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Living Hope
Living Hope
Living Hope
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Living Hope

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Grief, pain, hardship and tragedy happen to all of us equally. God gives us all the same opportunity to come to Him through Jesus, His Son. There is a misconception that Christians should be free from pain and suffering. They should have it better than everybody else, and that if they are having problems there must be some deep dark sin in their lives.

God is often judged by the circumstances that affect the lives of His followers. If something bad happens to them, it might appear that God failed or that He is punishing them or teaching them a lesson. The misconception is that Christians are loved by God more and therefore He treats them better and gives them more.

God is frequently viewed as a mere option in our world today. Even some Christians view God's participation in their lives to be necessary only if they are unable to handle something on their own - especially a crisis.

This series of books will visit many of the hard questions asked about God and what it means to be a Christian. Step by Step guidance will help the reader understand how to become a Christian, how to live daily walking and talking with God, and how to understand His will for their lives.

God is very real. He isn't a figment of our imagination. He isn't spooky or strange. He is loving and kind. He is good and loves each and every one of us more than we can even understand.

God doesn't just love Christians. He loves every single person in the world. He doesn't favor Christians. Christians aren't better than everyone else. Knowing and following Jesus Christ doesn't mean a life with no sorrows or pain.

Walking with God is a deliberate action taken by those who want to be born again into life everlasting with Him - it requires only believing in Jesus Christ, asking for His forgiveness of our sins, and learning how to live and walk daily with Him in your heart and at your side.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherLinda Weaver
Release dateAug 23, 2016
ISBN9781370762156
Living Hope
Author

Linda Weaver

Linda Weaver is the mother of two sons and five grandchildren. She presently owns and operates THREADS, a thriving alterations and embroidery businessLinda is active at Grace Church in Liberty, Texas, and presently serves as the Campus Service Director of the Prayer Team Ministry. She has an insatiable desire for others to know Jesus Christ, and she believes her call from God is two-fold: intercessory prayer and proclaiming the message of God's Word. She believes that God's Word is vital to every person and applicable to every situation in daily living because she has experienced many miracles in her life through trusting in God in every situation - great and small.Although life has held numerous heartaches, failures, pain and tragedy for her, Linda's love for God and her trust in Him has only grown stronger. Her trials have strengthened her faith and made her more determined to honor God by telling her story.In her book series, "How To Walk With God Daily" Linda is open and frank about her life, her tragedies, losses, failures and pain. She shares what God has taught her about walking with Him daily, step by step - in every circumstance -leading to a peaceful, fruitful, fulfilled life, even in the middle of any tribulation.Linda's prior ministries include serving on the church staff of two large churches. She served in the Department of Education for Forest Cove Baptist Church, in Kingwood, Texas; on the Publications Staff of Deerbrook Church, in Humble, Texas, and has served stateside as an Assistant Office Manager for World Gospel Outreach, in Honduras, processing all incoming donations for their missionaries serving in Honduras.Throughout her life, Linda has served in the local church. She has taught adult Sunday school classes and Bible studies for women; served as a Singles Director for a large church, served several terms as church treasurer, a liturgist, and as a member of the Church Council. She is a seminar teacher and special events speaker, and deeply involved with prayer ministry teams by special invitation to other churches.Linda has a heart for people who are hurting. She wants to share what she has learned about walking and talking with God, constantly seeking Him for guidance in every trial. She has written her story with the hope that it will encourage others to do the same.

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    Book preview

    Living Hope - Linda Weaver

    ABOUT HOW TO WALK WITH GOD DAILY

    LINDA WEAVER

    COPYRIGHT 2015 BY LINDA WEAVER

    SMASHWORDS EDITION

    MY BLOG

    HTTP://TODAYSWORDFROMGOD.COM

    Acts of Terrorism - Home Invasions - Sex Trafficking - Scams - Joblessness - Death of a Loving Spouse or a Precious Child - Terminal Illness - Unfaithfulness - Divorce - Bankruptcy - Violence in the Home - Homelessness - Hunger - Molestation - Abandonment - Lack of Money - Abortion - Tragic Loss of a Home

    IS THERE REALLY ANY HOPE FOR US?-

    The world is becoming a really scary place.

