Mrs. PIE

Everyday Faith: Building Blocks of Daily Discipline

• Shelley Jeffcoat • Season 4 • Episode 108

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Discipline is more than just a word; it's the backbone of both our spiritual and daily lives. Have you ever wondered how it plays such a pivotal role in achieving your goals? Join us as we reflect on the whirlwind of this year, sharing personal insights and lessons learned about the transformative power of discipline. We'll explore how staying anchored in faith can guide us through life's uncertainties, helping us let go of past setbacks and embrace new beginnings with grace. 

As we move into the next phase of our journey, we discuss the importance of spiritual and mental discipline. It's time to cut through the noise of social media myths and distractions, and focus on deepening our understanding of biblical teachings. Discover how aligning our thoughts with truth and honor, as highlighted in Philippians 4:8, can strengthen our faith and help us navigate challenging times with peace and clarity. Mindfulness of our own spiritual growth over external influences becomes a key theme, as we prioritize what truly matters.

Lastly, let's explore the influence of intentional speech and gratitude in our daily lives. By embracing a heart of gratitude and being mindful of our words, we open ourselves to God's blessings, often in the simplest joys. I share a personal testimony about launching a LinkedIn newsletter that exceeded expectations, underscoring the power of faith and positivity. Remember, in times of challenge, the support of community prayer and encouragement is invaluable. Connect with us, share your prayer requests, and experience the comfort that comes from knowing you're not alone on this journey.

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Speaker 1:

no-transcript. Y'all, it's week three in February and I feel like this month has kind of been a blur. Quite frankly, I felt like January was a blur as well, and I hope you're doing well. Thank you for waking up with me, thank you for going to sleep with me. For those of y'all who watch me in different parts of the world or listen on our audio streets, shout out to all friends and family on Facebook and LinkedIn and YouTube Hi to our new joiners or subscribers. Hello, parade Deck TV all the things y'all. Subscribers. Hello, parade Deck TV all the things y'all. Hello to everybody who listens to us on the audio platform Buzzsprout, itunes, apple, whatever, whatever you use to listen, spotify, whatever.

Speaker 1:

I was just sitting here before we got started just thinking about again. Here we are in the third. This is our week three of this series, and I just want to recap some of the things that we covered a few, I guess, a few weeks before, just so y'all are up to speed on where we are. Good morning, faithful Dr Tracy. And she says yeah, god is so amazing. Yes, absolutely, absolutely. So today we're going to talk about the building blocks of daily discipline. No, discipline is our theme for this year and I hope that for those of y'all who've been listening, at least for the past couple of years, every month we've had a solid teaching series and I literally sometimes I'm just taken aback with the amount of work that the Lord has done through this little old come out of the wilderness ministry y'all, this prayer ministry, because I literally, you know, I ran from just to share, like quick testimonies and how you know, we talk about everyday faith, talking about dying to the cross and all the things, the sacrifice and all the things that goes into this.

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I think a lot of us make this look easier than it is. This is complicating, complicated. I can't even get my words out because I've had a half a cup of coffee, not a whole. But in order to get to where we are, and in the same way for you, in order for you to get to where you are in your life no-transcript you had to keep expanding, keep learning, shifting and changing when you needed to, and that's something that we had to do as a part of a discipline. So I pride myself as being someone who is successful in all the areas of my life, but it's only because well, obviously it's because the Lord right, and I know I have his favor and I'm walking in his perfect will for me, right For me. But the other thing is that I've had to establish a level of discipline in every single thing that I do. Now it doesn't mean that I always get it right, right. So we're talking about everyday faith. We're talking about building blocks, of discipline.

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So, whatever it is that your end goal is, whatever it is that you're hoping to achieve this year, next year, two years from now, I just want to share just three things from a spiritual perspective that will help you as you're building out, and these are things, quite frankly, that you already know. So, for those of y'all like girl, I know that then just look at this as a reminder. Right, we're getting refueled on this Thursday. For those of y'all who already know all this, then I expect for y'all to go and share this with somebody else. Right, don't just eat from this table. You need to digest it, but you also need to go bless somebody else.

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So, lord, before we even go further, I thank you for this morning. I thank you for every family represented. I thank you for every person who's watching and learning and hoping to hear from you. Lord, I pray that you will be demonstrated here today, that it is you that we glorify and we honor, and that you'll give us wisdom and understanding and show us how to take your word and make it make sense for our lives, make it become practical. Lord, god, not just theology, not just learning scriptures, but learning how to adapt that into our lives. And we thank you for your blessing and thank you for every person who is watching and listening that, whatever they're standing in need of Lord, that you'll provide for them All these things. I ask in his name, jesus' name, just so you know. Amen, all right, so let me just do a quick refresh of some of the things we covered a couple of weeks back and it'll kind of make sense and kind of bring us to where we are today.

