Women – Page 12 – Pastor Susan

This Christian Believes In Evolution

October 23, 2009 tlc4womenLeave a comment

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Yes, you read that right. I believe in evolution. I don’t believe that I am a descendant of an ape but I do believe that I have choice to either evolve in my life or atrophy. The second option just doesn’t seem like an option to me. No, I can unequivocally say to atrophy or get stuck isn’t even in the thought process of my life.

So, I read, I listen, I watch, I search out wisdom. I want to be learning something on the day I take my last breath. I don’t think that I will ever achieve nirvana and complete enlightenment, but I want to go out a whole lot smarter than I came in. I’m not content to just believe something because someone told me it was so, I want to know it for myself. I plan to be a student forever.

I also work on myself, not just intellectually but emotionally as well. I want to find a balance in life. Where there are too many deadlines and stress in a life, there is a shortening of life where eventually you meet your own deadline in the form of a flatline because of a heart attack or high blood pressure or a stroke. I have the ability in my hands to shorten my days and I don’t plan to do that. For this to happen, I must plan my life and I must take control of my health. This means that I must balance my life between the world of my work and my personal time. I can’t let either consume me. This was a hard lesson to learn but I believe I’ve come to a peace within myself.

1 Corinthians 13:11. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 12. Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
13. And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

While many Christians are consumed with the earthly debates of rapture and end-time prophesy and their opinion on pre/post/mid, I don’t even care. God isn’t here yet and I have work to do. I know that whatever God decides whether it be pre/post or mid I will be secure in Him. In the meantime, there is an urgency to find out what my destiny and purpose is and then to fulfill that purpose. There are people who need someone to talk to about their problems, I am a good listener. There are people who need a meal. I am a good cook and I have in my hands a network of resources to buy some groceries or get some help. There are people who need a coat for winter. I’m not above asking someone to help with an extra coat. There are babies who need strong arms to hold them and love them, and I am capable of that. There are animals who need our help and humanity and I have a heart for that as well. There are just too many things that need my mind to be focused on them. For me to be worried about at which point my Lord decides to take me out is just a waste of time. One day God will reveal to me all I need to know. For now, I have work and love to give and I have my part of this whole picture called life on earth, to live out.

So yes, I believe in evolution. So what about you, are you evolving?

Romans 12:2Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is–his good, pleasing and perfect will.

When Romanticism Becomes Idolatry

October 4, 2009 tlc4women1 Comment

We all know her. It’s not us of course but we all know her. You know the one. Your friend, the one who is over all the time for coffee or to hang out as long as there is not a man in the picture. This isn’t so bad, you think to yourself, because we all do it to a certain extent. In those first few weeks of a relationship when lust permeates our thought process and we see are the wonderful attributes this man has. Yes, we all know her.

We all see her. She’s in church on Sunday and at TLC (or your form of it) on Monday evenings while she’s alone but once her man comes around she drops out. She’s beautiful on the outside but so insecure on the inside. Her convictions are solid until they are tested. You see, actions speak louder than words.

Then her new boyfriend asks her to sleep with him. She knows her God and His point of view on fornication but she shoves all the knowledge aside because someone actually loves her. Well, you see, he hasn’t actually said those exact words but we all know they are coming at some point, right? We all know she said she’d never date ‘the mission field’ but her new man has promised he’ll come to church and well, we all know how that will turn out.

She tells us he drinks a little too much. It’s okay, she continues, because she know it’s just the stress of his baby mama drama. You see, he wants to change. He just needs a little sex, a little fix-it and a lot less nagging.

So you ask her about his ex-wife. Only he doesn’t have one. You see, he got hooked up with a slutty girl and she got pregnant on purpose. She was a party girl and your friend, well, she just goes clubbing with her man now because it’s where his friends hang out. They don’t do anything there, they just go to dance and drink and relieve their stress. By the way, you tell her, she hasn’t brought him to church yet. No, she says, because he’s afraid of being judged and last week he wasn’t feeling well.

She tells you that he’s asked her to move in with him. He wants to have a big wedding and give her a big ring, only he can’t afford to right now. She knows it’s not what God would want but she knows if she just hangs out a little while longer he’ll give her the things she wants. She also mentions that he’s been too stressed out to see his child but he just needs her to pull him out of his slump.

She tells you that he quit his job and now she is the sole support of her family. You remind her of the scripture that says if a man doesn’t work he shouldn’t eat but she informs you he is trying to find himself. He’s not spending too much time with his child yet. She wonders if she should pay his portion of the child support payments so he doesn’t fall behind?

