You using that chair?

Yo, so true story - One day Breanna was walking and bumped into this chair that said, "Do Not Touch." She didn't seem to think anything of it, there seemed to be no reason to not touch it. So she leaned on it while texting, but when she went to walk away, she was stuck to it. No matter what she tried, she couldn't free herself. A short time later, Hannah is walking by and sees Breanna. She tries to pull Breanna off the chair, but can't and in the process touches the chair. Now they're both stuck. Along comes Elliott and Lauren. Upon seeing some damsels in distress, Elliott tries to be a knight in shining armor. Again, the attempts are unsuccessful and Elliott and Lauren both manage to get stuck on the chair too. Out of no where, Max comes flying in with some ninja moves, assesses the situation, and like those who've gone before him, winds up stuck to the chair. Christy was out for a run and finds the group all stuck to the chair. Instead of helping, she starts taking pictures of them, including a selfie (don't believe me? ask her to show you this picture!). But she can be a little clumsy and stumbles into the chair, getting herself stuck too. 

Next Natalie comes walking by. She's a little smarter than the others. Rather than getting herself stuck, she actually manages to get everyone unstuck!

Galatians 5:1-6 For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery. 2 Look: I, Paul, say to you that if you accept circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. 3 I testify again to every man who accepts circumcision that he is obligated to keep the whole law. 4You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. 5 For through the Spirit, by faith, we ourselves eagerly wait for the hope of righteousness. 6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. 

Now say one of them decided that they really liked the chair. They didn't really mind being stuck to it, they actually kind of liked it. Although they've gotten unstuck from the chair, they want to continue staying stuck to it. How would you respond to them? What would you do if you saw Max or Hannah walking around with a chair stuck to them?

It would be silly for anyone of us to want to stay stuck to a chair, but that's silly skit is an analogy to the way that we live life. There are so many ways where we opt to stay stuck (submit ourselves to slavery), instead being unstuck (free because of Christ).

Check out the chorus of this song by Hillsong: "Where the Spirit of the Lord is there is freedom! Where the Spirit of the Lord is chains are broken, eyes are open. Christ is with us." I don't know about you, but I want that freedom Christ is offering. I don't want to live enslaved.


1) What's an area in which you see you are stuck to a chair?
2) For freedom Christ has set us _____________; stand firm therefore, and do not _____________ again to a yoke of slavery.
3) What's a practical step you can take this week to experience the freedom Christ offers?

4) Take some time and journal about this passage:

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Written for the youth group devotional book. Check out the youth group blog for more. Mycbcyouth.blogspot.com

Brooks Was Here

Have you ever watched The Shawshank Redemption? There's an old guy in the movie his name is Brooks. He's been in the prison for 50 years and has figured out life in the system. He's a guy that's important; he’s respected by many of the prisoners (he runs the library among other things). He is given parole but is scared to leave. He leaves and gets a job and place to live. Brooks ends up hanging himself because he can't handle life outside of the prison. He's lived in prison so long that is has become his identity and he fears the freedom and newness of life outside of prison.

Galatians 4:21-27

21 Tell me, you who want to live under the law, do you know what the law actually says? 22 The Scriptures say that Abraham had two sons, one from his slave wife and one from his freeborn wife. 23 The son of the slave wife was born in a human attempt to bring about the fulfillment of God’s promise. But the son of the freeborn wife was born as God’s own fulfillment of his promise.

24 These two women serve as an illustration of God’s two covenants. The first woman, Hagar, represents Mount Sinai where people received the law that enslaved them. 25 And now Jerusalem is just like Mount Sinai in Arabia, because she and her children live in slavery to the law. 26 But the other woman, Sarah, represents the heavenly Jerusalem. She is the free woman, and she is our mother. 27 As Isaiah said,

“Rejoice, O childless woman,

    you who have never given birth!

Break into a joyful shout,

    you who have never been in labor!

For the desolate woman now has more children

    than the woman who lives with her husband!”

I've read this passage numerous times this past week. The phrase, "you who desire to be under the law" jumped out at me this time and made me want to scream "NOOOO!"

This is the struggle of the Early Church is having. They have lived their whole lives under the Law. It's what they know; it's what makes sense. It is part of their identity (think about the Pharisees). They don't know how to live under the freedom that the grace of the new covenant brings, so they desire the Law. Just like Brooks who wants to return to prison cause it's what he knows.

