It's tough being a women in the tight fist of fear!

We had a week off of Bible Study due to spring break and yet I am late getting this up. I wanted to have a talk about the fear thing with a mentor of mine. I have recently be dealing with some of my fears! I was rejoicing about a week before this Bible Study about over coming one of my fears! It was my greatest fear and that was losing one of my children. I love how Beth put it into perspective. She talked about what happens when your greatest fear happens and how she discussed it with God. How she broke it down to the then what. It truly made me think...then what. I still have my loving God! I will be reunited with my children in Heaven. That this time on earth is only for a short period, heaven is for eternity. Esther faced her hear. She went from I can't to I will. I have to make reference here to The Rugrats and Tommie and Chuckie are at a playground and Tommie wants Chuckie to go down the slide. If anyone knows anything about rugrats it is that Tommie is brave and Chuckie sides with caution. So Tommie goes down the slide and Chuckie is at the top of the slide saying" I am a big, brave dog! I am a big, brave dog!" I have often said that to myself to remind me that I can do it! Getting married raised new fears in my life that I had never had before. Then having children raised even more fears. Shortly after RJ was born we faced a death in the family. Clay, Eddie's brother, pasted away at the age of 21. I watched my mother in law have raw pain and my father in law that looked lost. I saw my in laws go from from strong people to the weakest link. Unlike the TV show it was real and they did not get the choice to just leave a show it was real life. I watched my husband glowing from the miracle of our son to a dull look of pain. It seemed to me my fears were coming true. We just overcame just about loosing RJ, our son. No one should loose a child! It just is not right. I will never forget that early morning when I was at my in laws...we just got home from the scene of the accident. I was getting baby RJ settled and I heard the back door open and close. I knew Robert, my father in law, headed outside. Then I heard my mother in law cry in such a way I have never heard a person cry before. I went to her and she was trying to get into bed. I held her as she wailed in pain. When she calmed down I helped her into bed. I never said a word. I just helped and hugged her and let her lean on my as she cried. I did not know what to say. I felt that I did not need to say anything because it would be empty words. The next few days I did what I felt God lead me to do. It created a bond with my in laws that even through a divorce and remarriage of there son could not deflate. Since then the devil has used that to play on my fear of loosing my children. Let me tell you the devil has had is shots at my children. My son was born premature with a major heart condition that requires surgery right of way. It was so hard to see my son go through open heart surgery and being so small. Again the devil had a change when Lone Grove was hit with the F4 tornado. I was separate from my kids and my fear was that I would make it and they would not! I prayed both times. I prayed hard. My God healed my son. My God moved a tornado to protect my husband and kids. The devil lost! He will not win. The Bible tells us that he will loose. I am a child of God. I stand firm in that and I will take my refuge in my loving father! I had prayed and thought about what to type in this for fears. I have so many. I have so many ways to share them. My God is faithful and I pray He will use this for His work. Please share your fears or ways that God has helped you through your fears!

It's tough being a women thrown a gaint-size weight!

It has taken me a bit longer to get this post out! I had to do some praying on what God wanted me to post. I could not settle on just what was to come out of this current blog. So much is going on in my life. God has been working on me in new ways and I am trying to take it all in at one time. The major statement that was made in Beth's video that has stuck out to me is "One of the most important parts of fullfilling our destiny is transpartancy." This is something that God has been working on me. It is a major reason for starting this blog. I am putting all of me out there so that I can heal and others can learn and use what has gone on in my life for there benfit. It is not easy. I am so ashamed of many things in my life. I am no better than anybody and am humbled to have such a loving God.

We all have things thrown at us at times when we just can not deal! As Beth says " I have issues!" I just love the way she put things into perspective! I feel like that about just doing what I have been asked to in the church to do stuff in the church. I just want to say "No, I have to much going on right now!" Then I stop to think...there is always something going on and the devil tries to use that to stop us from doing God's work! Let's not let him win. Instead we just need to give our issues to God and do God's work. We are about to learn how Esther does that and I am excited to learn how she does. I know that we feel like God has unreasonable expecations from us. He never gives us more than we can handle. There is a saying that He never puts more on your plate than you can handle. Well, sometimes I wonder how my plate got so big. Then I realize I am being selfish. So many others have it some much worse then I do.

