When Christmas Hurts This Year

Christmas can be, and is, a difficult time for some people. Whether because of a missing loved one this year, unresolved conflicts, or unfufilled dreams.

Infertility: Human Weakness

In every person's life there is weakness, there is struggle, there are trials. I would say my biggest struggle is not having children. Like I wrote in May, One in Eight people are affected by infertility. Infertility is defined as a couple who have been trying to have a baby for over a year and haven't been successful. My whole life all I've wanted to be is a Wife and Mother, but yet God hasn't allowed Mamahood yet.

One in Eight

I don't want to write this post. I've put this off for well over a couple of months, more than a year actually. Yet I know the Lord wants me to write. I think it will help me and help those around me. Maybe my hurt will be a help to someone else. So many thoughts swirling around in my head, "How much do I write?", "Where do I even start?", "Should I even do this?". So much pain, grief, brokenness inside. So today I share.

When You Feel Like Running Away From It All

I mentioned in a previous post how it seems like here lately we have heard a lot of discouraging news. It just makes me sad. We’ve had our own struggles here at church of our own the past few months and just recently I’ve heard of two other churches whose pastors have resigned. It leaves us all in a tough spot, in a rough storm on a raging sea. But it is comforting to know that my God has the power to calm the raging sea.

We've heard about friends who've had marital problems, and I have another friend whose dealt with this almost two years ago. It scares me. Terrifies me. These are good friends,who sat in the same Bible college classes we did, heard the same preaching we did. My Friend whose spouse left is such a testimony to me, not becoming bitter at what God had allowed to happen, but plunging into the ministries at her church, where the people love her uncondintionally. I know there are days where she probably wants to run away from it all. I'm not even in that situation, but hearing all the recent discouraging news makes me want to run away from it all, pretend it's not there. But I can't and you can't either when the trials and discouragement come.

I've learned something through these discouraging tidbits of information I received or went through, YOU CAN'T RUN IN THE MIDST OF BATTLE. We've got to stand strong, dig in and fight. It's really all the devil's work, He's having a hayday in good churches and homes. And let me warn you, he's not concerned about the mediocre, ho-hum, lower standard Christians; they aren't a threat. Satan after those who are trying to live their life according to the Bible in every aspect, trying to build marriages and raise children that honor God. He's on the attack and his goal is to make you fall, to destroy your life and your testimony. DON'T LET HIM! We've only got one surefire weapon that guarantees victory over Satan - we have the Almighty God on our side. Though Him we shall do Valiently, He will tread down our enemy! Be Strong!

I noticed I was really getting discouraged hearing these things, it feels like there is no hope for the church when I know there is. There is alway hope and there is always the joy of knowing heaven awaits us after all this turmoil. So what do we do now?

I'll tell you what I've been doing. Number one is keeping your time with God. Don't miss it for a day. For me it's not a struggle, it's a habit I've instilled in my life since a teenager. If it's not a habit in your life,make it one.

So for me I felt like I needed some more defenses. Like a shot in the arm, err, or a heavy dose of Vitamin C. I'm normally reading some sort of spiritual strengthening book with my devotions,(not for). Right now I'm reading one by an author I found a couple years ago when I stumbled on a book for sale in the college library, Fourteen Things Witches Hope Parents Never Find Out by David Benoit. The book I'm reading I found recently at goodwill called Who's Watching the Playpen?, also written by Benoit. If you can get your hands on either of these books, they are worth having in your home library. The one I'm reading talks a lot about how children are affected by New Age ideas through toys, books, and a lot of cartoons and movies for kids. Granted the book was written in '95 so most of the movies/cartoons and toys are ones that were made and on when I was younger. Most of them I wasn't allowed to have anything to do with, now I know why. He talks about how Christians have become numb,even embraced things that have magic somehow tied with it. Magic is real folks, and so are demonic spirits and they should have no place inour homes. Anyway, the book dealing with witches, touches on Wicca and their infiltration and influence on the same things. Remember Cabbage Patch dolls, trolls, Furbies, Smurfs, Barney, ect...there are underlying occult themes related to these items.



