Category: Faith and Trusting God

Waiting with Trust

On By PhillippiIn Anxiety and Fear, Faith and Trusting GodLeave a comment

“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, and whose hope is the Lord. For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters, which spreads out its roots by the river, and will not fear when heat comes; but its leaf will be green, and will not be anxious in the year of drought, nor will cease from yielding fruit. -Jeremiah 17:7-8

Although it was a fantasy of mine, I never imagined we would actually land in Alaska. My husband and I were the ones who watched all the Alaska shows on TV dreaming of the day. Then, this past September, it happened.

During July of last year, we were camp hosting in Central Washington. We had been in temporary living situations since 2018, ever since being forced to leave our home and nearly all of our belongings due to toxic mold causing us to become extremely ill. We had camp hosted the previous year at the same beautiful campground and were given the opportunity again to live in a cabin off-grid while caring for three campgrounds over the summer. Our end date for camp hosting was September 9th and we hadn’t yet found a more permanent place to call home. With the few belongings we had accumulated over the past couple of years in tow and no leads, my anxious self was beginning to mull over the unknown. It wasn’t that we couldn’t afford a place or that there weren’t homes available, it was that due to becoming hypersensitive to mold and environmental toxins because of our previous exposure, our heightened sensitivities have made it difficult to tolerate modern housing and drywall. We found that we do best in log cabins. And these are kind of far and few between-except in places like Alaska. Alaska felt out of reach though, because I still didn’t have my passport. Since the Covid-19 pandemic, the issuance of passports had slowed down tremendously.

We began scouring Craigslist and Zillow for possible cabin rentals all over, but were coming up dry. Then, God spoke in the most unlikely place. One sweltering afternoon as I fought off the mosquitos while picking up litter in the campsites and making sure fires weren’t left smoldering, God left a message, on a fire pit of all places, telling me to trust Him. I knew in that moment that all was well and He had us, that there was nothing to worry about. I didn’t have to jump ahead into the unknown, with my searching mind going into overdrive trying to figure out what we would possibly do, like I had so many times before. With a smile on my face, I could just rest, knowing He had it all taken care of, and He did. He had a cozy log cabin picked out for us planted right along a plentiful river filled with fresh salmon, here in Alaska.

See, my husband had been inquiring about cabin rentals in several states: Wyoming, Montana, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Utah, South Dakota, North Dakota, New Mexico, Colorado, and Alaska. He wasn’t receiving any responses after reaching out. Since my husband works remote and I homeschool, we were free to go just about anywhere God opened a door. And so we prayed that God would open a door. But, we continued to wait. As the days inched closer to September, heading to our dream state was looking slim. Then, my birthday came in August and to my surprise, my new passport had shown up! It was quite the birthday gift! Shortly thereafter, my husband received a call with a rental offer. The one door that opened was this current cabin we are in, here in The Last Frontier. With a rental agreement in hand, we were allowed to cross the Canadian border into Alaska during a pandemic. It was a long trek, but we made it safe and sound, by trusting that this was where God wanted us. It was in this period of waiting, that we grew in our faith.

While it’s not always easy to have faith during seasons of waiting, we can be sure that choosing to trust Him is always the right decision. So, when we are unsure about what the future holds for us, let’s remember that even in these uncertain places, we can still trust our Heavenly Father. It’s in these times of waiting, that we hold fast to Him, not letting our faith waver. Instead we lean in closer, remembering to always be in His presence, aware and expectantly waiting for Him to speak because He might just surprise us in the most unexpected of ways!

Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I entrust my life. -Psalm 143:

Fuel Your Walk Friday

On By PhillippiIn Faith and Trusting God, Fuel Your Walk FridayLeave a comment

Fuel your walk with some Jesus and Joe.

I love Jesus and I love me an iced cuppa fresh cold brew halved with vanilla almond milk. What better way to combine the two and perk up the beginning of your weekend, than to “Fuel Your Walk” with some Jesus and Joe. Once a week, I will be posting a little snippet, thought, or question to ponder in relation to your walk with Christ. So grab your favorite mug, pour yourself a delicious cuppa Joe and get comfy as you let this question percolate in your mind:

Oswald Chambers said “Beware of harking back to what you once were, when God wants you to become something you’ve never been.”

