10 Questions to Ask at the Start of a New Year

This is a guest post by Donald S. Whitney, author of Praying the Bible.

---

Consider the Direction of Your Life

Once, when the people of God had become careless in their relationship with him, the Lord rebuked them through the prophet Haggai. “Consider your ways!” (Haggai 1:5) he declared, urging them to reflect on some of the things happening to them, and to evaluate their slipshod spirituality in light of what God had told them.
Even those most faithful to God occasionally need to pause and think about the direction of their lives. It’s so easy to bump along from one busy week to another without ever stopping to ponder where we’re going and where we should be going.
The beginning of a new year is an ideal time to stop, look up, and get our bearings. To that end, here are some questions to ask prayerfully in the presence of God.

1. What’s one thing you could do this year to increase your enjoyment of God?
2. What’s the most humanly impossible thing you will ask God to do this year?
3. What’s the single most important thing you could do to improve the quality of your family life this year?
4. In which spiritual discipline do you most want to make progress this year, and what will you do about it?
5. What is the single biggest time-waster in your life, and what will you do about it this year?
6. What is the most helpful new way you could strengthen your church?
7. For whose salvation will you pray most fervently this year?
8. What’s the most important way you will, by God’s grace, try to make this year different from last year?
9. What one thing could you do to improve your prayer life this year?
10. What single thing that you plan to do this year will matter most in ten years? In eternity?

In addition to these ten questions, here are twenty-one more to help you “Consider your ways.” Think on the entire list at one sitting, or answer one question each day for a month.

1. What’s the most important decision you need to make this year?
2. What area of your life most needs simplifying, and what’s one way you could simplify in that area?
3. What’s the most important need you feel burdened to meet this year?
4. What habit would you most like to establish this year?
5. Who is the person you most want to encourage this year?
6. What is your most important financial goal this year, and what is the most important step you can take toward achieving it?
7. What’s the single most important thing you could do to improve the quality of your work life this year?
8. What’s one new way you could be a blessing to your pastor (or to another who ministers to you) this year?
9. What’s one thing you could do this year to enrich the spiritual legacy you will leave to your children and grandchildren?
10. What book, in addition to the Bible, do you most want to read this year?
11. What one thing do you most regret about last year, and what will you do about it this year?
12. What single blessing from God do you want to seek most earnestly this year?
13. In what area of your life do you most need growth, and what will you do about it this year?
14. What’s the most important trip you want to take this year?
15. What skill do you most want to learn or improve this year?
16. To what need or ministry will you try to give an unprecedented amount this year?
17. What’s the single most important thing you could do to improve the quality of your commute this year?
18. What one biblical doctrine do you most want to understand better this year, and what will you do about it?
19. If those who know you best gave you one piece of advice, what would they say? Would they be right? What will you do about it?
20. What’s the most important new item you want to buy this year?
21. In what area of your life do you most need change, and what will you do about it this year?

The value of many of these questions is not in their profundity, but in the simple fact that they bring an issue or commitment into focus. For example, just by articulating which person you most want to encourage this year is more
likely to help you remember to encourage that person than if you hadn’t considered the question.
If you’ve found these questions helpful, you might want to put them someplace—in a day planner, PDA, calendar, bulletin board, etc.—where you can review them more frequently than once a year.
So let’s evaluate our lives, make plans and goals, and live this new year with biblical diligence, remembering that, “The plans of the diligent lead surely to advantage” (Proverbs 21:5). But in all things let’s also remember our dependence on our King who said, “Apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5).

---

Donald S. Whitney (PhD, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa) is professor of biblical spirituality and associate dean at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky. He has written several books, including Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life. Don blogs regularly at BiblicalSpirituality.org.

Sugestões para aprender Inglês

Galera, boa tarde!
Gostaria de sugerir um site pra vocês de inglês que achei muito bom. A Carina Fragozo é a responsável pelo blog e, simplesmente tem ótimos videos e dicas para você começar a aprender inglês, assim como, para você aprimorar seu inglês, seja na escrita, na fala, compreensão, enfim. Atualmente eu moro nos Estados Unidos, mas continuo procurando melhorar mais e mais meu inglês, portanto gostei demais de como ela apresenta, e deixo a dica aqui pra vocês, Vale a pena comferir, ok!

http://www.englishinbrazil.com.br/

The Friends You Need Are Worth the Wait

It all started when my husband and I sensed God’s call to move away from where we were living, to a new city and a new church. The excitement, expectation, and allure of something new overshadowed the fear of the unknown. We eagerly looked forward to what God had in store for us as a family. When there were moments of doubt, we would rehearseMark 10:29–30 to each other:

“Truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and lands, with persecutions, and in the age to come eternal life.”

These words from Jesus helped to remind us of the promises of God to those who were faithful to his call.

What About Friends?

Then one day, in the midst of the excitement of selling our home, packing boxes, and looking for a new home, it hit me: I can’t pack my girlfriends into a box and move them with me. I would be lying if I said I didn’t have second thoughts at this point. These were women who watched my children, women who would sit at the park with me for hours as our children ran and played together, women who drank coffee and played Scrabble with me. These women were my friends! Did the promises found in Mark 10 apply to friends too? After all, I am a woman and I long for friendship. Did God care about the longing in my heart for close female companionship?

