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Bible Study

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

The List: Babies have to Grow Up!… Part 4

Posted on September 17, 2025

Here’s the 4th little segment about helping our “baby sisters.” New Christians don’t come into the church walking the walk perfectly or talking the talk without a stutter. Here are some more ideas to help us take their hands and help them through the developmental stages: 

13. Invite her to do Digging Deep with you. I’ve just done this with a girlfriend here in town. She made a facebook page with an alias name just so she can be in the DD facebook group. (She had not been on FB prior to this, and she doesn’t really want to do the whole social media thing. Her FB name is so “hippie” that my DD “watch team” all contacted to say “This is an AI bot, right? We shouldn’t let ‘it’ in?”) But she’s in! She’s coming to the local study next Monday night and she’s probably the most excited one coming. And DD has converted people! It’s just the Word and the Word is powerful. Invite, invite, invite!

14. Be sure you make time to study with her. Start with the Lord’s supper. 1 Corinthians 15 says “some are weak and sick among you.” Guess who these people were? They were the men and women who didn’t take the Lord’s Supper with discernment. Start with a study of the Lord’s Supper and write some things down for her…thoughts on which she can meditate during the Lord’s Supper. Help take her from the NICU to a place of wellness. She needs you! Then go on and study the book of John and then Acts with her. In the process, you will find out what she needs most. Go, in the Word, wherever that need is. Always start your study with “Do you have questions for me?” Make sure you give her Bible reading assignments for in-between your studies with her.

 

15. Encourage and help her to attend some rich seminar with you, like Polishing the Pulpit or Bible camp or a great ladies day. If there’s a lot of expense involved, consider asking your elders to help you in making it possible for her. If she can, she should help pay for it, too. She needs skin in the game. (P.S. Polishing the Pulpit (www.polishingthepit.com) is the best growth starter I have ever seen! If your congregation has PTP365, get her connected)

16. Often, those we convert come into the body with financial needs Go with these new sisters to speak with the elders, if you have them, about these needs. This is tricky, of course. We don’t want to convert people to a financial welfare system, but a spiritual one. But we minister to those in the body. Godly elders will have the wisdom needed to help in the best ways and to advise you about personally helping in these cases. 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

From Mandy Lovett: A Good and Simple Bible Study Hack

Posted on June 24, 2025

One more wonderful thing about Camp Moriah last week was that Mandy Lovett came to teach the girls how to teach children’s classes. I loved everything I heard in those classes. It was six hours of hands-on learning and had a great emphasis on simplicity and using available (and affordable ) resources. The girls ate it up and I think they learned much. I did, too.

One take-away for me was Mandy’s emphasis on putting yourself in the Bible event; just pretending you are on the ship with Jonah and thinking of how that would have felt in your own terrified mind, at the time. Putting yourself in the widow’s living room when Elisha asked her to give him the last morsel of bread that she could possibly make. What would you have done?  Can you smell the bread baking?

The simplest thing that struck a chord with me was Mandy’s suggestion that we take all of the five senses and imagine them in each moment of whatever Bible account we are teaching. For example: Put yourself at the foot of the cross. What would have been the sounds piercing that midday silence? You would have heard the loud clang of an anvil hitting spikes and certain cries of anguish.  You would have heard the thud of the cross dropped  in its prepared hole. You would have heard a crowd hushed by the execution they witnessed, and yet, some would cry out to taunt the Savior hanging there. You would have heard the women who had followed Jesus there, including His mother quietly weeping. You  would have heard the conversation about Paradise. You may have heard shrieks of fear when God turned out the lights on Jerusalem that day. You would have heard a mighty rumble when the earth quaked.  

What would you have smelled? You would have smelled human blood. It’s possible that you would have smelled the vinegar or the smoke from nearby fires, since it was cold that Passover weekend. (Peter was warming by a fire a few hours prior to the cross.) Maybe you would also have smelled the sheep that the Jews were bringing from every region to the temple for the Passover sacrifices and the donkeys on which they rode. You may have been close enough to smell the spices that were, perhaps, brought by Joseph, who planned to wrap His body. 

What would you have tasted? We don’t know that there were people eating at the foot of the cross, but we do know that he hung there for six hours in midday, and we know that there was not a spirit of reverence, except for the honor shown him by his mother and the other disciples that were present. So perhaps, some were even satisfying the physical hunger while the Lord was satisfying the desperate souls of all time. 

