Day 31- Wrap Up

I'm sitting here reflecting on the last month with this challenge of writing for 31 days about Being Still with God. Overall I think I have made baby steps toward God and in strengthening this relationship with Him- the awesome thing is that when I just step towards Him he runs to me with open arms! Praise the Lord, He doesn't give up on the weak and distracted and then He welcomes all attempts to grow closer to Him.

Thank you for reading and following this month! I sure did help me have some more motivation knowing that others were checking in on me/my blog. You all are GREAT!

This is the last day of the 31 Days so I"ll leave you with some of the verses I was reading this morning:

But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all this to be loss in view [in comparison to]of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. -Philippians 3:7-8

For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself. -Philippians 3:20-21

See the rest of the 31 Days here.

Day 28- A Day of Rest

source (and a good article on rest)

We often hear Sunday called a "day of rest" because the Lord rested from creating the world on the 7th day. It's best for us if we take at least one day a week off work to refresh-it allows for happier more productive people.

Sundays can get very busy even without work. I feel like most people just can't sit still, like the world will end if this or that doesn't get done! Now, I'm not petitioning for laziness, but it really is ok to just have a day to rest and enjoy without a to-do list or this or that place to be.

Our Sundays are usually pretty simple: Get up and go to church, have lunch, grocery shopping, maybe see friends, and maybe take a nap before dinner and homework. I know, I know- sounds like a really cush life, and you parents out there are shaking your heads at me-don't worry, i'm soaking in all my free time and naps before I have kids. :) But even Sundays as easy as that can feel burdensome due to being too worn out from the previous week.

Today was one of those days.

The alarm went off at 6:30 for church (we were going to head an hour south to our parents' church) and I just rolled over and asked if he still wanted to go. Of course he still wanted to go but my fabulous and caring husband saw that it was one of those Sundays I (we) needed off. So we rolled over and slept in.

Heathens! you say!

No, I don't think it's a sin to skip church, but I do think it is bad to make a habit out of it. We need fellowship and encouragement from fellow Christians, to learn and be convicted and have that time set apart to worship. Of course you can and should worship throughout your day (worship is anything you offer to God:singing, dancing, praying, fellowship, washing the dishes) but going and being with your church family is so important.

See more of the 31 Days here.

Day 27- Don't be Selfish

I've been slowly reading through Philippians this week, trying to soak in God's word every morning (I have missed a few days though.) THis morning I started chapter 2 and this is the verse I focused on:

Source

"Don't be selfish; don't try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don't look out only for your own interests, but take interest in others too.

You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had. Though He was God, He did not think of equality with God as something to cling to. Instead He gave up His divine privileges; He took the humble position of a slave and was born as a human being. When He appeared in human form he humbled Himself in obedience to God and died a criminal's death on a cross." Phip. 2:3-8

This is such a good reminder! It is so easy to feel entitled to certain privileges or titles or that we are better than someone else. In all reality, every single one of us is bad. We've all sinned, done something wrong/something against God's Word, so we are all on the same playing field.

Then look at Christ! If anyone was ever deserving of honor and glory, or who had the right to gloat and demand our praise it was Him. He made the world, He made us, and He knows exactly what is going on now and in the future and in the past. He is King but he didn't remand our love or praise but HUMBLED himself! He not only gave up His heavenly glory for the weak body of a man but He died like a criminal on the cross. For what purpose you ask? For us. For all of us sinners-we don't deserve Him. He died because the penalty of sin is death, and since we have sinned and He never did, God accepted His sacrifice on our behalf so that all we have to do is put our faith and hope in Christ, accept Him as our King, and we are forgiven and rewarded eternal life in heaven!

Seriously, if Christ can humble Himself that much then I can follow His example and my sacrifice (giving up my pride, being right, looking out just for me) is NOTHING compared to His. Thank you Jesus!

See the rest of the 31 Days here.

Day 22-24- Philippians

The last couple days I have been reading and re-reading Philippians 1. Yep, same chapter for three days. Sometimes it is just good to mull over a single chapter or verse for awhile.

"And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ; having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God." -Philp.1:9-11

"Only conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ, so that whether I come and see you or remain absent, I will hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one, with one mind striving together together for the faith of the gospel; in no way be alarmed by your opponents-which is a sign of destruction for them, for salvation for you, and that too, from God. For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for His sake, experiencing the same conflict which you saw in me, and now hear to be me." _ Philp. 1:27-30

See the other 31 Days here.

