10 GIVENS OF CHRISTMAS

Stephen Bly

Copyright(c)1996

Emmanuel: “God with us”

What does that mean?

It signifies that . . .

 1) God is not against you (Romans 8:31 ff).

 2) You are never alone (Matthew 28:20, Hebrews 13:5).

 3) You’d better toe the line (John 14:20, Ephesians 4:30).

 

 4) You have instant, available help (John 15:16).

 5) You are not the one in charge (Philippians 2:13).

 6) You cannot chase him away (John 15).

 7) There is someone more important than you to consider (Luke 22:42).

 8) You are where the action is (Matthew 1:18-25).

 9) He is close during tough times (Acts 7:55).

10) Everything in your life will turn out okay (Revelation 21:4).

What special marvel about the Christmas story do you contemplate this year?

STANDING ON THE PROMISES

by Janet Chester Bly

Copyright 2008

When do you get personal peace when you feel like you've gone into free fall after a bungy jump?

Peace comes when you know...

what to do next

when to speak

what to say

where to go

why you’re here

but especially...

whom to trust to land you in a safe place.

The kind of trust of really deep down in your gut kind of certainty that this one will pull you through.

It’s called faith.

Have you discovered your own promises from God...for comfort? For help? For peace? The sort of assurances that penetrate past your doubts? Every bit of unbelief? 

He’s got words meant straight from His heart to yours. Find them. Listen to them. Allow them to permeate deep within until you know He will not withhold any good thing from you.

When’s the last time you’ve claimed promise verses for yourself and those you love? Below you’ll find a few samples to examine.

Note the context.

Detect what comes before and after too.

Pay attention to any pre-conditions to be met.

Memorize the key ones.

Every good thing the Lord had promised them came true. (Joshua 21:45 TLB)

Psalm 4:8 - promise of sleep and safety.

Psalm 29:11 - promise of strength and peace.

Psalm 55:16-19 - assurance of deliverance from threats of harm.

Psalm 119:165 - promise of great peace.

Psalm 121 - promise of help, protection and watchful care.

Isaiah 26:3 - promise of perfect peace.

Isaiah 32:17 - promise of peace, quietness and confidence.

Isaiah 33:6 - promise of salvation, wisdom and knowledge.

Isaiah 54:10 - promise of peace, no matter what.

Proverbs 16:7 - promise of peace with enemies.

Matthew 6:33,34 - promise of provision of every need on this day.

Matthew 7:7-11 - promise of answered prayer and good gifts.

Matthew 11:28-30 - promise of rest for the weary.

John 16:33 - promise of peace and coping with world’s troubles.

Romans 5:1,2 - promise of peace with God through faith in Jesus.

What particular promise do you trust in today?

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Free download of “31 Ways To Win The Fight For Personal Peace” at www.BlyBooks.com/articles.htm/

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Check out: Words To Live By For Women

HAPPY JACK

By Stephen Bly

Copyright©1993,2009

I was sitting at the dining room table and strained to read the newspaper until I realized a couple bulbs had burned out of the overhead chandelier. Weak eyes. Getting older. Makes it tough to see even in good light. I’m pretty spoiled by 21^st Century lighting systems.

Citizens of the Old West survived on a whole lot less light than even our dimmest bulbs. If a prospector’s cabin or a cowboy’s line shack contained an oil lantern, that was pretty great. Most light radiated from a fireplace or maybe a happy jack or two.

A happy jack was nothing more than a candle in a tin can. If you’ve ever tried to read by candlelight or firelight, you can figure out why most cowboys were better at telling stories than reading them.

Sure applies to human knowledge versus spiritual light.

We think we’re so smart. We’ve got life and the universe all figured out. Yet, we stumble in our own dark arrogance. We trip over our own dense pride. Except for those times God beams down his lightning truth (1 Peter 2:9), which he is most willing to do. He proved that by sending Jesus, his appointed light giver (John 1:4,5).

Got confusion? Get close to Jesus. The farther you are from him, the more blurred life on this earth looks. You squint by the dimmest of flickers.

Jesus is no happy jack. He’s the ultimate luminary. Pure radiance. In fact, his presence alone lights up heaven.

To walk by his light is like stepping out of a dimly lit cabin into the brightest noon on a summer day.

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Throw The Devil Off The Train is now available in E-Book form.

HACIENDA HEAVEN

conquistador

On The Trail with Stephen Bly

Copyright©1993,2011

The very first cowboy didn’t come from Texas or Wyoming, but from central Mexico. The conquistadors settled into the New World and imported their Spanish horses and cows. 

