Archive for Brandy Little

Flourish

It has been a full few months but I am so thankful for everything God is doing!

One of the things I’ve been most excited about this semester is our monthly women’s gathering and Bible study called Flourish. We’ve been meeting once a month on the first Wednesday of the month since September. I have loved watching women gather and connect, I’ve loved getting to share what I feel God has placed on my heart for you, and I’ve loved partnering together to bless our community! {find out how you can get involved here}

If you haven’t been able to attend, I want to extend a special invitation to you, please join us in December! We’ve been talking about what it means to flourish in all that God has for us. This past month I shared on growing in grace and gratitude. I’d like to share it with you. You can watch the message here:

Hoping you are having a wonderful week so far!

Much Love,

Brandy

Summer Splash 2011

Love, Sweet Love

Love is in the air!  There is just something about Valentine’s Day that makes you nostalgic about the sweet, lovey-dovey times gone by and makes your heart beat just a little faster for your love.  In anticipation of a romantic, candlelight dinner, chocolates, and hearts and flowers, you go to great lengths to prepare for this one day of the year.

Even the kids join in with the fun…I know I’ve been helping my kids make Valentine’s for all of their friends, baking pink cupcakes with sprinkles, and making sure their teachers have treats, all in the name of love and friendship!

And, I must admit, I love Valentine’s Day….so much so, that Jeff and I usually go out the day before Valentine’s Day together and then stay home and have a special dinner with the kids.  The boys dress up in their nicest suits and cook dinner for the girl’s and serve us on our finest china by candlelight.  Oh, how I love to be pampered by my boys!

However…it does make my stop and think…What if we went to great lengths all the time to show people (our family, of course, but also others) how much we care about them?  What if we actually walked in Biblical love consistently?  Why do we need a special holiday to show people how much they’re valued (don’t get me wrong, I love the holiday!)?

The Bible goes to great lengths to explain what love is and how important it is in our lives….It says in 1 Corinthians 13 (the message version)

“If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing. If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.”

The Bible goes on to give a description of love….”Love is patient, Love is kind…” and then finishes with “Love never fails.”

I like that phrase…”love never fails.”  When all else fails, love never does!  So even though you might not see the fruit of it immediately, planting seeds of love in someone’s heart, showing them the heart of God and His love for them and toward them will never be empty or in vain.  So, the next time you think about that person or relationship that you think there is no hope for, remember that love is the key to unlock their heart!

Today, I hope you know how much that YOU are loved and valued, most importantly by God, but also by me!  You are a beautiful, precious and amazing daughter of the King (and that makes you a Princess!).  I also hope you know that, though we adore the Godly men that God places in our lives…no man determines your worth or value, only God can do that! (And He thinks you’re pretty amazing!)

Here is my prayer for you- Eph 3:14-19

When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.

Much love,

Brandy XOXOXO

P.S.  Don’t forget to tell someone how much you love them today!

Love God. Love People.

As we have been preparing for our spiritual emphasis series at church, it’s been easy to be distracted! This month has been full. As a church we’ve had Prepare 2011 with some great speakers as well as fasting and thinking about the year, praying over what God has and the people He has placed in our lives. Personally, basketball season has filled our schedule with practices and games. All of these things have been so good! I love spending time with my kids and watching them grow and I love investing time in the church.

Somehow, amidst all of the activity the new year brings, I did manage to get a copy of “The Relationship Principles of Jesus,” our 40 day devotional book and start reading on time! A line from the second chapter stuck out to me and has stuck with me:

“God does not demand of me that I accomplish great things. He does demand of me that I strive for excellence in my relationships.”

I love the truth of this statement but it hit me pretty hard. So often, I turn what God has graciously placed on my plate into a list of things to accomplish. I get focused on doing. While doing isn’t bad, in fact getting things done is great; but, it isn’t what is demanded of me by God. In other words, doing cannot take the place of what God has said is important. He has clearly laid out in the Bible what is important. It doesn’t get much clearer than Matthew 22:36-40:

“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied:“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Love God. Love People. That is what is demanded of me. So simple and yet so easy to forget! You know what, I think God knows how easy it is for us, as women, to get distracted. He actually put a story in the Bible about it. I love the reminder Mary and Martha give us in Luke 10:38-41:

As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me! “Martha, Martha,”the Lord answered,“you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

Here again, we see Jesus emphasize relationships over tasks. He gently reminds us as he shows Martha that only one thing is needed. Love God. Love people.

