Beware: Scripture Being Violated

This month our daughter turned 12 and she received a beautiful new Bible from her grandparents with her name inscribed in gold with a beautiful cross on the front of it.  Her grandparents lovingly went to our local Christian bookstore to pick out a special Bible for her that she would love and that would guide her through this period in her life.  

For her new age of 12, she is very mature for her age with a reading capacity of a college student.  Her grandparents looked over several Bibles, consulted the store staff, and settled on a Bible from Zondervan called True Images.  

It is a beautiful teen Study Bible with many inserts in it from teenage girls that are placed in certain areas of the scripture to help others understand how to use these scriptures in their lives.   Good idea, right?  My parents thought so and looked at several of them thinking that it was a good thing.

Book Review: Do Hard Things

I first saw this book on the Vision Forum website and thought it might be interesting soI borrowed it from the library and never got around to reading it.....sound familiar?  A few weeks ago, we received the latest catalog from Christianbook.com.  We enjoy getting these because our daughter finds great reading material from these catalogs.  She reads at an adult level and it is impossible to stay one step ahead of her while safeguarding her and what she reads.  We look a lot to Vision Forum and a few other sources to give us a good foundation in what we choose to allow her to read.  This summer, she has entered two different reading programs and spends all of her extra time reading.  Upon getting this Christianbook catalog, she quickly began to make her list for us to look at on which books she would like to get.

When I saw that she had asked for this one, I wasn't sure she was old enough to read it.  Sure she is plenty capable of

Faithfulness

Source

J.R. Miller has beautifully portrayed a Godly marriage in his wonderful writings.  Some of which I would like to share with you......you may find this particular writing in full by following the link below.

One of the first essential elements in a wife is faithfulness, in the largest sense.  

The heart of her husband does safely trust in her. 

Perfect confidence is the basis of all true affection. 

A shadow of doubt destroys the peace of married life. 

A true wife by her character and by her conduct proves herself worthy of her husband's trust. 

He has confidence in her affection; he knows that her heart is unalterably true to him. 

He has confidence in her management; he confides to her the care of his household. 

He knows that she is true to all his interests that she is prudent and wise, not wasteful nor extravagant. 

It is one of the essential things in a true wife that her husband shall be able to leave in her hands the management of all domestic affairs, and know that they are safe. 

Wifely thriftlessness and extravagance have destroyed the happiness of many a household and wrecked many a home. On the other hand, many a man owes his prosperity to his wife's prudence and her wise administration of household affairs.

A true wife makes a man's life nobler, stronger, grander, by the omnipotence of her love, turning all the forces of manhood upward and heavenward. 

While she clings to him in holy confidence and loving dependence she brings out in him whatever is noblest and richest in his being. 

She inspires him with courage and earnestness. 

She beautifies his life. 

She softens whatever is rude and harsh in his habits or his spirit. 

She clothes him with the gentler graces of refined and cultured manhood. 

While she yields to him and never disregards his lightest wish, she is really his queen, ruling his whole life and leading him onward and upward in every proper path.

HUSBANDS AND WIVES

by J.R. Miller


I just recently discovered this writing and will be printing it out to keep in front of me as a reminder along with my Proverbs 31 study.  What a beautifully strong and fearsome creature a true wife is, as we keep our eyes on this goal, praying for strength, through Christ, as we journey through each day, each incident, each challenge, allowing ourselves room to stumble, but never taking our eyes off of the goal.  We do this to honor our husbands and our families, but most of all, to honor God.

A Wife's Calling

Last Sunday our pastor preached on Ephesians 5 and he stated something that was very thought provoking for me.  That if we do what we have been called to do in being submissive to our husbands, God will honor us for it.  1 Peter 3:1 talks about if our husbands do not obey the Word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives.  If we follow this, God can work in our husbands lives.

Some women are afraid of being run over if they are submissive, but in fact, they will be honored which could be the saving of a husband or developing things within the husband that you could never achieve on your own.  When we follow the Word of God, we don't need to worry about these things, because we know that He will take care of it. 1 Peter 3:5-6.

The long and short of it is, if we are submissive and conduct ourselves properly, our husbands will benefit much more than what we could ever do with our words and behavior.  Follow the Word and God will honor us for it by your husband being blessed for it.  We can't change our husbands, but God can change us.  Being submissive to our husbands doesn't diminish us, it brings peace to our home and protects the home.

The relationship between a husband and a wife was designed by God to be intimate, not subject to commands by a spouse.  A husband and wife are partners for life, lovers and best friends.  If we follow God's Word and submit to our own husbands, as to the Lord, God will deal with our husbands.  So if I follow what God tells me to do and not nag my husband about fixing the tire, and I get stranded on the side of the highway.......as long as I conduct myself in the manner that God calls me to, God will honor me and deal with my husband.   That's a very freeing concept.   My husband is God's responsibility as long as I follow God's Word.   If I take the responsibility upon myself by nagging my husband and when I get stranded on the side of the highway I berate him in whatever manner I see fit, I lose... and have worked myself into a frenzy in the process.  Hmmmmm.....I think I'd rather let God be responsible, the process and outcome is not only much easier, but much more rewarding.

