Ways to Remember God's Goodness

In this Spiritual Life UPGRADE, Janet Thompson says our forgetfulness of God needs to stop with this generation!

“If we don’t remember what God has already done, we won’t believe what he is capable of doing in the future.” Janet says. “Memory builds faith.”

I (Dawn) am excited with Janet’s new book on this topic—Forsaken God?—not only because I shared a story in the book*, but also because each story encourages us to remember our good and faithful Father God.  

Janet continues . . .  

Today’s culture is quickly forgetting the goodness and power of our Great God.

The Bible describes the potential destruction through all generations to people who forget God. The dangers are paramount. We read the Old Testament and lament at how forgetful the Israelites were of God’s goodness.

Every time He did something good for them, they started grumbling that they needed something else. They repeatedly rejected God, even though He:

• freed them from bondage and slavery by miraculously parting the Red Sea for them to pass through on dry ground,
• provided manna from heaven,
• guided them with a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night,
• never let their shoes wear out even after walking for 40 years,
• and he offered them a land flowing with milk and honey.

God was only as good as the next miracle or provision. A forsaken God.

“But watch out! Be careful never to forget what you yourself have seen. Do not let these memories escape from your mind as long as you live! And be sure to pass them on to your children and grandchildren” (Deuteronomy 4:9 NLT).

We wonder at how the Israelites could be so blind and ungrateful. Why couldn’t they trust that a God who provided and protected them in the past, would do the same in the present and future?

But their memories were short. As often as Moses and God tried to help them remember, still they forgot. And at great sacrifice. The original generation freed from Egypt never got to see the Promised Land because they doubted God’s goodness. Even Moses wasn’t able to enjoy its beauty because at a crucial moment, he took matters into his own hands and forgot that God was in control.

We shake our heads at how dense and blind they were. But wait . . . can’t we be guilty of the same forgetfulness?

God has done amazing things in our lives too, but when the next crisis arises, we panic that He might not show up for us this time. Or when prayers are answered, we take credit ourselves or offer praise to someone else instead of giving God the glory and recognition He deserves.

But forgetfulness needs to stop with our generation. We live in a world that is quickly trying to eliminate God from the public square and even in the private domain.

Christians need to help a lost world remember God, and that starts with remembering Him ourselves.

In Forsaken God?: Remembering the Goodness of God Our Culture Has Forgotten, there are suggestions for ways to remember all that God has done in your life and then experience the power of sharing those memories in your sphere of influence and with the next generation.

One effective way is to share our testimony. As a Christian speaker, I give parts of my testimony every time I speak. “Feed my sheep” is my testimony of God clearly speaking those words to me. When I said an obedient “OK,” he revealed the "sheep" were women and "feeding" was mentoring.

That was 20 years ago, and today God has taken Woman to Woman Mentoring around the world as women enjoy the blessings of being in Titus 2 mentoring relationships. I still stand in awe as I write that story and every time I tell it from the stage. I will never forget how God used me to start a worldwide ministry and I give him the glory for the blessing it has been to so many.

But you don’t have to be a speaker to share your story.

Someone today needs to hear how Jesus changed your life. Our hurting world needs to hear from the Christian world the source of our joy and peace. Mentoring is a great way to share our testimony to encourage other women to know the Jesus of the Bible that we know.

In Forsaken God? there are over 50 ways to help us remember God.

Here are just a few:

• Taking pictures
• Journaling
• Reading our Bibles
• Receiving Communion
• Making a thankful list
• Joining a small group

What are some ways that help you remember God’s goodness?

Note: This article includes excerpts of Forsaken God: Remembering the Goodness of God Our Culture Has Forgotten, shared with permission. Dawn’s story appears on pages 121-122.

Janet Thompson is an international speaker, freelance editor, and an award-winning author of 18 books including Dear God, They Say It’s Cancer and Praying for Your Prodigal Daughter. She is also the founder of Woman to Woman Mentoring and About His Work Ministries. Each chapter in her new book, Forsaken God?: Remembering the Goodness of God Our Culture Has Forgotten, includes questions and conversation starters for discussion in small groups, Bible study groups, book clubs, mentors and mentees or with family and friends. It is available at Christian bookstores, Amazon, Christianbook.com, and signed at author’s website.

Graphic adapted, courtesy of pixabay.com.

Add Some Color to Your Quiet Time

Morgan Farr is a strong woman both physically and spiritually, yet she struggled with Quiet Time. In this Spiritual Life UPGRADE, she shares how she overcame her frustration.

Morgan asks, "Have you ever just dreaded doing your quiet time? Does it feel like doing what you are supposed to do, but it just doesn’t feel personal?"

Yes, that's a problem I (Dawn) have encountered many times, and God gave me a solution almost identical to what Morgan is going to share here!