Being a woman means juggling womanhood, wife, mother, sister, aunt, teacher, student, employee, boss and so much other. It is hard to take time to be in the word. It is hard to take time and talk to God in prayer. Let me tell you from experience, It is so much harder not to be. You can so easily get on the wrong path by not getting into God's word and not praying. We are to pray without ceasing. So pray. Every morning put on your armour of God...read His word. I have this new found hunger for God's word that I have never had to this excent! I could live in His word had I not other responsibilties. God has blessed me with two beautiful boys and a loving husband. So I am needed else where. I love reading The Word to my boys and listen to them talk about God and ask questions. Nothing fills my souls like littles wanting to learn more. I have to share this story. This past Christmas we made a birthday cake for Jesus. While my youngest was helping me frost the cake...let me take a minute to set the scene. My little Josh has chocolate frosting covering his mouth like a clowns red paint and he had is chair pulled up so he could reach the counter to help...He looked at me with his big blue eyes and said"Mom, is Jesus coming over for dinner?" I tried to explain that Jesus is here all the time. We are celebrating his birth and that on Easter we celebrate Him rising from the dead. He put his had on his little hip and said, "Mom, I know that, but is He coming over for dinner?" I told my son that Jesus lives in our hearts and is with us all the time. He still was not happy and wanted to set a place for Jesus at the table. So we did! We had Jesus as our dinner guest on His birthday!" My son took such Joy in decorating His cake and setting a place for Him. When we said our prayer before the meal he had to add.."And Happy Birthday, Jesus hope you like my mom's mash tatas!" All I could to was smile. My heart so was filled with love and pride for my son. I was thinking if only we thought that way. To invite God into our everyday activity! How many times are we ashamed to be know as christians? Are we only christians we it is convenet for us? Do we just come a warm the pew at church to show that we are good people? Or do we seek God's word and pray with out stopping? I know I fall short of doing what I am suppose to do! My prayer is for us to do the right thing. Get into God's word and pray!

I know that is not excaltly what the lesson was on this week. But I think it fits. Is is unreasonable to stand up and say Yes, I am a christian! I do not think so. I fear that it will not be long and we will no longer be able to meet in our church buildings but under ground. So take pride in our freedom...hold your head high and let people see the Jesus in you!

Misty M. Middleton

Mean homework!

So far my homework this week as left me a lot to think about. I am weak! I have fallen into so many tempations. I need God's strength! I think about how I in the past been wish washy about my faith. Trying to fit in and still be a good person! It was a headache and stressful. I was trying to please everyone but myself and in the mess of it I lost who I was. It is a visious circle. I am also doing the purpose driven life! I love what he says about finding yourself. Find God! What an impifiny. It was right there in front of me the whole time. Mr. Wistoffe was a teacher at my school and was a director at my Bible camp. He shared his favorite verse. Proverbs 3:5&6
Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not on your own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct thy path.
I fell in love with it. I memorized it before leaving camp that summer. Recently, I realized if I had just done what that verse has said I would not have been twisted up in the path of self destruction on trying to please others and loosing myself. I was a mean girl who lost herself trying to please others! Wow what a psych case! It is a good thing that God has a purpose for you and me.
I just joined Beth's adventure of memorizing scripture. I am starting late but hope to get all 24 memorized by Dec! My verse currently is
John 10:28
"And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish: neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand."
I love that I am God's child. I will be in Heaven with him. I love to talk and can't wait to have some long talks with a good cup of ice tea! Hope everyone is getting as much out of there home as I am!
Misty

It is tough being a women in a mean world.

