PODCAST TRANSCRIPT | EPISODE 370: LIVING THE BLISSFUL LIFE, No. 4
LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell
EPISODE 370: LIVING THE BLISSFUL LIFE, No. 4 -
A LIFE OF CONTINUAL PURPOSEFULNESS
Today we talk about more things that God wants us to do continually. You will be surprised at some of the things God wants you to do continually.
Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.
Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies! Good to be with you! Today we are continuing the things that God wants us to do continually. These are all part of our series on “Living the Blissful Life.” We’re still on No. 1, which is LIVING A LIFE OF THANKFULNESS. We found in the Scriptures that that means continually. Now we’re looking into the Scriptures and seeing other things that God wants us to do continually.
We’re up to No. 10, which is . . .
No. 10. WAIT ON THE LORD CONTINUALLY (continuing from last week)
We started talking about that last week, how it’s not really very easy to wait, is it? Nobody finds waiting easy. We like to think, “OK, I’m waiting, but hurry up!” But waiting is not always like that. The word in the Hebrew means that we “wait eagerly, and expectantly, but we wait with patience, and with endurance.” God’s timing is not our timing.
In fact, we read in the Scriptures, that Scripture in 2 Peter 3:8: “One day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years is one day.” Now, lovely ladies, I’m not saying you're going to have to wait a thousand years although I know that sometimes when you're waiting on something, and you're waiting on a promise, or you're waiting for God to deliver you from something, wow, it seems like a thousand years, doesn’t it? But God does things in His timing, and we have to learn to wait.
I found six wonderful promises that the Lord gives to those who wait on Him.
Number one: “Those who wait on the Lord will inherit the earth” (Psalm 37:9).
Number two: Those that wait upon the Lord will never be ashamed (Isaiah 49:23).
Number three: Those that wait upon the Lord will be strengthened.
Psalm 27:14: “Wait on the Lord. Be of good courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord.”
Then we have that wonderful promise that you all know. Isaiah 40:31: “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles. They shall run and not be weary. And they shall walk and not faint.” As we wait, we actually are strengthened in our faith because we’re not those who just expect something to happen immediately. We learn to wait on the Lord, and know, and trust God. We know that even though we’re waiting, He is working out all things for our good and working out the right timing.
Number four: We will be saved and delivered.
Proverbs 20:22: “Say not thou, I will recompense evil, but wait on the Lord, and He shall save thee.”
I like the New English Translation: “And do not say I will repay back evil. Wait for the Lord, so that He may vindicate you.” The commentary on that Scripture says, “To wait on the Lord requires faith in Him, reliance on divine justice, and patience. It means that the wrongs that have been done to you will have to be endured for a time, but God will save in His time. In His time, He will deliver, and He will give the victory.”
Number five: We will find that the Lord is good.
Lamentations 3:25-26: “The Lord is good unto them that wait for Him, to the soul that seeketh Him. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.” That’s a good one too, isn’t it? We know, and the more that we learn to know of God, in fact, the more we wait on God, the more we know that He is a good God, that we can trust Him. Even if it doesn’t come as soon as we want it, we don’t get that answer immediately, we can be at rest, because we know our God is working. He is always working things out for our good.
I’m always blessed by those Scriptures at the end of Genesis, the end of the story of Joseph. I think Joseph is one of my favorite stories in the Bible. We know how Joseph, as a young man, I think about 17 years of age, he was taken so terribly, really, from his family, ruthlessly taken from them. He didn’t see his beloved father, or all his siblings, or all the rest of his extended family in which he lived.
Back in those days, they lived in close-knit extended families, very close-knit, more so than we know today. We have lost a lot of that close-knit extended family, where they all lived in similar proximity, and they were all close to one another. Of course, not without their arguments and their disputes, and their yellings and shoutings, because that’s typical of Hebrew people. But they don’t get into a mood, or pout with one another. They can shout and yell at one another and still be the greatest friends.
But Joseph was taken away from his beloved family. For years, he didn’t know what was happening to him. He was even thrown in prison. There he was, just forgotten, in jail. And yet, God was working things out. God worked it out for him, in His perfect timing.
I’m going to Genesis to read you these Scriptures here. Genesis 45. I just thought of these Scriptures, so I didn’t have them prepared. Here, this is when Joseph reveals himself to his brothers. Of course, they are fearful because, wow, they’re the ones who got rid of their brother, and sold him into slavery.
But he talks to them. Genesis 45:6: “For these two years hath the famine been in the land: and yet there are five more years, in the which there shall neither be earing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth, and to save your lives by a great deliverance. So now it was not you that sent me hither, but God: and He hath made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house, and a ruler throughout all the land of Egypt.”
