Fruit of the Spirit Bible Study--Love

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.—1 Corinthians 13:13 NIV (bold emphasis added)

When you think of love, what comes to mind? Valentine’s Day hearts? Your children or spouse? An expensive object? What about Jesus and all He did for us and all He went through for us? Love is not only the first fruit we receive from the Holy Spirit (Gal. 5:22, 2 Tim. 1:7), it is who God is! 1 John 4:8 says it in plain English, ‘God is love’!

There’s a reason love is the first fruit. Love is so important to God, He inspired an entire chapter dedicated to love (1 Cor. 13)! That also happens to be one of my favorite chapters. You can’t have anything else without love because without love, we are nothing and can accomplish nothing (1 Cor. 13:1-3).

What is love? Here’s how Paul described love to the church in Corinth (NIV):

Patient. Kind. Forgiving (does not keep a record of wrongs). Rejoices in the truth. Protecting. Trusting. Hoping. Persevering.

What is love not? Again, here’s Paul’s description:

Envious. Boastful. Prideful. Dishonoring. Self-seeking. Easily angered. Delights in evil.

Love is the binding that holds the traits of the Christian together (Col. 3:14).

We come from God  and belong to Him if we love others and obey Him(1 John 4:7, 5:2-3) Jesus tells us we are His disciples if we love others (John 13:35).

There’s no way to be a part of God’s family and not love others (1 John 3:10). We show that we have ‘come over into life’ if we love others and are not ‘under the power of death’ (1 John 3:14). I don’t know about you, but I want to be under the power of love, not death! Love ‘shows itself in action’ (1 John 3:18), it is a choice. Jesus loved us so deeply He ‘gave his life for us. We too, then ought to give our lives for others!’ (1 John 3:16, John 15:13) and love like He loved. This doesn’t necessarily mean dying physically for someone else. It could mean denying yourself and your desires and putting others before yourself (and after Jesus of course!)

Jesus said in John 15, ‘Remain united to me, and I will remain united to you. A branch cannot bear fruit by itself; it can do so only if it remains in the vine. In the same way you cannot bear fruit unless you remain in me.’ (v. 4). The only way we can bear ‘the kind of fruit that endures’ (v. 16) is if we remain in Jesus and His love. How do we do that? By obeying Him (v. 10). He wants us to ‘love one another’ (v. 17), even our enemies (Matthew 5:43-48). We have to show the love of God to others if we want to bring them to their Savior.

So, to show the fruit of love in your life, you must love others,  be patient, kind, forgiving, protecting, trusting, hoping, and persevering. You should rejoice in the truth and deny your flesh’s desire and obey Jesus to remain in Him. Ephesians 4:2 NLT says: 'Always be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other's faults because of your love.'

I have barely scratched the surface of love! There is so much to the attribute of love that I couldn’t fit it all on one blog post for this study. The love of God and Christian love is something that should be studied, written and read about in depth. Maybe one day I will make a Saturday study on it but not anytime soon. I only want to work on one thing at a time so I don’t get side-tracked. J

So 'live a life filled with love' (Eph. 5:2 NLT)! Next up is JOY! :D

Love,

Kayley

Fruit of the Spirit Study Introduction

Galatians 5:22-23, NIV: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

How many of you know that old fruit of the Spirit Sunday School song? *raises hand* My parents used to play a tape (yes, a cassette tape) with Sunday School songs on it during car rides. That song is one of the few I remember. And I don’t mean the one about the coconut…

Well, I’m writing a study on those two verses in Galatians chapter 5.

I started researching fruit of the Spirit verses in early March with the wonderful YouVersion app on my Nook and the free version of the Olive Tree Bible study app on my iPod. I’m only going to be referencing verses from the New Testament since that’s when the first believers received the Spirit in Acts chapter 2. I’m going in order of the fruits and, unless otherwise noted, I will be using the Good News Translation (GNT). Why? Because I like it. It’s one of the few that are close to the way I talk so it’s easier for me to understand. If you like another version, feel free to look up the verses in your Bible or on your app. There’s no point in reading something you don’t understand because then you won’t retain the information.

The posts will be up in the morning on Saturdays following this post. I picked Saturdays for a personal reason. I get devotions emailed to me every week day morning and then there’s church on Sunday, but nothing on Saturdays! Well, not anymore! J Now there’s my Bible Study Saturdays! The study will begin next Saturday May 3, 2014.