Are you still looking back or are your eyes on Him and what He wants you to become?

Fuel Your Walk Friday

On By PhillippiIn Faith and Trusting God, Fuel Your Walk FridayLeave a comment

Fuel your walk with some Jesus and Joe.

I love Jesus and I love me an iced cuppa fresh cold brew halved with vanilla almond milk. What better way to combine the two and perk up the beginning of your weekend, than to “Fuel Your Walk” with some Jesus and Joe. Once a week, I will be posting a little snippet, thought, or questions to ponder in relation to your walk with Christ. So grab your favorite mug, pour yourself a delicious cuppa Joe and get comfy as you let these questions percolate in your mind:

Are there areas of your life you are still holding tightly to? What do you need to let go of and trust God with? What can you put into His hands right now?

He is All that I Need

On By PhillippiIn Chronic Illness, Lyme, and Mold, Faith and Trusting God5 Comments

The Lord is my Shepherd. I will have everything I need. -Psalm 23:1

Last week, something odd happened. I awoke with this Bible verse turning over and over in my mind. This has never happened to me before, nor can I ever recall having God speak to me through my dreams. Maybe this is a first?

As I lay there dozing in and out, I remember rattling off these words again and again: The Lord is my shepherd. He is all that I need. For awhile now, I’ve felt like He has been telling me this and apparently, this particular morning, God was really trying to pound it into me.

What I find even more interesting is that I will often start drafts of posts, to later come back and write more. I had forgotten about this post until I came across it tonight trying to figure out what I wanted to blog about. In His most impeccable timing, I saw the title I had written and once again, knew it was His way of reminding me of this after a most trying weekend.

This past weekend was one of those-can-I-please-just-pull-the-covers-over-my-head-and-keep-dreaming-so-I-don’t-have-to-get-up kinda weekends. This, along with the last three years of our lives, made me question life itself. It can be difficult to not understand what God’s plans are and yet, keep running the race. Without going into every detail, we have had to move several times in the past three years due to toxic mold exposure and environmental sensitivities. We are in another temporary living situation and were supposed to move into a different cabin this weekend, however, after moving nearly all of our stuff, we were not able to stay there. The entire cabin had been freshly varnished recently and although it had been aired out, it smelled so strongly, our belongings even smelled like varnish. So, after moving everything, it all had to go back to the cabin we came from. It felt like such a waste of time, energy and hard work. I know that there are different seasons in each of our lives, and then the seasons change, but this season we have been in the past few years has been extremely challenging, to say the least. Yes, there have been many adventures that I am so very grateful for, but there has also been a lot of hard.

I can’t help but wonder, after losing nearly everything we owned to toxic mold almost three years ago, when we will have a more permanent home. It’s all just wordly “stuff”, I know, and we are not of this world. Maybe though, I’m still grieving our losses-our health, our home, our belongings, my social work career, and private school for our girls. That’s a lot to lose in one shot. And it doesn’t include the more recent loss of seeing family due to Covid and our big move to Alaska. It’s tough not to compare our life before toxic mold, to the hardships we have endured since, or to others lives, but I know He’s refining us. There are definitely lessons in all of this. We are learning to trust God more and choose faith over fear. And we are being taught to wait patiently.

Today, I’m weary, but I’m going to choose faith. I’m going to keep my eyes on Him and remind myself that my prize isn’t this side of heaven. He’s telling me that He’s all I need, and maybe until I really, truly comprehend that on a heart-level, He won’t give me any more.

