Deposits: Who’s transacting in your life?

I love to go to the bank and deposit money! This is a great feeling and a blessing to deposit or put money in to my account. Deposits are good as it relates to the bank but what about deposits as it relates to our lives? Whether you realize it or not people who are in your life are doing one or the other: making deposits or withdrawals. It’s usually not hard to tell which transaction is taking place, just examine how you feel as a result of your dealings with a particular person. Are you invigorated, empowered, inspired and ready to take on the world? Or are you drained, zapped of energy and find it taxing to be in this person’s life which proves daily to be an uphill battle? Are they adding or taking away? It really is that simple. 

There’s an old adage that says: you are the company you keep.  As a teenager I didn’t fully know what this meant, I always thought I was my own person so it shouldn’t matter who I hang with; I’m me and they were them. As an adult I’ve come to see that this is far from the truth. ‘You are the company you keep’ goes far beyond the surface of the actual cliché but it delves into spiritual territory. Who we let in our inner circles is a matter of life and death. Here’s why: 

1. What people speak into your life, matters. Proverbs 28:21 says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof”. Words matter. What you speak over yourself matters. What you let others speak over you matters. It is about the deposit. I heard the preacher say on this past Sunday, “Don’t be someone’s garbage can”. Watch your company because they can speak Death into your life, death into your situations, and death into your circumstances all of which can affect your future. 
2. The presence of people in your life, matters. Having the wrong people around you can erode your character over time. Their very presence can make the difference on whether you succeed or fail. 1 Corinthians 15:33 says, “Do not be misled: ‘Bad company corrupts good character’." Other translations of this verse reads:  

Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals.”

Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners. 

Be not deceived, evil discourse corrupts pleasant minds. 

Get the picture?

3. The wrong people having access to your vision, matters. The wrong people can be a hindrance to your goals and dreams, choking the very life out of you until you are immobilized and never accomplish that which you set out to do. 

Beware of the:

Vision Assassins - the ones who shoot your vision down as soon as you share it with them or even get it off the ground. 

Vision Abortionist – the ones who kill the vision before it’s even born. 

(Sermon, Pastor Craig Oliver, Elizabeth Baptist Church, Atlanta, GA)

Who is transacting in your life? What transactions need to be voided? God is the “Manager on Duty” who can alter the transactions in your life; he can approve all voids. “If any man be in Christ he is a new creature” (2 Corinthians 5:17), He makes all things new!  

My Mom wrote me a letter a couple of years ago and I’ll end this post with it.

“Whenever you try to do anything for your future, Satan sees your success and he begins his attacks on you. WEED OUT the people in your life that are not going anywhere. They are your hindrance. Nowhere leads to Nowhere! WEED OUT all thoughts that do not please God. Ask God to give you a clean heart and renew a right spirit within you (Psalms 51:10). THINK and BELIEVE THIS DAILY – THE ENEMY DOES NOT HAVE WIN OVER YOU. A retroactive blessing is on the way only if you do it God’s way.

Read Psalms 91 Daily

I hope this blessed you like it blessed me.

You Can Sin Anywhere - Compromising Positions

I’ve seen this trend quite a bit here recently where men ask you out but the date is to come over their house so they can “cook” for you. Sometimes I’ve even heard of men suggesting this for a 1st date! Some use the excuse that money is tight and this saves money. Money is indeed tight these days (no argument there) but if it is that tight that you can’t afford Applebee’s 2 for $20, then this may not be the season for you to date! 

I posed this question to the Girrrl Stop nation last week: Is it okay for Christians to have in-home dates (i.e. dinner and movie etc.)? Most responses came on my personal page and not the blog page and one comment was “it really doesn’t matter because you can sin anywhere”. It is a true statement, you can sin anywhere but let me submit this question: 

Now this is for the win! Which scenario is more likely to result in fornication: 

Choice 1 - 2 for $20 at Applebee’s

Choice 2 - Cooking dinner at the house and snuggling up on the couch for a movie

Ok, three seconds on the clock, I need an answer…

The reality is that it is far less likely that you’ll fornicate with a man sitting with him in the neighborhood Applebee’s (ok, yes I do like Applebee’s laugh and get over it!) versus at his home while he’s making some fake-up 10 minute Rachel Ray pasta dish!

We have to operate in wisdom. If you really think you going to that fine man’s house and he does something so intimate like cooking for you, and nothing is going to eventually happen - Girrrl Stop!

You might make it through the first dinner, second, third or fourth dinner even but the truth is you’re playing with fire when you do this and eventually it’s gon’ go bad! Then you gon’ be at the altar crying profusely and carrying on and then the church mothers gon’ get to whispering “she must be pregnant” while you screaming like somebody died. The truth is, something did die, your standards and this is where allowing yourself to be in compromising positions will lead you. 

In my opinion, in-home dinner dates are not even appropriate for a 1st date, you don’t know that ninja! Why you at his house anyway?

But for those who may have been dating a while and would like to have an in-home dinner and movie date, I’m going old school here and suggest you get a Christian accountability couple. This couple would come and double date with you in the home. They gon' eat with you and watch the movie with you too and when they leave, you need to go - date over! 

I hear in the spirit some people saying, “Chile Boo! I’m 40 and I’m grown, if I wanna go to a man’s house for dinner I’m going!” Well, my dear, you’ve been doing it your way for 20+ years now and where has it gotten you? You can keep being grown and doing what you want to do but God is waiting for you to come out of flesh and fully surrender to His will and His way. 

Stop being loose! Stop stepping into compromising positions. 

Definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. 

That’s all.  

**Let me point out that inexpensive dates don’t always require a dollar, there are lots of free things to do outside the home if money is indeed tight. Be creative.**