Living With Many Signals

“Living with many signals”

Ephesians 4:31-32 “Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: and be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.”

 Colossians 3:2  “Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.”

 Life is busy! Track a normal day in the life of a mom for instance.  You get up to get your kids ready for school.  You get them up, feed them, get their lunch’s ready, homework packed up, clothes on, and teeth brushed all while trying to keep them from killing each other.  You try to get them out on time and if you have a job, you need to get where you need to be all at the same time.  Add daily home care needs, clothes washed, food purchased and cooked, and the list goes on.  In this list add whatever your families needs are, your husband’s needs, the church needs, and if time (Ha!) your needs. 

How do you handle all the signals without malfunctioning? Sometimes we are hit with so many signals in our lives, we can overload our mental, emotional or spiritual circuits.  We can make wrong choices before we stop and process all the information that we receive in this daily moving from one signal to the next.  We can be hurt by others responses to our situations or what we perceived as their lack of concern.  We have to examine the signals and find out from God what our proper approach should be to our situations. When we do not, we can become bitter, angry and unkind to one another.  When we do not examine the signals in our lives, we can also become focused on our selves (focused on things on earth, instead of on things above).  Instead, what we need to do is seek God to help us handle the many signals in our lives so that our affections can be focused on God and not on the things that affect our emotions.

What happens when our focus is our emotions:

Ø  We can easily become captive by our feelings.

Ø  We may hide or deny our feelings or wallow in them, usually the latter.
Ø  Our feelings show what is lodged in our hearts.
Ø  Our heart’s emotions rule our minds and direct our actions.
Ø  We question where is God during our hard times.
Ø  We (women) do not handle the multitude of signals we receive well, where our husbands appear to be able to tune them out, thus frustrating us to no end.
Ø  We do not recognize our basic differences without putting any value judgment on them.
Ø  We do not die to our demands and forgive when others treat us insensitively.

What are we to do to change what happens?

ü  Tell God immediately how we feel about hurts and injuries.

ü  Ask God to speak his best response through us.
ü  Sometimes we may need to dig dipper to understand our own emotions and responses.
ü  We have to change the “old” for the “new”. – Changing or the removal of our old foundation
ü  We must not place our emotions under the subjection of God, they can no longer rule our decisions and choices
ü  We must not allow how we feel to determine if God is there for us, we must trust regardless of how it feels.
ü  We must recognize our basic differences between men and women and allow God to help us remove judgment from our interactions with each other.


Our theme this year for the C.O.M.E. ministry is about changing our mindset so that our lives can be changed, to line up with God's will. This writing was from several years ago, but I thought it was worth bringing back to remind us of what we need to do with our emotions and the many signals we receive during the day.

What House Do You Represent?

Short Story by: Rev. Jewel D. Williams, M.R.E.

Hazel Crest Community Church of God

H.A.T.S ~ Having an Anointing That Sticks

There was once a model that looked for a designer, a house to represent.  Her journey took her to different designers to find one to represent.  One house said they would have her, but when they told her what she had to do, she said no, because she was not ready to sell her soul for it.  Her journey took her from one house to another with no success.

There was one house that she had not tried yet, even though it was the most famous house.  She wondered if they would accept her.  Without any further hesitation, she put on her best outfit and went to “The House of Dios”.

She opened the door and was greeted by the receptionist.

“How can I help you?” She asked.

“I would like to speak to someone regarding representing ‘The House of Dios’.”  As she was speaking the owner walked into the room.

The reception turned to him and spoke, “This lady is here to see if she can represent ‘The House of Dios’.”

The owner took one look at her and turned away, “I cannot even look upon her, no, no.”

The model was shocked; she didn’t know what the problem was. She turned to leave, but someone tapped her on the shoulder.

“Hello, I am the co-owner, wait one minute please.”

She turned back to hear what he had to say.  The co-owner turned to the owner.

The owner spoke to him, “She cannot represent this house her clothes are filthy rags!”

The co-owner spoke, “Father, I know, but I see potential in her.  If I give her a new garment would you re-consider?”

“Yes, let’s see what you can do.”

The co-owner, who also is the owner’s son, spoke to the model.  “You came here thinking your best would work and that was insulting to my father.  However, if you are willing to allow me to give you the right garments, I know my father will forgive your actions.  Are you willing to receive my gift of the right garment so that your wrong deeds can be forgiven and you can be given a new start and the opportunity to represent this house?”

“Yes!” She exclaimed.

And with that her old clothes were removed and she stood standing in an elegant white garment. The owner then turned and smiled at her.  The son and the owner stood looking at her for a few moments.  They then spoke to each other. She needs something else to complete her outfit.

“Yes”, the Son said, “and I know just where she should go.”

“Yes, take her to our division, ‘Espiritu Santo’, and our helper will know what to do.”

She was quickly whisked off to a room filled with hats.  There were yellow hats, red hats, and blue hats.  There were small hats and large hats.  There were hats with flowers and hats with feathers. She reached out to touch one of the hats.  It was a hat with feathers fanned across the front.

“You have to be brave to wear this hat.” She thought, “It’s way too much hat for me.”

As she examined the hats, someone entered the room. She assumed this must be the helper the owners spoke of.

“Welcome to ‘Espiritu Santo’. I am one of the owners. I work directly with the models and help them represent the House of Dios. You are here for me to finish your outfit with a HAT.”

To her surprise, he took the hat she had touched and placed it on her head. She lifted her hand almost by instinct to stop him, but quickly lowered her hand.

He smiled at her. “Yes, it might be overwhelming at first, but once you become comfortable with it, you’ll be able to work the runway and show off the outfit. There are a few rules I must tell you about.  First, the show isn’t about you. We aren’t looking for divas but for models that are drawing attention to the garments. We want the audience to want the designs of the House of Dios. Secondly, I am the one that makes all the decisions on what the models wear.  I’ve done this job a long time and I really don’t need help. What I do need is your willingness to represent us properly. And lastly, we need you to continually work at your craft. You have to be ready whenever we need you to do a runway show. Can you handle that?”

She thought about it, “Yes I can.”

The helper smiled at her and said, “Well then, hit the runway and show off the garments of the ‘House of Dios’ and the Hat’s from ‘Espiritu Santos’.”

And that is just what she did; she worked the runway and presented The House of Dios!