Wednesday

10 Ways to Help Start A Good Daily Habit - A Dose of Encouragement


Oh go on admit it!

We all have habits.

Some are Good and then there are those ones that we just don't want to talk about.







Well they say
(don't really know who they are but I am always reading or hearing that this is what THEY say)

that

 if you do something for 30 days you will form a new habit



I took this seriously a few years ago because I seriously wanted to get into the habit of reading at least one verse of the Bible before I got into some kind of Social Media or something else on my iPad each day.

So if you read my  "Advice for a King & for Us post in my Encouragement Series you will know that I started with Proverbs 31.


Well I can tell you that 30 days
did not truly make this
 a habit for me!!!


But


We all know the saying

"An Apple a Day keeps the Doctor away"


So how about we make it

"A Psalm a Day keeps the Devil at Bay"?







Or

Maybe it would be better to make it


"A Chapter a Day Gives The Lord His Say"?






A Chapter is not too much to read each day.


So


How do you get started?



Here are 10 suggestions:


Also don't miss the 3 TIPS at the very end of this blog post.


1.   Start at the very beginning.
If you are a methodical person you might find this suits you and of course the Book of Genesis gives us a good grounding for all that is to come later.

At the start of this year I chose to read through the Bible in one year Chronologically so it did not follow through the Bible in the order of the placement of books in the Bible but by the time in which they were written.






2.   Pick a Book you have never read before.
Something that will be fresh and new to you.

Even though I have read straight through the Bible a few times there are still some books like the minor prophets that I often can't recall.



3.   Pick a book you could read completely in one day.
There are 5 books that are only 1 chapter long:

OBADIAH
PHILEMON
JUDE

The other 2 are
2 JOHN
3 JOHN
However it might seem strange to read 2 & 3 John before 1 John so see below to join up all 3 books







4.   Pick a short book that you could read within one week.
There are several books that have between  2 - 7 chapters.

HAGGAI  -  2
HABAKKUK  -  3
JOEL  -  3
NAHUM  -  3
2 PETER  -  3
TITUS  -  3
2 THESSALONIANS  -  3
ZEPHANIAH  -  3
COLOSSIANS  -  4
JONAH  -  4
MALACHI  -  4
PHILIPPIANS  - 4
RUTH  -  4 
2 TIMOTHY  -  4
JAMES  -  5
LAMENTATIONS  -  5
1 PETER  -  5
1 THESSALONIANS  -  5 
1 TIMOTHY  -  6
1, 2 & 3 JOHN  -  7

Or a combination of 2 or 3 from this list to make up a week's reading.







5.   Pick one of the Gospels.
Some people prefer to read the New Testament first before the Old Testament as they feel it is easier.
Some people prefer to read the narrative about Jesus before the other books.

Many people recommend John's Gospel as the first Book to read.







6.   Pick the book of Psalms 
Where each one can be thought of as a complete read on it's own.

There is great wisdom for us in the very first Psalm so a good starting point.







7.   Pick the book of Proverbs
Where each chapter is often thought of as easy to read.

This is a book which is full of wisdom and advice & I like to note the repetitions of phrases within it.







8.   Pick a book you have read a long time ago.
One not so familiar at the moment.

Like my choice of Song of Solomon in the recent past because I could not really remember it and I never felt I understood it very well.



9.   Pick a book that your pastor has preached on recently.
One you can think of in the light of what your Pastor has taught.

For me that would be Ruth.

Perhaps I should have waited to hear his teaching before I wrote these two blog posts. 


Ruth & Boaz - The Start of the Story





Ruth & Boaz -  Love & Perfection?







10.  Pick a book that your pastor is about to start preaching on.
One to prepare you for future teaching.

For me that would be Esther.







Plus 3 EXTRA TIPS


1.  Do Not start with the book of Job  -  long & hard to read

2.  Do Not give up with reading the Bible daily  -  if you feel you cannot understand a book then simply leave it
 and choose another.
You can always go back & read it later.

3.  Tell someone your plan and ask them to check up with you regularly to encourage you.
  Maybe you can do the same for them.











Friday

How to Get rid of That Sticky Problem - Organising


Have you ever had a "Sticky Problem"?

Have you ever had that thought of "How am I ever going to get that off that?"?

Well I really did not know what to do with a problem that was in our house when we moved in several years ago so I just left it and got on with other things because I knew what to do about them.







Each time I would do a yearly overhaul of the toilet off our utility room I would have no problem going through my ToDo list of things that needed to be done.


Except for that one item.

One thing each time was getting left on my list with the idea that some day when I have some extra time I will try to solve this problem I had.

Only one item, nothing else needed to be repaired and no other decorative work needed to be done.