Day 19+20+21- Priorities

By the looks of it, I have a commitment problem. You could also say that I'm really bad about completing goals I set for myself. Sometimes I think I can do more than is possible, other times I am plain lazy or don't prioritize my goal.

I could get a lot more done if I made it a priority instead of just talking about it.

This is the wallpaper on my desktop right now:

I find that I do better with goals if I've got someone to be accountable to- like a coach, team, teacher, boss, or friend. For example, I lost 6 pounds competing with my coworkers, but once the challenge was over I gained it all back. Or like this 31 Days where I am suppose to sit and have quite time with God every day and then blog about what I learned...obviously I haven't been great on that.

So there you have it, my "blog life" image is broken. :) I'm 15 pounds overweight, I don't read my Bible everyday, and I'm really bad about completing personal-individual goals.

Praise the Lord that He isn't finished with me yet.

"For I am confident of this very thing,that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ." Philippians 1:6

See more of the 31 Days here.

Day16+17+18- God's Love

God's love.

How can it be explained? It is so huge and wonderful and beyond description.

He could have forced us to love Him, but then that wouldn't really be love would it.

Instead He pursues us and gives us with everything- Himself.

There on the cross the God of the Universe died, arms outstretched, taking our sin and calling for us to come to Him.

God's love is freely given, undeserved, unrestrained, complete, and cannot be earned. Nothing, not even sending His Son to the cross, is to costly to show His love.

And what does he get in return?

"He gets adopted children who are petty, petulant, spoiled, demanding, argumentative, mistrusting, angry, critical and an irritant to everyone but God... Nevertheless, our God bought us with an infinite price and intends on seeing us crowned with His very glory. Is is any wonder that Paul shouts at the top of His lungs, :I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have the power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long, and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses all knowledge-that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God." (Eph. 3:17-19) Paul prays that I will know the unknowable love and be so full of God that I achieve dimensions of being that reflect the boundlessness of God." -Dan B. Allender

 (quote found in Becoming a Woman of Purpose by Cynthia Heald)

That is also my prayer for both you and me- that we may know God and His love, though they are too great to understand, more and more fully and be filled to the overflowing with His love, grace and joy.

See the rest of the 31 Days here.

Day 15- Pray for your husband

I found this great illustration on Pinterest which coincides with a book i have been reading- The Power of a Praying Wife. I believe every woman should pray through this book! Prayer is so important in relationships, and as women, wives, it is our duty and joy to pray for our husbands and our relationships to them. 

One of the most poignant things I learned from this book is that I can't do the work of the Holy Spirit. Duh right? But think about it, how often do we try to change them on our own? Tears, nagging, getting angry- while not always intentional it happens- but those things don't work. God works. He is powerful and knows our husbands more deeply then we ever could. Prayer is our connection to God and in our prayers for our husbands we are also grown and changed by God. What a blessing!

See the rest of 31 Days here.

Days 13 & 14- Oswald Chambers

 The one marvelous secret of a holy life lies not in imitating Jesus, but in letting the perfections of Jesus manifest themselves in my mortal flesh. 

Sanctification is "Christ in you." 

It is His  wonderful life that is imparted by faith as a sovereign gift of God's grace.

-Oswald Chambers 

(emphasis added)

How can I say it better then that? Good ol' Chambers. We received his devotional My Utmost for His Highest for our wedding and we love reading it together. It's worth checking out!

Check out the rest of 31 Days here.

Day 12

Our love and relationship with Christ makes us different.

 Are you different than the world? 

How do you represent Christ?

Day 11- Draw Near

This morning I got to chat with my momma on the phone for a little over an hour. It is always so good to talk with her. She is fun and encouraging and very wise. One topic that came up was our various Bible times for this morning. I want to share some of her insight on a well known verse...

this is my pretty momma and me.

James 4:7-8

Submit therefore to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you..."

Momma talked about how a lot of people will only focus on one part of this verse, just submitting or just resisting, or just drawing, but we need all the parts.

The verse before this section says, "God is opposed to the proud, but gves grace to the humble. Submit therefore to God."  I know it is hard, but God really does know what He is doing, and besides who are we to question Him? Submit therefore to God. (submit means to relinquish your control, give it up, humble yourself.)

