A Valentine's Giveaway!

Ok, all you lovebirds out there . . . it's that time of year again and I couldn't resist . . . it's time for . . .  

A Valentine's Giveaway! 💗

Valentine's Day has always been one of my favorite holidays. I think that this is because of the memories that it holds for me. My Mom made Valentine's Day so special for me and my sisters when we were growing up. We would always make a homemade heart-shaped pizza and have a fizzy pink soda-drink that we usually didn't have. She decorated the table with special Valentine's Day things and prepared everything with such detail and love. She and my Dad always gave us a Russell Stover heart-shaped box of candy wrapped in that delightful red cellophane. My favorite chocolate was the caramel filled one. It meant so much to me as a little girl and it still holds such a strong remembrance in my heart. And thankfully, my husband now buys me the Russell Stover heart; it was part of our marriage agreement . . . haha; just joking. 😉

Anyway, I wanted to put together a giveaway for this special time of year. I pray that it brightens someone's day and brings joy to each one of you in some way. 

And may we always cherish and hold dear the greatest Love of our hearts . . . our precious Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who first loved us . . . 💗

What this giveaway includes:

• The DVD Old Fashioned (Read my review HERE)
• Lindt truffles~~Because I strongly believe in nutritional STAPLES  and am a great advocate for healthy foods 😉
• Exquisitely lovely Lauren Conrad earrings to wear for a special date or while watching Old Fashioned . . . ;-) Wonderful for promoting the ideal of a "rose-leaf complexion."-haha! 

I hope that this giveaway is enjoyable and fun! Please enter below using the Rafflecopter form. And Happy Valentine's Day to each one of you! 


a Rafflecopter giveaway



*This giveaway is only open to residents of the continental United States for shipping reasons.











You might find me on these link-ups:


Inspire Me Monday, Literacy Musing Mondays, The Modest Mom, Raising Homemakers, Classical Homemaking, A Wise Woman Builds Her Home, Woman to Woman Ministries,  Testimony Tuesday, Tell His Story, Messy Marriage,  Imparting Grace, Thought Provoking Thursday, Soul Survival, Good Morning Mondays, The Weekend Brew, Counting My Blessings, The HomeAcre Hop, Mommy Moments Link Up, Grace and Truth Linkup, Faith Filled Friday, SHINE Blog Hop, RaRaLinkup, Word of God Speak, Booknificent Thursday, Living Proverbs 31, Coffee For Your Heart Weekly LinkUp, You're the Star Blog Hop, Homesteader Hop, Fresh Market Friday, Heart Encouragement Thursday , Sitting Among Friends Blog Party, Fabulous Warm Heart Party, Oh My Heartsie Girls Wonderful Wednesday Linkup, Writer Wednesday

A Knife Dipped in Blood~~The Deadly Peril of Pornography

This post is part of a series of posts on marriage/relationships. I pray that this "mini-series" would be a blessing to you! Please feel free to share any of your own thoughts in the comments; I would love to hear them! 


If you are new to this series, you can find the Introduction HERE, Part 1 HERE , Part 2 HERE, Part 3 HERE, Part 4 HERE., and Part 5 HERE.

Please Note: This post contains adult material that is not suitable for children. 

We use a most unfortunate idiom when we say, of a lustful man prowling the streets, that he “wants a woman.” Strictly speaking, a woman is just what he does not want.

He wants a pleasure for which a woman happens to be the necessary piece of apparatus. How much he cares about the woman as such may be gauged by his attitude to her five minutes after fruition (one does not keep the carton after one has smoked the cigarettes).

Now Eros makes a man really want, not a woman, but one particular woman. In some mysterious but quite indisputable fashion the lover desires the Beloved herself, not the pleasure she can give.
~C.S. Lewis

Lust is a poor, weak, whimpering, whispering thing compared with that richness and energy of desire which will arise when lust has been killed.
~C.S. Lewis

I can still remember a sermon I heard years ago from Dr. Charles Swindoll. I was listening to the local Christian radio station in the car and I had pulled into the driveway. He was talking about the danger of pornography. An image that he used cut into my soul in a way that made me shudder. I don't remember all of the specifics of the sermon, but one description stayed with me. He carefully depicted the way in which (I think that perhaps it was the Eskimos) would dip a knife in blood in order to kill a wolf. They would cover the blade in the scarlet substance, and then place the razor-sharp edge sticking up out of the snow. The wolf, hungry, would smell the blood and begin licking the knife. Eventually, as you can imagine, his own tongue would be cut and he would begin to lick his own blood without realizing it. In this way, he would feed on his own blood, ultimately bleeding to death and perishing in the bitter cold. 

