I just have a few minutes to climb on here before my staff (and BFF’s) and I head to lunch. I just got a text saying we’re going to Luby’s Cafeteria so I’m already thinking about what I’m going to get. You’ll be happy to know after a year of being unhealthy and underweight and in bad need of surgery, I am back to my normal size and feeling ten tons better. (I am still dealing with some physical pain but I think it’s my trust from God right now. You’ll never waste a prayer on me but that’s another story for another time.) Anyway, the only unfortunate part about being physically healthy again and back to my real weight is that I can’t really get chicken fried chicken for lunch anymore. Grin.
Last night my man and I had the neatest experience and it’s on my mind so I think I’ll share it. We were invited to the 30th birthday party of a young woman we’ve known all her life. Kay’s parents and Keith and I have been dear friends since our early 20’s. Many years ago we served together in our young marrieds’ Sunday School department. Kay’s Dad, Roger (one of the finest men I’ve ever known), taught the men’s class and I taught the women’s. Each set of couples had 2 daughters almost exactly the same age. They grew up together at the same church and have known each other all their lives. We have vacationed together a number of times as families and as couples and leaned on each other more times than I can count. During difficult seasons, we have wept together and in times of victory, celebrated like wild people. Our oldest daughters served in summer missions together and met and fell in love with two guys from Missouri who were best friends. They each married those guys and were in each other’s weddings only two weeks apart.
We got invited to Kay’s birthday party because Roger and Mary Ann (one of the finest women I know) would be the only other older couple there. The rest were all in their late 20’s or early 30’s. As we sat at that table with our life-long friends right beside us, I looked around at those young people and remembered just yesterday when it was us sitting in their positions. We had so much life ahead. So much joy. So much victory. So much defeat. (I’ll just apply that part to Keith and me) So much need. Life – and marriage, for Heaven’s sake – is flat-out HARD. But you really couldn’t tell it last night. It was a celebration and time to put our troubles aside and boast in the graciousness of our God. And we did.
I thought last night how much God used that band of married couples so many years ago to keep Keith and me together through hard times and how much sweeter they made the good times. Many of us from that original young marrieds’ group at our church are still friends today. All but two couples have stayed together (no condemnation to those who haven’t – the devil is relentless) and through many very difficult times. None of us are without scars. None of us are as full of ourselves or as sure of ourselves as we were back then. We’ve been broken over and over and sometimes to pieces but last night there we sat, telling some of those people our stories and hearing a few of them say,
“That’s pretty cool.”
The way God ordained it, we don’t just need our vertical relationship with Him to make it in life and marriage. We need one another. We need Hebrews 10:24-25 kind of people. We need folks around us to cheer us on and even to question us and hold us accountable. We need people who will not only pray for us but laugh with us and cry with us. Eat Mexican food with us. Live life with us! We need more than Facebook and blogs and tweets, as much as I enjoy them. We need real people and real face-to-face, life-to-life relationships. Last night when Kay’s husband, Jerrell, prayed over her before we sat down to the birthday feast, for some reason Mary Ann, Roger, Keith and I grabbed onto each other for dear life and hugged each other with all our might. We are still standing after the enemy has done you-can’t-imagine-what to try to destroy us. Not one of us would take an ounce of credit. Jesus. It’s all Jesus. He’s been so much better to us than He had to be. He did not let the devil bring the destruction he wanted.
It seems only yesterday we WERE those young couples. In the blink of an eye those young couples will be our age, having endured what they were sure they couldn’t and having celebrated more than they deserved.
God is so good.
“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed but not in despair, persecuted but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed…Therefore we do NOT lose heart.” 2 Corinthians 4:7-8, 16.
Hi Siesta….
Please say a prayer for me…I am starting a MOMS IN TOUCH prayer group this Friday morning for our area year round schools. We started our school year 2 weeks ago. I did a prayer group several yrs. ago, it was strong but fell off after that yr. Another mom found me on the MIT website and I have the push I needed to start another one.
