needs it.

Merry Christmas and have a wonderful 2024 in conversation with the Lord.

Pamela Agboga.

Author of Conversations with Jesus.

***

Excerpt from Conversations with Jesus: A 21-day devotional for women.

DAY 18 – Knocking on Heaven’s Door

SCRIPTURE READING:

Matthew 15:25-26 Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, it is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it to dogs.

Interestingly, Jesus, who spoke first to the woman at the well, who sought out the woman with the issue of blood, is unusually rather reticent with this lady. Why does he refuse to speak to her, act like she isn’t there, or behave as though her problem isn’t his to solve?

I don’t know.

But did this deter her? In fact, his statement that he was not sent to her people gave her hope. She knew that this was NOT a no. This was a maybe, and so she approached. The disciples had come to know their master better by now. They knew his patience with people. So, they let her come closer.

And she worshipped him. The Bible says:

Hebrews 4:16 Let us, therefore, come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.

When you need help, do not be afraid. Come. Come just as you are. The Canaanite woman came with the problem that no one else had been able to solve. Her only hope was there before her eyes. She just had to reach him. He had to hear her. It was now or never. So, she worshipped.

She worshipped the man who had just said he was not here for her. She appealed to his heart, praying that she could turn him.

Mary, the mother of Jesus, had faced a similar situation. She had come to him with a problem at a marriage feast in Canaan. He had told her his time had not yet come. But she knew he would answer her. She didn’t know when or how, but she told the servants to be ready. Whatever he said to them, they were to OBEY.

Perhaps the Canaanite woman had heard the water-to-wine story. The servants who experienced the miracle must have peddled the story about for all to hear. So, if this man could make wine for a wedding, is it your problem that he cannot handle?

Like the widow who wearied the judge until he gave judgment on her behalf, do not cease to cry to God for whatever ails you. He will answer.

PRAYER: Whatever the reason for your silence, Lord, I will stay here in your will and wait. Amen.

ACTION POINT: Waiting takes time and patience. Are you a patient person? In what ways can you get better at waiting?

Conversations with Jesus by Pamela Agboga is available on Amazon and the publisher’s website www.chowilson.com