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal. -2 Corinthians 4:18

Tightrope of Trust

On By PhillippiIn Faith and Trusting God, Poetry, Surrender and AcceptanceLeave a comment 
I'm walking a tightrope
between the way things are 
and the way they should be

Or maybe they shouldn't be that way at all
and they just are what they are
Maybe that's what they need to be
for the time being

Toe steppin' through life 
afraid to cross that line
and accept what I don't want to

"Just for now," I tell myself
is what this has to be
"Just for now"
Where I am, is temporary

Like all of life 
that fades into the wind,
this too, shall pass

More days will come
Then suddenly, 
I will find myself in a new place
farther ahead than I thought possible

At a snail's pace, I creep forward
I land, but not for long
because change--that's what's constant

Into the unknown,
I glide again
while waiting for answers
and growing in my faith

Learning to trust
that where I am on this journey
is exactly where He wants me

© 2021 Aimee Phillippi

It was All an Illusion

On By PhillippiIn Faith and Trusting God, TraumaLeave a comment

The Lord protects those of childlike faith; I was facing death, and he saved me. -Psalm 116:6

The memories I have as a child feeling safe are a bit foggy, but they are definitely there. I can see them if I sift through the clouds. Those are the ones that shine bright in my mind, when I let them peek through the fog. I don’t allow myself to go there often though, because that time has long passed. Having blocked out a lot after the age of thirteen, part of me doesn’t like looking back-back before that time, when my life felt absolutely perfect. Yet, when I consciously dig, I can see that young, curly-haired, barefoot girl running wild and free in our neatly landscaped yard, without a care in the world. I miss those times. I sure do. Those were the times when I felt safe and secure. Life was easy back then-simple, or so I thought.

It was an illusion though, growing up living the American dream. I found out all too suddenly that safety didn’t lie in your mom, dad, brother, or dog living together in a beautiful house in the country with neighbor kids to play with nearby. Safety didn’t lie in family camping trips, going to Disneyland together, or a new 5-speed bike for my birthday. It didn’t lie in having best friend sleepovers all the time or my dad building us an amazing fort in our backyard. Safety didn’t lie in playing weekly soccer games or going water skiing together on the river. No, see, these are wordly things and those of us who believe in Jesus are not of this world. Those things and people aren’t our safety net.

When I lost my family, I lost my sense of safety and security. It all came tumbling down like a tower built on the sand. Baptized Catholic and forced to attend church service each Sunday when I was younger, the focus back then, was the religious rituals. Despite the religion, my life was still built on worldly things. I didn’t really understand having a relationship with God at that point in my life, and although my parents tried, I don’t think they really did either. So, these worldly things that my life was built on, came crashing down hard. Like everything on earth that perishes, that life was temporary.

The family I once knew and felt secure in, eventually died. My family unit was ripped apart in an instant like a vicious wolf tearing apart its prey. Each day suddenly became confusing and scary and painful-oh so painful-too painful, in fact, for my thirteen year-old self to take. I tried to carry it, but my body gave out. This was the beginning of what my life would eventually become. The start of something new-not easy, but new-a 180 degree turn in my life. Not only did I learn to walk in fear, it was the start of a life searching for answers in all the wrong places-addictions, people, answers to my illnesses, and answers about God.

After years of picking up the pieces, and trying to figure life out, brick by brick God began helping me build my life on Him. This life He is helping me build is one based on faith, not fear. He, I’m learning, is the only One I can put my entire trust in. And the only way to remain truly safe, is to remain a child of God, with childlike faith.

So let us reach for and trust our Heavenly Father with childlike faith, knowing that He will carry us, especially in our most trying times, because He sure will. He is love, and where there is love, there is no place for fear. The God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, is walking with us every step of every moment. And He is the only One we can truly count on in this life. Our Heavenly Father will never fail us.

and said, “I assure you and most solemnly say to you, unless you repent [that is, change your inner self—your old way of thinking, live changed lives] and become like children [trusting, humble, and forgiving], you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. -Matthew 18:3-4 (AMP)

Quiet My Soul, Lord

On By PhillippiIn Anxiety and Fear, Faith and Trusting God, Poetry12 Comments

Fear, Fear, it’s everywhere

Slips in without me aware

The cycle is endless

The constant fear, chronic stress

The rival won’t stand down

Fired shots in this battleground

A tight grip on my heart

I can’t pry the grasp apart

My stomach’s all a knot

Just too many anxious thoughts

Round and round in my mind

Until I cannot unwind

The fear it keeps me stuck

Continued struggles to trust

You say “Don’t be afraid”

Please Father, come to my aid.

