Righteously Redeemed

Follower of Christ Friday  November 11, 2020 Ever been looking for a specific themed video on YouTube, instead find something totally unrelated but something you still needed to see? That was me a few years ago when I stumbled upon Author and Speaker, Christine Caine telling some of her testimony.  (warning this may be a lot of parphrase)  She was talking about when she was in seminary how one of her preaching professors pretty much told her that she did terrible, and that she should never teach / preach to an audience again!!  I expected to next hear how it made her mad, and how she vowed to him that she would "show him."   I mean she is Christine Caine, this great motivating woman who currently speaks internationally to thousands of people.  She overcame it somehow.  However, what I wasn't expecting was to to hear what really happened.  She said it absolutely DEFEATED her.  She felt shame!  She questioned her worth! She didn't want to ...

Follower of Christ Friday  by: Brandi M. Bell  Have you ever went hiking?  When you approached the bottom of a big hill or mountain did you stop  to prepare for it before beginning?  You know what's coming because you just came down the back side of the previous mountain!  Man, that climb!!... you have to start out by first making up your mind to do it!  You start on the trek up with one set of muscles engaged, you get hot, sweaty even.  However, you keep going, not looking back, just continuing to climb.  Higher and higher until eventually you get there.   AH Victory!  You've done it!  You are exhausted, your muscles burn in agony, but you are at the top!   You take a moment to celebrate the view for a few minutes, maybe even seconds, before going down to continue on to the next ascension.   What I want to highlight here without trying to sound too much like a Miley Cyrus song, is we don't appreciate the actual climb...

I AM NOT ALONE  Follower of Christ Friday  by Brandi Bell  Yesterday as I was driving around with one of my sons we noticed that to the west of us were some dark clouds. Naturally we then noticed to the east of us it was still beautiful blue skies with cumulus clouds litering the sky.  My son was even aware "Mom, isn’t that crazy on one side of us is darkness and on the other side it’s still beautiful and pretty."   Well as we turn the corner, and head into another direction it turns out we were now going towards the storm. While only a short time ago we had been moving away from it.  Me, seeing the moment for teaching for myself and my son I explain to him that at a moments notice we could be heading into a storm.   I said, "Look, right now we’re coming out of the storm, and now that we have turned 'what are we doing?"  He replied,  "We’re heading into the storm."   I continued, "Right, and if this car represents God where is God in all...

Going into a storm, currently In a storm, or just coming out of a storm.   Doesn’t it seem like at all times in our lives we fall into one of these categories?   I know it does for me.   I bring up storms today because of a conversation I was recently having with my husband, Doug.   Perhaps it was because he kept hearing me say things like “the enemy was attacking, the enemy did this, the enemy was lying etc.”  As if everything that had happened was to the credit of satan.  Don’t misunderstand me, now, because I know satan is here to steal, kill, and destroy.  That’s all he is here to do.  I want you to be reminded or enlightened to the fact that God is in the midst of this… for a reason.   Being the smart guy he is, Doug said something along the lines of “…don’t forget that God may be allowing you to have these ‘attacks’.”  Awwww man, that’s right… I had completely forgot about that part.   Why did he ha...