Can you relate to that? Feeling like it's easier to stay in a current situation because the new is unknown and scary.

This past weekend I was at a Beth Moore conference. She talked about the Israelites grumbling and complaining about how great it was in Egypt and wished they had stayed. But they were slaves in Egypt!  They were choosing slavery over freedom!

She also talked about the story of Peter walking on water. Peter could've stayed in the boat. The boat was a good, safe place from where they could see Jesus. However, stepping out of the boat brought Peter to a place that was scary, yet closer to Jesus.

God wants us to have abundant life (Jn 10:10). He doesn't want us living in Egypt or staying in the boat. Christ died so we could live for so much more! Don’t choose to live under the Law when you can live under grace.

Put your fears aside. Trust God enough to move forward in your relationship with Him. Don't desire the Law; experience the abundant life that grace brings.

Questions:

1) Can you relate to Peter, the Israelites, or the early church? In what way do you need to choose freedom over slavery?

2) "you who _______ to be under the ______."

3) From what you know of Abraham and his two sons, held to the verses about them relate to this idea of grace/law and the old/new covenants?

4) Take some time and journal about this passage.

I'm like a bird...

Remember when we started our study on She's Got Issues? I offered Melissa a cup of coffee, and she turned me down. I tried adding half & half, sugar, whipped cream, chocolate syrup and caramel syrup and she still said no. Melissa doesn't like coffee; no matter what I added to it, it was still coffee. When I instead offered her hot chocolate, she gladly accepted.
In her book, Nicole Unice talks about how she thought life with Jesus would be sweet and couldn't figure out why her life wasn't any different than the lives of her neighbors. She found out that Jesus offers so much more. He doesn't just add sugar to our current situation but transforms our lives.


This morning I was walking down the hallway and saw this picture:

It blew me away. Two completely unrelated things and somehow one transformed into the other. What Jesus offers is so amazing! He isn't just changing us from one hot beverage to another. He completely changes us. Paul says this: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come." (‭2 Corinthians‬ ‭5‬:‭17‬ ESV). Total transformation. He changes us so significantly that the old looks nothing like the new.
Or even more amazing, something that was dead becomes alive. A bell to a bird. "even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved" (‭Ephesians‬ ‭2‬:‭5‬ ESV). Dead in sin, alive in Christ.


If you only looked at the middle two images, you'd think the artist was terrible. They are weird, confusing, ugly, misshapen, lumpy and at least the one is unrecognizable. It's hard to imagine what the artist is thinking when you just look at them. Seeing the images all together we see the transformation; the middle two images make sense because they are part of the process. We don't judge the art by the middle two images, we see the whole picture.
In your life do you ever wonder what God is doing? You feel ugly, weird, confused, broken, misshapen, worthless. Do you wonder what He could possibly do with your life? Don't just look at yourself in the process and forget about the whole picture. God can take our messes, our pain, our brokenness and make something beautiful out of it. In Isaiah 61:3, it says He will make beauty from ashes. Let God transform you and use your life as a testimony to others.

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I love when I can see God in normal everyday things. How has He shown Himself to you lately?

like boogers in the wind

You know, we haven't played Balderdash in Sunday School in a while... Let's do one now real quick, one of those crazy laws...

Ok, guess which one is correct: In Alabama, it is illegal to:

1) flick boogers into the wind.

2) have an ice cream cone in your back pocket.

3) sell peanuts after sundown on Wednesday.

4) wear a fake mustache that causes laughter in church.

5) drive a car without windshield wipers.

Some laws seem absolutely ridiculous. But they were all instituted for some reason. All five of those laws are actually real ones (according to dumblaws.com anyway). There must have been incidents where these things occurred that made some lawmaker put these laws into effect... Like why does McDonald's coffee say Caution Hot? Cause some lady sued them after she burned herself on their hot coffee. Laws may seem weird and outdated but generally have some sort of reason behind them.

[Galatians 3:21-22: Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law.  But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.]

God did not just arbitrarily put laws into the Bible. There are reasons for why he made the rules He did. Some of them are for the people's health and safety-they didn't have refrigerators to keep food fresh or the FDA making sure things are served properly. Telling them not to eat certain things helped them not get sick. Some laws are to give healthy boundaries for living in community with other people-I’d be annoyed if my neighbor was borrowing my donkey without permission. Some laws are given to make it clear what is sin and what it not-although it can be summed up as love God and love others, we can be a little thick and need the specifics spelled out for us.

