We’ve just finished reading our first week of Living Beyond Yourself Exploring the Fruit of the Spirit by Beth Moore. Beth launches us into the heart of God and the gift of the Spirit as we read through the first four chapters of Galatians. By now you’ve noticed Beth is using the NIV bible and other bible formats do not work well with this study. I’m using the Life Application Study Bible, NIV Large Print. Many of you are using online bibles such as Bible Gateway, Bible Study Tools or YouVersion to research the verses.

We started our week listening to the audio or watching the video Introduction and filling out the Viewer Guide on page 8 of the workbook. Our reading this week started with a view of hardship and a reminder we are placed in trials of persecution because His glory shines through us during our trial. We looked at the four major reasons why Christ died for us, followed by a lesson on the major characteristics that make us easy targets for the enemy. When we are unfamiliar with scripture and not carrying His Word inside our hearts, we’re easy prey. Look back on your own life when you were lacking in scripture knowledge and your attempts to battle Satan. Who won the battle then? Later, when you attended church bible study and learned scripture, some of you may have become bored and quit the study, easily diverted from a Christian life. Who won your battles during your boredom, you or Satan? Do not miss the importance of this message from Beth: without knowledge of the word of God, your battle is lost. With bible study and perservance through boredom, your battle is won. Place your feet on the path of faith and learn scripture day-by-day over the next ten weeks of study.

One of the most important lessons this week is found in day three, Beth Moore’s list of the “Ten Characteristics of the Crucified Life.” It’s important to understand how and why God gifted us with the Fruit of the Spirit. The father of lies, Satan, wants us to believe we are not deserving of the Spirit and the Spirit would not dwell inside our hearts. Through a covenant with God, we know righteousness, grace thankfulness and joy. These gifts and the gift of the Spirit are not earned by performance or following the law, we receive them through Jesus. We are adopted members of God’s family and Abba’s gift to us is the fruit of the Spirit living inside our hearts.

Prayer Requests

Please pray for the 130 women participating in this study, that each woman will have a heart’s desire to learn scripture and defeat boredom. Ask for God’s presence during this study as we learn together. If you have a prayer request for our prayer wall, please click here. Make sure you print a copy of the prayers, place them, in your workbook and pray for these women.

Beth Moore Quotes

• Nothing will make us more miserable than to live in the tomb of self.
• The enemy will do everything he can to discourage you from allowing God into your heart.
• Ignorance of God’s Word makes us easy targets for false teaching.
• Few things on earth cause as much unhappiness as trying to win the approval and affirmation of people.
• We become immediate slaves to the person(s) from whom we seek approval.
• Do not be surprised when God continually forces you outside your comfort zone.
• Never misunderstand pain as permission to forego the will of God.
• God’s specialty is making impossibilities possible.

This Week’s Memory Verse-NIV

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23 NIV

For Next Week

• Read Week Two in the workbook
• Listen to the Session Two Audio (optional)
• Listen to the Session Two Video (optional)

Group Discussion- Answer one question or as many as you like

1. What would it mean for you to seek only God’s approval? (page 18)
2. Which of the 10 characteristics of the crucified life spoke most personally to you and why? (page 22)
3. Share a time when you were challenged to believe God and He proved faithful to you. (page 24)
4. In your workbook on page 29, or in a journal, create a list of “Garden Tools” based upon each lesson of the day.  (see my example in the comments) We will be doing this each week.

Welcome to the Living Beyond Yourself bible study….we’re an international group with over 100 women participating in online bible study. We have been praying for you individually by name as you prepare to learn and grow through the next ten weeks of study. You arrive at this study with a desire to live beyond yourself, in the fruit of the spirit.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23 NIV

When I first completed the Living Beyond Yourself, Exploring the Fruit of the Spirit Beth Moore study at church, I met with women of all ages and we sat down to a table filled with scrapbook images, string, glue and name tags. You guessed right…we created Fruit of the Spirit name tags for our study. In keeping with the tradition, you’ll be seeing images of fruit throughout this online study, as a reminder of the lessons we read and the fellowship we have with one another. If you want to place a name tag on your blog, feel free to copy and link to the button we created just for this study. A smaller version appears at the end of this article.

