Sometimes it is so hard for Grace believing women (women who know the apostle Paul is our apostle and take a stand for this truth) to feel connected with other women of like faith. We feel lonely, for lack of someone to share our faith or struggles with. Some of our groups (local assemblies) are quite small and we may not have anyone in the group who is of similar age or life circumstances. Or else, we just lack the time to keep up our friendships.
The body of Christ, however, is our real support group, and there are many women just like us in need of fellowship, love, and support. Maybe now that we have the internet, the Lord would have us to use it to encourage one another.
I received an email from a dear friend and she said to keep the letters coming, because she said they help to spur her on to study the Word of God. She knows and I know that Gods Word is our real comfort. It is this Word that spurs us on to do the Lords will, after filling our minds with it! Gods Word renews our minds (Eph. 4:23) through knowledge (Col.3:10). This knowledge does not come from daily television shows, magazines, knowledge from the world, but only from the renewal that comes from the Word of God. IICor 4:16 says, ...We faint not; but though our outward man perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day, and is renewed in knowledge.
Today, I suddenly realized I had not taken the time to eat anything. It was 1:00 p.m. and I was famished. I found I could not concentrate nor think clearly. At that point I had to take the time to make a salad, cut up some ham and cheese and take more time to eat it. How our spiritual need is like that of our fleshly bodies! We must take the time to renew ourselves spiritually on a regular basis, or else we become famished and cannot think clearly. I often hear some young woman say that she feels something is missing in her life. All too often this something is a spiritual need, and she is starving herself spiritually. What if I had eaten a Debbie cake (isnt everyone from the South?) for lunch? An hour later I would have been hungry again. The Debbie cake would not have satisfied. So it is with the junk food this world gives us. It does not satisfy! Read John 4:1-39 this week.
I hope and pray that all of my dear daughters and sisters in the Lord will not just read the words written here, but will read the letters written to them by God himself. I trust that each of you will read the passages mentioned above, because the necessity for brevity prevents me from copying all of the verses. Nothing I nor anyone else can say will comfort you nor renew your spirit like the Word of God can.
On a lighter note, the other day my daughter-in-law, Kim, made the best apple pie I had ever tasted. Its true and it was her first apple pie ever! I was thinking maybe it was that the crust tasted so good. It had a definite buttery taste. So, Kim, will you share the recipe with all of us? Or is it one of those, Ill give you the recipe when Im on my deathbed ones? (I have a friend who says shell give me her recipe for chicken & dumplings when shes on her deathbed! Some of you know who this is and you know she is in her seventies!) Since it is the fall of the year why dont we all share our best apple recipes, along with Kim? I am sure the younger women would appreciate this, (and our husbands, too).
Dont forget your testimonies!
Happy renewing,
Mary Atwood, Grace Bible Church, Chattanooga
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