Do You Have "Those People" in Your Life?

I heard a pastor about a year ago, with a message that impacted my heart in a mighty way.

I think it was Pastor Chip Ingram, but I'm not positive. I wish I had a link to it for you...it was so good!

He said that as believers, we all need to have both a Paul and a Timothy in our lives.

We need to have someone through whom God is pouring into our lives, and someone into whose life we are allowing God to pour through us.

Think about that....

A Paul (or a Paulina)

and a Timothy (or a Timothea)

Someone who is teaching us to be more like Christ, and someone with whom we are sharing what He is teaching us, how He is growing us, pruning us, disciplining us even...

Do you have those people in your life?

If you don't start asking God to send them to you.

Your walk with the Lord will never be the same.

I have been blessed of God to have many Paulinas who pour into my life. Some don't even know it...these are the women who minister to me by their life choices...the women who are living as sacrifices to Christ Jesus in their every day lives.

I'm a keen observer.

Truly.

I'm a watcher...that's how I learn.

I observe and observe and observe some more.

The following post is written by one of those Paulinas in my life....one of those women whom I've "watched".

She's been a Precept leader for many years, and has shared her life with me through email.

I fell in love with her very quickly. I've observed her life through her notes to me, and have lost count of the many times that God has laid her on my heart to pray for her.

I count it a privilege each time.

She's running the race, sweet friends...she's pressing on, and her focus is on the Lord, the body of Christ, and the lost.

Here's the crazy part, we have yet to meet face to face.

We'll get to do that in a few weeks, at the upcoming Precept Training at our church, praise the Lord, and I just can't wait to hug her sweet neck!

You know I'm going to cry...you now that...when I finally get to see her, I will weep.

No doubt about it.

I love her. I love her heart, and I love how she lives to honor God.

Here is her guest blogger post.

Her name is Renae. I trust you'll fall in love with her too, so when you do...lift up those prayers!

Thank you, sweet Renae. You are precious, and I thank God for you.

For almost a week now, I’ve been trying to figure out how to express what Bible Study means to me and how it’s affected my life.

How can I briefly explain something that over the decades has TOTALLY changed my thinking, behavior, priorities, reactions, desires, relationships, goals and my attitudes?

Not that I’ve arrived and have it all figured out and now live a sinless life….oh, no, not by a long shot. I’m very aware every day that I have a LONG ways still to go in my sanctification process and life-race.

Through the study of His Word, I’m continually finding new areas that need to come under the Lord’s control, sins that need to be repented of and confessed, and new things that I need to learn and apply.

However, it’s learning what God has to say that affects the way I spend my time, talents and abilities, money, energy, and the way I want to spend the rest of my life.

In God’s Word, the voice of God speaks directly & personally to us & He reveals His heart and His grace.

That’s a simple statement of truth, but isn’t it also staggering and mind-blowing?

To think that the infinite, all-knowing, all-wise, all-powerful, wonderful God of the universe would even be interested in revealing His heart and in speaking to finite, faint-heated, feeble, frail me is just beyond words and incredibly wonderful.

As a believer, I have the privilege of direct communication with God. WOW!

I can hear from God and find Him revealed in His Word. WOW again!

God’s Word is a living Word, so it carries divine quickening power in it. And WOW once again!

As Andrew Murray said, “The words in which God has chosen to clothe His own divine thoughts are God-breathed, and the life of God dwells in them. God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. The Word was inspired when first given and the Spirit of God STILL breathes in it.”

When we understand and believe that, the Bible is no longer just a book, it’s a letter written personally to us. When we’re receiving His Word in faith and hearing from Him, that’s when His Word comes alive for us and in us. And when that happens, in my experience, the WOW-factor never ends.

Prioritizing time in God’s Word and wanting to hear His voice more than the voice of our emotions and more than the input of the world is the desire that gives us an ear to hear and a heart to absorb His Word.

Only God Himself can be the Interpreter of His Word.

The Holy Spirit, who dwells within all believers, will reveal the spiritual meaning and power of the Word. Every day, with His help, the Word can be the means to a deeper revelation of God Himself and to our deeper fellowship with Him.

Asking the Holy Spirit to grant me comprehension and a heart to hear and obey, and then having confidence (believing) that God still wants to speak individually to me through His Word is what brings both light and life to my heart and spirit.

In the Word, God has revealed His heart and His will.

I could go on and on with specifics benefits of Bible Study, and I wouldn’t begin to cover what a blessing it is in my life.

To have access to the mind and thoughts and will and promises of God and to see how He’s worked and is continuing to work through history for His purposes and His glory is an incredible privilege.

For me to do a prayerful, consistent, organized study of the Word of God and to apply what I’m hearing and learning to my daily life, brings meaning, purpose, joy, peace and hope to my life.

I guess to sum it all up; hearing the voice of the sovereign God inviting me to intimacy and fellowship, and by His Spirit to be able to gain insight and understanding through His Word, is priceless and exciting and challenging and wonderful beyond what a million blog entries could ever adequately express.