So here goes to PRAYING. Thank you to that one mom that called me!!!!
I know this post was about couples to grow w/, but I am really excited about this other mom to pray with!
Angela
Oh thank you for sharing your experiences with life long friends, and what marriage is, and the work that goes into it. My husband and I are young marrieds, and we are also newly weds, and we have the same exact goals above that you have described! To have one another, and get through the hard times. I just pray that God can bless us with other married friends to grow together with. That is the one part we are suffering with, and that is friends. Jesus loving friends. Thank you for the encouragement! Beth you are simply a doll! I love you!
My eyes have welled up in reading your blog tonight. We (my husband and I) have had a great weekend of worship as Mike Silva Festivals came with outreach to our community. If you haven’t heard of him yet Beth…look him up…he is doing a mighty work in the small towns of America after many years abroad. Anyway….despite the worship and praise and fun…I have felt in despair about our marriage. You are right…it is so HARD!!! On the way to the service today (day 3 of the festival) all I could think of in the car was “I can’t do this any more…why not just give up like so-and-so” I’m exhausted physically and emotionally. I needed to hear that its worth it tonight Beth, so thank you.
Working hard to work it out in Oregon!
Beth,
My husband and I have been married for 35 yrs (I like to tell people I was five at the time and adopted my children when they were 20 and I was six!). These have been long, hard years, especially coming from an abusive childhood, having two children with disabilities and moving around in the military so that we have no “friends forever”, but God IS faithful and it has been Him and Him alone who has kept us together and still does to this day. There is no one and nobody but God who could have kept us together and kept us believing in Him through all that Satan has thrown at us. This past year we have seen many couples married as long as us separate or divorce, the enemy just keeps wanting to get his way, but God is faithful and we praise Him for keeping us together and more in love than when we married. Thanks for sharing.
Good Morning Sweet Siestas,
I come before you in need of prayers. We are feeling very overwhelmed. We have had so many struggles over the past few weeks and it feels like they are still coming! We are very much feeling pressed from all sides!
*I am recovering from shoulder surgery- please pray for continued healing there.
*We have friends that are separated and have been praying feverishly for the evil that surrounds their family and marriage to be loosed, that God would bring them to a place of healing and that their marriage would be more beautiful than they ever imagined.
*We have taken my nephews in for an undetermined amount of time, as my sister has fled an abusive relationship, she is also struggling with addiction to alcohol and pain meds- please pray for God’s mighty hand to work in her life. Pray that we would have the love that the boys need right now too. Pray that the day to day functions in our house of now 5 children would run smoothly (ha!) and that we would not be overwhelmed. Pray also for our own children that their hearts would be full of love and they wouldn’t feel unloved with the extra needs in our home right now.
*Please pray for my father-in-law Ted. He had a massive stroke on Saturday and is still unable to speak, walk or move his right side at all. Pray for the swelling in his brain to go down and for his speech to come back…he is very frustrated not having any ability to communicate.
I love you all so much and you are so dear to me. I am honored to be a part of this great community of Siestaville where we can come with our needs and know we will be covered in prayer!
In Him,
Andrea
Andrea,
Sometimes the load is so heavy we don’t feel as if we’ll make it through the hour, let alone the whole day. Remember, “in our weakness, he is strong”, and to take your load to Him. Sometimes I need to do this every five minutes. đ I can not do it on my own strength and why do I always forget that? He is good and He is faithful. I too know some hard times right now, won’t get into it but will pray for you Siesta. Life comes in torrents sometimes but God is good!
Andrea,
I will be praying for all!
Blessings,
michelle
Hi Andrea, I will be praying for you. May you feel lifted up and encouraged by the Holy Spirit’s presence in the midst of your storm. You can do all things through Him who strengthens you.
Love, Karene
I’m praying that you will feel Jesus’ love in a fresh new way in these hard and horrible situations.
Pam
Andrea,
Praying for you!
Andrea,
You are feeling “pressed”, aren’t you? I will pray.
