Tag Archives: Freedom

I Gotta Get Mine, And You, You Gotta Get Yours…

Hey Hey Hey! Yeah so, I’m supposed to be writing a history paper, but I cannot go on until I get this off my chest. For months I’ve felt ummm stopped up, stuck, in a muck, in a rut, just like someone pushed the pause button on my life. Only to find out that it was God, He was giving me specific instructions about my life, but I was ignoring Him because I was afraid of the repercussions of man. Let me tell you something, just like a spouse, or a boyfriend or girlfriend know just what buttons to push to get a reaction out of you, the LORD knows exactly what you need to get you to where He wants you to be if you are not listening. Now God is a gentleman, He won’t FORCE you to do anything, but He does know how to deal with each of His children in a very specific way. Like a parent, He deals with us all according to our needs, our personality, our knowledge and our attitude, things like that. For instance, I let Christian (my son) get a tattoo for his 16th birthday, I know people will not agree but I know my son, and I know the significance of what he wanted. It’s a beautiful tattoo to remind him of my grandfather who was his bff. Now when I have more children, they may want one at 16, and I can hear it now “but you let Chris get one!” and I may have to answer “yes, but you want Tinkerbelle on the back of your neck, no ma’am”. Her pappy and I will have to deal with her accordingly. With that being said, God always tries to give me slight nudges, little pushes to say “go that way”, but unfortunately He usually has to smack me down on my face in a pile of tears and snot for me to listen…I know, I’m trying to do better, but it’s the truth, I don’t always listen! I like to live on the edge I guess (like this paper that’s due Wednesday that I haven’t started). :-/

Anywho, I finally decided to listen, and ever since I did I’ve felt like a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders, I’m seeing and hearing more clearly, and I just feel FREE, like doors are opening and nothing is holding me down. I don’t know why people think that being a Christian is all about rules and regulations, it isn’t! It is about FREEDOM in Christ! You are so much more free when you are obedient to His word, especially when He gives YOU a specific word for your life. You can’t let others tell you what you need to be doing in order to be in line with Christ, and you can’t lean on other people’s anointing as your own and expect to reap the benefits! You cannot walk in someone else’s calling and expect to be blessed! You have to walk in the path that God has carved out especially for you even if others don’t understand, even if you don’t understand. Hello, lean not on your own understanding…we say we trust God yet we question His judgement lol that just sounds ridiculous! WE don’t trust HIS judgement…let’s let that marinate…

OK, yeah so as I say all of this, I must say that you gotta get yours when it comes to the Lord. Not in a selfish, self serving way, but in a way that is reflective of Jesus Christ. Praise and Worship for instance, is not a show for you to sit, listen and be entertained by the vocal styling of the best singers of your congregation. Because really, the Lord can pass you the mic at any time and ask you to sing wit yo non singin’, voice crackin’ self. Yes!! It can happen, you know why, because the person with the best voice may not be anointed, or they may be in the flesh, but your praise is so pure that it sounds beautiful to ears of God. Now an anointed beautiful voice is a blessing Halleujah!! but that cracking pure spirit is just as amazing.

We don’t go to church to always receive, receive from the pastor, receive from the praise team, just soak up all the goodness of “church”. It’s not about tingly’s when your favorite praise leader starts singing your favorite song. It’s about you getting yours, however you need to, if you have to lay out in the floor, or cry out to the Lord!! Now, I do not in any means mean to make a spectacle of yourself and put on a show, don’t be foolish. But whatever it takes to get what you need, you need to do it! No matter who is watching because they should be getting theirs too and not be paying attention to you! Today I was on my FACE and I’m sure my tracks were showing, but if you saw my tracks, then you weren’t where you needed to be in the Spirit. When you’re fighting for your life it is NOT the time to be cute! You have to put in work, not just wait for church to usher in the Spirit to get what you need. You should be able to do it on your own, in the car, in the grocery store, on the highway, in the shower whenever you need Him!!

Punctuality and an order of service is not what one should be looking for. Do not stifle the Holy Spirit in order to stay on your agenda, or your schedule. Funny, I wrote that two months ago but today the Spirit moved one way and changed the course of the service and who are we to complain? Should order be in the church? Yes, of course but don’t try and dictate what the Holy Spirit is trying to do. The Lord obviously wants you to get something – TAKE IT!


Introduction Of Moi…

Hey everyone! This is Ivonnah and this is my very first blog entry!! Just a small introduction for you all to get to know ME. I’m so excited! This is going to be a place where I can just be free! Write what I want, say I how I feel with no concern of sentence structure or proper punctuation…much like my twitter page with more than 140 characters.

First and foremost I LOVE the Lord! Will all of my posts be preachin’ ? No, but I will reference Him a great deal because He is in the forethought of my mind throughout the day. I’m not religious, I have a relationship with God. There’s a BIG difference! I use to be religious, go to church, stand, sit, kneel and repeat, drink wine from the same cup during communion (glad y’all are dippin’ the cracker now St. Luke’s). I’d pray everyday…pray that I would get to my men’s magazine photo shoot on time, and thank God that there were no accidents on 95 South! Hallelujah Jesus!! Who moves to Los Angeles and finds God, not the surface God, the spare tire God, but the almighty, all powerful God and gets to have a deeper, more intimate relationship Him? ME! Most people move here and find drugs, sex and alcohol…me? I’ve been abstinent for almost two years (oh yeah God, about that husband?), I don’t drink…ok a sip of Moscato here and there, and cocaine looks like it burns and I hate when I get dust in my nose!

On a serious note, if I had never done a video or a photo shoot for men’s magazines then I would have never been a Wild N’ Out girl (everyone’s fave I hear), then I would have never moved to LA and found a church that helped me grow up so much in Christ! The girls that know me from television wouldn’t feel comfortable telling me what they need prayer for, but they do because they feel like they know me and they trust me with their problems. The guys who had my pictures on their prison walls (except Whalley Ave. my godfather is a CO there…nuff said) wouldn’t have had the courage to send me prayer requests with no funny business attached. I wouldn’t have people telling me that I make them want to go back to Christ or get to know Him better because of my twitter prayers. Please! They wouldn’t be following Ivonnah the hairdresser from New Haven! But they do follow Ivonnah, from the Avant video or Ivonnah the short haired girl from Wild N’ Out…

In conclusion, God has a divine purpose for our lives but we HAVE to follow His word, He orders our steps. Sometimes we have to go through things in our lives to protect the next person coming behind us, so they won’t make the same mistakes we did. Following Christ doesn’t always mean your life will be perfect, there are some rocky times that we have to go through in order to come out victorious in the end. Even when we mess up He’ll use it to get us to our destiny. Lord knows I feel like Joseph all the time!! He was sent to prison following Gods word, he wouldn’t disrespect the covenant of marriage. He was lied on and sent to prison, betrayed by his brothers (not in that order) but if it never happened then he would have never become the ruler of Egypt!

We are all Kings and Queens because we are joint heirs with Jesus Christ. He’s just waiting on US to get our act together so he can bless us with our inheritance!!

OK welp! That went in an entirely different direction than I planned! Haha! That was for somebody…