Finishing Chapter 7

Hey girls!

Can I just brag on you a minute? I get so excited every time y'all cross my mind....because you girls are really seeking God. Through the good times and the bad....your diving into the WORD and truly allowing Jesus to change your life. This has me so pumped.

On top of the LORD really doing a great work on our individual lives....He is also adding the numbers as we have been so diligently praying for. Thank you Kari Cotney for pointing that out this Sunday. So with that said....give a big welcome to our newest member Tarra Gore! She joined our class this past Sunday.

Ok, two important announcements.....

#1 We have decided to provide money for the Clarkston, Georgia Mission trip that will take place next Sat July 12th rather than trying to organize a group to go this time. We will plan class trips to minister to the refugees in Clarkston in the next couple of months...so be listening out for that. But for now...please bring money (if you can) to class THIS Sunday for this mission trip. The money will provide athletic equipment to entertain and build relationships with the children.And if you missed this announcement last Sunday and you haven't a clue what I am talking about you can read about this mission opportunity here.

#2 We have our How To Study The Bible class next Friday July 11th from 5-10pm in the Senior suite. Please let us know if you plan to attend this class. Also....please invite other women to participate with us if you would like. It's open to everyone. Once we are done with Don't Waste Your Life we will walk through certain passages of scripture in order to practice what we have learned from this class so that we will be able to dig deep into the Word in our individual quiet time! I am excited about this. It's just another thing that God is doing in our class to further equip you and to plunge you deeper into intimacy with Jesus. Weee-Daawwgee!!!

We will finish up Chapter 7 this Sunday on Living to Prove that He is more precious than life. If you are filling out your activity log that you received on Sunday, please bring it with you to class this Sunday.

Oh! and check out this quote by Leo Tolstoy: "Our whole life is taken up with preparations for living, so that we never really live at all. " Think about it!

Ok.... I look forward to seeing you all on Sunday.

Crazy about you,

War Time Lifestyle

Hey girls,

We will continue our lesson on Chapter 7 this Sunday and will talk about a war time lifestyle verses a simple lifestyle. In the mean time...here is a message by Piper that I found on his website that will be good reading to go with our lesson. See you Sunday!

What's the difference between living for the Kingdom and living for the American dream?
by John Piper

The essential difference is, What are you trying to make much of? Do you want to make much of Christ in the world, or do you want to make much of yourself, your business, or your family? What are you passionate about seeing exalted, praised and enjoyed?

I want to put that central because if we don't ask the question day by day–What am I going to make much of today?–then we will gravitate towards making much of the same things that everybody around us is making much of, like sports teams, food, or a new computer program. None of these things are sin unless they become the thing that we're driven by.

The difference between a Kingdom mindset and a worldly mindset is the King. What place does the King have? Is he central in our affections, our vocabulary, and in what we want to see happen at work, church, and in our leisure?

Does the "wartime lifestyle" come easily to you?

No, and I don't think it comes easy for anybody. If it starts coming easily then it may result in pride. That may not always be the case, because the things we work hard at are sometimes the things we boast in the most. Pride is a very insidious and subtle thing.

When I say "wartime lifestyle" I mean something very complex. That's why I say "wartime" and not "simple" lifestyle because of this complexity. In wartime you may need to build a B-52 bomber, which costs millions and millions of dollars, in order to win the war. In a simple lifestyle, however, you wouldn't fiddle around with bombers. Instead you would just move out to Idaho, plant potatoes, and be irrelevant.

In a wartime lifestyle you always ask yourself, How can my life count to advance the cause of Christ? And if it means buying a computer to keep in touch with your missionaries through email, then you're going to invest several thousand dollars into a computer and software. That's a wartime lifestyle. But you might not eat out as often, or you might buy a used car so that you can buy that computer. That's what I mean by wartime lifestyle. The alternative is to just go with the flow. Everybody gets his toys: bigger house and car, more clothing, more fine food, etc., without even thinking about how the war effort is advancing.

Personally, I must battle everyday against drifting. It isn't about making choices so much. The battle is primarily against becoming comfortable with things that aren't essential to the war effort. So you have to check yourself. Sit down with your wife and ask, How are we doing with our spending? How are we doing with the use of our discretionary money for leisure?, etc.

I admit that this is difficult. I don't have any laws to lay down about what specific things you should be doing either once a week or never or whatever. It's just tough, which is why it is tough for me.

How does what you're saying accord with the prosperity gospel–the belief that external signs of wealth are a key testimony to the world of God's blessing?

It doesn't accord. We must reject the prosperity gospel. It's just dead wrong. The world is not impressed by the prosperity of Christians. What the prosperity of Christians says to the world is nothing redemptive.

