Healthy Habits

Lots of us made new year's resolutions dealing with habits... mostly bad or unhealthy habits. Here are a few resolutions you shared with us:

• I'm going to quit eating so many sweets.
• I'll eat less fatty foods and sweets in 2000.
• I am resolving to quit smoking... and I really mean it this time!
• I am going to pause before speaking when the situation is emotionally charged and I might blurt out hurtful words.
• In 2000, I will not take on more than I can chew. I will not allow myself to become stressed out over other peoples' demands and requests for me to solve their problems. I have enough of my own.
• My resolution for 2000: I won't break traffic laws any more. No more speeding, no more parking over my paid time, no more "California stops."
• I plan to stop eating food high in cholesterol.
• I will quit yelling at my children, except in emergencies.

There were others, but you get the idea. Out of that list only one was a resolution to do something rather than quit doing something... and even then the doing (pause before speaking) was to prevent another action (hurtful words). Also, notice that most of these resolutions have something to do with health. This was true of all 196 who shares their resolutions with Handmaidens.... over 80% were related in some way to physical health.

Good. We're thinking of taking better care of the bodies God gave us. But what about our spiritual health. By comparison, spiritual well being is far more vital than any other aspect of our overall health. I'm going to keep it brief, but want to suggest some seemingly obvious resolutions with you now:

Daily Time Alone With God
Call it your "Quiet Time," or whatever else you like, your spiritual health will fail without a one-on-one relationship with God, and you cannot have a relationship with the Lord and never spend any time with Him! Make an appointment, get up an hour early, go to bed an hour later... whatever! Just DO it... and do it every day!

Regular Reading and Study of the Word
The Lord went to a great deal of trouble to see that the Bible with its 66 books and its full meaning intact made it down through the centuries to be available to you. It was important to Him that you have His word available, and He wants you to read and study and love His word. So, make some time each day to spend with the word. Open that Bible and wear it out!

Faithful Church Attendance, Participation and Fellowship
As a believer, you are part of the body of Christ, the church universal. It has not one thing to do with whether you're a Baptist or a Methodist, or any other denomination... It has everything to do with having a personal relationship with Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord! Interestingly, as the short piece below so aptly shows, your relationship with the Lord is unavoidable effected by church attendance, participation and fellowship with other believers.

Constant Prayer
Scripture tells to pray always, to pray without ceasing, to pray, to pray, to PRAY! In addition to the excellent suggestions below, practice almost constant silent prayer. Turn your inner thought life into a prayer life, sharing with God every idea, worry, hope, disappointment, frustration... every thought and emotion you have can be shared with Him on the spot.. that's praying without ceasing and it can change your life!

The Sacrifice of Praise
While you're praying without ceasing or praying more formally, don't forget the sacrifice God most desires from you... praises and love. Praising God does wonders. It can change despondency to delight and bring peace to the troubled spirit. For when we thank the Lord for His wondrous goodness and mercy, we begin to focus on all He has done for us and the more we do that, the more we realize how very, very much the Master of the Universe loves us and cares about even the small things of our personal lives.

A Healthy Happy Spirit Results
Try adding the above to your list of resolutions and no matter how many other resolutions you later break, keep these and your spirit will soon have a healthy glow. This will benefit your physical and emotional well being as well and make it a bit easier to forego that extra piece of double fudge cake.

The Lonely Ember

A member of a certain church, who previously had been attending services regularly, stopped going.

After a few weeks, the pastor decided to visit him. It was a chilly evening. The pastor found the man at home alone, sitting before a blazing fire. Guessing the reason for his pastor's visit, the man welcomed him, led him to a big chair near the fireplace and waited. The pastor made himself comfortable but said nothing. In the grave silence, he contemplated the play of the flames around the burning logs.

After some minutes, the pastor took the fire tongs, carefully picked up a brightly burning ember and placed it to one side of the hearth all alone.

Then he sat back in his chair, still silent. The host watched all this in quiet fascination. As the one lone ember's flame diminished, there was a momentary glow and then its fire was no more. Soon it was cold and "dead as a doornail."

Not a word had been spoken since the initial greeting.

Just before the pastor was ready to leave, he picked up the cold, dead ember and placed it back in the middle of the fire. Immediately it began to glow once more with the light and warmth of the burning coals around it.

As the pastor reached the door to leave, his host said, "Thank you so much for your visit and especially for the fiery sermon. I shall be back in church next Sunday."