Joseph is seeing here that it wasn’t his brothers. It was God who was working. It was God who allowed him to be sold into slavery. It was God who allowed him to be forgotten away there in the prison. But God was working, and, in His time, He brought him out, not only to save Egypt, but to save his own family, and thousands and thousands of people from famine.
God is always working out something far bigger than we can even realize. But we just have to wait, remember? I’m encouraging you today. I know some of you, maybe you're in this waiting period. Don’t despair. Strengthen your heart in the Lord. Keep having patience and keep enduring. Trust God.
Again, in Genesis 50, this is after his father has passed away. Now his brothers think, “Oh, my! Now he’s going to get us because our father’s gone.” But no, once again, he speaks to them. Verse 19: “Fear not. For am I in the place of God? But as for you, you thought evil against me. But God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.” So, God was working everything out for good. What a wonderful God we have!
The last one . . .
Number six: God will incline His ear to us and hear us.
Psalm 40:1: “I waited patiently” (yes, patience is part of the waiting) “I waited patiently for the Lord, and He inclined unto me, and heard my cry.” Be encouraged, lovely ladies. Keep waiting. The Bible says: “Wait on the Lord continually.” Don’t give up! Don’t give up. Wait with patience, and wait eagerly, even though you're having to keep on waiting.
OK, we’re up to number eleven.
No. 11. CONTINUAL FEAR OF THE LORD
I think that’s a wonderful one. The Scriptures tell us that we are to be continually walking in the fear of the Lord.
Deuteronomy 14:23: “That thou mayest learn to fear the Lord thy God always.” That’s that word in the Hebrew, tamiyd, which means “continually.”
Proverbs 28:14: “Happy is the man that feareth always.” Let’s seek to always keep in fear of the Lord. Amen?
No. 12. CONTINUALLY KEEPING GOD’S WORD
Psalm 119:44: “So shall I keep Thy law” (sometimes? When it suits me? No) “So shall I keep thy law continually, forever and ever.” That’s a powerful confession, isn’t it? What a great confession to make. What a good confession to make with our children.
When we have family devotions and we’re reading the Word of God to them, sometimes you could say, “Children, let’s say this Scripture together before we hear God’s Word today. When Daddy reads the Word and we’re listening, He wants us to not only listen, but He wants us to put it into practice. Let’s all say this Word together. ‘I will keep Thy law continually forever and ever.’”
Get the whole family speaking forth this Word out loud. Say it out loud together. It’s good to make a family confession of the Word of God out loud. Do you do that when you're having family Bible reading? Yes, it’s good to have reading, but it’s good to also get the children participating, to get them speaking forth the Word of the Lord.
When you come to a good Scripture, say, “Let’s say this together! Here’s a good one! Because we want to get that into our hearts, don’t we? ‘So shall I keep Thy law continually, forever and ever!’ Say it again! ‘Forever and ever.’” Amen.
Psalm 119:117: “Hold me up, and I shall be saved, and I will have respect unto Thy statutes continually.” And “having respect,” the Hebrew word there means “to look at them and gaze upon them.” We’re not just reading and flitting through as quickly as we can, but we’re gazing upon the Word, and looking at it, so we’re understanding it, and letting God reveal His beautiful, divine truths to us.
No. 13: CONTINUALLY PRAYING FOR ISRAEL
This is another thing that the Word of God exhorts us to do.
Isaiah 62:6-7: “I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, which shall never hold their peace day nor night: ye that make mention of the LORD, keep not silence, And give Him no rest, till He establish, until He makes Jerusalem a praise in the earth.”
Did you notice that word in the Scripture, “Which shall never hold their peace”? That word “never” is that Hebrew word tamiyd, meaning “continually.” We will continually be upon the wall, watching and praying over Jerusalem.
God wants His saints praying over His city and over His land 24/7. Well, we can’t do that 24/7, but we trust that around the world, God’s people will be praying, and there will be prayer 24/7, going up before the throne of God for Israel and for what God has promised to do in that land, and for His people. There are still hundreds of promises waiting to be fulfilled. We can bring them before the Lord and for them before the Lord. This is what we do in our family devotions, of course, when we come together every morning and evening to read the Word.
We also pray together. I have told you lots of times how we have our PRAYER BOXES. I wonder if any of you use prayer boxes? I’ve told you about them so many times. I do have to admit that without our prayer boxes, our prayer times would not be the same. We would forget so many things that we should be praying about!
We have our ISRAEL PRAYER BOX, of course. In our Israel prayer box, I have lots of Scriptures, amazing promises that God has given to His people, and how He’s bringing them back to the Land, and how they’re going to build up the waste cities, and they’re going to grow the vineyards, and they’re going to possess the land. There is still very much land out there in the Heartland waiting to be possessed. But God is going to fulfill His promises. But we are to pray them.