Wow! I will pray for you and your family. May you be able to rest in Jesus during these trials and difficulties and come through to the other side stronger and wiser.
Jennifer
Ladies-
Thank you so much for your encouragement and prayers! I so value the ministry that gets done through this blog! Thank you for your wisdom and your insight….Sandi you are so right….I need to take it one minute at a time! Thank you and keep the prayers coming!
Love you,
Andrea
Andrea, you and yours are added to our prayer list. May Christ’s peace, which is not of the world, flood your heart and your home.
Sending you big hugs and prayers, sweet sister!
Kristi
This is totally off topic, but Amanda: Pleasea thank Curtis for speaking at Faithbridge yesterday. He even attended the 5 pm service, and thank you for letting him do that, taking time away from your little family (I’ve got 2 toddlers, I know how precious Daddy time is). He did a great job of demonstrating practical application of using the Word to combat negative thoughts and influences. The last time I’d seen him speak was in your mom’s WatersEdgeClass, and he’d told about your mixed bag of experiences in England, starting the youth group there. Your family is precious, and, again, thanks for giving your time to Faithbridge yesterday!! (PS, my hubby was so bummed he couldn’t go. He was at home with our sick 17 month old.) -Amy (&Ben, who really wants to hear that England turned out better in the end đ
All I can say is thank you Beth!!! I love you more than you can imagine. God uses you so mightly in my life. I was just going to have a similar discussion with my dear friend about the same things and you just summed it up for me so I sent her the link. You are a blessing!
Beth,
I want to thank you for your bold stand for Christ and your deep love for scriptures!!!!!
Pam
That makes me think so much of our Young Adult class! My husband and I are one of about 12 couples in a smaller church. I would venture to say our Sunday School class makes up nearly half of the Worship services, especially when you throw our children in the count. It’s amazing how God has brought all of us together in this small town. Just in the last 5 years, we have seen each other through some scary times, some tragedy, some exciting times, and everything in between. It makes me wonder where we will all be, and what we will have gone through when it is our children in that young adult Sunday School class… Love reading your blog, Miss Beth! Bless you! ~Kristina
We all “need real people face to face”….
tell that to my husband.
This post makes me very thankful for the people that God put in our married life! We go to an amazing church with amazing people…and we have the privilege of having 2 best friend couples! One of the couples don’t go to our church, but when we meet, God is still at the center of us. They belong to a local church, we travel a little further for ours. The other couple DOES go to our church, and these are the people that if anything should ever happen to my husband and me at the same time, God forbid, they would get our kids.
Those kind of people. We’re richly blessed for such Godly people in our lives, and our sons each have best friends within these 2 couples. Praise Him for that. I don’t know what it would be like to walk through life without some BFF’s, but God willing, I won’t ever have to.
Thanks for sharing your heart. Love you in Christ!
Miss Beth,
I just got home from work and found the latest Christianity Today in the mail. What a wonderful thrill to find that you are the cover story (and the shots from Passion were pretty neat too – I was there!)!
It sounds so trite, but you and your daughters have been true heroines of the faith for me. Before the Moore girls, I had never seen anyone love the Holy Scriptures so dearly and proclaim that love so loudly. Thank you for loving Jesus and His Word and for saying that you do.
I’ve been praying about this hard subject for one of my “forever friends” and when I first read this, all I could do was be emotional and thank God for His perfect timing. We have been BFF’s for over 16 years, but also went to high school together, so we’ve known each other for almost 30 years.
She is currently going through a separation that she has asked for…and I’m heartbroken for her. My heart, literally, aches for her and at the same time I’m very much struggling with not judging. Please, please hear my heart there. I love her so much! But, she’s left her husband because, “I just don’t “love” him anymore”. And as much as I’m trying to be there, I’m not sure I can do it without hurting her more and I’d rather eat dirt than do that. But, I don’t agree with her, siestas…at all. We’ve prayed, cried, talked, and not talked (know what I mean?). She wants something new.