Jesus came to abolish the law. His death and resurrection brought us the new covenant. We are now under grace not the law. The verses today are talking about that idea. Does the law contradict promises of God? Certainly not!

In his book, Uprising, Erwin McManus addresses grace and the law. He says “The law says do not murder; grace says that we are not even to hate our enemies, but to love our enemies. The law says do not commit adultery; grace frees us from having lust in our hearts for another man's wife. The law says to give 10% to tithe; grace says be generous, we would never stop you at 10%. You can give 20, 30, 40% of your income if you'd like. Grace is never less than the law. Grace is not freedom to live beneath the law, but to live beyond the law.”

Don’t think that I’m telling you that you must follow everything the law says. Verses 22-23 talk about the law imprisoning us. It’s impossible to live up to it. But just because we are under grace, we cannot ignore all the law has to say. God didn't get rid of the law so we can live however we please. He wants us to be able to focus on loving Him and loving others and not get caught up in the legalistic details.

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These are devotionals written for the teens. A handful of us are taking turns writing, so it may seem like sporadic passages. It all flows nicely for the teens in their devo books though.

She's Got Issues- Unforgiveness

Sunday School: “She’s Got Issues”    by Nicole Unice                                              March 15, 2015

Anger’s cousin: Unforgiveness

[watch video]

Unforgiveness in our spirit has the potential to do a lifetime of damage but also be the place where we experience the most freedom and greatest testimony of what God is about and what He can do in us.

Unforgiveness, sown by our wounds, sprouts up like an unwelcome guest and chokes our ability to love, to be compassionate, and to experience freedom. 213

If left unchecked, unforgiveness thrives like a fairy-tale bean stalk, exploding in strength, eventually reaching into every emotion, thought, and action. The longer it's allowed to grow, the more strength and work will be required to remove it. Everyone has to pull the weeds of unforgiveness, tending to the daily removal of resentment over slights intentions in order to be free to love. 213-214

The reasons we are called to forgive:

1) we forgive because it's God's way.

Scripture makes it quite clear that we are required to forgive. Although his commands as simple and bold, it isn't always easy. Examining our souls for the weeds of unforgiveness is a lifelong process. 215

2) forgiveness reflect God's character.

Nehemiah 9:17, 2 Chronicles 7:14, Psalm 130:4, Psalm 86:5

3) forgiveness is the turning point in the story of our eternal lives.

When people see us forgiving someone who doesn’t deserve it, they can see Christ through us.

I love when science backs up God. The Mayo Clinic released an article citing the results of numerous studies that examine the effects of holding grudges. People who do so have higher heart rates, higher blood pressure, and more tendencies toward depression. God's command to forgive is backed up by God's design for our bodies and souls. Our Creator knew what he was doing when he spoke boldly in his Word about forgiveness! 216

4) forgiveness is a tool of the Gospel.

Jesus makes it clear that forgiveness is a continual process. I don't know about you, but I need God to cleanse me of my own sin and shortcomings every day. We should be ready to forgive others just as frequently. 216

we distort God's character for her own purposes. I want God to be merciful toward my sins and just towards others.    217

Matthew 18: Peter asks about forgiveness and Jesus response includes a parable with the king and the two debtors.

The process of forgiveness begins with our own recognition of the unequal footing we have in the presence of God. This unequal standing exists before we even sin! And sin we do, every day, serving our own interests rather than others. We are in deep debt before God. 219

Blinded by his own perverse sense of justice, the forgiven servant give no mercy to his friend. The second servant in the story was also in debt. God doesn't deny the wrongs done to us, but he commands us to view them against the incalculable mercy he has given us in the most important relationship of our lives in all of eternity: our relationship with him. 219,221

He treated the king’s mercy with contempt. Because he demands justice, he received justice. 221

Forgiving others is not possible without deep gratitude for the ways we've been forgiven. 221

Unforgiveness is like weight gain. We pile on resentments and hurt, one on top of another. If we piled on 30 pounds over several years of over eating, most of us wouldn't pray and expect God to miraculously bring us back to normal weight after one jog around the neighborhood! We can pray, though, for the discipline and strength to persevere in making healthy choices. 222

 Read the prayer on p222-223

The gospel is not just words on paper or an intellectual exercise and belief. The gospel should be lived out in our lives. 223

But like healthy living, the doing is much harder than the believing. How do we move from forgiveness is a nice ideal to a daily practice? 223

1) confess your sins with no “buts”.

