Are you living the abundant Christian life the way that God intended? Or do you feel defeated much of the time in your Christian walk? Do you struggle with areas and question if you’ll ever be able to gain victory over them? Are you growing as a Christian, or do you feel a bit stagnant? I was not living the abundant Christian life in college until Bonnie explained to me about the Spirit-filled life. Once
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When I was a little girl, I came very close to drowning one summer in Lake Plain Dealing. That event had a huge impact in my life. I remember waking up in the middle of the night and crying out to God, “Lord, you didn’t take me home. You left me on this earth, so you must have a purpose for me.” Even as a little girl, I felt a sense of purpose for being
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Is there a past sin in your life that haunts you? Something you hope no one will ever find out about; something you regret deeply. Sometimes you wonder if God could really forgive you for that sin. Or you feel that you need to punish yourself or serve Him even harder to insure that you’re forgiven. You may even be wondering if perhaps you have disqualified yourself from being used by God because of your
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If you read my post, Life’s Ups and Downs, you know that I had to recently put my sweet 11-year-old cat, Little Bit, to sleep because of a sudden blood clot one night. Even though it’s been seven weeks, I still miss her greatly. One of the things I have pondered since that night is the question of what happened to Little Bit after her death. Do animals just cease to exist once they die,
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Let’s say you meet someone who is a committed follower of Jesus Christ, but she just wants you to spend time with her. Is that discipleship? I would say that is the third level of discipleship: mentoring. People often ask if there is a difference between discipleship and mentoring or if they are the same thing. I believe there is a difference. Discipleship is the process of moving someone toward becoming a lifelong, committed follower
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Yesterday we looked at the first level of discipleship – a new believer or someone who has not been grounded in her faith. The goal of this first level is to ground her and give her a foundation for her faith. The second level of discipleship is a maturing believer who wants to grow deeper in his/her walk with Christ. They know the basics, they are grounded, and they want to grow deeper. The goal:
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Why do we not see more discipleship taking place around us? One of the reasons I have found is that even though people may sincerely desire to disciple someone, they don’t know what they would do with that person. Do I take her through a curriculum? If so, what would I teach her? Or do I just hang out with her? What do I do? In my last post, Will You Disciple Me, I
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If you were to ask someone to disciple you, or vice versa, what does that mean to you? Discipleship looks different for different people, depending on where they are in their spiritual journey and where they want to go spiritually. When someone asks me to disciple her, I ask several questions: 1. What are you looking for in this relationship? What do you want me to do with you in our time together? 2. Where
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I wonder how many people we have passed by this week who don’t know the Lord. Perhaps they were in the grocery store, in the neighborhood, at the gas station, at the mall or movie theater. To be honest, how often do we even think about it? I have to confess, I don’t think about it as much as I should. But why don’t we think about it more? Why is it not uppermost in
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Yesterday morning I visited a dear lady from my church who was admitted to the hospital recently. She is 94 years old and just in the past year had to move into an assisted living. Her memory sometimes fails her, but she always greets you with a smile and “I love you so much!” When I got word that Madeline was in the hospital, I immediately went to see her. We chatted for a few
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