Becky Kiser is a dear friend who has a tremendous ministry over at sacredholidays.com. It is a ministry dedicated to connecting the heart of women to the heart of God during peak seasons of women's lives (the holidays they celebrate). Becky’s greatest aim in life is that her life would make a significant impact on her world for the name of Christ. She hopes women would find confidence in following Jesus, studying His Word and living out what He has said. Last week she posted the following on her own blog and we thought it might be helpful for some of you.  Make sure you go check out sacredholidays.com.  We promise it is well worth your time!

Whether married, single, divorced or widowed, for most of us our love lives are anything but a Hallmark Movie. There are no Notebook or Pride & Prejudice romances to be found. We are lonely in our singleness or lonely in our marriages.

So how do we cope on a holiday that's all about love? Not just cope, but if we are called to abundant life (John 10:10), how do we have that when things feel so womp-womp? How do we remain true to ourselves when our celebrations of love feel forced?
 
IF YOU WERE MY BFF, THIS IS WHAT I'D TELL YOU TODAY:

BE HONEST ABOUT HOW YOU FEEL

If you feel sad, be sad. If you feel indifferent to the holiday, be indifferent. If you feel in love, be in love. If you feel grateful, be grateful. Whatever it is that you are feeling about this day, feel it. It's OK. This doesn't have to be a big production of emotions, but it is so healthy to be honest with where you are.

There is nothing in the Bible that says you need to have it all together. It is a lie we believe that we think we should all feel giddy with Jesus joy all the time. We can take all our emotions to Him He can handle it. He has felt them. He allows them. Read Psalms if you want some proof!

CHOOSE JOY BY BEING GRATEFUL (Yes, you can roll your eyes at this one)

I know that seems to contradict what I just said but I promise you that this will turn whatever funk you might feel into a lighter thing, and hopefully even into a joy filled day.

A few years ago my husband, Chris and I were in a really bad place in our marriage. We had tried everything and nothing was working. One of the things that helped me come out of that really hard season was to see the good, as little as there might have been, in the present. I gave him a stack of post its and promised to write something each day that I loved about him. This was really hard to do, especially in that season. But slowly things began to change. I started to notice the good because I was looking for it. Sometimes we give our struggles too much attention when we need to focus more on the good before us. Four years later and our bathroom mirror is still covered in post its. We've found that when we seek to see the good it makes the not so good more bearable.

Struggling to see good in your current season? Ask your Father to show you. Ask for eyes to see.

JESUS ISN'T YOUR BOYFRIEND BUT HE IS (you get to choose)

I remember when I was a teenager and girls would say that Jesus was their boyfriend because they'd Kissed Dating Goodbye. (Anyone else read that book and gave that a try? Oh SO funny!) I'd roll my eyes (in my head because I wouldn't think to do it obviously, ha!). Listen, Jesus isn't your boyfriend, He is so much more than that. Boyfriends come and go, but He lasts forever. He is referenced as husband several times through scripture. This title can be lost on us because many of us have experience this role as being impermanent. Jesus is anything but temporary. He is constant. You can always, always count on Him.  
 
Today, ask your Father who He is. Ask Him what name He wants you to call Him. This might sound strange, but try it. Last week I asked Him this question and He gave me the name Daddy. I've always called Him Lord or Father and last week He worked on my heart to call Him Daddy, to see Him as Daddy. All throughout scripture we see God as different roles-- Savior, Healer, Author, Creator, etc.

Jesus is enough for whatever it is you are going through. Let Him come in and be all you need.

DON'T SOCIAL MEDIA BINGE OR SULK (It's not even real)

The endless flip of the thumb upward. We love it. We hate it. We can't stop won't stop. We swear it off. Then we are back again. It can be a little much at times. So if Valentine's day is a hard one for you, then maybe choose to stay off of it that day or next week. Others will be giving their loved ones lots of shout outs and posting pics of all the things that don't typically happen. You will see all the romance and the heart eyes. You will hear all things rosey.

Truth: About 95% of it is filtered, the other 5% haven't figured out filters yet. Ha!

Social media can be a beautiful place to grow community and celebrate with others. But it can be our pit if we let it. If you can tell that it's not good for you during this holidays, maybe just remove it from you phone for a few days. I can promise you that you won't miss anything important-- if it was you'll get a call or a text.

