Good morning, lovelies! I just finished applying my mascara, but I didn’t want to wait too long this morning before I hopped on here this morning to share something with you all. Truth be told, Beth and I filmed a video blog on Tuesday, but after much headache and technical difficulties, I didn’t get it downloaded until late last night so, we decided to save it for Monday because of our SSMT post tomorrow. In the meantime, however, we have a friend, Crista Merrell, that is dear to both of us and she also heads up the ministry to women at our church. Yesterday she wrote a powerful post on the Bayou City Blog for our church and I asked her permission to share it on here as well. So, would you ladies please welcome our dear friend with open hearts and minds today?

Thank you so much, Crista, for sharing this powerful Word!

In 1818, an anonymously written, dream-based manuscript called The Modern Prometheus about a maddish scientist and his highly unorthodox experiment surfaced in London. You and I know the tale better as Frankenstein, and given the current season, it’s not difficult to conjure an image of Boris Karloff in his 1930s role as Victor Frankenstein’s creature—square head and hulking shoulders, bolted neck and awkward stride. Did you know that Frankenstein isn’t the monster’s name? It’s the scientist’s. But the characters of creature and created are so intertwined that we don’t even bother to separate them. We just call them by the same name: Frankenstein.

Frankly (I couldn’t resist), we can relate to the tangle of Frankenstein and his creature. There’s a familiar scene that plays out in our lives. In Victor Frankenstein’s obsession to create is our drive to achieve something amazing and unheard of. We want to do, know, raise more. And it consumes us to the point of abandoning what we know as truth and the freedom that grace gives us to partner with God in creating meaningful existence in our own lives is exchanged for the illusion of power and control. Frankenstein creates his ugly monster and we build our own monster: sin, selfishness, idolatry.

The last half of the novel finds Frankenstein and his creation in a cycle of death and destruction that tempts the reader to walk away but compels further engagement because of the need for resolution. Both Frankenstein and his monster are driven by the goal of destruction of the other, and the story ends very badly with Frankenstein pursuing the monster to the icy north only to die from illness, the monster to weep for his creator and then to depart further into the icy north to die.

But tell me this: Are you able to fully grasp how far your monster is removable from you? How very separable you are?

I Peter 2:24 says, “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the cross, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.” Bad news for Frankenstein, when he laid himself down to die, he never got up again. Good news for you and me, when we lay ourselves down to die we bury our old selves—that sin and selfishness and idolatry, and we can learn to live without the monster of guilt and condemnation hanging around threatening our fullness of life. We get to send it off on a block of ice to be cast far away from us for, as Micah 7:19 says, “Who is a God like You, who pardons iniquity and passes over the rebellious act of the remnant of His possession? He does not retain His anger forever because He delights in unchanging love. He will again have compassion on us; He will tread our iniquities under foot. Yes, You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.” We trade our sin monster for His great name!

So for all of us Frankensteins, life may be wild and appear loosely chaotic, but it isn’t a horror novel. It’s created by the perfect plan, purpose, and pleasure of a loving God who delights in us unchangingly. And can I hear a “Hallelujah!”…He is the slayer of all of our monsters.

Hey Friends! And happy Monday to y’all! The Springfield LPL recap just dropped in my inbox, so that means it’s time to share it with all of you. Thanks so much, Rich! We hope each of you experienced God this weekend in a new way, and if so, please feel free to share it with us!

Living Proof Live | Springfield from LifeWay Women on Vimeo.

Good Thursday morning, friends!

Can you believe this season of LPL is coming to a close soon and very soon? We only have one more conference left after this weekend. Kind of crazy to think about since I feel like we JUST kicked this year off. Anyway, like ususal, we are blessed to be able to give away 20 tickets this weekend thanks to our Siesta Scholarship Fund. These tickets are for those of you who are near our LPL location and have the urge to attend the conference, but cannot fork over that kind of money at this time. We’d love to bless you!

If this applies to you, or if you know of somebody and you live around that area, you can call us at 281-257-3344 or call toll free at 888.700.1999. Please ask for Kimberly and she will hook you up! If you happen to call during the lunch hour, or we miss you for some other reason, please leave a message and we’ll get back to you ASAP.

