It's me, Charity

Our women's bible study has been doing "Lazarus Awakening" by Joanna Weaver. We studied her two other books, which I blogged about last year, and we just finished this book. Sadly I was sick for most of this 8 week study so I wasn't able to attend many of them. But I made it back for the last chapter and boy howdy, did it really hit me. I have read the chapter twice since the lesson last week and I'd like to share some of it now. Hopefully this will translate to you, but I also want to write this for me, I want to remember what I learned and what God is trying to show me. This semester has been really hard for me. I've went through alot of hard health issues, struggles, I've seen people I love lose people they love, there has been so much pain and suffering that I admit, I have asked God why. Why do these Godly people seemingly have horrible thing after horrible thing happen to them? Why do I have to deal with this constant health issues that I feel all al...

Thursday night was our monthly Open Table night at church! I love going and hanging out with my Bible Study Babes! Especially now that we have finished our study for spring :( Here is my Bryna and her friend (who I can't remember her name because I am in the throes of Advanced Elderly age memory loss) with their FABULOUS glue Guns! I love them! And I totally want one like that!! Here is the project the Valster was working on. Easter Cards! After I left, (of course) I had the brilliant idea that next month instead of torturnig people taking their picture, I'm going to take pictures at the end of what they worked on! That way people can come in their yoga pants and pony tails with no fear:) And some of the crafts they do are super amazing! I am in awe of what you can do with a Cricut! So stay tuned for next month's post!! You will be blown away! Bryna and I are trying to branch out and not have every single picture we have together being taken in the Ministry Center! ha! S...

I walked into Bible Study that night feeling pretty confident. After 14 weeks of being hit over the head each and every Weds night of what was wrong in my life and heart that I need to change to become more like Christ, I was SURE that this was going to be the one week where I was not going to be convicted. I mean after all, it was about Speaking love and words of encouragement. Hello, I am a Words of Affirmation girl! I send notes to people and try and build them up as much as possible. I love doing that. So I was positive that I had NOTHING to work on and I was just going to sit there and pat myself on the back for finally getting something right. Clearly I was not paying close enough attention during the lesson on PRIDE a few weeks ago . Needless to say Bible Study did not exactly go as well as I thought it was going to. Whitney started teaching and almost from the very first words that came out of her mouth God started speaking to me. And what he had to say wasn’t pretty. All this ...

Its amazing to me how God can show his love for me even in painful situations. God is good and he SHINES in the hard times. I had something happen last week that a year ago would have broke me. I would have been so miserable and in a "STATE" as my Mom would put it. But this time I wasn't. By the end of the week I was darn near JOYFUL which truthfully almost freaked me out a little bit! Its awesome to see how much God has been working in my life and is changing me and molding me into his own. And how he is teaching me complete dependance upon him and how to find my happiness and peace within him. I've always tried to but I think being such a people pleaser I have tried in the past to find my happiness from others and what they thought of me. Which is pretty prideful. (When I catch up blogging on Bible Study we'll talk about that ;) ) But through the past year I feel like God has really been working on me and in me and opening my eyes to his blessings. I originally...

This Thursday was our Monthly Open Table night at church for us ladies! I was thrilled to go and spend some time with my friends! I had such a good time chatting with Bryna, who refused to have her picture taken so please just conjure up an image of her in your mind :) My craft this month was working on the flowers to hang from the ceiling in our office. I bought 4 bunches of Iris' and cut them apart so I had single flowers. Then I tied sparkly silver string on them and put a fancy hook on the end that I fashioned out of paper clips. I learned that it is not a smart idea to just lay them on the ground with the hooks and strings. Instead what I SHOULD have done, is hooked them when I got to the office. Oh yeah and I should have wrapped the string around each flower. You can imagine what happened. Thank goodness for Bryna and her friends untangling skillz! The other table. We actually had a full table! YEAH! It was awesome to have almost 10 of us there!! Bergs and the Valster. T...

There are very few reasons I would get up super early on a bitterly cold Saturday and go ANYWHERE. But for my Women's Bible Study I will do pretty much anything because I just love and adore these women and love learning and fellowshipping with them! So bright and early this snowy morning I headed all dolled up to church for our kick off Breakfast! It definitely did not disappoint! I had such a great time! I sat with my buddy Karen who I now know owns a pink shirt so I will be expecting her to be showing up to bible study in that on Pink Weds :):) For some reason we are always the loudest, giggliest table no matter what... I have no clue why? 0=-) We just like to have a good time! And we always do!! Brenda also sat with us, I have had the pleasure to get to know her a little better and she is just the sweetest, funniest lady!! And yes this is a bad picture of me but what can you do? I was super excited that my Bryna was there, we hadn't hung out in awhile so It was nice to cat...

