It is easy to lose sight of the treasure that you carry. My prayer today is that you will rediscover yourself and find ways to share your beauty with the world.

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I spent this last week pondering some of the parables of Jesus and, you know, with the Scriptures, they can be applied very, very directly within the context that they are written. But I believe that they also contain deep principles that can be understood and can inform us in many, many different aspects of life. I mean, truly, the word of God is like a beautiful diamond with so many facets. And I’ve been pondering some of Jesus parables with respect to a book that I’m kind of cooking at the moment that I began to write aimed very specifically at Christian entrepreneurs, men and women who want to kind of breakthrough and begin to make a financial living from their creativity.

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And I was thinking about the parable of the lost coin and how when Jesus speaks about this, he talks about this lady who loses one of her precious coins and looks everywhere in order to find it.

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I’m sure we can all relate in that we’ve all at some time lost something that we urgently wanted to rediscover and find. Where has it gone? You know, and this lady loses this gold coin. And I think sometimes we can feel as though our creative calling that our creativity is like one of those coins that somehow has been lost in the flurry of life. You know, it’s almost like we hear these sermons about how God has a magnificent plan for our lives, a destiny that is perfectly shaped for us to embody and gloriously fulfil.

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And we come away. A human is very encouraging to sit under those kind of truths being toward. But sometimes we can go away. And we can be like the lady in our house thinking, wow, that all sounded so precious and so valuable and so wonderful. But man, where has my coin gone?

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Who’s hidden it or who’s stolen it? Because despite the promise of this wonderful plan that God has for me, despite these promises of the destiny that is called me to fulfil, I feel as though somehow it alludes me. You know, many people feel like that. I believe, chasing dreams, looking under every stone, hoping that finally their day will come. And if a want of a better picture, the lottery of life will open up its treasures and all will be made plain.

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We know that we’ve got a creative gift. We understand. We know deep on the inside that there is a significant destiny car ing us upward and onward. But really the rough edges of life of often worn away our resolve almost to the bone and the idea of stepping out. Whereas at one time when we were this invincible young man or woman, Lee just looking to take life by the take, life on used to be an exciting prospect, but now it just feels frightening.

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The idea of step up and stepping out again, the idea of climbing into the ring, we feel sometimes and just one more disappointment might be the straw that breaks the proverbial camel’s back and then plaster this against the backdrop of screaming voices on the Internet, pulling us in every direction with all sorts of inflated promises and opportunities the bombardment can feel wearing. You know, this grand design that God has for our lives can be shaved thin by all sorts of devilish tools. It comes from all sorts of directions.

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You Satan is not choosy. If diminishing your sense of worth works, then that is attack you’ll take if keeping you frantically chasing the next shiny object in the hope that your breakthrough is hidden behind some other sales page and you plaster your life with endless opportunities to pry your credit card from its until either your bank account or your resolve runs dry.

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And then, on the other side, it can be the drip, drip drip of discouragement that kills that awesome creative spirit that you are and causes you to crawl into a shady place to Lee a shadow life, living your dreams through someone else. You know the list goes on. The devil is a master player in a creativity on the one hand, is applauded by the world and the Kings and Queens of self expression are lifted up as almost otherworldly examples of human genius. Meanwhile, on planet Earth, creative aspirations are often frowned upon in a creative a lampooned as dreamers, unrealistic folks who’ve lost touch with reality.

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Now the questions are asked.

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What makes you think that you can make it as an artist and author, an actor? Whatever it may be, how would how would your message be of interest to anyone behind a tiny, insignificant crew of equally helpless, hopeless Lee? And that may sound really horrible to say. I even felt awful writing it, but the devil is not polite. He will prod and provoke and be dis, consistently pack away until you Lee.

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And just I want today I want to urge you to pick up spiritual arms and wage war against his lies. You know, the devil is not a Pansy. He holds nothing back in the war against those who bear the image of the one he hates. And he’s got nothing, no power whatsoever to create anything himself. All he can do is stage a heist of the genius of God’s, image bearers and twist that inherent creativity in lamentable and destructive ways or else try and stuff it so far back down inside of them that it never gets the opportunity to express itself and release life and bring transformation to others.

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You know, you are a unique and marvellous gift to humanity and there is not an in history you can offer what you carry to the table. I read this quote from Martha Graham. She was a pioneering dance dancer and choreographer, and she said this there is a vitality, a life force and energy, a quickening that is translated through you into action. And because there is only one of you in all of time. This expression is unique.

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If you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and will be lost. I know you carry a precious treasure on the inside. It’s your creative nature, the very image and likeness of the one who made you. And you know, like the lost coin in Jesus Parable, you find it in Luke chapter 15. This creative nature, this unction, this anointing has to be reclaimed.

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Well, I’ll read from the parable. It says, what woman having ten silver coins if she loses one coin, does not like a lamp. Sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it. And when she found it, she called her friends and neighbours together, saying, Rejoice with me. So I found the peace that I lost.

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So many souls are lost to eternity, but many more never actually live life, even if they have been redeemed. Even if their future, their eternity has been secured. The bright, creative light that they carry has been dimmed and hidden away. Now I just want to encourage you. Don’t allow Satan to keep you in the dark any longer.

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Light your lamp and search incessantly until you find that spark that you once carried. That missing piece that fits everything else into place. You know, your redemption is not just an insurance policy. It’s an invitation to live fully and freely here on the Earth, adding value to the world through the unique expression that bears your name. How do we find that lost coin of creativity?