I’ve tried talking to her and telling her that Christ can make her marriage new. My husband and I have mailed her husband a copy of “The Love Dare”. My sweet friend who is the mother of two precious children, who I also adore, is leaving her marriage of almost 20 years to find something “new”. I simply don’t understand.
And I feel guilt. I was the friend that she came to when she wanted to gripe. I suppose that I assumed that like my marriage sometimes, she was just having a bad day with her man as happens in all marriages. Like most close friendships, we’ve been there for one another during those times, and frankly, I’m becoming convinced that the only person who should know about marital “bad days” is God Himself (excluding, of course, physical abuse or an addiction of some kind!). It’s just too easy to fall into a pattern of “cultural sorrow”, as Melissa’s book described, instead of a consistent pattern of joyful prayer and expectant waiting on the Lord. I’ve learned that while we may be “mad” with normal marital ups and downs, sitting around discussing them can more often than not lead to bashing sessions that quickly get out of control and create a stronghold of our own making!
I just didn’t see it coming. Most of all, I didn’t pray. It never crossed my mind that her marriage was in that kind of peril! How absolutely ridiculous of me and I can’t tell you how sorry I am for that. I’m praying now, though!
I long for my friend to allow God to come into her “house” and rebuild for her. But, He can only do that if she asks. Right now, she has no desire to do so. I’m asking each of you to please stand with me as my friend fights our enemy who has attacked her marriage and her family. Right now, all I can do is pray because she doesn’t want to hear it. So I’m asking each of you to think of her and her family in your prayers. He is the great Carpenter and I know he can build what was lost into something that is new and forever found.
Can I say I absolutely HATE, HATE, HATE what the enemy is doing to families all across our country and in the world?! I’m just spitting mad about it!
In Him, Kristi
Kristi, Oh how my heart cries out, âDonât do this!â for your friends. Iâve been there done that. When I was much younger, I was married for 5 years. We had two little girls. Life got tough and I decided it was all his fault and I deserved better than him. There are only two factors in a marriage â you and him â as far as the world is concerned. But Godâs plan is different. In Godâs plan, He is your commitment. I stood before God and made a commitment to Him to love my first husband for better or worse. When I look back, I donât remember the preacher saying, âLisa, you get to decide what is worse and can leave any time for something new.â I donât recall ever reading it in the Bible, but thatâs what I thought and the world backed me up. Two years later I was excited as I planned my second marriage. Not one time did anyone tell me that my new man would get old, too! Just like that new car that smells so nice. Life gets in the way and soon there is sour milk on the back floor carpet and hidden, half-eaten McDâs under the seats. It wonât take long for the new man to start smelling just as bad as the old man.
About 5 years into my second marriage it started again, but that time I felt the Holy Spirit grab me and say, âWho did you make a promise to? Did you not stand before God, in His house, and promise to love this man?â Right then I started seeking God for help and things got better but there were still things this womanâs heart needed that it never crosses my sweet husbandâs mind to provide.
A couple years later the Spirit spoke to me again and said, âAsk for your heartâs desire.â My heartâs desire was to love and honor God. So I asked God that I love my husband in the way God wanted me to love him so to bring glory to God. Not in the way I thought I loved him or for what I would get out of it from Doug, or the world thought I should â which are both very flawed and distorted. Godâs love is perfect. And if my marriage was to be perfect, it would only happen if God made it that way.
On Nov 14, 2010, Doug and I will celebrate our 24th wedding anniversary. Some days he smells really funny and I want to trade him in. Other days he smells like that new car and Iâm so excited. But every day, I make a new commitment to my Lord and Savior that I will honor the commitment I made before God 24 years ago. And every day I remind God that my heartâs desire is to stand before Him on judgment day and hear these words, âWell done, good and faithful servant.â Every day I ask God for my heartâs true desire â for His approval not manâs. And every day, God makes my Man perfect and I get giddy with excitement every time I see him or think of him (even when he smells funny!).
