Category Archives: Inspirational

Don’t Jump

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She was standing at the edge of the cliff trying to tell herself why she had no reason to live but something said,
DON’T JUMP
She said to herself, will anyone really miss me, will they even notice that I am gone? She heard that voice again,
DON’T JUMP
She started to step back away from the cliff and she turned around to see if anyone was there but she saw no one.She turned back around and started back towards the cliff.
She then began to wonder how far down would she have to fall before she died and as she started to step off the cliff ìt was as if something grabbed her and pulled her away, but when she opened her eyes she saw no one. Scratching her head as if to be puzzled she realized it was God telling her to LIVE.
Though I wasn’t physically at the cliff, ìt was as if I had been there for real but the Lord saved me just in time.
I was saved, sanctified and filled with the Holy Ghost, married with kids, but still felt like my life wasn’t worth living.
How do we get so down in life that we feel like dying would be the easiest way out.
We allow the pressures of life, people and our own self images of ourselves play over and over again in our heads. That moment seems to last forever.
That was years ago, but I made the decision to LIVE instead of die.
It hasn’t been easy,but I take it one day at a time and I trust God and his leading.
When I changed my way of thinking it changed my perspective, so no matter what I went through or had to endure I knew God would be with me through it all.
When I think about how God gave his only begotten Son that I could live and to know that I could live in peace and walk in freedom and total victory makes my life worth living.
Because He lives I can face tomorrow
Because He live all fear is gone
Because I know, I know, I know who holds my future
And life is worth the living just because He lives
#CLEANTHISHOUSE

Don’t Drive on (E)mpty

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Give Me You by Shana Wilson

One of the things that I hate most is pumping gas. I will almost run out of gas before I go fill up until one day I actually ran out of gas. I was on my lunch break and my light came on which indicated that I was low on gas. Some cars will either give you a red warning sign or it will make a ding noise to let you know that you need to fill up. I kept ignoring the warning signs thinking I had a little more time. I tried to guess what I could do before I went to go fill up. Something kept telling me to go now, but I was a little ways from a gas station. By the time I decided to listen to the inner voice as I was coming around the corner in heavy traffic my car stopped on me. It put me in a very bad situation. It was hard for me to even get out of my car because of the traffic, I backed up traffic, people were blowing their horns at me and I was embarrassed. I was hoping no one would see me. It’s just like trying to withdrawal money from your bank account that you don’t have. Depending on how you are withdrawing the money out it will either say insufficient funds, declined, or it will put your account in the negative. The end result is that you end up paying more out than you anticipated which could be avoided if we learn how to budget and not over spend. But just like we have to put gas in our car for it to run or to make sure we have available funds in the bank before spending it is the same thing we have to do in order for us to properly function. Have you ever been in a place where you felt bla! to the point of filling tired and empty? In most cases it is because we are running on (E)mpty. We have given out and we haven’t taken the time to be refreshed, restored or renewed. If we continue in this pattern it will cause our bodies to break down, we become sick and at times on the edge of having a nervous break down. You are all that you have and if you don’t take care of your body which is the temple of the Holy Ghost no one else. What good are you to anyone if you are broke down. 3 John 1:2 “Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul proseperth” Don’t get to the point of (E)mpty that you ignore the warning signs that you need to be refilled. #CLEANTHISHOUSE

We Built It From The Ground

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http://www.citizen-times.com/videos/news/local/2014/03/29/6953849/

20140401-223046.jpg

Treva Williams
with her daughters, Cierra, 10, left, and Corrie, 8, at their new
Reems Creek community home earlier this month.

“Surprise don’t get much better than this.”

