Author Archives: Becky Pliego

About Becky Pliego

I am grateful because God, in His grace, called me out of darkness and into his admirable light. When I did not look for Him, He found me. When I was in a pit of sin, He rescued me. I am not walking this road alone, my family is always with me, and we love Him, because He loved us first.

>Paper Hearts… Easy Projects for the Weekend

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>I couldn’t resist sharing some pretty easy and fun crafts for the weekend. I hope you enjoy taking out you scissors, markers, and old books. If you don’t have time to do all these fun little projects, then go here and print these:

Eat-Drink-Chic

For the joy of making lots of paper hearts and hanging them around our house, we dismantled and old book and had so much fun cutting as many paper hearts as possible.

The result is this:

If you feel more like coloring, then this is the craft for you today.

Alisa Burke

May you have a wonderful weekend full of hearts, and love!

P.S. Don’t forget to check this great recipe… Chocolate and Dried Apricots Baguettes! 

>Dried Apricots and Chocolate in a Baguette

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>Easy and delicious,  great for the weekend… especially for you who are in the cold, buried in white!

See the how to at my photography blog.

Visit my friend, Persis, as she is hosting a great book giveaway, The Mystery of Providence by John Flavel. 

My friend Trisha is also hosting a giveaway, another beautiful book, The Christian Lover:  The Sweetness of Love and Marriage in the Letters of Believers.

Christina encourages Christians who fail in obedience (me included, of course!)

You can still sign-in for Hollie’s giveaway; yes, another wonderful  book, Through the Year with Martin Luther.

I just discovered these beautiful readings from the Psalms; O how I love them! Be sure to listen while you do your chores.

And lastly, I invite you to read a four-part series on LOVE, posted by me, written by J.C Ryle. 🙂 (If you only read one thing this weekend let it be this series… It is great food for the soul!)  find this at Caffeinated Theology.

Have a most blessed weekend!

Under His sun and by His grace,

>15 Marriage Admonitions

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>Our “guest” at Thursday of Borrowed words is Leigh Richmond ( 1772- 1827); He wrote 15 marriage admonitions for his daughters… and us.

“My much-loved daughter,
When your sister Mary left her paternal roof, I gave her a paper of admonitions, which I requested her to read often. I do the same for you, in the form of a friendly string of maxims, to regulate your conduct in your new and very responsible situation.
1. Aim at keeping a devoted heart for God in the least and most common transactions of every hour—as well as in those events which may seem to call the loudest for manifestations of Christian prudence and principle.
2. Pray regularly and frequently, not seldom and occasionally—for grace to live by.
3. Remember the Christian principles and examples of your father’s house, and everywhere endeavor to preserve its character, by consistency in conduct, conversation, and temper. Keep in constant recollection—the wise, prudent, and conscientious example of your dear mother.
4. Form no hasty friendship; and none whatever, but such as may promote seriousness of heart, tongue and life.
5. Beware of cheerfulness degenerating into levity. Let no natural vivacity of temper, no occasionally indulged sallies of humor and jocularity—throw a shadow over the exercise of solid principle. Little foolish things give a color to character, and are more easily imitated, than serious and good sentiments.
6. Guard against hasty judgments of character, and above all against uttering hasty opinions, and making remarks to the disparagement of others. Particularly avoid making the errors, failings, faults, or follies of others—the subject of rash and unguarded remarks. Be known for charity, forbearance, and kindness. Be slow to judge—rather than swift to speak.
7. Wherever you are, in the first place, remember that God’s eye is upon you; and then imagine also that your husband and father are present. It may be a fanciful—but it is a profitable supposition.
8. Keep Christ’s golden rule,”Do unto to others—as you would have them do unto you” in perpetual remembrance. It is the panacea for most of the social evils of life.
9. Be conscientious towards all;friendly with few; confidential with fewer still; strictly intimate with fewest of all.
10. When you think of your father, bear with his infirmities and pardon his faults—but remember his principles and instructions, so far as they have been agreeable to the Word of God.
11. Do not be content with anything short of deep, sincere, diligent, and decided piety.
12. If you and your husband happen to differ in opinion or feeling on any point—remember whom you have promised to love, honor, and obey—and this will settle all things.
13. Of your husband’s warm affections towards you, I entertain no doubt—strive to preserve them by daily elevation of character; and not so much by fondness—as by prudence and dignity. May you both learn to raise a home of marital happiness—by mutual wisdom and love.
14. Observe great simplicity and plainness in dress. You should be a pattern to others in this respect. There is a just complaint made of many females who profess to be pious—that they are far too showy and mirthful in their outward apparel. Remember the apostle Peter’s injunction, “Your beauty should not come from outward adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight.”
15. Christ has been made known to you fully and freely; let Christ be your all in all, both now and forever.
Receive my parting advice in love, and be assured, my beloved child, that it comes from the affectionate heart of your dear father.” (1)

Many of these advices are forgotten, many sound “out-dated”, even for some women who profess to be Christians; but let’s be sincere,  Christian women nowadays desperately need to take some of these godly advices.