Lord, take it all from me

So in your hands it will be

Help me to rest in you

I need to sleep before two

Give me your peace and calm

Speak your Words of soothing balm

Quiet my soul, Lord, please

I’m begging you on my knees

You say your yoke is light

Show me a little more bright

Why am I so afraid?

In Your image I was made

Please take this dark gray cloud

Hanging over me too loud

Why can’t I just let go?

Surrender, so I can glow

Shower me from up above

Then I can shine Your sweet love

© 2021 Aimee Phillippi

*This was a poem I wrote in the middle of the night in November of last year, when I was struggling with fear and anxiety. It often comes in waves, but is diminishing the more I learn to trust Him in all areas of my life.

Fuel Your Walk Friday

On By PhillippiIn Faith and Trusting God, Fuel Your Walk Friday5 Comments

Fuel your walk with some Jesus and Joe.

I love Jesus and I love me an iced cuppa fresh cold brew halved with vanilla almond milk, so I recently started something new on my blog called “Fuel Your Walk Fridays”. What better way to combine the two and perk up the beginning of your weekend, than to “Fuel Your Walk” with some Jesus and Joe. Once a week, I will be posting a little snippet, thought, or questions to ponder in relation to your walk with Christ. So grab your favorite mug, pour yourself a delicious cuppa Joe and get comfy as you let these questions percolate in your mind:

In His Word, 1 Timothy 6:12 says to Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, to which you were also called and have confessed the good confession in the presence of many witnesses.

Living in a world fraught with unrest and strife, how will you continue to fight the good fight of faith? In your life, what does fighting the good fight look like to you? And in the midst of that fight, how will you be a light for others?

Copyright © 2021 Aimee Phillippi

Who He Is and Why We Can Trust

On By PhillippiIn Faith and Trusting God10 Comments

Being abandoned by my father in my early teen years, shattered my heart into a million pieces. This trauma taught me that it wasn’t safe to trust and I’ve grappled with it ever since. I want to trust my Heavenly Father with childlike faith, but there’s this part of me that won’t let go completely. Day by day, He’s showing me I can trust Him more, and He’s slowly healing pieces of my broken heart through my writing. He gave me the idea to dive into His word and see what it says about who He is and why we can trust Him. Here’s what His Word says about who He is-

Our Heavenly Father is:

*Love

The one who does not love has not become acquainted with God [does not and never did know Him], for God is love. [He is the originator of love, and it is an enduring attribute of His nature.] -1 John 4:8 (AMP)

*The God of all comfort

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort which we ourselves are comforted by God. -2 Corinthians 1:3-4

* Never Changing

I the Lord do not change. So you, the descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed. -Malachi 3:6

*The Prince of Peace

Peace I leave with you; My [perfect] peace I give to you; not as the world gives do I give to you. Do not let your heart be troubled, nor let it be afraid. [Let My perfect peace calm you in every circumstance and give you courage and strength for every challenge.] -John 14:27 (AMP)

*Good

Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good; Blessed is the man who trusts in Him! -Psalm 34:8

*Our Healer

He heals the brokenhearted And binds up their wounds [healing their pain and comforting their sorrow]. -Psalm 147:3 (AMP)

*Trustworthy

God is not human, that he should lie, not a human being, that he should change his mind. Does he speak and then not act? Does he promise and not fulfill? -Numbers 23:19

*The Truth

Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. -John 14:6

*Our Forgiver

Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. -Ephesians 4:32

*Slow to anger and rich in love

The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love. -Psalm 145:8

*Accepting

Therefore, [continue to] accept and welcome one another, just as Christ has accepted and welcomed us to the glory of [our great] God. -Romans 15:7 (AMP) ?

