Friday's Challenge on Posted by Rebekah

Every Friday @ 12:30pm (CST), you can hear a weekly challenge from me on Faith Music Radio.  My podcast is called Posted by Rebekah. You can listen online HERE or download the free app for your smartphone.  I would love for you to join us, listen and take the challenge!

Tune in any time of the day to Faith Music Radio for uplifting Christian music and talk. 

Here is today's podcast in blog post form. :)

The other day, I took my van in for a routine tire rotation.  I had been noticing that while driving, my van would start to shake about 60MPH.  When I signed it in at Les Schwab, I mentioned the shaking and they said they would check it out.

So all the kids and I are sitting in the waiting room, eating bag after bag of free popcorn (One of the reasons I love Les Schwab!)…life is good.  Until you see the man with the tire.  Then life becomes a little hairy.

He rolls the tire over to me and tells me that one of my wheel bearings are bad – causing this tire to wear down significantly on the one side as well as a slit in my actual tire!  Well, I then knew where this conversation was going.  It went very quickly to the place of ALL four tires needing replaced as well as the wheel bearing.  You see, when you have an AWD vehicle (which I absolutely LOVE and ADORE!), you can’t just replace one bad tire.  You have to replace all four tires.  To the tune of $1,000.00.  Sigh.

At that point, sitting in the waiting room of a tire shop with seven greasy fingered kids, and no van…you don’t have many choices.  You get the new tires.

It all worked out.  We came out a little poorer but definitely in a better and more safe vehicle.

The thought from this story being…one bad wheel bearing – an INTERNAL part – caused a lot of damage EXTERNALLY.  And that damage cost us a bunch.  
What do you have going on internally that is causing damage to you?  Bitterness?  Anger?  Unrepentent sin?  Ungratefulness?  Lust?  Apathy?  
There is so much that we can have inside that will eventually cause us damage on our outside.  And it will be at a cost that you may not be ready to pay.

So today’s challenge is:  Evaluate your heart.  What may be there that is causing big damage?  Take care of it while it is in the inside before you have to pay for it on the outside.

Will you take the challenge?

Friday's Challenge on Posted by Rebekah

Every Friday @ 12:30pm (CST), you can hear a weekly challenge from me on Faith Music Radio.  My podcast is called Posted by Rebekah. You can listen online HERE or download the free app for your smartphone.  I would love for you to join us, listen and take the challenge!

Tune in any time of the day to Faith Music Radio for uplifting Christian music and talk. 

Here is today's podcast in blog post form. :)

My five-year old, Summer, has a new thing that she likes to do with her dad.  She will come to me during the day and ask to call her dad who works at the church.  I will ask her “Why do you want to call Daddy?”  She will reply, “I want to ask him how many minutes.”  I ask, “How many minutes for what?”  She will firmly reply, “How many minutes until he comes home!”

So the other day, my husband had literally just left the house.  We only live a mile from the church and she asks, “Can I call Daddy?”  “Why?”  “I want to ask him how many minutes!”

I was chuckling inside as she called her dad.  I wanted to see what my husband would say to her!  She gets off the phone and I ask, “What did Daddy say?”  She says, “He said it would be all day – like 8 hours!”  I just laughed cause even though it was 8 hours…she had her answer of in how many minutes – Daddy would be coming home.

And you know my husband just loves it!  Who wouldn’t love their child calling them letting them know they want to see them…to talk to them…to hug them? 

I bet God feels the same way about us!  If you have accepted the Lord as your Savior, you are God’s child!  When is the last time you “called” Him during the day – maybe you are at work, doing the dishes, taking the kids to piano lessons, grocery shopping – and you looked up to Heaven and said, “How many minutes, Lord?  I can’t wait until our devotion time together!”

And God smiles down and says, “I’ll be here anytime.  I love you, child.”

I love that about my Heavenly Father.  So the challenge today is – Don’t forget God in the midst of your busy week.  Take time to look up and say, “How many minutes, Dad?”

Will you take the challenge?

Friday's Challenge on Posted by Rebekah

Every Friday @ 12:30pm (CST), you can hear a weekly challenge from me on Faith Music Radio.  My podcast is called Posted by Rebekah. You can listen online HERE or download the free app for your smartphone.  I would love for you to join us, listen and take the challenge!

Tune in any time of the day to Faith Music Radio for uplifting Christian music and talk. 

Here is today's podcast in blog post form. :)

The Bible says in Psalms 73:6, “Therefore pride compasseth them about as a chain; violence covereth them as a garment.”  One of the sins that probably 100% of us listening to this need to work on is the sin of pride.

Pride is a sin that is so easily fallen into…and so dangerous to our life and relationships.  The Lord says that pride is like a chain around you…weighing you down.  There have been more times that I can count that I would want to remember and admit…that I have been the person in a relationship causing conflict because of my pride.  Pride is an ingredient in every quarrel.  The Bible says in Proverbs 13:10…”Only by pride cometh contention”.

