GREEN-LIGHT revolution

Ladies, here's the last post for my week--written by a dear friend. She's also single, and quite a woman! Be encouraged:

Introductions are the best way to start, hello my name is Ginger Price; I am the embodiment of my name—spicey and full of life. Ten years ago at the age of 26, God brought me to St. Louis to be a part of Jubilee Church.

When I packed my car to move, a set of expectations about God’s plans came with me. It has been tempting to lament about the dreams that haven’t come to pass. Doing that would reflect the focus back on me as they were my wants and desires. This is not right thinking; I am here to serve Jesus and a purpose that goes beyond me. My actions and choices count for generations of people to come.

God has shown me that when I give my whole heart to Him (which if I’m honest it is on loan from Him to begin with) I will not be disappointed. He promises that He will give us the desires of our heart; for me this has involved reshaping those desires.

I would not trade the last decade for anything—it’s not been easy—and thankfully He didn’t give me what I wanted. He has changed my thinking and the vision I have for my life. He has not let me wander from Him, He has continually renewed my heart and removed hard places and through the process continues to write my story into His wonderful plan.

I have seen many friends that have wandered from Him because they were discouraged or wanted their own desires and for this I am sad, but I am here to say that God will not disappoint, if you set your heart on Him and you will be satisfied.

ee cummings is one of my favorite poets and recently I read a portion of i carry your heart with me that is a picture of how our hearts become one with His. I’ve included the last stanza. I love it, but the last lines are the ones that I think are beautiful.

i carry your heart with me

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

You can read the rest of the poem here, http://tinyurl.com/3b5psh.

When God gave me a new heart (Ezekiel 36:26); I made the choice to lay down my desires, hopes and dreams and take on His vision, His grace and His compassion—that is when I become fulfilled. I look forward to hearing the stories of how you’ve carried His heart for the Kingdom.

Going Green,
Ginger Price, also known as The Ging

One of the things I enjoy about living in the city is parallel parking. Call me crazy, but the feeling I get from a smooth, tight-packed parallel parking job is quite... unparalleled, haha. Last night I had one of those moments and thought, it's the little things. What is it about those little things that are so enjoyable? ...and so frustrating at times? (like when I have to re-do a parking job, for the trillionth time) ...and embarrassing? (like when I backed up into a tree, while all my friends were in the car)

In living single, I've definitely had moments that are like that: enjoyable, frustrating, and embarrassing.

Over this last year though, my understanding of singleness has totally shifted. If you've found yourself in the "enjoyable, frustrating, and embarrassing" roller-coaster of singleness, I hope that you are able to find encouragement in something God has encouraged me with:

"Living unreservedly for Christ during your single years is one of the little things that I enjoy."

Going green!
Amie Fox

So, it's been two months since my last posts, and wohoo am I glad to back! A lot has happened since the end of August. I'm sure you could agree that the life of a single lady can be crazy at times! But truly adventurous with God... He's just so audacious in loving us!

Here's a recap of my October:

At the beginning of the month, I started a 90-day Bible Reading Plan and was even featured as a guest blogger on Bryan Mowrey's blog. I'm now at Day 26 (even squeezed in 2 Kings on Saturday as it was accidentally left out of the plan) and it's been challenging, eye-opening, exciting, humbling, and absolutely amazing! This is the first time I've ever read the Bible from beginning to end... observing God through every page, one account after another, has made me want Him so much closer. The wonderful thing of it all is that I've been assured again and again that my growing desire for Him is the direct result of His steadfast desire for us.

During the second weekend of this month, my church had our annual women's gathering and I was invited to speak for 20 minutes on singleness. The theme of the weekend was Women of Freedom. Tell ya what, I poured out my life as much as I could within those 20 minutes! Particularly on why I've found it's important to have God as #1 above all else. If you'd like to give it a listen, you can get the audio here.

Then the weekend before this last one, I started housesitting for a couple friends of mine. They come back home today which puts an end to my 10-day vacation at their abode (which is really like a mini-mansion and the closest thing I'll get to a cabin, being a city dweller and all). Just for the record: housesitting has to be one of the best perks while living single.

These last 10-days have been significant, to say the least. I've had a lot of quiet time to think on life, wait on God, and pray into the promises He's given. It's in these types of concentrated moments that I discover more of who I am because God is so good to help me discover more of who He is. These moments are the kind that linger with me throughout the months and the very reason why I find I'm able to face 'tomorrow' with an increasing joy.

Not surprisingly, one of the things I asked God about was my husband-to-be (somewhere out there). I've learned not to be so fearful in asking Him about... him. In return, God plopped a couple more of His desires into this heart of mine.


However, until Mr. Husband appears, I was encouraged to continue helping a couple of my married friends (by kid-sitting for them on a consistent basis) have what I desire to have someday: date nights for a healthy marriage.


Going green!
Amie Fox

Hi everyone!
My name is Anna Lee Miles. I like my name a lot. It means "graceful poet." Most people call me Anna, but I really like being called Anna Lee. I think it is very feminine and pretty, and it makes me feel like a southern belle or country girl with pig tails.

Other things you should know about me...I am 19 and lovin it! I'm attending Missouri Western in St. Joseph, MO. God is definitely stretching me, and, surprisingly enough, I like becoming more flexible in Him! It feels good to have a nice stretch and to have faith for "flips" and "somersaults" that I could never do before. With God the flips are fabuloso! Anyway, enough analogies about flexiblisms and flipisms.