I am so thankful we are going through these 40 Days of Relationships together. There is always more to learn and more to grow in, I cannot wait to see what these next 36 days hold!

As we go through this series, I would love your questions. This blog is meant to encourage and equip you in all God has for you. What is it about relationships that is hard for you? What has stuck out to you in the messages, small group discussions, or readings?

Merry Christmas!

The holidays are in full force at the Little household! I love this season…and I loved starting it with our Milestone Women’s JOY event! We had over 600 women in our beautifully decorated building! Hopefully, you were able to get all dressed up, enjoy beautiful music from our amazing worship team, some wonderful hors d’oeuvre and chocolate,  and visit one of the photo booths for great Christmas pictures. (You all looked marvelous and you can download your pictures at www.milestonewomen.com/joy). I want to say a special thank you to the 250+ volunteers who made it all possible. Thank you ladies! (and men!)

As Christmas is quickly approaching, many of us are thinking about gifts…I know I am.  I love giving gifts. I loved seeing all of the single moms at JOY receive their Christmas boxes.  Every year, this makes me cry…I’m so glad we can give a little something to show our single moms how much we love them and appreciate them raising their children to know and love God!

But, with all the hustle and bustle of the season, rushing around trying to find last minute gifts, it’s easy to lose sight of what’s really important.  What is the real focus of Christmas?  Jesus Christ, the greatest gift of all, who was born to bring us salvation and life!

So, I ask, what are you doing with this gift?

First, have you accepted the greatest gift of all?  Jesus Christ was born, lived a perfect life, was crucified for our sins, and rose again so that we might accept this gift (Him) and spend eternity with Him in Heaven.  If you’ve never accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior, I encourage you to pray and ask Him to come and dwell in your heart and to change you from the inside out.  He is faithful to answer our prayers, He hears you, and He will come in and change your life.

Secondly, what are you doing with the gifts and talents He’s given you?

We know life is a gift and that He’s created us for a purpose and to do great things, but how does that happen? God wants to take our natural motivations, our natural gifts, our natural passions and breathe on them to do supernatural things in and through us. He wants us to lead spirit-led lives.

It always starts with our relationship with God. It starts with intimacy, knowing He loves us and loving Him in return.  When we spend time with our Creator we can better understand how He fashioned us and how he wants to use us.

Then, when we truly understand God’s heart for us, we know that we must love and think about others. When God thinks gifts, He thinks people!  Romans 12:9-16 speaks about our responsibility to love and serve others.  When we are operating in love and using our gifts to serve others, people are drawn to the Jesus they see living in us. Wow! What a testimony!

Finally, you must live called. So many people live SAVED but you were made to live CALLED.  He wants to lift you up and make your life significant!

He has saved us and called us to a holy life—not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time.
2 Timothy 1:9

Brandy

Generosity

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.”  Winston Churchill.

As I’ve been thinking about this journey of Generosity that we’ve been on as a church, I’ve pondered all of the people throughout my life who have been generous to me.  I think about the people who sowed into my life when, frankly, I had nothing to offer them.  And, when I think about them, I smile….knowing that their kindness impacted and changed my life for the better,  in ways that I probably don’t even realize.

Because I serve an EXTREMELY generous God, and I’ve had loving and giving people in my life, I’ve always strived to be a giver.  When I give a gift to someone, it takes me forever to pick something out, because I want my gifts to be very thoughtful and meaningful.  I love to see the expression on someone’s face when they open a gift that they love!  It truly makes my heart happy!  The Bible actually says this is what happens when we are givers:

Proverbs 11:25  “A generous person will prosper; whoever refreshes others will be refreshed.”

When we are givers, not only do we prosper ourselves, we are refreshed in our spirit…WOW!  So many times, the enemy lies to us and tells us that if we give, we will have less and he makes us anxious and downcast in spirit.  What a strategy!  If he can control our thoughts and make us worry about tomorrow, then our actions will follow and we neglect to do the very thing that will prosper us and refresh us!