Thank you in advance for your prayers for this upcoming weekend! Prayer is the work, friends. They literally could not do anything of eternal significance without your intercession on their behalf.

Lastly, for those of you ladies who got to attend the MOPS convention last weekend, I heard that a few of you got to have your group picture taken! So fun. Unfortunately, we only have a side shot because the main one on our dear Beth’s phone disappeared. It’s a mystery, but this is better than nothing, right? So here is your picture girls!

We love y’all!

This past Saturday a sweet woman and a friend I’ve known for some time invited me to a birthday tea she hosted for her 13-year-old girl. Before the celebration, she asked a few ladies to write down a few things to encourage her girl as she is stepping boldly into her teenage years. As I sat and stared a blank document all last week, these ten things came to mind that I wanted to share with her. But as I read them aloud to her Saturday afternoon and handed her the letter for good, I  had the desire and got the blessing to share these ten things with other teenage girls if they had ten minutes to put down some homework, and read a little blog. So, here we are. Of course, this list is just scratching the surface of things we need to be teaching those younger than us, but we have to start somewhere, right? The only thing that is coming between us is a computer screen, but imagine us sitting across a quaint little table from one another sipping on some hot tea. 

Dear _________________,

Life is learned as you live it, but as my mind started spinning, my fingers slowly started typing the things that I wish someone would have told me at 13 years young. And although I’m sure someone did tell me these things, I probably didn’t listen because I probably thought I already knew everything. Grin. So I’m praying that even if these words seems useless or boring to you today, that you would keep them tucked away and read them when life seems confusing or hard.

For years I’ve loved the word becoming. It’s one of those words that I’ve latched onto for different reasons and at times have even desired to start a ministry called “Becoming Ministries”. Don’t tell me you don’t think things like that, too. And if you don’t, well, just humor me. I really latched onto that word in college because I remember thinking that that season would either make me or break me. That who I chose to become in college would influence the rest of my life.

That is true, but what I realize now is that it starts long before college.

The choices you make affect who you are becoming long before you ever get to college.

You are always becoming. You never arrive. That is, until you meet Jesus face to face. Until then, it’s one long (or short the way you look at it) journey of becoming more like Jesus Christ. Because each circumstance and situation we find ourselves planted in is another opportunity to respond like Jesus would.

Hence my love for the word, becoming.

So, as you are becoming a young woman devoted to the Lord, here are a few things I’ve learned on my own journey of becoming who God has called me to be, for such a time as this:

1) God is the author of your story, not you.
That is so much easier said than lived out, but it is the Gospel truth. He has a plan and a purpose for you that is greater than you could dream up or imagine. If you think your dreams are big, imagine how big His dreams must be for you! If He is the author, He knows the beginning, the middle and the end. Nothing is too complex for Him, no detail is left unnoticed, and His timing is perfect. Sometimes life can be complicated, hard and confusing, but that’s why we have to remember that we have the God of the universe in charge of our story.

2) You are beautiful.
I want you to hear that with fresh ears. God made you unique. He made you, you. And He made you in His image. Since you bear His image, I am praying that as people see you, they would see His face shining upon you. Beauty really is fleeting, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised. (Proverbs 31:30)

Side Note: Yes, it’s okay to like cute clothes, just don’t let that be your measure of beauty. (I mean, let’s be honest, some girls like to shop. Hand raised!)

3) Know the Word.
And know what it says about you. If I’ve learned one thing, I’ve learned that if I can’t always believe what I think about myself, and I can’t always believe what people are saying about me or what the internet says about me,  I can believe what the Lord says about me. I can rest in the truth of His word and the promises He gives.

4) Life Consists of Seasons.
Just like the four seasons come and go, so will different seasons of life come and go. Don’t despair! “This too shall pass.” is true in both sweet and bitter seasons of life. While you don’t need to wish any of it away, remember to savor the sweet seasons, take the joy when it comes and stay faithful during the bitter seasons. Worship in the good times and bad. Jesus will be faithful over and over and over again. It’s in the valleys that God develops your character.