Do you have a favorite one? 

Which other would you include?

1. Source @Grace Gems

>Gift Wrap Prayers for Your Husband

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>Praying for our husband is a gift we can give him, a beautiful thing we can do every day, during the day. However, for me it seemed difficult at times because I always found myself praying the same prayer over and over again.

The best way to pray effectively in all areas. including our husband, is praying with the Scriptures, in accord with the Word of God; so I decided to try this book,  Prayers of an Excellent Wife, by Andrew Case. Today I can say that this is a book I highly recommend you.

This book has helped me to pray in so many different ways that I had not prayed before for my husband based on the Scriptures.

One thing that I would like to make clear here, is that just with any other of my favorite prayer books, I use the prayers as models, as springboards to help me pray more effectively, using my own words.

Let us give our husband the gift of a praying wife behind him, every day, all days….

“O Triune God,
I love you, O LORD, my strength.
May You be to my husband his rock and his fortress and his deliverer, his God, his rock in whom he takes refuge, his shield, and the horn of his salvation, his stronghold. You alone are worthy to be praised.
By Your mercy bring him out into a broad place; rescue him, because You delight in him. Put all your rules before him, and may he never put your statutes away from him. For it is You who light his lamp; O  LORD my God, lighten his darkness. Make him abide in this precious promise: ‘This GOD- His way is perfect; the word of the Lord proves true; He is a shield for all those who take refuge in Him.’
Give him the shield of your Salvation, and with Your right hand support him, and with Your gentleness make him great. With Your perfect law, O LORD, revive his soul. With Your sure testimony make him wise. By Your right precepts cause his heart to rejoice. And may Your pure commandment enlighten his eyes.
Keep him, your servant, also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over him! Let the words of his mouth and the meditation of his heart be pleasing in Your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer (Psalm 18 and 19)”

May His grace abound in us as we learn the privileges of being wives who constantly pray and intercede for their husband.

Get the Book:

You can download this book for your Kindle almost for free , or you can download the pdf (also free) here, (as well as other prayer books) at the author’s website, His Magnificence.

On this series:

Gift Wrap Respect for Your Husband

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>Octavius Winslow’s Book -Help Heavenward-

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>I wish I could have the time to blog about every book I read! But then, I would not have time to read…

I mentioned few weeks ago that I was going to be part of this reading group hosted by Matthew Blair at the Octavius Winslow Archive, so yes, I have been reading  along and enjoying this book a lot.  The chapters are short and very meaty; you don’t have to buy the book, because Matthew Blair posts the chapters on his blog, and you can also find them at Grace Gems.

I also said that I was not planning to write about this book, but this week I will. (and who knows… maybe next week too)

It is chapter 4, The Clouds of the Christian, The Chariot of God; this title means that whatever comes to our life that seems like a cloud, is indeed what God has brought us to our lives to bring us closer to Him, to Heaven. We are not to fear, if we are children of God because we have hope in God; Because He has justified us, who can condemn us?

“the darkest dispensations in which He hides Himself shall presently unveil the brightest views of His character and love; and thus the lowering cloud that deepened in its darkness and grew larger as it approached, shall dissolve and vanish, leaving no object visible to the eye but Him whose essence and name is Love. Oh, it is because we have such shallow views of God’s love that we have such defective views of God’s dealings. We blindly interpret the symbols of His providence, because we so imperfectly read the engraving of His heart. Faith finds it difficult to spell the word “Love,” as written in the shaded characters of its discipline; to believe that the cloud which looks so sombre and threatening is the love-chariot of Him who for our ransom gave Himself unto the death, because He so loved us!”

If we could understand this Perfect Love! If we could only see Him in the darkest clouds.

Seeing Him…  is the only way to live through hard providences; seeing His glory brighter than any storm, and the greatest storm, the greatest cloud of darkness is our sinful nature, but Jesus came and took it away.

“So divine, blinding, and overpowering is the essential glory of our redeeming God, that a believing sinner, enveloped by its beams, is changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. All his unrighteousness, his sins, and hell-deservings are consumed and destroyed by the Divine Sun of righteousness: Jesus makes this cloud His chariot, and waits to bless us with its vision.”

Winslow says that also the Divine Truths, (for example, are the revealed doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, Election, Sovereignty, the New Birth, and the Resurrection) maybe regarded as the cloud-chariots of God.

