Not long after I gave my life to Jesus in 1975, I started going to a women’s Bible study.  It was made up of mostly young moms from my church, some older women, and some women from other churches. I learned so much from those women and I will always be grateful to them.  During one of the lessons, we got into a discussion about all the ‘self’ words; selfish, self-control, self-righteous, self-absorbed, self-confident, self-motivated, self-sufficient, self-conscious etc.  The point of the lesson was not to be selfish; * we were warned to beware (or be aware) of the self-words. The warning resonated with me, and I’m reminded of it often.

* Phil 2:3 Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves;

From the journal . . . August 2014

 I am trying to be less self-aware.  Lord, what about these journals? They are written by me and are so much about my feelings and my thinkings?

(My words are similar to something I wrote in my December 2009  journal,  but God’s response went a different direction.  I named that post The Rock of Failure.  11/26/19)

And I Believe God Said:

You can’t get away from you. But you need to be aware of Me and My sovereign plans for you.  I am over all.  Always be aware of My presence.  Notice how everything that relates to you – also relates to Me. Even more so it relates to Me!

Seek Me first and everything else falls into place. *  Time spent with Me like this is good, but you know it’s not our only time together.  I am always here.  Trust Me and trust Me in you.

Matthew 6:3 But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be provided to you.

When we feel especially close to God, it seems that it should always be that way.  Why in the world would we ever leave His presence?  After reading the Christian classic, The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence, I decided to set my watch to beep every hour to remind me to think of God.  It actually helped. I was teaching kindergarten at the time and the kids would often tell me when the beep sounded.  It was a public school, so I didn’t necessarily explain exactly what it meant, but I did to my grandchildren. After a while, I couldn’t hear the beep as well, but my granddaughter, Bonnie, would hear it from a room in another part of the house and holler out “Thank You, God, for being our God!” Anything that makes us think about God more often has got to be a good thing!!!