Once upon a time when I had not spent any alone time with God...I got stressed to the max! Then one night I couldn't stand the weight of my own self-reliance any longer! So, I went for a run. As I approached the pond at the back of our property I cried out to God. He, in His infinite faithfulness, answered me. He whispered to me, "Look around you Anna." The back yard was a riot of golden light coming from thousands of lightening bugs. Then He said, "Anna, look up!" What I saw that night was a sky with no moon, yet it was completely dazzling. I was surrounded by a silver and gold tableau, and God said, "Anna I am here. This picture is for you and Me to enjoy together. I love you so much that I would bring out the stars just for you my daughter." As soon as I heard His gentle voice the weights were lifted, and security and peace filled my being. Since that night God has continued to romance me in my quiet time. Because of the quiet times God has provided for me I am convinced that He has enabled me to glorify Him more.
The points of my story are:

• God is faithful to speak when we cry out to Him


• God knows how to get our attention and love on us better than anyone


• The king of kings loves to be near us


• He is the only one on Earth who can bring us peace and security, and that often comes through alone time with Him


• When we spend time alone with Him, we open up opportunities for Him to make us beautiful women by opening our ears to hear Him speak


• And most importantly!!! When we spend time alone with God we become more like Him

I would like to end this post with a Psalm! Psalm 91:1,4(NIV) says "1He who dwells in the shelter of the most high will rest in the shadow of the Almighty...4He will cover you with His feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart."

I hope this encourages you to spend alone time with God! Going green,
Anna Lee

Hi dear sisters! First things first: I want to get this out of the way so we can move on to the good stuff! Everyone calls me Missy, even though my real name is Melissa Anne (with an E, just like Anne of Green Gables; it’s important), and when I grow up I want to be a gypsy.

Life has never been extremely hard for me; I have great parents and have never really known what true hardship is. But lately I have become very discontent and impatient about a certain area in my life. A certain area of... cough cough… singleness. My discontentment for the husband that I did not have reached the point far past frustration last week, and I knew my attitude was out of control! I did not feel pleasing to God, let alone pleased with myself.

Then out of the middle of nowhere I began to see weaving pop up everywhere! (God tends to be good at that sort of thing). The heroines in all the literature I was reading wove, poems I read talked about weaving, and the music from the Prince of Egypt was stuck in my head… “A single thread in a tapestry- though its color brightly shines- can never see its purpose in the pattern of the grand design.”

I decided to take up this art of weaving; I figured there must be something God wanted to teach me… since it was constantly showing up! I found out that weaving is the most time consuming art there is, and it takes a lot of PATIENCE! Each thread is so delicately placed over and under again, that if you get ahead of yourself the design can be totally thrown off. It didn’t take me long to realize that God was sending the very clear message of “BE PATIENT MISSY!” Patience itself became, “material for sacrifice”, as Elizabeth Elliot so eloquently suggests. 2 Samuel 24:24 says, "... I will not offer to the Lord my God whole offerings that have cost me nothing..." By choosing patience instead of discontentment I was giving something of myself up, and learned that contentment comes from obedience.

I began to look towards my beloved Bedouin women of the Bible for examples. I was surprised by how many stories I found concerning weaving. The Hebrews practiced it in the wilderness while building the Tabernacle (Exodus 26:1), Rahab hid the two spies on top of her roof by placing stalks of flax over them (Joshua 2:6), and the Proverbs 31 woman worked with her hands in delight while weaving. This reoccurring them of contentment in the home, and working with your hands seemed to be reflected in these women’s lives. Titus 2:5 says women should be, “Self-controlled and pure, to be busy working at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands so that no one will malign the word of God.” I took this as my cue. This season of singleness that we are in is only a single thread in the King’s grand design, but such a beautiful and important piece!

Still so much more to say, but shall have to wait for another night….
Love all you ladies,
Going Green!
Miss

God has blessed me with a huge second chance: He has given me the opportunity to enjoy a second season of singleness with Him.

As I previously mentioned, it has been two plus years that I've been steadily and consecutively single while pursuing God. In a very painful past, all of my "relating abilities" were severely crippled at one time or another. Some were buried and hidden underneath the hard exterior I was beginning to take on, others were crushed to a point beyond recognition.

I knew something was wrong with me and my relationships, and getting worse... but I wasn't keenly aware of my issues because I had no community (aka relationships) in which to see a clear reflection of myself. I wasn't engaged in many friendships period, and a good deal of those I was engaged in were only detrimental to my mental, emotional and ultimately spiritual well being. In other words, they were pulling me away from God, not pushing me towards Him. In general, I was becoming more and more isolated--Satan's #1 goal.

But God, out of His amazing mercy and love, transplanted me into part of His community here in STL. There were multiple times I almost left this blessing of His behind, as things like selflessness & accountability were completely unappealing to me. Yet, I felt Him gently asking me to stay, and by His grace, that's exactly what I did. He likewise, kindly pushed me into the deep end (relationally speaking) and helped me to swim, knowing all along I would absolutely love His community! It is true when I testify that His perfect love casts out all fear (1 John 4:18).

Lately God's been putting the "icing on the cake" in regards to my relationships within community... and that would be learning "how to be a sister" to all of my wonderful brothers.

My first instinct was to quickly retreat from any relating period regarding the opposite sex, which is perhaps exactly what the Dr. ordered. But it quickly came clear that I couldn't stay put, as I found insecurities & wrong assumptions running rampant in the presence of brothers.

So what does it mean now to say, "Love ya like a sister, bro!" Ha... just when you thought I had the ultimate answer! ...or maybe you didn't, but guess what? I'm still learning! Here's what I've picked up so far:

• it means my identity rests in Christ, and not in you or your reactions, brother
• it means my security rests in Christ, and not in the amount of attention or affection you give me, brother
• it means my heart motivations in regards to you are pure, brother
  
• it means I can be generous in giving sisterly affection & encouragement, having a pure heart before God
• my security in Christ allows me to enjoy the protection and support you provide to the sisters you love, brother

To be continued... but as for sisterhood in Christ:

Going Green!!
bek