Psalm 27

The Lord is my light and my salvation; Whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the defense of my life; Whom shall I dread?
When evildoers came upon me to devour my flesh, my adversaries and my enemies, they stumbled and fell.
Though a host encamp against me, My heart will not fear; though war arise against me, in spite of this I shall be confident.

One thing I have asked from the LORD, that I shall seek: That I many dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the LORD and to meditate in His temple.
For in the day of trouble He will conceal me in His tabernacle; In the secret place of His tent He will hide me; He will left me up on a rock.
And now my head will be lifted up above my enemies around me, and I will offer in His tent sacrifices with shouts of joy; I will sing, yes, I will sing praises to the LORD.

Hear, O LORD, when I cry with my voice, and be gracious to me and answer me.
When You said, "Seek My face," my heart said to You, "Your face, O LORD, I shall seek." Do not hide Your face from me, Do not turn Your servant away in anger; You have been my help; Do not abandon me nor forsake me, O God of my salvation!
For my father and my mother have forsaken me, but the Lord will take me up.

Teach me Your way, O LORD, and lead me in a level path because of my foes.
Do not deliver me over to the desire of my adversaries, for false witnesses have risen against me, and such as breathe out violence.
I would have despaired unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living.
Wait for the LORD; Be strong and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the LORD.

Saints,Vikings, & the Holy Spirit?!

So...anyone that knows me knows that football just doesn't thrill my heart. Just let me go shopping!! But having been married for 14 months to an avid sports enthusiast, it's always on tv at our house...except for the few minutes of the week he turns it to HGTV and pretends to be interested with me! I must say though, Bryant has been able to get me to watch it a little more since we've been married, and last night was one of those times. Vikings vs Saints. Would Brett Farve go to the Super Bowl for perhaps the last time or would the New Orleans Saints go to the Super Bowl for the first time ever?! We decided to watch the football game together! It was a great idea and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed myself! Only problem...I was cheering for the Vikings...he was cheering for the Saints. I have just never been a fan of the Saints, not because of their playing record, just because I don't like so much black! It was up and down, back and forth the whole football game long! I didn't get bored once! One minute it looked like the Vikings were going to win, the next definitely the Saints, then wait, maybe the Vikings after all...only for the Saints to win it all in overtime! So, what does that have to do with the Holy Spirit you may be asking? Well, this morning I was reading in Acts 1. Jesus had ascended into Heaven and while Jesus had promised the Holy Spirit, He had not yet come. So here's Peter in verse 26 trying to make an important decision, without the help of Jesus or the Holy Spirit. Who would be the disciple to replace Judas? Would it be Joseph or Matthias? "Well," Peter reasoned," Jo would be good because he has a good heart, but Matthias would be good too because He has been with us the whole time, but so has Jo...." you get the idea. Who should they pick? They had to draw lots in order to decide and just hope they drew correctly! No pressure! Let's face it, if I had taken a gamble on who would win that football game last night, one minute I would've wanted to choose the Vikings, the next minute the Saints...I would've failed miserably. In fact, I did because I chose the Vikings to win! How great God is that He didn't just leave us here to wonder back and forth every time we must make an important decision, more important than who's going to win a football game! I am so thankful we don't have to cast lots in order to know what to do! I thank God that He gave us the Holy Spirit to speak to us and give us wisdom to know what to do when we don't have a clue! If we will just listen and be obedient, our tough life decisions are already decided! And unless the Saints decide to go with gold jerseys for the Super Bowl, it looks like I'm going to have to cheer for Peyton Manning and the Colts!

L3 - Learn. Live. Lead.

I posted a blog about a week ago intiteled "L3- Is Your Fruit in Season?" I thought you may want to know what L3 is. The L3 Journal is a reading plan that our church (Pinelake Church) produced to help you dig deeper in the Word in 2010. What makes this reading plan different than others is the L3 focuses just on 1 or 2 chapters of the Bible per day. The purpose is to encourage you to dig deeper and find out more about the Scripture instead of merely skimming it and checking it off your list. It's about learning, living, and leading. Learning what God says in His Word, living it out, and leading others to do the same. You can find out more about the L3 Journal here: http://pinelake.org/blogs/l3/. You can even get it sent to your smartphone! God has already revealed so many things so far and we're only on day 20!

L3-Is Your Fruit In Season?

Mark 11:12-14
On the next day, when they had left Bethany, He [Jesus] became hungry. Seeing at a distance a fig tree in leaf, He went to see if perhaps He would find anything on it; and when He came to it, He found nothing but leaves, for it was not the season for figs. He said to it,"May no one ever eat fruit from you again!"

I think it's interesting how Jesus expected to find fruit on the tree to eat even though He knew it wasn't the season for the fruit. We go through different seasons in life like Solomon so wisely noted in Ecclesiastes 3. We may not always be in our best season or our favorite season, but God is still expecting us to produce fruit for Him. Yes, there will be seasons where it is easier to bear fruit and seasons where we will bear more fruit than other seasons of life, but there should never be a season when we aren't bearing any fruit.

