Women In The Word Wednesday~The Vine

"Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me.

I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing." John 15:4-5

Women In The Word Wednesdays~03/16/11

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"Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and get gain"; wheras you do not know about tomorrow. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. Instead you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we shall live and we shall do this or that." James 4:13-15 RSV

Now, I don't think it means we can't make plans, or try and prepare for the future. I just think we need to be in constant awareness, that the future belongs to God. We can make those plans, but should be prepared for the Lord to change them if He wills, and not go into a fit over it, or be caught off guard and have the wrong attitude or response.

I used to pray every morning, when we lived in Georgia, for God to guide my day. For Him to lead me, and rebuke satan, that I would stay in His path for my life. I would ask that He help me make all my decisions and be with me every time that I spoke, so that I would speak His words, and not my own. I also asked that He hold my tongue when I should not speak so that I might not sin against Him. (I'm very bad in that area) It's been a few months now, that I haven't been praying this every morning, and God has definitely told me that it's time to return to doing so. I am a planner. I feel much more comfortable having a firm plan in place for everything, but this leads me to great disappointment when it doesn't work out, and sometimes I have even looked like a fool, saying I know somethings going to happen, and then it doesn't!

We do not know what tomorrow will bring. It only makes sense to lean on the One who does, and include Him in our plans!!! An elder woman in the church in Georgia, who really was a Titus 2 woman for me, always said, "Lord willing." She said it so much, that I really pondered it, and if it was necessary. But as time went along, I realized how much everything really was, "Lord willing!" Something as simple as driving to the post office, can be delayed with a suddenly bad starter, or keys being locked in the car! She taught me to always remember that the future is in God's hands, and all I can do is live each day for Him, and see where that takes me! :)

Women in the Word Wednesday

"Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded."

James 4:7-8

If you find yourself feeling down, angry, frustrated, sad, or just not yourself, do a spiritual check up! Ask God to show you what you are doing, or are NOT doing that has pulled you away from Him. He will be faithful and just to show you, so that you may restore your peace with Him!

Our God is a loving God, but he is also a jealous God! He has every right to be too! He created us, and only wants the best for us. Having our loyalties divided between the world and God, will only bring bad things for us. Our eyes need to be set on God above, and He needs to be our #1 priority all the time. As a wife, mother, sister, daughter, friend, etc, I know how hard it can be. It's a daily struggle for me as well. The blessings are so great though, when God is put in His deserving place! My joy is great, and my cup overfloweth, even through the bad times, when I am close to God!

I pray that today, you will pull that one foot out of the world, and place them both in the Lord's path. I pray you find that same comfort and joy that comes from walking in the Spirit, side by side with our merciful, patient, and loving God!

Women In The Word Wednesday

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Good Wednesday morning to you all! Well, I tell you what, this study in James has really been a doosy so far! If you aren't even the slightest bit convicted by the words in James, you need a serious spiritual check-up! James is so blunt, and to the point! (In a good way of course!) But he leaves no room for excuses and loopholes here! It's black and white, and my toes have been stepped on for sure!

I consider myself to be a very compassionate, kind, and caring person...but I definitely show respect of persons, and James makes it clear, that it's a sin! :( I've been reading out of my Life Application Bible, and the foot notes are just wonderful! They really help you to apply the scriptures to your daily life, and understand them on a deeper level. If you've never looked at one, I would recommend you do. They print it in several translations...KJV, NKJV, NIV, and others! One thing I learned last week and wasn't able to post about for time reasons, was that respect of persons and favoritism is actually a selfish act. When you really think about it, what are your motivations for showing favoritism? Most instances of favoritism or respect of persons, is the rich vs the poor. There are others of course, but I think this is why James focuses so much on the rich/poor aspect. This is out of my footnotes....

"To have "respect of persons" means to show favoritism to some people over others. Often we treat a well-dressed, impressive looking person better than someone who looks poor. We do this because we would rather identify with successful people than with apparent failures. The irony, as James reminds us, is that the supposed winners may have gained their impressive lifestyle at our expense. In addition, the rich find it hard to identify with the Lord Jesus who came as a humble servant. Are you easily impressed by status, wealth, or fame? Are you partial to the "haves" while ignoring the "have nots"? This attitude is sin. God views all people as equals......