Swindoll then went on to relate this story to the manner in which pornography slowly weakens and then kills the soul. 

Pornography. We think that it will feed us, satisfy us. But instead of nourishing, it actually accomplishes the opposite. It drains us of all that is true and pure and good. 

Sometimes it seems so innocent. A little taste here; a lick there. Until the stream begins to flow and we are strangling on our own blood. 

Pornography destroys. It crushes. We think that it is giving satisfaction, but it is really robbing us of that which is truly life-giving.

We live in a time when it is looked upon so lightly, laughed off, even--Oh, every man struggles with that--

But I believe that in not adopting a more serious attitude toward this sin, we weaken ourselves, we weaken our marriages, we weaken the church as a whole, and we become unfit for ministry in any way. 

We need to take pornography seriously. We need to kill lust in our lives before it kills us, before it kills our families, before it kills our souls and sears our conscience until it is dead. 

Our families are at stake. Our marriages are at stake. Our souls are at stake. 

You have heard that it was said to those of old,‘You shall not commit adultery.’But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell. (Matthew 5:27-29 NKJV)

 Flee sexual immorality. Every sin that a man does is outside the body, but he who commits sexual immorality sins against his own body. Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s. (I Corinthians 6:18-20 NKJV)

We may so weaken the voice of the Spirit in this area that we will be rendered spiritually useless. I believe that this happens in many men's lives (as well as women's) and this is one of the reasons that the Church is so powerless and ineffective today. 

These are three ways that I believe pornography damages and destroys and then ultimately kills the soul--I am sure that there are more--

It damages our marriages

Pornography kills romance. It deadens our own souls against the soul of our spouse. I know that some may disagree with me, but I believe that viewing pornography when one is married is quietly committing adultery against their partner. This is why the Bible exhorts us to "flee immorality." Because it is so grievously damaging. Besides hurting ourselves, it also wounds the ones we claim to love. The late Pastor Adrian Rogers said that once a man breaks trust with his wife in his marriage, it may take years to repair the breach because a woman's emotions are so sensitive. Many men feel that pornography is no big deal and that women just need to get over it. But I believe that it may be difficult even after the woman has genuinely forgiven her husband, to  easily "get over" her husband's actions. The sting of his deception and betrayal may remain for years and make it difficult for her to relate to her husband sexually or in other ways. This is one of the consequences of "soft" adultery. 

It damages our relationship with God

Pornography immediately places a barrier in terms of our relationship with God. The more that we view it and engage in practices associated with it, the more our hearts are hardened, our consciences are seared, and we deaden the voice of the Holy Spirit. 