If any of you want those Scriptures, and ideas of things to pray for Israel, just email me, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. I’ll be happy to send them to you. And then you can print them out, cut them out, and put them on cards, and put them in a box. Make it your Praying for Israel Prayer Box so you can be part of this Scripture, pray continually, never getting off the wall.
It says here: “Ye that make mention of the Lord.” In other translations, it says: “You who are the Lord’s reminders.” God wants us to remind Him of His promises.
I remember at the end of Ezekiel 36, which is filled with promises of what God is going to do in the Land. He says at the end of that chapter: “For these things I will be inquired of you.” God puts forth His words, His purposes. When God states His purposes, they will come to pass. And yet He still wants us to be part of them. He wants us to know these promises, be part of them, and bring them before the Lord and remind Him of them.
You can be part of that. It’s not meant to be a spasmodic thing, but once again, continually. Yes. Do you live a “continually” lifestyle? It’s very easy to live a very spasmodic lifestyle, isn’t it? There is something very powerful about living a continual lifestyle, having the habits that God wants us to have. We make them a continuality in our lifestyle.
All right, on to the next one . . .
No. 14. CONTINUALLY DELIGHTING YOUR HUSBAND
This is a very interesting one, ladies. It’s here in the Word of God. When I’m doing a study on a particular subject, I never want to leave anything out. I want to include everything that God says. So, this one is continual intimacy with your husband. Wow!
This is found in Proverbs 5:15-19. Let’s read it, shall we? “Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of thine own well . . . Let them be only thine own, and not strangers' with thee.” Isn’t that amazing, ladies? God is saying here that the marriage relationship is very exclusive. It’s something that is between a man and a wife, and no one else is included in this beautiful intimacy, even in this very oneness with our husbands.
I have shared with you before, and I will share it again. I believe in the exclusivity of marriage. I don’t believe that once you are married, you have ever again a personal friend, apart from your husband, with someone of the opposite sex. My husband and I have so many beautiful friends, families and couples who we love to fellowship with. But I would never dream of going out with one of those husbands on my own for a cup of coffee or something. Yes, with my husband certainly. But never on my own.
No, because now I am married. I have become one with my husband. Our relationship is exclusive. I cannot share that very personal and exclusive relationship with any person of the opposite sex. I would never dream of going on my own with another man anywhere, or having fellowship with him, or having a cup of coffee with him on my own. And yet, some people think they can do this. No, no, not if you are married. It is exclusive.
We see that right here as we read these words. “Let them be only thine own.” It carries on: “Let thy fountain be blessed: and rejoice with the wife of thy youth.” It’s talking to the husband here. “Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts satisfy thee at all times; and be thou ravished always with her love.”
So, once again, we see that Hebrew word, tamiyd, meaning “continual.” What’s it’s saying here, saying to the man: “Let her breasts satisfy thee at all times.” Not spasmodically. No, continually.
“And be thou ravished always with her love.” There, when we read that, it comes back on us, who are the wife, because who is ravishing the husband with her love?” It is the wife. Here it says that she is to be ravishing him continually.
OK, well, ladies, I’m just giving you the Word of the Lord. If we read other translations, they use some wonderful words too. I found all these different words as I read different translations of this Scripture. Instead of saying: “Be thou ravished always with her love,” others say: “Be intoxicated.”
That’s an amazing word. Wow! “Intoxicated.” That’s not something very normal. It’s over the top! To be intoxicated, to be captivated, invigorated, delighted, infatuated. Another translation says: “To be lost in her love.” That is something that we must seek to do, even in our daily relationship, to show this, not just this boring kind of love, but to be over the top in showing our love to our husband.
Then, in times of intimacy, we have to remember they’re not meant to be spasmodic times, but continually. Well, we’re not thinking continually all day. In fact, sometimes I tease my husband, and I say, “OK, well, you know, they called the burnt sacrifice the “continual sacrifice” because it was morning and evening. So, what about morning and evening?” Well, I don’t think he’s quite got to that yet!
But anyway, if we get back to the Word of God, we see a beautiful picture here, in how God has made the husband and wife to be one flesh. I always notice this. It’s interesting. God doesn’t elaborate. He just says, right at the beginning, “Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother. They shall be one flesh.” That’s it. He just leaves it right there, leaving it as a statement that is the statement of marriage. It’s something that should be very much a continual part of our marriage.
All right. Did you like that one? The next one is . . .
No. 15. CONTINUALLY KEEPING OURSELVES SPOTLESS
Ecclesiastics 9:8: “Let thy garments be always white.” That’s the word tamiyd again. Continually white. That means that we’re keeping them washed in the blood of the Lamb. That’s the only way to keep our hearts white, and our garments white, which is figurative, of course.