Well, enough of that, but really if you can get your hands on these books, it will be well worth your reading. And to tell you the truth it's hard to put it down, because I now know why I wasn't allowed to watch Disney's Pocahontas or Lion King, ect...

Another thing I've been doing recently is listening to more preaching and teaching at home. Most of us have access to the world wide web in some form or another, we have access to download good solid preaching and carry it with us in mobile form. That is one thing about our new phone I love, I can put preaching on there and listed to it whenever. Like Sunday, I had downloaded this umm, radio program about feminism in our society and how Christians are embracing it. It was really good and so I thought Working Man would be interested, so on the way to church Sunday night He had one earbud and I had the other and we listened to it on the way there and on the way home. And I was right, he did like it. One of my favorite places to download messages is sermonaudio.com. You can look by preacher, by topic (I looked up womanhood, just browse with caution, it's got stuff from everybody),and other choices. I tend to stick with people I know are sound.



Another helpful thing are ladies lessons. I want to be the best, godly wife I can be. And I need encouragement in that often. I don't want to be the next one someone hears of that's having marital problems. My friend here let me borrow some cds she had by Mrs. Lee Marshall, Mom of the Marshall family. I think there were a total of 4 full length lessons(about an hour) for ladies on each cd. So I have 8 total. I have listened to them NUMEROUS times and there is always something new to be convicted or reminded of. You can find these on their website, www.johnmarshallfamily.com . And then when we were up for Ressurection Sunday weekend in Pa, I remembered my mother-in-love had a set of cds on her bookshelves by a woman who wrote the book, Teachers of Good Things, Francie Taylor. Boy were these a blessing too! Her lessons are shorter about 20-30 minutes long but packed full of Scriptures and principles. I went to look them up on Sword of the Lord and found she has numerous cd series', the one I borrow was The Titus Woman. Let me just challenge you, load up your arsenal, and fight of the Devil. You can have the victory in this battle and we have no need to run away from it all.

A Continual Feast

All the days of the afflicted are evil:
But he that is of a merry heart hath
a Continual feast.
Proverbs 15:15

Do we realize how much Proverbs applies to our everyday lives. It’s easy to read a proverb every day, one for each day of the month. But sometimes it can become monotonous and we just skim the page out of duty and familiarity. (or maybe that just me) So I take a break from them every now and then, so that it becomes a little “fresher” the next time I read it.
I’ve been reading there this month and this verse stuck out today. Because of my latest bout of sickness and recovery I guess it took on a new light.
When you are afflicted with sickness, you tend to look at each day as another struggle, another day to “take it easy” and rest. Let me tell you, I got /am so sick of resting. Yeah, it’s nice to have a day or two to be lazy because you are sick, but after almost 4 weeks of it, your days seem to become evil. O.k., we should look at every day and say I’m going to have a great day today but when you wake up, still sick, you think “will these awful days ever go away?” Or maybe that’s just my carnality again…
So I looked up a merry heart in the concordance. Merry means good, a good thing. So the verse speaks of a good heart. The word heart is the feelings, will and intellect. I looked up intellect in the dictionary (yes, we know it but do we really know it?) Intellect is your ability to reason, think and understand.
The heart doesn’t exist on it’s own, it’s located in a body, and obviously we are talking of a human. So, here is my conclusion: (Suddenly I feel like a scientist)
The human that sets his mind up to have a merry heart, one that purposes to be good, despite feelings, self-will, and often out-of-whack intellect, is going to be a human with a feast. No, not turkey, stuffing and the like. Every day is a feast, one full of God’s mercy, love and grace on us. That person purposes in their heart: “I’m going to feast on this day, because God will help me control my heart and mind.” So despite the sickness and affliction in our life, we must purpose to have a merry heart and make every day a feast day.

Have You Had Your Beauty Sleep?