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And the first thing is week one. We talked about the heart, having the heart of discipline and finding peace in God's plan, and the scripture that I shared then was Luke 9, 5. And it basically says you know, wherever they do not receive I'm going to just contextualize it wherever they do not receive you when you leave that town or that situation, shake off the dust from your feet as a testimony and kind of move on. So the idea here was how we shape our future, and letting go of some of the things, even some of the corrections that we get, prepare us for where we're going our future, blessings and success. But there are things that we have to let go of in order for us to move forward right.

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And week two the theme then was resetting with grace, and the scripture I pulled from there was 2 Corinthians 5, 17. And it said, therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away, behold, the new has come. And the idea there was to talk about how discipline can help you bridge when you're overcoming setbacks, how we take specific steps but you reset your life in alignment with God's grace and discipline, and a focus on moving forward. And again, new focus, new steps, you know, moving into new all the things. It was a reset. So we're leaving the past, we're moving forward this week when we're talking about building really consistent spiritual practices.

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And I'm going to share two scriptures and then a few things, just three things that I want us to think about as we're kind of going through, not just like the rest of this week y'all, but even starting this morning, like today. Okay, so the first thing, the first scripture that I want to share, comes out of first Timothy. I dropped it in the chat and I'm going to pull it up on my screen and it's obviously the HLE version, esv version. It's 1 Timothy 4, 7, and it says have nothing to do with irreverent silly myths, rather, train yourself for godliness. Now, as I always say y'all, I want us to develop the practice of reading scripture and in fact, as I'm saying this, I'm already fully aware thank you, lord, for late nights of what we're going to do for the month of March.

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And for the month of March we're going to go into a little bit more of a solid teaching in four specific areas. So each week we'll break the Bible down in four specific areas. So the month of March we're going to consider it, you know, our meat and potatoes teaching, not our milk drinking teaching. It's going to be less about encouragement, as we're doing now, and more about solid food that you know, really getting into the word. I think we can do that together right, and then we'll shift back to more encouragement as we move into the spring.

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So I want to say that, and I'm really excited about that because, again, I want us to get a good understanding of the Jesus that we serve and really understand the context of the time and make our spiritual lives a part of our everyday, not just you know, I know a scripture, because, quite frankly, a lot of us know scripture but as soon as trouble comes we fall apart. That means you're you might know it, but you don't actually have faith, you don't actually believe it, right? So we're going to dig into that a little bit more in the month of March. So just y'all, please stay tuned, all right? So? So have nothing to do with irreverent silly myths, rather, train. You have to train. That means you put work into it, train yourself for godliness.

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Now, something that came to mind as I was thinking about like I don't have anything to do, like if you're the kind of person who, like gossip, finds you in the part, you know everybody's bringing you tea, then you're not my person. You know, literally I try to minimize the amount of negative or distraction, especially if you're in a season of building up, like for me right now. I said before, this is a year of seeding for me, right? So, because I have to focus on building myself, the things I'm connected to, the things I'm responsible for this ministry, my day job, my family, my health, my mindset, all those things. That's my year. This is the year for me to do that. Then I have to, every day, have some kind of discipline in place, so have nothing to do with anything.

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Silly myths also mean, like you know, again, there's so much noise right now on social media and what's really funny to me is when you're on social media, people really think that folks who are not on social media have any idea what's going on, like there's all kinds of speculations and theories and things happening on Facebook and TikTok that people who don't follow those things have no clue what's happening. So I just want to put that out there. But there's things that you have to do right now in terms of disciplining yourself. That's really going to be important for you to stay focused.

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I told you that one of, I believe, the superpowers I have many. Thank you, lord, because of his grace right that I have. One of the things that I've been able to do very well is I'm able, lord, because of his grace right that I have. One of the things that I've been able to do very well is I'm able to because of the grace of my life. I can stand in the middle of a storm. It can operate, go crazy, flip out, go chaotic all around me, but I'm still. I'm peaceful, I'm standing straight in it and I'm able to pause and watch and see what's happening. And I'm able to pause and watch and see what's happening. So why is that important? It's because you have to be able to have the right perspective about what's happening around you and in order for you to get ahead of what's coming, you got to be still enough to see and hear and all the signs that the Lord is sending you. You're missing it because you're consumed with all the myths and the posts and all the things.