For 10 months, Treva Williams and her 19-year-old daughter, Kade’sha, kept a whale of a secret from Williams’ two
younger daughters, Cierra, 10, and Corrie, 8.A new house.
“We built it from the ground up,” Williams said, cooking dinner in the
kitchen of her new north Buncombe home as Cierra and Corrie set the
table.
A supervisor at the Mountain Area Health Education Center,
Williams, 40, participated in the Mountain Housing Opportunities
Self-Help Home Ownership program, which provides low- or
moderate-income families a pathway to homeownership.
Participants reduce their mortgage payments through “sweat equity” — working on their home and others in the development on weekends.”We started in November of 2012 and worked through August of 2013 — in the cold,
in the rain, you name it,” Williams said. “We had two contractors on site giving us instructions, step by step.”They put in 17 hours a week, usually working Saturdays and Sundays.
Going through a divorce at the time, Williams told her younger daughters she and their older sister were working on “a project” on the weekends when
they went to stay with their dad.They kept the secret until August, when they blindfolded the younger girls and took them inside the two-story home in the Compass Park subdivision.”It was the hardest thing for me to keep this away from them,” Williams said. “I’m big
on surprises.”When the girls removed the blindfolds, they didn’t know what to make of their surroundings. Until Williams told them it was their house.Then the girls dashed upstairs to claim their rooms.”It still brings tears to my eyes,” Williams said, choking
up. “To be able to provide that for my daughters. I couldn’t have done it without my daughter’s help and without God’s help. If it can happen to me, it can happen for somebody else.
“Williams’ older daughter attends college at Amada Musical Arts School in Los Angeles now, but for 13 years she, her two sisters and their
parents shared a two-bedroom apartment in MHO’s River Glen
Apartments. Williams received information about the Self-Help
program in the mail and jumped at the chance.
The program combines
the sweat equity of multiple families helping build each others’
homes with financing from the U.S. Department of Agriculture,
NeighborWorks America, and Buncombe County.
The girls love the new house, with its spacious living room and laminate wood floors. And
they like not having to share a bed anymore.”We can have our own
room, and I don’t have to sleep with that person,” Cierra said,
pointing at her sister.”Me either,” Corrie chipped in. “She’s such kicker.”Williams, who has a strong Christian faith, thanks Mountain Housing Opportunities and God for her blessings. She knows how tough the Asheville housing market is.”Like in most cities, you have a cost of living and your income that would balance out,”
Williams said, gesturing with her hands for emphasis. “In our area,
the cost of living is very high, but the income is low. It’s hard to raise a family and make it without three or four jobs. “Mountain Housing Opportunities homeowners have built 26 homes so far in the Self-Help program in Leicester, Black Mountain, and the Reems Creek
area of Weaverville. Six more are under construction in Reems Creek, and the next neighborhood will be in Swannanoa. More than 700
hours per homeowner of construction labor creates “sweat equity,”
which serves as down payment on the home, so there is no cash down
payment required. Homeowners in MHO’s Self-Help program typically
have $25,000-$30,000 of equity in their home when they complete
construction and move in.MHO Executive Director Scott Dedman said
homeowners in the Self-Help program “accomplish a Herculean task to
build their own homes.”
“Treva’s story is especially inspirational because her oldest daughter, Kade’sha, worked so closely with her
throughout construction, and then they surprised the younger daughters with the finished home,” Dedman said. “I believe that Treva and her children appreciate the value of owning a home as much as any family could.”An Asheville native, Williams says she
makes between $20,000 and $30,000 a year. They were paying $445 a
month for rent at River Glen, and now her 30-year mortgage comes in
at about $675 a month.Paying the mortgage beats paying rent any
day.”I calculated what I spent in rent, and I would’ve had half a
house paid for if I’d started then,” Williams said. “To me, I think
about how it’s an investment, not a debt.”

Don’t Ignore The Signs

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Potters House by Tramaine Hawkins

I came into the house and I laid my stuff down. Of course my shoes are the first thing off. I went to hang up my coat and as I stepped onto the carpet I noticed it was wet. I kneeled down to see how wet it actually was and how far it went out into the carpet. The first thing I thought of was to call my contractor to see what I needed to do being that this is a fairly new house and everything is still under warranty. As one who has helped to physically build my home I knew the layout, so the next thought was to find out where the leakage was coming from. I noticed that the water was fresh so it had to have happened sometime within the course of the day. As I was describing what I saw to the contractor he asked if I saw any water leaking from the ceiling or if I noticed any water coming from out of the walls. The fact that we didn’t see any signs of those was a good possibility that it wasn’t a busted pipe. The hall closet is underneath the washer and dryer room so I immediately went upstairs and right before I reached to the top of the steps I noticed some dark spots. I felt the carpet and it was soaked which lead all the way out to the hallway. I knew then it was coming from the washer and dryer room because of the direction it was coming from. As I went in I saw water on the floor and in between the washer and dryer. I stood still to see if I could hear any water dripping and sure enough it was coming from out of the vials. My contractor told me to call the plumber, but being that it was after hours I probably wouldn’t be able to get in touch with anyone. I thought I would try anyway, but I had to leave a message and wait until the following day. In the mean time I started to lay down towels to soak up the water within the carpet and the water that had gotten on the floor. We determined the problem, what was the source of the problem, how to fix the problem and were there any long-term damages. The contractor said it is normal and over a period of time things become damaged or loosed. It could be a simple fix or if it isn’t caught in time there could be long-term damage. Just think if I would have ignored that or not noticed it what I could have walked into or woke up to. It is important that we take care of our natural as well as our spiritual house. Over a period of time there are things that need to be repaired, tightened up, things we need to get rid of or clean up like our attitudes, our thought process, a broken heart, the company we keep, the things we entertain, etc. If we ignore the warning signs that something in our house is wrong over a period of time it will cause more damage than what it’s worth. #CLEANTHISHOUSE