I can honestly say that yes, God did and does care about my need for female companionship, but those friends didn’t come along right away. There was a long, lonely season after we moved. My husband traveled frequently, women at our new church were busy, and I questioned whether I would ever have dear friends again. I remember asking God if there might be even one woman who would want to have a cup of coffee together once in a while. The answer seemed to be, “Not yet.”

Oh the waiting was so hard — and yet, so worth it.

When the Call Came

It did feel like I waited forever. Thankfully, I had a dear friend from our previous home that, in spite of the distance, checked in with me. She was a lifeline, an ever present reminder that my friends did not have to be in the same place. To this day, we are still friends, upholding one another in prayer, rejoicing and weeping together, even drinking an occasional cup of coffee together plus getting that game of Scrabble played. That helped, but certainly didn’t feel like a long-term answer to my prayers.

Then one day the call came. “Would you like to be a part of our birthday group? We don’t get together often, but we do celebrate birthdays and were just wondering if you would like to join us?”

Would I like to join them? I remember holding the phone and feeling the tears drip down my cheek. Who knew that this would be the beginning of a group of women that, to this day, I drink coffee with twice a month? Such a sweet providence of God!

In all of this, what have I learned about friendship? How has God encouraged me? Here are five gleanings from my season of waiting for friendship that I’ve found apply in less dramatic circumstances as well.

19 Ways to Protect your Marriage

Before I tell you about my encounter with the 6 foot French goddess, you need some back story.

We had a 3 1/2 year old, a 12 month old, and I was pregnant again. My husband decided to get his MBA through a Business School program designed for those already in the workplace; therefore classes met nights and weekends.

A week into the program, the college held a cocktail party to welcome the spouses, thanking them in advance for the sacrifices this program required upon their family time. It was a nice touch.

The dean of the program gave an inspiring speech about the life-long relationships the students were going to form and suggested we get to know the 6 individuals assigned to our spouse’s “Study Group” because this is who they’d be spending much of their time with over the next 2 years.

I was ready. I was excited. I was supportive.

I met 4 middle-aged married men and a very lovely, engaging single woman. We chatted about their careers and families.

Then the sixth member of the group walked up, or should I say slinked. We all stood silently, mouths hanging open. She possessed that type of beauty that wasn’t subjective. She was unaware of her exotic, stunning presence, but at 25 years old and 6 feet tall commanded the room.

In the strongest of French accents, she said “Hallo” and for a moment I thought she was seducing me.  The next thing I heard her say was,  “Maybe some of you men could help me move into my apartment on Saturday? Yes?”

As we wiped our drool, I quickly saw other wives speak for their husbands regarding prior commitments to soccer games and birthday parties. My husband locked eyes with me, and with the biggest grin whispered, “Honey, I can hear you. Do you realize you are laughing out loud?”

I covered my mouth attempting to suppress the increasing humor I found in this situation. I just couldn’t contain my pregnant myself. This French goddess is going to be my husband’s late-night-and-weekend study buddy for the next 2 years? It felt like an episode of Punked. Can somebody wave a Red Flag please?

I have never been a jealous wife. I trust my husband completely but I am not naïve.

When we got into the car after the party, we shared more than a laugh. I asked why he hadn’t mentioned there was a French goddess in his study group. He explained he wasn’t sure how a pregnant wife with a baby and toddler at home would receive such information. He reassured me of his love and devotion which was unnecessary but always good to hear.

Then my tone turned serious as I asked him to be discerning of the situations he put himself in knowing we were both entering a period of sleep deprivation and exhaustion.

The next morning I called my sister with residual laughter about my husband’s new study buddy. After a few witty jokes, we committed to praying for protection over his heart, his study group, and the coming two years. Prayer was our strongest line of defense.

A week later my husband called me from work saying the French goddess had to switch to a different MBA program due to scheduling conflicts.

Yes my friends, it works. Sometimes it’s not answered quite so obviously or exactly how we imagined, but it has the power to transform situations and relationships.

Although I have much to learn about marriage, I have been surrounded by quite a bit of divorce. What I do know is that we have to intentionally protect our marriages and that starts by protecting our own hearts.

Glorify by Giving Thanks by John Piper

It is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people it may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God. (2 Corinthians 4:15)

Gratitude is joy toward God for his grace. But by its very nature, gratitude glorifies the giver. It acknowledges its own need and the beneficence of the giver.

Just like I humble myself and exalt the waitress in the restaurant when I say, “Thank you” to her, so I humble myself and exalt God when I feel gratitude to him. The difference, of course, is that I really am infinitely in debt to God for his grace, and everything he does for me is free and undeserved.

But the point is that gratitude glorifies the giver. It glorifies God. And this is Paul’s final goal in all his labors: for the sake of the church — yes; but, above and beyond that, for the glory of God.

The wonderful thing about the gospel is that the response it requires from us for God’s glory is also the response which we feel to be most natural and joyful; namely, gratitude for grace. God’s glory and our gladness are not in competition.

A life that gives glory to God for his grace and a life of deepest gladness are always the same life. And what makes them one is gratitude.

Você pode ser bom sem Deus?