The Word

Consistency – YouVersion Bible App

Tammy M CardwellLeave a comment

I’ve been using the YouVersion Bible app for years, and I love it. When I first discovered it, I primarily appreciated the fact that I could have access to multiple Bible translations on my phone. After a friend invited me to do a devotion with her, however, my life changed.

Once you’ve downloaded and set up (easy) the YouVersion app on your phone, you have multiple options. If you look at the graphic above, you’ll see the little house highlighted at the bottom of the screen. This Home screen gives me a snapshot of my YouVersion life.

Select Read, and you’ll pop straight into the Bible. Here you can choose from various translations, some of which you can download, some you can have the app read aloud. As you read, you can highlight, make notes, and more. Depending on how you set your preferences, your friends can also see your highlights and notes. Yes, you have friends here!

Plans is where the real fun begins. You can see that I’m working my way through 2 plans right now, both of which are around 7 days. God alone knows how many plans are available, but I can almost guarantee that you can find a plan (or several) on whatever topic you’re interested in. The plan length varies greatly, from three days being the shortest I’ve done to…well, I know you can read the Bible through in a year, so 365 days for sure. You don’t have to limit yourself to one a day, however. You can blow through any devotional just as fast or as slow as you like.

And you can do it with friends too!

So when you start a devotion, you decide if you want to do it alone or with friends (You invite whomever you choose), and whether or not you want your activity to be public. When you start the plan, you’ll read, watch, or listen to a devotion; then read its accompanying verses. Finally, if you’re reading with friends, you have an option of making comments and carrying on conversations. This can be a very enriching experience!

The app has a lot more that I don’t even get into – like Verse of the Day and being able to make your own verse graphics. It is, indeed, quite amazing and a marvelous tool for me in my determination to be consistently engaging with God’s Word.

Celebrating The Word!
Tammy C

Through the Word

Tammy M CardwellLeave a comment

So, you can probably expect me to have quite a few Consistency-related posts this year. At least, if I can become a more consistent blogger you will. Not surprisingly, since God is my highest priority, I intend to put more of an emphasis on His Word this year than I ever have before. One of the tools I’m using is the Through the Word Bible app. I learned about it while doing their study of Luke in the YouVersion Bible App (review to follow) before Christmas, and I’m hooked.

The concept is simple. They’ve put together teachings on every single chapter in the Bible. You can walk through the Bible one book at a time, which would be awesome, or you can browse their topical options. I’m currently going through their End Times collection, which uses chapters from Daniel, Thessalonians, Jude, and Revelation, and I can’t limit myself to one session a day. The things I’m learning are fascinating and valuable!

Anyway, it’s really that easy. Download the “Through the Word” app, register, and then take time to do their introductory session. While you might want to dive right in, it is best to start here. However, if you’re too ready to run forward, just go to Browse, select the series that interests you, and tell it to start playing.

I expect to use this one a LOT in 2020!

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

He is I AM

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Jesus said to His disciples, “Before Abraham was, I Am.” (John 8:58)

I’m sure you’ve heard someone, at some point, refer to a Scripture as having leapt off the page while they were reading. This is one of those verses for me. There I was, reading along, when suddenly I SAW Jesus say, “Before Abraham was, I AM.”

I’ve heard this verse used to support Jesus’ divinity, as it hearkens back to God’s declaration to Moses, but the revelation I gained in that moment was entirely different.

Picture me sitting there, stunned expression on my face, realizing that He’s saying “I AM before Abraham,” that even though He was standing there talking to them He was also, at the same time, before Abraham was born!

The revelation hit me in a moment, but it took my brain weeks to process it. Throughout my days, I kept going back to the thought the way you keep returning to a pot that’s simmering on the stove. I even pulled out my concordance and sought out similar times when God made such references to Himself.

You see, I’d always heard it taught that God was saying, “I am _________ (insert your need in the blank,” meaning He is whatever you need.
I am your Savior.
I am your deliverer.
I am your healer.
I am your provider.

This is all true, and lines up with the very names of God. The challenge is that Scripture isn’t two-dimensional. You can look at it one way today and see that it means one thing, and realize tomorrow that it means that and much more. The challenge is to keep from getting locked into only one view.

As I meditated on Jesus’ declaration, God lifted another verse from the page. “Be still and know that I am God…” (Psalm 46:10) It was as if He were writing me a personal message.

Be still and know that I AM
~God

It’s a fact: Time is meaningless to God. Yes, we find it hard to comprehend this truth, because it’s almost everything to us, but I’m convinced that its only use to God is that it helps us keep our own lives in order. Well, perhaps that’s an oversimplification, but you get my point.

Through the weeks, I slowly gained an understanding that GOD IS, that even as God IS with me as I type this, He IS also with Moses in the desert and Adam in the garden. At first, it was almost like a mental exercise. I’d been given a new piece of information and was slowly grasping what it meant, what its significance would be in my life. Like watching the sun slowly creep up over mountains, I knew something was coming. And I was actively watching for it.

And then the day dawned.

We’d been dealing with CPS (Child Protective Services). The report was completely bogus but, like everyone else who has ever been accused, we had been doing our part to prove wrong the accusations made against us. On “that” day, I walked out my front door, heading to the mailbox, and I suddenly GOT IT. Even as I took those steps, I prayed something along the lines of, “Daddy, you’re in all times at once, so I ask that you do whatever you have to do three days ago for there to be a letter in the mailbox today saying, ‘We’re so sorry. We’ve found nothing wrong. We’re dropping the whole thing.’”

