A Forwarded Email Worthy Of Sharing
Category: Women
What Every Stepparent Needs To Know
Click here to read a very good article about a child’s perspective on stepmothers. Here’s an excerpt:
Everyone’s heard of stepmonsters: those evil second, third (forth?) wives who cruelly shuffle stepkids off to the sidelines and compete for their dad’s attention. This isn’t about them. I’m talking about stepmoms in crisis who are really trying to make it work. They all wonder why, after knocking themselves out for their 21st century Brady Bunch, they still end up with stepkids who treat them like they are auditioning for The Little Rascals Reality Show. On top of that disrespectful drama, toss in an already frustrated stepmom overhearing the little darlings bandy about the dreaded stepmonster jab one too many times – and snap. Off goes the wedding band, pop goes the Xanax, and out come the tears.
Driven By Eternity
Tonight TLC begins a new women’s bible study. We will be studying John Bevere’s Driven By Eternity. Join us at 7 p.m. if you live in our area!
Women and Multiplication
Women are multipliers. We don’t just add to things we multiply them. The funny part about this is that we are also great finger-pointers so while I don’t consider MYSELF a multiplier I can point to each of my friends and say they are. Okay, I’m kidding, I am a multiplier! I tell this to the women of TLC all the time. They laugh but we know it’s true. And men, they nod their heads slightly because they don’t want to get into trouble in case a woman is watching. But let’s be honest we are multipliers. I think it’s that XX chromosome God gave us. After all, the X is the symbol of multiplication and we have two X’s!! Something about it makes multiplication an innate thing!
We take a man’s seed and multiply it into a baby. We make things bigger and different than their original design. Have you ever seen a bachelor’s home? He has a television, a bed, a fridge, a stereo, a computer and a video game console of some sort. He is happy just to be a minimalist. Then he gets married and his wife, the multiplier, is not ever going to be happy with this setup. So she buys a couch and a love seat and a coffee table, lamps and pictures and bedding, towels that match and pots and pans. She buys a dining room set and not just with two chairs, one for each of them, but she sees a future that includes more people sitting at that table. She multiplies everything and makes their house a home. I multiply because that is what I was designed to do. Have you ever noticed that a man’s wardrobe increases significantly if there is a woman in his life? The only thing that seems to diminish is the amount of friends he is allowed to have over at one time! Interesting…..but I’ll move on.
Naturally most women talk more, they worry more, they spend more and this is the part that is not fair, they tend to put on weight easier too! We also make life miserable when we aren’t happy because we multiply the problem. My husband says all the time, if the queen is happy the land is happy. Why? Because we multiply our mood and set the atmosphere for any situation we are in. How? We over-think it all! Which is multiplication! It’s in our nature to multiply.
God said be fruitful and multiply and in this area of our lives, we are just being obedient! Let’s work at being multipliers in a healthy way. Let’s work together to multiply the good in our lives and leave the stuff that doesn’t do us any good behind us. It’s all about balance! Often we go way overboard on negativity and bitterness and resentfulness. Let’s learn to be fair and multiply those things that life hands us in a positive manner. Multiplication is a powerful tool if we use it correctly. In the next few weeks we’ll be talking more about this and how to influence in the right way.
It’s Never Good Enough
I’m learning so much! We are taking The Love Dare at church. The lessons have been excellent. I’ve learned a lot about myself and the kind of wife I am. On some things I’d grade myself an “A”. On other things I fail miserably. Yet, my husband, week after week loves me anyway.
One phrase that seems to be the resounding cadence of the men in the class is, “It’s Never Good Enough”. Wow! I can certainly see how the snake in the garden of Eden got to Eve and caused her to sin so simply. In her eyes, it simply wasn’t good enough and there was room for improvement. Since in our inner design, we as women are multipliers. I suppose that at our base level we view everything as able to be improved. However, in our saved condition we must learn to be at peace and content.
It has really been a learning experience to hear good men say they feel that they can’t do things right at home, when really the issue is they don’t do the task as their wife does it. It can be something simple like sweeping the floor or something a little more complicated like giving the kids a bath. We women have this idea that we can do it better.
So my resolve is set, my eyes are fixed on the prize and that is to have a husband who feels more than adequate and who really is my partner in life. He’s not perfect, but neither am I so we’ll have to be works in progress together.
Potential Is Risky Business
Just the mention of this word sends the women of TLC into laughing mode. It’s because when they come to me about a man and they use the phrase, “He has potential…” I always answer the same way, “Potential is just potential until it’s put into play.”