Morgan continues . . .

Quiet time is one of those Christian phrases that can be overwhelming to new believers. As someone that didn’t have a relationship with Jesus until my 20s I can tell you, I used to be so very frustrated with "quiet time."

I tried everything that people suggested to be diligent in reading my Bible and none of it fit.  

A few things I have tried: 

• Reading just my Bible  
• Reading my Bible with with a Bible commentary 
• Reading my Bible with a concordance   
• Reading my Bible and taking detailed, organized notes 
• Following a Bible-reading plan 
• Reading through the Bible in a year 

None of it really stuck and that made me feel like the worst Christian ever.

I mean, really, what kind of Christian dreads quiet time?

Finally, one of my mentors suggested that I think about what makes me … ME.

After really thinking about it, I realized I like the academic side of studying the Bible. I love to study, but that isn’t enough. A quiet time is so much more than just studying. Quiet time is your time to communicate with God.  

So how would I have a quiet time and personalize it between just God and me? He is the creator of the universe.

When it hit me that the Creator of the universe loves me and wants a relationship with me, that changed everything.

The Artist of the universe, the Creator of color wants a relationship with me! So why can’t I add color in my quiet time?

I am that person who loves nothing more than a brand new pack of crayola markers, so using color in my quiet time just seemed natural.  

But how do you do it?  

I am sure many of you have heard of Bible journaling. If you google it—or check it out on Pinterest—you will find all kinds of really awesome examples. They are beautiful and delicate.

I tried my hand at it. But honestly it was a little much for me. I didn’t want to make a mistake in my Bible. I am an absolute perfectionist and the idea of illustrating in my Bible made me very nervous. I was unable to actually do my quiet time.

Since Bible journaling was too much, I had to come up with something else.

In lieu of creating an actual drawing in my Bible, I use a system of color-coded symbols to mark the text of my Bible. I gathered up the symbols from around the internet, and the colors were based off of my associations with each group.

What does my Bible marking key look like?

Purple is God’s "team members" (Father, Son, Holy Spirit...)

Red is the cost of our salvation (blood, cross, sacrifice...)

Orange is sin. because it makes me think of traffic warnings (lust, cursed, suffering...)  

Brown is all the things with earth (nation, land, home...)

Blue is the things we give back to God (prayer, repentance, believe...)

Green is the things God does for us (grace, bless, forgiveness...)

Pink is for family interaction (family, marriage, child...)

Using this system has made me so much more willing to do my quiet time! I like being able to look back at a text and see if it was more about the cost of our salvation or the gifts that God has given us.

I also like that it doesn’t take forever to complete my daily reading using this method. Having a one-year-old, writing a blog and running a full-time, functional fitness gym ministry doesn’t leave a lot of down time.

That means I have to be even more diligent about utilizing my quiet time with God to the best of my abilities. In Colossians 3:17, we read,

“And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.”

I am so grateful that God made me just the way He wanted to, with a love of Him and the color He created.

Does this sound like a system you might use? Do you use a different kind of coding in your Quiet Time?

Morgan Farr is an Army wife currently stationed at Fort Bragg in Fayetteville, North Carolina, with her wonderful husband Brian and their seven-month-old son, William. She is a homemaker who dedicates her free time to ministering to other Army wives through Bible studies, one-on-one interactions and physical training. Morgan writes about her transition out of feminism and into biblical womanhood on her blog. You can find her training programs on her blog, FarrFunctionalFitness.blogspot.com.

Fenced in by Love (Part 2)

In part 1 of "Fenced in By Love," we saw that God keeps and preserves His own "sheep"--the souls of those who love Him and are in a personal relationship with Him. 

Today, we're considering HOW and WHY God keeps His people.

This is important, because I (Dawn) think there is sometimes a misunderstanding when people think God has forgotten them in their difficulties. The truth is, God is always up to something beyond what we might be able to see or understand.

So let's continue . . .

3. HOW is the the Lord keeping His people?

This goes back to the words "keep" and "preserve." Does being kept by the Lord mean God's people will never suffer? No, it's clear from scripture that believers will suffer (Psalm 6:6-7; Psalm 71:20a).

The harmful effects of the Fall in Genesis 3 will touch all of us this side of heaven. We may suffer persecution and even death. But we can be steadfast in the midst of the most desperate trials (James 1:12; 1 Peter 1:6-9).

The Christian's perspective on suffering is far different from those without the Lord. Instead of fighting the testing process of our circumstances, we can ask for our Father's will to be accomplished, learn to see life's trials as a blessing as we seek His perspective, and ask Him for wisdom to proceed.

We are never left alone in this process. Our Father knows we are weak and this is an uncertain world, and we cannot fully protect ourselves.