5) Be Humble.
At church my pastor always tells us to “go low”. Going low means being humble, staying humble, becoming a servant instead of searching for the spotlight. Serve, serve, serve. Invest, invest, invest in people. Never get too comfortable in your routine that you can’t go out of your way to help somebody else. Work quietly with your hands and your Father in Heaven will reward your faithfulness. Be faithful in the small things. You’ll never be too good to do something “meaningless”.

6) Be bold.
In a world of social networking, we can hide behind our computer, our phones, or our iPads. Be bold. Learn how to communicate face to face. It’s a life skill that’s becoming extinct, especially to our teenagers. Refrain from posting things online that you wouldn’t say to someone in person. Passive-aggressiveness (posting something for all to see when you only mean it for one to see) is not attractive.

7) True Love Waits.
I don’t mean that in the way you hear it in church all the time. Staying pure until marriage is a gift, by all means, yes, pursue purity. It’s much harder than you think in the sex-saturated world we live in, but whether you believe it or not, it’s possible. What I mean is, wait for a man that will pursue you, not confuse you. (And be careful not to be the one doing the confusing, either. We girls certainly know how to manipulate.) Wait for a man that will protect your purity, not use it. You are responsible for how you present yourself; so present yourself in a way that’s worth protecting. Sex doesn’t equal love, so wait for a man that loves and respects you enough to practice restraint towards you instead of giving into temptation before marriage. Building a relationship and romance takes time, something we’ve lost the art of in a world with technology at our fingertips, so don’t feel pressure to rush things. Remember, before you are someone’s wife, you are first their Sister in Christ, so don’t settle for less than being treated like a Sister. Your future husband will admire and value you. But also remember, there is forgiveness in Christ. You are not your past; your future spouse is not his past. The Lord redeems and renews. Praise God! But be patient in the waiting. (That’s coming from a girl whose story is still being written. It’s not easy at all. Not one ounce is easy. But Jesus is good and He is better.)

8) Pursue Your Calling.
You may not know what the Lord is calling you to do today, and that’s okay. But pursuing your calling is a bold and courageous thing. Run after the things that make your heart swell. Ask questions, ask for wisdom. Be friends with those younger than you, older than you and in the same season as you. Do things you love to do. Make a plan, but keep in mind that you can make all the plans in the world, but the Lord is the one who directs each of our steps.

9) Your Words Matter.
Speak kind words to, in front of, and behind your friend’s backs. And make sure your words and your actions line up with each other. Be honest. Be loving. Be kind. Be generous. A lady named Maya Angelou once said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Make people feel loved with your words and actions. In a world of email and text messaging, don’t loose the wonder of snail mail.

10) Laugh.
You are never too old or too young to simply stop and have fun on this journey of life. Laugh until your stomach hurts. Laugh with your friends. Laugh with your family. Enjoy life Savor it. Journal about it. Talk about your experiences. Visit places you think are interesting. When all is said and done, you don’t want anyone to remember you as a Negative Nelly. Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom and joy! So own that joy, live it out and share it with those around you.

You are dearly loved, my Sister in Christ. This I know, the Lord has a plan for your life that no eye has seen, no ear has heard and no mind can comprehend or imagine. Believe it. Believe that Jesus is better.

“No one has ever seen,
 no one has ever heard,
 no one has ever imagined 
what God has prepared for those who love him.” 1 Corinthians 2:9

“3 So trust in the Lord and do good.
Live on your land and be dependable.
4 Enjoy serving the Lord, and he will give you whatever you ask for.
5 Depend on the Lord. Trust in him, and he will help you.
6 He will make it as clear as day that you are right.
Everyone will see that you are being fair.
7 Trust in the Lord and wait quietly for his help.
Don’t be angry when people make evil plans and succeed.
8 Don’t become so angry and upset that you, too, want to do evil.
9 The wicked will be destroyed,
but those who call to the Lord for help will get the land he promised.
10 In a short time there will be no more evil people.
You can look for them all you want, but they will be gone.
11 Humble people will get the land God promised, and they will enjoy peace.”
Psalm 37: 3-11

Toward the end of my prayer time this morning, the Holy Spirit spoke 4 words to me with such clarity and fire that I can’t keep them shut in my bones. They are not new but they cannot get old. They are the 4 most well-known words in our Christian vocabulary but they never wear out. These 4 words possess an authority that can speak worlds into orbit, make floors of seas, and send devils off cliffs.

