DeeperStill Oklahoma City from Rich Kalonick on Vimeo.

It’s time to announce the winner of our Fabulous K Giveaway. Woo hoo! The winner will receive a custom blog design as described on our previous post. Excuse me one moment while I do some fancy schmancy number generating on random.org. Here we have it…

736, you are our winner! Please excuse me one more time while I figure out just who Siesta #736 is. Ok, got it!

Kayte Elliott – Wake Forest, NC

My favorite color combo is blue and silver…although I also love the Red/Green combo because I love the tradition of it.
December 4, 2009 10:17 PM

Congratulations, Kayte! Email us at [email protected] and we will get you all set up. We can’t wait to see your fabulous new design!

Before I go, I thought I’d share some pictures from our snow day. The Lord did indeed bless us with a day filled with flurries! It was so fun. None of it stuck to the ground at our house but it was beautiful coming down.

Siestas, guess whose Friday weather forecast includes snow? Houston’s! Of all places! It probably won’t stick, but won’t that be fun for us? We got an afternoon of flurries last year and Jackson had the best time playing outside with the kids on our street while all the moms documented the rare occasion with their video cameras. We’ll all look like fools tomorrow but we’ll be happy fools!

Do y’all like our blog’s new Christmas design? Kelly at Fabulous K Creative whipped that up for us so we’d have something festive for the season. She has been wonderful to work with on our last two designs. Besides being creative and excellent at what she does, Kelly is generous! She has offered to give away a free custom blog design to one of our Siestas!

The giveaway is for a “Lovely Design Package” ($70 value) which includes:
-a custom designed header
-matching wallpaper sides
-color coordination of links
-name signature for bottom of posts
-(up to 7) custom sidebar titles
*Please note that Fabulous K only works with blogs hosted on Blogger.

To enter the Fabulous K Giveaway, just leave a comment on this post with your name and hometown. And for fun, let me know your favorite Christmas color combination. (Mine is red, green and silver.) I will close comments, do the drawing and announce the winner this Saturday night.

Kelly is also doing a huge 12 Days of Christmas giveaway on her blog. I told you she’s generous! You can enter that giveaway through the weekend.

*Comments are now closed*

Verse 23! WOW! We’re almost there, Siestas! I hope you are doing so well this winter morning. I had a little bit of a restless night like all of us occasionally have, then ended up oversleeping, like all of us occasionally do. I got out of the bed to a delightfully cold house from a northern that blew in overnight. We almost never turn on the heater because both Keith and I love a cold house and lots of heavy covers. This is particularly expensive in the summer but that’s another story entirely. This December morning I got the fire place going and sat down with my Bible to have my quiet time. About thirty minutes into it, my cell phone rang. I saw that it was Amanda and she rarely calls that early so, of course, I answered it. I always do when it’s one of my children.

“Hello?”

It wasn’t Amanda after all. The sweetest little sleepy voice on the other end:

“Bibby, we have a Christmas tree at our house!”

The Joneses had gone to get their tree last night and, when Jackson went to bed, it was still outside tied to the Suburban. Amanda said that she heard him come out of his room early this morning, take a few steps, stop dead in his tracks, and gasp. Then she heard him say, “An inside tree!! An inside tree!!”

I could hear him saying the same thing when he handed the phone back to his mommy this morning. He is utterly astonished that we get to have outside trees inside our houses this time of year. It is pretty cool, isn’t it? Amanda said, “You know, Mom, that’s the wonderful part about the age Jackson is right now. He was so little last year, he really doesn’t remember much about it. This year is a whole new experience.”

I wish it could be a whole new experience for you and me. And if we’re willing to be renewed and revived in our spirits and willing to let go of how old (regardless of how young) and beat up we feel from the poundings of this world, we could recapture that childlike wonder that makes this season unmatched.

Now, onto our 23rd Scriptures! I going to give you two sets because I’m taken with both of them right now but my official memory verse for this round is the first one. I think I told you that Curtis and I are reading through the Bible this year from Eugene Peterson’s translation so that’s why some of the verses jumping off the page to me this year are from The Message. I’m so accustomed to my beloved NIV that I can almost anticipate how certain portions are going to be worded. The beauty of doing some of your reading out of a totally different version is that they come to you with glorious, unanticipated freshness.

Here’s the first one:

The Spirit can make life. Sheer muscle and willpower don’t make anything happen. Every word I’ve spoken to you is a Spirit-word, and so it is life-making. John 6:63, The Message

The reason why this verse speaks so clearly to me right now is because, at this juncture in my journey with Christ, my usual “sheer muscle and willpower” aren’t cutting it. Only a Spirit work and a Spirit word are going to make a hill of beans of difference. That’s how my Nanny would say it.