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Listen, this is a season. Right now, I tell my mentees, this is a season of we mind our own business, we focus on what's in our household, what's in our heart and what does God want to do with our lives. Right, this is seeding year. Right, this is not the year to get distracted by everything and everyone, but that takes discipline. It means that you can distracted by everything and everyone, but that takes discipline. It means that you can't just align and attach to everything that's happening and that means that you might lose some friends because there's folks that like that churn, they like to be a part of the thing.

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But again, for those of us who are trying to be the blessings in our families, those who are trying to be the breakthrough, those of us who are looking for elevation, all the things we say y'all Proverbs 31, woman all the things we've been saying right, like I said, we all know scripture, but you've got to walk it out in your everyday faith. So that's the first scripture have nothing to do with anything irreverent, silly myth. And it says train yourself. It means that there's something that you have to do every single day so that you can put this into play. Now the other scripture I want to share really quickly, and then I'm going to give you my three things, three areas that I'm also doing this. So you're not doing this by yourself. Okay, we're in this together, all right.

Speaker 1:

So I'm going to drop this in here, and then this is it's kind of a longer one, and again, I think this is these are scriptures that we know. We say we know Philippians 4.8. This is, you know whatever is true to think on these things. So Philippians 4.8 says finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there's any excellence, there's anything worthy of praise, think about these things. This is really important, right? So I want to do a quick shout out. She doesn't know I'm doing this, so, whatever, she doesn't know, I'm doing this and I'm not. Listen, I'm not one of those, I'm not affiliated, I'm not sponsored by none of those things, right, and I'm not doing this for anything, any praising of people. But I just wanted to share really quickly.

Speaker 1:

There is a pastor. Her name is Dr Rosa Herman. You can find her on Wednesday mornings, 6 am on Facebook and also on YouTube. But something that she was talking about yesterday was about our thoughts and how important that was. Now, just for a moment, I don't know, just just for transparency. She, I consider her my spiritual mother, she's someone who I look to as a mentor.

Speaker 1:

But we don't talk about what we talk about. You understand what I'm saying. We don't share, you know, a plan about what we're going to say. We don't do. God doesn't work like that. For some strange, amazing, incredible reason, the Lord has connected us in some amazing ways and it's and he, we confirm it. Just, it's like a confirmation all the time. But something she talked about I say all that, so I want you all to go check out what she's saying, follow her on the YouTube and all the things you will be blessed.

Speaker 1:

But something she talked about just this week, just yesterday, was our thoughts and our words. And you know, I talked about on Tuesday night, about even being silent right now, the power of silence, and I challenge folks, you know, with what's the first thing that you think about in the morning when you wake up and what's the last thing that you think about when you go to bed. And so we have to retrain our thoughts so that we can kind of capture the day. I use the first moments of the day. I know people are like, well, I wake up at four and I pray because the Lord woke me up. Listen, okay, right, but listen to me, you have to be able to train your thoughts because that actually controls your day. There's something about when you think it, because when you think it, it's something that's seated in your heart and it goes through your mind and it becomes something. You speak and then you create that action. You actually carry this thing out, right, that's how it flows that way. In your head, your heart, it all flows out. But you have to train yourself right To the point of the other scripture. You have to train yourself in your thoughts. You have to train yourself to think on these things. So what does that look like? It looks like for my brothers and sisters who are losing their jobs right now and again. My heart is beyond heavy and I toss and turn more over that situation right now.

Speaker 1:

If you're a prayer warrior or an intercessor, when you pray for other people you tend not to be able to. You have to learn how to compartmentalize those prayers or you will get exhausted by it. You know what I'm saying. So there are times when it's very, very difficult. My own thoughts start to take over. Lord, where's the answer? When are you going to help so-and-so, can you bless so-and-so? All those things? So even in my own training, I have to train myself on the things that I'm even thinking about. So I'm thinking about God's graciousness, his blessings, and I start to align myself back to what he has confirmed to me for me, right. What he's shown me for my family, right. So it's really important. So, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, what's lovely, what's, and listen. It doesn't mean that there aren't going to be times when you're thinking about the losses, or even the gains. Right, you know, that's not what it means. It's just we have to train ourselves to start.

Speaker 1:

I expect a miracle. There's a song I look, expect a miracle. I don't remember who sings it now Might be the Clark sisters but that used to be one of my favorite favorite songs in one of the lowest points of my life, when I was in my early twenties, y'all, and I had a rough, rough, rough time. But that song I'm looking for a miracle, I'm expecting the impossible. That was my thought pattern and it just changed a lot of the things because I started to see God differently and I was more open. When things were happening the bad stuff, y'all the more I set my mind on him and I started to just believe that God is coming through for me, y'all. Things actually started to turn around.