He is "watching over the way of His saints" (Proverbs 2:8). I have no doubt, if we could lift the veil between heaven and earth, we would see His care and protection in countless ways: the car that missed hitting us, the poison we missed ingesting, the thief who somehow couldn't find our front door, etc.

Yes, many things do happen to us in this sinful world, but ...

We are proud people indeed if we think we are not in God's constant, loving watchcare.

Back to Psalm 121:7 for a moment. The tense of the word "keep" in that verse includes the future. It means God will keep us both now and forever. He is with us and helping us in our current troubles, and and He will ultimately rescue us from ALL our troubles.

God, in His perfect and loving will, may not rescue us from all our troubles in the here and now, but the Lord has promised protection from our ultimate enemy, sin (Romans 6:14). Sin no longer has the power to enslave us or determine where we will spend eternity, if we are in Christ. But we do have a choice about sin.

In other words, our future is secure in Christ, and no one can snatch us out of our Father's strong hand! (John 10:28-29); but will we trust Christ and live now under His provided protection, or will we go beyond the fence of His love and "sleep with the enemy," giving in to sin's control?

4. WHY is the Lord keeping His people?

Way back in Genesis, God told Jacob, "I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go ... I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you" (Genesis 28:15).

God has always watched over His people, not only because He loves them, but also to accomplish His purposes in and through them.

God absolutely has the ability to deliver His people, but it is not always His will to do so. For example, in His love He may allow a physical trial or some other trouble in order to purify us (James 1:2-3) or to show Himself strong in our declaration of faith (as happened with the patriarch, Job).

Sometimes Christians pay the ultimate price for their identification with Christ and their witness, as did the first Christian martyr, Stephen (Acts 6:8-7:53). God doesn't ask everyone to make the ultimate sacrifice, but He does call us to be faithful soldiers in the battle, wherever that leads us (Ephesians 6:12-20; 1 Peter 3:15).

Romans 8:28-30 explains God's ongoing and ultimate purpose for ALL of His children (the "saints" of verse 27):

"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified."

Our Father wants us to be like His Son; and He lovingly, faithfully chisels away anything that doesn't look like Jesus.

So we read these powerful words in verse 31: "What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?"

• It's not that we will escape bodily harm (v. 36)—we may even be called to martyrdom; 
• but rather, we are "more than conquerors though him who loved us" (v. 37)—we have spiritual and eternal victory in Jesus;
• and nothing will ever be able to separate us from the love of God in Jesus, our Lord (vv. 38-39). We are sealed for eternity through the indwelling Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:13-14).

No matter our circumstances, God is watching and involved with eternal purposes for our lives.

We are forever fenced in by God's love!

Are you struggling with a deep problem? How does a fresh perspective on God's purposes for you encourage you today?

Dawn Wilson, founder and President of Heart Choices Today, is the creator of three blogs:Heart Choices Today, LOL with God (with Pam Farrel), and Upgrade with Dawn. She is the Director of the San Diego chapter of Network of Evangelical Women in Ministry (NEWIM San Diego) and is a contracted researcher for Revive Our Hearts. She and her husband Bob have two grown, married sons, three granddaughters and a rascally maltipoo, Roscoe.

Church graphic adapted from pixabay.com.

Chisel graphic adapted, Image courtesy of bugtiger at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.

Fenced in by Love (Part 1)

Photos of fences remind me of two things: Some things are kept out; other things are kept in.

I believe the LORD has fenced His people in with love.

In this Spiritual Life UPGRADE, I (Dawn) want to encourage us with a truth we may not fully understand.

Psalm 121:7 says the Lord "keeps" His own.

The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. (ESV)

Other translations use the words "protect," "preserve" and "guard."

Over and over again in scripture, we see this:

• "The LORD preserves all them that love him: but all the wicked will he destroy" (Psalm 145:20).
• "You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance" (Psalm 32:7).
• "The LORD protects and preserves them—they are counted among the blessed in the land—he does not give them over to the desire of their foes" (Psalm 41:2).
• "The LORD is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for those who trust in Him" (Nahum 1:7).
• "And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto his heavenly kingdom...." (2 Timothy 4:18).

The Psalmist, especially, cried out to God for protection and was grateful for His care. In so many scriptures, we hear: God will keep, guard, protect and lovingly preserve His own.

Yet when I look around at the world today, I see those who claim to be Christians being slaughtered on the left and right by extremist movements. It's heartbreaking.

How does this square with scripture?

We have to ask . . .

1. WHAT is the Lord keeping? Is God promising to preserve our bodies? Or is He, as we see in Psalm 97, preserving something else?

"Hate evil, you who love the LORD, Who preserves the souls of His godly ones; He delivers them from the hand of the wicked" (Psalm 97:10).