Stop The Cycle

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Break Every Chain by Tasha Cobbs

One day my two smallest girls had gotten into an argument and my baby girl started yelling and stormed up to her room. At that moment I had a fast forward picture of an older version of me and I heard the Lord say stop the cycle. To myself I said we are going to stop this now because she will not wait until she is my age to learn how to communicate and express herself correctly. So I called her back downstairs and I asked her what happened and to talk to me about how she feels. She immediately began to cry. I told her that I’m not fussing and that we are going to do whatever it takes to walk through this process. It was ok for her to feel the way she felt and what she had to say was important, but it wasn’t ok in how she responded. I would sometimes have problems with communicating what I felt and wanted to say so in my frustration I would not think what I had to say was important so I wouldn’t say it, I would hold it in until I exploded and 9 out of 10 it was on the person who didn’t even deserve it. Because I had no one to help me through it, it became and formed other unhealthy habits that became worse as an adult. They say that some habits are hard to break, but every cycle can be broken. A lot of it was learning how to forgive, let go and how to effectively communicate. I explained to my daughter why it was important and that I didn’t want her to wait until she was an adult to learn what she can now. It’s just like a hamster who get’s up on the wheel and once it learns how to make it turn it continue’s the cycle. It may occasionally stop and get off, but it will get back on it because overtime it became a habit and that was all it had been shown. Until it learns something better it continues the cycle. In life we continue the same cycles because it’s all we’ve known, been shown or we didn’t learn from the time before. We have the power within us to break every cycle that has been handed down to us through generations or things we have picked up over the course of our life. Just like the hamster we can get off the wheel at any given point, but it’s up to us to make the choice to stay off the continued cycle and form a more positive habit that will cause us to live a long and healthy life. The question is are we willing to do what it takes to break every chain? #CLEANTHISHOUSE

Even Damaged Goods

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Never Be Same by Shana Wilson & Tasha Cobb

When your buying fresh fruit it is originally whole. It’s not torn apart into pieces, damaged for the most part, but intact and complete. If you were to start peeling away the skin it would no longer be whole, but in parts. You could try to piece it back together but it would never be whole again. Some fruit may look damaged on the outside and in most cases would be overlooked because we would consider it damaged, rotten or no good. Like a banana it can get brown pretty quick on the outside, but when you pull back the skin it could be perfectly fine. Not all fruits are bad because of what they look like on the outside. It’s after you pull back the layer of skin and get to the core of it which is the best part and what will benefit you most. I am reminded of the nursery rhythm: Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall and the Kings horses and all the Kings man couldn’t put Humpty together again. Yet we look to imperfect people to heal us when yet we have a righteous and all-powerful God. But even a broken egg can produce a meal. Some fresh fruits like peaches, pears and mangos you don’t want to buy them when they are still firm or hard because they won’t to be ready, but the longer you let them sit, over a period of time they become soft and you can smell their scent that means they are ready to be picked. It you pick or use anything before it’s time or out of its season it want taste as good and not only will it affect you, but everything that is connected to you. When you wait on the direct timing of God it will all fall in place. You may not see it initially or even feel that anything is happening, but if you follow His plan it’s working. #CLEANTHISHOUSE

Are You Willing To Launch Into The Deep

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One day my mom was telling me how when I was around 2 or 3 years old they took me and my sister to the pool to swim or more like play in the water. The next thing they heard was this big splash and they saw me trying to fight my way up. Of course my mother panicked because she didn’t know how to swim so she had to get someone else to help get me out of the water. My mom said that the last time she saw me I was at the top of the steps. She turned her back for a split second and I decided to jump in. I couldn’t only imagine what my mom was feeling. I’m not sure what made me just jump out into the deep not knowing how to swim. I’ve always been a little fish when it comes to water and to this day it is where I like to go to find peace and strength. When God bided Peter to come to him and he began to walk out on the water as if to having a kids like faith, but all of a sudden he began to sink. It wasn’t the fact that the storm around him was so great but it was the fact that he took his eyes off of Jesus. There are situations and circumstances that will happen and in most cases out of no where. There was no warning though we thought, no point of reference of why or even how, but no matter how unstable your surroundings faith never takes its eyes off of the one it seeks. If you feel like you are sinking then who is the one that you seek. Even if you feel yourself you still have time to cry out HELP! #CLEANTHISHOUSE