I know that even with a giving heart, there have been times that God has called my husband and I to give in a way that was sacrificial and, honestly, a little scary.  But when we stepped out in faith, God showed up, and it was during those times that God’s greatest blessings were poured out in our life.  Not just financial blessings and provision, but people whose marriages were restored, salvations, the broken and hurting, healed and restored.  You just can’t put a dollar amount on that….and in the midst of the sacrifice, our lives have always felt richer!

Going into this weekend, I am so excited to give in the Miracle offering.  Even though I know that God has called us once again to give sacrificially, the journey of Generosity that God has had us on for the last several years has never left us empty or replete, but always having what we need and truly blessed!

This is what I know and am sure of…..

“And my God will meet all your (my) needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus.”  Philippians 4:19

I can’t wait to see how God uses my resources in His hands to multiply and accomplish His purposes and His plan to His Glory!

Expecting a Miracle,

Brandy

Laney is Here!

Hello, Beautiful!

Well, it finally happened!  After months of anticipation and excitement, and a few weeks of bedrest, Laney Kate has made her arrival!

Friday, September 24th,  Laney made it clear that this was the day she was making her debut.  After having contractions five minutes apart for about 12 hours and a call to the doctor, we decided to go in to the hospital.  So, we stopped, picked up our kids at school (yes, we are crazy like that) and headed that way.  About 30 minutes after arriving at the hospital, my water broke.  Because it had been determined that Laney Kate was footling breech, and had been for about 3 months, they decided to do a Cesarean section.

Though this was my first C-section out of four deliveries and I was a little nervous, everything went wonderfully!  Jeff was by my side the whole time and I couldn’t have asked for things to go more smoothly than they did considering the circumstances.

Laney and I are doing well and working on getting into a new rhythm!  There’s not much sleep to be had right now, but I wouldn’t trade this time for anything!  She is a very content and sweet-natured baby. She is going to fit right in with the Little family!  Hannah, Caleb and Lauren are proud siblings and were very excited to welcome her into the family.

Thank you so much for all of the sweet prayers, well-wishes, and gifts that you have lavished on us.  We appreciate our church family so much and are so thankful for each and every one of you!

Here she is snuggled in her new favorite chair:

Encouragement Changes Everything!

Don’t you just love encouragers?  I have people in my life that are always so encouraging and every time I am around them I leave feeling better about myself.  Everyone needs encouragement and we are all changed and impacted by encouraging words.  The impact of a positive word, a sincere compliment or a “you can do it” is truly profound for those who receive it.

When we encourage our friends, they are inspired to be better.  When we encourage our spouses, we can change the tone of our marriage.  As leaders, when we encourage those around us, they are inspired to reach their potential and we add value to their lives.

John Maxwell states in his book, Encouragement Changes Everything, “And the heart of encouragement is to communicate a person’s value.  When we help people feel valuable, capable, and motivated we sometimes see their lives change forever – and then see them go on to change the world.”  Wow!  Who knew that’s what simple words from a sincere heart can do?

The  Bible actually tells us this in Proverbs 18:20-21 “Words satisfy the mind as much as fruit does the stomach; good talk is as gratifying as a good harvest. Words kill, words give life; they’re either poison or fruit—you choose.”  Msg

I pray that I always choose life with my words; that when I encounter others, I add value to them, inspire them and love them with the heart that Jesus has toward them; and that I always see others through the lens of God’s tender mercy and love.

“Treat a man as he appears to be and you make him worse.  But treat a man as if he already were what he potentially could be, and you make him what he should be.”  -Goethe

So, as the beautiful women of Milestone and more importantly, beautiful daughters of the King, my prayer for you is the same…that when you encounter the lost, the hurting, your friends, children, spouses or anyone God places in your path, you will be a voice of  encouragement in their lives…inspiring, adding value, and motivating them to be the best they can be and more!

“Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than himself.  Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also to the interests of others.”  Philippians 2:3-4

Lovingly,

Brandy

How?