Listen up all you Siestas. God calls us out to be set apart. As hard as it is, stand by what God says, not what the world says, and Godâs word is clear â He hates divorce, and so should we. God will give you your heartâs desire when it lines up with His good and perfect will. God will make your husband perfect and everything God wants you to have in an earthly husband, then God will take care of the rest! My relationship with my husband stands witness to God’s plan. Praise His Name!
Also, lifting you in prayer, Kristi.
Thank you so much for sharing your story with me, Lisa. I’m so happy that you allowed God’s gracious love to flow in your marriage! Is IS so hard, but so very worth it. God works all things to the good of those that love Him…
Blessings to you sweet sister!
And thank you and Andrea S. for praying for me! I want so much to honor God in everything I say and do in all situations, but this one is so personal to me. As Beth says, you won’t waste a single prayer on me.
Kristi đ
Kristi-
Praying for your friends. It feels like everywhere I turn I see destruction in marriages and families. It can be so overwhelming sometimes. You are doing the ABSOLUTE best thing you can do for them….pray pray pray! Praying for you as well!
In Him,
Andrea
OH BETH, I CAN SO IDENTIFY….I’M SO SADDENED WHEN I SEE HOW THE ENEMY WORK OVERTIME TO DESTROY FAMILIES….I AM NOW WATCHING A GRAND DAUGHTER WITH A 2 YR OLD SON, STRUGGLE IN HER MARRIAGE. I ENCOURAGE HER IN THE LORD AND PRAY THEY WILL GET INTO CHURCH AND WALK THIS JOURNEY WITH JESUS AT THEIR SIDE…THAT IS THE ONLY WAY THEY WILL MAKE IT…I’M INTO MY 3RD MARRIAGE, BUT IT WAS INTO THIS ONE THAT JESUS BECAME MY SAVIOR AND MY HUSBAND FOLLOWED…WE JUST CELEBRATED 38 YEARS, BUT BACK IN ’96 WE SEPARATED FOR 16 MONTHS….I WAITED UPON THE LORD, BECAUSE HE TOLD ME TO (JESUS DID)….MY HUSBAND DID INDEED COME BACK, AND ALL THE GLORY GOES TO JESUS….IT TRULY IS HARD WORK, BUT SO WORTH IT WHEN THE LORD IS AT THE HEAD…..WE HAVE FRIENDS THAT ALSO WALKED THRU WITH US AND ESPECIALLY ONE MAN WHO WOULDN’T LET MY HUSBAND GIVE UP AND HELD HIM ACCOUNTABLE…..WE TRULY DO NEED FRIENDS IN THE LORD …. BLESS YOU FOR SHARING…..AND MAY YOU AND KEITH HAVE LOTS AND LOTS MORE YEARS TO GROW TOGETHER. LOVE, IN HIM, LIZ
I’m just wondering if Vangie’s wedding was this past weekend? I do hope and pray that day is gorgeous for her. So Stoked!
Thanks so much for writing about your experience last night. In the past year I suddenly realized I was one of the “older” women and part of the “older” couples. When did that happen??
Your comments are very encouraging.
this post really hit home to me, this wk I will be celebrating 31 yrs of marriage & yes it has been the hardest thing I have ever done. God’s love,grace & unless allowance of do overs is why we have made it to 31 yrs.
It really breaks my heart to see how Satan is destroying lives & families these days. I have directed 10 weddings in the last 6yrs (side job)& half have divorced. So yes Hebrews
10:23-24 is so needed these days !
Beth, you should write a book on marriage. It IS hard but, standing from the vantage point of 36+ years, I see more of the big picture and realize the importance of staying in it (and, like you, I condemn no one who hasn’t stayed–God only knows how many times I’d have liked to walk away). As one who has, by your own account, encountered rough times, you’re in a place to talk about what marriage really is all about. Just a thought from one Midwest girl trying to love Jesus more and more.