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I’d love to be able to tell you that it’s that like just a click finger solution, you know, click your fingers in all as well. It’s a pressing problem. But honestly, there is not an easy option for all of the quick, easy, cheap effortless answers that the marketing world wants to foist upon you. The reality is that most things take work. If it were easy, effortless and cheap, everyone would live in the luxury fulfilment joyously sharing their authentic self with an adoring audience.

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But again, let’s come back down to planet Earth. That’s where we’re stationed at this time. The process of discovery is often often requires digging through a few layers of dirt, excuses, insecurities, roadblocks reasonings, fears, failings feelings. Fumblings, discovering your awesome is like digging in to the dirt. You discover.

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You need sometimes to shift a lot of Earth before you hit the precious vein that carries your voice to the world. You know, the lady in the parable hunted tirelessly until and I believe that you need I need to do the same. The journey can be challenging. The temptation to turn around and head back to the village with your tail between your legs will press on you at times. Shame even can sneak up on you and poke its bony finger in your face.

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Spewing a river of I told you so. But honestly, the prize is worth the work. The delight is worth the digging because not just for you, but the ones that you will help and encourage. Lee, there are not many devotionals that really stick with me for decades, but one story that I read in one of the very first devotional books that I read, Streams in the Desert by Lee Coman has never left me. The author relates it far better than I can, but I’m going to try and kind of re tell the story in the way that I remember it.

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The picture that she paints in this particular devotional is of a small girl who finds a cocoon, and inside she can see the encase butterfly struggling to escape its woven womb, thinking to do the exhausted creature a favour, the girl carefully slices the cocoon open and waits for the beauty of the full form butterfly to take wing and Grace the world with its wonder. Instead, the beautiful creature falls from the opening and dies limp and helpless in her hand. What she didn’t realise was that it was actually the very struggle, the pressing against resistance, the pushing and straining to break the mould and finally find the full expression of its nature that pumped the blood into its wings and allowed it to fly.

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When finally the casing would crack. I believe it’s the same with our personal gifts and our full formed personality.

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It becomes over time, sometimes can become encased in layers of resistance, and on that playful, believing child is wrapped up out of sight. You know, the dreams can still call to us as we grow. But when we respond, we discover that it’s not so easy to act up on them. It’s not so easy to step out of what’s considered ordinary or normal and begin to express ourselves more fully and freely and authentically. You know, we want to be liked, we want to be considered normal.

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We want to fit in with the crowd, all of these things. Sometimes Lee back from just claiming our inheritance, claiming who we are and saying, yes, I’m here and I’m ready to be counted. Being yourself without fear and full of faith. You would think it would be a cinch. But I found that it’s not always the case.

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It’s actually a great quest to reclaim and rediscover your beauty and to let it fly. And like that butterfly, we need to learn to harness the resistance. We need to let its squeeze that deeper reality from the depths of who we are as a child of the Creator. O understand that the pressing through is all part of the great creators plan, that your mess and your message are often intertwined, that your journey will be the very thing that helps others reach their destination. Paul speaks of this so beautifully in Philippians, and I just love the way he puts this in Philippians 3:12.

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He says, not that I’ve already attained or that I’m already perfected, but I press on that I may lay hold of that for which Christ Jesus is laid hold of me. Christ Jesus is laid hold of you for a reason and a purpose. And you are now called to lay hold of that for which he is laid hold of you, pressing forward, meaning to endeavour earnestly, to acquire, to take hold of that for which Christ has taken hold of you. And you do this every day, daily building habits that respect your dreams and hopes, disciplines that lean into the person you believe yourself to be.

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You know, you are willing to face the prospect of a hard climb or a long dig, your desire to write or sing or paint or dance overrides the world’s.

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Baying discouragements de a creative friend. Make your desire to make something beautiful a priority. Don’t back off. Whatever your circumstances may say, whatever voice is standing your way, push through them, pressing toward your own Mark. That Mark that’s been set and planted by God Himself in your heart.

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For me, it’s to be a writer. You know these words, this recording, this chapter. They’re all part of pushing my cocoon. I feel the creative juice flowing through my veins as I do, even if hidden from the world. And we can sometimes feel that.

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That’s the case. There is a bursting beauty that will one day burst forth and break out and bring something wonderful showing down on some days that’s easy to believe in other days, it may not be so. Sometimes you may feel it’s inevitable. It will, of course, it’s going to happen. And then others know you may feel more like that, Caterpillar cold away in the darkness and reluctant to emerge.

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The important thing is to keep pressing, regardless of the feelings. To recognise that there is a unique expression that only you can bring and to do all you can to transform those ideas into action. For you. It might be words on a page like myself. It might be images, painted sketches done, an instrument, played a new song, song but keep digging.

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Keep pushing in a you are special. No one else can go deep enough to draw you out. That’s a journey that only you can fully undertake. Others may help and direct. They may act as guides, but at the end of the day, your love and wonder is not going to be a pale reflection of someone else’s experience.

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It will be a glowing testimony of who God has made you and you alone. To be this treasure. You know, this treasure of creativity may be lost for yours is reaching for your attention today. It’s the treasure of creativity calling to be recognised and to be released in your life. Well, thanks for listening.

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Hopefully, it’s been an encouragement to you today. If you want to connect any further, you can do so through my website at Davidleemartin.Com. Have a great day.