Working slowly north along the missions and presidios, ranching and the Mesta cattleman’s association reached the Rio Grande and the land of Tejas near the end of the 18^th Century. By then, the Old World armor and lances had been replaced with rawhide reatas, leather and wooden saddles with a wide horn on which to dally, and big roweled spurs on high heeled boots and wide-brimmed hats.

hacienda corridor

The main house and outbuildings at the Spanish and later Mexican ranches were always called the hacienda. I like that word. It conjures up images of huge one-story, sprawling adobe buildings with red tile roofs. With expansive gardens. Fruit trees. Chickens in the yard. Blacksmiths and tinsmiths. Carpentry and leather shops. And a stable of fine horses. Like a self-sufficient village.

hacienda

It’s always been a dream of mine to own my own hacienda. I think I would have felt at home in such a place. But at my stage of life, that dream’s not likely to happen, here on earth. I’m content with my country home here in the mountains surrounded by ponderosa pines. As far as outbuildings, the yard filled with my homemade false-front Broken Arrow Crossing will have to suffice.

Broken Arrow Crossing

But some day I am going to live on a great hacienda. Jesus said it this way: “In my Father’s house are many mansions. . .I go to prepare a place for you” (John 14:2 KJV).
 

stairway to heaven

I don’t know your view of heaven, but I see it as a great hacienda. . .with Jesus as the Don. I’ll be thrilled to work in the carpentry shop or maybe ride herd for the boss. I do know that he is custom making a place for me. . .and you. . .so when we get there we’ll feel at home. I’m just sure mine’s going to resemble a sprawling hacienda.

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CONTEST QUESTION:

What do you think your place in heaven will be like?  Leave an answer below and be entered in a drawing to win autographed copy of Throw The Devil Off The Train. Winners chosen Friday, April 29th.

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Order your copy of Stephen Bly's newest novel now:  
Throw The Devil Off The Train (hardback, in print large enough for anyone to read). 

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3 WAYS TO ENDURE AN EARTHQUAKE

Janet Chester Bly

Copyright©2008,2011

We used to live in California near the San Andreas Fault. We know what it's like to endure the rolling, surging, rumbling of terra firma. 

My world’s been shaking for a long time now. It’s like I’m treading an earthquake fault and the big blow’s going to happen any day. That’s what it feels like to come alongside someone you love dearly who is critically ill.

Old comfortable routines get blown away. Familiar road signs blur. Safe standards like security and settled in your place with your people get reassigned.  Nothing’s sure. The ground rocks as I fight for balance, sanity, some way to regain some small part of all that’s being taken away from us.

But some anchors stay the same.

1.) I still walk with God. 

I know him. Well, not everything about him. I don’t grasp every insight about his character, every nuance of his wisdom, each facet of his personality. I look forward to all eternity for that closer up and more personal study. But it starts now.

He continues to speak to me through his words. For any specific situation. Like when I wondered where the guardian angels were when my hubby who has suffered so much took a nasty fall … he reminded me of Job who said, “Though he slay me, yet will I praise him” or those three guys tossed in the fiery furnace who stated, “Our God can deliver us. But if he doesn’t, we will still honor and obey him.”

2) I’m keeping on the journey to understand spiritual truth. 

All that information that’s been tucked away after years of church attendance and Bible studies and devotional readings of my own. It’s all there in the brain files. Even so, I don’t always recall the particular principle, the relevant law, one of those divine commands … upon demand. I have to keep processing the accumulated body of facts, the growing vision, until certain soul sparks glow with the Father’s Word of the Day: “Here it is. Pay attention. Live this out right here and now.”

3) I continue to meditate.

Reading and ruminating brings the power of peace to me. My old, tattered Bible’s alive with God’s Spirit. It’s sturdy. Well used. Full of scratches and notes. Pages wrinkled and worn. But then, on occasion I pull out a fresh, new copy and start over … for a cleaner, clearer perspective. I love it when precepts and promises jump out like they’re made just for me. The delight of discovery’s in sifting through ancient verses to filter into present crises and encounters. I’d rather walk by the awesome glow of massive eternal light than rush around by the puny flicker of my own self-made fire.

What have I been reading lately? Psalm 23 … as we walk through a personal  valley of the shadow of death. Psalm 91 … as I need gut-level trust in him more than ever. John 14 … to search the heart and hope of Jesus.

When was the last time you felt you were experiencing a personal earthquake?

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Adapted from “31 Ways To Win The Fight For Personal Peace.” The full article’s available for free dowload at http://BlyBooks.com/articles.htm

God Is Good All The Time

Hope Lives Here

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God Is Good All The Time 

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Hope Lives Here

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ARE YOU TRUSTING FAKE PEACE?