This is such an amazing thing, for you to write this, because last night, I went to Bible study, and we were on Week 4 of When Godly People Do Ungodly Things, and you were talking about these very verses in the video, although I think the videos were made seven years ago…and all your staff was there with you:) Your ladies that love you:)…and we had the best prayer time last night. We talked about the masks we wear, afraid to confess our sins to one another, as in James, which I am very much looking forward to because that verse, James 5:16 has been repeated to me about 5 times in the last week from different places too! All I can figure is that it must be significant. I think I’m like you were in that I am so afraid that I’ll mess up relationships that I tended to not get very deep with others, but now that I am trying, I’m ultra confused about some of my relationships. I need Him. I need Help. That is true, my friends and I have woefully thought that we know it all, pride is nasty. A whole bunch is about to come down the pike in the next twenty years…I’m glad you posted this,
Blessings to you today Siesta Mama Beth,
katiegfromtennessee
Hey fellow Beth Moore lovers-I found this website after reading so long insecurity and have never blogged before. I hope I am doing this right…
It’s really nice to know that there are other christian women that are just a click away. Have a blessed day!
I liked this post. Thanks for the story and the encouragment to faithfulness and steadfastness in marriage.
Hello Siestas, if you have read my comments before you know how excited I am to add another Bible Study for the future to my recommended Bible Study’s list. I am so exiceted! I just had to share. The Lord WILL provide your hearts desire. By chance, a lady mentioned to me a place where “a long time ago one could check out studies” so I went to this place. The receptionist said oh yes, we have studies anyone can check out for free. Let me show you our library. Praise God from Whom all blessings flow! A room full of studies (including Beth’s). I will never ever have to take even a breath between studying God’s Word. I’m on my 5th year of reading the Bible all the way through like a good little Christian girl should, but as Siesta Summer Bible Study Siesta’s we know there is nothing like digging into the Word with great teachers (Beth, Kelly). Seek and you shall find, and not only find God throws open a door! I felt like Belle in Beauty and the Beast when she saw the castle libray, mine is a library full of Bible Studies from Above, and through it I will receive a Kingdom and get to know my King! Woohooo!
Now I am thinking about stuff too! just different stuff. Ladies in Christ, please pray for me. I need some courage. My Uncle is terminally ill with only weeks or days left. I have been told that he was saved a few months ago, but I have never had the chance to ask him about it. Tomorrow I am going to visit before I leave on a trip. I am feeling pressed to ask him about it. I want to hear his story, but I am also afraid that I will upset my Aunt. Afraid that it will be a reminder that he is dying. I also want to hear it straight from him …that he is in Christ. Nothing is more important than his eternal security right now. I want to stand at the funeral knowing he is in heaven.
I am not really sure what I am scared of. How crazy is it to be afraid to offend at a time like this?
Dear Beth
I cannot begin to tell you how I literally inhaled your new book: So long Insecurity. It was as if, finally, someone could hear my silent scream. I felt SEEN, understood by a God who knows my every heartbeat. Thank you, thank you, thank you for being obedient and shedding light. I am sending you a HUGE hug and leaving a pink lipgloss kiss on your cheek, all the way from South Africa.
Fellow Clay Jar
Debbie xxx
Praise His Name. He’s so gracious!
I can understand the idea of being broken– just like you said, Beth, we all have been. God reminded me yesterday that a “pot marred” (Jer 18) can still be redeemed in the eyes of God. (www.onthegochristianwoman.com)
AMEN to that Beth!! What a beautiful testimony to God’s grace and power!!! HE IS SO GOOD, ALL THE TIME! Praises to our KING! God Bless
Love,
Christy
Summit, MS
Dear Beth,
I finished reading your book “So Long Insecurity” this morning about 3am and I just wanted to say thank you for being so transparent because in your transparency healing began to take place in my own heart.
I was sexually abused as a child from age 7 until 10 years old- So most of my life I have struggled with feelings of insecurity. Now I know I can have victory in Jesus- Praise His mighty Name- Thank you again for letting Him use you to help so many, many women struggling just like me.
Blessings on you,
Willerina