Random Little TidBits - January & February 2017

TidBit #1

"Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil" Matthew 4:1

I'd ask you to read EVERY single word there. Absorb it. It says a whole lot more than you realize at a quick glance.

TidBit #2

"The abundance of religious activity is no substitute for a daily, transforming walk with God." 

Dr. Adam Dooley

TidBit #3
It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out. C. S. Lewis

TidBit #4


Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her "How could God let something like this happen?" (regarding the attacks on Sept. 11). Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said "I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives. And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?" In light of recent events...terrorists attack, school shootings, etc. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found recently) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK. Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school .... the Bible says thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK. Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about. And we said OK. Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves. Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with "WE REAP WHAT WE SOW." Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell. Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says. Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing. Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace. Are you laughing? Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they WILL think, of you for sending it. Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us. Pass it on if you think it has merit. If not then just discard it... no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in.
God bless you as you share it with friends. No Nation or people can ever survive or succeed without Jesus Christ.

TidBit #5

"Though God does not require that we seek persecution, He does insist that we refuse to run from it" 
~ Dr. Adam Dooley

TidBit #6

I really enjoyed this study.  Learning from Ms. Shirer or any member of her Spirit-filled family is always a blessing.  Love how she digs in there and gets into the nitty gritty!

TidBit #7

One chapter a day, one book at a time, alternating from Old Testament to New Testament, just love doing this.  Lots of groups that you can join also, to discuss with others.  

I am starting a group of my own, message me if you'd like to join it. 

TidBit #8

This study is amazing!  I loved it! I will love it more when I do it again.  I can't say enough good things about this one.  My TerKeurst is simply a blessing to Women's Ministry.  She's not up there above us, she has problems and issues just like us, and she is down to earth and dare I say "normal".  Love this lady's approach to Bible Study, and look forward to more coming from her!

TidBit #9

I just love the quick and to the point devotionals as well, and this one was a good find!

TidBit #10

When we lose one blessing, another is often most unexpectedly given in its place. C. S. Lewis

TidBit #11

Today's Devotional:

"God is more anxious for you to know His will than you are to find it. In fact, it's not really your responsibility to find the will of God. It is your responsibillity to do the will of God. If God wants you to know His will, it is His responsibility to reveal it. It is your responsibility to obey it. Scripture is clear in saying that obedience is a birthmark of the believer.

A store that was having a going-out-of-business sale hung a huge sign that said, "No refunds. No returns. All transactions final." That describes the kind of no-excuses, sold-out obedience God wants from us, the kind Jesus described in Mark 3:35. Trust and obey God as He reveals His will to you - it's the only way God's children truly live!"

- Dr. James Merritt, Cross Pointe Church, Duluth, GA

TidBit #12

Went to the NewsBoys concert last night here in Ft. Smith.  Amazing group of talented gentlemen.  At last nights concert Michael Tait said the below quote.  This is true, and so real, I created this meme for everyone to share his message!

Wrap Up

I want to apologize for missing the January post.  Things got real busy and I didn't realize that I didn't get it out there until Mid-February, so a two-parter is what you get this month.  Chock full of great stuff I have come across.  

I want to thank you guys for being a part of my week.  Know that I love you all, especially those of you that aren't here yet. 

Random Little Tidbits - October 2016

TidBit #1

This book was a quick read, just a couple of hours. This one is full of information, but nothing I hadn't see already.  I felt a little disappointed after finishing, as though I expected something more from the reading of this text. 

TidBit #2

Joshua 23:12-13 speak so loud to me.  If you cleave to the remnant of these nations and make marriages witth them, I (HE) will no longer drive them out, and they will be scourges, and traps, and thorns...

I am SO applying this to sin, my inability to control my temper, my lack of progress in losing weight...  I read something this morning by Joyce Meyer that talked about our 'want to' and this just all came together for me just now.  

I will never succeed at accomplishing my desires until I first let go of the old habits, the old hang ups, the old desserts, the old self and put on the new self, the self that I am in HIM the self that HE will make me.  

At the Joyce Meyer LoveLife Women's Conference this past weekend, Christine Caine said that HE won't do what we can do, HE will only do what we can't do.  And HE won't do what we can't, until we do do what we can do!  And what that basically says is HE is waiting for us to do our part!

TidBit #3

Good Morning Girls

An online community.  Do your daily SOAK's and reflect on one chapter each day.  Then join one of their many facebook groups and discuss with other ladies in your area or around the globe. 

I started with James, now have completed Joshua.  Started Judges on October 17th.  So looking forward to it!  Love what the Holy Spirit has shared with me, and what He has shared with the other ladies in the group.  Am thankful for having someone to talk about each chapter with!

Update:  I studied James with the U.K. group, great ladies, very talkative and supportive!  I joined two others (closer to my time zone), thinking I would get more out of the study of Joshua.  They are not so talkative.  So glad I have the U.K. ladies!

TidBit #4

I really got a lot out of this study!  Even though I was a little overwhelmed by the amount of homework in each session.  The book is the size of all of Ms. Moore's studies, but only 5 weeks instead of the normal 8-10 sessions.  