Please don’t make life changing decisions based on potential unless you are willing to take a risk. Potential is just possibility. It doesn’t make it a reality. It makes it a maybe.
Dictionary.com defines Potential as:
1. possible, as opposed to actual
2. capable of being or becoming
3. Grammar. expressing possibility
Has everyone told you that you have potential? If so, it’s possible you could move ahead in that area but you may not. It remains to be seen. I won’t bet on it unless I am willing to take a risk. There are some things worth betting on. There are other things that are just to precious to risk a bet.
Make wise choices!
He Covers Me And Doesn’t Expose Me
God is such a gentleman he takes care of me so beautifully. In him I feel totally safe. It means I can go to him and tell him everything knowing that in him I will find the security, advice, love and above all, he will work with me to find a solution. His love for me makes his care for me his priority. He loves me as an individual and doesn’t exploit me.
When you meet the man who is a keeper there are things that he does that prove to you that he is a gentleman who is going to cover you. Some are easy to see and others, take time to see. First off, he knows his manners as a man and he walks on the outside, in front of you down the stairs, behind you up the stairs, he opens the door for you, pulls out the chair for you while dining. You get the picture; he knows what a man is supposed to do. In him you will find security and love because his main priority is God and his family.
He’s not into what I call over-the-top PDA (public displays of affection). There are men who grab their woman’s butt in public. You know what that says? It’s actually a type of marking you publicly as his property. He is showing other men that yes you are his. Some women think that he loves them so much he can’t keep his hands off of them and they are flattered but let’s get real, it’s inappropriate. This type of behavior is really about his pride and insecurity and marking his territory and not about his woman at all. Holding hands and a kiss is not to be confused with a make out session, the former being normal. Your naked pictures are not on the Internet because it’s sexy but because you are a commodity. Don’t get these things confused with each other as it’s not an indication of love.
The man whom you choose, covers you in prayer, guards his heart and takes his role seriously so that you stay safe and secure in your place.
The woman who grabs the attention of a man of this stature is a woman who is respectful of herself. She isn’t obnoxious or rude with him. She doesn’t discuss him excessively picking him apart with her friends. She isn’t exploiting him or wasting his time. She is mature and sees the man for who he is and not what his potential could make him one day. She certainly would not waste his time with games and presuppositions. The woman who grabs the attention of this man, is self-assured and ready for a lasting relationship.
Please Don’t Do This!
With weddings costing on average $30,000, you can see that the couple has gone to great expense to make their day perfect. They’ve spent money on photographers and a video choreographer and florists and a wedding planner. They’ve selected beautiful centerpieces, wonderful dinners a beautiful cake and favors.
Favors are what the wedding couple has selected for you take home as a remembrances of their special day. It’s their gift to you. A thank you for coming to share their special day with you.
What I’ve been seeing for years now is that people are taking whatever is not nailed down. Ladies, this is stealing. Plain and simple. At one wedding I saw the mother of the bride run out of the reception hall chasing down someone who was leaving with the centerpiece of their table. The person had to audacity to be upset because the mother of the bride said she wanted it back. You see, the centerpieces were rented! Please don’t do this! Don’t let this be you! What are you going to do with the centerpiece anyway?
It’s the same at church. For each dinner or special event we’ve had to let people know that the decorations are not to take home. We reuse them. We change them up to make them look fresh but it’s for your looking pleasure not your take home pleasure. Yet and still, people walk out with things.
And the same goes for dinner parties. I’ve had dinner parties where women, sorry, but to date I’ve never seen a man do this, put the napkin ring holders in their purse. What are you going to do with one napkin ring holder? How am I going to replace the napkin ring to complete my table setting? I had to let them know, I like my napkin ring holders and I want to keep them! I know for some of you reading you are staring at the screen with open jaw. Some of you would never think of taking anything and others of you are mad because I’m spoiling your thieving tradition.
One of my friends stole something from a dinner party I had recently then she mailed it back to me as a joke because she knows it’s my pet peeve. Also, you don’t leave a dinner party taking food with you unless you are invited to do so. You don’t ask if you can take a few pieces of pie home to your kids. You don’t arrive telling the host that your husband didn’t want to come because he was watching TV but he wants you to send a plate home for him.
Please take pictures, no not the ones that are in frames in the person’s house! Bring a camera and take pictures if you want a remembrance. Don’t take the host’s supplies!