    How much can we endure without losing all hope?

    Have we done something to deserve this?

    Can we trust God in the midst of horrible situations?

    Are we being punished for something?

    Can we ever be good enough?

    Does God really forgive all our sins?

    How long do we wait on God to help us?

    Is there anything we can do that He won’t forgive?

    Is it too late for me?

    Will things ever change?

    NEW BIRTH INTO A LIVING HOPE

    Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a LIVING HOPE through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade — kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God's power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that your faith — of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire — may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls. I Peter 1: 3-9 NIV

    *A FEW REVIEWS*

    I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK

    By Erma Martin on October 14, 2015

    I highly recommend this book. I read it completely in one sitting. It is a deeply emotional book from the author's perspective, but she does an amazing job of showing the faithfulness of God. She was able to show that regardless of what we go through in life, when it all comes down, we can still walk in the joy and peace of God. She clearly communicated to the reader that our joy and peace does not come from our circumstances and situations of life, but from our choice to focus on and follow our God. Well done, Linda Weaver!

    A GOOD READ!

    By Pam Milentz on October 26, 2015

    I always think that a good read is a book that pulls me into the story and lets me personally become involved and this book is a good read. L. Weaver has written a very personal and poignant story of her life's journey and how her simple faith in God has helped through the good and not so good times. I read this book over the weekend and hated for it to end as I enjoyed reading every step of this lady's walk with God by her side.

    INSPIRING STORY OF HOW GOD HELPED DEAL WITH TRAGEDY AND

    DISAPPOINTMENT

    By G. Wells on October 13, 2015

    Ms. Weaver writes about her very intimate feelings about heartbreaking events in her life. I like her style - short, simple sentences and simple, Anglo-Saxon words. - The style espoused by Winston Churchill. She conveys her feelings in such a clear way that the reader can feel her joy and sorrow in. each event that she describes.

    WHY I WROTE THIS BOOK

    THE THINGS YOU WILL LEARN

    This is the first book of a series about How To Walk With God Daily, Step by Step. I am going to begin by sharing part of my testimony. It starts right after I graduated from High School. I was raised in a Christian home and I went to church because my mother made me. I accepted Jesus into my heart at a Baptist Camp when I was nine. I remember it well. At the end of the nightly camp meeting an alter call was given, and I felt a stirring in my heart. Somehow I knew that it was the Holy Spirit gently nudging me to walk down the aisle. I complied by walking to the front of the auditorium and accepting Jesus into my heart. I wasn’t really sure what it all meant at the time, but I knew something inside me was different. All I knew of God was that I was supposed to love Him and be good. I had heard a lot about what I wasn’t supposed to do, and I heard all the Bible stories as a child. I sat in Sunday School each Sunday, but I wasn’t aware that God knew me, personally – until a little later.

    The objective of my book is to reveal to the reader the relevance of walking with God on a daily basis. Some believe that a Christian should be free from pain and suffering, and certainly of tragedy. There is also an assumption Christians should have it better than everybody else, and if they don’t, they either really aren’t Christians or they have committed some deep, dark sin.

    God is many times judged by the circumstances that affect the lives of His followers. Some determine that when tragedy strikes a Christian, God is not doing His job. Evidence of failure or tragedy in the life of a Christian is often interpreted as punishment by God.

    God doesn’t force us to follow Him. He wants our love given from our free will. As a result, God is frequently viewed as a mere option in a world of many choices. Even many followers of God view His participation in their lives as only necessary if they are unable to handle something on their own – especially in a crisis.

    I pray that my book will accomplish several truths. Readers need to know that life happens to all of us equally. Christians don’t belong to an exclusive club preventing bad things from happening. Failure and tragedy visit them, too. If that weren’t the case everyone would become a Christian just to get under the umbrella. The difference is that during the times of conflict, failure or pain, we turn to God and He gives us the peace nothing else can. It is inexplicable.