A wise woman builds her house....if we belittle our husbands, we are tearing down our home by tearing down our marriage.  Our pastor states that men are incredibly insecure creatures and the opinion of a wife matters a lot.  If a man can't get his wife to respect him...he feels like an absolute failure because she knows him best.  That is why we need to respect our husband until he is respectable.  A lot of men live on the confidence that is instilled in them by their wife.

1 Peter 3:4 talks about letting our adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious.  A Godly woman understands that ultimately it is her character, not her clothing that makes her beautiful. Maybe what Peter is saying is that we need to take 30 minutes off of our hair and put it on our heart because that is where true beauty is found.  More time on our heart gives us wisdom and guidance in our relationship with our husband.

Submission: The divine calling of a wife is to voluntarily respect her husband and affirm his leadership in their marriage and home.

Headship: The divine calling of a husband is to take primary responsibility for the Christ-like servant leadership, protection and provision in the home.

And when the wife affirms her husband...and the husband takes responsibility to be a Christ-like servant leader....what happens is, the roles are carried out with such love that the authority and the submission, while existing, are almost invisible.

Learning this and practicing it has been like a weight taken off of my shoulders.  And yes, it is a daily choice.  Sometimes it is a minute to minute choice when it comes  to biting my tongue.  I am a very strong and independent woman (and my husband is an extremely patient man) and I struggle with becoming gentle and meek as God calls me to do, but I am making progress and have already seen the rewards!  One thing I am learning is that it takes a strong (not tough) woman to be kind, gentle and submissive.  Being submissive does not mean being weak, it takes much strength and I feel myself getting stronger each day.  It is a very worthwhile cause and I am excited to continue down the path I have been called to follow!

Blessings from Faith

I remember very clearly taking this picture.  After filling up my bird feeders one morning, I turned to walk back into the house only to be surprised by this beautiful rainbow spanning the whole sky.  It was so close!  I ran inside to get my camara and was able to take this picture of the end of the rainbow in my neighbors field.  It was one of those times in my life where I was struggling with some difficult circumstances and my faith wasn't what it is now.  That morning strengthened my faith.  I had been calling on God, feeling very alone, and after finishing my devotions, I decided to refill the bird feeders.  To turn around and see this beautiful rainbow, well I was brought to tears and felt such a warmth of security at that moment.  It was like God was saying, I'm right here.  You are not alone.  

This week has been a lot like that.  My faith is much stronger than it used to be, but God never promised us an easy life.  Financially things are very tight, prices seem to keep going up and the news isn't very bright.  We know that the path our family has chosen is the right path, it isn't easy, but it is very rewarding.  God reassures us in subtle ways from time to time that we are in His will.  Yesterday we received an abundant amount of blessings, which makes me laugh with joy at God's timing since it is the week of Thanksgiving.

Our daughter has been needing two specific pieces of curriculum; an additional worktext for her reading curriculum which costs $25.00 and a $5.00 workbook in geography.  The $5.00 workbook costs an extra $6.50 for shipping.  I couldn't bring myself to purchase them last week when I saw the costs.  Yesterday we were in town and happened to have enough time to drop by a used Christian book store.  I might stop in there about once each year, it's not a place that we constantly frequent.  We just happened to be driving by with extra time and it dawned on me to maybe take a look around.  They had the exact reading worktext she needed for only $10.50 and they also had the exact geography workbook she needed for $1.50 no shipping!  Now if you think that is just coincidence, you don't know my God.

With Christmas coming, we are looking at doing several creative craft projects for our family.  Lots of what we decided to do requires assorted glassware.  I thought we would stop by the local hobby store to see what the costs might be to complete our projects.  Also, we were planning to order several half gallon canning jars for food storage online.  Not only did the hobby store have the glassware for the projects, but they had the food storage glass jars too and it was all 50% off!  Now if you think that is coincidence, you really don't know my God!  

These are the whispers from God to me, that tells me, He's with me, He knows what we're facing and He cares.  It is Him telling me that He is right there beside me, encouraging me and then watching me delight in His surprises and blessings.  By faith we walk each step of the way........

Religious Freedom

We hear the term "religious freedom" used so much these days and I felt that I understood what that term really meant and that I also understood feeling grateful for what "religious freedom" we have in the United States.  This past Saturday evening, my husband and I watched a video, A Cry from Iran, that I had happened to come across at our local library.  Now mind you, we do not spend our evenings in front of the TV, and we have reduced our screen time to almost nothing, working towards removing the TV from our home completely.  Even when there is a good program on i.e. an educational cooking program etc., the trashy commercials ruin it, but that issue is for another post.  The reason I picked up this video was because it caught my eye being about Christianity in Iran.  I highly recommend