In my last blog, we talked about living, not necessarily a “balanced life,” but living in Rhythm…focusing on others and seeing beyond our own “bubble.” This week, I would like to talk about how that is possible – how we have the power to live beyond ourselves.

I’ve been reading “Forgotten God” by Francis Chan and I highly recommend it as a must-read for every believer. It speaks to the person of the Holy Spirit and the work of the Spirit in and through us on a continual basis to produce not only the fruit of the Spirit in our lives, but to produce true and lasting change – the “something” that sets us apart from the world.

Chan quotes A.W. Tozer in his first chapter entitled “I’ve got Jesus. Why do I need the Spirit?,” saying “We may as well face it: the whole level of spirituality among us is low. We have measured ourselves by ourselves with the incentive to seek higher plateaus in the things of the Spirit is all but gone….[We] have imitated the world, sought popular favor, manufactured delights to substitute for the joy of the Lord and produced a cheap and synthetic power to substitute for the power of the Holy Ghost.”

So many times, we imitate what the world prioritizes in our own lives and then try to “add in” a little Jesus or a little Holy Spirit and expect our lives to look different, feel different or be different than those around us.

Romans 8:9 says that “You, however, are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you.”

Many of us know about the Holy Spirit, but when it comes to experiencing the Spirit in your life it’s a different story. Take a minute and reflect on the last time you undeniably saw the Spirit at work around you. If you can think of a recent experience, take some time and thank God for moving in and around you, but if you can’t, maybe it’s because you’ve been ignoring the Spirit, having a lot of head knowledge about Him, but not much of a relationship.

To quote Francis Chan, who I think puts it best, “It is an astounding truth that the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you. He lives in me. I do not know what the Spirit will do or where He’ll lead me each time I invite him to guide me, but I am tired of living in a way that looks exactly like people who do not have the Holy Spirit of God living in them. I want to consistently live with an awareness of His strength. I want to be different today from what I was yesterday as the fruit of the Spirit becomes more manifest in me.”

My prayer for each of you, as beautiful women of God, is that you will pursue the Holy Spirit of God who lives in you and be continually filled with His presence, His peace, and His purpose every day; that you would not just survive in your marriage, career, home, or ministry, but that you would FLOURISH!

“How do you balance it all?”

Ladies, you had some great questions!

Let’s start with the one that was most asked: “how do you balance it all?”

Sometimes, I think it might be nice if there was a simple formula, a 1+1= a balanced schedule kind of thing, but, you know what? That would be boring! There is no set formula because you are unique, the gifts and calling and season God has you in are unique. And that is beautiful!!!

In the midst of our beautiful, full lives I would love to give you a few practical thoughts that have helped me:

1) Time with God is a daily necessity. We each need God. I need God to be the wife I am called to be. I need God to be the mother I am called to be. You need God to be the woman He has called you to be in every area of your life. My time with God is a daily necessity. I need His perspective. I need His paradigm. I need Him to live out the abundant life and purpose He has called me to.

2) Seek first the Kingdom of God. I shared a message on this very point at our recent women’s conference, Summer Splash. It’s easy to get caught up in all of the details of our lives and lose sight of the things God has called us to. It’s also easy to make a change, to gain God’s perspective and start reaching out to those around you. You can watch the message here:

3) Live in rhythm. Balance isn’t the goal! There’s a good chance that the minute you finally get everything figured out, Christmas is around the corner and the family is coming in town, except your sister just realized she can’t host your grandparents, and the kids are sick, and Jenny has a final project and could you please make all the homemade pies and figure it all out? There is a rhythm to life, a natural changing of the seasons. My husband started out our year at Milestone preaching on this very subject. You can watch the message here:

4) Learn how to say no. This one is the hardest for us women! We love to help and care for others and be involved and it always seems like a worthy cause and the right thing to do but sometimes the best thing for everyone (you, your husband, your kids, the person you want to serve) is for you to just say no. The enemy of great is often good. What are some things that are good but keeping you from great? What do you need to say no to?

I hope this helps and empowers you to tackle the busyness! I’m excited to see all that God has for us as we put Him first, seek His kingdom first, learn to live life in rhythm and learn to say no.

Please feel free to keep posting questions! What else would you ask if we were sitting across the table from each other at our favorite coffee shop?