✞ C E L A I L a C R O I X ✞
After an amazing worship session performed by the praise team, the loud and joyful congregation finally starts to die down when Pastor Edmonds stands at the pulpit. He allows them to slowly simmer and for some of the people to wipe away their tears.
There's always that once-in-a-while church day where everyone can feel the presence of the Lord and cause the praise team's songs to bleed into the time for the week's message and this one of those days. It was much needed.
"Don't fight His love," Pastor Edmonds starts, giving the congregation a little more time to calm themselves.
After another minute or so, he continues. "Now, there is never an easy way to transition into announcements after experiencing God so closely, so I'll just get into it: we only have one announcement and that is we will be having a lock-in next week, Friday, February 13th. We'll be providing food and entertainment, all you have to do is show up and spend the night in the Lord's sanctuary. I won't go so deep because we are limited on time, but if you want more information, you can look for our youth pastor, Pastor Antoinette Webster or my son, Pastor Julian Westbrook."
Celai glances over at Julian, who's already looking at her with a small smile on his face. He raises his eyebrows a little and leans his head in her direction, like he's asking, "Are you going?"
Celai shrugs, returning the small smile, and she turns back to the pastor to prevent her smile from getting any bigger. After last night, she is undeniably smitten with Julian. After they ate, they talked, watched a movie, and when Celai began to get sleepy, Julian made her get up and slow dance with him, all of it accompanied with sweet kisses.
She didn't regret their date ending in the wee hours of the morning because she now carries the ability to be intimate with Julian without sex being in the mix and all she wants to do is share that with him.
Bernard prays before he starts his sermon, and then he reads the verse the church would focus on today. "I ask that you turn your Bibles to James 1, one of my favorite books. We're going to be looking at verse 6 which says, 'But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.'"
He gives the church time to get to the right page before he begins to pace across the floor, the microphone in his hand. "Now, in this church, we talk about trusting God a lot; it's important, but I don't think I've ever discussed what trusting God really is and how to do it. So what I'm gonna do today is first, explain what trusting God is, and then give you three things to remember when you want to trust Him."
By the end of his message, Celai and everyone around her has a page and a half filled with valuable notes, and Celai knows that she, at least, would try her best to think back to the notes whenever she has trouble putting her faith in God.
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘬𝘦𝘺 𝘵𝘰 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘧𝘢𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳 𝘛.𝘙.𝘜.𝘚.𝘛.
𝘛-𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘯 𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘳 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘎𝘰𝘥
𝘙-𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘭𝘪𝘻𝘦 𝘎𝘰𝘥'𝘴 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘯 𝘪𝘴 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘧𝘦𝘤𝘵
𝘜-𝘶𝘯𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘩𝘶𝘮𝘢𝘯 𝘭𝘰𝘨𝘪𝘤 𝘪𝘴 𝘧𝘭𝘢𝘸𝘦𝘥 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘥
𝘚-𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘺 𝘴𝘵𝘪𝘭𝘭 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘴𝘵𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘮
𝘛-𝘵𝘪𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘪𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘎𝘰𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸
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A Lily Among Thorns
Spiritual23-year-old Celai (sa-lay) LaCroix should have died in a horrible accident, but instead, she wakes up beside the man who is responsible for her making it to the hospital, Julian Westbrook. God had put him there to be her knight-in-shining-armor, how...