Janet Chester Bly

Copyright©2008,2011

You can counterfeit peace. A false peace. Such as what comes in bottles. Or other altered states of mind, body, spirit. Or when you risk your life on iffy information...from suspect or amateur advisors.

You’ll suffer a rugged siege of finding peace, if you don’t know true peace when you have it.

Peace is not the absence of conflict. Nor freedom from stress.

Hurricane Frances

Peace is alert calm when the alarm bells ring. It’s steady perseverance in the smack center of chaos. You recognize you’ve been through stuff like this before. You can determine not to melt down. You know you’ll survive. Somehow. And you know who is in ultimate control.

Janet: Trust Me. Jesus

I’ve got a plaque on my office wall: “Janet, Trust Me. I have everything under control. ~~ Jesus.” I read it every day. I believe it. But that doesn't mean I don't want to go scream in a deep canyon on occasion due to overwhelm or frustration. It means I come back to Jesus as my center.

What’s a perfect day for you? Make a list. Just for fun.

Here’s what it would look like for me . . .

Writing at the computer for hours with no interruptions. No emergency breakdowns. No commode backing up to flood the basement.

Plus, every idea, every scene on the screen, a zinger that captivates, that refreshes, with all new slants.

Steve golfing in desert

But most of all, it would be a perfect day if my hubby was strong and well and able to do the things he loves best. . .with a good lab report.

But perfect conditions don’t guarantee personal peace.

However, Jesus does.

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” John 14:27

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God warns about Faux Peace: Check out verses like Ezekiel 13:10

When’s a time you’ve had true peace when there was every outward indication that you should not?

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Get a free download of the whole article: “31 Ways To Win The Fight For Personal Peace” at our website: http://BlyBooks.com/articles.htm/


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God Is Good All The Time

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TASTES LIKE FRIED CHICKEN

Fried Rattlesnake Meat

On the Trail with Stephen Bly

Copyright©1993,2008

The first time I ate roasted rattlesnake meat, some timid soul at the table asked me, “What’s it like?”

“Tastes like chicken,” I reported.

           

At another time, I had the opportunity to bite into alligator tail. “What’s it taste like?” wife Janet asked.

Fried Alligator Tail

“Sort of like chicken,” I replied.

In the Old West, a cowboy’s diet consisted of chicken, beef or pork. No bona fide cowboy would choose lamb on purpose. Everything they chowed down on could be one of those three meats. If they didn’t know what it was, but it looked white-ish, they’d say, “Tastes like chicken.”

On the range, real fried chicken was rare, almost a delicacy. Biscuits, beans, and bacon (or salt pork) provided the normal fare. Getting hungry for chicken caused a few culinary innovations. Sometimes old cookie would roll the bacon in flour and batter and fry it up. The cowboy crew called it fried chicken. If a greenhorn pilgrim joined the gang at the chuck wagon and dared to say, “This ain’t chicken,” the cowboys insisted, “It’s the best fried chicken for three hundred miles.”

If you’re desperate enough, you call the phony stuff the real thing. What you call your supper out on the prairie doesn’t hurt anyone. But when it comes to spiritual truth, the results can be deadly.

One of the tests of a mature disciple of Jesus Christ is that he or she learns to detect the signs of sound doctrine and can discern the smell of deception. No matter how the teacher wraps it up with sincere sounding phrases and claims ‘it’s the real thing,’ or ‘the better thing,’ if it doesn’t ring with the freedom and simple truth that. . .it’s all about Jesus. . .flee until you hear the right voice, His voice.

My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. (John 10:27)

Bacon ain’t chicken. Never was, never will be. And what false teachers peddle won’t keep you centered on the power and presence of Jesus Christ for your life. No matter how much fluffy flour and sweet batter they dip it in.

Fried Rattlesnake with dipping sauce

How do you determine what's true from someone trying to fool you?

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COMING MAY 1ST, 2011:

THROW THE DEVIL OFF THE TRAIN

Catherine longed for escape. She'd do anything to get to her fiance, Philip, a childhood friend she hadn't seen in 17 years. 

Race had his heart set on revenge and his body desperately needed sleep. These strangers head west on a long, cramped, chaotic 1880 train ride from Omaha to Sacramento. And though they hate each other on sight, somebody's got to throw the devil off the train. 

pre-order on http://Amazon.com:    

Throw the Devil Off the Train (Western Standard Series) 

GET YOUR HOG BACK

Stephen Bly

On The Trail with Stephen Bly

Copyright©1993,2008

An insurance salesman and I chatted at a nearby coffee shop when Prairie Bob entered, covered from hat to boot in oil and grease. We’ve got several fellas named Bob around our parts. . .so one gets called Prairie Bob, another is Forest Bob, and a third is Town Bob, more affectionately known as T-Bob.

