Tag: Bishop T.D. Jakes

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Opportunity in Chaos

December 5, 2012December 5, 2012 jcladyluv

“You will not be challenged in your convenience you will be challenged in your chaos”

~ Bishop T.D. Jakes

The other evening I was home, at a moment that I would not have ordinarily been home. My daughter wasn’t feeling well and even though we were supposed to be going skating, as we do every Sunday, at the last moment she decided that we should stay home. I for one had some homework to finish so I wasn’t full of disappointment. Needless to say, I think that God had somehow orchestrated this turn of events from what had become my normal because he needed me to sit down and hear a message that I believe he’s been trying to give me, but that I was too hard-headed to listen to.

So there I sat, trying to do my homework, flipping through the channels on the TV for something that could provide some background noise but that wouldn’t distract me from what I needed to do. I came across a program on a channel that showed religious programs and there was Bishop T.D. Jakes discussing opportunities that are given even in your chaos. Now the program was halfway over but I believe that I turned to the channel at the precise moment that I needed to turn to it so that I could hear exactly what God needed for me to hear. In fact just as I turned to it he was saying that it is the insecurity of the times that defines who you really are. That caught my attention.

He went on to discuss about how in a moment of chaos, God will send you an opportunity. In a moment where you are counting up how many mistakes you have made, there will be a turning point in which you can choose to stand up, make the u-turn on the path that you are on, and get yourself back on track. There will be an opportunity where you will be given to get things right.

Perhaps the most hard-hitting thing that Bishop T.D. Jakes said in his message was that, in general, we keep telling God what you don’t have, from friends, a husband, or even the degree you feel is necessary, that we keep missing the moment for that opportunity to happen. He stated that “the devil’s got you counting up what you don’t have when you ought to be looking at what you do have. What you do have is an opportunity. God is setting you up to completely turn your life around.”

Immediately I called my best friend, Ms. L. She knew how important this message was to me because it’s the same one that I’m sure God was sending her to tell me so many times before that I was just too depressed to hear. I was just in such a bad place about where things stood in my life and about the “chaos” that seemed to be surrounding me. Nothing seemed to be going the way that I thought it should’ve been going. But I don’t think that the cloud that I was under was allowing me to see the opportunity that was right there this whole time.

In fact it was because of Ms. L. that I finally felt that cloud lift. It was her that pointed out that my brand for Write 2 Be wasn’t as clearly defined as I thought it was. It was her that helped me put into better words what my brand really stands for (yes writers can benefit from the help of other writers). I suppose in a way I was listening to the message that God was sending through her, but I just missed a large and necessary portion of it. Ms. L. has told me before to stop counting up the things that are going against me, to stop checking off all of the things I didn’t have in my favor, and to focus my energy and time and attention on the things that I do have going for me, the things that are being placed in my path, and in my favor. I just didn’t hear it before.

So hear me when I tell whoever it is out there, that person who is sitting there with those thoughts of everything that they can’t do, and all of the decks of cards that are stacked against you, there is, in the midst of all of that, an opportunity that you have not chosen to take yet. No matter what chaos you think you are in, you are being handed an opportunity, you just have to choose to take it.

Be whoever it is that you feel you have… the Write 2 Be!

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

Oh the Obstacles We Duck and Dodge While Investing In Our Future

June 6, 2012 jcladyluv

“If you make the investment up front, the return will come back later.”

~Bishop T.D. Jakes

As writers we go through many obstacles, if we’re lucky, before ever really hitting our stride in our career (and I say our, because I am speaking my future successes into existence even though it is not quite a reality yet). We go through tons of rejection, writer’s block, having doubters and negativity with anyone who doesn’t see the vision, and often times we are our own and biggest obstacle that stands in the way.

I was just talking to Ms. L. earlier and saying that I really wish that my journey to this success that I know I am destined for could be going a lot smoother and with a few less obstacles to stumble over. But then I quickly took that back because I remembered something I heard while listening to Bishop T.D. Jakes talk about living your life on purpose. He talked about making investments in your future, in your purpose, and how sometimes our mistakes and our struggles are our investments.

They are what make our successes all the more worthwhile. He said that sometimes “what you think is working against you is actually working for you” and that “it is the digression that causes the progression”. I suppose that is what is meant when people say what doesn’t kill you will only make you stronger (although it never feels like that when you’re going through whatever it is you’re going through). Our struggles are in many ways our fuel and motivation to keep going and to keep dodging those obstacles as they come.

Bishop T.D. Jakes also said that when it comes to making investments into your future “you can never reap of a dividend where you don’t make an investment—you sow first and reap later; you can’t sow and reap at the same time.” I suppose that I have to be a little more patient as I make my investments and have a little bit more faith that everything will work out the way that it should.

I can’t honestly say that all of the obstacles along my journey have not had their purpose. It may not have felt like it at that particular point in time, but looking back on them now, they all, in so many ways, served their purpose. I think that all of the struggles that we go through are simply just preparation for when our success comes to fruition. Then we’ll be able to say to anyone who has something to throw at us to bring it on because there won’t be anything that they have to hit us with that we can’t handle.

