Can you believe our final gathering has arrived? The summer flew by, didn’t it? As I told you in this video, you’ll make your usual comments to this entry after your gatherings but watch for a final roll call one week from today. I’m going to ask every single INDIVIDUAL (each solo participant or member of a group) who completed all her homework to sign in with her first name and location NEXT TUESDAY. You’ll recall that we did this as we launched the study and we’ll do it again next Tuesday to give a shout-out for those who made it to the last page. (No condemnation to the ones that didn’t! These kinds of disciplines can be extra challenging in the summer which is precisely why we did this.) Because we want to set up as many people as possible for victory, we’re putting off the roll call for one week to offer a little grace period to finish. You can do it!
OK, so here are our discussion questions or statements for our final gathering:
One from Week Seven:
1. On the bottom of p.148 and in the context of promised blessing, Kelly writes, “Sometimes the Lord immediately replaces what we have left [as in, said good-bye to], and other times we are left feeling empty for a time.” At several very important seasons of my own life I believe God deliberately let me feel that empty space for a while before He filled it…even with Himself. If you’ve had a similar experience, share it and discuss what purpose God might have had in it.
This line of discussion also brings to mind the segment of Jeremiah 15:17 that Kelly shares on p.167 in Week Eight: “I sat alone because Your hand was on me.” Keep in mind that God created each of us to be a very plugged-in part of the Body of Christ. We were created for relationship but sometimes God draws us into a time of aloneness with Him so that He can work something IN US that He desires to later work THROUGH US. If you’ve had a season like I just described that had a pretty profound effect on you, share it briefly with your group.
The next three from Week Eight:
2. The intro to Session Eight was so powerful and dead on. Revisit the testimony about the married friend realizing she needed to get rid of the cards, letters and emails from the first guy she ever loved. Another friend shared a similar story with Kelly that she references on p.178. We can hang on to all sorts of things from the past besides old boyfriends and, often, until we really say goodbye, we can’t say hello to something wonderful God has for us. As Kelly’s been telling us for weeks, we’ve got to make ROOM. Discuss a time you came to a similar conclusion and acted on it. OR, if you haven’t let go of something but you know you need to, ask your group members to hold you accountable and pray for you to have courage to follow through.
3. I loved Day Three! Revisit Kelly’s first paragraph on p.173. What is the “bridge between the old and the new”? THEN, take a good look at Deuteronomy 6:23 in the margin of that same page and note Kelly’s abbreviation of it in the second paragraph: “He brought us out…to bring us in.” Girlfriend, that statement deserves an index card! Why is it so critical to keep that concept (not the index card but the abbreviation!) in mind?
4. The last two days of study out of the Book of Ruth were so good. Didn’t you love the last line of Ruth 1 (V.22) where we learn that Ruth and Naomi, devastated and grieved, entered Jerusalem, just “as the barley harvest was beginning”? Read John 15:8. As we draw our journey to a close, having moved out some idols to make room for Christ, encourage one another to believe God to move in powerfully and purposefully. Speak these words over one another, emphatically and with authority: “Your harvest is just beginning!”
As you conclude, please thank God for Kelly and pray His richest blessings over her.
I’m so proud of you, Siestas! Thank you for taking this journey in the Word of God with so many of your Siestas. We made it through the summer without a famine of the Word sending us into the emotional abyss! I sure love you.
Tags: Videos
Oh, honey – you HAVE to know you're NOT right, right?? You are so precious. My face hurts from laughing about your white elephant kitchen gifts!
I haven't done NOG yet, but have heard Kelly speak about it at our Church in Colorado Springs. Maybe soon!
I am, however, finishing Stepping Up – with my tight knit group of 4. What God has done in my life in the last 6 weeks, you wouldn't even imagine. We are thankful & praising God for leading us to our little girl in China, whom we hope to be united with this Fall! This study really has met us right where we are at!
I hope I get in in time to do a study with you online….what fun! Please do it again!!
