Thought for the Day

:D

Boundless: Advice by Scott Croft

I love the Advice section in Boundless. Thought I'd repost one of their articles.

Is church the only place I can meet a Christian woman?   
 

Question :

 

I'm 24 and have been actively seeking a Christian woman for quite some time now. Not only have I been seeking, but I have been failing.
Everywhere I go, I try to be proactive in meeting a godly woman, but how am I supposed decipher between the godly women from the ungodly women?
Sometimes I'll find myself outside church wanting to strike up a conversation with a beautiful woman, but I don't want it to lead somewhere, get interested in her and develop feelings just to find out she's not a believer. It's almost as if I have to meet a woman at church or some type of church-held event, because then the chances of her being a believer are 100 times greater.
Any advice?

 

Answer:

 

Thanks for your question. First, I commend you for being deliberate about dating only believers in Christ. I've written this before, but it seems I can't write it often enough. Godly marriage can only be undertaken by growing Christians who are relying on Christ. The Bible is clear that believers are only to marry other believers.

In 1 Corinthians 7:39, Paul instructs that marriages of believers are to be "only in the Lord" — that is, only to other Christians. Also, Ephesians 5:22-33, the fullest explanation we have in the Bible of what a godly, biblical marriage is, makes clear that what God calls us to in marriage — to bring God glory by intentionally reflecting the way Christ has loved the church and the way the church responds to the leadership of Christ — can only be carried out by people who are themselves in Christ.
 
As for finding a potential wife who is a believer, there are some really helpful steps to take. It's not entirely clear from your question whether you've already done this, but in case you haven't, find a good, biblical church and really get plugged in. In your question, you mention being at church, but it's unclear how involved you are.

If your church has membership — which it should — join formally. Make it a priority to be at every service. If the church has small groups or other discipleship opportunities, take advantage of those things. Get to know people, and just as importantly, be transparent and let people get to know you. Look for ways to serve others. Be involved in the church's ministries.

Why am I encouraging you to do these things? First, and most important, it's for your spiritual good. All Christians need to hear and read God's Word regularly, and we need other believers around us to build us up, hold us accountable, help us examine ourselves to make sure we are in Christ, and help us grow spiritually. Second, and more to your question, it will put you in a better position to find a woman who clearly loves Jesus and whom you might pursue as a potential wife. The more you build your life around serving God and His people in the church, the more you will be able to see who the women are in your church who have the same priorities. You'll also see how they interact with people and how they serve in ministry

Remember, you're not looking for the most physically attractive woman from across the room; you're looking for consistent evidence of faithfulness and godly womanhood as defined by Scripture (see 1 Peter 3, Proverbs 31, Titus 2). Though as finite human beings we can never know with absolute certainty whether another person is truly a believer, the consistent choices and priorities in a person's life pretty reliably tell us a tremendous amount about what is in his or her heart. A woman who is consistently involved in and under the teaching of the type of church I have in mind is about as safe a bet as it gets in a fallen world.

And there's even more! (This is starting to sound like an infomercial.) As you get to know more mature Christians and are discipled, there will be people in your life who are able to teach you about godly marriage and help you discern how to approach it. They can also vouch for potential spouses to you and vouch for you to others when and if that becomes helpful. As you serve in the church and minister to others, you will be around other godly single people — not a bad thing — and you will learn skills and characteristics that, among other things, will serve you well in marriage.
So, do you have to find a potential spouse through involvement in a local church? No, of course the Lord can and does work in many other ways, but the Lord has given us the church as the source of true fellowship of many sorts among His people, so it's obviously a wonderful place to start.

I will pray for the Lord to give you wisdom and peace as you continue to pray and look for a godly wife.

For His glory,
SCOTT CROFT

Book Review: 8:28

I usually don't do book reviews.And the very few that I have done,have  probably had an impact on me. One such book that I read recently was Ian and Larissa's 'Eight Twenty Eight'. I have been following their blog Ian & Larissa for a while now and when I can came to know that they are going to publish a book I knew I had to get a copy.

In a day and age where the true meaning of love is so adulterated, it was good to read Larissa's account of how she continued to love the man she was dating after he met with a really bad car accident. Something that comes out very clearly from the book is that on our own, we cannot love someone unconditionally. It is because we have experienced Christ's love in our life- be it his sacrifice on the cross, or that he came down on the earth to save vile sinners like us or the daily grace and mercy we experience.