We’ve heard people say it all the time, “I need my beauty sleep.”
Now we know that all the sleep in the world doesn’t make someone become more beautiful,
…or does it?
After working the one week and getting very little rest I began to think about that saying, but in a different light. I found myself becoming very irritable and easy to spout off hurtful words. Then I noticed I became more emotional and run down making me feel like crying or just falling in a hole and sleeping for days. (Yes, this was the point I was at!) So I looked at that saying with a spiritual light, what are you like when you are tired and worn out?
God’s Word tells us that we need to guard our heart because that’s what comes out in our action.

“Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” (Proverbs 4:23)

If I am not taking care of my heart that will be evidenced in my life by my actions. And if I am not getting the proper amount of sleep I am not functioning well. Which means I am not understanding what I am reading in my devotions and when I try to pray I become weary and tired. You see the point I am trying to get to is that when I am not getting the physical sleep I need, I’m not taking care of the body God has given me. I cannot live my life to please the Lord if all that is coming out in my actions(the evidence of my heart) is ugliness. Thus getting the physical rest we need is helpful to being a beautiful woman of God, not for physical beauty but to be spiritually beautiful.
Remember that spending time with God is important, and spending that time with Him will bring spiritual rest also. Spiritual tiredness puts a strain on our relationship with the Lord and deprives us of the blessings that we could have
.

“Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen,
I will be exalted in the earth.”
Psalm 46:10

So be sure to take time to take care of the temple of God that He’s given you, you may not become more physically beautiful with sleep, but it will help you become a more beautiful woman of God. Being alert physically helps you become more alert to the spiritual truths God has to show you. Are you getting your beauty sleep?

Contentment - A Life Long Journey

Contentment- we are all in that stage of life. I realized earlier this year that we never reach a point in our life where we are completely content . You can try to convince yourself that once you get to a certain point, like marriage, you’ll be content. The Lord has shown me that it doesn’t end there. We are all human beings and most times very fleshly ones at that. We are always desiring something else.
Growing up it was my dream and prayer that I would marry a godly man, that God would help me know the right man without me “trying others” and being in a lot of relationships. This is a normal desire and there is nothing wrong with wanting to marry a godly man, but we have to be content where the Lord has us. If you are single right now, God wants you to be content there. And contentment isn’t just saying, “I’m fine with this stage of life because I have to be, I‘m supposed to be content because that‘s what the Bible says.” God wants us to be happy and joyful, serving Him, not worrying about our future with a godly mate. If we sit around spending too much time on ourselves we dwell on the things we don’t have. Want to know a simple cure for that? Busy yourself serving the Lord and being involved in the lives of those around you.
Recently the Lord has brought a godly man into my life and has worked it out that we and both sets of our parent have the peace of God about a relationship. So over the past few months we have spent time together, getting to know each other and the goals we feel God has for us. For some reason I thought once God brought the godly man He created for me into my life, it would all be great, no more dealing with contentment for a godly mate. Guess what? I was wrong, I found myself content in our relationship but waiting and longing for the moment that he would ask me to marry him. God had to remind me, “Anna, be content where I have you, in a wonderful relationship with a godly man, your engagement time will come.”
Little did I know that less than a month after I was praying about this my man of God was going to propose to me. And it was amazing… better then I could even dream, and now, the next project for me? Being content until the day God has for us to marry, August 20th. And I know that once we are wed I will have other issues of discontentment to deal with: homes, children, money, ect… It’s a normal part of our lives.
We will never reach the point of perfecting ourselves in the area of contentment, but this also means we have to keep bringing that sin to the feet of the cross and let God work it out in our lives.
Embrace where God has you right now, “…for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.” Philippians 4:7. Whatsoever state in the Greek means who, which, or what - that’s you and your circumstances. Content here means 1) sufficient for one’s self, strong enough or processing enough to need no aid or support 2) independent of external circumstances 3) contented with one’s lot, with one’s means, though the slenderest
Be happy with the things God has given you and the way He’s made you “…Be content with such things as ye have…” Hebrews 13:5. The word content in that verse can mean satisfied but also means to be strong in.
Lord willing this may have given you a glimpse of what to look “forward to” or the work you have cut out for yourself. There is great joy and peace from God that comes as a result of being content and rejoicing where God has you in life, who He’s created you to be. Remember- contentment is a lifelong journey, you’ll never arrive at your destination until we find ourselves in Heaven with the King.

