The Lord has been challenging and encouraging me so much as I’ve been studying and sharing these lessons from Proverbs 31 over the past eight months! I encourage you to spend your own time before the Lord with your Bible open to Proverbs 31:10-31, seeking, asking, and knocking.  His plan for women and girls is the highest and best, much better than anything you could hope or dream of.  God always reward obedience.  When you follow HIS plan for your life, looking into HIS Word, He blesses abundantly, and best of all He is glorified.  It can be a challenging road at times, but it is so very worth it, my friends.    Seek Him and His Kingdom first and foremost, and all other needed things will be added to you.  Be encouraged!

“And let the beauty of the LORD our God be upon us: and establish thou the work of our hands upon us; yea, the work of our hands establish thou it.”
~Psalm 90:17

]]> http://bellissimamodestyboutique.com/blog/2009/04/more-lessons-from-proverbs-31/feed/ 1 http://bellissimamodestyboutique.com/blog/2008/10/the-way-i-see-it/ http://bellissimamodestyboutique.com/blog/2008/10/the-way-i-see-it/#comments Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:53:00 +0000 Marianna http://bellissimamodestyboutique.com/blog/?p=7 Not only do I have a passion for encouraging ladies and girls in their journey towards Godly womanhood and beautiful girlhood, I love politics.  I want to support people who stand for righteous principles who are, or are attempting to get in leadership positions, along with being personally involved in the political process.  Dare I venture to write about politics in the both vivacious and venomous realm of political blogosphere?  As a Christian who believes that Christ should be brought into every single aspect of our lives, I believe I dare not write about it during this vital time of American history.  Below is a blog I shared on my personal blog, and with a desire for the Body of Christ to pray, I post it here:

I didn’t think the point in time could come for this FOX news junkie, Limbaugh listening, Hannity lovin’ girl, when I would be able to join my friend “KoolKat” in saying, I’m sooo ready for this election to be over! Yet here I sit, thinking just that.   I’ve enthusiastically muttered insults at the tv screen during many a debate and interviews of Obama and Biden.  I’ve cheered for McCain and said “hip hip hooray!” for Palin.  I’ve been angered about all the attacks that both of them has received and the bias of the media.  I’ve joyfully listened to the commentators of some of my favorites, Dick Morris, Mike Huckabee, Karl Rove and the like.  I’ve prayed my way through the primaries, the debates, the ups and downs of the polls.  I can tell you, in detail, about all the outrageous relationships and ties, and voting records that Obama has in his short but rich with controversy history.  I can tell you all the pastors and leaders who know better who have endorsed Obama, and in doing so have brought my respect for them down to a negative number.  And because it’s been so long a road, I’m for lack of a more eloquent term, plumb tuckered out by it all.

But I feel a quickening in my heart, a burning in my soul, a call to my ears that NOW is the time to buckle up, hunker down, dig your heels in and PRAY.  To come before the Lord for mercy, for I’m not ignorant of what America as a whole actually deserves.  I shudder to think.  But my heart’s plea is for mercy.  If America needs a spiritual awakening, and I believe it does, frankly I would so much rather it come through a economical crisis while a wiser hand is at the wheel.  My dad had an analogy that rang true with my  heart; as long as men were helping to lift up Moses hands, the battle was won.  I feel now is the time for us to lift up, spiritually speaking, the hands of righteousness in this battle.

I have heard it been said that John McCain is the lesser of two evils.  Do I agree with everything John McCain has to say?  No.  Is he the lesser of two evils?  No.  For I do not believe that a man who believes and treasures the sanctity of human life, who has served our country most honorably and in a way that most of us will never be called, who loves this country and it’s freedom is evil.  I respect John McCain very much and he most certainly has my vote and support.

I will tell you what I believe to be evil, or at least influenced by evil, and that is when good men stand by and do nothing.  When Christians attempt to split the vote over issues that are less important than life.  Unfortunately I’ve seen a lot of that this year.

I do not pay “blind allegiance to the Republican Party” as I have heard it said.  I espouse myself with the Republican party because of their pro-life platform, and their stance on many other issues.  I am Republican because I am pro life, I am not pro life because I am a Republican.  I am neither conservative nor liberal, I am a juris naturalist.  I believe in the supremacy of Higher Law.

Because I believe in a Higher Law, and a Higher Power, our Lord Jesus Christ, never ever will I vote pocket book over moral issues in any election.  Am I a one issue voter?  You betcha.  And I’ll be happy to tell you why.  If a candidate does not value human life, they leave me no reason to conclude that they can have proper judgment in any other area.  If they cannot look at the facts, that life begins at conception, refuse to come to terms with it, and still be “okay” with destroying it, they are not a man or woman worthy of holding any position of authority.

Why?  Because life is vitally important to God.  He created it.  He loves it.  He’s the only One that can give it.  And for every life He has a purpose.  He has called us to stand for the innocent.  Among many other verses on God’s heart for this is Prov 31:8, “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves,for the rights of all who are destitute.”

I have been a volunteer counselor at a pregnancy help center for well over a year now, and I cannot tell you how heartbreaking it is to be sitting across from a young woman, knowing that there is a precious God-breathed life inside of her, and despite my pleadings to choose life for her and her baby, she can walk outside of our center and have an abortion at the Planned Parenthood that is just a few doors down from us in the same strip center.  Knowing that in this country, land of the free and home of the brave, there are no laws protecting this little one. That is despicable.

That is the number one reason that I could never vote for Obama or any other pro-death candidate.  Aside from Obama’s cockamamie ideas about foreign policy, aside from his sorry stance on the war, aside from his socialist ideas about our economy, aside from his lies and attempts to smooth over his friendships with the likes of Reverend Wright, Bill Ayers and Father Flager, aside from the fact that he thinks it’s okay to teach sex ed to kindergartners, aside from the fact that he will not keep marriage as being defined between one man and one woman, that he is anti guns, anti homeschooling and aside from the fact that he refuses to produce a birth certificate, if none of the aforementioned were true, he is pro-death.  For those reasons, as a citizen, I believe he is unfit to lead our country.  But as a Christian, the mere fact that he believes, and will appoint like-minded supreme court justices, that a baby being expected at an inconvenient time can be destroyed, and furthermore if the attempt to destroy that life isn’t successful, that that baby has no right to medical care, that is enough to cause me to fight against this man with all that I am able.  And for me right now, that means in the my prayer closet.

I’m praying that we, the Body of Christ, will make a concentrated effort for the next eight days in praying, and fasting as we feel lead, for this election.  That the scales would be removed from people’s eyes, that the truth would be revealed.  That God would have mercy.  I believe beyond a shadow of a doubt that prayer is a game changer.  Now is the time for us to step up the plate, set aside the weariness, and humble ourselves before the Lord in repentance.  Daniel came before the Lord “speaking, and praying, and confessing my sin and the sin of my people Israel, and presenting my supplication before the LORD.“  (Dan. 9)  I pray that my heart, and all of ours would be so set before the Lord.  Let us not be weary in well doing, let us lift up holy hands before His Throne, let us labor hard in the Secret Place, and may HE be glorified whatever the outcome.

Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. (Is. 55:6-7)