“The gospel is the vehicle in which Christ makes his constant advent to our souls”

We don’t need to understand every single doctrine, every single mystery in the Word; but that we are sinners and Christ is the only Saviour.

“Regard it as one of your chief mercies that your salvation depends not upon reason but upon faith: that you are not called upon fully to comprehend, but unquestioningly to believe and love: that you are not the less saved because your faith deals with obscurity, nor is your faith less real, precious, or saving, because it abjures the wisdom of the sage for the docile spirit of the child, and the learning of the philosopher for the humility of the disciple. Let your great study be the mystery of Christ’s love to sinners—the mystery of Christ’s love to you.”

 God’s providential government over our lives brings us Heavenward, Winslow says:

“Those clouds of providential dispensations, which turn our day into night, bring out to view such constellations of Divine promises, discover such perfections of the Divine character, and present such discoveries of Divine love, as to make even night more wonderful and resplendent than day. Ah, beloved! we should know but little what Christ’s chariot of love was, but for the clouds in which He comes to us.” 

Let us fix our eyes not on the cloud but on the One who is blowing the winds, on the One who brings storms and calms tempests.

“It is our wisdom and our happiness to know that there is not an event or circumstance, a cloud or a sunbeam, in our personal history and experience, that is not a vehicle of Christ. He maketh the clouds His chariot; and His providential dispensations, whatever their form or their hue, are His means of approaching and visiting us. “The Lord hath his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the clouds are the dust of his feet.” 

Let us no fear the storm, let us find our hiding place, the Cross of Christ; let us hide beneath the wongs of the Almighty, let His Love be our shelter!

 The last chariot the Lord has prepared for us to help us Heavenward is death; which shall bring us to our home where we will be able to see the Lord and be with Him forever!

“Let us so live detached from, and above, the world, and creatures, and earthly delights; let us so live in fellowship with God, and in communion with Divine and eternal things, that when the Lord’s chariot gently knocks at our door, we may have nothing to do but to step into it and away to heaven!… Be patient and trustful; the Lord’s time is best, and ere long thou shalt exclaim, “It is the voice of my Beloved that knocketh! the Master is come and calleth for me. Earth, farewell! friends, farewell! parents, kindred, wife, children, home, farewell! Sorrow, suffering, trial, sin, farewell! I go to be with Jesus for ever!” And then a cloud of glory shall receive you out of their sight, and so shall you ever be with the Lord.”

As I read these words I was reminded of Paul, he too knew that to be with Christ is far better…

Under His sun and by His grace…. Daily On My Way to Heaven

Next week we’ll talk about Chapter 5, Bonds Loosed

>I am grateful for My Marriage

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> This month where hearts are hanging all over I find it to be the perfect time to stop and consider our marriages, our roles as wives, as lovers, as friends to our husband. It is always good to stop and set apart times to nurture our marriage, to water it, to read about marriage and what it means to be in this beautiful covenant.

Today I am taking the time to express my gratitude for my Beloved. And dear friend, if God’s providence has brought you to a place where you have no husband by your side, why not considering giving thanks today to God specifically for being your Husband, your Maker.

My Beloved and I in New Zealand

1118. His hand holding mine.

1119. His patience with me.

1120. My Beloved’s diligence.

1121. Always giving.

1122. I am grateful because I can find in his arms love.

1123. Tears we have shed together.

1124. Times of struggles that make us  grow.

1125. Taking care of my van’s gas.

1126. I am grateful because He wakes up early to read the Word.

1127. Because He is a loving father.

1128. Because he never quits.

1129. For taking care of me with gentleness when I am not feeling well.

1130. For all the books he lets me buy 🙂

1131. For the notes he has written me.

1132. I am grateful because he has literally taken me around the world holding hands, dreaming together.

1133. I am grateful because I wake up and he is always there.

1134. I am grateful because he is slow to anger.

1135. Because his arms are strong to hold my weaknesses.

1136. Because I can stay at home.

1137. I am grateful because he says that my cheesecake is the best in the world ever! (It makes me happy!)

1138. I am grateful because I can take of him when he doesn’t feel well.

1139. I am grateful that I am his helpmate.

1140. I am grateful for real love, in real life.

1141. I am grateful that we have a God who forgives us when we sin against each other.

1142. I am grateful that we have God’s Word to show us how to love.

1143. I am grateful that even though we have said words that do not edify each other’s life; God’s grace abounds and we always find a place to ask forgiveness.

1144. I am grateful for the marriage bed.

1145. I am grateful for the fruit of our love, our children.

1146. I am grateful to see our bodies changing together.

1147. A glass of red wine almost every night.

1148. I am so thankful that our God has brought us to this day together.

1149. I am grateful that we know nothing about the future except that all things work for good for those who love the Lord; and that our times are in the hands of a Sovereign and loving God.

What are you grateful for today?