What would you have felt? Some felt the clothes of Jesus. Some held the spikes. Some felt the rough hewn lumber of the cross. You would have likely felt the cool air when the sun was hidden and maybe you would have tightened your garments around you. You would have felt the ground shake and perhaps some felt the spray of saliva from those who were irreverently mocking the Son of God. Some felt the warm blood when the spikes pierced and then mutilated His flesh. If you believed this was the Son of God, you would have clung to those around you who also believed.

But, more profoundly, what would you have seen? The bound and naked body placed on the cross. The spikes and the blood’s spray. The blood flowing from this forehead and the clanging of Roman armor on the soldiers commissioned to keep peace as they carried out this horrendous horror of capital punishment. You would have seen the scornful face of both–then just one–of the thieves. You would have seen Mary weeping beside John, the centurion piercing the side of Jesus and blood flowing from his side.and dripping in the dust. You would have seen darkness and people running as the ground trembled. You would have seen the body go limp. You would have seen Joseph of Arimathea gently take the lifeless body from the lowered cross. You would have seen the sun come back out and people hurrying away to observe the Sabbath on this passover weekend, unaware that they had just observed THE sacrifice of THE Passover lamb. 

Thank-you Mandy, for this reminder to plug in the human senses when studying. I plan to make this a practice as I unpack passages. 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

I CAN HARDLY WAIT! Digging Deep 25-26…The Dates You Need to Know…

Posted on June 6, 2025

The new Digging Deep topic reveal is just six weeks away! Coming from Branson this year on Saturday, July 19th at approximately 1 pm CST, will be the official announcement of the 2025-26 topic (https://polishingthepulpit.com/). I cannot wait! The writing is finished, the designing of books and shirts and most-things-Digging Deep is finished. The printing is underway and the plans and logistics for getting materials to both Branson and Sevierville are happening now.

All of the build-up is fun (and keeps us a little stressed-out), but the meat of God’s Word in hearts of women is the focus. I’m very  excited, as always, about the study this year. For me, it is personal, but it will be universally challenging and encouraging. The Word is like that; it zeroes in on my every need when I dig, and yet, it is doing that same thing for every digger around the world. I hear about this amazing phenomenon over and over every year. It is because it is the Word of our Creator and it continues to be breathed out from God, through Scripture. It lives!

Here are the dates, times and places you need to know. I hope you will join us this year! Digging Deep changes lives. It’s not the program that does this. It’s the Word!

June DD Podcast for “Conversations” –live on June 24th here: here: https://thecolleyhouse.org/live-digging-deep-video-podcast,

July podcast for “Conversations” –from Branson Missouri: Thursday, July 17 at 12:30 CST. It will be posted on the Digging Deep facebook page and at www.thecolleyhouse.org that afternoon when completed. Those present in Branson may attend at 12:30 CST in Short Creek 1).

REVEAL for 2025-26 study–live in Branson on Saturday, July 19th at 12:30. This session will include recognition for those present who have completed all of the study through the month of June (All reading, questions, “Practically Speaking” and all video or audio podcasts through the year!) The reveal will be posted (via a special video made for those at home)  on the Digging Deep facebook page at approximately 1 pm on this date.) Those present in Branson may attend this reveal in S1 at 12:30 CST.

2025-26 materials will be available after 1:00 pm on 7/19 in Branson and at  https://thecolleyhouse.org/store.

August podcast for “Conversations” will occur live at  Sevierville PTP  on August 14  at 12:30 pm. EST   It will be posted on the Digging Deep facebook page immediately upon conclusion. This present may attend in Ballroom D.

Introduction of the 2025-26 study and recognition of those present who have completed all assignments through July will occur on Saturday,  8/16 in Ballroom B at Sevierville at 12:30 EST. .

2025-26 materials will be available in Sevierville throughout the Polishing the Pulpit convention.

September 1st, 2025 is the official beginning of Digging Deep 2025-26! This year, we are hoping to have all materials in all diggers’ hands by this date!

September 30th at 7 CST will be the very first 25-26 video podcast! It will be on the facebook page and here: https://thecolleyhouse.org/live-digging-deep-video-podcast,

We hope this is helpful to you as you plan to be there, or listen or gear up your groups for the new Digging Deep season. It’s the most wonderful time of the year (And I really love Christmas more than most. This is still eternally better!)

If you are new to the study there is an introductory video pinned near the top orf the Digging Deep facebook page. You will find that helpful. https://www.facebook.com/groups/diggingdeepingodsword/permalink/8965388123475809

It was a simple four day study at PTP in 2011.  The first podcasts were the idea of Jennifer Benavides  and were prepped in a nursing home as I lived in a little corner of the room and slept on a cot beside my dad’s bed in Jacksonville, Alabama in 2012. They were delivered to a small audience from my laptop there in Jacksonville. . Who knew I’d be so excited in 2025 about hundreds, even thousands, of  women around the world getting into the Word together!? Who knew we  He could do this? Only God. Digging Deep is all His!