This Bible study has taken me on a huge journey already! I have a sister who shared her 40 day journey testimony with the bible study. I love listening to what others learned and how it relates to me. I use to think that was selfish but I have learned that if I can learn from them it is not. God always has a word for each of us in those moments, ok maybe not directly but I found that in some way it can be used on someone you know or in you leading someone to christ. Now that I have gotten way of topic here I am going to lead in the I have been a mean women. I have so many fears and insecurities that I have blotched two very good friendships with two beautiful sisters of christ. This is hard for me to share because it hurts me and I hurt them. It was a time in my life that I was struggling with what God wanted from me and I could not hear him, feel him and felt like he could not hear me. I was in Bible College and was learning about him but was struggling with my past hurts. The more I learned about God the more past seem to surface. I ended up leaving Bible College and hurt a good friend of mine. She was even my roomate in college. I had introduced to her a good male friend of mine and they are now married. I also hurt my best friend from high school. Up until doing this lessons I did not understand why I did so. I left threatened. I was a coward and fearful to let my past and mistakes that I was still making show so I hurt my friends. It is low. I have to live with that and it hurts. They both were beautiful, moral and knew what God had planned in there life. They seemed to have it all together and I was jealous and felt threatened that I would be left behind in the friendship. So instead of letting that happen I acted in ways to ended our friendships. Several years ago I tried to mend things by sending letters to these ladies. I did not get a response. I understand we will never be great friends again. I was hoping to chat once in a while and email once in a while. I was a mean girl because of my history! Something that I regret to this day. I pray for my two friends and pray that God will guide us to least work things out. It is not wise to compare yourself to others yet we find ourselves doing it all the time. It is hard not to get sucked into that mind frame. I have started to new prayer at night. As I am laying in bed I pray for God protection over my boys, husband and house. I pray that God will always us to have restful sleep. I thank God for loving me and creating me in His image. I thank God for making me the way I am and to help to use that in anyway He has planned. I pray for God peace to fall on me and I am usually alseep before Amen. I have already seen the difference. My challenge is to have all of us identify with our threats, insecurities and what makes us mean. Assess them and find out why it makes us do mean things. Let's put scripture there instead. Proverbs says we should be slow to responsed to anger and we need to cool down first. Something I need to do. I have a long was to becoming a wise women but with God on my side and I in His word I will learn more on how to do so.

Homework

The homework that is for this week is great. It brings Cinderalla story to new meaning. I like Beth's refernce to Top Model and to the Bachelor. As King Xercus was looking for his new Queen what it had to be like for those women. They did not get a choice. I am thankful that I got to choose my husband. We strive to women who are beautiful. We strive to looke great all the time. I sit home with a bad cough and a temp off and on. I do not look good at all. I am not saying that I look great the rest of the time. I do take pride in looking MY best. I wear makeup and fix myhair. I try to wear clothes that flatter me. I am well aware that I need to loose weight. I do not run around town in my pjs...you know what I mean. I am so grateful that I was not paraded around like a trophy. I have a t-shirt that says future trophy wife. I get lots of remarks about that shirt. One that stand out to me is...a male. Pointed out that I was wearing a wedding ring so I had to be someone trophy wife. Then he looked right at me and said to not become a snotty women that thinks she looks to good for anybody. I smiled and said Thank you. It was a huge complment. I surprised me. We strive all the time to be better looking, youner looking, and being somebody else--anybody but ourselves. Esther is teaching us who to be a women after God's heart while being what He created us to be. WOW! To be just myself! This Bible study is such a eye opener. We had to read vrs from Proverbs about being wise. It shocked me. I have so much to learn. I need to work on controling my anger. Not that I get bad but I do get upset easily and want to act on it before I think. I desire to be more wise. God has set it out there for us if we just take the time to learn!

Reflecting

I just love to see God flow through Beth. I love watching her understand women...I mean she gets it. She truly get women. I often find myself missing an old friend from high school when I see Beth Moore speak. I guess it is because they are both strong christian women and have some of the same body language. I have a lot of regrets with this friend. It has often eaten at me. I have attempted to apologize for my lack of being a true friend. That I fell short of myself and everyone I loved. I know that is all I can do. I do not expect to be best friends again but I would love to just chat once in a while. I guess what I am getting at is if anyone out there understand. I will take advice and if nothing else pray for us.