......By honoring someone just because he dresses well, we are making his appearance more important than his character. We sometimes do this because (1) poverty makes us uncomfortable; we don't want to face our responsibilities to those who have less than we do; (2) we too want to be wealthy, and we hope to use the rich person as a means to that end; (3) we want the rich person to join our church and help support it financially. All these motives are selfish; they view neither the rich nor the poor person as a human being in need of fellowship. If we say Christ is Lord of our lives, then we must live as he requires, showing no favoritism and loving all people regardless of their circumstances."

What about you? Do you have times of favoritism? Are there people you treat better than others for any reason? Family members that get better treatment than other family members? Co-workers that you favor over other co-workers? Sometimes just our personalities clash, and therefore we treat people less than desirably. The thing is, those you shun see your actions, and feel the hurt you cause them. If you claim to be a Christian, and treat people this way, they will NOT see the love of Christ in you. All favoritism stems from selfishness on our part. This has been so convicting for me, and I pray God will help me to overcome my respect of persons. Won't you join me in this prayer today?

God, help me to see people like you see them. Help me to look past the appearance, move past the personalities, and gaze upon the heart. Help me to remember that you created all men, and you created them equally in your sight. Help me to LOVE like you LOVE! Help me to not focus on myself, and my wants and needs, but on You, and on others! Please guard my heart, and may your Spirit speak to me loudly, that I might not sin against you, and cause hurt to others. I want to set the standards of this world aside, and remember that the true goal of this life, is entering your kingdom, and bringing as many with us as possible! In Jesus name I pray, Amen!

Women In The Word Wendesday~2/2/11

Oh, what a wonderful study James is! There is sooo much good, good stuff in here! Convicting, yes...I think the best of God's Word is! If we didn't get our toes stepped on, we wouldn't know what to change, or have the desire to change it! Surrender to the Holy Spirit, is one of the best feelings we will ever have here on this earth!

"But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was." James 1: 22-24

Here's that phrase again..."be ye doers of the word!" You know something is pretty important to God when He repeats it in His Word! He wants to make sure we get it, just in case we skimmed over it the first time! :) Oh how true this passage is! If you read a book about how to ride a bike, are you going to be able to ride one perfectly? If you read a book about how to play the piano, will you be ready for a recital? NO! Of course not. It takes practice! Without actually "doing" it, you cannot have success. Not only will you not have success, but you will eventually forget what you even read.

God's word is that way too, only more so. There is an enemy out there who has had thousands of years of practice doing what...? Everything He can to make you forget God's word, disobey God's word, avoid God's word, etc. James tells us that if we only listen to God's word, and don't obey it, and act upon it as well, we will be deceiving our own selves. Worse yet, we will forget what kind of person we ought to be. Have you ever seen someone really living in sin, and you say to yourself, or someone else, "I don't even know who they are anymore." Well, if we aren't doers of God's word, we will be saying that about ourselves one day too.

Listening to God's word is good! Very good! But what profit it is, to know it, if we aren't going to do anything about it?! Hypocrisy is born this way too. The number one reason I hear from people as to why they don't want to go to church, is that they feel the church is filled with hypocrites. Why is this? Because too many Christians are talking the talk, and not walking the walk! Unsaved people, and even saved people, are going to be more affected by our actions, than by our words, and our "knowledge." Actions speak louder than words! If we say we are different, if we say God has changed us, but we aren't living any different lives, that's hypocrisy. Such a stumbling block that is, for non-believers, and ourselves.

I've seen Christians who are definitely deceiving their selves. They've got so much head knowledge of God's word, but aren't living it in their lives. They put off this "I am so godly" attitude, but then turn around and make filthy jokes, or show judgement to another brethren. Doesn't that just hurt your spirit when you see that? I know I have been guilty of it before, and I just pray I didn't hurt anyones spirit. That is NOT the kind of Christian I want to be. I want to be a "doer of the word and not a hearer only!" God help us to strive to be a great doer of His word, and have it all be for His honor, and His glory!

Feel free to read other posts about what God is teaching the Good Morning Girls in this study of James!