Prayer Requests

We welcome any prayer needs from the group, please send them by email or post them at anytime and anyplace during the study. If you have a prayer request for our prayer wall, please click here. We ask you each to print a copy of the prayers, place them in your workbook and pray for these women.

If This Is Your First Online Study

You’ll want a little direction if this is your first online study. We’ll read a week at a time, and each Tuesday you can visit the blog anytime and participate in the group discussions. We’ll list some discussion questions and you can answer all of them or as many as you want. If you are not posting on the blog, we will send you an email and check-in to see what’s getting in the way of your study. Please read these blog posts and feel free to ask questions. Don’t be shy…your questions benefit the entire group.

• 25 Excuses for Not participating in Bible Study (most common reasons women drop-out)
• My First Bible Study
• Bible Cafe FAQ
• About Online Bible Study
  

For Next Week

• Follow us on Twitter or like us on Facebook to get the latest updates
• Download the Answers to the Viewer Guide
• Check the Reading Schedule for this Study
• Check Who We Are in This Study
• Listen to the Introduction Session Audio (optional)
• OR…Listen to the Introduction Session Video (optional)

• Read Week One in the workbook
• Listen to the Session One Audio (optional)
• OR…Listen to the Session One Video (optional)

note: the audio/video links do not always work on the first click, you have to CLICK TWICE to get the correct page.

Group Discussion

Before you start your study, open the front cover of the workbook and on the blank page, write the date and a letter to God. In your letter to the Father, tell Him why you are taking this study, what you hope to learn from it and ask for His presence and His blessing over your study.

Roll call: If you created a welcome name tag for yourself, what would it say and what fruit would you place on it? Why did you select this fruit?

We’re starting another online bible study for women on September 14,2010 and all women are invited to attend. Our study is called Living Beyond Yourself by Beth Moore. As we spend the next ten weeks of study together, we wanted to tell you who we are as a bible study group.We’ll gather each Tuesday of the week to read an online discussion of the lesson. Drop by anytime and post a comment for the week. We have a diverse group of women, from a grandmother of 15 to a mom with a newborn and a mom 32 weeks pregnant. We have school teachers and homeschool moms, nurses, students and retired women.

JOIN THE STUDY

To join the study, please post an introduction here.

BLOG UPDATES
I update the blog in the evenings California time, Monday night. This allows the post to appear in your email the next morning on Tuesday. So if you are on California time, you may notice the blog updates around 9:00PM PDT.

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Who We Are

Number of women participating in the study: 151

last updated Sept 26

Where We Are From

• Australia-2
• Canada-5
• China-1
• Alaska-1
• Alabama-1
• Arizona-4
• Arkansas-2
• California-12
• Colorado-1
• Delaware-2
• Florida-5
• Georgia-7
• Idaho-1
• Illinois-3
• Indiana-4
• Kansas-1
• Kentucky-2
• Maryland-1
• Michigan-1
• Minnesota-1
• Missouri-1
• Montana-2
• North Carolina-3
• New Jersey-1
• New York-2
• Ohio-3
• Pennsylvania-3
• Rhode Island-1
• South Carolina-3
• Tennessee-2
• Texas-14
• Virginia-1
• Washington-1
• Wisconsin-2
• Not stated-27

Welcome to each of you in the study. We are praying for you by name and asking God’s presence to flow over the pages of your workbooks and into your hearts.

In faith and love,

Living Beyond Yourself is about to begin on Tuesday September 14, 2010 and we thought you’d like a written reading schedule. We’ve included a quick schedule below. Each week you’ll get an email or blog feed with the study update. We post our blog updates on Monday evening California time zone, and they appear in your email Tuesday morning. If you miss a week of reading, come to the online discussion anyway. We want to encourage you and support you- this is a no shame zone. If you fall behind in reading, don’t hide from the group. We’ve all been there at some point in time. Read at your own pace, and do your best to catch up when you can. Soon you’ve crave reading each day…and will not want to put the workbook down.

Reading Schedule For Living Beyond Yourself

• Launch Day: Introduction to the Study (Sept 14)
• Week 1: Free at Last (Sept 21)
• Week 2: Live by the Spirit (Sept 28)
• Week 3: Love (Oct 5)
• Week 4: Joy (Oct 12)
• Week 5: Peace (Oct 19)
• Week 6: Patience (Oct 26)
• Week 7: Kindness (Nov 2)
• Week 8: Faith (Nov. 9)
• Week 9: Gentleness (Nov 16)
• Week 10: Self Control (Nov 23)
• Celebrate!