*A God of justice

And the heavens proclaim his righteousness, for he is a God of justice. -Psalm 50:6

*Gracious and righteous

The Lord is gracious and righteous; our God is full of compassion. -Psalm 116:5

*Always with us

No one will be able to stand against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you. -Joshua 1:5

*Our Helper

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. -Isaiah 41:10

*A merciful and compassionate God

For the Lord your God is a merciful and compassionate God; He will not fail you, nor destroy you, nor forget the covenant with your fathers which He swore to them.- Deuteronomy 4:31

*Wise

To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen. -Jude 1:25

*Gentle

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. -Matthew 11:29

*Faithful

But the Lord is faithful, and He will strengthen you [setting you on a firm foundation] and will protect and guard you from the evil one. -2 Thessalonians 3:3 (AMP)

*Our Shepherd

The Lord is my shepherd, I lack nothing. -Psalm 23:1

*Giving

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not 8perish but have eternal life. -John 3:16

*Kind

in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— -Ephesians 2:7-8

*Our Protector

You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance. -Psalm 32:7

After seeing this list, are you asking yourself the same question I am? How can we not trust Him fully? He is an amazing God!

Tested to Purify

On By PhillippiIn Faith and Trusting God, Hope and Strength, Other2 Comments

So be truly glad. There is wonderful joy ahead, even though you must endure many trials for a little while. These trials will show that your faith is genuine. It is being tested as fire tests and purifies gold–though your faith is far more precious than mere gold. So when your faith remains strong through many trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day when Jesus Christ is revealed to the whole world. -1 Peter 1:6-7

When the storms are raging all around us, and the trials are piling up in heaps, how do we hold onto our faith and how do we count it all joy? These are the questions I am asking myself right now.

If faith is believing even when we cannot see, and we are supposed to walk by faith, not by sight, maybe I’m just not seeing yet. Yet is the key word. I may be blinded right now to what’s up ahead, but that doesn’t mean it’s not there. Maybe, just maybe, He has something waiting around the bend that is far better than I can imagine. This is faith and hope and I’m going to hold onto it. Just because I can’t see, doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist. He knows the plans He has for us, and He tells us that they are plans to prosper us and not harm us, plans to give us a hope and a future. We can clutch onto this piece of Truth. But, that isn’t to say that we aren’t in the fiery furnace right now or that it’s easy to hang onto our faith.

As the hurricane of life sweeps in, He tells us to continue to be faithful. How though, when it’s all so heavy and it hurts? And then when we become flooded with doubts? One way we do this is by nourishing ourselves in the Word and soaking up His teachings, so that we can keep putting one foot in front of the other in a Christlike manner. His Word is refreshment for our souls. We read and we memorize. We tuck His words deep into our hearts so we don’t forget them. His Word is a lifeline to the One who carries us, the One who is hope.

We put our hope in our Father and we realize that He is doing something bigger here-He is training us and growing our faith during these times. And if we are afraid of the unknown or we can’t see a way out of the flames, we rise above our fear and we choose to trust. We make that choice and act as if we trust, even when it appears that the dark clouds will never make way for the sun to shine again. We continue to stand firm in Him, trusting that He knows what’s best for us and that He has our best interests in mind. Because He does.

And the joy part. This is where I stumble. How do we consider these trials joy? And how do we feel some joy in the inferno?

For one, we keep our eye on the prize. We will have trouble this side of Heaven. This is a given. Yet, Heaven is our reward and we have to continue to persevere and run the race for Him. We have to sacrifice our comforts now, by accepting the pain and suffering, and knowing that we will be blessed beyond measure later. We remember that this agony we are enduring in this moment will be nothing compared to the joy we will experience when we receive the crown that He has for us. So we look up and keep our focus on what is waiting for us. We can do something else though, too.

Phillipians 4:8 tells us “…whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable-if anything is excellent or praiseworthy–think about such things.” We think about the things in front of us that are lovely and praiseworthy and true and right. These are things that can give us joy now.

And worshiping Him in the pain will also bring us joy and peace. We raise our hands, crank up the Christian jams and we sing and dance through the pain and frustration, rejoicing in Him. He will comfort our hearts and give us the gift of joy, despite our circumstances.

In 1 Timothy 4: 8-10, Paul writes to Timothy, “Physical training is good, but training for godliness is much better, promising benefits in this life and in the life to come.” Then he states “This is why we work hard and continue to struggle, for our HOPE is in the living God, who is the Savior of all people.” The struggles will be there. He says that, but so is He, because where He is, our hope lies. And He never wavers.

He is not afraid of bad news; his heart is firm, trusting in the Lord. -Psalms 112:7