It damages the church as a whole

Because we are weakened spiritually when we engage in viewing pornography, the church as a whole suffers. There is sin "in the camp," and so the church cannot go forward spiritually. I truly believe that this is one of the reasons for the weakness of the American church--unconfessed sin that is taken lightly and is causing our souls to rot in the blazing sun. Only true repentance and turning away from sin will bring cleansing and revival. 

~~~

Lust needs to be killed in our lives, not stroked gently, not hidden away and then taken back out, not ignored, but killed. 

Ultimately, feeding on lust shows that we are seeking satisfaction outside of Christ. We are discontent and that discontentment flows into the utter selfishness of taking that which promises to fill our deepest need. 

We are empty and so we seek a temporary fix. We fill our souls with poison and refuse the Great Physician who would heal us if we would only run to Him, run to the Self-Giving One who alone can satisfy us.

I speak mostly to men, but I know that there are also women who struggle in this area. 

I'd like to add a note here--the answer to a man's problem with pornography is not ultimately that his wife needs to fulfill him more sexually. It is true that a woman is biblically constrained  to join together with her husband (I Corinthians 7:3-5). It is also true that this becomes a joy when her husband treats her with gentleness and loves her as Christ loves the church and that it becomes a painful act of obedience when she is not treated that way. 

A man's problem with pornography is not ultimately the failing of his wife, but the failing of his own disobedience and failure to resist evil through the power of the Holy Spirit.

We need to take responsibility for our own actions and stop placing the blame on someone else--stop using someone else's perceived disobedience to give us an excuse to continue sinning. And we do this when we blame our wives (or husbands) for our sin when we feel that they are failing to fulfill us sexually. 

What we need is not an attitude of making excuses and of indulging the flesh, but an attitude of cutting off that which is causing us to sin. 

There is a scene in the movie Fireproof where the main character Caleb, uses a baseball bat to destroy his computer. He is struggling with pornography and realizes that he needs to get rid of that which is causing him to stumble.  His wife is not fulfilling him sexually (which he gives earlier as one of his excuses for looking at pornography). But then Caleb turns to the Lord in repentance and begins to treat his wife in a loving, sincere, and gentle way. It takes time because he has wounded her so deeply, but eventually his wife responds to him and their love is rekindled. 

There are times when we need to "cut off our hand," and nothing is too radical if it is causing our relationship with Jesus Christ to suffer and our soul to wither and die. 

Do you struggle with pornography? Repent, turn to the Lord and He will give you the strength to overcome it. 

I have read articles that talk about how the pornographic images that a man or woman sees may never be erased because of the chemicals that seeing these images triggers. 

I believe that this is true, hence the peril of exposing oneself to these images--but I also believe that the Lord is able to miraculously redeem all things and to remove our sins as far as the east is from the west. 

I believe that the Lord is able to refresh and restore marriages, hearts, and consciences that are seared when we turn to Him and turn away from that which is destroying our souls. He is able to redeem. He will redeem. 

So turn to Him. Turn away from the darkness and deception of self fulfillment and let your fulfillment be found in the Person of Jesus Christ. 

He is able to do exceedingly, abundantly above all that we ask or think. He can cleanse and purify. And He will--to those who run to Him. 

.

This was a helpful article for further reading (clickable link).



You might find me on these link-ups:


Strangers and Pilgrims on Earth, Inspire Me Monday, Literacy Musing Mondays, The Modest Mom, What Joy is Mine, A Mama's Story, Mom's the Word, Rich Faith Rising, Cornerstone Confessions, Mom's Morning Coffee, Raising Homemakers, Classical Homemaking, A Wise Woman Builds Her Home, Woman to Woman Ministries,  Testimony Tuesday, Tell His Story, Women With Intention Wednesdays, Messy Marriage,  Graced Simplicity, Children Are A Blessing, Imparting Grace, Thought Provoking Thursday, Soul Survival, Good Morning Mondays, The Weekend Brew, Counting My Blessings, The HomeAcre Hop, Mommy Moments Link Up, Grace and Truth Linkup, Faith Filled Friday, Tell It To Me Tuesdays, SHINE Blog Hop, TGI Saturdays Blog Hop, RaRaLinkup, Word of God Speak, Booknificent Thursday, Living Proverbs 31, Sharing His Beauty Blog Linkup, Coffee For Your Heart Weekly LinkUp, You're the Star Blog Hop, Homesteader Hop, Fresh Market Friday, Heart Encouragement Thursday , Sitting Among Friends Blog Party

The Crucible and the Covenant

Love, remember, is proven by the sacrifice it makes.

-Robertson McQuilkin

 Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends.