The Way You Love Me

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Love by Musiq Soulchild

I have never been a materialist person, don’t get me wrong I love to be showered with gifts, to be sent flowers just because or to get an unexpected surprise when someone will just show up even for a moment to see you smile. I realized something greater than any materialist gift that anyone can give is the gift of love. The moment someone has opened up their heart to not only love you, but to be loved. You shouldn’t have to wait one day a year for someone to “show” you that they love you if so you may need to revisit why they are with you or better yet why are you with them. Holidays or special occasions should only enhance what they have done for you all year. Anyone can give you things and still not give you their heart. You should be able to look in their eyes and see that they care deeply for you, the way they look at you with such compassion and when they smile it brings warmth to your heart. They talk to you with such respect, they are detailed when it comes to caring for you. It’s not just what they say to you but how they say it or even in their silence you can hear their heart beat. When someone can give you their heart they have given you the greatest gift in the world because they are given you all of them. When they give you them they will move heaven and earth just to please you. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 “Love is patient love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it’s not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trust, always hopes, always preservers. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they be stilled; where there is knowledge it will pass away.” Jesus could have called thousands of Angels to come and rescue him at any given point but because His unconditional love for us he suffered, hung on the cross, bleed and died and rose again just to save us. What greater love is this that a man would lay down his life for a friend. True love comes with no strings attached, with no conditions, but to give of themselves unconditionally. You may say well how will I know? Oh! You will know the moment they give you their heart, it will show in the way that they love you. #CLEANTHISHOUSE

Looking For Love In All The Wrong Places

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Lost In You Again by Fred Hammomd

It wasn’t until I was in my late 30’s as I looked back over my life that I realized how much of me I had given away to the point that I no longer knew who I was. Most of my life I was searching for love or my idea of what I thought love was, but only to come up empty-handed and in most cases heartbroken with a life full of pain. I held high expectations of my father that was beyond what he was able to give me. I didn’t realize it then but he loved me based on what his perspective of love was and what he had been taught. Because my father was unable to give me what I thought I needed it put me into years of built up walls, anger, resentment, unhealthy and ungodly relationships. Over the course of my life on the outside I appeared as if everything was ok and carried myself as such, but on the inside I was breaking down. I looked for my daddy to take me out on a date, to go to a daddy/daughter dance, for it to be just me and my daddy. I still as an adult looked to hear his approval of me.So because I didn’t receive the love I taught I should have received from my father then I searched for it in other men in hoping that they would give me the love I needed. I was going from relationship to relationship and every time I gave of myself to someone who didn’t deserve that part of me I was loosing who I was. I ended in some relationships and situations that left me like the woman with the issue of blood an outcast, considered unclean. About time I realized it I was broken, damaged goods in need of a healer. It wasn’t another man or my father, but only Jesus Christ could heal me. It is never to late to be restored, to be mended, to be healed, but you have to go to the source which is Jesus Christ. After my divorce as I began to pick up the pieces of my life I did some soul-searching and that was when I realized that my biggest part of looking for love in all the wrong places is because I didn’t know what true love was. When I began to seek God with all my heart He began to show me what true love really was which taught me how to love myself and to be able to give and receive love. I had to take down my high expectations that no one would be able to reach and loving people for who they are and the level that they are on. Unconditional love which is the same love God has for us has no expectations. Sometimes we put people in the place of where God is meant to be. When we love God he will teach us how to love and when we love who we are we want to have to search for it, it will come and find us. #CLEANTHISHOUSE

The Developer

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    Never Be The Same By Shana Wilson

    When I look at the technology that we have now it makes me wonder how did we ever do without it. Even with the best of techno L ogy it isn’t perfect and it doesn’t always work properly. You can’t even imagine how many recalls, how many times they’ve had to go back to the drawing board or how many times it’s been completely taken apart, but to only start over again. I remember when we use to have cameras and you would have to take the roll of film in to be developed. On the film you could see the image of a picture, but it was only a glance of what it appeared to be. You could only guess what it turn out to look like according to the image that you could see and what you might remember it to be until it was developed. Once the picture was developed it turned out to be more than what you could ever think or image. They say a picture has a thousand words. It was “picture perfect”. It had to go through the process before it was developed into it’s true state or identity. Sometimes it take us failing many times just to get that one thing right, but how awesome it turns out to be once completed. Every mistake, every mishap, ever wrong or bad decision, flaws and all the developer (God) will take every (-) negative film and develop it into a (+) positive picture. Instead of working against you they are all working for you. “The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me; thy mercy, O alord, endure the forever: forsake not the words of thine own hands” Psalm 138:8 We have to trust the developer (God) enough to make us “picture perfect” #CLEANTHISHOUSE