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

Approval Ratings

May 31, 2012May 31, 2012 jcladyluv

“Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.”

~Judy Garland

Today I got this feeling around me like I was being talked about. I almost felt like I was back in high school again, when people would talk about me and my insecurity level would rise. But then I realized something strange, well at least strange in comparison to how it was in high school. I just didn’t care.

I mean of course it feels horrible to have anyone talking about you in a negative way, especially when you did nothing to warrant that type of behavior. But oddly enough, my insecurity level didn’t creep in, and I didn’t feel defensive and I didn’t feel the need to say something to somehow defend myself. I just simply didn’t care. I almost felt honored to be on someone else’s mind so much, in any capacity, that they felt the need to converse about me.

For as long as I could remember, I have always been that person that has sought the approval of others. Mostly I wanted my mother’s approval (which I realize I am never going to get), but because I couldn’t have her approval, I desperately needed others to approve of me. It was when I was listening to a sermon by Bishop T.D. Jakes that I realized that I must have somehow, within my journey in this life, gotten to the point where I didn’t need the approval of anyone else. I don’t know how I missed it because that’s a pretty important moment.

He said that “the losing of those who don’t stand by you is the discovery of you” and that “people who don’t know who they are, are always needing validation to feel secure, but when you know who you are, you are safer within yourself, you don’t need everybody in your space to make you feel good about who you are.”

In many ways it feels very freeing when you just stop caring so much about what others think of you and what they have to say about you. My best friend Ms. L. once told me that if people are talking about you then that means you must be doing something right because it’s nothing but the devil trying to put more walls up to keep you from moving forward. I sure wish she was around when I was in high school because I sure could’ve used that bit of knowledge then.

I suppose the devil has been putting walls up in my path for a very long time then, and I have just been foolishly letting him. Now that I am in a place where I don’t need anyone else’s praise or approval I feel more secure within myself and with who I am. I am in no way perfect and I am probably going to make many more mistakes but I am happy with who I am. Even if no one else agrees with my path, it is the path that I have chosen and I am quite happy with it.

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

Structuring Ourselves In Order to Sustain His Blessings

April 17, 2012 jcladyluv

“Your real strength, your guts, your tenacity, your staying power, your discipline, is in the things God did for you when nobody was looking.”

~Bishop T.D. Jakes

I realized last night that my post yesterday was a little unfinished. I don’t think that the message that I was trying to convey was finished yet. I was reading Ms. L’s blog post this morning and realized that there was more I needed to say. She spoke of having doubts in her mission and her purpose with what she is trying to do with her company and her new magazine, PIEhole, and in reading her post I thought all of these doubts sounded all too familiar for me.

I hadn’t realized that she was experiencing this much doubt. I always see her as so well put together and it just always seems that she is fearless and ready to take on the world. I started thinking back to the Bishop T.D. Jakes sermon that I listened to yesterday and the particular part that I wanted to convey to Ms. L. in her time of doubt, and what I have to get through to my own mind as well, is that greatness takes time.

“The best miracles in your life take time; can not be driven by hunger, or need, or necessity. Sometimes you have to get yourself structured and in order so that you are ready to receive the magnitude of what God has for you. Just because you have a driving need does not mean that you can disperse with the order and the time and the structure that is necessary to hold the weight of what God is going to do. Some people are so busy trying to get what God has that they don’t provide the structure that is necessary to sustain what they have been given.”

This quote struck me when I heard it in his sermon. It hit me like a ton of bricks because I thought about the fact that I have not necessarily built up a stable structure. I have not yet gotten the order that I need to have to sustain the kind of structure that I need. It makes sense that God would want to hold onto the overflow of blessings that he has stored up for me until he sees that I have built up a stable enough structure to hold the weight of those blessings.

I am still working on the order and my structure and perhaps I should stop rushing God along to give me what he knows that I am not ready to sustain. “Until you can be thankful for something that is not enough, then what you have can not be multiplied into what is more than enough.” Perhaps my time would be better spent preparing my structure and being thankful for the things that he has already blessed me with and seen me through instead of just waiting for him to do what he has in his plans to do for me.

So that’s what I’m going to continue to strive for and work on. I am going to be building up my structure and getting my ‘house’ in order and enjoy and be thankful for what God has already blessed me with on an everyday basis. He has blessed me with so many things in my life thus far, among them a purpose, knowledge of how to go after that purpose, and the ability to carry out that purpose. I know that once he feels I am ready for the overflow, my cup will runneth over.

*(And Ms. L., your cup is already nearing the edge.)*

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

Somewhere Hidden In the Scraps

April 16, 2012 jcladyluv

“Miracles always begin with recognition of what you have; if you don’t recognize what you have, you can never multiply what you have not recognized.”

~Bishop T.D. Jakes

There are some writers that will always tell other aspiring writers that they are never supposed to throw anything away. That whatever you create should be held onto. There are those scraps of paper that you set to the side whenever your idea doesn’t pan out the way you thought it would.