Here’s the second one. Maybe some of you haven’t chosen your verse yet this round and this one will resonate:

When I walk into the thick of trouble, keep me alive in the angry turmoil. With one hand strike my foes, With your other hand save me. Finish what you started in me, God. Your love is eternal—don’t quit on me now. Psalm 138:7-8, The Message.

I used this verse for my devotional time with my LPM staff yesterday. I’ll tell you what I told them. This segment causes me to picture one of those huge battle scenes in the third movie of Tolkien’s trilogy, “Return of the King.” I see all the same characters and sights. This time, however, in my mind’s eye I see Jesus storming right through the middle of that bloody battlefield crawling with vicious and monstrous demonic creatures. I picture each one of us as a child running beside Him, little legs nearly flying, and He’s got our right hand firmly grasped in His left. With His right hand, He is swinging a mighty sword. Over and over and over again. I can almost hear it slicing the air. As we trudge across that battlefield, unending armies rage against us but He parts them like the Red Sea, slaying one foe after another with His double-edged sword.

It reminds me of another verse I memorized several months ago out of Psalm 112:

His heart is steadfast, trusting in the Lord. His heart is secure. He will have no fear. In the end he will look in triumph on his foes.

Amen and Amen.

You cannot imagine how I rejoiced to see many of you name your Siesta Scripture memory as the biggest surprise on your gratitude list this Thanksgiving. There’s just nothing in this human experience like being a child of God through Jesus Christ, abiding in Him, and having His words abiding in you.

So blessed are we, Siestas!!

Hold on tight to the hand of Jesus. This is a war we’re in.

My Sweet Siestas,

It’s a little after 7:00 PM on Thanksgiving evening and it’s just me and my best little buddy, Star. WHEW! We had a great celebration today that started with a bang. I had an abbreviated quiet time out on the back porch (it’s gorgeous and cool in Houston right now) then hit the kitchen tile running. I baked a ham, pulled it out of the oven and glazed it, put the turkey in the oven, and started setting tables. Everything becomes a table for holiday meals at the Moore house. Melissa and Colin rolled out of bed early and helped me get everything ready. She made the most incredible broccoli rice casserole. You’d think that dish would take the place of a green bean casserole but not in my family. They would be aghast. Amanda also came over early and brought that incredible pumpkin dessert. I made my usual Texas Sheetcake. It’s a family tradition. Curtis lagged behind another hour with Jackson and Annabeth so Amanda would just be free to help before all the company hit the house. My sons-in-law are the best.

My mom would have been super proud of my cornbread dressing again this year. It wasn’t my absolute best but it was really great. Keith’s parents, one of his sisters (the other lives in Japan), her two fine boys, one of my sisters and her two fine boys, the Joneses, Fitzpatricks, Keith and I all crowded in this very familiar abode of 25 years. So many memories here.

It was such a sweet day. We gave thanks to God, ate, all talked at the same time, laughed, and ate some more. The Fitzpatricks left the earliest because Colin’s parents, Joe and Jude Ann, live in our area, too, and they didn’t want to miss that celebration either. The two of them will probably gobble in their sleep. I remember those days really well because, when Keith and I were young, our parents also lived in the same town. We didn’t want to miss out on either family and would have gotten in the biggest fight if the other dared suggest otherwise.

Keith and one of his nephews headed for deer country by mid afternoon. (I told you he would. Has for 25 years. Uh, make that 30 but who’s counting?) His other nephew headed to the Texas A&M/Texas game. One by one all the other company left as well. My sister and I hadn’t seen each other in way too long so we hugged and hugged before she and her boys pulled out of the driveway.

Curtis and Amanda would not leave me here by myself until they’d cleaned the entire kitchen and even vacuumed my floor. I was astonished. I’ve had a dern herniated disk – the MRI said a “large” one – and, boy, has it ever hurt. I have never been a weakling or a person who preferred to be waited on so it’s really been hard for me to sit back and let people do certain things for me. This back thing has been so painful, though, that it has forced some sizable limitations. I’ve been so annoyed with it. That does NOT include putting down Annabeth – she’s within my weight limit, that tiny thing – although I have had to tell Jackson that Bibby can’t carry him for a few weeks. He dearly loves for Bibby to carry him.

After watching CJ and AJ whip my house back into shape, I packed up enough leftovers for them to have for supper when they got home and I walked them to their cars with their sleepy babies. Then, I came back inside, got down on my face and thanked God for my family, fixed me a plate of leftovers and savored every bite in front of the television. Have you ever noticed that you can’t really relax and taste the food as well when you’re the hostess? But afterward, you can relish every single crumb all by yourself and say, “Not bad, woman. Not bad at all.”

