MyLeslieNotebook

This is my 12th year of teaching Sunday school to teenagers. My 12th year of Easter lessons. My 12th time to dig deeply into God's Word about THE most important thing that ever happened in history. The Easter lesson never gets old. Not because I don't know it; I mean, I've been in church for 37 years. But because God loves the Easter story , and it seems He is more than willing to bring it alive to use every year. All of Scripture--literally--points to the crucifixion, death, and resurrection of Jesus. If there is any one thing that we need to know and believe and stake our identity in, it's the Easter lesson. I was studying Luke 23-24, which is Luke's version of the crucifixion and the resurrection. I'm always a little partial to this part of the Easter story because of the prominent role the women play in it. Though men (Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus) take Jesus' body down from the cross and place it in a tomb, a small group of women (including M...

I am a terrible writer. Seriously. I'm awful. How do I know? Well, last Friday I had a few hours to write. I was so excited to share with you. I grabbed my Study Bible and concordance, turned on the computer, opened my blog, put my hands on the keyboard, and... Nothing.  Not a thing came to mind. No scriptures, no words, no cute stories, no life lessons. NOTHING. So I checked email. Stalked a few of you on Facebook and Twitter. (In Jesus' name, of course :) Reviewed that morning's Jesus Calling, waiting for those great ideas to come flowing into my head. Nothing. I couldn't believe it. I am ALWAYS thinking about you, praying for you, and going to God on your behalf. I miss you, love you, and want more than anything to be one way that God's Word comes alive to you. And many times a day I have these great ideas for blogs.  But none of them came to me last Friday. So I sat here face to face with the reality that I am a terrible writer .  But God isn...

Dear 19-year old Me, You're halfway through your second semester of college. You've found the guy. You've got the plan. You've figured it all out.  Very cute.  I'm sorry to break it to you, love, but your life is not as clear-cut as you might think. And you need to hear this from an older, wiser, different person than you are right now. You need to hear the truth from your 37-year-old self. That guy is good.  Don't get me wrong. He loves you and he loves God. He's going to be a great husband and a great father. But marriage is not what you think it's going to be . And neither is buying a house, being a parent, or any of the other things that make you a truly independent adult. It's going to take a lot of hard work. A lot of sacrifice. A lot of submitting. A lot of learning and thinking and praying and loving unselfishly . Because he's not perfect yet. You're not either. You both have some stuff to work on in your own mind and heart an...

I love words. I love making words dance and sing and twirl. I love words that say exactly what I want to express. I love words because they allow others to see what's going on inside our hearts and our minds. And the best kind of words are the ones God impresses on us. Lately I've felt drawn to the words rejoice  and be silent . I get so excited to pull out my 10-pound concordance, digging deeply, spending hours looking up all the scriptures so that I can really understand the meaning of that special word. Today's word is simply awesome. PLUS, I found a new resource for understanding words in Scripture. It's easy to use and will open your mind to how deep and beautiful the words of the Bible can be! TRY IT! So I'm in the middle of memorizing a passage from 1 Thessalonians 5:16-22: Rejoice always! Pray constantly. Give thanks in everything, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus. Don't stifle the Spirit. Don't despise propheci...

I had an awesome ponytail today. "Wow, Leslie is so spiritual. So Godly. So mature." I know that's what you're thinking right now. :) But seriously, a good ponytail is tricky. Especially when your hair is plain and straight and brown and long and boring like mine. Ponytails are a necessity to keep your hair out of your face. But rarely are they cute.  Today's ponytail was the exception. It was awesome. So when I saw the ponytail, I couldn't help but think of Philippians 4:4, which says, "Rejoice in the LORD always. I will say it again, rejoice!" And I rejoiced--in the Lord, of course--over my ponytail. I'm not really kidding. I had a good 30-second conversation with God, praising Him for the ponytail. It was a true blessing on my day. So I started to wonder what the word rejoice  really means in Greek. I looked it up in my concordance and the definition is this:  "to rejoice, be glad, delighted; (as a greeting) Hail! Greeting...

Oh, I have stumbled upon the most amazing Hebrew word. " Be silent before the Sovereign Lord, for the day of the Lord is near," (Zephaniah 1:7). "The Lord is in His holy temple; let all the earth be silent before him," (Habakkuk 2:20). Obviously, there is something appropriate about being silent when in the presence of the Almighty God. It's commanded. So I looked up the original Hebrew word-- has --and it's an interjection , or exclamation , meaning it's always said forcefully or dramatically. And besides "be silent" ,   has can also be translated, "Silence!" "Quiet!" or "Hush!" Now, I didn't add those exclamation marks; they were in my concordance. So any time this word is said, it is shouted ! It's also translated a little differently in a few other verses: " Be still before the Lord, all mankind, because He has roused Himself from His holy dwelling," (Zechariah 2:13) "Th...