So now your friend has abandoned her belief system for her man. The Holy Spirit leaves and she doesn’t even know it. She has traded God for a man. Her heart has chosen its treasure. You mourn for your friend but her romantic notion of what love is supposed to look like has become idolatry. God says He will never be second. She missed that part I guess.

Six months later she comes to you and now she is pregnant. Now your friend is the slutty party girl and her boyfriend has moved on to the next best thing. You won’t say you told her so. You just hold her and try to be there for this next difficult phase of her life. She now has more hard choices to make. Move home to her parents house to raise a child or put the child up for adoption. Her life has been irrevocably changed.

Don’t be like your friends. Smart women stick to their beliefs. It’s the core of who they are. It’s what defines them. Remember that. No man can ever take the place of God in your life and no one can ever tell you who you are. That has to be determined between you and God. You have to be worth more than that.

For When It Rains

September 25, 2009 tlc4women1 Comment

Umbrellas are important on rainy days. We don’t think about them much any other time but when we wake up in the morning and we look out the window, and it’s raining, we look for that umbrella. We also look for that umbrella on extra hot summer days when we want to be protected from the sun. We don’t want to risk being burned.

Matthew 5:45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

Umbrellas are covering. As a married woman I count on my husband to cover me. As a woman who lives in a family whose umbrella is God I count on my husband to cover us in prayer, in character, in morals and as the head of my family we walk according to his plan praying that my husband walks according to God’s plan.

What happens though when he doesn’t? We never think it will happen to us. It’s other women whose husbands get depressed, or fall and suddenly they find themselves out in the elements dragging their family behind them. It’s never us, but the reality is, sometimes it is.

What do we do then? Do you know how to access your umbrella? Do you know how to pray for your family and cover them in the meanwhile? Can you lift your husband up in prayer while he deals with his issues? Can you keep your family out of the elements when you’re going through a storm? You see, rain is going to come for each of us we all must know how to take cover. The sun is going to get hot sometimes, we need to access that umbrella.

It’s going to call for serious relationship with God. It’s going to require deep faith. It’s going to require amazing love. Can you access the umbrella that will shield you and keep you until things get back to normal?

Do Stay-At-Home Mom’s Risk Their Careers?

September 19, 2009September 19, 2009 tlc4women1 Comment

http://www.theparentszone.com/ working-parents tips-to-l...rking-mom

This is part four of a discussion we started on Lies Women Believe.

Marina, a young mother had some valid issues to address in her comments and I wanted to bring them forward as we discuss solutions.

Marina: When I was little, I was sucked into feminist deceit thinking that women should be just as successful as men and we need to rise up and prove that women are actually superior in many areas. I now see that I don’t need to prove anything to anyone!! I know who I am and whose I am. My career focus has been dramatically changed. Please don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying women shouldn’t work or be successful, God wants to partner with us in our desires so that He can use us wherever we are. The thing is, I have realized the source of many of my desires has come from this prideful, feminist propoganda. This has so touched my heart that I am actually considering what I can do to spend more time at home raising my child and children to come!

According to Tony Robbins, a 40 year study on 1.3 million women show that women are more unhappy today than ever before. So what is the reason for it? I believe we’ve hit on it over the last few days.

You see, when you look at how we were created and when we were created our unhappiness makes sense. In Genesis, the woman, in physical body form, didn’t come on the scene until everything was in place and ordered by God. Her body was formed out of man after he developed a need for her. She was created to be his helpmeet. She was emotion and love and sacrifice and willful and strong and opinionated. She also carries the seed and multiplies into human form, so she is hated by Satan. When you remove her from all that she was created to be, she is lost to her original design.

She finds herself today out of order. She finds herself today, both mother and father, both working and sustaining. Her apron strings long to have children tied to them but her demands are many. She’s painted herself into a corner and yet pride and obligation keep her from her true destiny. Her number one need is security but she finds herself in a world where the only security she has lies in her own abilities.

The biggest thing corporate America will tell her is that she will risk her career by taking a time-out for her family. That statistic is, that in fact, she will make less money and have less ladder climbing ability over her overall career than a women who stuck it out. Hey, facts are facts.

Ask yourself, should you make your lifelong decisions based on financial gain? Are there some things that are more important than money? It would seem that the 1.3 million women who participated in the study that Tony Robbins talks about, will tell you that there’s got to be more to life than what we’ve been given over the last 40 years.

