11th Anniversary

11 years ago I said "I Do" to God's most precious gift to me. We were young with stars in our eyes and everything was perfect. 11 years later we are in the middle of real life and each year God has taught me more about loving Jim the way God loves me. This year is no exception.

This year God has taught me that love does not quit just because things are hard. Love does not quit just because you are hurting. There is no excuse for giving into selfishness, no matter what the other is doing. He has taught me that love is often caught and love never returns void. Love is sacrificial and is ready to offer your best even when you don't want to. Love grows as you give of yourself to God and others and wanes when you are selfish and prideful.

Life is far from perfect. Each day has its own challenges as we face this fallen world together. We are learning to trust God is all things. We are learning to seek God and His will for our family together. We are learning together that God knows what He is doing, even when we do not understand His plans, and that it is for His glory and our good. God is God and we are not. His path is the best path for us.

It's hard to believe it has been 11 years, and I pray that we have many more to come so that we can continue to grow together in God and in love.

Roman Diary

This book was part of our Core B curriculum through Sonlight. It was a very short read that follows Iliona's as she becomes a slave in Rome and what that her life looks like. There are some challenging parts as you see life from a slave's perspective, but it is appropriate for kids. It gives a little glimpse into the Roman empire and how it works as well. My kids really seemed to enjoy it and I enjoyed reading it to them.

4 stars for this short read.

Unit Two Preview: The Quiet Fight Among Women

I completed unit two of The Quiet Fight Among Women yesterday and it could not have been more timely. It is exactly where God has been helping me see my sin and how I want to go deeper with many women, not just one or two. It also reminded me to live the life God has given me to live.

3 Quotes that stood out to me:

"Just because your lifestyle choice might offend someone else does not mean you need to apologize for it or stop living it."

"We are in a dangerous place spiritually when we cannot allow others to live differently than we do or to speak into our lives to call out sin."

"If we take personal offense to the exposure of sin in our lives, it could be because we unknowingly allow sin to contribute to our identity, to define us."

Will you join me in this journey to break the quiet fight?

Isn't Your Church Full of Hypocrites?

This is the question Pastor Daniel tackled at Sojourn this week. I am so thankful for it. It was so helpful to hear what a hypocrite is and what that means for us who follow Jesus. We looked at Matthew 23:1-39. (Yes, it's a long passage, but so important.)

Then Jesus spoke to the crowds and to His disciples, 2 saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees have seated themselves in the chair of Moses; 3 therefore all that they tell you, do and observe, but do not do according to their deeds; for they say things and do not do them. 4 They tie up heavy burdens and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are unwilling to move them with so much as a finger. 5 But they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for theybroaden their [a]phylacteries and lengthen the tassels of their garments. 6 Theylove the place of honor at banquets and the chief seats in the synagogues,7 and respectful greetings in the market places, and being called Rabbi by men.8 But do not be called Rabbi; for One is your Teacher, and you are all brothers.9 Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. 10 Do not be called [b]leaders; for One is your Leader, that is, Christ.11 But the greatest among you shall be your servant. 12 Whoever exalts himself shall be humbled; and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted. 

 “But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven [c]from [d]people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. 14 [[e]Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense you make long prayers; therefore you will receive greater condemnation.]

15 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel around on sea and land to make one [f]proselyte; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of [g]hell as yourselves.

16 “Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the [h]temple, that is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the [i]temple is obligated.’ 17 You fools and blind men! Which is [j]more important, the gold or the [k]temple that sanctified the gold? 18 And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, that is nothing, but whoever swears by the [l]offering on it, he is obligated.’ 19 You blind men, which is [m]more important, the [n]offering, or the altar that sanctifies the [o]offering?20 Therefore, [p]whoever swears by the altar, swears both by [q]the altar and by everything on it. 21 And [r]whoever swears by the [s]temple, swears both by[t]the temple and by Him who dwells within it. 22 And [u]whoever swears by heaven, swears both by the throne of God and by Him who sits upon it.