My mom and sister and I are so grateful for this study! Here are our answers sort of morphed together from our online study across the world:
#1 empty space not filled:
Between breast cancer, the loss of a husband, and lonliness, we each felt a desert that seem unfilled. We actually each felt abandoned, like God wasn’t answering our cries during these times. It wasn’t until later that we realized God was still there and brought us through to use it in a later season. We felt even closer to God and realized all the more how He never breaks any of his promises.
#2 Letting go to make room:
Some of us let go of something purposefully,like a negative friendship, some of us let go of something unwillingly, knowing it’s for the best. We all agreed how painful it was or how difficult to stay disciplined. If you can just stay disciplined with God’s help, He will reveal himself far more than you expect! which leads to #3 Bringing out to bring in: we were reminded that the promised land actually turned out to be far greater than Abraham could have known, Deut. 11:10-12. What a refreshing truth that we need to always remember, although we endure such horrible things while living on this earth.
Thank you, Beth, for encouraging this study with Kelly. Our summer was full of truth, not a pit!!!
I have had a blast doing this study with my teens. Thank you for facilitating a summer Bible study!
1. God let me feel empty when we moved before He revealed how much more He truely had in store.
2. My dear youngest teen related this example to a Touched By An Angel episode that she had seen… The darling 15 year old said that she had to let go of her music dreams in order to move forward with her writing.
3. The bridge is faith. My dear 13 yr. old said, “He brought them out of what seemed like something good, to something better.”
4. The impact of Ruth 1:22 was made on my life at a LPL event – the Word is alive in my heart and life today – glory! So I could hardly wait to speak “Your harvest is just beginning” over my darling teens.
I’m believing Him!
Siesta Mama,
It was a sweet time as we finished the bible study. The group ended much smaller than it began, but the fruit in the hearts of the ladies who battled through was radiant! I don’t want to speak out of turn and represent God’s work in someone else’s life so I won’t share any details. Simply said, I am so inspired to watch the intimate work of God transforming lives. There is a harvest, and I am overwhelmed embracing the prophetic implications seen in Ruth!
Thank you for facilitating!
Jina from Oregon
I was solo this summer for the bible study and while I was hesitant doing it by myself at first… it ended up being a blessing. Completely enjoyed every minute of it!
Thanks to Beth and LPM!
Diana
Claremore, OK
Beth, I have so enjoyed this study! I have been doing it solo with another siesta through email – her name is Marcia but she lost a dear friend to her in the middle of week 5 &6 and I have not been able to contact her for us to meet on the last two weeks. Please pray for her, I sense through her emails that she is really hurting. I loved this study and learned so much through not only doing the homework but reading all the other siesta comments and of course your amazing videos. Thanks for encouraging us all to stay in the Word this summer. Julie (Alabama)
Siesta Mama Beth,
Nicole from South Carolina and Maria cristina from England checking in for this final NOG session – with apologies for our delay; we had to coincide the difference in time zones with our individual constraints, but finally we made it! here it is!!
Nicole and I both speak BLESSINGS upon Kelly Minter and her incredible work that has touched lives in ways unimaginable. Both Nicole and I are all the stronger in the Lord because of this Study, not to mention the incredible, absolutely incredible blessing of meeting each other online and forming a deep, deep bond that will go on to grow even deeper.
Thank you for this opportunity and privilege.
QUESTION ONE:
NICOLE: This seems to be a non-stop event for me but I have learned why, and it is either only to prepare me and strengthen me to become a woman of “”faith” and not a woman of “feelings” or I have somehow strayed and He simply pulls away ever so slightly so that I might feel an emptiness and I will have to seek Him to fill it.
MARIA: My moment of surrender a few short years ago was almost anticlimactic. I had expected a “big-bang”, earth-shattering type of event to ring in my new life as a child of God. Instead, it was a very quiet, subdued sort of affair… So much so that I felt a total and utter emptiness – one that I would typically rush to fill with my addictions – that’s how scary and unsettling a place it was …. But it was only a matter of time before I finally understood that the quiet and the emptiness and the loneliness (a sort of “suspended time” if you will) was the only way I would finally be able to hear from God – away from the cacophony of my degrading past sins.