Speaker 1:

The truth was that there were blessings already in front of me, but because my mind was so warped, because I was so fearful, because I was so worried, because I was so afraid, because I was losing faith, because I had doubt, and then because I started to speak it. I started to become so negative about my life because I was losing faith, because I had doubt, and then, because I started to speak it, I was starting to become so negative about my life that I was missing all of the blessings in front of me. I literally was cursing the blessings and they were right there. Where are you, lord? And the blessing was right in front of me. Okay, so I promise you, I'm telling you from a person who experienced I experienced God. I'm not just telling you about a God I know, I'm telling you about a God you know, not not just about a God I read about, but a God I experienced.

Speaker 1:

All right, so here are the three things that I want, the three things that we think about, want to retrain these areas of our, of our, of our lives. Okay, and the first first area is is going to be our thoughts. So I kind of, you know, blurt that out there. The second one is going to be speech and silence, and the third one is going to be a grateful heart. So, when we're thinking about our, our thoughts, again, this is where I really want us to think.

Speaker 1:

Think about what you're thinking about, take an assessment about what it is that you're thinking about, right? So if you just lost a role, if you just lost a job, or you're worried that you're going to lose a job again, the natural response is to go into fear mode. What is going to happen? I got bills to pay, I've got kids, I got my health care, all the things right. So I'm going to challenge you to start looking at this differently. First of all, I thank you, lord, because the job that you have lined up for me is coming. It's better than this one. It's going to, like you literally start flipping it because you're training your thoughts. Lord, thank you for sending divine help. Thank you for all the interviews I'm going to get this month. Thank you for the open doors. And you start to train your thoughts. I'm a person of value. God loves me, god's blessing me, god's not forgotten me.

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If you need good scriptural encouragement, go into Deuteronomy and read, even to your own life, the blessings, right. Go back, and I read those blessings because they're mine. Right, we were brought into the blessings, right, we're tied into that right. So again justified by faith, which means we're connected back to the blessings of Abraham. Okay, can we just go back to that? So I want you to go back and start reading and speaking those things now.

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Moving to when we speak, speaking God's blessing into your life, then the other part is don't want to be silent. As the Lord is working through you, it's okay to be quiet. You don't have to put all your thoughts and all your deeds on social media. In fact, this is where, as the Lord is working through you on some things, you need to be quiet and allow the work to take place right. Come back when it's all done and you're ready to share your awesome wins and how great things are. It doesn't mean that you have to be silent, mean, like you know, don't communicate, but just be more intentional about what you speak, what you say and then when you speak, right. And the final thing is having a grateful heart which again feels like well, what do I have to be grateful for? There's a long, there's a there's a long list of things you know that we could be grateful for. But it is a heart posture that we have with the Lord to be grateful for what we have.

Speaker 1:

So I was sharing with some of the ladies in our. We kind of have like a little fellowship behind our, our, our Tuesday nights and I was sharing that. I was just really just appreciating the, what I consider small things in my life. Like really appreciating things, like the smell of this cool lotion that I bought, and you know what I mean. Like just y'all. Like really appreciating, um, the, the small things, the art in my home, different spaces, you know cooking differently, like I'm, I'm, I'm taking the time and as I'm, um, as I'm looking at, like, for example, like here I have, I usually have fresh flowers somewhere, um, so I have fresh, a fresh flower, a rose, on my desk in my office.

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I have fresh flowers downstairs, just, just, a very small thing. But as I, as I'm looking at those things, I'm saying, god, I'm so grateful that I have the finances to buy a bouquet of flowers. Thank you, god, that you've blessed me with Wi-Fi this morning. It's having a heart that's so grateful and realizing that when you have yourself, when you put yourself in that heart posture, for some amazing reason the Lord bends his ears towards you even more right. It's just a different posture.

Speaker 1:

So I wanted to share again those three things, three things that we're going to retrain our thoughts, our speech. You know, know when to speak, know when to be silent and then having a grateful heart, and these are just really. You know, these are the things that we're building on. We call them our building blocks for our daily discipline. So I hope that blessed you y'all. You know, like I said, I'm really excited about what we're going to roll out in March. We'll you know, we'll put that information out, hopefully today, so that you'll be able to.