    God gives all of us the same options. He is no respector of persons. His principles were written down in the Scripture long ago, and it is up to each individual to open the Bible, fellowship with God, and learn His truths. He is the peace you need, and the protection you need. He can and will direct every step you take, if you let Him. It’s not always easy because we are accustomed to having what we want when we want it.

    God is unchangeable. But, it doesn’t mean He is old fashioned or out of date. There is nothing on this planet that wasn’t already planned and arranged by Him long, long before time, as we know it, before this world was created.

    I am now sixty-eight years old. I have lived a long life of mistakes, pain, hardship, suffering and grief – probably like most people I know – Christian or not. The most important correct decision I ever made was the one I made that night when I was nine years old - walking down the aisle at that Baptist Camp to receive Jesus Christ into my heart.

    The only thing I would change if I had a do over would be that I would have worked harder at getting serious about my relationship with God earlier in my life, and I would not have worked so hard at doing things my way. I would have spent the necessary time getting to know my Maker and letting Him guide me rather than having Him constantly have to bail me out of my troubles, and set me back on my feet.

    That’s life – as they say. After this one, there’s one in eternity – Where will you spend yours?

    CHAPTER 1 *MY HERITAGE*

    My biological daddy died when I was eighteen months old. After being discharged from the Army he returned to New Gulf, Texas, and went to work with his dad at the Texas Gulf Sulfur plant there. It wasn’t long before he was killed in a horrible accident at the plant.

    He and a couple of other men were working on the inside of one of the enormous water tanks that pumped super heated water (320 F) into the ground for melting the sulfur so it could be returned to the surface.

    Someone, not knowing the men were working in the empty tank, began to release the super heated water into the tank. All of the men were immediately removed from the tank to safety. Tragically, my daddy was somehow dropped back into the tank where he suffered burns all over his body.

    He survived for a few hours after being transferred to the local hospital. He had a few moments to tell my mother and me goodbye, but when he asked to see me he was told babies were not allowed in the rooms. That didn’t stop my hard headed grandpa who ignored those rules and took me to my daddy’s bedside so he could see me for the last time. My mother was about twenty years old when he died, and I was barely one year old.

    Of course, I was too young to remember anything - or was I? Many years later, as a young wife and mother, I found myself in marital counseling. I was asked to write a page about my relationship with my mother and a page about my daddy. The next day I turned in a paper filled with information about my mother and hardly anything at all about my step-dad.

    The counselor was concerned, and requested that I try again. I told him that I had nothing to say about my step-dad because he wasn’t very involved in my life. He loved me and was very good to me but his work prevented his spending much time with me. The counselor didn’t like my answer and told me to write about a father I would like to have had, and I did so.

    After reading my comments, the counselor said he believed I had some issues stemming from the death of my biological daddy. He then sat me in a child’s small chair and placed an adult chair in front of me. He told me to pretend that my biological daddy was sitting in that chair, and to tell him whatever came into my heart. I thought it was foolish but before long, in my mind’s eye, I could visualize my daddy sitting there. I began to feel sadness rise up in me like I had never before experienced. Then, I began to cry. It became so real. I had no idea those emotions and feelings were hidden deep within my heart.

    After a few moments of uncontrollable sobbing, I began to talk to my daddy. I began to pour out my heart. So many things floated to the surface. I was upset that he left me and my mother. I told him that I loved him and I needed him. I described how his death had affected my mother and that I couldn’t help her.

    After the session was over, I felt such a peace come over me – a peace and a freedom I had not experienced before.

    A few years after his death, my mother and I moved back to her hometown and she went to work as a car hop. There she met and married my step-dad. He was the only daddy I remember. He loved me and was good to my mother and me but being old school he showed love to his

    family through his hard work. He wasn’t very interested in school programs or spending time with anyone socially.

    SCHOOL DAYS

    Mother took me to church regularly, and at only nine years old, I gave my heart to Christ. Some may question whether or not a conversion at such a young age is real but I can verify that it is. I physically felt God stir in my heart. I didn’t know just what it all meant but I did recognize that God wanted me to be part

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