When we submit to God it also means we need to resist the devil and his temptations. We can't obey God and fall into sin, but "No temptation has overtaken you but such that is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are capable, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it." (1 Cor. 10:13) Temptation is not sin. Sin is when you give in to temptation. The devil can only tempt us as far as God will let him and when we don't fall, he has to flee.

To draw near to God we have to submit to Him and resist the devil, to resist the devil we need to submit to God and be close to Him (to rely on His strength), to submit to God we have to draw near to Him and resist the devil.

"Draw near to God and He will draw near to you." That is what I am attempting to do this month, draw near to God and be still in His presence.

See the other 31 Days HERE.

Day 10- God's Glory

As I mentioned before, this morning I made the effort to get up early enough to have quiet time with the Lord before classes. I am so glad I did. I not only got to be in His Word but I had time for breakfast and it set a great happy tone to my entire day. I'm going to do it tomorrow to!

This morning I worked on about half of the first chapter of "Becoming a Woman of Purpose" entitled "God's Purpose: A people that will reflect His glory. It certainly makes sense that to more fully know our own purpose we would want to know God's purpose first since He is the one who gives us our purpose.

God is perfect, holy and wonderful. He created us with the general purpose of bringing Him glory. Part of that is how He saved us and wants a personal relationship with Him.

Think about it: this amazing God, THE God of the universe, who is perfect and all knowing wants a relationship with little, tiny, imperfect sinful ME! That is something worth praising Him for, worth living for, something worth centering our purpose around.

Here are some verses from my morning study about God's glory:

The heavens are telling of the glory of God; and their expanse is declaring the work of His hands. -Psalm 19:1

Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory because of your lovingkindness, because of your truth. -Psalm 115:1

Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God. 
-1 Cor. 10:31  

But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in truth. It was for this He called you through our [the apostles] gospel, that you may gain the glory of Christ. -2 Thes. 2:13-14

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly in this present age, looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ Jesus, who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed, and to purify for Himself a people for His own possession. -Titus 2:11-14 

I heard this song {Amazed by Kutless} on the radio driving home today. Listen and worship!

 

See the rest of the 31 Days Here.

Day 9- Time

I think I've discovered that I need to change the layout of my day if I'm going to have quiet time with God everyday. For instance, I'm writing day 9 of day 10 ... 

I realized last night about 10pm that I needed to blog! Then it hit me that blogging isn't what this 31 Days is about. This month is between God and I and you just get to peak in at the process. God comes first, blog comes second. The other revelation form last night I mentioned already, I need to set aside a time in my day for the Lord, spending time with Him won't just happen and it's less likely to happen after noon.

So I decided last night to begin getting at least 45 minutes earlier, make coffee and breakfast and sit down with the Lord. That's what I did this morning and it was great! I'll post later about what I learned this morning.

See the rest of the 31 Days Here.

Day 8- Wherever You Are

Living in the moment has always been a problem for me. I'm a planner. I love to think about the next fun thing and plan it,  I obsess over know what my day tomorrow will look like, I like to know what's going on when and how we are going to get there, do it and all that jazz. This is a good thing, to an extent.

I often miss out in the now, and then miss it later. For instance, right now I am in my last semester of college, I don't know what I'm going to do with my major and I am SO ready to be done with school. I'm ready to know where we will be for next school year (when Jeff starts grad school), where we'll work, where we'll live. I'm just ready for the next step!

I have to remind my self to slow down and enjoy where I am at. I am taking some fantastic classes and if I'm not "all there" I'll miss out on the fun and the important learning experiences. If I'm too focused on the future I'll miss out on college, the friends, activities, campus life and I know that I will miss this time of life badly.

You would think after years and years of dealing with this problem I'd have it worked out, but no. It is hard to just trust the future to God and be in the moment.

It's Monday night and I'm procrastinating on writing a paper (a short paper) for my Russian Literature class, but here is my goal for this week- Wherever I am, to be all there. Whether its in class, doing homework, at work, spending time with Jeff or just relaxing, I'm going to be in the moment and trust the future to God.

You're prayers would be appreciated! And with that said, I'm going to go write my paper.

See the rest of my 31 Days Here.

