Episode 218-God's New Thing I read this somewhere and it resonated with me. I don’t know the author. “God is telling me today, rest in Me. I am already ahead of you, working in your life. I will turn around every bad situation you are in. I will bless you and your family with all that you need. I will heal all that needs healing. I will wipe away of your tears. You will be blessed.” Rest became my word for 2024, but it’s not the ordinary sleeping kind of rest. God showed me some new reasons...

Episode 217-Here's My Heart, Lord You’ve likely gotten all kinds of gifts for Christmas already, but I want to give you another one. When I take the love language test, mine comes back words of affirmation, imagine that. It’s what I love to receive, but it’s also what I love to give.  Words can build us up or tear us down. I hope these words, which one day may become a picture book or illustrated book, will make you think and cause you to draw closer to our loving Heavenly Father.  So here...

Episode 216-Season for Temptation It’s the season for temptations especially for a sugar and comfort food addict like I used to be or like you may be right now. How can we resist falling into temptation?  If we are surrendered to God it can help us resist temptation. Overcomers Academy link: https://TeresaShieldsParker.com/overcomers/  

Episode 215-Make Time for God With so many time-stealers in our lives, how do we make room for God? First, we have to first above everything else. If we don’t have time set aside specifically to spend time listening to God, How will we know what He’s saying to us. How will we know what He wants us to do? James 4:8 NLT tells us, “Come close to God, and God will come close to you.” It is really up to us to find time to meet with God. It boils down to making time, space, and room for Him.  ...

Episode 214-Stubborn Surrender My mother used to say to me, “You’re so stubborn you’d argue with a fencepost if it would talk back.” Stubbornness is not a good trait when you are not wanting to do what you know God wants you to do. It just reveals a whole lot of the very worst of our humanness.  Stubbornness is a huge part of being human and we think we don’t really need any help from God.  However, if we stay stubborn and never surrender to God, we will just sink deeper into sin. We will...

Episode 213- Grace and Surrender Without the grace of God, I would never have surrendered to Him. I’d still be trying to work my way to heaven by trying to earn God’s favor God understands us though. He is not a distant far away God. He is the God of grace. We don’t have to earn anything. Failure is part of the learning process.  God gives us grace. It’s a gift, but its more than just a box we unwrap on Christmas morning. It has substance to it. It is endless. From grace we take and grace...

Episode 212-Efficacy and Surrender It was during my quiet time recently when kind of like a benediction on our time, God said, “May your day be filled with efficacy.” He does this kind of stuff to me a lot. It is one of the great benefits of a real quiet time. I said, “Efficacy? Why are you giving me this word, God?” He was quiet and I sensed He wanted me to look-up it’s meaning. It means the ability to produce a desired or intended result. It also means to produce effectiveness. It doesn’t...

Episode 211- Surrender to His Majesty Lord, Don’t allow me to make a mess of my life, for I cling to Your commands and follow them as closely as I can. (Psalms‬ 119‬:31‬ TPT‬‬).‬‬‬ We all need to pray that verse every day, especially in the days we’re living in now. Everywhere I look it seems like everyone is in a world of self-doubt. Today I got a flyer in the mail. Don’t usually read these flyers this one happen to be from evangel University, where my daughter graduated. It’s talking to...

Episode 210-Surrender Bad Habits As humans we want to be in charge of what we want. We want others to listen to us. We don’t want anyone telling us what to do. We don’t want to give up what we think we have to have in order to endure this life and all its temptations, desires, wants, needs and must haves. We want stuff and we don’t want the trials, tests, and troubles. We think we know what we need but if we get what we want, we don’t have what we really need. Our desires have become our...

Episode 209-Surrender the Hard Stuff Why is this topic of surrender so difficult for us? As soon as I said that I answered my own question. “We can’t surrender to God, because the only one we have ever fully surrendered to and trusted in is ourselves.” It’s hard to trust in Someone you can’t see.   While this is true, there have been many times when I have surrendered things to God that looking back now seem like small things. After we surrender them, they become easy because we’ve already...

Episode 208-Why Surrender to God? Why should we surrender to God? The unstated question here is, what’s in it for me. I mean I’m doing pretty good here on my own. Besides I know a lot of people who say they are Christians and they are just as bad off as me. I don’t really see a reason to give over control of my life to anyone. How do I know what God’s going to do when I give things over to Him? Things might get worse than they are now. Here are six reasons to surrender to God. And just to...

Episode 207-Surrender Control Surrendering what little control we have feels impossible. The truth is when we are trying to be in control, we many times wind up out of control while trying to be in control. That became the story of my life. I had been trying to be in control of everything and everyone in my sphere of influence. I finally had to admit the truth. That wasn’t working. I was exhausted and in control of nothing. The truth I didn’t want to face was: I will never be IN control...