We wear clothes and they get dirty. But we are also to wear spiritual clothes. We’ve got to keep them white. We know that Ephesians 5 tells us that Christ is coming for a Bride without spot, and without wrinkle, and without any blemishes. That’s a big challenge, isn’t it? That’s something that God wants us to seek to do continually too—keep our garments always white.
It's interesting that when we read about what they wear in the eternal realm, in Revelation it says that the glorified saints, many of them who have been martyred, they’ve all been washed in the blood of the Lamb, that they are all going to be in white. I don’t know. Maybe we will have also colored garments. I’m not sure, but every picture in Revelation is about garments of white. I will give you the references to those in the transcript so you can get them if you are interested.
Now, I did say a couple podcasts back, when I started this, that I found 15 things that God wants us to do continually. But now, I have found two more! I’m always finding more, aren’t I? But I’d better be true to the list also.
No. 16. CONTINUAL BEARING OF OUR CHILDREN’S NAMES UPON OUR HEARTS
This comes from Exodus 28:29-30. This is part of the high priest’s garment. Oh, it’s worth reading the whole chapter and seeing the beautiful garments that God invented, what would be the word? Yes, He thought of them for the high priest. In fact, it starts off that chapter that He wanted Moses to make for Aaron, the high priest, clothes that would be “for glory and for beauty.”
Isn’t that wonderful? God obviously loves clothing. He loves to dress the high priest in this glorious clothing. It was very glorious. That’s His heart. I’m sure He wants us to dress for GLORY and for BEAUTY. We don’t see a lot of that in our modern age. It’s just kind of “dress any old how”. It’s not always glorious or beautiful. But I think that’s something that God likes.
Then we get to the part about the breastplate that Aaron wore on his heart. On that breastplate, there were 12 sparkling, beautiful, shining gems. Each one represented a tribe of the children of Israel. Let’s read it here. “Aaron shall bear the names of the children of Israel in the breastplate of judgement upon his heart when he goes in unto the Holy Place, for a memorial before the Lord (and how often? Yes, here’s that word again) continually.”
“They shall be upon Aaron’s heart when he goes in before the Lord, and Aaron shall bear the judgement of the children of Israel upon his heart before the Lord (and here it is again) continually.”
As Aaron was in the Holy Place and daily doing his ministrations that he had to do as high priest, he was in the Presence of the Lord. He was carrying the names of each of the tribes of Israel, each one represented by a shining, sparkling gem. They were before the Lord. But now, of course, we’re in a different age and God has now made us all priests and kings unto God.
Now, as priests, and especially as priests of our home, and of course the husband is particularly the priest and leader of the home. But we also are a priest, according to Revelation, and therefore we can also take this Scripture. I have taken this, and, of course, I don’t have a breastplate with the names of all my children upon my heart, but I actually have all the names written out.
In fact, now, when I write all the names of our children and their spouses, and their children and their spouses, and now the next generation, and now they’re having their children. We’re up to the fourth generation. I have over 100 names. I have, for many years, brought those names, not only on this paper laying on my heart (but sometimes just putting my hand upon my heart, because many times when I’m praying for the children, I will just put my hand upon my heart).
Do you notice, God said those names were to be on Aaron’s heart? They were to be there continually. But now, oh, it’s often hard to get time to get through over 100 names, praying individually for each one. Sometimes I have to take turns. But I will still bring that paper with their names on it, and say, “Lord, here they are, before Your heart.”
So, precious moms, that’s something you may like to do. You may have some wonderful ideas. God is very, very creative and He thought of these beautiful gems to represent His people. You may think of other things that you could do to represent your children as you take them before the Lord. But take them on your heart continually. Amen?
Well, time is gone! It always goes so quickly.
“Dear Father, we thank You for Your Word, I’m always thanking You for Your Word, Lord God. Thank You for how You show us a lifestyle that You have designed. Lord, everything in Your Word is not there just to read and forget about it. Everything in Your Word is for a purpose.
“Lord, You give principles and purposes. They’re for our lifestyle, to give us, Lord, a purposeful and wonderful lifestyle. And also, how to live a blissful lifestyle, which You want us to have. Lord, You don’t want us to be in a place of complaining and discouragement, and down in the dumps. You want us to live in You in a blissful lifestyle. So, I pray this blessing upon everyone listening today. In the precious Name of Jesus. Amen. “
Blessings from Nancy Campbell
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Transcribed by Darlene Norris
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DON’T FORGET TO TELL OTHERS ABOUT THESE PODCASTS AND TRANSCRIPTS.
“LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell, Above Rubies”
DON’T KEEP THE BLESSINGS TO YOURSELF.
IT IS ENCOURAGING FOR ALL WIVES AND MOTHERS.
SCRIPTURES ABOUT WEARING WHITE IN HEAVEN
Revelation 2:17; 3:4, 5; 4:4; 6:11; 7:9, 13, 14; 15:6; 19:8, 14.