           

“I aint’ got time to eat dinner,” Prairie Bob reported. “I bought a truck on Saturday and it didn’t even make it home. I ain’t keepin' that truck. No sir, I’m goin’ to town right now and get my hog back.”

           

Prairie Bob banged his way out the door and the insurance man stared at me with a frown. “That guy traded a pig for a truck?”

I explained that ‘getting your hog back’ is a cowboy expression for recovering something that belongs to you that has been taken by devious means. Usually it connotes stolen property. I figure Prairie Bob thought his hard-earned money was purloined by some slick talkin’ truck salesman.

           

Most folks have had a valuable stolen from us at one time or another. Maybe your wallet. Your keys. Your purse. Your favorite cow dog. Your pickup. Or perhaps a treasure even more critical.

The Bible reveals there’s a deceiver and liar who roams this planet. His main purpose is to “steal, kill, and destroy” (John 10:10). He’s mighty good at it too. He’ll try to ruin your reputation. Swipe your sanity. Pilfer your friends. Rob you of family. At the least, bankrupt your peace. But, most of all, he targets your spiritual life. He attempts to make God look bad in every circumstance. Instead, St. Paul exhorts: “Become friends with God” (2 Corinthians 5:20 MSG).

That is, let him prove to you he’s worthy of your trust. He'll show you the way, every time. Don’t be swindled. Don't allow the most crucial relationship you’ll ever know be stolen from you by lies and deceit.

It so happens that Forest Bob recently stood at a close friend’s grave and felt like a precious gift had been ripped from him. “I had such an empty feelin’ in my gut. Like somethin’s missin’. Part of it was my friend. But that’s not all. I once had a relationship with God and somehow I lost it.”

It’s time for Forest Bob to go get his whole hog back.

What's the most precious thing that ever got stolen from you? Did you ever get it back?

NEW NOVELS NOW AVAILABLE: Cowboy For A Rainy Afternoon and Creede of Old Montana . . . order through www.Amazon.com or get an autographed copy via  www.BlyBooks.com/store.htm  

COMING MARCH 2011: Throw The Devil Off The Train

Catherine Goodwin’s got to escape. She wants a fresh start with her fiancé in Paradise Springs, California. Race Hillyard’s into revenge. He seeks to settle a score. But it’s a long, crowded, volatile train ride from Omaha to Sacramento.

7 WAYS TO CREATE A SEASON OF PEACE

Janet Chester Bly

Sometimes it seems we here in the mountains of northern Idaho experience the shortest autumn period in the west. A few weeks tops. Yet, fall’s my favorite season. The colors. The sunsets. The crispy, sensory sounds and smells and sights. I could live in the heights of this season forever. 

Fall signifies peace to me. If I could order a perfect weather day, it would be…70-ish degrees. The softest of breezes. Streaks and puffs of layered clouds brushing the azure sky. Clean-cut air.

But just like the weather, peace of mind seems to come and go for me and most of those around me. It’s over-turned by . . . Panic. Turmoil. Sleepless nights. Storms of stress. Troubled times.

Yet, over it all, Jesus says, “Keep calm. Don’t panic” (John 14:27).

My present goal? To walk with God every moment without anxiety, free of fear.

My prayer? “Lord, guide me in your way of peace. Help me do the actions that promote peace. . .for myself and others around me.”

One thing I’ve learned over the decades. . .fighting for God’s peace requires courage because . . . .

1) I choose love over hate.

2) I admit sometimes, “I was wrong.”

3) I try to comfort the afflicted.

4) I reach out to hug a prodigal.

5) I try real hard not to become a cynic when confronted with maddening words or outrageous deeds.

6) I’m on the watch for what God’s doing in my world, above and beyond the salacious, the distracting and diversionary, as well as the evil stuff.

7) When I hear heart-stopping news, I try to remember to ask, “Lord, what do you want me to do?” rather than “How did this mess happen?”

I’m training myself. . .not to freak out about the future. To grab hold of God’s big picture plan…the one that brims with promise of the abundance of good blessings, with compassion to all who reach out to him, and the forever peace of the life to come.

Autumn’s a transition period, an evolving stage. So is my life. So is yours. Remember that the next time leaves begin to turn and twist and fall.

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What is the season that denotes peace most to you and why?