I'm not saying that all prosperity is necessarily wrong. I'm just making the point that the prosperity of a Christian says absolutely zero about Christ to the world. Christians who simply follow the American trend of "moving up" financially and materially causes the world to simply say, "They're just like us! They love the same things we love and do the same things we do." This has zero witness to the world.

The person who follows the prosperity track must find other ways to testify to the world about Jesus, because their wealth, health, and prosperity are not saying anything redemptive.

My way of remedying this lack of witness is to identify that the prosperity gospel is wrong. Don't go that direction! Don't believe that prosperity is our evidence to the world that we belong to the King. It doesn't work that way. In fact, if you look in the New Testament you'll see that the things that bear the clearest witness to our faith are the occasions when we're willing to suffer for him.

A little child can understand that. Something is valuable to you to the degree that you're willing to suffer in order to have it, not to the degree that it gives you other things that you really like. God is not shown to be valuable because he gives us other things that we like more than God. God is shown to be valuable when we're willing, for God's sake, to let certain things go which we wouldn't let go if he wasn't so precious to us.

Our testimony to the world works precisely opposite to what the prosperity gospel says. When Christians are willing to suffer for the cause of the unborn, for racial justice, and for spreading the gospel, then the world is going to say–just like it does in 1 Peter 3:15–"Where is your hope?"

Our answer will not be, "In houses, cars, and lands." Rather, we will say, "My hope is in the Lord Jesus Christ, who is going to take me to himself. To live is Christ and to die is gain. I'm here on earth to spread the gospel. I'm going to keep my life as wartime as I can in order to maximize my effect for showing Jesus as valuable, not things as valuable."

God's Steadfast Love

Because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you. Psalm 63:3


Hey girls,

I am so excited about our lessons from Chapter 7. I am praying that you all are letting Psalm 63:3 cover your thoughts this week as you ponder whether or not you consider God's steadfast love is better than life. We know God's word is true....but is this verse true in our lives? Do we love our lives more than we love God? Once we get this...we will see our lives in a different light and we will begin to live differently. May God really prune us in the coming weeks so that we are being used for His glory!

Happy Birthday this week to Brenda Noto and Kristen Seals!
Happy Birthday to Kari Cotney on Monday!

I look forward to seeing you all this Sunday!

Brittnie

PS...if you did not see the Summer Quest videos and would like to check them out you can go here.

CHAPTER 7

Ladies,

I have a feeling that the LORD will step on our toes more so than we have experienced thus far in the new chapter (7) that we will begin this Sunday. Come and let's learn together how we can live in such a way that makes Christ look like the treasure that He really is!

Brittnie

Excited!

Ladies,

I don't know about you....but I am extremely encouraged and excited about what Christ is doing in our class. Do you realize how far we've come? Your love and hunger for God is growing and we are learning how to apply God's word to our lives. I realize that we have seen how short we have all fallen from what God has called us to live out....but the beauty of it is that He is teaching us and we are getting it. We are another step closer to living this thing out the way God intended. I am praying for transformed lives and our lives making a huge impact on the world!

We had a great night last Friday as we learned how to study the bible together. I have heard from many of you on how this gathering has made a huge impact on your life and your approach to bible study. On the flip side of that, there have been a few of you that were disappointed that you were unable to attend this meeting. So, we have decided to make this study available to you again for anyone that would like to do it for the first time or even if you would like to sit through it again in order to grasp more of what was taught. Please also feel free to invite anyone to do this with you as well. We'll poll on Sunday to see what night would be best for those of you that would like to attend for the first time.

We will start Chapter 6 in your books this Sunday, so please read that chapter. (it's a short one) The title is The Goal of Life—Gladly Making Others Glad in God.

Lastly, a big thank you to Melissa for filling in for me last Sunday. We had a great discussion and I appreciate you all allowing me to take a deep breath during her leadership.

I look forward to seeing you all Sunday!

For His Kingdom,
Brittnie

PS...Happy Birthday to Kimberly, Wendy and Shae this week!

A Call for Christian Risk

Girls,
This is a must read as we study our "Risk" Chapter.

http://www.desiringgod.org/resourcelibrary/topicindex/20_Risk/1203_A_Call_for_Christian_Risk/

Taking Risks

Hey girls!
I hope that everyone had a great Mother's Day!
We had a good start today on our new Chapter, "Risk is Right".
We all discovered that we are all not prone to taking any risks.
So, I see we all have a lot that God can teach us this chapter.
I am looking forward to it.

Don't forget that REVIVE is this Thursday. It will be the last one before the summer.
Hope you can all join us.

Have a super week.

Blessings,
Brittnie