Speaker 1:

If you're not subscribed, you need to subscribe to the YouTube channel channel, because then you'll get the notification and you'll never miss a teaching. You're also welcome to watch the replay, drop the notes. If you have prayer requests, we'd love to hear from you. I do read the comments and also you're welcome to join our phone prayer line every Thursday, one o'clock, seven o'clock. It's free, y'all. I'm so grateful for these amazing women who show up every single week. They take your prayer requests and they pray you through some, some, some things, and the Lord has really blessed us. I'll give you one quick testimony about having everyday faith and discipline, and then I'm going to close this in prayer. So this here's something that just happened for me.

Speaker 1:

Friday, on my day job, we launched our first ever LinkedIn newsletter. It's a corporate newsletter and it is. It was a lot of work had to build a coalition and had to work with some very people who are much, much smarter than me to pull it together. But we launched it on Friday. Friday was a tough day for me personally. I was exhausted, okay, just to be honest. Okay, I was exhausted and when we launched it on Friday, in my heart I was like well, you know, we'll see what happens.

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I had a meeting with one of my mentors on Tuesday. If you remember, monday was a holiday in the corporate arena for many companies, so we didn't work on Monday, but Tuesday I had a connection point with one of my mentors and I said to him you know my heart. In my heart I was saying, geez, if I could get 500 people to subscribe. Saying geez, if I could get 500 people to subscribe, that would be amazing. That was my goal Y'all. By the time I had this conversation with my mentor, 24,000 people subscribed. 24,000 people subscribed right, far surpassing anything I ever dreamed or imagined, right?

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So I want to share this with you because I think that when you go through a season where you feel like there's a lot going on and I feel like I'm being shaped and molded and challenged and like you name it. It's happening y'all. But I have not given up my faith. I do not ever stop believing that there is more to come. The best for me. God loves me, I'm his favorite, I have his grace, I have his protection. Everything I touch is blessed, where I go is blessed, like. I do not let that go ever In my thoughts, even my thoughts. Like you know. You can't try to tell me I don't belong anywhere. I go because God put me there right. None of those things change despite the season that I'm in. It doesn't mean life isn't life and people aren't peopling.

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But I want to share that part of my testimony just to say that you know, if you don't have the right mindset, you will miss when God is blessing you. So that, to me, was incredible testimony. That's something that is imprinted now in my mind. Right that the Lord, even while it looks like everything is shaking you know what I mean that the Lord is still blessing me and I hope that encourages you. I want you to look for those moments. I want you to look for the good things that's happening in your life. I want you to be laser focused in your mind. I want you to do that. It's not magic, y'all, what the grace I have you have access to, right? Maybe the difference is that I fully, absolutely believe and I cling to that, but it's also because I have so many testimonies right.

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God will do more, exceedingly, abundantly, than all that we ask or think, and that's my prayer. I pray that he will do that exceedingly, abundantly, more than you ask or think in your life, this week, this month, this year. But you have to be disciplined, you have to train your thoughts, you have to mind what you say, you have to know when to be quiet, and you got to have a grateful heart. So, lord, I thank you for this blessing of your teaching this morning. I thank you for encouraging those who needed to hear your word and for reminding all of us of the grace that you have extended to us. Father, thank you for every person who is standing in need, that they will be blessed in such incredible ways that you bless them in such a way that none of us can take credit for what's happening in their lives. When we look at their lives, the only testimony we can give is say that is you, that is my Lord, jesus. So, lord, let it be that you are demonstrated in their life and give them peace in the middle of the storm so that they can see every opportunity, every open door that you have already laid open for them, so they don't miss anything this year. Thank you, god for everything. We love you, lord, amen. All right, y'all Isn't that awesome, all right? So that brings us to remember.

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Today is Thursday. Call our phone line. By the way, it's free, you know it's free. This is a month that we're still praying for veterans who are transitioning service, and also now that means veterans who are transitioning service not of their own accord, if you know what I'm saying, especially veterans who worked, uh, and they're uh, you know they're coming out of the, the public sector, I know, unbeknownst to them, if you will.

Speaker 1:

But, um, this is a, this is a tough time, but we're gonna push through it, we're gonna support you, we're gonna pray with you. You can call the phone line, you don't have to tell your business. Like I said, it's free, but that's the theme that we're going with this month. But if you have other prayer requests, you're more than welcome to call. Drop your prayer requests on the videos, on the streams, cause, like I said, I do actually read and I do actually pray for you guys and for those of y'all who listen on the audio streets. I pray for y'all too. So y'all have an amazing rest of your day. I love you and I will be back next week, take care.