What fruit are we talking about? Galatians 5:22-23 says, "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control..." This is the fruit that Jesus wants us to produce. Different seasons of life will usually dictate which fruit we are producing more of or less of, but Jesus should never come to us expecting fruit and find nothing. He was so passionate about it that when He found no fruit on the fig tree, He cursed it so that it died. Notice that the tree was not without leaves though. So much so, it was misleading. It had leaves which would make one assume it also had fruit. God didn't call us to produce leaves. Leaves can be things like going to church, volunteering, leading a Bible study, etc. While these are good things, apart from a relationship with God, they cannot produce fruit. Anyone can produce leaves, but we have to let God produce the fruit within us.

How do we make sure we are always producing fruit? We will only produce fruit as we are daily in God's word and in constant communication with Him. God uses different seasons in our life to produce more fruit in us. We must wait for something because God is producing in us the fruit of patience. We discover addictions in our life so God can produce in us the fruit of self-control. We go through times that test our faith so God can produce in us the fruit of faithfulness. The wilted, dried up fig tree was of no use to Jesus when He needed it. May Jesus always find us hungry for His word, communing with Him, and producing fruit that He can use to bring Himself glory through us!

Thoughts from Passion 2010...

Passion Twenty Ten
Atlanta, GA
My husband and I recently spent a few days at Passion 2010 with 21,000 college students and leaders, and some of our favorite worship leaders and speakers. Here are some thoughts I wrote down from the conference and wanted to share with you...
Beth Moore
God equips us to do His will for our life. Col 1 "Be filled with the knowledge of His will."
The word equip in Greek means "to prepare, adjust, to fit, to re-adjust, to supply, to mend, to complete."
3 Ways God Equips us...
1. God equips us by preparing us. Eph 1, Eph 2:10 Our natural line - physical circumstances, who your parents were, how you grew up, etc. Our spiritual line - people who influenced you spiritually.
2. God equips us by adjusting us. Maybe you don't think you fit where you are, but maybe it is fitting for you to be there. God allows us to be around people who bring out the worst in us so He can bring out the best in us.
3. God equips us by repairing us. Will you let Him restore you, or are you just going to be mad at Him because of your circumstances or in denial that He really cares?
4. God equips us by filling us. Whatever God has called you to do, you cannot do. Only by God's Spirit equipping you.
*You can find out more about Beth by visiting her webisite: lproof.org.
Andy Stanley
"It's always a mistake to decide what you're going to do before you decide who you're going to be."
"Who you are on the inside will determine what you will do." "Your talent and ability can possibly sweep you past what your character can uphold." "Your doing will always come out of your being."
Everyone should sit and think about what you want certain people to say about you at your funeral. Write down names and what you want them specifically to say. Then, take a characteristic such as honesty, and ask yourself, "What's at stake with honesty?" "Why is it important?" Well, it's important because it's the basis of every relationship in your life.
What you want said about you at your funeral is your personal definition of success.
Determine, what you want to be, but make sure you won't sacrifice your convictions to get there.
"What values do you want to form the perimeter around you?"
*Andy Stanley is the pastor at North Point Community Church in Atlanta, GA: northpoint.org
Louie Giglio
John 11
Jesus allowed Lazurus to remain sick for 2 days even though He knew.
Jesus wake me up! v11
Jesus told them to roll away the stone. They replied, "It stinks!"
"Jesus is not afraid of the smell behind your stone."
"Don't make any more promises to God, just surrender your life."
"Let others see the playback of what God's doing in your life on your face."
*Louie is the pastor of Passion City Church in Atlanta, GA. passioncitychurch.com
John Piper
Is God an egomaniac?
There are many verses in the Bible in which God demands people or things to give Him glory.
(Isa. 43:6, Jer. 13:11, Psalm 106:7, Isa. 48:9) Does this make Him an egomaniac?
Exploring...
1. Eternity Past - Eph 1:4-6 Before the foundation of the world God predestined us to be a part of His family for the praise of the glory of His grace. We don't have to choose between God getting glory and our joy!
C.S. Lewis said, "We delight to praise what we enjoy because it brings us joy! We were created for it...it's the satisfaction of our fulfillment. We can only be happy in seeing God's glory!"
2. Eternity Future - John 17:24 We are sinners, so we don't like having a greater treasure outside of ourselves. Neither do we deserve it.
3. The Cross, the Center - Rom 3:23-26, Rom 8:3 Everytime you sin, you are belittling God and choosing something else as more important than God's glory. The foundation of our salvation is not our worth, but God's worth.
Psalm 25:11 "For Your namesake, O Lord, forgive me of my sins for they are many!"
"We are awaiting an eternity of self-forgetfulness not full of mirror walls that reflect what we like. They will reflect God's glory!"
"Self-exultation by God is not the act of an ego-maniac, desperate for attention, but of infinite self-giving for our enjoyment!"
"It's not that He won't be fully God unless He gets glory, but we won't be fully happy until we give it!"