THE LORD JESUS CHRIST.

Let these 4 words resound in your mind, leap from your mouth, and strengthen your step this day. His is the Name that shakes the earth beneath His feet with authority, salvation, affection, and anointing. His is the Name that snaps the chains. His is the one Name that cannot be etched in gravestone. This Name reverberates with everlasting life and extraordinary unction.

“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation…He is before all things and in Him all things hold together…He is the head of the Body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might be preeminent.”

Preeminent.

In everything.

He is THE beginning. And our new beginning. Our defeat ends with the full conviction of the incomparable Name of Jesus in our bones. Our lack is filled. Our souls are thrilled. Our knees are bowed. Our chins are raised.

We put no confidence in our flesh. We unleash every ounce of confidence we possess toward one game-changing, life-rearranging Name: The Lord Jesus Christ.

THE. There is no other.

LORD. Everything must submit.

JESUS. Yahweh is Salvation.

CHRIST. Messiah, the Anointed One.

Those who want to participate have a 3-part assignment:

1. Write out any ONE verse in the Bible that uses the name of Jesus. His name appears in most of your formal translations around 1000 times so you are wide open. Hunt His Name down. Grab your Bible concordance or get on a website like Bible Gateway and do a word search. You are welcome to use any translation. Choose one verse, write it out in your comment along with where it is found and which translation you used.

2. If you have the full conviction and earnest desire to do so, write the italicized sentence below in the second part of your comment and complete the exercise with your own specifics. This is not an exercise in magic words. This is a profession of faith in a matchless Name. We have a Savior. There is no god like our God. No other Rock I know. He cannot be defeated. His power cannot be depleted. Call out His Name over every single thing that is trying to exalt itself in your imagination over the knowledge of Christ. At His Name, let’s BOW.

I submit myself and the following challenges in my life to the unconquerable authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, confessing His powerful Name, and acknowledging His absolute preeminence in all these things:

3. Keep confessing the power of His Name and of His Person in the coming days and every time you get that old angst, deliberately swap it for thanks. He who calls you is faithful. He will surely do it. 1 Thessalonians 5:24

Friday greetings, y’all!

On a whim I decided to jump on here and share a bit of the randomness in my head. It’s called five minute Friday. It’s not new. It’s not original. But it’s sometimes fun and a lot of other bloggers do it, so why not jump on the bandwagon this morning?

So, I’m setting my timer for five minutes, literally, and at the end of this post, I suppose we’ll all see where my finger tapping took me. Beware, none of it will have anything to do with each other. Okay? Okay.

Ready…set…type!

– I’m learning more and more that it’s always better to give more grace than you feel like giving. Whoa. That’s hard. But where would we be if the Lord only gave us grace dependent on how He was feeling that day? Oh no. We’d be a puddle.

– I’m also learning, probably the hard way, that sometimes it’s better to keep your mouth shut. If you have nothing kind to say, don’t say anything at all.

– I’ve had to administer drugs to myself in the form of NyQuil all week long. I can’t decide if the scratchy throat and stuffy head is due to allergies or sinuses, but either way, I’m ready for the junk to move along.

– Fall is sloooooowly creeping into Houston. And by slow I mean the high is 84 degrees today. What?

– I am currently wearing a t-shirt that says, “Y’all”. That’s all. I kind of love it. I recently got it from an antique shop called Junk Gypsy in Round Top, Texas and it makes me so happy. As Kinky Friedman once said, “Y’all is singular. All y’all is plural. All y’all’s is plural possessive.” And all the Texans said amen.

Yup, I just took a selfie. It’s five minute Friday, y’all. What more could you expect? Plus, I really wanted y’all to see the cuteness that is this t-shirt, you know, since I don’t typically wear t-shirts. Smile.

– When one’s throat is sore, chocolate milk for the win. (I don’t want to hear if it’s bad for me, I just want you to know that it feels good.)