I have seen the Devil trying to rip us apart. I came home from church wiped out and he just got some bad news so instead of us sharing that we start in on each other. It got ugly. Finally I sat down and asked him what is truly wrong and after a while he shared that his uncles cancer news was not good. With treatment he has possible three months to live with out there is no telling how long but no more than a month. We stopped and talked about it and prayed about it. Then we talked about me doing to much. I am disabled and forget it sometimes until I hurt so bad I can not walk. So the devil works on me with thought like if God truly loved you He would heal. you. He may but I do know He is using me and I am His vessel. I just have to keep that thought process going. I hope to get more people to add to this blog and have a great support system going here.

It is tough being a women in a world where beauty is a treatment.

Ladies we are in for a treat! This Bible Study is taking off. We have had an ice storm our first week and had to reschedule. We had our intro week and last week we had a tornado. The Devil does not want this Bible study to proceed. God has big plans for these ladies...including me! I have to add this first. I wanted to write these down as Beth was sharing these but I did not. I later copied them from a sister. These are four types of women
1. A woman who wants other woman to think she is beautiful is a miserable woman.
2. A woman who wants other men to think she is beautiful is a dangerous woman.
3. A woman who wants no one to think she is a beautiful is a terrified woman.
4. A woman who wants just a few to think she is beautiful is a normal woman.
We are always struggling with self image. I know I do. I have so many insecurities. So much so that it shocks me to hear that women I look up to have them. Yes, I am including Beth Moore in this but more so the women at my church. The ones whom seem to have it all together all the time. Today we got to touch on Esther background. Who she is and where she came from. Beth had me thinking about Mothers. I beat myself up all the time about doing what is right for my boys. I have failed them in so many ways. Let me tell you one thing that I strive for for them. I will not hear"Mom, you never told me about Jesus!" They will hear and have heard. With that said, I know that I am not the prefect mother and will not be. I do want my boys to look for a wife that has the same christian values I do. I want them to want wives like there mother. Not in some sick twisted way. Just in a way that I feel like I have done my job as a mother well.

This past week has been a rough week on our community. We had a F4 tornado interrupted our Bible study last week. We have a teenage girl whom has lost her parents. We have a two children that lost there mother in another matter. We come this Bible Study and touch base about Esther being an orphan. Wow that is something to ponder. Prayer is heavy on my heart for those families.

God is attracted to weakness. My first thought was WHAT?? But Old Faith Beth(not old in age sense but in wisdom)explains...more room for God! Ok I got it.

The heart of true wisdom is knowing the ways and the will of God.---Beth did not say this but I found it in my Bible and want to pound this into my head.

God rejects human wisdom because of its pride and self glory!---wow! How often do I try to rely on what I know instead of seeking God. I struggle with not being self centered...or being pro trade that way. I talk a lot. I talk to much. I feel because of that I come across as self centered. It eats me up. I am working on shutting my mouth and have been temped to just get that good ole duck tape out.

I have often felt cursed for being female. I have always had dreams that I feel conflict with being female. As I had kids I felt blessed for my boys. I also felt pressure. How do I compare with that soccer mom next door? When my kids are not listening in public what are others thinking? I struggle with this often. I have gotten better. I will raise my kids to respect and obey. I have learned to put my foot down. I am learning to discipline my kids in love. I have God on my side and I have a lot to learn. I have sought the council women in my church. I pray for my kids!

I am the music directory for 1-3 grade in my church. This means coming up with lessons for them. Often I write my own. I have had to learn to put it at there level and what works and does not work. I came up with a lesson while listen to Beth talk. I just wrote down the scripture and will work on it later. I love how God uses that sort of work.

Please continue to pray for Lone Grove as it goes through so much healing. I want to take a moment to thank all the people who have open there hearts, wallets, and skills to help get us back to some sort of normal life. May God bless you ten fold!