Laugh! It's almost 2010!

"A wife of noble character who can find?...she is clothed with strength and dignity: she can laugh at the days to come." Proverbs 31:10a,25

Have you ever noticed how hard it is to get the perfect snapshot of someone laughing at something funny that happened? You've got to be quick if you're going to capture someone's reaction to something funny. I noticed this several times during Christmas. My husband and I gave a couple of funny gifts, and we were so excited to see the recipients' reaction to the gifts. Bryant would hold the camera up in the air, pointed at the person unwrapping the gift...waiting for the perfect second to take the picture so we could have that snapshot of them laughing to remember forever.

I've noticed this in my own life recently. My life is filled with so many blessings, but we all have days that we wish would never have started. We have problems we wish we could fix, but we can't. And many times, I get so focused on my problems and the things that are wrong, and that's all I can think about! Then I flip through mental snapshots in my brain...something funny that happened, or a time when I was experiencing great joy, and I think..."why can't I feel like that right now?" I long to feel that happiness in my moment of my frustration over my problem or situation.

Reading through Proverbs 31 today, I stopped on a part of the verse. "She can laugh at the days to come." But I can't help but wonder, did she always feel that way? Really? I mean, yes, her husband calls her blessed. Yes, her children are protected and have what they need. Yes, she is praised by others in the city gates because of how great she is. But, did she ever have days where she just didn't think she could go on? Did she ever feel tired and worn out from taking care of everybody and making sure everything was perfect? Did she sometimes sit and think of the snapshots of days when she wasn't as tired and didn't have so many responsibilities...times when someone wasn't sick or when money wasn't so hard to come by? I mean, I know everyone refers to her as "the perfect Proverbs 31 woman." Let's face it though, she wasn't Jesus! I think the truth is that she did sometimes have these thoughts. I think sometimes she did feel overwhelmed by all of her responsibilities...and the expectations of her husband, children, and those in the city gates. But I would like to think that her glory was in the fact that she didn't sit and dwell in those thoughts. 2 Cor. 10:5 says, "and we take every thought captive to make it obedient to Christ." She didn't let those thoughts and feelings become her identity and dictate her mood. She didn't waste her time thinking and talking about how life used to be or could be better. Her attitude was like David in Psalm 17:15 "...when I awake I will be satisfied with seeing Your likeness." She quoted Psalm 23 often "...He restores my soul." Her heart's desire was to bring God glory! She knew that even though at times she may feel tired and weary, she was being obedient to her Lord, and if that's what it took, that was what she did. She knew God had called her to live on this earth for His glory, and this is the reason "she can laugh at the days to come."

We live to bring God glory! No matter what it takes. No matter what situation we've had to walk through or we are walking through presently. If we are living obediently and walking in His way, then He has a plan for us. David lived and experienced both good and bad circumstances but he said in Psalm 37:25 "I have been young and now I am old and I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread." Although at times I feel overwhelmed by my circumstances or by the uncertainty of the future, I know that I am living to bring God glory. It's not always the way I would choose to let Him be glorified through me if I was in charge, but it's great to know that He sees a much bigger picture than we see. Because He is in control, we CAN laugh at the days to come!

Happy December!

It's December 1st already! I could hardly believe my eyes when I looked at the calendar yesterday. As you can tell, judging from the date on my last post, things have been crazy busy. Too busy for blogging, unfortunately. Because my mom and I own a retail business, we have both been running around like chickens with our heads cut off!

Thoughts from Black Friday: So many joyful people. Rushing around to find the best sales, and asking you if all the things that don't have sale signs on them are on sale! No, if they were...they too would have a SALE sign. (I'm venting, can you tell?) Waiting outside for you to open the door...most popular "can't wait to get in the door item" this year? Silly Bandz! If you haven't heard of them, they are rubber bands in the shape of animals that kids from 2 to 32 are wearing on their wrists as bracelets. They sell in a pack of 24 or individually. They are collected, traded, etc. Craziest thing I've seen in years! Parents waiting outside for us to open so they could be the first to buy up all of our packs of Silly Bandz, and by 11am, they had succeeded! Attitudes, long lines, and people shopping for family and friends just because they "have to." You have to wonder what God thinks about how we prepare for His most special holiday?!

In other news, Bryant and I will be putting up our Christmas Tree and decorations tonight! I'm so excited! We had planned to do it sooner, but we have been working hard coordinating Best Gift, Pinelake's Christmas presentation. It's been crazy but fun. Long hours at the church, fast food, and little sleep. But tonight is a free night, so up goes the decorations! I know Bryant is thrilled. He doesn't get into it as much as I do...as I'm sure is the case for most guys. Sweet as he is though, he will be crawling into the attic tonight to bring down all the boxes! I'll be sure to post pictures when it's all decorated! Have a Happy December 1st!