I tell this story all the time but it bears repeating. When my son Anthony was 5 and my daughter Casey was months old, my neighbor came home with a new car. A working mom, her kids in daycare, they were going to Greece that summer for a 10 day vacation. I was beyond jealous. We shared a car and weren’t going on vacation. I determined that day to get a job because I was missing out on the good life. After I put Casey down for a nap and fed Anthony, I was rocking him to sleep. He would nuzzle my neck and play with my hair while he yawned and talked. That day he said, “Mommy, you always smell so comfortable.” It stabbed my heart. Who would rock him to sleep, who would smell comfortable to him? No one but me.

My mom was a working mom. She got to hear about our first word and first step, she regrets she missed her time with us. I was a stay-at-home mom, I could tell you a million stories. The only thing that I regret is that my kids grew up. It was the most fulfilling, happy time of my life. I have a career now and I’m happy with that. Women: you can have it all. I promise you, I am proof of that. I have to now tell you the bad news. You can’t have it all at once! Make wise choices.

Whose Raising The Kids?

September 18, 2009September 18, 2009 tlc4women2 Comments

http://www.blog.thesietch.org/ 200803/13/ we-be-hav...ral-world

This is part 3 of Lies Women Believe.

In part three of the discussion on lies we women have bought into, Marina, a young mom brings up some interesting points that I thought were provoking enough to discuss.

Marina:Many have abortions because the timing is not right, they can’t afford a baby. This has become not just a mindest, but a cultural mindset affecting an entire nation. The laws in place are not a cure for this mentality, it just masks the symptoms. The real problem has come from a cultural shift on our priorities and what we regard as first importance.

Pastor Susan: What happened was that the moms of the 60’s raised daughters who believed that men were trying to keep us from our goals. We also had very guilty feeling moms who knew the heart-wrenching decisions of picking work over their children. Yet, they were stuck. Women were telling other women that they were somehow less than for feeling guilty or for wanting to stay home. They were asking the women why their husbands weren’t carrying 50% of the workload at home. So women sucked it up and did what they had to do. This created moms who were out of sorts, feeling guilty, tired and resentful of the whole mess. Women began to believe they had options. That their needs were more important than an inconvenient pregnancy. Only statistically we see many more women who live in bondage over the decision of abortion than women who live free. They end having deep regret, they think about it each year saying things like, “My baby would have been 14 had I kept it.” If this was such a flippant decision then the residue of that action would not permeate our thoughts in the now. It’s not as easy as women told us it would be.

Marina: I have been struggling with this issue even before I attended this conference because for the last few weeks, every time I drop my child off at the sitter’s I think to myself “I should be the one that spends time with my child during the day, loving him, playing with him and teaching him.”

Pastor Susan: Now there is this shift happening not just in Marina but in her generation who is waking up to the knowledge that women were sold a bill of goods. The adults who were raised as latchkey kids realize they missed out on something. The women of this generation are realizing that we weren’t given more freedom, we were given more burden. Now we are expected to work, raise children and statistically we are doing a majority of the household chores and running of the kids from event to event. We are tired! Women realized that they spent their childhood raising themselves, divorce rates increased in this society and we were not better for it.

The problem lies in that our society has changed. Men, for the most part, and I am generalizing here, don’t want to marry women who want to stay home and raise children. If truth be told, 40% of white, over 50% of Hispanic and over 70% of African American babies are born out-of-wedlock. 65% of kids in prison don’t know their fathers and if they do, they weren’t raised with them. Men also are in an period of finding themselves so they also think they are entitled to stay home. It’s a mess to say the least.

Tomorrow let’s talk about what this all means and what we have to do to make it work for everyone.

Marina

September 17, 2009September 17, 2009 tlc4women1 Comment

http://www.flickr.com/ photos/ lizaedithphotography/ 2423267040/

Yesterday I repeated a blog on Lies Women Believe. Marina commented on this from her perspective as a young mother. I didn’t want her comments to get lost and I want to discuss it further.

Marina:Wow….this article was sent to me by my mother…it is soo true. I myself have been evaluating this issue for the last four days, and here’s why. I was at a conference this last weekend and one of the speakers was Kris Vallaton of Bethel Church in Redding, CA. He gave us a little spill that has had me thinking. He brought up the issue of abortion and how this issue has arised in our culture and how our society’s value of children has been demeaned. America went through the agricultural age with a high value for children. The children helped with the farm and helped to bring income in their family. They were important to the family. They could do more. Somewhere along the line (after the war sometime) the feminist era creeped in and women had an itch to be comparable, to be valued as much as men.

Pastor Susan: During WWII women went to work, while the men went to war. It’s what was needed to keep our country going but what happened is, we really liked working. We liked the independence and we were appreciated in a new sense. This group of women, raised women of my mother’s era. My mother graduated high school in 1959 and for the first time, women of her generation were given options. No longer did they HAVE to get married and have children to be considered decent women. Suddenly they were going to college to get a masters and not a Mrs.