What I really liked about the book is that she was very honest about how she felt during the trials. Personally and as a family we went through a similar trial recently, and the comfort that i could draw from her experience, was that it is normal to feel tired and angry and sad. But at the same time not to wallow in it too much, as we have Christ as our sympathetic high priest.

I was encouraged that in a day and age where people divorce and break up for trivial reasons, they both persevered post his accident and even got married :)I would encourage you to read this book, but be warned there shall be many tears even as you read it- tears of sorrow and tears of joy as well :)

And It Finally Happened

I never thought we would ever move out of our old place. I accepted a long time back that I would probably never get to stay in a decent society. Don't get me wrong-its not like my old place was a dump. But just that it was way too noisy ( we lived right on the main road), dusty and high ( 4th floor without a lift). All of this combined together was never an ideal combination.

 

But it was for a time and season. We had to move out of that place for Dad's health and my knee condition. So grateful to God that everything went smoothly:) Even as I write this post I can hear my thoughts clearly. There is a heart of gratefulness for the small things- like an elevator in my society, bus stop right outside my house, a seat every time I take the bus from my place (as its the starting point) and the biggest of all my own room:)

 

I don't think these small things would have mattered to me as much, many years ago if I had got it all easy. Sometimes its good when certain things are taken away from you. You tend to appreciate it more when you have them.

 

All in all right now I am happy.. and that's all I have to say :)

Gym competitions and fun :)

Those who have been  reading my blog know that I love to exercise. After many many years my sister and I took part in the gym competition. It was soooo much fun :) The excitement, adrenaline, body aches, friends..all make a wonderful combination.

My team did not qualify post the initial rounds but my sister ended up in the finals and it was such a joy to be with her and the team. Even though they lost in the finals they put up a good fight. The other team might have been huge and muscular, but we were leading in each set of exercise. The tug of war was the deciding factor with ten points and that's where these guys lost. 

But I loved their spirit and joy :) The way we were cheering and congratulating each other after the competition, nobody would have thought that we were the losing team. In the end I am glad we all had fun and of course  we made some new friends : ) 

Here are some pics from the day:)

Burpees

Forearm planks with partner clap

Team+friends :)

The Team

You Can’t Catch Sin Like a Cold- by Barnabas Piper

It’s my favorite time of year. That time when we send our children off to slap five, share books, and suck on the same water fountains as hundreds of other little germ carriers at the Petri dish we call “school.” Every time one of my daughters comes home and says a classmate went home sick or missed school my wife wants to boil her in bleach, wrap her in Clorox wipes, and lock her in a hyperbaric chamber. If only we could quarantine them to keep them safe from all those nasty germs.

Sadly school is a necessary evil so we have to expose them to the ills and ailments. This is much the way many Christians think of “the world” – that necessary evil that we must be exposed to full of evil and vices and insidious temptations. If only we could quarantine ourselves from that too.

And many Christians do live in cultural quarantine, shutting themselves off from what they see as sinful influences. They avoid “bad” people and even places. They talk about those people and places like they are disease carriers – “We can’t have them around” or “We couldn’t go there.” They act like someone can sneeze sin onto them, that they will catch the bad decisions and guilt of another through physical proximity. What does his shunning communicate to those we have labeled “unclean”? Exactly that, Christians think they are unclean. Not the ideal way to draw people to Jesus. But sin is not an infectious disease

We don’t “catch” sin. It’s in us from birth. We are sin carriers. It’s only by the grace of God that we can become immune to the virus that lives in us, that we can live a life without its symptoms oozing and coughing and exhaling out of us onto others. Because of the work of Christ we are able to choose whether or not to sin. It is a decision, one that we often have a very hard time making, but a decision nonetheless. Sin is a theology too. It is a belief, or lack thereof, in the goodness and work of Jesus. It is this theology, this belief that informs our decision and drives us.

So, when we are around obvious sin, those people and places, we can’t catch their sin. We can choose their sin, but that is a matter of decision, of belief, of theology. If we hold fast to Jesus there is no risk of that sin invisibly taking hold of us like a flu bug might. How freeing! We no longer have to keep our distance or live in cultural quarantine. We can engage those people with grace and freedom without fear. Because we are near Jesus we can be near to anyone without fear that they will make us more like them than like Him.

But it would be nice if they used Purel and covered their mouths when they sneeze.