And if you read the post  "An Organised Medicine Cabinet"  you would understand.

There were 2 hooks stuck to the tiled wall above the window
 that so annoyed me because they were
       1. different
      and 
      2. not level

You can see that clearly in the picture of the 2 different hooks above - I know, I know we can't understand why the previous owners did this either!






To be truthful I was just lazy about getting round to removing them plus being rather concerned about how to tackle this without annoying the tiles because the whole room is tiled floor to ceiling and we didn't want a new tile job.
 (Well they are definitely not my favourite tiles!  But the bother and expense of doing walls top to bottom did not really justify doing this except that while getting our new kitchen in over a year ago we had some times let from the kitchen and utility room and the tiler just put them down on top of the ones there so that we now had the same tiles throughout.)


So one day a couple of years ago I decided to get on with this (well I decided Fred could help me to get on with this).

Fred got a scraper blade thingy and cautiously tried to remove the hook on the left.
Surprise, Surprise!
It came off quite easily and with a little bit more scraping all the glue was removed as well.


We were delighted  -  Yes this looked like it was going to be an easy clean job after all.


Then he tried the one on the right and although it did not come off as easily as the first one it did come off after a short time
BUT
even with more and more scraping the glue was not budging.


Not so delighted now, but still at least the hook was off and no tiles had been harmed in the process.

Fred said maybe we wouldn't really notice it because it was high up and the room is not used too much so we could live with it.

Does your husband say things like that.

Surely they that once we have seen it there we will always think of it when we enter that room.


A Solution had to been found!


I have a product from Lakeland (not sure if it is sold elsewhere) called
 STICKY STUFF Remover Gel
and
 it's mate STICKY STUFF Remover  which is a liquid.






So I got out the Gel which has a brush attached to the lid

I have used it previously for removing labels from containers with good success but would it remove this?








I simply applied the gel liberally over the glue residue and left it to work






I left it on about an hour and wiped it off with a damp sponge.


The result




the glue was completely removed.

So it does what it says on the tub.


Just another great product from Lakeland (one of my favourite shops as I have stated before)
I am not compensated in any way for mentioning this product.


You can imagine how thankful I was that this was not the awkward job we had imagined and it was nice to have a whole ToDo List completed.


Ok, Ok, I know it only had one item on it 
but the satisfaction was still there.



Now I don't have a sticky problem

and I don't have to even think about why there were 2 different hooks

and why they were at two different levels.


But every so often I do wonder Why????









Monday

3 Little Letters - Do You Know What They Mean? - Coffee & Conversation


They are just 3 letters!

They are used in everyday language!

They are written in messages, tweets, comments, etc.

But just because other people have used them it doesn't mean that we ladies as Christians should be using them.







People write them down often but some people don't even stop to think what they mean.

They are often used in capitals to show immense unbelief.

BUT

They do not mean "Oh My Goodness"  which is what some people may consider to be their meaning.

NO

The 3 letters 

OMG

DO NOT mean  "Oh My Goodness" 

Just google them and see that in every listing that comes up in Google it clearly states that these three letters mean

"Oh My God!"


Almost daily on facebook I see people sharing what they consider are fun quizes or fun games to play like

"What Job Suits Your Face?"

"What's Your Power Colour?"

"What Age Can You Pass For?"

"What is Your Life Story?"

"How Old Are You Based on Your Photo?

"What is Your Biography?"

"Who Loves You 100%?"

"Which Bible Verse Will Give You Strength?"


"Which Bible Verse Do You Need Today?"


Each time anyone clicks on that picture to get an answer about themselves they are promoting someone who is taking the Lord's Name in vain.







We need to have good standards and be obedient to God's word and therefore we should not say those words but we also should not support others who do.


I know that the Facebook page putting out these  "fun" click posts have this pic of a shocked face before the letters




 but that does not take away any meaning or severeness of the meaning of the letters.



Then the one that I really could not believe that Christians were clicking on was the following


"What Bible Verse Did God Write For You?"


because we as Christians should know that all the verses in the Bible have been written for us by God.






In fact I saw the same person do this one twice and they got a different verse each time.



So ladies I am saying that these 3 letters written or spoken are NOT glorifying to God.


We should be careful how we use God's name at any time and so we should look to His Word to determine just what are the right ways to use this Holy Name and in so doing Honour our heavenly Father.







Ladies let us take our cue from Mary who clearly recognised the Holiness of God's Name when she sang to God on knowing she was to bear His Son.







If we recognize as Mary did that God does great things for us how can we possibly not treat His Name with the reverence it deserves?
