Several Ways to Make Yourself Miserable

These were in a devotional book by Elisabeth Elliot, Keep a Quiet Heart.

1. Count your troubles, name them one by one- at the breakfast table, if anybody will isten, or as soon as possible thereafter.
2. Worry every day about something. Don't let yourself get out of practice. It won't add a cubit to your stature but it mught burn a few calories.
3. Pity yourself. If you do this enough, nobody else will have to do it for you.
4. Devise clever by decent ways to serve God and mammon. After all, a man's gotta live.
5. Mike it your business to find out what the Joneses are buying this year and where they're going. Try to do them at least one better even if you hvae to take out another loan to do it.
6. Stay away from absolutes. It's what's right for you that matters. Be your own person and don't allow yourself to get hung up on what other expect of you.
7. Make sure you get your rights. Never mind other people's. You have your life to live, they have theirs.
8. Don't fall into any compassion traps - the sort of situation where people can walk all over you. If you get too involved in other people's troubles, you may neglect your own.
9. Don't let Bible reading and prayer get in the way of what's really relevant - things like TV and newspapers. Invisible things are eternal. You want to stick with the visible ones - they're where it's at now.

Times of Old

We wonder why our churches aren’t experiencing revivals and God’s power like times of old but the answer is so clear. Prayer is power, we little power because we pray so little. What is wrong with us that we think because we are a “different” generation that we should do things as they were done before? Cottage prayer meeting and prayer partners are things of the past, hardly ever heard of, but look how God used that to move the church and transform it into the image of His Son. There used to be prayer meetings before every church service where the members would come and pray that God would speak to them and God answered. Yet today we can’t even find a man to volunteer to pray and close the service. God help us as we’ve drifted so far from the simple, tried and true ways of knowing God! I’m not harping on everyone around me, I’m “preaching” at myself. I propose we get back to the way things were and they way need to be. I want to see God change me and those around me, and conform us into the image of Christ. Let’s get back to the methods that God blessed, praying and seeing His power.

How Heavy is Your Burden?

Do you think living the Christian life is hard? Do you often feel burdened down? Why do we become so burdened and overwhelmed?
I was listening to chapel messages and reading some verses and felt slightly convicted about something. Throughout our Christian life we go through times where we feel so burdened down. But do we realize that it’s our own fault? We cause ourselves to bear those burdens. Jesus tells us that the Christian life isn’t hard in Matt. 11:28-30, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
Our burdens are self-inflicted. Jesus says to bring them to Him and he will give us rest, not that He’ll take it away. We are to learn of Christ, learn how to leave the worry with Him, worrying is a sin. When we cast out the sin (worrying, complaining, selfishness, ect…) in our life that is connected to that burden, we can then learn how to carry the light burden. Jesus says “my yoke is easy and my burden is light”. Living the Christian life isn’t hard, unless we are trying to live it with sin at the same time.
Christ tells us to take His yoke upon us and learn, a yoke is used to guide animals to get work accomplished. The master in charge of the animals decides on how much the animal should pull and how much they can handle. So does the Father for us, He knows what burdens we can handle when we are yoked. The verse tells us that Jesus’ yoke is easy, and the “burden is light”.
We know we are going to have a burden to carry, Christ tells us to “take up his (your) cross, and follow me.”(Mk. 8:34) A cross is going to weigh something, but it doesn’t have to overwhelm us and be hard, because the “burden is light”. Choose to carry your burden, your cross, without dragging that excess weight of sin attached to the burden. Think of when we are serving Christ like we know we should, how burdened down do we feel? Now think of when we take upon ourselves the care of running our own life and doing what we want. Which makes you happier?
How heavy is your burden right now? Do you need to drop some excess weight?