Get Into the Habit of Prayer
Submitted by Cheryl

Are you stuck in a childish pattern of prayer? We are told to receive the Kingdom as little children - but there is difference between being childlike and being childish.

Prayer is to be a good habit, springing from the best that you can offer of your experience, your intelligence, and your love of God.

How to achieve the habit of prayer:

* Set aside time. Take time when it can best be found, preferably early in the day. Prayers that are not said in the morning tend not be said at all.

* Set a minimum time. Begin modestly but gradually increase in length. Ten minutes is a realistic minimum and a half-hour is within most people's ability.

* Be faithful. Whatever length of time is decided, it should be firmly kept. Without some discipline, prayer tends to be pushed to the margin even by the most devout - there is always something else to do that appears more pressing or more attractive. There are days when prayer seems less easy and spontaneous and concentration is harder. On these days the offering of time is an act of obedience - which is itself an act of faith.

* Have structure. This can give shape on constancy without constricting your spontaneous approach to God. Begin with acknowledging the presence of God. Adoration follows: praise, awe, and love for who He is. Then follow where the personal situation leads. This might mean thanks for particular benefits or mercies to you and others, admission of sins, and requests for your desires or needs, intercession for the help of others. Don't worry if one area monopolizes your prayer time - consider this as a principal need of the day.

* Ask. Prayer is not a shopping list of things you'd like to have, yet it is right to bring your hopes before God, and in so doing to test their quality. But you are encouraged and even commanded to ask, so that your relationship with Him includes all aspects of your life. As you make intercession for others, ask that you be made available to be used in God's service if the opportunity is given.

* Be ambitious but not impatient. All Christians have known periods when there seemed to be no progress. These are times to hold fast to the discipline of prayer, waiting until you are ready to receive God's calling to new understanding and fresh devotion.

* Use a prayer book. There is strength in praying established prayers in addition to your own personal prayers. The insights and phrasing of these prayers can expand your understanding of God. Remember the Lord's Prayer which gives you a perfect pattern for prayer. Commit to praying it with renewed awareness of the words.

* Prayer is relationship. Essentially prayer brings you into contact with God. Your growth in prayer should be a deepening of that relationship with Him. Like a child who runs eagerly with requests to a loving parent, your sincerity and complete honesty are essential for prayer as you run to the Father.

The Prayer Chair
Submitted by Bobby Lewis & The Uhlers

A man's daughter had asked the local minister to come and pray with her father. When the minister arrived, he found the man lying in bed with his head propped up on two pillows. An empty chair sat beside his bed.

The minister assumed that the old fellow had been informed of his
visit.

"I guess you were expecting me," he said.

"No, who are you?" said the father.

"I'm the new minister at your church," he replied. "When I saw the empty chair, I figured you knew I was going to show up."

"Oh yeah, the chair," said the bedridden man. "Would you mind closing the door?"

Puzzled, the minister shut the door.

"I have never told anyone this, not even my daughter," said the man.

"But all of my life I have never known how to pray. At church I used to hear the pastor talk about prayer, but it went right over my head. I abandoned any attempt at prayer," the old man continued, "until one day about four years ago my best friend said to me, 'Joe, prayer is just a simple matter of having a conversation with Jesus. Here is what I suggest. Sit down in a chair; place an empty chair in front of you, and in faith see Jesus on the chair. It's not spooky because he promised, "I'll be with you always." Then just speak to him in the same way you're doing with me right now.'

So, I tried it and I've liked it so much that I do it a couple of hours every day. I'm careful though. If my daughter saw me talking to an empty chair, she'd either have a nervous breakdown or send me off to the funny farm."

The minister was deeply moved by the story and encouraged the old man to continue on the journey. Then he prayed with him, anointed him with oil, and returned to the church.

Two nights later the daughter called to tell the minister that her daddy had died that afternoon.

"Did he die in peace?" he asked.

"Yes, when I left the house about two o' clock, he called me over to his bedside, told me he loved me and kissed me on the cheek. When I got back from the store an hour later, I found him dead. But there was something strange about his death. Apparently, just before Daddy died, he leaned over and rested his head on the chair beside the bed. What do you make of that?"

The minister wiped a tear from his eye and said, "I wish we could all go like that."

We live by faith, not by sight. 2 Corinthians 5:7

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