There’s that opening scene that you decided that you weren’t crazy about once you had completed it. Even the novel that you, for some unknown reason, stopped working on halfway through it and have just set to the side never to be seen again for years, possibly decades. I firmly believe in never throwing things away but not just for the sake of holding onto things and not being able to let go but because you never know what treasures lie in those scraps of paper that you are thinking about throwing away.

Those scraps of paper may not have been right for what you initially intended it for but they might be perfect for some other project down the line. That scene may not have fit that particular story but could find a home in the next one. That unfinished novel that is still sitting and collecting dust may just be waiting for the right time for you to be ready to finish it and it could be the next great novel the world is waiting to read.

Last week I wrote a post that mentioned some segments from a sermon given by Bishop T.D. Jakes that was featured on a particular episode of Oprah’s Next Chapter. I had only captured certain pieces of that sermon on the show but this morning I went back and listened to it in its entirety and got so much more out of it then I did before. His specific message was on saving the scraps (our past burdens) and it was centered around a passage from the bible taken from Mark6:42-52.

In his sermon he said that “The miracle is not in what you lost, the miracle is not in what you have consumed previously, your best days are not your yesterdays, your miracles are in what you have left. If you discard it, ignore it, don’t use it, don’t value it, don’t learn from it, don’t understand it, you will lose the battle before you because you did not learn from the battle behind you. – That which remains is more valuable than that which was lost.”

He talked about us taking our scraps and using them to enable us to power through and forge ahead. To use them as our learning tools that eventually become our blessings. “Your power is not in where you are, your power is in where you’ve been” and if you don’t recognize and hold onto the place that you were once at you can not truly appreciate the place where you are now.

Bishop T.D. Jakes closed his sermon by saying to those who have been broken, that the problem is that you have not considered the scraps that God has given you. If you had considered the scraps then you would already know and trust that you are safe. That it is not what you go through, but rather how you perceive what you go through.

I am very aware of the fact that I need to learn how to appreciate the scraps of my life instead of continuing to try and bury them. True gratitude comes in the appreciation of the fact that those scraps have been the reason for more than my fair share of blessings. Like it or not those scraps are what makes me who I am. They’re what make you who you are too.

When you look back at the things that you have been through and on the lows that you have been in, you have to know that God would not have put you through those things if he did not have a plan to bring you to higher ground. Your blessings are hidden in what you’ve already experienced and been through, in the lessons that life has already been teaching you. Your blessings are hidden in the scraps of it all.

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

Being Broken Down To Be Blessed On the Way Back Up

April 10, 2012 jcladyluv

“God never intended for you to go through something and get nothing out of it.”

~Bishop T.D. Jakes

Sometimes I have days where I feel encouraged and empowered. My writing flows, my productivity is better then average and I feel like I am going to get to my destination. Then there are other days when my writing is not going as smoothly, there is no productivity and my destination seems further and further away. Those are the days that I just feel broken down. I try to think of the wise people who tell me that it’s not going to always be that way but the message never came across to me as clear as it did the other night when I was watching Oprah’s Next Chapter where she did a sit down interview with Bishop T.D. Jakes.

Now anyone who knows me well enough (either personally or through this blog) knows that I am spiritual but I am not necessarily terribly religious. Meaning I don’t necessarily believe that I have to go to a building (i.e. church) to get the word that God is trying to communicate to me. But every once and a while I will see and hear a Pastor, Preacher, or in this case Bishop say something on television that will make me wish that their church was within my reach so that I could go get that message in person.

On Oprah’s Next Chapter when Bishop T.D. Jakes told his congregation that “The blessing is in the breaking; that, which refuses to be broken refuses to be blessed; It is the breaking of life that produces the blessing of life.” I felt as if that message was meant for me. Now I know I wasn’t even there, and this was after all a repeat on TV so it wasn’t even live, but yet I felt like I was directed to watch it for a specific reason; because it’s what I needed to hear.

I always see my breaking points as my own little personal failures but I suppose the truth is that they are the foundations for my future successes. They are the models of what I need to look at so that I know not to repeat the same process that got me to that point in the first place. They are lessons for me to learn from, not mistakes for me to forever regret.

Bishop T.D. Jakes also said “The most blessed people I have ever met in my life have gone through something that broke them.” In essence, adversity breeds success and a multitude of blessings. If you look at the most successful people, they didn’t get to that place without having to be broken down at some point in their lives. Why should I be any different? Why should I expect to get to the level of success I know I am destined for without having to go through the trials and tribulations to get there?

The words I heard him speaking were so powerful and so profound and while I realize this is not the first time I have heard that message, this is the first time I have believed the words as I said them to myself. Building up any business that you want to have takes a certain amount of tenacity and drive. However, when it comes to building up a business that is centered around your love of writing and your sense of purpose, it takes guts, and courage, but most importantly belief in yourself and in the very words that you speak. The words you say are very important and you never know who your particular message might touch, giving them the strength to not stay broken so that they won’t miss their blessings.

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”