Challenge to College Students

My Dearest College Students,
If there were one bit of wisdom I could impart to you as you start this journey of college it would be to keep your focus on the Lord, letting nothing sway you or distract you from Him. I’ve been to college and lost my focus on the Lord. Freshman year of college was new and exciting to me, I was the shy girl, just observing everyone around me. By my second semester I had warmed up to my surroundings, loving every part of college, even learning. But seemingly without my notice my eyes slipped and the Lord wasn’t my main focus. The more I became friends with those around me the more I cared about them and their lives. By my second year of college other things came into my life that were not right at the time and further distracted me from the Lord. Oh, I still read my Bible and prayed and served in my ministries but not with my whole heart. After my second year I didn’t expect my plans to change, I would be back in the fall to finish my schooling. Little did I know that God had other plans. A ministry opportunity arose, teaching three missionary children while their parents attended language school. Someone volunteered my name, so I said I’d pray about it but I had no intention of giving up my plans. I fought it, I did not want to go across the ocean and teach, I didn’t even have my degree! I heard college horror stories of how people that drop out for a year most times don’t return. I didn’t want that, I loved college. But during a camp service where I was a counselor that summer the Lord got a hold of my heart and I surrendered. Two months later I was across the ocean teaching children without a college degree, but I was right where God wanted me. It was there that He revealed to me that my focus was not on Him and Him only. My God became so real to me, my Bible, my greatest comfort. The Lord had to take me across the world to get my attention, but it worked and college now is so different. You see He knew how much I love college and He has allowed me to come back and finish what I started but I came into this year with a new focus. “I have set the Lord always before me, because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.” Ps. 16:8. Don’t learn this lesson the hard way, start your college years with the right focus, so you can end your years of college with the right focus.

Daily Struggles

I wrote this in my journal the other day and haven't had time to post it until now.

I seemed to have such a struggle today with the flesh and the mind, thinking of things in the past, things I don't understand, things that I long for. All throughout today I kept asking the Lord to keep my focus on him, to keep my thoughts pure and holy. But tonight I was reading about how singleness is a season and an enjoyable one. We shouldn't spend it on longing for a different season.

"God took care of me today,
I didn't need a husband.
God takes care of my needs."
-Greer

Fed Up With Myself

I look at myself and I want to change so bad. I watched a preaching DVD of David Gibbs this morning and it is one of my favorite messages, Doing the Impossible. This is an amazing message, if you want to hear it there is one on sermonaudio.com that I think is the same thing. I haven't checked. In my book this sermon is one I've listened to numerous times but I still need it, I guess it's like Jonathan Edward's Sinners In the Hands of an Angry God.
I've been struggling with the whole concept that we have good churches full of people who are unwilling to leave their comfort zone and do something for God. Yes, I know we have to have those faithful ones who remain at home to take care of the church, but I fear our churches grow larger and larger because people become too comfortable.We have people that are called to go but they stay. I fear that might happen to me and I pray it never will. I'm not saying that we should all go to the foreign missionfield, home is a missionfield all in itself. Nevertheless, we need to beware of becoming too comfortable and not willing to do whatever God says. I've realized though that I can't change anyone else, just myself. I can voice my concern, but I've got to look in the mirror.
I just know I don't want to be a stagnant believer, sitting in my good church, serving in my ministries that were created for me. I don't want to just be a good Christian, I want to be a great believer for Christ. But I don't want to have people look at me and say "Look what she did for God!", I want them to say, "Look what God did!" Yet, I want to be out there, I want to be on my missionfield, wherever that is. I'm ready, willing, excited, and I guess impatient to get there. I feel like we have so little time left here on earth and I myself am not using it wisely enough. I think I'm failing. Mediocrity scares the life out of me! I'm so afraid of becoming just another run-of-the-mill "Christian". And I guess I feel alone, I feel there aren't many out there that feel like I do. This isn't something I should feel alone in, yet I do. I'm just petitioning others to not become so tangled up with your lives that you become comfortable where you are.