The letter was there. It didn’t say, “We’re so sorry,” but I really didn’t care. That was the day my prayer life radically changed, the day I realized that what I call retroactive prayers are a thing.

Have you ever received a prayer request at noon for a surgery that was taking place at seven, and felt terrible because the surgery was surely over and all you could pray for was a swift healing? But you can still pray in such situations! God, who is with you when you get the request, is – at that same moment – with the person before they go into surgery, in surgery, and as they come out. Truly, since God isn’t bound by time, there’s almost no such thing as “too late” for Him. (Almost. There are definite spots in Scripture where God declares to man that time is up.) I mean that literally.

We’ve heard it said that when a man is dead he’s dead, that you might as well stop praying for him. As a Protestant who doesn’t believe in Purgatory, I understand where that teaching comes from, but I don’t entirely agree. Not anymore.

The fact is that the same God who is with me now is – even now – with a specific young lady I’m thinking of who died in a car wreck, and He is capable of reaching out to her in those last few moments and saving her soul. Yes, I asked Him to as I learned about her. It is true that, even at the end, she might have resisted Him, but I still have the ability, the right, to ask Him to try. He told me so Himself.

Be still and know that I AM.
~God

Celebrating Jesus!
Tammy C

What You Have

Tammy M CardwellLeave a comment


You can tell I wasn’t preparing to share this, because my handwriting is terrible, but I HAD to share. See, SEE what God is telling Gideon in Judges 6:14 (NLT)

Then the Lord turned to him and said, “Go with the strength you have, and rescue Israel from the Midianites. I am sending you!”

The emphasis, of course, is mine. 

How many times do we want to ignore God’s call because we’re not good enough, talented enough, outgoing enough, strong enough…? We feel like someone else would be better because THEY have what’s needed. But that’s not the way God does things. 

He wants us to bring Him what WE have. Yes, the strength Gideon had was minimal, but his strength wasn’t the point – God’s was. It was Gideon’s weakness that made room for God’s glory. 

Go. Go with the strength YOU have!

Celebrating Jesus!

Tammy C

A Satisfied Soul

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There are two times I particularly don’t want to go grocery shopping – when I’m hungry and when I’m overly full. When I’m hungry, it seems like everything tries to jump in the cart. When I’m overly full, nothing looks good and I don’t buy it unless it’s already on the list (which often isn’t complete). 

This is a simple illustration of what Proverbs 27:7 is saying. When my soul is satisfied IN HIM, even the seemingly sweet things of the world lose their appeal. When I’ve not been spending time with Him, when my soul is unsatisfied because I’ve slipped away from eating at His table, even the bitter things of the world start looking good. 

Celebrating Jesus!

Tammy C

The One Year Bible for Women

Tammy M CardwellLeave a comment


I’ve shared before about the great value I find in reading through the Bible, and I’m currently reading it through again. This time God had me pull out The One Year Bible for Women in the New Living Translation.

I’ve never even considered reading this format before. I felt it would make for too choppy a read, that it would interrupt the flow of the text to such an extent that I would get little out of it. I was mistaken.

This Bible offers itself up in daily readings that include passages from the Old Testament, the New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs. I’ve discovered that this works quite well as no one section is so long that it gets boring, and having Psalms and Proverbs broken up into such small bites really gives them the attention they deserve.

I still believe it’s vitally important to read through the Bible chronologically at least once, preferably two or three times, but I had to come confess that I find this to be an exceptionally good reading plan as well.

Celebrating Jesus!

Tammy C

Store My Commands

Tammy M CardwellLeave a comment

“Store my commands,” he says, and “Write them deep in your heart.”

God’s Word isn’t just a book meant to sit on a shelf between church services. It is the very Word of God, words from God that He gave us for a reason. We aren’t just to look at them, or simply read them. We are to learn them, to interact with them, to use them. Yes, we are to KNOW them, to have them be so truly part of who we are that it is as if they were physically written in our hearts. 

God’s Word is THAT important. 

Celebrating Jesus!

Tammy C

A Timely Word

Tammy M Cardwell2 Comments

Here’s a good Word for a new year.

My Child, listen to what I say, and treasure my commands. Tune your ears to wisdom, and concentrate on understanding. Cry out for insight, and ask for understanding. Search for them as you would for silver; seek them like hidden treasures. Then you will understand what it means to fear the Lord, and you will gain knowledge of God.

Proverbs 2:1-5 NLT

Years ago, I realized how often the book of Proverbs commands us to seek out three things: Wisdom, Understanding, and Knowledge. I made it a practice to ask for them, and as I did I learned how they build on each other. For instance, knowledge is great, but without wisdom and understanding there is only so much you can do with it. 

There is much to be gained by listening to the wisdom in the book of Proverbs. It really is a great place to go when starting a new year. 

Celebrating Jesus!

Tammy C

They Began to Worship?

Tammy M CardwellLeave a comment

There’s a verse that bothers me every time I read it, and I’d like some input. 

Adam and Eve, and clearly Cain and Abel, had fellowship with God even after being kicked out of the Garden. So why, in Genesis 4:26, do we see that, “At that time people first began to worship the Lord by name.”?

I’ve thought of several possibilities myself, and I may share them later, but I’m honestly looking for input and others’ thoughts. Has someone, somewhere, studied this verse? 

Thoughts?

Celebrating Jesus!

Tammy C