Marina:In the industrial age many women entered the workplace and suddenly the children became a burden for the family. Now we need somebody else to watch our children because he have the responsibility to provide just as the man because now we’re equal! Our mindests become as such: The more children we have the more expenses we have and the children are no longer valuable for helping us, but burdensome for taking from us.

Pastor Susan: This were the dilemma came in. As women, we were supposed to work and bring home the money but society still expected every woman to have a child. If you were a woman who didn’t want a child you were considered selfish or something was wrong with you. We still carry that stigma. If you wanted to stay home and raise your child, you were a stone-aged babe who needed to get with it. The pressure was coming from all angles and we, as women, were just as caught up in the pressure of this new generation as the men were.

Men became accessories in this era. Women determined that men weren’t necessary. We needed their sperm but not their input. We began to teach our sons that they needed to find a woman who would work and help him financially keep the family together. It was a pretty sad state of affairs but you would have never convinced us of this at this time. This is, coincidentally or not, if you see the writing (spirituality) on the wall, where the shift in families attending church services began to decline. I mean, think about it, with all we had going on at the time, we couldn’t fit another thing in. We were tired women and something had to give!

Good points. We’ll continue this tomorrow!

Lies Women Believe

September 16, 2009 tlc4women3 Comments

Something has been on my heart recently. It’s about those missed windows of opportunity that occur in a woman’s life. I grew up in a feminist household so until maybe the last 10 years or so, I believed a lot of the propaganda. Now, I believe some of it and some I dismiss as damaging. Let me explain.

I believe that women should earn as much as a man for equal work, no question about that. I believe that women should get an education and should pursue their passions, buying property and handling money. I am in no way a woman who believes a woman should be at home or a subservient.

That being said, I know so many women who have pursued their dream career only to find themselves in their mid to late thirties and just meeting that man of her dreams. Marrying him, she is approaching 40 when her baby hunger arrives. Frustrated, heart-broken and thousands of dollars later, she is desperate to have a child. Only what has happened is, that she has traded her child bearing days for the corporate ladder and now time has run out. Medicine has tried to keep up but it’s not as successful as we’d like to believe.

There are windows of opportunity in a woman’s life. There is time in a young woman’s life where she is finishing college and heading into her career. She is becoming who is supposed to be and hopefully finding her lifelong spouse. This is a window of opportunity.

There is time in her late-20’s and her 30’s to grab hold of that baby hunger and raise her children. There is nothing wrong or sad about a woman who takes a time-out to do this for herself and her family. I think we demean a woman who chooses to do this and I believe that it is her right to choose for herself what she’d like to do in this season of her life.

Then there is the time in her early 40’s where she once again pursues her passions for herself. This is where the burden comes in for me. I’ve met many women who are in this season of their life and they are only getting started on marriage and family. Unfortunately, for many, their window of opportunity for a child or four has come and gone. We can’t fight nature. I’ve hugged them as they cried because tests have shown that they no longer are in the stage of their life where a baby is possible naturally. I’ve seen their eyes as they explain that they were always told that they could get fertility treatments and have a child. Only fertility treatments are expensive and not always as successful as we’d like to think. There are seasons in a woman’ life and sometimes opportunities are missed.

I think we’ve been told that a woman can do anything a man can do. Sometimes that’s true and sometimes it’s not. A man can have children in old age, a woman can’t. Instead of thinking that her body has betrayed her, we must teach our daughters that we have moments that must be grabbed in life. We must teach that career is not the only enrichment in life and that one day, we’ll look up from our work, to discover that we’ve missed out on some things that we’d like to have. Let’s begin to talk about this.

Fashionista

September 13, 2009September 12, 2009 tlc4womenLeave a comment

http://www.flickr.com/ photos/ 81441889@N00/ 296506567/

I love clothes and fashion and everything about being a woman. I love shoes the absolute most and I like a good purse. I refuse to be a slave though. I wear what I want and what makes me feel good. I used to follow the no white after Labor Day rule but don’t anymore and haven’t for some time. I didn’t do it as some sort of rebellion but in California it’s still hot in September and white is cool and summery. I do have to say that as the summer days grow to fall and winter, my white generally goes away but I do have a suit with a white skirt that I wear in winter at least once.

Where did the rule come from anyway? So here’s a article of explanation. Enjoy it and remember, if it was good enough for Coco Chanel it’s good enough for us!

