God's Game Plan (Chapter 3)

The Balance:

100% God + 100 % Me

"You must be even more careful to do the good things that result from being saved, OBEYING GOD WITH DEEP REVERENCE, SHRINKING BACK FROM ALL THAT MIGHT DISPLEASE HIM. For God is at work within you, helping you WANT to obey Him, and then helping you do what He wants." (Phil 2:12-13 TLB).

God's Holy Spirit will be at work in me helping me to want to do what He wants and enabling me to do it. (eating right, loving Nate, doing chores, etc). A motivation towards godliness.

Think about what God has done in your marriage this year. Where have you seen His faithfulness to you as a wife? (Answering my prayer to get over the past. O God, You are good!)

During difficult times go away alone and make a list of all God's faithfulness of the growth in my marriage relationship, all I have to be thankful for. Remember what God has done and get His perspective on my present circumstance.

God won't leave me:

"I will not, I will not, I will not in any degree leave you helpless, nor forsake you, nor relaz my hold on you, assuredly not." The only triple Negative in the NT! So cool!

Christlikeness:

possesing the fruit of the Holy Spirit in one's life.

Give God my concerns - He wants them!

My Part:

"Moreover it is required . . . that one be found faithful (1 Cir 4:2). The world says, "it is required that one be found successful, rich, famous, and attractive," but God only requires one thing: that each of us is faithful."

Trust and Obey.

Trust.

We are to place our trust in Him for what He has already done and what He promises to do. Relating every circumstance and situation to His promises. In order to base our life's view on these promises, we need to MEMORIZE them.

Examples: Giving thanks in everything because it's God's will in Jesus for me.

Verbally claim the promise to God, thanking Him for it, and expressing trust in Him that He will fulfill the promise in His good and perfect time.

Obey

"Jesus asked the people to do all the things the could do: show Him the grace, roll away the stone, unwrap the graveclothes. And Jesus did what they could not: raise Lazarus from the dead!"

God does give motivation and feelings, but usually they come as a RESULT of our obedience to Him. We must first act.

Repetition and Discipline.

"Your trust comes from a certain knowledge of your own inability to live it; your obedience comes from the confidence that if you obey and trust, He will fulfill his promise, and His Spirit will mold you into His image."

It takes a while! A lifetime!

IF God wants to grow a cabbage, He can do it in a few weeks, but if He wants to grow n oak tree, He has decreed that it will take Him a lifetime. God is trying to produce oak-tree Christians - Christians who have deep roots who have learned obeidence, who have strong trunks that are not easily swayed by winds or trials."

He is at work in your life, molding you, changing you, encouraging you, helping you.

The Beautiful Blueprint (Chapter 2)

"A creative counterpart is more than just a helper. She is a woman who, having chosen (or having found herself in) the vocation of wife and mother, decides to learn and grow in all the areas of this role and to work as hard as if she were aiming for the presidency of a corporation."

READ: Gordon MacDonald, Ordering Your Private World

Proverbs 31.

Excellent means a "woman of strength."

Wise. Qualified for her work. Having command of her own spirit. Able to manage others.

A woman of resolution. Having chosen godly principles, is firm and faithful to them. She's rare.

Her husband

has reason to trust her conduct because of how she's treated him over the years. He knows she will always be loyal and never betray him.

"The most important thing to man is to know that the woman he loves is on his team. If the rest of the world calls him a fool and deserts him, she'll be there beside him."

His confidence rests in her ability to manage household affairs; comes home to find his family and house peace and order not chaos.

Never do anything to dishonor his name. Not confiding in her friend how much he hurt her - or get a laugh by listing his faults. She upholds him with the utmost respect.

For all the days of her life - a decision of the will (not an emotion) - regardless. Love endures all things.

"We do all things, beloved for your edification" (2 Cor 12:19). -

"I will do everything, my beloved for your benefit." <3

Industrious

Willingness to work with her hands. Maybe not "overjoyed" but willing. We ARE to have a positive attitude because we are doing this job for the people God has given us to love <3.

Am I willing to do hard work? Or do I look for ways to avoid unpleasant tasks?

Begging God for help when I'm hardly willing to lift a finger myself. House in disarry.

Organized

Say "good morning" to God first. (While it is still yet dark). I can be an important part of how Nate's day starts. Wake him up with a kiss :D A help to him to walk out in a pleasant state, food in his tummy, a kiss on the lips, knowing everything is good at home and his wife is happy and loves him. (Even if everything's not wonderful, we can lean on Jesus for it. I'm not alone.) I can ask him if there's a way we can pray for each other.

For Me:

have lunch and breakfast prepared night before.

Clothes picked up.

So well organized, she had spare time to be a business woman. Ask for time to think and pray about a decision before saying yes to it.

Loving

"She opens her mouth in skillful and godly Wisdom."

Don't give your best to other ppl and save the leftovers for your family.

At the same time, her love for her family extended to anyone in need. (Community/Local Church). Commitment of time and love - extending ourselves.

The praise of others means nothing when compared to the praise of those who know me the best.

"God wouldn't use her as the example of the "excellent wife" unless we, too, could grow to become like her. - Her inner qualities did not appear overnight but were hammered out in the trials of life as she trusted God and obeyed Him."

"The KEY to her success was that she feared the Lord." Begin where she did, with a vital relationship with God.

The Honeymoon Disaster (Chapter 1)

When there's problems in a marriage, the wife will usually blame 1)the hubby, 2)circumstances 3) herself.

Creative Counterpart

Gosh I am loving this book! I have to start blogging about it because I want to remember what I was thinking and feeling at the time.