Sunday

10 Bible Verses of Encouragement in times of Fear



We all need encouragement and the best place to go is to the Bible.

In this blog Post I have tried to gather some Bible passages or Bible verses which will encourage us all in times of fear.







I do believe that we should not just grab a verse and read it on its own but we should always lift our bibles and read a passage of scripture to make sure that we know the real meaning and context of each of the verses we are putting our trust in. 

I pray that you will do the same and only use this list to guide you as to where you may find help.



So here are 10 Bible verses or short passages for us to turn to in times when we are afraid





1.   Isaiah 41 v 10 & 13     

God truly is the one who wants to encourage us in times when we are afraid or when a fear (just or unjust) comes upon us or in those times when we do not even really know what we fear.

God always knew that we would need reassurance against fears and He prepares us and is ready to help us through the fear.

God also knew that this fear we would face would be very real to us but He also knew that His presence was the answer to our fear and He wants us to know that as we rest in His presence we do not need to fear anything.

We find this in Isaiah 41 v 10



Here His instruction is not to Fear,  
  • Why - because He is with us.
  • Why - because He is our God.
  • Why - because He will strengthen us.
  • Why - because He will Help us.
  • Why - because He will hold us in His Hand.


Then a few verses later He repeats Himself


We find this in Isaiah 41 v 13



Here His instruction again is not to Fear,  
  • Why - because He is our God.
  • Why - because He will hold our right Hand.
  • Why - because He will Help us.

When God says something we need to listen and take heed to His Words but when He repeats something it makes it all the more important.






2.   Joshua 1 v 9
    
God is gracious to us and knows that we forget what He has told us or lapse in our faith so we need to be reminded of what He has said He will do as this verse states








Not only is God with us now so we should not fear but He is going to always be with us wherever that may be so should never need to fear.




3.   Matthew 10 v 28 


Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul
Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.


Here we have two kinds of fear


Fear of Man and the influence of evil

Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul


Fear of God who is Good

Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.


Fear of God
 is awe of God,
 respect of God,
 admiration of God
 and
 believing that He is in control of everything



The Fear of God is the right type of fear because it leads us to God.

I previously wrote a Dose of Encouragement about the Right Type of Fear it's called  A Good Kind of Fear




4.   Psalm 23 v 4 

This psalm is a Psalm of great comfort to us because if we read it carefully and thoughtfully we will see that the Psalmist is acknowledging how God is with us in everything.

No matter what situation we are in we need not be afraid.



Even when we feel we may be near death:

 Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.


He will be with us and we will not need to fear any evil.


You may want to look further into Psalm 23




5.   Psalm 34 v 4    


Oh how good it is to know that God knows all our fears, listens to us and hears us when we are afraid and on top of that is loving towards us in His attitude to us in our fear because He cares enough to bring us through whatever the situation is.






God asks one thing of us when we are afraid - seek Him.

God does two things for us when we are afraid & seek Him - He hears us & He delivers us




6.   Psalm 27 v 1


In this verse God is 3 things to the Psalmist and because of these 3 things the Psalmist has the confidence that he need not be afraid of anyone.




The Lord is his Light

The Lord is his Salvation

The Lord is the Stronghold of his life

Think carefully and consider do we believe like the Psalmist that the Lord is these things to us?

If we do then just like the Psalmist we can say

"Who can we possibly fear?"





7.   Psalm 56 v 3


We are only human and no matter what happens we will act and think in human ways.

So because of this we will often fear when a situation comes upon us but the important thing is not to stay engulfed in that fear but to remember that in that situation we can trust in God and then to act on that knowledge.










8.   1 John 4 v 18



Love is the opposite of fear.

Love is stronger than fear.

Hence where there is Love there can be no fear and God is Love and His Love is the perfect love that cannot be marred by anything even fear





God has love in store for us in which fear can have no stronghold nor cause us any harm.






9.   Deuteronomy 31 v 8





Not only will God not leave us alone when we are afraid but He also will never forsake us.

We are the ones who run away from God yet He is always there going in front of us and walking beside us.  He is prepared for what is going to happen because He knows everything.













10.   2 Timothy 1:7




Where does our feelings of fear come from?

They certainly do not come from God because His Word is clear to tell us this.

Not only is God not the author of fear He is instead the one who cares so much that He wants to give us His Spirit which is the Spirit of Power and the Spirit of Love and the Spirit of a sound mind.

God never adds to our Fear - He adds better qualities to our life.



God gives us the opposite of fear.

When we keep close to Him and trust in Him we will look at things in the right way and witness His Power and His Love and His right thought for us.












Friday

Organising a Gift Wrapping Cart / Station


I like having a selection of wrapping paper and bags in our house ready for when I have to organize a gift for someone or my daughter or son need to wrap items when they are staying with us .