John 15:13

Two men, a crucible, and a covenant.

Two men, both in their 80's now, one ready to live, the other trying to beat death.

The first man, Robertson McQuilkin. 

I just finished reading his short autobiography addressing the time that he took care of his failing wife, Muriel. 

She was diagnosed with Alzheimers. In her 50's. 

And he cared for her over the span of 25 years, from the onset of the disease until she died. 

Sacrificially cared for her, though he would never call it a sacrifice. 

And he eventually resigned from his position as President of Columbia Bible College to become her complete caregiver. 

A marriage in a crucible. A man whose wife would never be the same, who would never be able to fulfill his needs in the same way that she had before.

And he chose to stay. Chose to surrender. Chose to give and give and give because the love of the Giving-Christ filled him. 

Chose. 

Another man. 

Wife diagnosed with a debilitating illness, her body becoming more and more crippled as the years passed. 

Eventually she needed a wheelchair. 

And that was just the last straw. 

So he left her. 

Divorced her; he's with a much younger woman now--

And before she died, she still used to ask about him, ask how he was. 

He was still in her heart, the one who broke it--

When the crucible shattered, overburdened with heat.

And a heart, broken, lay among the shards of clay.

A man with feet of clay . . .

Broke the covenant.

And I found myself asking the other day, What holds a marriage together? What holds a marriage together in a crucible?

The logical answer--the covenant--the covenant forged, the covenant spoken and witnessed and signed and consummated. 

What holds a marriage together? The covenant, and then something deeper, still, I think--

And that is covenant love. 

The love that mirrors Jesus' love for us, the kind of love that McQuilkin had for his wife, the love that gives and gives and gives, for the joy that is the reward. 

Jesus gave. 

And His covenant love washed over us. 

Because the covenant without love is just a legal transaction-seed, and love is the lifting of that seed into the flower of beauty and grace. 

Covenant love -- and what is perceived as bondage ultimately brings freedom, the bondage of love. 

McQuilkin said, in an interview--

Ours is a day of passionate pursuit of self fulfillment. And the folk wisdom of  twentieth-century America holds that fulfillment can be found only in freedom. So, if some responsibility or commitment, some relationship or value shackles, you have a moral obligation to yourself to break free. 

But it's a fantasy. That doorway to freedom and fulfillment may turn out to be the doorway to a stronger imprisonment. I've watched in sadness as many friends and acquaintances march through that doorway. The new bondage may be subterranean, below the level of consciousness, even. But such a person has broken one set of shackles only to shut himself or herself off from the soaring freedom of experiencing God's highest and best. He who preserves his life, affirming himself, will lose it all, says Jesus. Only the one who can say no to self-interest for Christ and the gospel cause can ever find the treasure of true life--freedom and fulfillment in Christ. But we don't seem to get it. 

We live in an age where even high-profile evangelicals are demeaning marriage vows. In reading more about Robertson McQuilkin, I came across this article that was shared by Randy Alcorn. It contained a video clip of the influential evangelical Pat Robertson insisting that Alzheimers is a kind of "death." He implied that divorce is understandable in such a situation.  

Whatever became of the covenant?

And deeper still, what of covenant love? 

What of Jesus?

Elisabeth Elliot tells the story of a man and his wife who were having marriage difficulties. 

Desperately wanting to save her marriage, the woman finally convinced her husband to go with her to counseling. 

The Christian marriage counselor who met them and learned of the husband's desire for a divorce quipped something along the lines of "Well, I was divorced, and now I'm happily remarried!" 

As Elisabeth Elliot put it, "That was all the husband needed." He quickly pursued a divorce and that was that. 

No regard for the covenant. 

No understanding of love. 

The love that held a man named Robertson McQuilkin to his marriage vows, to his wife, to Jesus. 

An example of covenant love. 

Self-giving love. 

The love born of sacrifice,

The love that brings life. 

You might find me on these link-ups:

  Strangers and Pilgrims on Earth, The Modest Mom, What Joy is Mine, Yes They Are All Ours, Missional Call, A Mama's Story, Mom's the Word, Rich Faith Rising, Time Warp Wife, Cornerstone Confessions, Mom's Morning Coffee, So Much at Home, Raising Homemakers, Hope in Every Season, A Wise Woman Builds Her Home, Woman to Woman Ministries, Whole-Hearted Home, A Soft Gentle Voice, My Daily Walk in His Grace, Messy Marriage, My Teacher's Name is Mama, The Charm of Home, Graced Simplicity, Children Are A Blessing, Mittenstate Sheep and Wool, Imparting Grace, Preparedness Mama, A Look at the Book, Essential Thing Devotions, Count My Blessings, Beauty Observed, Christian Mommy Blogger, Serenity You, Renewed Daily, Sunday Stillness, The Beauty in His Grip, Tales of a Kansas Farm Mom.

