Happy Monday all my bloggy friends! What a wonderful weekend I had! I told you on Friday that I was anticipating a date with my hubby that night but I didn't know what he had planned. To my surprise, he wisked me away to a very nice dinner and then when we got back home, I was surprised again at lit tea light candles lining the ledge of our 4-seasons room and a lit fireplace. How romantic! He's still got it after all these years!! :) :)

Then, on Sunday morning, he woke me with an idea. It had been a long time since we spent an entire day having fun with our kids so he suggested that we take them hiking which is one of their favorite things to do. We got up, had breakfast and left for hiking (yes, we skipped church - shhhhhhh, don't tell anybody :) ) Here's a couple pictures:

What a great time we had! When we returned home, we got on the 4-wheelers and continued our day together with a ride. We stopped at a few bridges in the country and went underneath to see what we could find. Our biggest discovery was some very large cow bones in the creek. It was fun just to horse around. Family is such a wonderful blessing from God and I'm so glad that we took an opportunity to soak up His goodness.

Back to our study of James. 1:12-15 "Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. Let no one say when he is tempted, 'I am being tempted by God'; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death."

Life is hard and consists of many many decisions that we must make. Does God tempt us to do evil? No, but He will test us in our faith. God does allow satan to tempt us. Notice that in vs. 15 it says that when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin. Just being tempted is not a sin but giving in to the temptation is sin. When we are tempted, we must act quickly to release the temptation. The longer we play with it in our minds, the closer we are to allowing it to become an action. When we consider the act for too long, we begin to justify why we can do it, why we deserve it and what excuses we can convince ourselves of so that we don't feel that nasty old guilt.

When tempted, ask God for strength to remove it from your mind and make the choice to change your thinking each time it rears its ugly head. The choice may be difficult, but the results will be well worth the effort as you grow closer and closer with our Lord.

Check out the "I'm not who I was" video on our pastor's blog http://www.pontiacbible.org/index.php?/blog/index/

Have a great day

Living fearlessly in Christ

Christie