QUESTION TWO:
NICOLE: This is an easy one for me as well being that it is very very recent. I, for 6 years, had held onto a friendship that god had been trying to tell me that I needed to let go of for both mine and my friend’s sake so that He could “start over” and “rebuild” it on a firm Godly foundation. I finally let go and almost immediately I could begin to see the results of obedience and how God was being faithful to His promise to me and to her. I’m just unfortunately pretty darn hard-headed and couldn’t see past my own wants and selfish desires to let the Creator of all good and perfect things mold it like He knew all along it would be better.
MARIA: I had to once and for all make the final and of-no-return decision to rid myself completely of the comfort blanket that was my addictive behavior – that false, absolutely false, sense of security and “safety” from the guilt of the errors of my life. That had to be done once and for all if I was truly serious and committed to cross that bridge from old to new!
QUESTION THREE:
NICOLE: Oh, what a deep valley the bridge can be!! There is always jubilee as we first realize we are on our road to freedom and everything God has in store for our lives but God seems to purposely leave out the next steps it will take to get to the other side or how long that road truly is before we reach total freedom. Had I known the pain of the journey, I am sure I would have never continued! God is great though, isn’t He? Glimpses are all we are allowed and for good reason! The more we lay down our idols, even the more faithful He is to hold us and strengthen us for the rest of the race for He knows what is just on the other side of that huge mountain we have been staring at and He wants with every ounce of Him to get us there. Thank God for that!!
MARIA: The bridge between old and new is the desert, the difficulty, the dry season, the test as we move away from the (for me life-long) bondage from our false gods and on to our ultimate and complete liberation through obedience and surrender to the very author of our faith, Jesus Christ (side note – what a revelation it was to take in the deeper meaning of the phrase “author and perfecter of our faith”!), This ultimate prize IS itself the crux of the matter and is the sole reason why it is absolutely crucial to keep Deut 6:23 in constant mind.
LAST COMMENT OF THIS BIBLE STUDY (“QUESTION” 4):
NICOLE SAYS TO MARIA: Well, Maria(Cris), I am speechless…. What God has done for us both through this study has been nothing short of miraculous. I am not at all sure what it was I had in mind when I started this thing with you some very short weeks ago but I do know that it seems I have known you for what seems a lifetime. God has used you to bring so very much joy into my life in a season when I truly needed some good ol’ joy and laughter. Each day it never seems to fail that you bring a smile to my face and God shows me with each e-mail and with each phone call what a true and loving friend is. We are so different in so many ways, I’m loud and restless and well, you’re not. I’m the loud friend!!! But you are so gracefully and humbly natured that it brings my somewhat radical nature to a rest at times and believe me at times I need that. I am so humongously proud of you!!!! You in just a few short weeks have made a drastic transformation! It has been like watching a flower open from bud to full bloom in warp speed!! God is so good that way isn’t He. You say I have taught you much, but my friend, in so many ways, you have taught me so much more than I could ever teach you. I just want to end this note by saying, Maria Cristina, it is my honor and most high privelege that you would call me your friend and to God be the glory for all He has done… thank you my sweet sister in Christ…
MARIA SAYS TO NICOLE: Nicole, the friendship and love I have “gleaned” from you since partnering “long-distance” on this Bible Study are such incredible blessings to me. I can hardly type without getting choked up in gratitude. Your strong walk in the Lord is such that is helping me tremendously as I learn my own path in the Lord as well. I know that this beautiful gift you have of being a great encourager, helper, GIFTED WRITER!!, counselor, and selfless friend is just one of the many blessings that our Father God is pouring on you as a result of your passion for His Word , for your incredible love for Christ, for your staunch obedience to Him. I speak continuous, abundant, ever-flowing blessings over you, my wonderful, beautiful friend and sister; and it is with the deepest of affection and total conviction that I say to you… YOUR HARVEST IS JUST BEGINNING!!!