Anyway, I will link all the posts back here as I complete them.

LOVE

JOY

PEACE

PATIENCE

KINDNESS

GOODNESS

FAITHFULNESS

GENTLENESS

SELF-CONTROL

I hope you all enjoy reading this study and diving into God’s Word with me!

Love,

Kayley

Flake Stacks

You know those haystack candies made outta Chow Mein noodles and butterscotch and peanut butter? Well, I made my own version on Saturday. I was bored and I've had the idea in my head for a while now. I call 'em Flake Stacks. They're made from Honey Bunches of Oats© and peanut butter and I added some chocolate. Why? Because everything is better with chocolate! I'm pretty sure you could use any flaky cereal in this yummy recipe.

I will warn you, it is a bit of a mess. You might want to have a plate or a paper towel under it. I'm not sure why it fell apart so much. Maybe they were too big?

Anyway, moving on! Here's the recipe! I'm not sure how long it took me to prepare it though.

• 3 Cups of Honey Bunches of Oats © Honey Roasted
• 9 Tablespoons of peanut butter( I used some reduced sugar peanut butter I had stuffed in my cabinet that I wasn't going to eat. It tasted good in the recipe. I just don't like it because of the added fat and calories it has to make up for the sugar loss)
• 4 Tablespoons of semi-sweet chocolate morsels
• Cool time: 1 1/2 - 2 hours
• Makes 15 candies

Pop the peanut butter into the microwave for 45 secs to one minute, just enough til it's liquidy.

Measure out 3 cups of cereal then add in the peanut butter.

Next, heat up the chocolate chips for 1-1 1/2 minutes until it's become a liquid. I'm sure you could use a double boiler but I don't have one of those...

Put aluminum foil down on a cookie sheet. Trust me, it'll be easier this way. Then dollop out the cereal mixture. I didn't exactly measure, but my guess is it's a heaping tablespoon full, if not 2 tablespoons.

Then drizzle the chocolate over the top. It doesn't have to be perfect. Mine certainly aren't.

Last, put the stacks in the fridge to harden for 1 1/2 to 2 hours.


My hubby was bugging me to try it every half hour or so. I didn't blame him because I was excited to try it out too. As soon as I could, I took 2 out to try them. They're yummy, of course. :) I ended up leaving the rest of them in the fridge overnight. They hardened up a little bit more but not by much. I think they would have been harder if I could have put them in the freezer but I didn't have any room...

Well, that's it! If you try them, tell me what you think!

Love,

Kayley

 

Snow!!

There's a white blanket of snow on everything outside. It started yesterday afternoon and was still going around 7 last night. I think there's about 2, maybe 3 inches of snow outside. Nothing too bad but it stuck. My guess is it'll start melting when the sun comes up. There is a winter weather advisory from accuweather.com for my area. I'm not too worried about the snow though. It's the way people drive around here that make me nervous. There are crazies here! Haha!

Me and my hubby went outside yesterday and walked in the snow for a bit. We exchanged a few snowballs too, until he shoved a little snow in my face. Yeah, that wasn't fun, but I did get him in the back of the head with a decent sized snowball. ;)

The 24 hour fast food restaurant I work at even closed down because of the snow. They're re-opening this morning around 7:30 but since I don't drive, I'm not going to be there. My wonderful hubby is at work though. I guess they didn't shut down since he hasn't called me to tell me his supervisors sent him home. All the schools are closed here too. Not that I care. I don't have any kids to send off or take care of.

I'm hoping to be able to do Day 2 of my exercises today. My knee is sore from Monday. I try not to do anything that would bother those joints since I have problems with them without working out. So pray for me! I don't know if I'll be able to do Day 3 at all this week because of the way my work schedule is. If I have a long day of running around working, I tend to be too tired to exercise, especially if it's going to be a bunch of cardio. Of course, I burn calories running around at my job so at least I'm doing something! :)

For now I'm just Pinning and watching cooking videos. I love food and I love learning about it. I realized the other day that while I don't want to go to culinary school, I like to cook and learn about food. I guess I just like being filled with knowledge about strange things! Haha! I get obsessed with something and I want to learn all I can about it before finding something new to learn about. But with food, I think it's going to be awhile before I run out of material! :)

Now back to my videos!
Kayley

My First Day Back At Exercising!