READING RESOURCES

There is a Beth Moore online study which allows you access to the video sessions, and you’ll save about $20.oo from the download video sessions. However, if you participate in the Bible Cafe study and the Beth Moore online study, you may be on information overload. This is only suggested for rugged, able to focus and stay on course, iron-willed women!!! If you’re an average gal like me….um…..just sticking to one study is enough commitment. I use the workbook and I’m using the CD’s for the series, The videos are excellent- Beth uses sign language, visual aids and you get to see her “Big hair from Africa.” It’s hysterical and you do not see these on the audio or CD sessions. If you want some fun…watch the videos!!!!!! (exclamations are Beth’s early trademark, LOL) Since this is my THIRD time participating in the Living Beyond Yourself study, I am using the audio CDs and I load them into iTunes and then my iPhone so I can listen in carpool while picking up my kids. I like my two daughters to listen as I’m driving, this models womens bible study for them and they enjoy listening to Beth Moore.

Link for Beth Moore Living Beyond Online study Currently $23.95
Link for Living Beyond Yourself Audio CD’s Currently $39.95
Link for Living Beyond Yourself Video Sessions (11 total) Currently $54.89 for all 11 sessions
Link for Living Beyond Yourself Audio MP3 Sessions (11 total) Currently $43.89

Walk in faith toward the woman God has designed you to become. His Word will not return void. Beth Moore

We’re about to begin a 10-week Beth Moore study called Living Beyond Yourself, Exploring the Fruit of the Spirit on September 14, 2010 and we are looking for a few leaders for this study. In our last study, Shannon Barr lead the studies and did a fantastic job.

Since we have so many women participating who lead church small groups or want to start online bible studies, we’re going to ask FIVE women to write blog posts during this study.

Christine will write the posts on alternating weeks, and she will write the author quotes, scripture quotes, prayer requests and discussion questions.

The guest blogger needs to simply write a paragraph or two to summarize the week’s study. We insist that you write in your own words and respect the copyright laws of the authors work and workbook.

Details for Bible Cafe Leaders

• Write a summary of the week’s lesson
• Email the summary to Christine on Monday morning
• Explore online bible study blogging
• Consider leading an entire study, as Shannon is doing in Jonah
• Allows us to run simultaneous studies and gives more options to women who want different workbooks to learn from
• Increases the number of studies we can offer here at the Womens Bible Cafe
• Allows you to select the workbook and the group study
• Keeps you centered in your own study and accountable to the group
• Prepares you to lead a church study, home group study or online study

Leader Qualifications

You don’t need a long list of qualifications or years of experience to lead Living Beyond Yourself. You simply need a heart prepared by God with availability and teachability. rather than teaching the material, you will help members learn for themselves. (source: Beth Moore, Living Beyond Yourself Leaders Guide)

If you’d like to be a guest blogger for this study, please post a comment below.

Serving Him in Love, Faith, Grace and Hope,

In just a few weeks, we’ll begin a women’s bible study Living Beyond Yourself, Exploring the Fruit of the Spirit by Beth Moore. By the time our study begins on September 14,2010 we’ll have almost 100 women participating from around the world. Some women have already completed this study and like myself, enjoyed it so much we are repeating it. Other women are new to bible study or this their first Beth Moore study.  For most of you, its your first online study. We gather here with one common purpose: intimacy with God.

During our time together, you’ll establish accountability with each other through group study and celebrate with one another at the completion of the ten-week womens bible study. Living Beyond Yourself by Beth Moore is written to underscore the basic biblical truths through a workbook format. You’ll be using your workbook and bible, any translation is fine. You can also use one of the many online bibles linked to this site under “resources” in the right column. Note the link for “Strong’s Lookup” where you can type any word from your study and translate into Hebrew or Greek to see the original meaning of the word.

Throughout the study, you’ll learn ways to apply the Fruits of the Spirit to your everyday life. You’ll answer personal discussion questions in the workbook and also comment in group discussions each Tuesday.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. Galatians 5:22-23 NIV

Register for the study here.