Okay, so I've been trying to come up with things to do every day so I make sure I am posting what I learn. And have some accountability. So far I have...
Sunday--I will read through a few chapters of the Bible and post what I think or learned.
Monday--I will read a chapter or two of Psalms and post my thoughts on it.
Tuesday--Will continue to be Reader's Pick.
Wednesday--Weekly reading/thoughts of Philippians
Thursday--I will read Proverbs and post what I learned from it.
Friday--I will post a little something from the book called, "Gaining Favor with God and man".
Saturday--I will post on what the week was about in the devotion book I'm doing called 'Up'.
Also, I want to apologize for not posting this past Tuesday for Reader's Pick. I'm going through some struggles and I haven't been doing very good spiritually. Please pray for me if you think about it! Thanks everyone!!!
~Emily
Showing posts with label Motivation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Motivation. Show all posts
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Tuesday, January 1, 2008
New Year
Well, happy new year everyone!! I have my resolutions for the year, a.k.a. goals. You can see them when you scroll down on the right hand side. I just finished my devotions for the day. I decided to do the devotional book that my mom got me for the year instead of the other one. And then I read my Bible in 90 days challenge. It took me a little over an hour and I stayed decently focused. I was surprised. In the devotional book I did it has a hymn and then a little bit about the hymn and a verse. Today was really good. It talked about how at the beginning of a new year we can be thankful that we have another whole year to be with God, whether we live the whole year or die, we will still be with God. It was just really good. The hymn talked about another year being a servant for God and the way it was laid out was soo great!
Well, I am sorry that this is late...But I was traveling and doing my devotions when I got home.
Today's Bible reading is Genesis 1:1-Genesis16:16 if you are doing the Bible challenge.
I'll do better tomorrow now that I'm home!
~Emily
P.S. --I will post the Reader's Pick tomorrow because of lack of time. And I will put up the new poll as well.
Well, I am sorry that this is late...But I was traveling and doing my devotions when I got home.
Today's Bible reading is Genesis 1:1-Genesis16:16 if you are doing the Bible challenge.
I'll do better tomorrow now that I'm home!
~Emily
P.S. --I will post the Reader's Pick tomorrow because of lack of time. And I will put up the new poll as well.
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Very Blessed
In December 25th's Our Daily Bread [find the link under Devotion Sites] the story is about a couple going through some really hard trials with money.
They decided to have a party and invite all their friends. For a tree they had what they called a "Blessing Tree". It had pieces of paper tied on as ornaments and each paper had a blessing on it that the Lord had provided through the year.
Instead of getting upset because they didn't have much money to spend, they stayed focused on God and remembered to praise Him for their blessings.
Starting January 1st, every time something happens that is blessing, I'm going to write it on a piece of paper. Then in December I will start hanging them on my little Christmas tree. The ones that don't fit I will hang elsewhere in my room. What a great way to remember what God has done for you! I hope that you may try the same thing and write all your blessings down!
~Emily
They decided to have a party and invite all their friends. For a tree they had what they called a "Blessing Tree". It had pieces of paper tied on as ornaments and each paper had a blessing on it that the Lord had provided through the year.
Instead of getting upset because they didn't have much money to spend, they stayed focused on God and remembered to praise Him for their blessings.
Starting January 1st, every time something happens that is blessing, I'm going to write it on a piece of paper. Then in December I will start hanging them on my little Christmas tree. The ones that don't fit I will hang elsewhere in my room. What a great way to remember what God has done for you! I hope that you may try the same thing and write all your blessings down!
~Emily
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Doubting God
Last night I didn't get to bed late cause it was so hot in my room and I couldn't get comfortable. I got to sleep a little after 11 o'clock thinking, "I'm NEVER going to get up at 5am!" I was just so upset...
Little did I know when I woke up and looked at my clock it was 5:06. 5 o'clock. I got up. And I was refreshed, and ready to start my day. [For the most part.]
Later as I was doing some school and thinking about other stuff, I realized...Saying that I could NOT get up was doubting that God would not give me the strength to get up. I pray every night that He would help me to get up every morning ready to serve Him. And I had... At that moment of realizing that I had doubted God, I prayed to Him and asked forgiveness.
How often do we pray about something, and often we have little or no faith that God will actually do it. Rick taught in Sunday School about it...
James 1:5-6 says, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed."
Matthew 21:22 says, "And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive."
What a great reminder that we need to have true faith when we ask God for help and to know that He CAN help us. I feel that God was teaching me a little lesson this morning...And my day went great too. I was happier, and felt refreshed all day. It's amazing what we often don't think about things like that when we need to.
And of course, following our answered pray of receiving help, we need to praise and thank God for the power to get through things.
~Emily
Little did I know when I woke up and looked at my clock it was 5:06. 5 o'clock. I got up. And I was refreshed, and ready to start my day. [For the most part.]