HAVE SOME FUN!

Yes! Go have fun! Regardless of if you are single or married, go and have some fun on Valentine's day! Here are some fun things you can do just because, not dependent on anyone else:

Do some random acts of kindness (invite a friend to tag along)
Get a new outfit that is all red or pink
Throw a fancy dinner party for friends
Have a cheesy chick flick night
Call 10 people who have loved you well and thank them for it
Make old fashioned Valentine's for your co-workers
Visit a nursing home or hospital and take treats
Drop donuts or cupcakes off at your local Fire Station

Praying for you this week!

P.S. If you haven't yet ordered your Lent study, then you want to get on that today! Lent begins in just 20 days. The Final Days of Jesus study is all about... you guessed it, the Final Days of Jesus. :)  There are scripture study days and also prayer, sabbath and justice days each week. 10% of profits provide Bible studies for women in prison. There is a study for women, men and families!

You can get the lent study at sacredholidays.com

It's February...the month of LOVE!  We found a fun blog by Ann Voskamp that includes a free February calendar that we thought you might enjoy.  She encourages her readers to give away what we already have in kindness and love to the world around us.  You can find an excerpt of the blog below along with a link to read it in it's entirety.  In keeping with the idea of her blog (and because we like giveaways) we thought we would do a book giveaway too.  All you have to do is comment on this blog post or on social media about your favorite activity from the calendar before February 13th at midnight.  We will post the winner of Ann's book, The Broken Way, on Valentine's Day.  Now hurry up and read the blog, download your calendar, enter the drawing, and join us in spreading kindness and love throughout our communities!  We can't wait to see who wins!

Because You So Want to Love Right Now - Ann Voskamp

You’re in, right?

You’ve got nothing to lose, right? And only a whole lot of unexpected joy to gain.

Dare with us in 2017?

Let’s start a bit of a kindness movement, a giving, generous, caring, broken and given and transforming movement, that moves us all closer together?

In tender times,  bruised with division — now is the time to all reach out our arms and give one intentional kindness, grace, gift forward today, every day, because now is the season that we live broken and given like bread because this is how we’re given a feast of love, of connection, of community, of communion.

http://annvoskamp.com/2017/02/because-you-so-want-to-love-right-now/

And Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day. 25 When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched his hip socket, and Jacob's hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. 26 Then he said, “Let me go, for the day has broken.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” 27 And he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” 28 Then he said, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel,[b] for you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed.” 29 Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him.  Genesis 32:24-29 ESV

I could easily insert my own name for Jacob’s into these scriptures right now.  You see, this has been my life since November.  Life threw me a couple of curve balls in the form of denial of good things for my children, and people just being fallen people.  The details of those situations don’t really matter.  Needless to say the aftermath was that I felt alone.  I felt abandoned.  I felt left behind and I felt that my children had been left out.  It is a pretty isolated place to find yourself, and it doesn’t feel good!

On top of all those feelings, there was this internal struggle between heart and mind.  My heart wanted to lean into all those feelings, but my mind told me that I wasn’t alone. 

I will never leave you nor forsake you. Hebrews 13:5 ESV

My mind told me that my Lord and Savior was fighting for me and that this was part of His story, but my heart didn’t trust it. 

The Lord will fight for you: you need only to be still.  Exodus 14:14 NIV

Be still and know that I am God. Psalm 46:10 ESV

I know all of these scriptures and can recite them by heart, but my heart just didn’t quite believe them in this season. 

I am six years into this journey from when my husband committed suicide and left me a young widow and single mother to two young and amazing boys, and I am still learning.  I stand before you solely by the sheer will of God’s grace and the promises found in those scriptures I mentioned a few minutes ago.  I know that there is no way in my human flesh that I could have done what He has called me to do over these past 6 years.  He has comforted, strengthened, restored, healed, and redeemed so much of my past and I thank Him daily for it.  But the journey is still hard…

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.  Romans 8:18 ESV

The plain truth of my situation is that I am beloved daughter of the one true King who is so thankful for all that He has done, but I want Him to do more.  I don’t want to be single.  I don’t want to do this alone.  I don’t want to sit and watch my children struggle with the fact that there is not a consistent male presence in their lives and the consequences that go with that.  I don’t want to, and if I am not careful, that mindset can become my focus and my purpose.