"For as he thinks within himself, so he is" Proverbs 23:7 And here we have come to the last bible study until Spring Semester starts. I am so sad not to meet with my bible babes :) every weds night, truthfully I don't know what I'm going to do with myself! But I'm almost happy for a bit of a break because man alive God's really been workin on me! Learning every week's lesson through real life experiences has been a tad painful. But as our good ol buddy Joanna Weaver says, its a good hurt :) I walked into this bible study exhausted. Mentally, emotionally, physically. It had been a very rough week already and I had two more days to go. It was do or die week at school and the stress and tension was rolling off everyone in waves that all seemed to hit me. Working at the front desk you hear everything from EVERYONE and I had just gotten to the point where I couldn't take anymore. I was spent. I couldn't listen to another sad story, whine, rant, I just ...

I am the Lord's servant" Mary answered, May it be to me as you have said~Luke 1:38 In this chapter we looked at having a willing spirit and heart. It was kind of funny because right before the lesson started Whit had an announcement about a need for help with the Awana Parents program in a few weeks. They needed women to bake cookies and then to help serve. As she's asking for help and starting to pass the sign up sheet around I kid you not this is going through my head... I am coming up with 8978079897 reasons why I am unable to help out that night. I can't cook very well.. People are so much more talented than me.. I should let someone else do it... But I wanted a free night!! I wonder how long I'd have to be there.. and on it goes... Well the sign up sheet got to me and before I even realized what was going on, I was writing my name in the blank spot for people to serve. (I later became the head of that committee but i digress!ha!) As I sign up and wonder what o...

Thursday night we had our once a month craft night at church and I actually made it this time!! I worked on decorating two stockings for our office, Sheryl and Muy Caliente were not here last Christmas so they didn't have stockings. I quickly remedied that situation!! Here I am working away!! Me and Foxy!! Funny- she is a good friend of Becky whom I worked with for three years in college at Watson's! So I have known her for 6 years and now she is coming to my church and bible study so I have gotten to know her in a different way and deeper and I think that is just so cool! And plus its great to have a friend thats taller than me!!! Me and Berger... Glitter Glue is just one of the best inventions evah!! I will say though, Bryna let me borrow some of her glitter glue to have several different colors for my snowflakes, and i'm drawing them and getting glue ALL OVER my hands. I couldn't figure out how untill after the 6'th snowflake I realized there was a hole in the...

WOW. So I wasn't kidding when I said that God is using real life examples every week to teach me what we are learning through this Bible Study. I am excited and slightly terrified of what he is putting me through (or rather my sinful self!) and how I am going to change, grow and learn. This past week was entitled Spirit Check. I was actually at home sick with a Migraine last week and missed the actual study. I honestly think that was Satan because if I had been able to learn this then and attach it to my heart and change my ways it would have saved me from alot of heartache last week and early this week. Everytime I went to read this chapter something would stop me or prevent me from reading it. The final time i attempted I was outside at lunch in the quiet, looking forward to spending a quiet hour with God. I was still on the first page of the chapter when a car parked by me blaring rap music. I got so frusterated and annoyed! And then I thought you know everytime I have tried to ...

Well God is continuing to show me real life examples of what we learn in Bible Study each week and specifically what *I* need to learn and change in my heart! It can be a tad painful at times, but again like the book says, Its a good hurt. I admit sometimes when I am faced with everything in my life and heart that is sinful and God needs to chang it can be a little daunting, but the Bible says that He who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it. A few weeks ago someone brought that verse up and they said something I hadn't thought about. God says he will be faithful to complete us but he doesnt' give us a time frame. He has his own time frame and we may not be completed untill we go to Heaven. That makes me feel better! Because I look at myself and think WHOA. There is no way that all of this is getting changed anytime soon! And it helps me to remember that i'm on God's time frame and not my own. Which is wonderful because I am the most impatient hurrie...

