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Digging Deep Hand of God

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Digging Deep: Don’t Stress about the Schedule!

Posted on September 12, 2026

If you’re new to Digging Deep, I hope that you’re not stressing out about schedule. It’s important to say that the flexibility of Digging Deep is one of the draws. You can do the schedule pinned by Julie Orr in the featured section of the website, IF it is helpful to you (And it IS helpful to many, so thanks so much, Julie!) But you can also just do what you can, at your own pace, each month. That’s what I do. I try to complete each month, but, sometimes, just because of my speaking/kids/home/church schedule, my time is not as scheduled as that of others. I may spend a few minutes most days in the assignments and then spend 10 or 12 hours on one of the weekends, for instance, as I finish a month’s study.

IT’S OK to CRAM for the podcast. It’s OK to stick to your weekly or daily schedule. In fact, it’s OK if you “learned a lot this month, but you didn’t finish every question.” It’s important to just say that Bible study is going to help you—it’s going to be an immense blessing to your life and family—whether or not you complete every question on every page of “The Hand of God”. 

SO take a deep and relieving breath and do what you can, in your own particular circumstance. If your husband says, “Let’s take a weekend off together,” never say “I can’t. I’m behind on Digging Deep.” Just take it with you and grab it while he runs to the bait store. 

If you get a chance to go hear a great lecture at a nearby church, don’t say, “Well I can’t go. The podcast is next Tuesday.” Say, instead, “I’m going to be growing every time I’m in the Word. I’ll be in the Word at this lectureship.” 

As I write, I’m in a hotel room in North Alabama. My husband is on the other side of this king-sized bed watching the 9-11 memorial news coverage. That’s a good thing. My Digging Deep bag is on the floor beside me and I will be getting to that, either while he goes out to get the coffee or as we drive to a different destination today.  I won’t be on the calculated schedule. But I, like you, will grow, commensurately, with the amount of time I am able to devote to study.

Just do what you can, where you are, with what you have! And we will all be better wives, mamas, sisters and daughters of the King! 

“She has done what she could.” Mark 14:8.

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Digging Deep Flash Contest!

Posted on September 10, 2026

Send me a one liner!…One thing you’ve learned (something you didn’t know before), so far, from month one of “The Hand of God.” Just text it to byhcontest@gmail.com. One lucky winner can choose the deluxe study book for any one of the DD studies available on our site, OR either DD mug you see there, OR a shirt or hoodie from the current study, OR the current keychain, OR the Digging Deep tote!  We’ll draw a name! (All entries must be in THIS email and must be submitted before midnight today!) 1…2…3…go!

 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

How God Smiled on Us!

Posted on September 9, 2026

Yesterday was a challenging day in several areas of life. I’m sure it wasn’t as challenging as some of your days or as some that I may yet face, but still, there were some emotions like Asaph described: “Thus was my heart grieved and I was pricked in my reins!” (Psalm 73:21).

You know, sometimes you have hard things and you know how to fix them, even though the fix is painful. Then there are other things that, at least in your small purview, leave you bewildered as to what to do. Yesterday held several of those challenges. 

God always has strength for those days. This morning, up way before His sun, first I prayed. (I think I was Asaph again saying “My flesh and my heart fails, but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion, forever” (Psalm 73:26).  

Then I studied Asaph. I found (as our study prompted)  prayers of desperation and then shouts of his majesty. I needed both of those this morning. Then I went out for a neighborhood walk in the stillness of the new morning. And I prayed some more. 

As I was coming back toward my kitchen door, I realized that, in all of the busy-ness that was yesterday, I had failed to check the mail. When I opened that box, I thought, “I’m going to need a bag. I will never get in the house with all these letters and packages.”

