A Magnolia's Heart Beats

Chapter Two

What Happens When Women Walk in Faith



A Line in the Sand



This week's chapter was great! I enjoyed it immensely.

From Lysa's book...

"We must leave our past behind, draw a line in the sand, and determine to proceed forward with God."

"Experiencing life change is not a matter of chance, it's a matter of choice", choosing God's ways instead of your own."

"God renamed Abraham, and He has renamed you as well. When you go through the leaving phase, you are asked to leave much behind. But you don't walk from this place empty-handed. You are going to be equipped with a new name."

Hebrews 11:39 - 40 - "These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised. God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect."



Reading Hebrews 11 reminded me of all the heroes of faith in the Bible. It's very encouraging to see how their faith made them strong. They had seasons of trouble, but they persevered because they had the courage to step out on faith and believe God for the bigger things.





Isaiah 43:19 - "See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland."



Now if this is not exciting, I don't know what is! What a call! God has promised to make a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland. You have to go through the bad to get to the good sometimes. You have to leave things behind that you'd rather take with you more often than not, but God has promised that He will provide. And He has provided a few streams in the desert for me. My biggest stream in the desert He provided for me was the sweet relief of having a hysterectomy at the age of 29. Ya'll, I got a "No" answer from God on asking to raise a biological child, and my reward for having the faith enough to say, "Whatever You will, God, You know best," was that the insurance issues surrounding my hysterectomy were mostly paved smoothly and I was able to have one without jumping through 84,000 different hoops. I had to press toward that stream in the desert, though. I pressed through infertility and miscarriage. I pressed forward in prayer. I got my reward. How is not having a baby a reward? I think after just praying for it so hard for 8 years, totally submitting to God's will, it's just a thrill to have finally gotten an answer other than, "Wait." I have written some other posts on this topic, so I won't go into much more of it here.



Isaiah 62:2 -"...you will be called by a new name that the mouth of the LORD will bestow."



Often, when God did a new thing through a person, a new name was given. Abraham became Abraham, Saul became Paul, Simon was called Peter, or Cephas, and my favorite, Jacob was named Israel. You get the picture...



Names are important. Lysa says, "As He designates us as His beloved children, may we lay claim to our new names, which He has engraved in the palms of His hands (Isaiah 49:16)."



She encouraged us to find out the meaning of our name and see if we could find a verse that correlates with the meaning, spending some time thinking about how it applies to our lives and God's plan for us.



My name means "Laurel". Further research told me, "The laurel, or bay leaf, was used to make wreaths of victory. So to be "laurel-crowned" means to wear the crown of victory."

I Corinthians 15:57 - "But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."

He is my Victory! He motivates me to leave things behind to pursue a higher calling of faith in Him.