– Yesterday we had some visitors at LPM. Jefferson Bethke and his wife Alyssa. If you’ve not heard of Jefferson, he recently (this week) released a book called Jesus > Religion and also, Jefferson is very gifted in the way he brings the Word to people. He brings it through a poetic stance that we sometimes label as spoken word. If you’re looking for something to do today, go look him up on YouTube. You will not be disappointed. They were so genuine, so easy, so fun and so clearly love Jesus. The kind of people you just see yourself being best friends with. (Side note: Beth and I both only knew Jefferson through Twitter. That is what is so fun about social networking, one day you’re Twitter friends, and the next day you’re real life friends. Or, like many of you have experienced, one day you’re blog friends and the next day you’re real life friends. So crazy, y’all.)

Beth, Alyssa, and Jefferson.

And then I hopped in the picture. So fun.

– Oh, I wanted to tell you all (y’all) thank you so much for your sweet words about my Grandpa. I read every last word. And thank you for sharing your struggles and losses, too. Your authenticity and vulnerability encouraged me. Life is hard. But how fun that we have this neat community to encourage each other and lift each other’s heads up? I’m so grateful.

– I was reading through an old journal very recently, (some old journals make me want to sob and some I want to shred and throw away, can you relate?) and anyway, I ran across this sentence I wrote and it was a fresh wind to my soul. While faith is the doorway, grace is where we stand, but hope is our fuel. 

– This I know, if we’re not being fueled by the hope of Jesus Christ, we’re looking to something else to keep our weary engines rolling, and sister, this I know, it will come up dry. Every time. The hope of Jesus Christ is our fuel. Hope in Him today. He’s got you. He’s carrying you.

Welp! My timer just went off. I’m going to cheat now and add one picture.

Your turn! But to keep the comments slightly bearable, let’s make it one minute Friday. I promise you, one minute will FLY by.

That was fun! I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. I love y’all so very much.

I know most of you can relate when I say there are times you look back on a year and see how God has been so faithful in the little things. For different reasons here and there, I’ll just go ahead and admit that 2013 has not been my favorite year. It has certainly had its rough patches and that’s okay. Not every year is a pep rally. Sometimes there are certain years that are amazing and you treasure those and keep doing life, then there are those that are just plain hard and still you keep doing life. The key is to keep moving forward with Jesus not matter what. Because one thing we can know is that each and every day is the day He has made, and we WILL rejoice and be glad in it, even if it involves tears, heartache, confusion and disappointment.

Two months ago you might remember that I blogged about my brief trip to Colorado to celebrate my Grandpa’s 86th birthday and my grandparent’s 60th wedding anniversary. Before that, my grandparents spent Memorial Day weekend in Houston with us and before that, I spent Christmas in Colorado with my entire family. Only the Lord could have ordained all of that time together because last week, we said goodbye to my sweet Grandpa. He was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer right around Labor Day, and three weeks later, on September 26th, he met Jesus. It was fast and furious, but knowing how incredibly sick and in pain he was, we’re all so grateful he’s no longer suffering.

I realized recently that not everyone gets to experience the blessing of grandparent’s like I have. Distance didn’t mean a thing to my grandparent’s. They were so faithful and never missed a beat or a birthday in our lives. Always involved, always healthy and thriving, which is what made the last month so hard. I’ve been quiet about all of it, but mainly because I can’t talk about it without a big lump in my throat or crocodile tears on my face.

We celebrated his life together last week in Colorado with hundreds of family and friends gathered and honored his long and very blessed life that ended with a 21-gun salute to his service in the military, and the flag presentation to my grandma, which is incredibly moving.

(Can I just pause and say a big THANK YOU to those of you that sacrifice your husbands, fathers, brothers, uncles, grandpas, mothers, sisters, wives, aunts and so on and so forth to the military? Thank you is lame, I know, but I mean it. It is no small feat, and no small sacrifice. We appreciate them more than we can say. I hope you know that and feel that today if you are in that situation.)

My Grandpa is so deeply missed by all of us, but now I can brag about what blessing he was to literally everyone that knew him. Every morning last week I woke up at my grandparent’s house expecting to be greeted by his huge grin, kiss on the cheek and a, “Good morning my Lindselpie! What do you want this morning?” and then he’d list off every breakfast option imaginable.

