Everything Changed Overnight - episode 124
She’s been through a very dark season of wondering if she wanted to be alive anymore to a radical transformation, listening to a speaker that she was sure was speaking directly to her. Everything changed overnight. Helen CD Jamieson is our Insta Summer 2 guest this week. Helen shares all about the major health challenge she had as a teenager that ended up being more pivotal for her life than she could have thought possible.
Now Helen wants to make a difference. She loves to engage and encourage as a way to give back. Doing so is her assignment in this life and it is deeply rooted in her faith. Helen wants to do whatever is possible to impart the hope she has. Sharing the good things, and the bad things, inspires us all to be who we really are. Fully. Ask Helen. She knows.
Advocacy. Motivator. Connector.
— Helen CD Jamieson
Thank You for the Book
Thoughts from Everything Changed Overnight
It is clear Helen has a strong faith and she is unabashed in sharing it. Here is another area where we get to all be different, to be true to our beliefs as we are led. What does that mean for me? I’ve written about my own faith journey in these pages. I identify as a Christian but not that kind. Do you see what I mean when we start to categorize ourselves? Groupings do help us begin to understand what other people are about. Yet that must be simply an overview. There are countless nuances involved. I’m going to give you an example of some of mine. Let’s take a word I hate (feel intense or passionate dislike) and shift it to one that works for me. It doesn’t have to work for you! Remember I get to be me too.
Sin | Missing the mark
Repent | Turn around and change course
Saved | Belief
Ok, you get the idea…I mention this because I am currently in a study using the book The 30-Minute Bible by Paige P. Vanosky and Craig G. Bartholomew. So yes, we read the book this summer along with select passages from the Bible, likely the most misunderstood book ever written. There were six of us. Last night we had the pleasure of meeting one of the authors, Paige. She sat in on our time, and was interested in what we had to say. Not just the book itself, also how it may have impacted our faith. Let me give you some quick thoughts I had around this, and why I would turn it into a blog.
One author a scholar, the other a teacher
Clocks in at less than 200 pages
30 chapters, each 5-6 pages long, covers a 30,000 foot view of God’s big plan
Chronological, themed, it brings a clearer sense of order to the relationship between God and people
He wants to be known, and to know us
He takes imperfect people, and let’s them experience natural consequences (often he’s the one who gets blamed)
If allowed, he will shape them
He never wastes a thing, and causes all things to work for good (his timing, not ours)
I believe next to the gift of his son, the greatest gift God gave us is free will. He will not impose, he will let us choose. After all, God is a gentleman. That is one of the things I love best about him. So to conclude, the book we read helped me to see who God is, and what he’s been doing all these years. Yes, there is a plan. And yes, he lets us choose. Both are true. I can’t explain how they work together. Yet I know they do. That is another thing I love - that he will work it all for good because that’s who he is. That is his nature. Unchanging love. Forever.
Thank you Paige and Craig for deepening my understanding. Thank you for the book.
A good book is the purest essence of a human soul.
— Thomas Carlyle
Yep, spilled cough syrup on the book. No matter, it reminded me how much life was lived as I read it.