Moore takes her time with 2 Timothy and for that I am glad!  Really diving in and digging out the Word from the text.  And Melissa's additional pages, I love, love, love that Moore is letting her take us even deeper into the studies.  

TidBit #5

God At The Center

He built there an altar, and called the place El-beth-el: because there God appeared unto him. Genesis 35:7

After Jacob’s first memorable encounter with God in the wilderness, he called the place Beth-el, which means “the house of God.” Many years later, after he had suffered and sinned and repented, and discovered the worthlessness of all earthly things, he renamed the place, El-beth-el; literally “the God of the house of God.”

Thus Jacob had shifted his emphasis from the sacred place to the God he had met there. God Himself now took the center of his interest.

We need to consider that many Christians never get beyond Beth-el. God is in their thoughts but He has not been given first place. Faithfulness to the local church is a good thing; but when the church becomes so large and important that it hides God from our eyes, it may become a good thing wrongly used.

Always God must be first—and we ought never forget that the church was never intended to substitute for God! What is our primary interest? Is it Beth-el or El-beth-el? Is it my church or my Lord? Is it my creed or my Christ?

Father God, I want You to have first place in my life and in the lives of the people in my local church. Help us to focus on You so that we can enjoy Your presence wherever we are—at church, at home, in the office or on vacation.

Mornings with Tozer, by A. W. Tozer.

TidBit #6

Atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning. C. S. Lewis

The homemaker has the ultimate career. All other careers exist for one purpose only - and that is to support the ultimate career.  C. S. Lewis

I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to. C. S. Lewis

TidBit #7

I purchased this book over a year ago, from Sondra Baras, when she came to visit our church.  I can't say I agree with everything she had to say, but she certainly shared information with us that I didn't have, and open my eyes to things of a Jewish nature.  I wish there were more people of Jewish descent that would sit with us and teach us the old ways!

This book, walks through the Torah, one Parsha portion each week.  And gives us even more information, from her perspective, that really was enlightening to me.  

I fully recommend this book!

TidBit #8

"Good works are not a means of salvation because we are saved by grace through faith. We are saved only on the grounds of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

But, our good works are an evidence of salvation; and if we fail to do all the good we can, to all the people we can, at any time we can, by any means we can, we will be condemned at the judgment bar of God. Make no mistake about that."

Billy Graham

TidBit #9

Men and women who are out of fellowship with God, the Creator, still have an instinct towards some practice of worship. In most of our “civilized” circles, the practice of picking out what we like to worship and rejecting what we do not like is widespread.

This has opened up an entire new field for applied psychology and humanism under a variety of religious disguises. Thus, men and women set themselves as judges of what the Lord has said—and so they stand with pride and judge the Lord.

In the Bible, God takes the matter of worship out of the hands of men and puts it in the hands of the Holy Spirit.

It is impossible to worship God without the impartation of the Holy Spirit!

A. W. Tozer

TidBit #10

Postponing Obedience

Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.Acts 16:31

A notable heresy has come into being throughout our evangelical Christian circles—the widely accepted concept that we humans can choose to accept Christ only because we need Him as Savior, and that we have the right to postpone our obedience to Him as long as we want to!

The truth is that salvation apart from obedience is unknown in the sacred Scriptures. Peter makes it plain that we are “elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience” (1 Peter 1:2).

It seems most important to me that Peter speaks of his fellow Christians as “obedient children” (vs. 14). He knew their spirituality—he was not just giving them an exhortation to be obedient.

The entire Bible teaches that true obedience to God and His Christ is one of the toughest requirements in the Christian life. Actually, salvation without obedience is a self-contradicting impossibility!

Humans do not want to admit it, but the Apostle Paul wrote to the Romans long ago that “by one man’s disobedience” came the downfall of the human race (see Romans 5:19).

Dear Lord, I pray today for all the “nominal” Christians in our churches who are straddling the fence of faith. I pray that Your Spirit will impress upon them the need to become fully devoted followers of Christ who will become actively engaged in the battle for men’s souls.

A. W. Tozer

TidBit #11

John Wesley’s Advice on How to Vote in an Election

“October 6, 1774
I met those of our society who had votes in the ensuing election, and advised them
1. To vote, without fee or reward, for the person they judged most worthy
2. To speak no evil of the person they voted against, and
3. To take care their spirits were not sharpened against those that voted on the other side.”

― John Wesley, The Journal of John Wesley

  

I'm putting this pic here, because I want you to know, that even though I think it might be a waste of time, I did my civic duty and cast my vote for the most qualified candidate!  Now it's up to God, do we get a leader that will lead us UP to HIM, or one that will sink us farther down?  Either way, I intend to follow Wesley's advice.  

TidBit #12

Opens November 2nd!  You wouldn't know it by what I have listed here that I've spent most of my month of October working on the Studio so that we can get it open.  There were a few set backs, with a procedure that I had to have.  But we open this week!  

Y'all come see us!

Meme Corner

 Some of these I designed myself, so be forgiving of the colors!

