The Secret to Successful Living

Good morning! My name is Charlotte and I am writing to help us give our first thoughts to the Lord. Hope you had a wonderful weekend. I did. I was off from work for the first weekend in over a month and it was wonderful.

There are three new quizzes up and going today. Janice wrote that I may have created a monster in Keith as he is going to make a quiz for every book in the Bible. Go! Keith, go! If you have a quiz you want to post, just let me know your address and I will post it.

I Corinthians 7 says this:

Verse 32 But I would have you without carefulness.

He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord;

but he that is married cares for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife.

There is difference also between the wife and a virgin (a classification that is almost unheard of today). The unmarried woman cares for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit:

but she that is married cares for the things of the world, how she may please her husband.

And this I speak for your own profit; not that I may cast a snare upon you, but for that which is comely, and that you may attend upon the Lord without distraction.

My granddaughter came over to my house yesterday and I really enjoyed her visit. She has grown up so much, I just couldn't believe how she has matured, and what has matured her is a relationship with someone she really, truly loves. She has had to compromise her ways to maintain communication in her relationship. Isn't that amazing what love in your life can do.

She started telling me what all she had bought for Alan for Christmas. How she had searched for just the right thing that she knew he wanted, and how excited she was to have found it for him. Loving someone makes a big difference in your life, however, it is sometimes a rocky road, especially if it is not from God.

I was single for many years and my life belonged totally and completely to the Lord. There were a lot of people who thought I was out of my mind when I told them I was completely happy being single.

I blew them out of the water when I held a singles seminar called "It is good to be single." These were not my words, they are Paul's from I Corinthians 7:7-9. He says For I would that all men were even as I myself. (Paul was never married) But every man has his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that.

He goes on to say in verse 9 that it is good for the unmarried to remain unmarried like he is, but (there's the but) if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn. In other words, it is fine to not marry, but if you can't hack it, and not restrain from having sex with your girl/boyfriend, then get married. For it is better to get married than to burn with lust or in darkness.

That is kinda outspoken but folks, sex outside of marriage is one of the sins that keeps us from heaven. It is called fornication/adultery for people are married and have sex outside of their marriage relationship.

We haven't taught this enough. We have tiptoed around it until we have a generation of people who think sleeping around is good and acceptable. Well, I am bold enough to write to you - that that way of living is wrong and it will send you completely into darkness, where there is no light.

Say, well how can I be happy single without sex? Well, I'm here to tell you that there is life outside of sex. When you sell out to the Lord and the Lord becomes the most important person in your life, anything that is contrary to God and his ways becomes foreign and unattractive to you. Just like my granddaughter delights to please Alan and to search for things that will make him happy, when you give your life totally to God, you are delighted to live your life and make the compromises to please God, and it is not a sacrifice, it is a joy.

I know this because I have lived it. For years I wandered around single, hoping and looking for someone in my life, but he wasn't there. When I finally, out of desperation, turned wholly and completely to the Lord, He took the unmanageable things in my life and turned my life around. Then, after years, one wonderful day, God sent a wonderful man into my life. I wasn't looking, I wasn't praying, I wasn't thinking of having anyone in my life, but God had other plans for me.

You see, when we sell out to God, whether we are married or single, God blesses our lives with things 'above and beyond what we could ask or think.' It is amazing to me as an older woman and follower of God, how people have missed the secret to successful living and that secret is serving God.

I will write more tomorrow, in the meantime, have a great day today.

Charlotte