iChristian

Yesterday, a small group of women from my church started the bible study, “Unglued” by Lysa TerKeurst.  For those of you who either know me really well or even just through this blog, you are aware of my ability to sometimes spew my emotions onto my family.  My hopes are that through this study, I will learn to stop letting my feelings get the best of me in life’s tricky situations and use God’s word to combat my raw emotions before I allow them to sabotage my most valuable relationships.

Before we’d even left the church yesterday, I knew there was something from the guide that I would be sharing with you all today!  Lysa gave us a list of “animals,” asking which described us best when faced with an unglued kind of situation:

Wounded bear:  I am hurt & unpredictable, so watch out!

Agitated skunk:  I may or may not create…

Really hoping some more of you can help me. I recently lost my aunt to cancer and i’m running this years 13.1 miles of the Great Birmingham Run for Cancer Research UK

Please please please sponsor me http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/AndrewVokes

Even if its just £1, if everyone on my friends list sponsored me £1 i’d smash my target!

If you haven’t got £1, at the very least put the word out for me!

Paul continues to tell the people about the kinds of behavior they need to rid themselves of and closes off the passage with ways they should behave instead.

Ephesians 4:28-32

²⁸ Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work,doing something useful with their own hands, that they may have something to share with those in need.

²⁹ Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. ³⁰ And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. ³¹ Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. ³² Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

As Paul closes out this fourth chapter of Ephesians…

Some time ago when my parents returned from their business trip, they bought me some perfumes from various brands. I really love perfume. Every day I always use it and I think every woman likes and use perfume too so that always smelled fragrant wherever she is. When I tried one perfume, don’t know why suddenly I remembered a bible story about a woman who poured a most expensive perfume to Jesus’ head.

Mark 14:3: “While He was in Bethany, reclining at the table in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, made of pure nard. She broke the jar and poured the perfume on His head.”

This is a beautiful act of love towards Jesus. This woman took her best; she gave a most expensive perfume to Jesus as an expression her love to Jesus. What prompted…

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

(1 Corinthians 13:4-7 NRSV)

“Love” is one of those words which can have a range of meanings in English. We make the one word serve a multiplicity of circumstances. For example, “I love my wife and I love my children” use the term in a different sense from “I love football” or “I just loved that holiday in Malta. There are many more instances we could use, and we understand the meaning of the word “love” by the way it is used.

But what do we mean when we apply the word to Jesus? The Bible…

I’m resting,
I’m waiting on the Lord
some people say . . .
I look a little bored.

But, I’m trusting,
see how I am still
it’s because I know
it’s all about His will.

Yep, that me,
looking sweet as a lamb
Only because I know . . .
He sees me as I am.

Waiting, anticipating,
nothing to worry about
I have faith in my Lord
what is there to doubt?

God’s timing is perfect,
so I am just hanging
He’s teaching me to be still
and I’m not even panting!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Psalm 46:10

“Be still, and know that I am God:”

King James Version
Public Domain

Copyright 2013
Deborah Ann Belka

Where the land meets the sea
Is a beautiful place to be
Where the water covers the land
And the stones get turned to sand

Where your life meets the King
Is the most amazing thing
Where his Power opens your mind
And your thoughts become refined

Part 4 Yesterday

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“This is a war in the eternal world – a war for our everlasting-lives – and we fight halfheartedly, forever losing parts of our armour and leaving ourselves and others wide open to attack.”
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At the start we said: ‘It would be great if we could deal with the Enemy and give him no influence in our lives.’ And we asked: ‘Do you think that we can achieve that.’

So, what do you think?

We also said: ‘we must not be lulled into a false sense of insecurity.’

What I mean is this:

We have security – in God. In absolute respect for God and a complete dedication to obey everything that Jesus said – there you find security. This is a security that stretches into the everlasting world of God; it never ends. Even if we die in this life, we are safe for…

Part 3 Yesterday

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“We are dealing with an Enemy who wants nothing more than to destroy us – and we are doing the work for him.”
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As we have already said, the enemy is going to do whatever he can to make us disobey God. He is going to use all his influence to cause as much mayhem in this world as he can. This is a big question: who is actually carrying out the mayhem?

I have certainly never seen the Enemy but I have seen so much of his work being done by people – by non-Christians and Christians alike.

This is something that Paul wrote:

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now…

Part 2 Yesterday

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“some physical problem that we suffer with could actually be part of our spiritual healing”
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The Enemy is going to do whatever he can to frighten us or persuade us to disobey God and fall away from the faith. He will throw all kinds of feelings and thoughts our way to try and lead us to a place where we lose our trust in the Father.

We will face all kinds of trouble. We will come up against many problems and hardships, but, does that, in any way, mean that we cannot trust God? Of course not – it means that we have to trust Him even more.

Jesus suffered – massively – and the Enemy attacked Him. All his disciples suffered and they were also subjected to the Enemy’s tactics. Although there is so much unnecessary suffering and so much that the Devil will…

I once observed a moth dancing around a candle light. It zinged past blindly at first and then I wondered if it was blind or just too courageous to consider that it was within an inch of it’s life playing with fire. It wasn’t quite long before the moth flew into the flame and that was the end? I wondered how it could be so dumb, how it could not know that the flames would roast it? In fact, within a short time of that moth falling victim, the next one followed suit. It’s just like that. They’re simply irresistibly drawn to light no matter how dangerous it may be. It’s no fault of theirs. They’re just easy prey.

Is it not odd when human beings that are accredited with much higher intelligence than any other animal act like moths? Like moths drawn to a flame, they fall into their…

Part 1 Yesterday

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“We must learn to see beauty as God sees it.”
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If you were asked ‘what is the most dangerous thing in this world’ – what would you say?

I am sure that there are a few good answers to that question. Perhaps pride or greed or envy; they are some of the most deadly feelings that underlie all the nonsense that goes on – but where did they come from?

Let me tell you, one of the most deadly things in this world is beauty. It has nearly destroyed our world and we really need to understand that. Do we think that the Enemy is a beast? Well, he has an interesting relationship with beauty. Here is a quote from Ezekiel:

“‘You were the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty. You were anointed as a guardian cherub, for so I ordained…

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“We must not be lulled into a false sense of insecurity”
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It would be great if we could deal with Satan and allow him no influence in our lives. Can we achieve that?

Here’s part 1:

‘The Enemy is so clever’. We hear this all the time:- how true is it?

Here’s a quote from the back near the beginning:

Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
Genesis 3:1(NIV)

According to Moses, the serpent was more crafty than all the wild animals. We know that he is referring to the Enemy, the Devil, Satan or whatever you want to call him. So, how clever is he?

Being ‘more crafty than all the wild animals’ means what exactly – have…

Being in a world
Where our actions
Are not driven by fear

Being able to look
Without ever seeing
Any bad things

Being able to talk
Without saying anything wrong
About anybody else

Being able to laugh
Without laughing at the misfortune
Of any other person

Being able to think
Without thinking
Any nasty thoughts

Being able to live
Without living at the expense
Of anyone else’s life

Being able to do good
Without any fear
About what might happen

Being in a world
Where you know that nothing bad
Will ever happen to anyone

Being in a world
Where you know that you’re loved
And you always will be

Isn’t that what we all what
Well, that is all the bible talks about
And that is exactly what God wants

This world is not just about you
It’s about everyone; we’re in this together
And God – He must…