Moms Against Hunger

September 10, 2009September 9, 2009 tlc4womenLeave a comment

Today I want to direct you to a really good friend of mine and fellow Pastor’s wife blog. Her name is Dr. Gayla Holley and she is the President of Moms Against Hunger. As you will read her prayer list she has some exciting things that we can get involved in. There are people that can use our help and if we all just pitch in a little, it will go along way. To the right of my home page you’ll see a donate button. Please donate to this worthy cause. There are people who are quietly working for the betterment of others and Dr. Gayla is one of them. Click here to view her blog.

He Is A Provider And Protector

August 18, 2009 tlc4women6 Comments

This is the fourth installment on a series that began here.

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OOOOO this post gets me excited because this is where we as women miss the mark completely on the men we choose to share our lives. “I can fix him”, is the common thing I hear. But sister let me tell you that if your man isn’t working now he isn’t going to work later. As I always say, “If he’s broke, don’t fix him.” And yeah I do mean financially too, if he is working and not rich fine, but if he is living off of mommy and daddy or whoever his girlfriend is at the moment, he’s not marriage material. Period. Let’s read what the bible says about this:

Genesis 2:7 the Lord God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being

If you want a provider and protector you first have to find a man who has a relationship with his Father in heaven. How do you get closer in relationship then to have the breath of God bring you to life? This is critical ladies and I hope you are paying attention!

8 Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. 9 And the Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground–trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

Notice Adam was not living in his daddy’s house. You want a man who has lived on his own while still maintaining a relationship with his family. A man has to stand on his own two feet first and know how to feed himself.

15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.

Before a woman can even consider a man for marriage material she has to ask him a critical question. “Are you working?” If not, do not pass go and do not collect $200. Make a decision. Either you will wait until he is working to have feelings for him or you won’t. That is up to you but I would not under any circumstances date a man who isn’t working. He isn’t ready for a relationship. Between jobs? Then he’s between getting me and not. Before you go thinking this is about money, it’s about a man who knows how to provide for himself and isn’t looking for a mommy to breastfeed him.

16 And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.”

God gave the man some rules to live by. Is your man submitted to rules to live by? Character and morals are shaped on this premise. What are his rules and what does he live by? This is critical so don’t miss it. You’ll find men who are wild and out of control and we like those bad boys but we don’t marry them. I seriously hope you are reading this today because I am giving you some good advice. Does he have babies here, there and everywhere? I know he said the condom broke or the woman tricked him but it speaks to his character.
The rules of conduct of a man aren’t very important to him and if he isn’t supporting and seeing those babies then he isn’t submitted and he won’t be different for you.

Does he drink a little too much, gamble a little too much? Then expect that in your life. Is he a good man, but doesn’t believe in God? This won’t pose a problem to you if you are a follower of Christ until you have children. Once you have children, it will become extremely important to you so again, choose with the end in mind.

18 The Lord God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.” 19 Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. 20 So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field. But for Adam no suitable helper was found.

Notice, God didn’t say, “Now Adam, I think the time has come for you to get married.” NO! He waited for Adam to see his need for a mate. Don’t go around thinking that because your man is 28 that he wants to get married. It’s different for everyone. Don’t push for marriage just because you’ve dated for two years. Don’t give ultimatums. When your man is ready to get married and he has his life in order with the things we’ve blogged about here then he will tell you. This is the mistake I see time and time again. Pressure may make him do the thing you want but pressure will not make him stay. And quit wondering why he won’t marry you if you are sleeping together. Remember that old saying, ‘Why the buy the cow if you can get the milk for free?’ It totally applies here.

22 Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man. 23The man said, “This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ‘woman,’ for she was taken out of man.” 24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.

You want to avoid the mama’s boy? When he sees for himself what is required of him is when you’ll get that. Don’t shortchange what God has put in place.

EVER.

FOR ANYONE.

Your Lord, is your provider and your protector. There is nothing he wouldn’t do for you. There is no place he wouldn’t go for you. He laid down his life at your feet, for the chance and opportunity to have your love. His life is ordered just as he set up Adam’s life, for God used his own pattern. To do anything else is to live a life of uncertainty. God made our number one need as women to be loved and feel secure. The bible never once tells a woman to love her man. She does that automatically. He tells the man to love his wife and take care of her. Why? Because God does. He loves you and takes care of you. No one had to tell him to. No one had to push him to. He did it because he wanted to.

You will know when a man is ready for marriage because he will move towards it. Until then, make wise decisions with your life. Either you are willing to wait for his decision or you aren’t and you move on. Do not give yourself away to a man who is not ready. And certainly do not give your heart to a boy who doesn’t know what he wants and hasn’t earned his position in your life, no matter his age. You only have one heart so give it to someone who will nourish and protect it.