Fear not

Dear Friends,

Thanks for stopping by, and all your prayers and encouragements. Thank God for His goodness and mercies in seeing us through another week.

It has been a very busy and tiring week for me, in much joyful service for our Lord. Thank God for grace and strength daily. I am looking forward to a time of rest and worship this weekend and Lord's day :)

Recently, I read this very comforting portion from CH Spurgeon's Morning and Evening, and reminded afresh that we have a God Who loves us dearly and is in control of all things in our life. So we need not be afraid no matter what befalls us or what we have to go through in this temporal life.

God is continuing to work all things for His glory and our good. He sanctifies us through ever trials and afflictions He allows us to go through. He draws us closer to Himself and enable us to know more and more of His love and sufficiency.

Are you going through a difficult time or fearful time? Fear not, you are of more value than many sparrows. God will take care of you as you cast all your anxieties upon our Lord Jesus Christ. His grace is sufficient for you. He will most assuredly deliver you or continue to support you under the trial so that you may know more and more of His sufficiency and presence with you.

“Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night.”
Psalm 91:5

WHAT is this terror? It may be the cry of fire, or the noise of thieves, or fancied appearances, or the shriek of sudden sickness or death. We live in the world of death and sorrow, we may therefore look for ills as well in the night-watches as beneath the glare of the broiling sun.

Nor should this alarm us, for be the terror what it may, the promise is that the believer shall not be afraid.

Why should he? Let us put it more closely, why should we?

God our Father is here, and will be here all through the lonely hours; He is an almighty Watcher, a sleepless Guardian, a faithful Friend.

Nothing can happen without His direction, for even hell itself is under His control. Darkness is not dark to Him. He has promised to be a wall of fire around His people—and who can break through such a barrier?

Worldlings may well be afraid, for they have an angry God above them, a guilty conscience within them, and a yawning hell beneath them; but we who rest in Jesus are saved from all these through rich mercy.

If we give way to foolish fear, we shall dishonor our profession, and lead others to doubt the reality of godliness.

We ought to be afraid of being afraid, lest we should vex the Holy Spirit by foolish distrust.

Down, then, ye dismal forebodings and groundless apprehensions, God has not forgotten to be gracious, nor shut up His tender mercies; it may be night in the soul, but there need be no terror, for the God of love changes not.

Children of light may walk in darkness, but they are not therefore cast away, nay, they are now enabled to prove their adoption by trusting in their heavenly Father as hypocrites cannot do.

“Though the night be dark and dreary,
Darkness cannot hide from Thee;
Thou art He, who, never weary,
Watchest where Thy people be.”

Taken from CH Spurgeon's Morning & Evening, 22 April, Evening

Thanks again for stopping by. Hope you have a very restful and blessed weekend. Take care.

Warm regards,
Nancie















My friend, CW, took this lovely picture

Trust in God, believe in yourself and dare to dream

Found this card among my collections of cards. Yes, I collect cards besides quotes and short stories :-)

I am going through a big change now in my life, at the age of 42. After so many years of dreaming a life like this, I have finally and providentially, taken the step to do it.

I have always wanted to do freelance work in which I can make use of my skills and earn a decent living. And have time to serve God, more time to spend with my family and to reach out to others.

Through a relapse of severe depression in July last year in which my employer decided to scale down her businesses, I was led to leave my job of 4 years and to look for a new one. Bipolar, depression and other mental health disorders are very much a stigma in Singapore. I have difficulty finding a fulltime job. I did temp job for a short while, my depression worsened and then I took time off to recuperate.

It was during this time of break that I was able to learn to understand my condition better and how best to manage it so that I can be more functional. I began to enjoy brisk walk, photography, catching up with friends and making bookmarks and other crafts.

When I was ready to return to work in February 2008 this year, God provided me with a part-time job. It was short term but this part-time job provided me with freelance opportunities with them. I am thankful to God that through this freelance assignment plus helping my friends, I am able to earn some income to support myself and my mother. Freelancing do have its own stress in terms of instable income and tight project deadlines, and I do have so much more to learn on this and much patience to wait for progress. But I am grateful, very grateful as I can learn to manage my condition better this way when I can work at my own pace and take breaks as and when necessary.

I am so happy to use my skills in typing to do my freelance typing and transcribing work. And also to use my skills in making bookmarks and other crafts together with photography, to give to my friends, and maybe one day to sell these items too. I enjoyed these very much.

And by doing freelance work, I have been able to continue to serve God through some small work for my church as well as writing and visiting some church members. I have been able to take better care of my mother and spend more time with her as I usually works from home.

I am also grateful to God that I can continue to share God's goodness and mercies to me on this blog as it is therapeutic to me. And it is so wonderful to know so many friends through our blogs. Several kind people also wrote to me and now I have a handful of penpals from several parts of the world!

All these are so wonderful and amazing. I never thought my dreams can come true! Thank and praise God.