Set your mind on things that are above, not on things that are on Earth.  Colossians 3:2 ESV

I recently found myself sitting across from a dear friend and fellow widow who had lost her husband about a year after I lost mine.  She was also struggling with keeping perspective and trusting God’s sovereign plan.  She asked me the questions that I had been asking — no, yelling — at God for the past couple of months. 

Why do we have to be alone?  He is supposed to be this great big God, why doesn’t He send us someone?  Why do our children have to cry at night and walk this painful journey?  Why doesn’t He just fix it?!?!

I found myself hearing her and my mind started answering those questions while my heart hung on every word that the Holy Spirit Himself gave to me to speak into all those deep wounds.  I found myself saying, “We have to remember this is not about us.  Right now we have a myopic view of our suffering and it feels like it is going to last forever, but this is just a season.  I don’t have the answer to why, but I know this is His plan and I trust Him to bring it to completion.  There are things to learn in these wounds and we just have to have eyes to see Him at work in our situation.  He loves our children more than we do and we have to know and trust that He will work all of this out for their good and His glory.  And at the end of the day, I think the real question we need to be asking is: why do we think He is not enough?”

I sat back in stunned silence because there it was…the root of all the wresting and the tears and the emotion.  Why did I not believe that He was enough?  Why did I think that a man could stand in substitute for My Jesus?  Why was I looking around for a fallen human being to step into the shoes of the Savior of the World? 

I wish I could tell you that I have arrived at my answer as to why I would ask any of those questions.  I have partial answers and I am still pursuing the full answer.  I trust that together Jesus and I will seek and learn together why I don’t feel fulfilled by Him.  And I know that while I am seeking and searching He will be right by my side leading the way healing and restoring as we go, because that is what He does.  He allows us to wrestle with Him.  He allows us to get mad and ask the hard questions, because in the seeking and wrestling we find more of Him.  The healing goes deeper and the restoration continues. 

And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.  1 Peter 5:10 ESV

Will I still have days where I wish I was dating or married to an earthly man?  Yes, I am sure that I will, and I am sure my wrestling days are far from over.  But what I know now is that if I have eyes to see Him actively working in the lives of me and my children, ears to hear His word and a heart to seek after the Spirit that resides in me then the wrestling always leads to a more profound knowledge of Him and a sweeter and deeper love for the lover of MY soul.  That is a space that no human man will ever fill and that is a space that is ONLY reserved for Jesus.  The really cool part is that He doesn’t just leave me there, He lets me go on to be a part of His kingdom.  As I sat across from my sister in Christ I watched her open her own eyes to see more of Him.  There is always purpose in our pain.  We are comforted so that we may comfort others.  In fact, on the very day of the six year anniversary and two days after I had lunch with her, I came home from a Bible study which reviewed the beginning parts of Romans chapter 8…coincidence? I think not!  And I sat down to one of my favorite devotionals.  This was the scripture that I read that day:

Comfort, comfort my people, says your God.  Isaiah 40:1 ESV

The devotional ended with a quote from John Henry Jowett:

God comforts us not to make us comfortable but to make us comforters.

So I am officially done wrestling because quite frankly, there is work to be done in this lost and hurting world, and as believers He has entrusted us to work in the fields.  If I need to wrestle and ask the hard questions I have learned that is ok, but I can’t stay there.  I need to seek Him and find His answers and His will while I wrestle, and then get up, dust myself off, and get to work!  The world needs more of my Jesus — after all, He has overcome the world, and I am His ambassador as many of you are too!  If you are wrestling right now in the season that you are in I encourage you to find the answers that you need and then trust and believe that He wants you representing Him to this world in the field that He has called you to.

So I get what Jacob was saying in those opening scriptures.  He needed to wrestle with God to flesh out if He really was who He said He was, and afterward, God called Jacob blessed for asking those hard questions!  I claim that blessing myself because I am indeed blessed.  One day I hope I can say that part of that blessing is a deeply happy and satisfying marriage to a wonderful man, but if it isn’t in the cards for me that is ok.  Jesus has never disappointed me up until now and I know in my heart and mind that He never will.  I will pursue the fact that He is more than enough for me now and forever, and I will make every effort to let the world know He is more than enough for them, too!