Whew! It's been a long time since I've exercised. I could feel it. Haha! But I know it will help me in the long run. And I actually felt good today after exercising! Granted, it took me about ten minutes after I stopped, but I felt better! I don't know if it was exercise(because I know it releases something in your brain to make you feel good) or the fact that I was listening to some great Contemporary Christian music. Maybe it was both. But either way it was awesome, despite briefly getting queasy during the workout. I don't think I've ever exercised and gotten sick like that. It was weird. I'm thinking I might need to eat more about 15 minutes before my exercise session to give me time to digest. Just something to try next time.

I didn't exactly follow a routine. I just went on Pinterest and looked up different exercises and pinned them. Then I wrote down the ones I wanted to do and divided them up into three days: Day 1 is for my upper body, Day 2 is for the lower, and Day 3 is going to be HIIT or High Intensity Interval Training. You need a lot of cardio to work off extra weight. Just doing crunches and squats won't help if you're not elevating your heart rate and burning calories. Wow, I sound so smart. Except I didn't study nutrition and exercises. I just researched for myself. I think making my own work out will help me be more inclined to exercise. Plus listening to great songs like Skillet really helps! :)

Love,
Kayley

Why?

So today at work, I notice what shouldn't exist yet. I mean, it is the middle of January and in the 20's for Pete's sake! A spider was dangling from it's web outside the window. Granted, it was tiny and barely noticeable, but I mean COME ON! I'm so not ready for these bugs!

It wasn't my only encounter with bugs today. Oh, no. A stupid gnat had the nerve to bother me during my lunch break and I was INSIDE! Please tell me I'm not the only one not ready for this...

On a better note, I'm drinking a delicious peach smoothie. I think it would be better with fresh peaches but all I had on hand was the little fruit cups in 100% juice. I mixed it up with milk and it foamed up on top. This is the second time a smoothie has done this to me recently. I need to figure out why because a smoothie shouldn't be half-foam. I'm thinking it might be the milk. Not that I think it's gone bad because it better not be. I just opened it! But I've made protein shakes in the blender with milk, the powder, and some peanut butter and they would foam up too. I thought it was the protein powder. I guess not. Stupid milk. Why does it have to separate?

Well, I guess I better finish it off before it gets warm!
Love,
Kayley

2014 New Year's Resolutions!!

No, I'm not dead. So I decided to get back to blogging. I've been meaning to do this, but I just keep forgetting. I'm kind of addicted to Pinterest I can't help it. But it's helpful! It will help me with my 2014 New Year's Resolutions! Well, at least some of them. Here they are! In no specific order:

My 2014 New Year’s Resolutions!

1)  Grow closer to God!

This is a big one, so I put it first. I've grown closer to God within the past year, but I think you can never be too close to God. I receive devotions through my emails Monday through Friday. Sometimes two, but usually three. I listen to a chapter of the Bible every morning before work and I have 2 or 3 Christian Pinterest boards. I want to know more about Him and His Plan for my life.

2)  Spend more time with my love!

This one is pretty big too. I do spend lots of time with my wonderful hubby, but sometimes when we get off work our ways of relaxing are different. He plays Call of Duty and I read or play on my computer. I want to watch more movies and spend more time with him.

3)  Lose 20 pounds!

I did this last year, without much exercise. I plan on changing that. I want to exercise at least 3 times a week at 20-30 minutes each time. I actually want to lose more weight but I don't want to set my goals too high and not make it and get discouraged...again. It happens.

4)  Eat more fruits & veggies!

This one kind of goes with #3. I love many fruits, not so much on the veggies, but I want to eat more because I want to be healthier. Plus, they are filling and light on calories! :)

5)  Finish writing a book!

I think this one will be a hard one. I can never focus on writing one thing anymore ever since I finished This Reckless & Unreasonable Love. But I'm very determined. I love writing and I have so many unfinished stories that need to be told that it would be a crime not to finish them! ;)

6)  Grow a small garden!

This one will be hard too and I'm thinking I may have to skip it this year. I have very little, if any, extra room in my apartment and I don't even have a window sill to put plants on. I'm still going to continue researching it, however, in case the opportunity presents itself.

7)  Quit cussing!

My last one is one I've already been doing pretty well with. I still slip up but I don't cuss as often as I used to and I'm very happy about it.

 

Well, that's it. What do you think? Tell me about your New Year's Resolutions in the comments! I'd love to hear them!

Love,

Me!
P.S.
Follow me!
<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/10949087/?claim=gx82yegfu6u">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>