And right there, in the middle of that huge stack of things ordered, and bills, and statements and ads, was the sweetest Digger note I think I have ever read (along with gifts from that McCook, Nebraska local and zoom group.) A little pink leather business card holder, with Romans 10:15, that’s perfect for my little Bible-study-invitation cards was in there, along with a big gift card to Connors Steakhouse. But the best part was the words of Jennifer Allen, that included statements like these: 

“…That first year’s study changed my life! It made me confident in a way I had never been. Not because I had all the answers, but because I knew I could do it. It opened the Bible up to me in a way I had never seen it. I had done may book-by-book studies, but the way this study went from the very beginning to the very end, showing truths throughout, gave me a new perspective. It helped pull it together for me in a way that changed me. 

I became passionate about encouraging other women to challenge themselves in Bible study. It made me a much better Bible class teacher. I became passionate about changing our children’s class curriculum to give our children a good solid base. We have since changed all our curriculum from cradle roll up, to be all wonderful, brotherhood created, intentional curriculum. It made me passionate about family Bible time. I know this will sound foreign to you, but I had never even heard of that concept….This is something that is not done or taught around here. 

…God really is so good! He truly is the God of MORE!” 

She said a lot more about how she unintentionally stumbled on PTP and Digging Deep. She talked about starting a group 14 years ago with four women and then she named 36 women in six states and one foreign country who are currently digging in person and via zoom in this same group.  She thought she was relating some history to me. She didn’t know she was determining the course of my actions and reactions in a time of difficulty.  She thought she was saying “Thanks for digging.” . But she was really saying “Get up, Cindy Colley. Our God has got this!”

Of course, it’s true.  The sword, the lamp, the sanctifying Word is the source of all our strength. It is surely not me and it is not even Digging Deep. The Word is precious, palatable and powerful. It is all we need in every endeavor. It is sufficient and more than enough. 

(I am going to study that Word today with a woman who desperately needs to see that sufficiency. I am praying that I can cause her to want to depend on that Word for the horrific things she is facing.)

And, while, through this wonderful mail, Jennifer was telling me how Digging Deep had opened her eyes to blessings that had changed her for the better, she, unwittingly opened my eyes to blessings that come through this encouraging sisterhood to which we belong! And those blessings, in turn change me for the better.  How I needed her gift today!  (Not the one that will go in my purse (though it is so kind and generous!), but the one that’s filed in my heart! How we need each other and how our God smiled on us when He placed us in a family!

I can do today now! 

Again, like Asaph, I say:

It is good for me to draw near to God;

I have put my trust in the Lord GOD,

That I may declare all Your works. (Psalm 73:28).

 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Last Call for Hoodies!…And Asaph, the Cymbalist.

Posted on September 8, 2026

At the end of this week, we are going to order more hoodies. You’ve bought them all up already in some sizes. This time, the order we place will be based on what you have/will order online. So, if you want the Nehemiah 2:18 hoodie (The Hand of God), and you’ve not yet ordered, please do so by the end of this week. There’s a quick turn-around on these, so we would still have them to you in just a few days. If you’ve already ordered and not received, hang tight. They are coming. 

This last weekend, I finally had time to dig into the first chapter of The Hand of God. I have not ever studied Asaph in the Kings and Chronicles before, and sure enough, there was a nugget there that has given me resolve about my own family. (It’s in Dig-a-Bit #1 and will be posted soon!) So many of us have children and/or grandchildren. When we have fulfilling families, we also have lives that are filled full. That fullness is not always sunshine and roses. It is more often, that we walk a path that has much hope and happiness, but intermittent (…and often we endure whole seasons of this) storms and darkness. There are hard things that test us and make us doubt our God-given ability to persevere for Him. 

The generations that followed Asaph in his Levitical family were often hard and I know the music in that symphonic family sometimes did not come naturally. From Asaph, already, I have taken heart, and I cannot wait to study more deeply the songs he composed. I’m thankful for the hand of God in the music of Israel. 

14th century (BC) cymbals found in Hazor.