Day 6+7

oops. I totally stink at blogging everyday. Well, I was having a good weekend if that helps :)

Saturday I worked in the morning and then went to a Mad Hatter Day tea party! It was so fun, relaxing and very cute. I love having girly girl time every once in a while. I didn't think I'd miss it (constant girl-time like in the dorms) after I got married but I do! Anyway, the tea party was fabulous and I even tried new teas!

I don't like tea, by the way. It makes me gag. I love the idea of tea so I've been slowly making myself like it. Up until Saturday the only tea I liked was chamomile with LOTS of honey, but now I can add white tea and pumpkin spice to the list!

Mad Hatter Day is the 6th day of October because of the card stuck int the Mad Hatter's hat in Alice and Wonderland.

Adrienne, our hostess who put together this lovely table, and I thought it would be fun to take a group photo together so we got out our creative sides and made/bought little props to represent some of the characters from the story.

We have the Queen of Hearts, The Mad Hatter, The Cheshire Cat, The Rabbit, and Alice.

   
    Saturday night and Sunday Jeff and I went and celebrated His mom's birthday. WE spent the night with his parents, went to church with them, had Yumm bowls for lunch, Momma opened presents, we drove up to Belknap Hot Springs for a soak and then ended the day with Pizza. Sherine, Jeff's mom, is such a wonderful and beautiful woman. I am so blessed to have her as my second mom!

Momma Sherine, Daddy Byron and all the kids.

Sherine and all her Daughters

Jeff and Sherine

So what about the 31 Days? Well, besides church service I wasn't in my Bible, but we did pray together as a family and I was (and am) very thankful for time with family.

Day 5- Purpose

Have you ever wondered- why am I here? What's my purpose?

I have.

John Piper says it well...

The chief end of man is to glorify God by enjoying Him forever.

I've never really understood the "religious" practices of denying/emptying of natural human desires. Weren't we given these desire for a reason? The need for love, accomplishment, recognition, joy, fun, and many other desires are easily corrupted but in God they are good.

God is Love.

Working for the Lord accomplishes His perfect plan.

We will share in Christ's glory.

In Christ their is joy in good and bad times.

God created the platypus-what's more funny or playful than a platypus?

Today (tonight) be still in His presence and ENJOY Him. We are building stronger relationships with Him-what is friendship, relationship, without love and enjoyment?

But how do you enjoy God?

Reflect on your blessings and thank Him for them.

Enjoy His creation.

Enjoy His gifts in a spirit of thankfulness. 

 

See the rest of the 31 Day Posts Here.

Day 3- God's Beauty

Fall is probably my favorite season for many reasons: Pumpkin lattes, pumpkins too, the delicious crisp smell in the air, new school supplies, etc.

But the thing I love best about Fall is how beautiful the trees get. The leaves start changing color and then the wind picks them up and tosses them in a rainbow of natural confetti. It is so beautiful.

Isn't creation beautiful? Isn't God beautiful?

Today I just want to reflect on His beauty, which is often revealed to us through His creation. And think of this-His creation is only a shadow of His glory!

Thank God today and worship Him in His beauty and power.

Here are some images that brought me to thank God for His beauty:

Read the rest of my 31 Days series Here.

Be Still- Day 2: Prayer

This last Sunday's sermon we went over Colossians 4:2 which says

Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with an attitude of thanksgiving.

So i got to thinking about how thankful I've been lately, and how much I've actually been praying...

Praying is so easy, it's simply talking to God. So you'd think I'd be better about talking to the One who loves me more than I can dream possible. The Almighty God, maker of the heavens, the earth, mountains, rivers, animals, me, wants me to talk with Him.

It's so lame to say the reason...I get busy, I forget to pray, to be thankful. Oh, and when I do pray, it isn't always with an "attitude of thanks." I can be really selfish and bratty toward God. 

And yet, He still loves me.

 This little quote on Pinterest got me thinking:

Things I'm thankful for:

My husband, home, friends, my family and extended family, a warm day, ability to go to college, a warm sunny day, a good job, freedom to say things like this, freedom to worship God without fear of violent persecution, food in the fridge, gas in the car, pumpkin lattes, laughter, friends getting engaged, owning my own Bible, going to a Christian college, knowing that I am saved-a child of the Most High God.

There are so many things I am thankful for, things I need to thank God for and remember how He provides when I need an "attitude of thanks." 

What are you thankful for? How can I pray for you?