23 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and [v]cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. 24 You blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!

25 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full [w]of robbery and self-indulgence. 26 You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also.

27 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. 28 So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

29 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, 30 and say, ‘If we had been living in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 31 So you testify against yourselves, that you are [x]sons of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Fill up, then, the measure of the guilt of your fathers. 33 You serpents, you brood of vipers, how [y]will you escape the [z]sentence of [aa]hell?

34 “Therefore, behold, I am sending you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city, 35 so that upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the [ab]temple and the altar. 36 Truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.

 “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling. 38 Behold, your house is being left to you desolate! 39 For I say to you, from now on you will not see Me until you say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’”

Hypocrisy Defined vv 3-5
Hypocrisy is saying one thing and doing another, living a life of outward deeds for men to see but in their hearts do not follow their teaching.
A hypocrite trusts in a persona or in pretending instead of trusting in God. They are driven by shame,

Hypocrisy Displayed vv 13-28
In these verses Jesus shows how the Pharisees lived by the letter of the law, while neglecting the heart of it. Hypocrisy denigrates the law of God, putting emphasis on actions instead of loving God and loving others with all of our being.
Hypocrisy not only hurts ourselves with our hidden sin, it hurts others and damages the witness of Christ in our lives.
When we live in hypocrisy we are trying to manage God, our lives, our jobs, our homes, etc, instead of dealing with the reality of these things.

So how do we live a life apart from hypocrisy? It's a heart matter

Hypocrisy Defeated vv 29-39
God is the only One who can make our hearts clean and show us how to live a life of honesty and humility so that others can see who we really are.
Isaiah 50:6-8 shows us that Jesus was humble so that we could learn to be humble. He took our shame so that we can live free of shame.
Jesus split the curtain so we no longer have to perform.
We are only right and strong when we realize we are weak and wrong!
It is all about God being right, not us. The Gospel Works and we need to put our trust in Jesus. We were designed to live in light of the Gospel without shame. This makes us better spouses, workers, parents, creators, etc.

Are you living a life in light of the Gospel or are you a hypocrite? Let's learn to be real with each other and be who God created us to be together.

Redeeming the Division

I am so excited about Redeeming the Division: The Quiet Fight Among Women, an online course for women to learn about coming together as Sisters in Christ and love each other in our differences. I have joined the launch team for this endeavor and cannot wait to dive into the course. I joined this team because this is the heart of why I started Childbirth Conversations; to bring women together to talk and learn from each other instead of staying quiet about things that are non-essentials in our faith. We have so much to learn from each other to help us walk the road that God has for us. We are to live the life He has given us without fear or judgement, but we are not meant to walk it alone.

I will be starting this course this week and writing about what I am learning as I go through it. I would love for you to join me in this course. Currently there is a pre-purchase discount that you can take advantage of this month.

There is also a giveaway related to it for the launch month of June, where Angie will be giving away a free course along with an Apple iWatch! So jump on over and check it out.

How have you experienced the quiet fight among women?

* There are affiliate links attached to this post. 

Screwtape Letters

This book was chosen as my satirical classic for the Back to the Classics challenge I am working through this year, as those books written from a spiritual perspective often fall into this category. However, as I read this book I am not sure how satirical it really is. It is very obvious Lewis was given some insight into how spiritual warfare works and I could see issues with myself and others in the advice Screwtape was giving to Wormwood. This book is very thought provoking and, no doubt, there are many who would see this classic as satirical. I found it very enlightening as to how to be more on guard to the schemes of Satan and his demons. 

I did not always agree with the theology presented in the letters. (Perhaps that might be the satirical part for me.) At times some of the wording and phraseology was weird and I had to read it a couple of times to really understand it. 

As a whole, however, I enjoyed reading this and at times found it a bit scary and too realistic. I highly recommend this book for anyone, but especially for Christians and those wanting to better understand spiritual warfare.