Random Little Tidbits 11-7-2015

"Life is 10 percent what happens to me and 90 percent how I react to it" ~ Charles Swindoll

TidBit 1:  Is a post I made on FaceBook on 11-6-2015

When you disagree with something I believe, that does not automatically make me wrong. What you should do is try to see why I think what I do. Maybe there's an adjustment in thinking that should be made. But it could be its needed in your thinking and how will you know if you just automatically think I'm wrong.

TidBit 2:  Get Healthy... for you and your loved ones. 

I've been overweight a good portion of my life.  I am miserable.  I somehow managed to lose a lot of weight when I was having my babies, but then about two years ago, I quit smoking.  And no matter what you think you're not doing, the weight went back on.  

I was miserable, sick all the time, no energy, lots of naps, depressed, didn't want to go anywhere, just MISERABLE...

And now, I have a hernia... Doctor's don't want to fix it, cause they know it won't heal right.  I've had it since my appendectomy.  Which healed wrong.  Doctor's say; "it would be better for you to lose the weight before we fix it".  As if I haven't tried...  I've been going to the gym for over a year now, I wind up not feeling any better, and miss a few days.  I get hurt, and miss a few days.  Talked my husband into going with me, and actually GAINED weight... and he was working me so hard it's not funny.  So, I ask the Doctor, "how... how do I lose weight... I've tried everything I know, and a dozen others... and my husband verified this...  and the Doctor seriously... looked me straight in the face and said "well science would beg to differ"...  I understand science...  I understand the concept of calories eaten versus calories burned...  THAT didn't work for me!!!!  "well what about liquid calories?"...  Hahahaha....  "I didn't think that water had any calories in it?" I say to him, before I get up and walk out.  WHAT an "asshole"...

Needless to say, I have a new doctor now...  He says "six weeks, you try to loose weight, if you loose weight we will wait six more weeks and look at it, if you're are not losing weight, six more weeks, and we fix your hernia regardless"

OKAY!!!!   SIX weeks later, I have lost 21 lbs.  

Here's how:

1.  I got me a nutritionist that put me on a plan.  She is a friend so she didn't charge me anything.  Talked to me about "target heart rate"....  Apparently I'd been working out too hard.   She put me on an exercise plan.  On a diet plan that did not work for me, but I did take from her plan, that I should not eat a lot of "grain" in the evenings.  I can eat grain, but not for dinner.  And she gave me a low expected loss rate of two pounds per week. 

2.  Then I come across The Daniel Plan, a book by Rick Warren, Daniel Amen, and Mark Hyman.  I read this book.  And loved it.  I have not implemented the 40 day Challenge yet.  But I have incorporated their 5 areas into my life.  I eat whole and natural foods any and every opportunity I have.  I eat a LOT more fruits and vegetables.   And (BIG AND) have eliminated almost all intake of sugar.

3.  I work out, at least one time per day, 4-5 days a week, at the gym.  Supposed to be 5, yes I know, but sometimes life happens.  10 min walk, 10 min bike, 10 min walk and 10 min bike.  THAT's it, so far.  And these are at rates that stay within 2 bpm of my target heart rate.  WHICH means you need a machine that measures bpm... or a fitbit...

4.  Praying God's Words by Beth Moore, I take this to the gym with me, and read the Overcoming Food Strongholds section while I am working out.  That's chapter 8.  

5.  I take Beta Plus, which contains enzymes that replace the function of my gall bladder, as well as the multi-vitamin Alive for Women, in addition to Fish Oil for the Omega 3's.  

6.  I read the Bible, every single day.  Even if it's just a reading plan, that talks about the Bible and then gives you just one verse to read.  I still do it EVERY day.  I have kids, and am not a morning person, so a "routine" hasn't happened yet, but I'm working on it. 

I wrote these down, not in order of importance, but in the order in which I implemented them in my routine.  Above everything else, God is the one that is helping me lose the weight.  It's for His glory that He is performing this miracle in my body.  Praise be to the Father!

I shared with you what I do, that does not mean it will work for you, but it is working for me.  There are many many many diets and exercise programs out there.  This is because none of us are alike, but we all want to share what we have found out.  I won't lie and tell you I don't have a long hard road ahead, losing the first 15% of what I need to was hard, but I feel tons better not carrying that weight around.  I have more energy.  I can't wait for the other 85% to go, and anticipate the greatness in the Lord that I will feel when that happens.  I would recommend to each and everyone struggling with weight... Ask God to help you, Ask Him to show you the plan, parts of plans, or many plans that you need to succeed in this.  AND thank HIM in advance!!!!  He will come through for you. 

   

TidBit 3:  Saved Memes

I have to admit that C.S. Lewis is rapidly becoming my favorite author.  I meet with a friend on Tuesday evenings, in sort of a "book club", in so much as a club can consist of two people.  And although I had read Screwtape Letters before, we are reading it for this months book selection.  And I'm loving every second of it.  

Tipi, has gone so far as to tell me that Lewis's Lion, Witch and Wardrobe series is all about Christ.  So now, I'm on a hunt for more information.  That possible connection had never occurred to me.  I will keep you informed... as always!


Shabbat Shalom!