As Matthew Henry wrote in his Concise Commentary:

"Care is taken for their (God's faithful servants') safety. But something more is meant than their lives. The Lord will preserve the souls of his saints from sin, from apostacy, and despair, under their greatest trials. He will deliver them out of the hands of the wicked one, and preserve them safe to His heavenly kingdom."

Our bodies are merely shells housing precious gifts from God: eternal souls. God says He preserves the souls of His saints.

2. WHO is the Lord keeping?

Is God keeping everyone? No, He is keeping His own, those He is making holy.

The Shepherd of the sheep knows and keeps His own flock (Psalm 23; John 10:14). "... The Lord knows those who are his..." (2 Timothy 2:19); "...whoever loves God is known by God" (1 Corinthians 8:3).

Note: the Lord just as clearly says he "doesn't know" others in the same kind of personal relationship (Matthew 7:21-23). Jesus knows how to identify His own sheep. He knows those who have not trusted in Him—those who are faking it or trusting in other "shepherds."

Yes, Jesus, the Good Shepherd of the Bible, loves His sheep, and He will faithfully preserve each soul in His flock.

Tomorrow, we'll look and HOW and WHY the Lord keeps His people.

Are you part of the Good Shepherd's flock and fenced in by His great love? If you're not sure, please read this helpful post (not related to my blog).

Dawn Wilson, founder and President of Heart Choices Today, is the creator of three blogs:Heart Choices Today, LOL with God (with Pam Farrel), and Upgrade with Dawn. She is the Director of the San Diego chapter of Network of Evangelical Women in Ministry (NEWIM San Diego) and is a contracted researcher for Revive Our Hearts. She and her husband Bob have two grown, married sons, three granddaughters and a rascally maltipoo, Roscoe.

Church graphic adapted from pixabay.com.

Rethinking Single Leadership

A strong woman of purpose, Nali Hilderman encourages women—both by her teaching and in her life example—to embrace Christian leadership at all ages and stages of life. She knows this is difficult for some single women.

“If you’re feeling unimportant in your singleness,” Nali said, “I’d like to challenge you with a biblical perspective.”

When I (Dawn) was a young single woman, a Christian ministry offered me strong reasons to see my singleness as a gift from God. I'm so glad Nali is addressing that in this Leadership UPGRADE.

Nali continues . . .

While there are many examples in the Bible of women that God used—some married, some single—we should focus on obedience to Him in whatever stage of life we find ourselves.

Nowhere does the Bible indicate that your ability to make a difference for Christ and His Kingdom is dependent on your marital status. 

However, I know sometimes it can feel like you’re overlooked and unimportant in the Church if you don’t have a husband and family. 

Here are three reasons you really do matter in the Kingdom of God.

1. Rethink Leadership.

We often tend to think that leadership is about position, personality or platform, which includes certain “requirements” you may feel you don’t have as a single woman. 

The reality is, leadership is mainly about the ability to influence others, serve them and—in Christian leadership—point them towards Christ. 

These things you can do successfully, regardless of whether you’re married or not. 

“Leadership is being alive with truth and love in your sphere of influence.”

That is something anyone can do!

Focus on those God has placed in your path, and work on serving and loving them. This is the most powerful form of influence.

2. Examine and Use your Spiritual Gifts.

Just as there is nothing in Scripture that indicates the gifts of the Holy Spirit are either “male/female,” so there is no designation that some gifts are given to married people and some are for singles.

Because of this, take time to find out what your gifts are and set about using them for the edification of the Church (1 Corinthians 12:7).

You can take free online tests to find out which gifts are your strengths.*

Also, spend time studying 1 Corinthians 12 to learn what the gifts are, what their purpose is, and how each gift is important in the body of Christ.

3. Steward Your Time.

I know this sounds cliché, but as singles we often have more time on our hands than our married friends. Paul is speaking truth when he says married people are concerned with the affairs of their spouse and needs of their children, while single people are “concerned about the Lord’s affairs” (1 Corinthians 7:32-35). 

I know it’s easy to spend time focusing on what we don’t have, but ask yourself, “Am I being a wise steward of the time I have now? Am I serving the Lord—using my gifts to edify the Body of Christ?”

You have the ability to make a significant impact on others during your singleness.

These are three important ideas regardless of what season you find yourself in, but they are especially challenging if you are single and feeling like you cannot have an impact for Christ.

You do matter in the Kingdom of God!

If you are single, which of these three points is hardest for you? What can you do to increase your effectiveness for the Kingdom of God?

Nali Hilderman is a professor of American history at San Diego Christian College, and Director of the college’s Dr. Henry Morris Leadership Program. She studies women’s history and Christian theology. Always seeking how to become a confident, successful Christian woman, she does not buy into the secular feminist mentality. Nali attends Journey Community Church in La Mesa, CA.

* Two free Spiritual Gifts tests are here and here.

Graphic adapted, image courtesy of pixabay.