Well, Lis just called me and she’s on her way home so I better sign off. She’s dying for some of her mother’s leftovers. Can you believe it? She’ll eat then we’ll have some hot tea, put our aching feet in some hot soapy water, and talk all about today. Tomorrow we’ll do absolutely NOTHING. And I can hardly wait. I’m closing in on the last few chapters of a really great Christian fiction novel. Yep, tomorrow’s the day. Monday will come all too fast.

I am so thankful for each one of you. So grateful to our merciful God for the privilege to serve people like you. So thankful for my family. For my salvation. For JESUS. I thought it would be so rich to ask you to share one thing that you’re thankful for this year THAT YOU NEVER DREAMED YOU’D BE THANKFUL FOR. In other words, what has caught your grateful heart by surprise this year?

I love you. Happy Thanksgiving, my dear, dear fellow sojourners.

Hey, Darling Siestas! I have some really fun news! Remember last year when I began leaking to you that God was pounding a passion in my heart to see Him free women from the epidemic insecurity our culture keeps whipping up? That passion turned into a women’s survey right here on this blog where more than 950 of you lavishly and thoughtfully participated. It then turned into a men’s survey where over 150 guys were willing to offer priceless insight into their own insecurities AND what they perceived to be the most obvious insecurities of women. (That part was especially fascinating, by the way.) That continuing passion went on to become one chapter, then two, then three, then ten, then eighteen that spanned over the course of one of the most interesting years of my life. God went out of His way to trip every single insecurity switch I had and to make the pursuit so personal to me that I’d be willing to do virtually anything for freedom. This became the result:

(If you’re wondering why it has to have my big ole face on the cover, those kinds of things aren’t my idea. In messages like this one – and Get Out of That Pit – publishers often feel like a friendly face gives some familiarity to an unfamiliar message and takes some of the intimidation out of a hard subject.)

The book will hit the shelves on February 2, 2010. The reason I’m so happy to share it with you on the blog is because, Siestas, YOU HELPED ME WRITE THIS ONE! You are all over it. You made such a profound contribution that you are the very first ones mentioned on a lengthy gratitude page. Your reaction to the subject matter was so decisive that God used it to stir up the courage in me to do the research and go to the hard work a project like this demands. If I would have concluded that insecurity was just an issue to a handful of women like me, I wouldn’t have bothered with a book. I would have settled for a small group or dealt with it by myself with God as I have a few other less public and pervasive things. Instead, I knew from you that the problem was tremendously widespread and carried titanic repercussions. I knew from you that I wasn’t just imagining it to be the number one issue I saw among women across our country and across professions and ethnic backgrounds, and despite marital status or age. The research that followed the surveys only proved the point first made by you.

Since you were such a huge part of this process, I want to do something special and, God willing and ever-present, something healing here in our community. The vision on my heart is for us to go through the book together when it comes out. We will give everyone seven to ten days to acquire a copy then we will launch with a sign-up (first name and city, just to see who’s participating) and begin weekly reading assignments. We’ll read two to three chapters a week, then I’ll pitch out a couple of discussion questions per week that you’ll actually answer here through a comment on the blog. I’ll explain all of this in greater detail in January but I hope this will whet your appetite like the thought has mine. Even if you prefer to read the book in one week’s time, you can still review it as we go through it together and participate in our discussions.

Of course, just like the Siesta Scripture Memory Team and Siesta Summer Bible Study, this won’t be exclusive. There will still be other things on the blog so there’s no pressure to participate nor will it hog every bit of blog space for months. It will strictly be offered to anyone here in Siestaville who wants to take part.

We will wrap up our reading and discussion a week or so before the scheduled So Long Insecurity CCN Simulcast on Saturday, April 24, 2010. I’ll make sure we have proper closure here on the blog for our journey through the book but, for those who are able to find a location and participate in the simulcast, we’ll be able to end with an extra bang. I’ll also be able to use some of the insight I gained from you at that event. You are priceless to me. If you’re interested in finding out if there’s a simulcast location in your area or if you think your church might be interested in becoming a host site, jump on www.ccn.tv/bethlive for information. (Keep in mind that there’s plenty of time for new host locations to pop up in the coming weeks so, if you don’t see something in your area right now, give it a month or so before you conclude you have no place to attend.)