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Romans 8: 37-39 ESV

Last week, one of our dear Overflow sisters left this world to be with the Lord.  Delorce Anderson was an amazing servant for the Kingdom.  She served her home church, The Church Without Walls, faithfully throughout the years.  She contributed to the prayer team, the student ministry, women’s ministry, and so much more. 

Delorce was married to Anthony Anderson who preceded her in death five years ago.  Even in the midst of her grief, she was a ray of sunshine to others. She faithfully and intentionally raised her 3 children on her own, pouring her love of Christ into their lives, and they are her legacy of faith. 

She was a special education teacher in the Cyfair district and taught at Truitt Middle School.  Delorce came to Overflow events several times over the past few years to refill her own love tank so that she could go back into these communities to pour out the love of Christ.   

We join her family and community in honoring her life and we are thankful that we were a small part of her journey.  Her three children:  Hananiah Rock, Azariah Strong, and Christian Love will be in our thoughts and prayers for many years to come!  Please join us in praying for this family and these children.  We rest with confidence in the knowledge that she is safely home with her Savior, Jesus Christ.  May she rest in peace knowing that she left a testimony of faith, love, and service in the hearts of her children and those who knew her. 

Back in November, Bayou City Fellowship had a special visitor that shared a special message on forgiveness.  RT Kendall is an author and teacher, as well as being the pastor of the historic Westminster Chapel in London until 2002.  He is an author of over 60 books and we were so honored that he came to teach at Bayou City!

I personally listened to this message over the Christmas holidays, and it had a profound impact on me.  I believed that I had done all of the forgiveness work I needed to do to deal with my past, but God is so gracious and gentle, and He showed me a new level that needed to be healed through RT Kendall's words.  They were healing medicine to an open wound in my heart.  Even if you think you don't need to listen, push play anyway!  His words are life-giving and true, and I promise it will not be wasted time.  Be blessed sisters and know that you are being prayed for and loved in a mighty way!

https://www.buzzsprout.com/43135/445862-mark-forgiveness-sb-rt-kendall

Happy New Year!  We are so excited to let you know about an exciting opportunity that has just gotten started.  Beth Moore hosts a scripture memory team every few years and it is time to do it again in 2017.  Many members of Bayou City Fellowship have taken part in this journey in the past, including our very own Natalie McGehee. We asked her to share a few thoughts with us about what the "Siesta Scripture Memory Team" has meant to her in the past.  This is what she had to say...

SSMT is life changing...memorizing scripture is really hard for me and doesn't come naturally.  But the Lord graciously and supernaturally equips and empowers me every time, as long as I will obediently commit, and do the work to memorize the scriptures.  The scriptures are ever present in my mind as I work to know them over time by heart.  They renew my mind and also become of great use in application.  It is one of the hardest and best things I have done in my spiritual journey.  It never fails that verses I have memorized become applicable, or even essential, in ministry and opportunities to pray over people or share with them.  In fact just talking about this brings up the scripture...

"All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness."  2 Timothy 3:16 NIV

I sure hope you gals will join the team this year!  I promise you won't regret It!

Natalie McGehee

So all of that to say, you should definitely sign up and join us on this journey!  The team officially kicked off on January 1st, but it isn't too late to join.  Beth Moore does a great job of explaining the process in this blog post...

 https://blog.lproof.org/2017/01/ssmt-2017-verse-1.html

Here is a periscope that Beth did last Saturday with a few suggestions on how to structure scripture selection according to what you are needing in this season...

https://www.periscope.tv/w/1DXxyVLyrmWKM

And finally here are your official instructions from Beth on how to jump on the team...

https://blog.lproof.org/2016/12/2017-ssmt-instructions.html

Your posted scripture is your registration to SSMT 2017.  You can post your scripture in the comments section on the blog above or on the LPM facebook page.  If you have any questions please do not hesitate to reach out to us and we will get them answered for you!  We hope to see many of you at the end of year party for SSMT!  I commit...will you?