So as the Hospitality Director for our Women's Bible Study on Weds nights I am in charge of dressing up the tables and making it a beautiful and inviting place to be. These are my centerpieces if you will on each of the six tables. The fact that the bottom left second bead is out of line is driving me CRAZY!! The ladies have picked up on my pickiness of the beads and now tease me that they are going to move them! Too cute :)

This fall my Women's Bible study that meets on Weds nights is doing the first 8 chapters of Having a Mary Spirit by Joanna Weaver. Last semester you'll remember we did the Prequel to that called Having a Mary Heart in a Martha world. I blogged each week about what I had learned during the study and I want to do that again, but with a change. This fall I want to be real and sincere and talk specifically about what God is teaching me and what he is trying to do in my life. This won't always be pretty, ok well its not really going to be pretty at all because my sinful heart isn't pretty but with God's help he will change me! I want to start off with an illustration that God gave me today in my life. I didn't realize it was an illustration at the time, untill we got into the word tonight and it was like God was hitting me over the head with a sledgehammer. Charity Brooke this is a problem and you need my help to change it. Today was a beautiful fall day here in Indi...

Ok these pics are a little out of order but thats ok! :) Once a month my Women's Bible Study does an Open Table night at our church. Women come and bring their crafts and projects that they are working on and hang out and chat. I had not been to one of these nights because, well, I'm not crafty. there, I said it. the secret is out. Not that it should be a huge secret now, do we all remember the ribbon that was supposed to be a bow that turned out to be a headband? um.. yeah.. 'nuff said. But Jessica has been telling me about it and so I figured I would go and check it out, not like I had any other pressing events on my social calendar. I'm sure you're wondering what "craft" I decided to do! I went with digital scrapbooking! I haven't scrapbooked since I left PCC in 2003 and you can just imagine how many pictures I have taken in 7 years! Most of them digital! So I thought this would be a good way to put them all together! I actually really enjoyed it...

Ok with my laptop being repaired we missed a few weeks of blogging so I'm going to pick up on a lesson a few weeks ago and then skip to the one we did last night. I have really been wanting to blog about this and share whats on my heart and everytime I have tried to, even tonight I have been distracted by Satan and have had annoyances and haven't been able to do it. Well we are going to push through it tonight!! I was really convicted about this lesson. One of my greatest struggles, well really probably the greatest struggle I face is my need for control. My need for control and wanting to do/get what I want to do and what I think is right. So often I don't seek God's leading and go off on my own. And when i see that maybe his plan isn't what I have laid out and I just don't see it working I throw that to the side and go do what I want to do. This ALWAYS ends up with major heartache and problems. The author (Joanna Weaver) has several points that I'd like to...

This week the dear, sweet Cara spoke to us about having Living Room Intimacy and like she always does she forced us to go deeper and really look at our hearts and this time our relationship with God. I love it when she teaches us because she is so REAL and Genuine and she always has us do table time and its a really neat time where we're able to connect with our table mates and hear what is on their hearts. One of the things i enjoy about our bible study is the wide range of ages, and life experiences. Its wonderful. I wish I had taken a sheet home with the questions she had us answer. One of them was whats standing in the way of us spending time with God? My answer, Internet! I'm not on it all day, I come home after work and want to unwind, so I check my email, facebook-because heaven forbid i miss someone's status! then we're off to the blogs, pccb, twitter and a celebrity gossip sight JUST FOR GOOD MEASURE!! Before I know it I have wasted a big amount of time! I was ...

So we're still focusing on worry and anxiety and BOY HOWDY do I need that this week! Its kind of cool to see how God is using this study, things we discuss on Weds are actually happening and affecting me the rest of the week. For instance, its been a really bad past few days. I have cried myself to sleep twice and been very upset and unsettled. I tend to run to people and share whatever I'm upset about instead of running to God. My Mom will tell you that alot of times I dump my problems and worry on her and expect her to make it all better, I mean, she is a Mom and that's what Mom's do, right? This is something I really need to work on for the rest of my life. I am happy to share though, last night was prob. the worst. I was in a horrible mood, nothing, not the three pieces of birthday cake, the guacamole, people and us weekly magazine, NOTHING was helping. I sat on my couch trying to figure out what to do. It was after 8 pm and I had been pretty much miserable for the ...

Our Winter Women's Bible study is going through "Having a Mary Heart in a Martha World" by Joanna Weaver. I am really enjoying this book so far and we're only on chapter 3! The author has a way of speaking biblical truth and merging that with real life examples. She speaks right to you and its very easy to follow along. I am a little behind in blogging about Chapter 3 but hey at least I'm getting it done before Chapter 4!! :) Whitney spoke this week and did such a wonderful job (as usual) she has such a sweet heart and spirit and I love hearing what God puts on her heart. This week what got to me was the Worry vs Concern. Whit had us all write down everything that we worry about on a daily basis and what is on our thoughts and minds. And then we went back after reading some scripture and took a second look at our cards and categorize them as worry or concern. Wouldn't you know almost everything on my list was a worry, something I couldn't do anything about...