4 Stars for this classic

Questioning Jesus

Yesterday we started a new sermon series at Sojourn: Questioning Jesus. We began with the passage about Jesus's conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well, who had no trouble questioning Jesus, and discussed what we can learn from this encounter.

John 4:1-26

Therefore when the Lord knew that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John 2 (although Jesus Himself was not baptizing, but His disciples were), 3 He left Judea and went away again into Galilee. 4 And He had to pass through Samaria. 5 So He *came to a city ofSamaria called Sychar, near the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph; 6 and Jacob’s well was there. So Jesus, being wearied from His journey, was sitting thus by the well. It was about [a]the sixth hour.

The Woman of Samaria

7 There *came a woman of Samaria to draw water. Jesus *said to her, “Give Me a drink.” 8 For His disciples had gone away into the city to buy food. 9 Therefore the Samaritan woman *said to Him, “How is it that You, being a Jew, ask me for a drink since I am a Samaritan woman?” (For Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.) 10 Jesus answered and said to her, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is who says to you, ‘Give Me a drink,’ you would have asked Him, and He would have given you living water.” 11 She *said to Him, “[b]Sir, You have nothing to draw with and the well is deep; where then do You get thatliving water? 12 You are not greater than our father Jacob, are You, who gave us the well, and drank of it himself and his sons and his cattle?” 13 Jesus answered and said to her, “Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again; 14 but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him shall never thirst; but the water that I will give him will become in him a well of water springing up toeternal life.”

15 The woman *said to Him, “[c]Sir, give me this water, so I will not be thirsty nor come all the way here to draw.” 16 He *said to her, “Go, call your husband and come here.” 17 The woman answered and said, “I have no husband.” Jesus *said to her, “You have correctly said, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one whom you now have is not your husband; this you have said truly.” 19 The woman *said to Him, “[d]Sir, I perceive that You are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshiped in this mountain, and you people say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship.” 21 Jesus *said to her,“Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. 24 God is[e]spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman *said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called Christ); when that One comes, He will declare all things to us.” 26 Jesus *said to her, “I who speak to you am He.”

Questioning Jesus
The Samaritan woman asked many questions that have undertones for questions we ask today of Jesus.
Do you care? Who are you? Do you satisfy? Could you really forgive a person like me? What about other religions?
From this encounter we see it is OK to bring your questions to Jesus. He wants us to ask questions and her responds with much grace. Questions can be a gift to us as we wrestle through them with Jesus and grow in our faith as He gives us gracious answers and draws us into what is True.
So where do we start with questions?
Start where we are- we do not have to put on any pretense, but can ask the questions that are relevant to our lives right now.
Start in community- you are not the only one struggling with questions and we need each other to wrestle through questions together (Proverbs 12:15)
Start with the Bible- the Bible is God's Word and that is where we begin to search for answers. As you read write down questions and bring them to Jesus and other believers to talk through them.

Questioning Others
People do not care how much you know until they know how much you care. As we seek to help others with their questions, we must be willing to cross barriers as Jesus did and think about dialogue before defense. Listen to the honest questions they are asking and seek where their hearts are. Jesus responds to questions with questions. (He asked over 380 questions of others.) Therefore, we need to learn the art of asking more questions, not just giving answers to defend our view.
We need to learn to understand and empathize with those we are talking to.
We need to learn to respond with truth and grace as Jesus does.
Jesus was bold and compassionate. As we become more like Him we can do the same. He called out sin but did it in a gracious way that continued conversation.
We will not always agree with those we talk with, but disagreement does not have to lead to hatred.

Something More
Jesus shows us there is something more than the questions.
Our desperate spiritual longing is to know God.
In Jesus we can know God and we are given living water- Eternal live with God and forgiveness. This is what we are looking for!

What do you think about questioning Jesus? Do you take your questions to Him?