Book Review on Robertson McQuilkin's A Promise Kept

Ours is a day of passionate pursuit of self fulfillment. And the folk wisdom of  twentieth-century America holds that fulfillment can be found only in freedom. So, if some responsibility or commitment, some relationship or value shackles, you have a moral obligation to yourself to break free. 

But it's a fantasy. That doorway to freedom and fulfillment may turn out to be the doorway to a stronger imprisonment. I've watched in sadness as many friends and acquaintances march through that doorway. The new bondage may be subterranean, below the level of consciousness, even. But such a person has broken one set of shackles only to shut himself or herself off from the soaring freedom of experiencing God's highest and best. He who preserves his life, affirming himself, will lose it all, says Jesus. Only the one who can say no to self-interest for Christ and the gospel cause can ever find the treasure of true life--freedom and fulfillment in Christ. But we don't seem to get it. 

-Robertson McQuilkin

This book honestly surprised me. I was expecting a somewhat mushy love story and was deeply and pleasantly surprised by the rock-solid content and anything but mushy love and commitment of the author toward his failing wife. 

It is the brief story, written almost journal-like and poetically, of Robertson McQuilkin and his wife Muriel, the latter who was diagnosed with Alzheimers Disease and the former who became her full-time caregiver until her death. 

McQuilkin was at the height of his career as President of Columbia Bible College and Seminary (now Columbia International University) when he made the decision to step down from that position in order to care for his wife. 

This decision both intrigued and unnerved McQuilkin's friends and acquaintances, but regardless of the response toward his decision, McQuilkin was convinced that it was the step of obedience that the Lord was leading him personally to take. 

In his Acknowledgements, McQuilkin emphasizes that his decision was a personal conviction and that he isn't advocating his response to his wife's sickness as the only right way to care for a loved one. He says, "I hope none will hear me advocating my approach as the only or best approach in all circumstances. I'm just telling my story, celebrating the joys of married love, not pushing a specific agenda for caregiving." 

McQuilkin's conviction was that he alone could give Muriel the best possible care; he realized his constant presence gave her a sense of security amid all of the confusion that she experienced in gradually losing her memory more and more. These are the words that McQuilkin shared in chapel at Columbia Bible College regarding his decision to resign as President in order to fully care for his wife: "The decision was made, in a way, 42 years ago when I promised to care for Muriel 'in sickness and in health . . . till death do us part.' So as I told the students and faculty, as a man of my word, integrity has something to do with it. But so does fairness. She has cared for me fully and sacrificially all these years; if I cared for her for the next 40 years I would not be out of her debt. Duty, however, can be grim and stoic. But there is more: I love Muriel. She is a delight to me--her childlike dependence and confidence in me, her warm love, occasional flashes of that wit I used to relish so, her happy spirit and tough resilience in the face of continual distressing frustration. I don't have to care for her. I get to! It is a high honor to care for so wonderful a person." 

McQuilkin dispatched his duty of love to his wife until the day of her death and faithfully cared for Muriel until her passing to heaven. 

This is a beautiful, true story of greater love, one to savor and to mull over. I would highly recommend it. 

If you'd like to read Christianity Today's interview with Robertson McQuilkin, please click here. 

I'll share some of my own thoughts about McQuilkin's decision/commitment in next week's post--The Crucible and the Covenant. 



To purchase the book through Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/A-Promise-Kept-Robertson-McQuilkin/dp/0842350993

I share my posts with these blogs: Strangers and Pilgrims on Earth, The Modest Mom, What Joy is Mine, Yes They Are All Ours, Missional Call, A Mama's Story, Mom's the Word, Rich Faith Rising, Time Warp Wife, Cornerstone Confessions, Mom's Morning Coffee, So Much at Home, Raising Homemakers, Hope in Every Season, A Wise Woman Builds Her Home, Woman to Woman Ministries, Whole-Hearted Home, A Soft Gentle Voice, My Daily Walk in His Grace, Messy Marriage, My Teacher's Name is Mama, The Charm of Home, Graced Simplicity, Children Are A Blessing, Mittenstate Sheep and Wool, Imparting Grace, Homestead Lady, Deborah Jean's Dandelion House, Preparedness Mama, A Look at the Book, Essential Thing Devotions, Count My Blessings, Beauty Observed, Christian Mommy Blogger, Serenity You, Renewed Daily, Sunday Stillness, The Beauty in His Grip, Tales of a Kansas Farm Mom.