Do We Really Want Revival?

I mean do we really, seriously want a revival that will change our life? Like that of the old days. I am reminded of the time at college when we went up for teen visitation and were told that we were going to stay on campus and pray for the upcoming revival. That was one of the best moments of my life and the lives of others. We spent that time praying, really praying, that God would send revival to everyone but more specifically to us individually. And it was amazing! We spent time searching ourselves for any sin that would be in the way of God getting a hold of our lives and making us more like Him. Why is it we don't have revival? Even my 9 year old brother Josiah, after learning about the Great Awakening in history, said "Why can't we have a revival like the Great Awakening? I wish we had a revival like that." This coming from a 9 year old! Yet you never hear things like that coming from adults. What a sad world we live in and what carnal Christians we are!
I want revival, I want the Lord to change me and make me more like Him. But how can I help make it happen? I mean we have revivals and they are wonderful but they aren't like I believe they could be, so what do we do?
I read a really great book called The High Cost of Compromise & Worldliness by Glen Spencer Jr. and in it he speaks about how we can obtain revival. So I am going to put some quotes from the book and hopefully it will help remind me to do my part in helping to bring about a revival.

"It is only when God's people repent and separate from ungodliness that God can hear from Heaven and pour out a might revival." (p.20)

"Christianity is suffering today because the bible has been replaced by television, pleasure, sports, and just about everything else the Devil has thrown out. What's the solution you ask? A God breathed heaven sent revival is our only hope! How can we have it you ask? Junk the television, movie going, money mongering, jungle jazz music, card playing, public nakedness(mixed bathing), cigarette sicking, cocktail drinking "sipping saints." Then get rid of these pussyfooting, back scratching, ear-tickling, gospel-dodging, compromising, soft-soaping, corner cutting, aim-at-nothing, hit nothing, modernistic, cemetery seminary, manufactured, assembly line preachers, and get some Daniels, John the Baptists, and Elijah's. Then, and only then, will we see an old fashioned, Holy Ghost, sent from Heaven, God-breathed Revival." (p.23)

We need to forsake our worldliness and get focused on doing what God's Word says. And I'm just as guilty as the next person. We never reach that peak of perfection, where we've done it. It's an everyday process of denying the flesh. So pray with me and strive with me to do our part to bring about an old fashioned revival.

Finding Contentment

The other night we had our Aloha dinner singles activity and Dad gave the challenge about being used of God in this stage of our life. And the Lord had been working in my life lately about something anyway. He read us the verse in I Corinthians 13:11 where Paul says:

"When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child:

but when I became a man, I put away childish things."

In this verse the word child doesn't refer to an actual child, it means an immature Christian. When we grow in Christ and slowly mature we become "men". This point, as singles, most of us have been raised in church and know what we are to be doing, we are the "men", and we need to not just sit back and watch all the older Christians do the work, we need to get busy. Because we are single we tend to have more time in our schedule that those that are married and have a family to care for. God's given us this time to serve Him without any strings attached. We don't have to worry about a spouse or children to take care of, just ourselves and anyone else we choose to care for.

Like I said, the past few weeks the Lord has been working in my heart, showing me His plan for me right now and slowly I was coming around to the fact that if the Lord wants me to serve Him and He wants me to do it alone, then I will. I am just like any other Christian girl, I want to find the one God has for me, settle down, get married and live happily ever after(now I know life isn't this way, but we tend to think it is). But after Dad's challenge, it hit me; I am single right now and need to be content until God says otherwise. There is no need for me to be wishing that things would just fall into place now. I realized on the way home that I wasn't doing that anymore. I didn't feel that way, I felt different...I am learning to be content in this area.

Philippians 4:11

"For I have learned, in whatsover state I am, therewith to be content."