2) ask God to give you new eyes.

Don't evaluate through your own eyes those who have wronged you. Instead, ask God to give you spiritual eyes so that you can see past their wins and the way they have wanted you and see their brokenness. 224-225

(I cannot emphasize enough that to forgive doesn't mean to forget. You cannot erase the pains of your past because in doing so you would risky racing much of yourself. But you can believe that God can transform you and redeem even the most broken of lives. 225)

3) recognize that forgiveness is an act of will.

You must not wait until you feel like forgiving. Instead, see forgiveness as an act of obedience toward your father God, who so graciously has forgiven you. That may mean asking him to help us extend mercy. 225

When you release others from your grip, he released them into the hands of God. In a great paradox, God is both merciful and just. 225

"When we forgive, we set a prisoner free and then discover the prisoner we set free is us." -Lewis b. Smedes

Forgiving ourselves

Sin is sin because it brings relational harm. Every act of disobedience against God's role is inherently an attack against God. 226

His design is an about enslaving us. It's about providing us freedom to love others without harm. Yet we all fail at it. We all have, we all do, we all will. 226-227

Sometimes the hardest person to forgive is yourself. There is nothing like the feeling of letting yourself down, of walking through temptation, sin, and consequence from beginning to end. And when you get to that place, even when you've pleaded with God, even when you've confessed your sins to others, you can still feel stuck in the mud of your mistake. 227

If you've ever thought you were too bad for God to forgive, if you've ever felt beyond his loving grass, if you've ever thought your story is too much for him, let me assure you, there is a person in scripture for you. I am overwhelmed that God, in his goodness, chooses to count among the heroes and heroines of faith many broken, wounded, and wound-inflicting people. These are the people he uses to bring his message of forgiveness, power, and love to our world. 227

Ps 51:12 Restore to me again ... and make me willing to obey you.

Ask God to do what you cannot do for yourself.

Forgiving God

We may believe in God, but we don't believe him. But our God is bigger than our hurt. 229

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We are studying the book She's Got Issues by Nicole Unice with the teen girls in Sunday School. These are my notes from the book. Just about none of it is my words-it's almost all quotes and paraphrases. I would recommend you read the book!!

i'm all about the grace, bout the grace

When you first go to kindergarten, you learn the very basics: the alphabet, numbers, colors, shapes. You then progress to reading, adding & subtracting, and they start teaching you geography and science. By the time you're in high school, you're so far advanced beyond those basics that you hardly ever even give them much thought. The alphabet, numbers and colors are so ingrained into your thinking that you probably don't even pay that much attention to them.

[Galatians 2:20-21: I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.]

Christianity is different. We learn the basics and as we progress and learn new things, we can't forget the basics or we've lost the point.

Reread those verses. These are some pretty powerful statements that Paul is making.

God loves you. God loves you when you feel unlovable. God loves you when you are deep in sin. God loves you. God loves you so much that He sent Jesus to die for you. He knows that we can’t follow the Law. He humbled Himself and came to earth to live a perfect life to take on our sins. What an amazing way to show His love for you!

There’s more… He loves you so much that He doesn’t want you to struggle and give in to the flesh. Christ lives in you. He is always with you. He hasn’t saved us and then left us to fend for ourselves. He helps us live out our faith.

The other thing Paul addresses in these verses is the grace of God. That’s another thing that is so basic, but we can’t forget about it. As we read our Bibles, we learn more and more of what it means to follow Christ. There are things we should and shouldn’t do. It’s easy to start to focus on those should’s and shouldn’t’s and make them matter. When we do that, we start to become judgmental and legalistic of others because we’ve created a new law. We take grace out of the picture and then Christ died for no purpose. We need grace and Christ’s death! Don’t forget the basics!

1. Do you have a tough time believing God loves you? Do you ever feel like you don’t deserve His love?

2. I live by faith in the Son of God, who _______________ me and gave himself for me.

3. What can you do this week to help you focus on Jesus and the cross so that you don’t live as if He died for no purpose?