We finished up our last gathering, and we were so sad for it to end. It has been good in so many ways–the Bible study and personal growth, and the sweet fellowship. What a wonderful God to bring us together! So since we are in a groove, we are having a movie night in two weeks with fondu to eat, and two weeks after that start “Wising Up.” Can’t wait!
I finished No Other Gods.
See you Friday!
Mary
Marion, Arkansas
Patty, Karen, and I finished NOGS, we loved the study and were sad to see if conclude. In Sept. we begin Living Beoynd Yourself.
Blessings to you, your staff, and all the Siestas heading to San Antone this weekend.
Annette
Richmond, Texas
Beth,
I am speechless…. This study has been nothing short of a miraculous divine intervention in my life. Because of this study, I was able to see things clearly enough to lay on the altar of sacrifice something that had been my consuming fire for way to long. I immediately began to see results and can say now that I am a new woman and may all the Glory be given to Him, the only true “changer” who can literally change our very DNA. I also was given an amazinig gift of friendship with MariaCristina. she and I live worlds away but God saw no distance and molded our hearts together in the most beautiful bond of sisterhood and friendship. So, I got a double blessing!!!! God is everything and He is all that matters. He is all that will ever matter and thanks to your act of obedience in having this study, I can honestly mean and say that with everything in me. I love you Beth from the deepest places in my heart. May God give you all your heart’s desire beyond what you could ever ask for or imagine! Thanks to you, Kelly, and most of all, God, another life has been reformed and transformed into all God intended. To God be all the glory, honor and power!!
Nicole, SC
Beth and staff,
My husband and I moved to this small town a year ago as led by the Lord to start a church~Darby Grace. I knew not a soul. God led us to a house in a cul de sac and within this street there are 34 kids! While the kids are playing outside, I have gotten to know some of the moms in a casual way.
I just started to read your blog at the beginning of summer after a friend encouraged me to. I felt this burning passion to start a NOG bible study and open it up to the community. Who would come? I had no idea and I had never done anything like this before. I hung fyers around town, at the local market, laundry mats….anywhere that I could find an empty spot. Deep down I was scared but at the sametime I burned with this passion to reach out to women I have never met before.
The first night came and I was shaking in my boots (OK, flip-flops), face down on the floor crying out to the Lord rescue me, don’t leave me now and thinking what have I gotten myself into…..(I’m notorious for doing that sort of thing) 10 ladies showed up I had never met before; some were from the neighborhood I had casually talked to. I had led Bible studies before but none like this, not a familiar face was looking back at me. I was overwhelmed and scared to death I wouldn’t be able to deliver, they’d see right through all my insecurities and not come back….and the worst I have to live next to them!!! The enemy could have had a field day especially with what we were called to do here. Did I happen to mention I was scared!
But God showed up and in a BIG way! Oh My gosh!!! He blew me away!
The group consisted of 2 ladies who saw my sign out in the community, a mormon neighbor, my younger sister, a mom of 2 who started atttending our church from a casual encounter at preschool, and the rest were ladies from the hood all but 2 had never done a Bible study before.
We met every week in my home. (I had someone who was going to lead it cuz I didn’t want to be a hog and host and lead. But 2 days before the study started, she bailed and I was left leading)
Long story short,….. We lost 2 but consistantly had 6 every week for discussion and yummy food. God showed up and blessed our time and discussions and my leading!!!
We ended up with 2 new members for our church. One of which was baptised this past Sunday for our first official Darby Grace baptism and rededicated her life to the Lord. Her whole family showed up! (I didn’t even know her before this study) The mom of 2’s husband was also baptised. What an overwhelming day! Who knows how the Lord will work in my mormon now friend/neighbor. This study has surely opened the door for many discussions that the Lord will engineer. Different ladies from the hood have come over for prayer for crisises that have arose since then. All I can say is OH MY!