However for quite some time I've been complaining that I couldn't find the items I was sure I had already bought and I seemed to be wasting a lot of time searching around trying to remember where I had put them.

So when I saw a wooden kitchen cart for sale on Facebook marketplace and I knew it was a really good price I had the idea of creating a Gift wrapping Cart or Station as our American friends would call it.







I know I am not the only person who buys things in advance.

I know I am not the only person who puts them away somewhere which seems to be logical.

I know I am not the only person who hunts around frantically looking for the items I bought and put away in a logical place but now I can't find them.

Obviously I am not as organised as I would like to be or need to be.


So I really needed to organise my wrapping paper and gift bags

I had made a first attempt at getting everything together some months before I saw the kitchen cart advertised but it was not a great success.

The bags had been gathered up and put into this plastic 3 drawer container and it did hold many bags that were not too big







BUT

there were a few reasons why this was not a success

1.   There was a piece broken off at the bottom corner of one of the drawers and was quite rough so I had to remember not to grab the drawer at the corner.






2.   It was reasonably fine for holding bags which were not not large - I still need somewhere to put the really large bags I had.   (you know the bargains we buy when we see them)


3.   I do like to use gift bags as much as I can but the younger kids within the family tend to prefer paper wrapping on their presents so that they can tear it off as quickly and roughly as possible and the only way to keep paper in this set of drawers would be to have sheets folded up and although I do have sheets like this I do hate folds in the paper on presents.

    So Mostly I buy rolls of paper and they would just be too long to fit in the drawers so they were still in a green bag I had bought some years ago however each time I took out a roll even though I would put it back into the bag (eventually) I would often leave the bag down somewhere and then forget exactly where I had left it the next time I needed it.








4.   I also have tissue paper to use in the gift bags and it is always folded so it will in the drawers okay but when I hunt through a drawer for a suitable bag or paper or tissue I found that the tissue paper got rather messed about.





5.   Then I needed to keep gift tags somewhere plus sellotape and string and ribbon and bows and scissors.


6.    The main reason that I disliked my choice of the plastic drawers was not the actual drawers but the difficulty in moving the set of drawers as they were not on castors and the fact that castors could not be attached because of the style of the bottom of them and also that it was too low to do wrap anything on top of it.


So a sturdy wooden cart on castors with shelves 






and a rail







and a drawer

and has a top that could be used for wrapping

was looking great to me.







I am a great lover of baskets for storage and have in the past grabbed up some bargains when I have seen them so I knew I had baskets which could work with this cart.


I had 3 sets of these 3 baskets which were in 3 sizes.







I also had a lovely box which had come with Gin Sing as a gift from our in-laws in South Korea and it could be put to use with the cart too.







So how would I go about using the box & baskets?


Would I put a basket on each of the 3 shelves?







Would I put 2 baskets and the box on the shelves?







It would really depend on what was in the baskets and how they would fit into the shelves once they had the contents filling them.


So what I had would have to be sorted into types and sizes starting with the gift bags.


A lot of my gift bags were of the same size and I started to place them in the largest of my baskets






but there were many others as well






so they had to be grouped into 2 lots to be put in the other two smaller baskets.



Then the papers





and the tissue papers






Because of the more flimsy nature of the paper and especially the tissue paper I decided they should probably be all in the Box and I knew they would all fit well in there.





The box was able to sit on the top of the cart or it could go on the top shelf so a choice had to be made about that.

But before that I had that other paper to cope with - the rolls of paper but I knew exactly how I was going to store them and yes it was on the cart okay.

In fact those rolls were one of the reasons I was really drawn to using that cart because I knew they could sit upright resting on on of the shelves and held on by the side rail or handle.







So that after they were put on the cart I had to decide about the final placing of the box and the baskets.

Would it be box on top with baskets on the shelves




except that the top shelf would not hold the basket due to height so I had to take the gift bags out and lay them flat on the shelf.


Or

Would it be box on the top shelf with largest basket on the top and other two baskets on the bottom 2 shelves?






However 2 things were left to finish off

1.  How would the drawer be used?

2.  What about the really large bags I also had that never fit into anything?


Well

The drawer will hold all the gift tags, scissors, sellotape, pens etc. that we also need to have a fully working wrapping cart / station but at the moment I do need to go out and buy some more gift tags or make some as I only have about 2 left.

and as for the very large bags this picture of the finished project will explain about them










Now if anyone has any ideas what I could use the long ties (see pic below) that came around the sets of baskets for I would be grateful for your suggestions just let me know in the comments because I hate to not use something and hate to throw something out when it might be useful later.