4. Take a minute and journal your thoughts about this passage:

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These are devotionals written for the teens. A handful of us are taking turns writing, so it may seem like sporadic passages. It all flows nicely for the teens in their devo books though.

Is that the finish line up there?

Ever watch White Wolves? For those of you that haven't had the privilege, a group of teens and their leader go on a backpacking trip, very much like us, with less canoeing. Their goal is to get to the top of Eagle Rock. They eventually make it to the top and disaster strikes! Their trip turns into a rescue mission. Before that happens they have a little encounter with a bear. Kara doesn’t want to hang the food in a tree and a bear sniffs it out and eats it. If you’ve ever done a wilderness trip, you know how important it is to plan out your food carefully. You don’t want to eat too much or too little so that it lasts for the duration of the trip. A bear eating your food makes all that planning seem to have been done in vain.

[Galatians 2:1-2: Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along with me. I went up because of a revelation and set before them (though privately before those who seemed influential) the gospel that I proclaim among the Gentiles, in order to make sure I was not running or had not run in vain.]

In the last few verses of chapter 1, Paul has explained why he has any power to speak about this whole issue regarding the Gentiles and circumcision and the Law. Now the beginning of chapter 2, he’s telling us what he did about the situation. There are two things that standout to me.

The first thing is the parenthetical comment in verse 2. Paul went to Jerusalem to talk and he sought out the people who were influential and talked to them privately. He didn’t go make a scene and get into a huge public debate. He didn’t protest and post on facebook to get supporters for his cause. No, he went privately to address the issue. I don’t know about you, but I don’t always just go quietly and talk to people who are influential in a situation I have issue with. I think Paul’s honest and humble approach to the situation is something we could all learn from.

The second thing that stands out to me is Paul explaining why he’s doing this in the end of verse 2. He wants to make sure that the effort he has put forth in proclaiming the Gospel to the Gentiles hasn’t been in vain. If he’s got this whole thing wrong, he’s been preaching a false gospel for the past few years and so he wants some clarification.

We all want to have purpose. We want to know that out lives matter. We don’t want to spend years of our lives doing something to find out it was all in vain.

Paul’s life was radically different because of his encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus. He’s been running the race of life proclaiming the Gospel. He runs with purpose. We should do the same. Make sure the things that you are focused on are the things that truly matter. Don’t run in vain.

1. How do you generally handle situations in which you disagree with someone?

2. …in order to make sure I was not _______________ in vain.

3. Are you running in vain or are you running with a purpose?

4. Take a minute and journal your thoughts about this passage:

She's Got Issues- Anger

Sunday School: “She’s Got Issues”    by Nicole Unice                                              March 1, 2015

Anger

These are not the things that get discussed at Mother's Day teas and women's retreat. Bitter, forceful anger? From nice Christian girls? Anger might turn women into wild things. Then again, anger causes some women to turn to all kinds of secretive behaviors to vent their true feelings. Anger has the power to change lives. Many of us know what it's like to be on the receiving end of rage in the form of emotional or physical abuse. Many of us also know what it is to speak and act from a place of anger ourselves. Yet anger can also change lives for the better – if it is harnessed and transforms into a power for good. (180)

I wonder if these women, like me, are recalling the last time they lost their temper. What they said and how they said it. What they squeezed, slapped, or threw in anger. I wonder if some of them are thinking about the space in their souls were unresolved anger lives, how they hide it and suppress it and try to ignore it, all the time wondering how and why they have such strong, seemingly irrational feelings, a force they can't quite reconcile with their concept of what it means to be a sweet Christian woman. (181)

There's another kind of woman altogether. She's the one who claims to never get angry. These women worry me even more. True, they aren't inflicting damage on anyone else with their words or actions. But studies consistently show that women who repress their anger tend to have that poison leak into many areas of physical and mental health. In fact, one definition of depression is "anger turned inward." The truth is that every woman I've ever met has some good reasons to be angry, as well as many completely irrational reasons to be angry. (181-182)

Anger is a God-created emotion! 14 times in the Old Testament, God himself is called angry. (182)

We should not fear the emotion itself, nor should we attempt to live a life devoid of anger. (182)

powerful forceful anger has two benefits:

1- it can serve as a warning light when something is wrong. It is a signal that all is not well and something is going on in our hearts that needs to be examined. 2- anger can be the power that activates us to work for good. Anger's force can provide get–up–and–go we need to stop being apathetic and instead fully engage with life. (182)