Episode 206- Intentional Surrender Surrendering to God is a choice we make, but it’s much more than just choosing whether we will eat a huge piece of cake or not. It’s an intentional, purposeful choice to lay everything at the feet of Jesus and then follow Him completely.  That means we will be intentional about listening for His voice. We will be intentional about making sure we know what He wants us to do. We will have intentional focus on God. We will be committed, purposeful and...

Episode 205-Surrender Takes Trust I know, above and beyond everything else, God is my source and the source for my family. I trust Him as the ultimate Puzzle Master, the only One who really knows what my final picture or story will look like. I didn’t always trust Him as my total source. My future used to be rather disconcerting. I said God was my source, but I relied on things I felt were more tangible, like foods made with sugar and flour or my job. I still don’t know exactly where all...

Episode 204-Surrender and Destiny Why do we think it’s OK to ignore what God is telling us and yet get mad at Him when He doesn’t magically make the money appear to pay our bills, or stop one of our kids from doing drugs or getting in with the wrong crowd. Why do we refuse to surrender to God, but we still want Him to answer our every prayer exactly how we want it? There is something missing from this equation. God is not our genie in a bottle so all we have to do is just speak and all our...

Episode 203-Fear and Surrender Through the last nine years, I have coached many women who tell me they want to surrender to God, but are afraid of giving up the foods they love. Surrendering to God reminds them of giving up. It reminds them of being forced to do something. When we feel forced, many of us rebel. That’s because it reminds them of a fear from their past.  If that fear involved a father or father figure, we may transfer those fears to Father God. Then unknowingly, this fear...

Episode 202-I Surrender All What does it mean to surrender all? What things is God asking us to surrender that we haven’t? Does it really matter if we don’t surrender everything to God? Can’t we hold back a little for ourselves? When we think about surrender, we should immediately think about what Jesus did for us. When He came to earth was and still is God, but even before He came to earth He surrendered to the Father’s will and laid aside his Godly position to become like one of us.  All...

Episode 201-7 Steps to Surrender God wants to be first without a second in our lives. He wants us to be totally surrendered to Him. He told us this in the first commandment. “You may worship no other god than Me.”  (Exodus 20:3 TLB). Here are seven steps to surrender. 1. Have a relationship with God.  2. Get to know God better.  3. Understand what God wants from us. 4. Confess when we mess up. 5. Pivotal moment of surrender 6. Surrender requires God’s strength 7. Surrender daily   ...

Episode 200-This Thing Called Surrender God’s desire is for each of us is to totally surrender to Him so He can lead us to be victorious in Christ! Our surrender delights God, but most of us don’t really know what surrendering to God means, how to do it, or why we should do it.  We think surrender means the same as being a prisoner. It's what happens when one side defeats the other. They get taken captive. Surrendering to God is not like that at all. We don’t surrender to God because He has...

Episode 199-Resisting Temptation What should I do if I’m tempted? Well, first it’s great that you know when you are tempted. Many don’t recognize that they are being tempted.   However there is not an “if” about it. If you are a Christian trying to follow Jesus, you will be tempted. And the tempter will offer you exactly what you want because he’s been watching and knows your habits, behaviors, and weaknesses. He will tempt you with them. It’s a given. He knows your weaknesses better than...

Episode 198-What is Self-Control? We all know that self-control is part of the fruit of the Spirit. You know the list from Galatians 5:22-23: love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control. I could always see that I had some portion of the other eight qualities, but that last one always tripped me up. I wanted to be in control of my wants, desires and cravings but I wasn’t. This was frustrating because being in control was something I valued....

Episode 197-Seven Lessons in 70 Years I turned 70 last week. I’m not any wiser, but God challenged me to come up with the seven most important lessons I’ve learned. These principles really do guide my life today but in order to learn them I went through a lot of trials and turmoil.  I go into depth with each of these on the podcast along with scripture references.  Listen to God. Don’t bite off more than you can or should chew. Surrender everything to God. The devil is real. ...

Episode 196-Victory is Here! Victory can be defined as overcoming or winning in a competition or struggle over an opponent, or difficult problems. The Bible tells us we already have the victory if we have Jesus. “For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith.” (1 John 5:4, NIV).   The problem is when difficulties, troubles and hard seasons come, we tend to forget God’s glorious promise. His promise is if we stay true to Him we...

Episode 195- How Can I Hear God? How do we hear from God? We listen for His voice. We have a conversation with Him. He most often speaks to us and we hear Him as the still, small voice. He speaks to us from the depths of our souls, which we hear in our minds. Then we make a decision as to whether we will do what He says or not. Many times we tell God what we want Him to do and then it doesn’t happen so we wonder is He really listening or not? We go to Him with our to-do list and then say,...

Episode 194-Do I Trust Jesus? Do I trust Jesus? How do we know if we really trust Jesus completely or not? He’s the member of the Trinity who is most like us because He knows what it’s like to live as a human. If we have a trust issue with Jesus it will affect our relationship with those we think we love.   One day God dropped these words into my heart. “Any disconnect with the one we are closest to here on earth will affect our intimacy with Jesus.”  When I asked Jesus if I trusted Him...