My grandchildren will be going, later this week, as they do most weeks, to their respective piano lessons. I like to go to their recitals. But, like Asaph, I care a lot less about their musical abilities, than I do their spiritual abilities to serve in His covenant. (I love that turning point in Psalm 77!) Asaph’s family had a coveted place beside the ark of the old covenant—the meeting place of God and man. May our children be near to Him in that new covenant service all their days. May they always meet with Him through Christ! Now that is a coveted place! 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Do I have to have PayPal?…

Posted on September 4, 2026

Someone’s mug got broken. Someone’s package was opened when it arrived and something was missing. “My box was missing a shirt.” …”My friend already got hers and she ordered after I ordered.” …”I don’t have PayPal. Is there another way to order?”

Sometimes there’s a hitch of some kind. But the percentage of packages with hang-ups is still low. The books and shirts are coming your way as fast as we can get them there. The answer, of course, to any problem, is to ask us and we will make it right. Of course, we will make it right. 

That PayPal question, though. The answer is to keep going through the payment process with your credit card number. It will go through and you do not have to have a PayPal account. It looks like you do, but it is ONLY PayPal on our end…NOT yours. It will go through just like any other credit card purchase, WITHOUT your having a PayPal account. This is the question I have been asked probably 100 times. So the system is confusing. We apologize for that, but that part is out of our hands. (We always have enough confusion that IS in our home and hands, though, for sure!)

Bottom line is: We will make it right. Always communicate any mistakes, broken-on-arrival mugs, etc….We will make it right! (Just Facebook message us or cindycolley@gmail.com.)

Most of all, keep inviting! I have already heard from several of you that there are questions, comments, burdens shared, feedback…at this early point, from women who desperately need our Father and salvation. 

And if you are new to the study, I’m praying today that you will be blessed as much as I have been. The Word is what sanctifies us (John 17). Put your hand in His!

P.S. I can’t wait for hoodie weather. These shipping days are triple digit heat index days. He is good, though.

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Encouragement from His Hand (and Podcast Dates for 2026)

Posted on September 3, 2026

Well, you bring me to tears  almost every day during the inviting season, because He is just so good. One place in the midwest going from one woman to a group of 70 plus in a week because of the contagion of accepted invitations. One woman, outside of our Lord Jesus, who’s  accepted the invitation this year, for the first time, after many tries in a variety of studies, for several years. One digger, who was baptized last night after contemplating, seriously, her relationship with God. One little community of 1500 people, where there likely are more women on staff at the local high school, who are studying, than those who are not.  One porch where community women are just stepping up to get their materials from a basket, because the study leader cannot keep up with all the new students who need them. Two more groups started from one small-town group and from two women connecting in places that are really not so geographically close. Zoom groups growing by leaps and bounds. A coffee shop room that could not have held one more chair at ten o’clock in the morning, yesterday. You just try to tell me or any digger that this is not going to help us to heaven?! It is, because it is the Word! It is not any person. It is not any advertising scheme. It is the Hand of God, working already in providential ways. 

Oh, I know the devil will try his hardest to grab the women back. The devil lets us coast along when we are  in sin. But let us get interested in the Word and He starts calculating the risks—His risk of losing us to the Lord— and he gets in lion mode…devouring mode (1 Peter 5:8). So watch for him. Recognize when you want to take a few days off from the Word…that’s him. Watch when you have time for the football games or the beach trips, but not the Word. That would be him, too. Watch for general suffocating busy-ness.That would be him, too. But draw near to God and resist the devil…and God will draw near to you (James 4:8) And yes….I am talking to myself.  

Podcast dates are as follows for the rest of 2026: 

September 22

October 27

November 24

January 5 (This will be for the month of December, Month 4 of the study.)

(See how I gave us all 6 weeks to do month four during the holidays? I didn’t say we can’t ever slow down for giving gifts, hospitality, and encouraging! …I said keep digging!)

I’m encouraged beyond what I can start to say, by Him, but THROUGH you, as we put our hearts in His hand and watch Him work in our lives this year!

Did I say “Keep on Inviting!”? She may not dig if you ask her. But she, for sure, won’t, if you don’t.