Submission Continued
I love military life. I love the protocol and I love the well-executed plan. It fits my personality to have order. In the military and in boardrooms across the world there is a meeting where everyone is given a task and expected to fulfill it. There is a meeting of the mind where everyone and everything is clear. A general never goes to battle with soldiers who don’t know what they are going to do because he expects to win. To do so would be foolish. It makes it easy when the couple is on the same page. Often though we hear a couple say, “He/She should know what we are working towards.” Without a meeting of the minds in which both people come together to set the mission, there is no mission, only chaos. We can’t assume anything. A mission must be clearly defined.
Just tell a woman that you want to go to Fiji next summer and that it’s going to take $10k to go. I guarantee you she will clip coupons and wear ‘that ‘ol thing’ in the closet to get the money to go. Tell her you want to save an extra couple of grand for her new wardrobe and she’ll make it happen. Most women are not evil or scattered. They are willing and able to help a mission to get on its way. If she didn’t love the man or didn’t care about their family, she’d go shopping but most often she want to please him and he clearly set the mission and she is going to follow it.
What if I don’t agree with the mission? I mean, this one is an easy one to submit to because I get something right? That happens sometimes when we don’t agree we don’t want to submit to the plan. The time to speak is in the initial meeting. I would voice my opinion and why I don’t think it’s going to work. You can’t whine, you don’t get emotional, you just practically stated your views and back them up with fact. Sometimes your appeal works and sometimes it doesn’t but let’s face it, this is when the rubber meets the road. Submission isn’t submission until you disagree.
So you have to ask yourself two important questions. Does my agreeing to submit to this plan violate my relationship with God? Does my agreeing to submit violate my belief system? If the answer is yes, then you can’t submit period. You can’t override your convictions without losing a part of yourself. BUT HERE IS THE GREAT PART! Your man, the one who vowed to love you forever, would never ask you violate these areas of your heart because the bible is very clear that we submit one to another. God really had the idea that we’d work together for the good of the whole and not for the good of the one. That means that I don’t pull the conviction card out for just anything. I really have to be honest and search my heart. Let me just say here that if you are really honest most things don’t fall into this category. Just because you don’t want to do it, does not excuse you.
There is nothing sadder, and I mean this nothing sadder, than a woman without a mission. She will use her energy for what she thinks needs to be done and we don’t need to ask Eve the outcome of that story. There is nothing more dangerous than a marriage without a mission. It may limp along but it will never be what God designed it to be. A marriage without a mission doesn’t have unity, peace and ultimately the blessing of God. If you find yourself in a marriage without a mission it’s time for a meeting. It’s time for a God-seeking moment. Simply ask the question, what are we working for and how are we going to get there? God will bring the answer. Then work the plan.
Submission
Submission seems to be an ugly word for women. The bible says if we are married we are supposed to be in submission to our husbands. I think the word gets a bad wrap because we don’t know or understand what it means and because sometimes men throw it up to us in an ugly way. Today I want to break down the word and make sense of it and show you that it doesn’t have to be bad when all the pieces of the puzzle are in place when it comes to this word.
First off, we have to break the word apart.
Sub- is being used as a prefix for under, below or beneath. Let me just say here that is does NOT mean less than. We need to open up our hearts to read this carefully without shutting down.
Mission- is a task that clearly spells out what we are doing; how we are doing it and the reason we are doing it.
The bible says that a woman was designed as a help-meet. This is not a bad thing and it’s in our nature to be helpful and we are great at making things happen. I think of it, as we are the supports to a bridge. The supports are what hold everything up. It in no way lessens the importance in fact, in increases it. Without the support the whole thing falls flat. A bridge without a support is useless. Again, not saying men are useless just that when we are joined as one in marriage the pieces have to fit together in order to function.
Ever see a woman missing from the scene? I remember when I married Pastor Doug, he lived on skittles and slim-fast and his kids would stay up till 2 or 3 am bleary-eyed watching TV then have stomach aches and were missing tons of school. They were missing a support system. Ever see a man taking care of the kids after his wife has been at a conference? The kids are asking every half hour, “When’s mom coming home?” and dad is wishing mom would hurry up. It’s not a bad thing to be a support. It’s necessary.
The problem is that most men do not have clearly defined missions. So the problem lies not in the fact that women don’t know how to submit. We submit very well thank you very much. We submit when we know the mission. We submit when we know our role. Submission is not an ugly word. It’s a beneficial word. What is the mission of your home? Men, if you don’t know then you can expect for your woman to do something that may not be the plan. A support, supports something even if it’s the wrong thing. There is the problem in a nutshell. Just as Adam assumed Eve knew the mission most men today also assume women know the mission. But Adam was so wrong.
Pastor Susan 