Have you ever tried to win an argument…prove a point…be the victor in a fight…and when you can’t, you can’t let it go?  It hangs on you  - on your mind – on your spirit – and literally, it can weigh on your physical body.  It feels like a chain around you – hanging around your neck.  You try to walk around, living life, all the time feeling heavy.  Pride is compassing you about as a chain.

What is happening?  The Bible says in Proverbs 29:23…”A man’s pride shall bring him low”.  Pride will bring you to a place so low that eventually the Bible says, “Pride goeth before destruction and an haughty spirit before a fall.”  Pride can literally destroy us and all our relationships around us.

So how do we guard against pride and its destructive path?  We strive for humility.  The answer can be found in Philippians.  We are to esteem others better than ourselves.  It is humbling ourselves such as Christ did when He went to the cross.  When we put the Lord and others above our pride and selfish desires, we will find ourselves freed from the chain that encompasses our neck.

So today’s challenge is in what situation do you find that you are in that you should let go of your pride?  In what relationship do you need to humble yourself?  I have those areas I need to work on and I want to get rid of my chain of pride.  I hope that you do too.

Will you take the challenge?

Friday's Challenge on Posted by Rebekah

Every Friday @ 12:30pm (CST), you can hear a weekly challenge from me on Faith Music Radio.  My podcast is called Posted by Rebekah. You can listen online HERE or download the free app for your smartphone.  I would love for you to join us, listen and take the challenge!

Tune in any time of the day to Faith Music Radio for uplifting Christian music and talk. 

Here is today's podcast in blog post form. :)

As I write this recording, it is snowing.  It has been snowing for hours.  That might not seem like a big deal when I say it is snowing.  But when you take into account it is spring…yesterday was Easter Sunday and I was out grilling in short sleeves…then it becomes…Ah ha!  I see where you are going with this now.

Change.  In big ways.  Extreme ways.  Ridiculous ways.

One day, everything is fine.  Dandy.  Life is sweet.  The next day, bam.  What just happened?

On those days where you feel blindsided by circumstances beyond your control just like our weather here in Nevada – Ponder these verses.

Malachi 3:6  “For I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not comsumed.”

Hebrews 13:8  “Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.”

After you remind yourself that Jesus never changes, look for the good that can be found as a result from those changes.  Maybe in the end, that change is what is needed for you to grow.  That change could be the catalyst for something bigger and better that God has for your life.  It says in Isaiah 55:8-9, “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

And the passage goes on to say (which I find very interesting in coorelation to my illustration of snow), “For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater:  So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.”

That change – the “rain and snow” in your life – is what will bring forth good!  It will bring forth new life – seeds that will bring forth and bud.  And after that seed grows, matures and is harvested, it will turn into bread for someone’s life.  God will not let that change return void.

And my favorite part is the ending found in verse 12, “For ye shall go out with joy, and be led forth with peace: the mountains and the hills shall break forth before you into singing, and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.”  That change will bring forth joy and peace.  What more could we want or ask for?

So today, the challenge is – don’t buck that change!  Embrace it.  Let it bring forth good which will end in joy and peace.

Will you take the challenge?

Friday's Challenge on Posted by Rebekah

Every Friday @ 12:30pm (CST), you can hear a weekly challenge from me on Faith Music Radio.  My podcast is called Posted by Rebekah. You can listen online HERE or download the free app for your smartphone.  I would love for you to join us, listen and take the challenge!

Tune in any time of the day to Faith Music Radio for uplifting Christian music and talk. 

Here is today's podcast in blog post form. :)

Different phones have different capacity levels. Sometimes, we can have the same brand of phone but one seems to work better for one person than it does for a different person.

My husband and I both have an Iphone.  His battery seems to last forever while mine can barely last through the morning. 

Our phones seem to be a mirror of us actually.  While my husband can last through a lot in a day and not even be affected, it doesn’t take much for something to affect my spirit.  My life battery seems to drain more quickly than my husband’s life battery.  It can be frustrating to not be as strong as him.  As resilent.

In Psalms 18, David begins the chapter saying, “I will love thee, O Lord, my strength.  The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower.”  What truth can we come away with from the lesson of a phone battery?

Don’t compare your strength with someone else.  I can get easily frustrated if I compare myself with my husband.  God created him differently than me.  The fact that we are different doesn’t make one right or wrong.  We are different and that needs to be ok.

Our true source of strength always needs to come from the Lord!  David, even when he was at his lowest point, he got his strength from the Lord.  The Lord was his rock, his fortress, his buckler, his high tower and notice, it says deliverer.  When you feel you are at your lowest…that there is no hope…the Lord is there to deliver you.  And why?  It says in verse 19…he delivered me, because he delighted in me. 

At the times that I am not strong….I am watched over by my Savior because He delights in me.  Delight means to please someone greatly.  Wow!!  How does the perfect one – the sinless one – delight in a sinner like me?  How can I please him greatly?  It is almost unthinkable-unimaginable.

So on those days when you feel weak…when you have absolutely no strength…take this challenge.

Don’t look at the person next to you and compare who is the strongest.  Look to the Lord and remember…My strength is from Him!  He delights in me! 

Will you take the challenge?