Review: Out Live Your Life~Max Lucado

Max Lucado is an excellent story teller, and this novel is not short of brillance!  Max moves through each chapter with a different story of one ordinary person who allowed their extraordinary God make difference through them.  Each seeing one thing, and as it lays heavy on their heart, prays to make a difference.  Each story stirs the heart to praise God! But it doesn’t stop there, it provokes the mind to do the same…make a difference..do something! (Even if it seems to be small and not making a dent) Our Extraordinary God take a little and makes a lot!

Max Lucado impresses me that the stories are not made up from somewhere in his creative juices. All can be followed up in the back of the book with the proper documentation.  This book would be an excellent study book for a small group. Questions for discussion and self application are listed in the back of the book for each chapter.

This is a must read! Easy to read, back with Scripture, and motivating to press on and move forward with our God. Nothing is too hard for HIM.

Out Live Your Life, you were made to make a difference!

(also printed to http://www.booksneeze.com/  in agreement with Book Sneeze )

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Abundant Grace~Week two

(trying to keep up with schedules while nursing a back injury is not my stong suit.  Sorry, i need to post once a week for now. If any of you would like to post something from this study, let me know, or leave a comment with a link, or email me and we will work something out so you can do that. Please keep moving with this study…)

Are you amazed yet with the happenings in this family line?  At times they have me shaking my head, and at other times wondering what they were thinking…then realizing they are just people just like us…not perfect, paying for their bad choices, and still blessed beyond what they even know.

Jacob~ deciever…wrestles with God…receives  a new name that will soon be the name of a new nation..then he learns what deception is like at the hand of Laban..he ends up working 14 years for the hand of Rachel.

Judah~ caught with a prostitute bc he ripped her off in his family, by not giving her what was rightfully hers. Tamar, taught Judah a thing about deception..she was still wrong in how she did it, but deception seems to run deep in this family.  Then remember..Judah talked his brothers into selling Joseph but telling their Father he was killed…

Deception…it just seems to grow and grow…how often have we felt the hand of deception and how many  times have we dealt the hand of deception? No Matter… God took their bad and made it good..thats what HE does.  This does not mean that we should continue in that, or that we should condone a deceptive person.  The bottom line to me, GOD’s plan is full proof or fool proof! HE has a plan and it will work 100%, and nothing we do or anyone else does will change that plan.  Our choice is to walk in HIS blessing or walk in the curse.

Jacob..Judah..Tamar.. all in the family line of Jesus.  I love that GOD put this in the Bible easy for us to track. DO you see that our lives and family lines are not that different? Sinners, i need of redemption.  Thoughts???

Abundant Grace Day 5~Deception

(fell behind last week, later today i will post for today, and back on track! noticed i have a few stalking w/o commenting, please comment, your thoughts are safe here, no condemnation)

Philippians 2:3

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves.  Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.”

Genesis 25:29-34 /Genesis 27:1-10

Jacob was named the “Deceiver”, remember grasping his brothers heel at birth.  This family had some issues!  Parents you favored one more then the other, a son who would sell his future for a bowl of food, the other who would gladly take it all, and a mother who keep the secret, and send her son away to protect him from the other.

WOW! Still God’s plan.  HE knew they would choose these things, and HIS greater glory would still shine through them.  I am always amazed when looking at this family line, and the fact that God had every bit of it written down for us to know and see, HIS mercy and grace, His plan that can not be stopped.  Faithfulness.

Which of these  family members gets your attention? Are you amazed at how God makes a plan that would not look anything like the plan we would make?  Thoughts?

Abundant Grace ~Day 4 Twins

Isaac and Rebekah have twins after trying for 20 years! I am amazed with how God has a thing for making babies where the woman is barren.  He did it with Sarah, then again with Rebekah, fast forward to the new testament…again with Elizabeth (mother of John the baptist) and then the ultimate conception with Mary a virgin.  (just alittle of how my brain ran on.. 😆 )

Esau and Jacob. Two completely different types of men, one a hunter, and one a home body. Interesting in just that. The fact that Jacob was grasping his brothers heel at birth was no mistake in the story.  The struggle between them started before birth, and carried on much of their life.

We have parents here favoring one or the other. Please don’t forget that in all their bad choices, God hand picked them to be the family line of HIS son! yep, back to looking at the heart, and knowing the plans HE has.

GOD doesn’t play favorites, no one is more popular or more worthy, more beautiful, or more wealthy, or has a brighter future, none of this matters to HIM, He adores all HIS children, and sees them equally.  I love that! Pshhh! the world needs to get behind us!

Ephesians 6:9 MSG  Masters, it’s the same with you. No abuse, please, and no threats. You and your servants are both under the same Master in heaven. He makes no distinction between you and them (Ephesians 6:9MSG).

As I read through this study, so many things are stirred, and brought to mind…God’s plan always works, HE selects people who have made bad choices, HE shows how strong HIS hand is to make that plan happen, and the shadow of HIS redemption plan is all over the old testament. Amazing!

Who in this section interested you and why?

Abundant Grace-Abraham (God’s plan begins)

Romans 15:4  “For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us, so that through endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have hope.” why do we read scripture? to learn, to know more about HIM, and so that we will have the hope that HE wants us to have. Honestly, there is no place like HOPE.

(Who does not want hope? raise your hand..and I hope you will be okay with me thinking you are my Special person in this study! 😆 )

“God doesn‟t look at outward appearance, God looks at the heart.  He looks beyond what man looks at (1 Samuel 16:7).”  I had to stop here..and breathe..God Looks At The Heart! Yours, mine, and Abraham’s heart…

Abram (later to be renamed Abraham), 75 years old, and his life was just to begin…

The LORD had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household

and go to the land I will show you.  “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I

will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and

whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth

will be blessed through you.” So Abram left, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him.

Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran. He took his wife Sarai, his

nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in

Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.

~Genesis 12:1-5

God picked Abram to father HIS country, HIS people, and made him promises that were incredible.  Abram’s faith in God was huge. He believed that GOD could do what HE said.

There are times I struggle with this, I know God can do anything, but taking a step in faith can be terrifying.

What are your thoughts on Abram? Can you imagine hearing God speak, and picking up your family and just going, without knowing where you are going? Don’t we usually want our ducks all in a row? thoughts?

Abundant Grace-intro

The word GRACE used to totally baffle my mind.  Not many people can even define the word, much less apply it to daily living.  When I was a child my Sunday School teacher defined Grace as an acronym

G-God’s

R-riches

A-at

C-Christ’s

E-Expense

Altho I could understand that Jesus died for me, the whole riches, and expense escaped me.

Grace is so much more, and once we accept the fact that it is a gift that we will never be able to pay for, or feel worthy of…IT’S AMAZING!  Abundant is the word! As believers we are swimming in it! GOD said.. “My Grace is sufficient for you” .  WOW, sufficient…its enough, you are not left wanting or needing..its enough!  Nothing is too hard for HIM, nothing is too costly, nothing is too good for you as HIS child. HE does reserve the right to decide what is good for you. 🙂

The Blood of Jesus is enough to cover yours and my sins. No limit to the power of it, and its given to us FREE…

What are your thoughts on Grace?