Growing. Changing. Becoming.

Earlier this summer, Lester and I read through Titus in our devotions together.  On May 17th, we focused on Titus 2.  Verses 4-5 specifically caught my attention that night.

And so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.

First of all, I thanked the Lord for the godly influence of my mother and grandmothers as well as my mother in law.  By their example, they are teaching me how to develop the attitudes and attributes found in these verses.

Secondly, I realized my desperate need for growth in these areas.  I don't know about you, but there have been times in my life when I have reached a point of complacency in my spiritual walk - not really seeing any areas that need to change and definitely not looking for them.  Praise the Lord, God has used my relationship with my husband to daily, many times multiple times a day, show me areas in which I can love Him more and then love Lester more.

The next morning, I made it my goal for this summer to focus on passages addressed to women, specifically wives, in my own personal Bible study.  I want to learn all that I can about what the life of a godly wife looks like and, by the grace and strength of God, grow to become that wife to Lester.  Along with my Bible study, I have been re-reading the book A Woman After God's Own Heart by Elizabeth George.  It has been a great tool in assisting me to focus on practical applications of some of the passages I have been studying.

God has been teaching, growing, and stretching me in a variety of ways already this summer.  Granted, I most definitely still have my besetting sins, but God is working in those areas too. And, I still have so much to learn! Through God's grace and strength, I am seeing victory and experiencing a closer relationship with Him, which is also changing my relationship with my husband.  I am so thankful for the work of the Holy Spirit in my life through my study of the Scriptures!

Lord, I give up all my own plans and purposes, all my own desires and hopes, and accept Thy will for my life.  I give myself, my time, my all, utterly to Thee to be Thine forever.  Fill me and seal me with Thy Holy Spirit.  Use me as Thou wilt, send me where Thou wilt, work out Thy whole will in my life at any cost, now and forever. - Betty Stam