[take quiz]

Anger is expressed in three distinct ways, the first two, rage and resentment, are destructive ways to deal with anger. The third, indignation, is a constructive loving expression. (184-185)

If you answered mostly true to statements 1, 5, or 6, you have used rage as an outlet for anger. (185)

Lashing out is a great way to release that powerful emotion – because it works! Like the calm that follows a severe storm, our bodies often return to a peaceful state after we arrived. But, oh, the destruction are rage leaves behind! Not only can we create permanent damage to the object of our anger – whether through violent actions or words – but we also create permanent damage in our own hearts. That's because anger often leads to another powerful emotion – shame. (186)

If you answered mostly true to statements 2,3,7,8,11, you may vent your anger through resentment.

Ball in pool- rage punts ball, resentment tries to hide it under the surface.

It keeps popping back up as sarcasm, grudges, unresolved conflict – so it demands continuous emotional energy causing us to miss out on enjoying life.

Or we choose a passive–aggressive response by not responding as a method of making our point.

Resentment is closely related to the issue of control and often causes us to act out in manipulative ways. Because we haven't learned to deal directly with our anger, this monster begins to control us. (188)

If you answer mostly true two statements 4, 9, 10, you've experienced the power of anger used for good.

Every time Scripture describes Jesus as being angry, it was for a real evil that kept people from experiencing God's kingdom. (189)

Richard P Walters notes "among Christians there is a fear of rage, a surplus of resentment, and a shortage of indignation." (190)

[watch video]

Jerry bridges says: "we need to realize that no one else causes us to be angry." (196)

The way I respond to things is my choice. Including the choice to respond in anger.

Matt 5:3- "blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." commentators point out that the Greek rendering for affairs implies exclusivity meaning "blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs and only theirs is the kingdom of heaven."

When we recognize our own deficits and inability to control our issues, we are able to embrace the true reality of God's grace.

What does it mean to be poor in spirit? It means coming to the end of yourself and realizing that you are lacking – lacking love, lacking patience, lacking the energy to act like you've got it all together. It means recognizing the ugly side of yourself (anger will do that for you). It's here – and only here – that you can experience the true power of Jesus is transforming power in your life. It's here – and only here – that you can embrace the strength of the spirit moving and working within you. (197)

We can try to prevent anger or employed techniques to diffuse anger but the most important thing we can do one anger rises is to ask God to stand there with us. We can actually invite him into that ugliness. (197)

God will provide away out for my anger that doesn't involve screaming or sarcasm. God can replace my anger with love. (198)

When God gets involved in the solution, he always, always, always softens our hearts with love. (198)

But the "poor in spirit" verse isn't a free pass to stop trying or to wash our hands of all responsibility. Rather Scripture tells us that "since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the spirit" (Galatians 5:25). Jesus says the person who "listens to my teaching and obeys me is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock " (Matthew 7:24).

Often you want to justify our bad behavior with the litany of reasons why we lost it. We were tired. We were stressed out. We had a headache. We hadn't yet reconciled after our last argument. We are preoccupied with other emotional stress. In fact, it can be helpful to step back and list what mental, physical, or emotional conditions are likely to predispose us to losing it. (199)

We need to recognize the healthy outlets we have to release our tension and anger, and then we must get honest with ourselves before God about the reasons for our anger. (201)

There are preventative measures we can take to help control our anger – getting enough sleep, eating better, being aware of the time of the month, etc. run, read, rest..

But, reality is that nothing – not rest, not reading, not a girls night out, not anything – can bring peace to my soul like Jesus’ words. (204)

Words are powerful. We can all probably think of hurtful words someone had said to us...

We must take her word seriously. Once they are sent out, they cannot be taken back. (205)

-our talk shouldn't be unwholesome.

-our words should be used to build others up.

-our words should be used according to the receiver's needs.

-we pay attention to our words because they are a thermometer to our hearts. Jesus said “whatever is in your heart determines what you say” (Matthew 12:34). When our hearts are right with God, we naturally reflect that in the way we speak. And when things aren't so good? The words that spill forth from this place are often the first sign of a true heart sickness.

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We are studying the book She's Got Issues by Nicole Unice with the teen girls in Sunday School. These are my notes from the book. Just about none of it is my words-it's almost all quotes and paraphrases. I would recommend you read the book!!