Hebrews 13:5

Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have:"

Lesson from a Single's Activity

We had a singles activity last Thursday and Mr. Serafin(he hosted our activity at his house) gave a challenge that made a lot of sense and all of us singles deal with it.
Genesis one is the creation of the world, and how after everything that the Lord made He said, "it was good." And on the sixth day He said "it was very good." God created it all, it was perfect.
In chapter two the Lord created man, but there is an interesting thing mentioned in verse eighteen that, "It is not good that man should be alone;"(Vs.18) First God made everything and said it was very good and then He made man and said it wasn't good for him to be alone. So He brought a woman along in His timing, mind you, and it was all good again. God has someone for everyone, except for those who are serving the Lord in areas that a relationship doesn't seem to be the wisest. But we can know that it isn't good for most of us to go through life alone. Two heads are better than one. So much more can be done, when two people are serving the Lord together. Anyway, I thought this was interesting, hope is may have touch someone else's life.

Exerpt from Stepping Heavenward

I am reading the book Stepping Heavenward, it is a little hard to understand at times and I don't fully agree with it but there was a really good paragraph that I thought I would post.
"I do see that the Christian life must be individual, as the natural character is, and that I cannot be exactly like Dr. Cabot, or exactly like Mrs. Campbell, or exactly like Mother, though thay all three stimulate and are an inspiration to me... This is the testimony of all the good books, sermons, hymns, and memoirs I read- that God's ways are infinitely perfect; that we are to love Him for what He is and prospers us; that there is no real happiness but in doing and suffering His will; and that this life is but a scene of probation through which we pass to the real life above." (P.258)
Our life is not about copy another person's and being like someone else. We have to be ourself and live for God to best that we know how. The only one that we ought to imitate is Christ, and never will I be completely like Him, but I must try.

Don't Trip!

I was thinking the other day about something. You know we hear it preached all the time that we need to be careful that we are not a stumblingblock. That we don't cause another believer to trip and fall in their walk with Christ. Well, some of the verses in I Corinthians 8 speak of meat and how this was a stumblingblock for other believers and if it was going to cause soemone to stumble then Paul said he wasn't going to eat it. Verse nine says, "But take heed lest by any means this liberty of your's become a stumblingblock to them that are weak." Somethings are simple as meat be a stumblingblock! Crazy! But I was thinking that not only we can be a stumbling block but there are probably things in our lives that are stumbling blocks for us. For some of us books may be a stumblingblock, the word stumblingblock in verse nine simply means an offence. Our books may be an offence to others but they also might be an offence to God. If we are spending too much time reading books then spending time with God then we have a problem. I just used books as an example but there are any number of things that could be used. What about t.v.? Video Games? Hanging out with friends? Listening to music? Any of these things could be a stumblingblock in our lives if we let it get out of control. I am reminded of the verse in Eph.5:16, "Redeeming the time, because the days are evil." So what is your stumblingblock? We all have them, but with the Lord's help we can get rid of them, maybe not fully but learn how to control those things that we struggle with.

More thoughts from Through Gates of Splendor

I was reading more of my book and some more things stuck out to me.
There was a chapter about Roger Youderian, one of the men, and how he was struggling with going on for the Lord. He was discouraged and felt that what he was doing with the indians wasn't helping anything. He was struggling with leaving the field and going home. He was having a rough time of it and was praying and begging the Lord to help him. But at the end of this chapter it tells the end of his struggle. Nate Saint came to him and asked him to go with him and the other men deeper into the jungle. And "Roger recognized something of what this decision might mean for him, and the hours spent on his knees with God witnessed agony of soul. But God 'who causes us to triumph,' brought him out of his slough of despond.
'He was cleansed through the Spirit for the task that lay ahead of him,' said Barbara (his wife) afterward, 'and went with a happy, expectant mind and his heart full of joy."
He wrote something in his diary that really made a lot of sense. On December 19 he wrote: "I will die to self. I will begin to ask God to put me in a service of constant circumstances where to live Christ I must die to self. I will be alive unto God. That I may learn to live Him with my heart, mind, soul, and body."

That's what it is all about, dying to self daily and living for God. We are going to go through stuggles but when you are in that trial don't give up. Continue to seek His face. He will come through and be there in the end.