My goal here is ministry. Not book sales. Not simulcast tickets. I have certainly had impure motives in my life and impure actions in my past but God has graciously and mercifully guarded a sincere heart toward ministry for these many years. My life passion is to see people discover the power and freedom of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the World, and the life breath of His Word. My particular concern is women and we women have one whopping case of insecurity. It’s time we dealt with it.

Let me throw out one more detail and we’ll have as much information on this subject as you need for a while. When God began to formulate the plan in my mind to go through the book together as a blog community, I began to wrestle with the matter of finances for some of you and whether or not everybody who wanted to participate could afford a hardback book. I talked to Sabrina, my coworker, about it and that’s when the idea for a Christmas gift certificate hit us. This way, when your family members or friends ask for a few hints of what you want for Christmas, if you’d like a book, you might jot a gift certificate for it on your wish list. Just when we got ready to launch our LPM rendition of a gift certificate for SLI, we learned that CCN (the company hosting the simulcast) was totally on top of things and had beat us to the punch. SO, here is the link:

www.bethmoorechristmas.com

(If I see another “bethmoore” anywhere, I may throw up. Sorry about all of that. Not my doing but keep in mind that publishers or hosts are trying to make it easy to find or identify. Thank you for your patience.)

NOW, here’s the deal. If you really want a book so that you can journey through it with your sisters here on the blog but you absolutely cannot afford it and do not have a single person who’d get you a gift certificate for it for Christmas (or after Christmas), Girlfriend, I will personally buy you one. Gulp. That’s how serious I am about making sure everyone in our community gets one that wants one. After all other alternatives have run dry, just write an email to the ministry and let us know. Again, this is specifically and only for those who want to go through the book together as part of our blog community beginning in February 2010. If you’re reading this in 2015, the offer isn’t still good. But I love you.

This is one of only a handful of things God has ever led me to do that has some seeker-friendly possibilities. With this project behind me, I’ll go right back to my first love, in-depth Bible study. I felt as led of the Spirit to write this message as I did the curriculum for Daniel or for Esther or most of the rest of the studies. We have a serious problem and God has serious solutions. A whole lot of women out there in that big lost world struggle with insecurity. There is a very clear invitation to know Him in the book and my prayer – not my manipulation or hidden motive – is that they’ll discover what all of us so desperately need to find:

“The Lord is your security. He will keep your foot from being caught in a trap.” Proverbs 3:26 NLT

I love you so dearly, Siestas.

Your Mama.

*A note from Amanda*
Blogger is currently experiencing a comment publishing glitch. We can read most of your comments but we’re having a lot of trouble publishing them. We hope this will be resolved soon. Until then, there will be an unusual delay before you see your comments posted. We’re so sorry, Siestas! We love hearing from you!

Hey, my dear Siestas!

How is my favorite blog community doing this fine holiday season? It’s Monday and LPM is closed all week so we can all have an extended Sabbath and spend a little extra time with our families. The staff works so hard through the Fall semester of Bible study that, by Thanksgiving, everybody could use a rest in the worst – and best (we love what we get to do!) – way.

Melissa’s already here and her darling Colin will join us tomorrow. Our men let us have a special weekend just with the girls so she, Amanda, and I have already had the best time together. We laughed until, honestly, I pulled a muscle in my stomach. I’m not even kidding. I can’t remember ever doing that in my entire life but we got that kind of tickled when you think you’re going to throw up or your face is going to freeze in a contortion. The stupid part of it is that I can’t even remember exactly what originally got us tickled but it was in a restaurant and I doubt anybody was blessed but us.

We will have a big four-generation family Thanksgiving here at my house with several new guests followed by a tad quieter Christmas. Keith, the Joneses and I will all head to Atlanta soon after for the Passion conference. That’s one reason Thanksgiving will be our big holiday blow out this season instead of Christmas. Amanda is going to bring this incredible pumpkin dessert that you serve warm and I’m sure Melissa will fix something really good. She hasn’t committed yet. I’ll do the traditional Thanksgiving meal. As poor a cook as I am, generally speaking, I make a really good meat-and-potatoes meal. I can make cornbread dressing nearly as well as my mom did and Amanda lives for it every year. I have this small window of opportunity to be built up for my cooking so I relish the fleeting moment.

I can’t wait for the big family to see Annabeth. Jackson has always been a huge crowd pleaser and, boy, is his sister trying to hog some of his spotlight. She is at that stage where she is doing something new constantly. Crawling all over the place. Starting to say a few words (we should have “Bibby” mastered by Christmas), waving, clapping her hands, laughing her head off, and giving her big brother a run for his money over his toys. My firstborn is about to have her hands FULL because her baby is going completely mobile. I think God makes toddlers extra cute so their parents can bear the trouble.