I don’t know if it’s possible, but I fell in love with my family all over again last week. We got to do so many things Grandpa loved to do, like work on the puzzle he had been working on during his last weeks, laugh at thousands (and I do mean thousands) of pictures, re-tell his old (and sometimes inappropriate) jokes, take a visit to the mountains to visit the old cabin he built and they used to live in and eat his favorite foods, among many other things.

Sad? Yes. Despairing? No. We know we will see him again one day. Hard? Absolutely. But blessed in the midst of it all? Without a doubt.

So, if the blog has seemed a bit quiet, you’re not imagining things. In the middle of tweeting, blogging, facebook, Instagram, snapchat, and all things social media, real life happens. To all of us. I’ve learned that when real life happens, sometimes nothing is the right thing to say, and other times when real life you happens, you just have nothing to say. If you’re in the thick of it right now, and if you feel like you’re barely keeping your head above water today, I pray you feel God’s nearness. I know many of you are in storms that are unbearable. For that, know that every tear that falls on your pillow (and we all know those pillow tears, don’t we?) I have a deep compassion for you. But when we know God is near and in control, it makes life a little more bearable. Amen?

But just like I was reminded last week, it’s much more exciting to live life as opposed to making up things to write or tweet about. Can I get an amen? And my Grandpa lived life to the fullest. I could go on and on about him, but I won’t, lest I bore each of you to death. Let’s live a little life this week, in the midst of chaos, blessing, sadness, and joyful occasions, let us express our hope in Jesus and live. Because where there is hope, there is life.

I thought about not sharing any pictures with you all, but that just felt wrong. So, I’ll share a few of my favorites pictures and memories from this last week that we got to smile over.

One thing I want you to notice is my Grandpa’s pocket protector in each picture. He OWNED that pocket protector and wore it literally my entire life. Can you say fashionista? Laughing.

I can honestly tell you that Grandpa never withheld one ounce of love. He loved so well.

I just thought this was fun. We were looking through some books and found this picture of Grandpa during the Korean war. “Nothing like an early morning shave with cold water out in the open.” (That is something I cannot relate to. Grin.)

This was just two months ago celebrating my grandparent’s 60th anniversary. Such a treasure right here in this picture.

Me and Grandpa and couple of years ago. Again, notice the pocket protector and pens. I hope it makes you smile as much as me. (Side note: He wrote EVERYTHING down, everyday. From sun-up to sun-down. That was fun to look back on.)

I am sure this sight is familiar to many of you. To you, I say thank you so, so much and I am so,so sorry. But what better way to honor our military troops and veterans? So moving. So incredibly special.

In his free time, my Grandpa worked on puzzles of all kinds. Jigsaw puzzles, crossword puzzles and just plain old puzzles. This is the last one he was working on and this was as far as he got. We used to work on them with him, so you better believe we picked up where he left off and in all our might, tried to finish this one, but alas, did not. Too little time and WAY too hard. But it was a good memory to relive despite his absence.

We got one day last week to just be, so we headed up the mountain to visit my grandparents’ old cabin where they used to live. Right next to this lake where we used to fish all the time. (My Grandpa was the fisherman of fisherman.) Three of us may or may not have been wearing some of Grandpa’s old coats as we were not prepared for the cold weather. (Another side note: My Grandpa built every house he lived in, except the last two.)

The view right outside their cabin. A little Autumn snow had just fallen. It was chilly, crisp, breezy and beautiful.

I came home Sunday evening to this stunning sunset. We were driving out of the airport when my dad pulled over so I could get out of the car and take this pictures. It took my breath away. This was THE best welcome home banner ever. All I kept saying was, “Jesus loves me, this I know.”

After that sunset, we kept driving and then this happened. As if the first sight wasn’t enough. THIS? Unreal, y’all. And we watched plane after plane take off into that sunset. To say I was obsessed is a slight understatement. My dad didn’t pull over so I could take this, but apparently that didn’t matter. A moving car couldn’t even ruin this picture.

I don’t know about you, but it’s little things like that, a welcome home sunset, that remind me how faithful God is. That He sees. He cares. And He goes before you and me. I needed that. And maybe you do, too. He is so worthy of our faith and our trust.

And all the people said amen.