Later as I was doing some school and thinking about other stuff, I realized...Saying that I could NOT get up was doubting that God would not give me the strength to get up. I pray every night that He would help me to get up every morning ready to serve Him. And I had... At that moment of realizing that I had doubted God, I prayed to Him and asked forgiveness.
How often do we pray about something, and often we have little or no faith that God will actually do it. Rick taught in Sunday School about it...
James 1:5-6 says, "If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed."
Matthew 21:22 says, "And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive."
What a great reminder that we need to have true faith when we ask God for help and to know that He CAN help us. I feel that God was teaching me a little lesson this morning...And my day went great too. I was happier, and felt refreshed all day. It's amazing what we often don't think about things like that when we need to.
And of course, following our answered pray of receiving help, we need to praise and thank God for the power to get through things.
~Emily
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Learning Every Day
Today in my devotions I learned a little bit about submission. How we need to submit and surrender ALL to God.
Nancy goes on tell the other 4 motivations for our quiet time with God alone.
The second thing is direction. We should seek God's direction in our lives. With our schedules that we make, with our time. Nancy says that God needs to be the One who finalizes our plans. We need to pray and bring what we are doing to Him and ask for His guidance. One thing she said that I liked was, "So when someone comes and says, "Will you...? ...what do you do? You say, "Let me check with the Lord first, and I'll let you know." Full submission right there, along with wanting God's direction. We need to continually ask God what He wants us to do and tell Him that we want His will to be done and to show us what we need to do.
The third thing is Intercession. Interceding is the action of pleading on somebody's behalf. We need to call on God to help others, not try to change them ourselves.
The fourth thing is Transformation. You become like the person or Person that you spend the most time with. If you are with a none-Christian friend a lot, you become like them, if you spend time with the Lord you become like Him. Whoever you spend your time most with, or whatever you spend your time doing or thinking on, you will become like that. So we should focus on the One Person that we should want to be like, Jesus Christ. I love the way she compares things. She says explains the two ways of 'changing'. We can change 'metamorphosisly' or 'masqueradely.' {I have no clue if those I true words, but I just added the 'ly'} Metamorphosis means that you change from the inside out, and masquerade means that you only change on the inside. She mentions halloween. How lots of kids dress up and go trick-or-treating, they were costumes. They may be a clow or a pirate in costume, but that is not what they are in real life. She says out we often 'put on a mask' to try and fool other people. And the main place a mask is put on is at church so we seem more 'spiritual' than we truly are.
I have to admit I have done this, and probably still do a tad bit. But it's not so much a fake mask anymore than it is truth. I am truly changing, and I am not just 'acting' like I am changing. It's a great deal of hard work, but it can be done. And in the end, it is ALL worth it!
~~Em
Nancy goes on tell the other 4 motivations for our quiet time with God alone.
The first is submission. One thing that Nancy mentioned was that we often pray that God would take away our trials and temptations. We should not pray that He would take them away, but that He would help us get through them. Just like Jesus, He faced the temptations and everything we go through, but He was still submissive and did God's will, which was dying on the cross to save us from our sin.
The second thing is direction. We should seek God's direction in our lives. With our schedules that we make, with our time. Nancy says that God needs to be the One who finalizes our plans. We need to pray and bring what we are doing to Him and ask for His guidance. One thing she said that I liked was, "So when someone comes and says, "Will you...? ...what do you do? You say, "Let me check with the Lord first, and I'll let you know." Full submission right there, along with wanting God's direction. We need to continually ask God what He wants us to do and tell Him that we want His will to be done and to show us what we need to do.
The third thing is Intercession. Interceding is the action of pleading on somebody's behalf. We need to call on God to help others, not try to change them ourselves.
The fourth thing is Transformation. You become like the person or Person that you spend the most time with. If you are with a none-Christian friend a lot, you become like them, if you spend time with the Lord you become like Him. Whoever you spend your time most with, or whatever you spend your time doing or thinking on, you will become like that. So we should focus on the One Person that we should want to be like, Jesus Christ. I love the way she compares things. She says explains the two ways of 'changing'. We can change 'metamorphosisly' or 'masqueradely.' {I have no clue if those I true words, but I just added the 'ly'} Metamorphosis means that you change from the inside out, and masquerade means that you only change on the inside. She mentions halloween. How lots of kids dress up and go trick-or-treating, they were costumes. They may be a clow or a pirate in costume, but that is not what they are in real life. She says out we often 'put on a mask' to try and fool other people. And the main place a mask is put on is at church so we seem more 'spiritual' than we truly are.
I have to admit I have done this, and probably still do a tad bit. But it's not so much a fake mask anymore than it is truth. I am truly changing, and I am not just 'acting' like I am changing. It's a great deal of hard work, but it can be done. And in the end, it is ALL worth it!
~~Em
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