What an impact it has been on me to see God show up and change the hearts and lives of the women who showed up couragously every week this summer. My faith has certainly been deepened…He is soooo faithful, Jehovah-jirah, and all powerful!
I wish I could send you a pic of all the gals from the last study. I morphed the simulcast with the last study and we dressed each other up as princesses using foil. We ARE women of substance. We have the God of the universe at our fingertips. Satan tells us what’s true but never the truth! Who are going to put your faith in? The Almighty God, who was and is and is to come. No God other is worthy!
He turned my scared to death into rich blessings that impacted Heaven. May the glory be all His!
I so pray that the seed sowen in these precious women this summer never be taken away by the enemy and their hands will be held over their hearts as a sign it is a treasure that noone can steal. God continue to do a mighty work this lives of these women and those they come into contact with. Take our fears and turn it into a harvest for the Kingdom! Glory be to God!
Many blessings from Plain City, Ohio!
Siesta Beth,
We had our last meeting today. I know that it is a week late but the summer has kept us all so busy. It was great! God has done some amazing things in our lives. So many of us could relate with the study. It is good to see the idols in our lives and know that we can be set free from them. Thanks for doing this, this summer. We love you
Siesta’s from New Hampshire and Vermont
Hi there,
I finished!! I have a propensity to love to start things but stop short of finishing, so this is good. 🙂
#1 There was a time when all of my friends, who I depend on for support and encouragement, had moved or were not available in certain areas of my heart, and I had to decide what to turn to….. God is so good, now I love to be alone with Him, centered in Him, and even have trouble finding that time.
#2 I think I hang on to what the past “could have been”, in my childhood, if only “my parents had not divorced, I had done this or not done that, we had not moved……..” and I look at everything through that instead of seeing and trusting God for how He will work good things out of it. I think my bridge is letting go, and of course MAKING ROOM for the new things God has coming momemt by moment……..
#3 and 4 I love the “bringing in” and the “harvest is just beginning,” no matter what the circumstances look like, God is so faithful to be leading and guiding.
Thank you again for organizing this Summer Bible Study, it was wonderful.
Love, Karen 🙂 🙂
Our group in Rochester, NY had its final meeting this past Sunday afternoon. I’ve been rather slack about posting our progress, but it’s just b/c we learned so much every study and talked about so many things that I couldn’t figure out how to summarize. So one of the group members, Avila, helped me figure out a summary at our last meeting (I’ll paraphrase her): “Each week we learned so much and each of us learned different things. The study meant a lot to all of us and we grew some new friendships as a result. It was awesome.” We plan to keep meeting and studying and praying together. Thanks.
Mama Beth,
We finally had our last Bible Study with the NOGS this evening. What a blessing to have participated in this study.
Thank you so much for facilitating this summer series.
Our group had the most blessed time together. There were definately some shackles being released! We are a work in progress and who but God knew that we had so much to let go of. There were things in my life that I never knew were idols until this study clearly showed me the truth. I don’t know why I seem surprised. HE truly does know best.
We are ready for our Harvest!!
In His Love, Lori
Hi beth, this is the first time I have ever watched or read any of these blogs. Shortley after I started reading them, I asked God to speak to me through what I was about to read! For the past month or so I have sort of had a dry season, and have been praying so much that it would just go away. I read your blog about eating the bread while sowing the seed. What good advice. I am going to start doing that. God has delivered me from so much and I KNOW will continue to do so! Then I watched this video blog and the part about GOD allowing us to go through something like a dry season is part of just letting us know what we really want. And I want HIM with everything in me! It’s is so amazing to me when GOD talks to me and answers my prayers. The Living GOD talks to me! Plus something like that , GOD is using to produce more trust in us for HIM! and that never hurts! Praise HIM for letting me want HIM! And I most certainley do! GOD is so very good! PRAISE HIM!