OK, I’m anxious to hear what you guys are doing for Thanksgiving, even if it’s just regular stuff. That’s the best kind of holiday if you ask me. So here are three questions so we can see what everybody’s up to this week:

1. Where will you be for Thanksgiving and with whom?

2. Do you guys eat turkey and dressing or do you have a different tradition? If so, what is it?

3. What’s your one favorite dish at Thanksgiving?

Like you, we Moores, Joneses, and Fitzpatricks have so much to be thankful for. God has been unreasonably good to us but, of course, that’s the nature of divine grace. We have had a really challenging 2009 in several respects that we haven’t necessarily been free to share on such a public format but God has been active and powerful in our midst. Several of those situations are ongoing so you won’t waste a prayer on us right now. I will look forward to sharing about some of the things we’re walking through as we get to the other side and have some of the clarity and revelation that retrospect brings. Meanwhile, we need God enough for His Word to be such life and breath to us that we’re not taking a lot of spiritual time off…and that’s the way I like it. Many wonderful things have happened, too. I’m sure our lives are much like yours: a wild concoction of joy, laughter, pain, and bewilderment. Our one true unmovable thing is Jesus. He continues to be the uncontested center of life around here. Even when we waver, wander, or stumble, He remains steadfast and faithful.

Later in the week I’ll give you a chance to let us know what this holiday season finds you most grateful for. I’ll look so forward to that.

Amanda, Melissa and I are honored to serve you. You are loved here. Let me know what you guys are up to!

I have wonderful news. Maryam and Marzieh have been released from prison in Iran. Praise the Lord!

You can read about their release here and here.

They may still have to face a court hearing, so please pray that their release will be unconditional. Also pray for the restoration of their health, their protection, and that God will continue to strengthen their faith.

Psalm 98

Sing to the LORD a new song,
for he has done marvelous things;
his right hand and his holy arm
have worked salvation for him.
The LORD has made his salvation known
and revealed his righteousness to the nations.
He has remembered his love
and his faithfulness to the house of Israel;
all the ends of the earth have seen
the salvation of our God.
Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth,
burst into jubilant song with music;
make music to the LORD with the harp,
with the harp and the sound of singing,
with trumpets and the blast of the ram’s horn—
shout for joy before the LORD, the King.
Let the sea resound, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it.
Let the rivers clap their hands,
Let the mountains sing together for joy;
let them sing before the LORD,
for he comes to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples with equity.

Is there something you’ve always dreamed of doing? I’ve always wanted to do two things. Well, if I thought hard enough about it I could probably name a hundred things, but we’ll stick with two. First, when I was a kid I used to dream about galloping across a golf course on a horse. Don’t ask me why! Second, I’ve always wanted to work in a bookstore.

In college I was sort of an unofficial Beth Moore book supplier to a lot of the Christian girls on my campus. Our resource director, Diane, would hook me up with the books that had been requested and then I’d get them to my friends or friends-of-friends. The only problem was that since they were my mom’s books, I had the hardest time letting the girls pay for them. Diane probably had to mark most of them down as donations, which I’m sure she was pleased to do, but the point is I was a terrible book seller!

Even so, the dream of working in a bookstore has lived on in my heart. Every time I drive past a LifeWay store, I imagine myself working there. I think it would be so cool!

Well, this semester I’ve been getting to work at our resource table at Bible study with Diane, Evangeline, and several other co-workers and volunteers. It’s kind of been a scaled-down version of my dream and I’ve loved it! It’s been really fun to stand behind the tables and help our ladies with questions they have about the products. (But it’s so hard for me to take their payment. I’m still compelled to say, “Oh, don’t worry about it!”)

Tonight is the last session of our Revelation study. It’s been an amazing semester and I can’t wait to see how the Lord will wrap it all up for us. Some of you have asked if this series will be made available and I wanted to let you know that it will! Praise the Lord!

The Revelation DVD Set – Here and Now, There and Then – will be available after the New Year. We’ve actually been taking pre-orders for it on our web site for the last month. The product will begin shipping the first week of January and it will go out in the sequence in which we received the orders. If you’re interested in doing this 11-week series, you can see a video clip and pre-order it here. There is an accompanying listening guide that includes some brief weekly assignments. (Not full-scale homework like many of our other studies.) If you have any questions, you can email our resource department through the contact page.

As usual, I didn’t ask my mom if I could tell this on the blog because she’s generally averse to product promotion. But I wanted all of our siestas who wished they could be with us every Tuesday night to know that this is going to be available. At least if Mom gets mad and wants to fire me, I can now put book sales on my resume. Maybe a LifeWay store would take me!