Let’s celebrate year 15! Let’s thank Him!

 

 

 

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

I Still Believe This…

Posted on March 20, 2025

This morning, I came across the following paragraph that I wrote about 20 years ago. I wrote this prior to ever thinking about a study tool like Digging Deep. I wrote it prior to even the pre-cursors of some pretty big trials in my own life. I wrote it six years before I would know the joy and the responsibility of influencing grandchildren. I wrote it in the very early days of our work in Huntsville, Alabama.  I wrote it while  both of our children were still single, neither having even met the people who would become their mates.  I could not have known that, in America, we were  in our last months of homosexual marriages being legally denied and in the last days (for a long while) of recognition of only two genders. So much water under the bridge since this writing. 

We have, together, gone through a lot since this writing. But some things haven’t changed. The truths of His Word are not fluid with culture. Those truths are what have brought his faithful people through the fires of the last two decades and what will continue to give us comfort and hope. I still believe every word of the writ I found this morning:

“But take careful heed to do the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of the LORD commanded you, to love the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways, to keep His commandments, to hold fast to Him, and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul.”

These words were spoken to the two and a half tribes of Israel who elected to inherit on the Eastern side of the Jordan. They were spoken at what is arguably the zenith of their history. The young nation had witnessed the powerful hand of God in their miraculous deliverance from Egyptian bondage. They had learned the seriousness of faith in Jehovah, having been turned back from the promised land for their unbelief even as they stood on the brink of the Jordan. By the point of these words from Joshua, they had conquered the heathen tribes of Canaan and were ready to return to their families to enjoy the fruits of the vineyards they did not plant (Deut. 6:11).

This careful heed is exactly what they had exhibited as they helped conquer Canaan. It is what we have to exhibit if we are conquerors in Christ (Romans 8:35-39). We will not do better than we know. I am amazed by a recent Barna study revealing that less than one in five church members in America today have any measurable goals related to spiritual growth or development.  The most widely known Bible verse among church members in America is “God helps those who help themselves.”  (That, by the way, is NOT a Bible verse.)  Only a minority of church-goers believe that absolute truth even exists and less than one in ten say they let a Biblical world view affect their daily decisions.  Something is very wrong with this picture.

While I pray that in the Lord’s church today, the results of such a survey would be more encouraging, it is obvious in my own sphere that we have failed to carefully heed to do the commandment and the law.  I have talked with more than one tearful Christian mother whose child has grown up to be an atheist. I am currently studying with a college girl on one of our Christian university campuses who simply wrote to me and said, “I want to believe in God, but my faith is gone. Is there any way you can help me?”  As I teach teen girls, I’m often amazed that many do not understand the difference between the concept of New Testament Christianity and denominationalism. Many are confused about whether or not baptism is essential to salvation or why we do not worship with instruments of music. Some have asked me if some people are homosexuals because of genetics and many believe those who never hear the gospel will be saved. Teens who ask these questions are not from “un-churched” families. Many are active in youth groups and programs of churches of Christ.

We will not be putting the commandments and the law into the hearts of our children if we are not internalizing them personally. May I encourage every Christian woman who reads this to make an iron-willed determination to get into the Word? Studying at a prescribed and pre-planned time and place will help you do this regularly. Studying topically will help you do this effectively. Studying to teach another will help you study with passion.  Praying about your study will help open doors of opportunity to pass along your knowledge to those in need. Study begets more study. Study ultimately begets faith (Romans 10:17).  No one has an accidental faith when it’s time to endure the trials. Faith, at the crucial time, is always preceded by years of careful heed during all the uneventful ordinary times.

Work Cited:

Barna, George; Growing True Disciples  Waterbrook Press  Colorado Springs Colorado 2001

Much of the above article taken from Building Your Own Altars, by Cindy Colley
Bear Valley Bible Institute Lectures, Denver Colorado 2009

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Be a Body-Builder!!

Posted on February 17, 2025

This week-end, my assigned ladies day topic was “Craving the Protein: Learning to Love the Meat of the Word.” I loved it so much. A  lady came to me at the end and said that her goal, as she went home, was to get in the Word in measures and ways that she’s never practiced before now. That’s a big win, in my book, because HIS book has the answers to all of life’s challenges. Therapists, physicians, exercise, diet, counselors, friends and family are all good resources, but the basis of your answers—the starting place— is the Word. I hope every lady who said she’s resolved to study more deeply really keeps her word. If she does, her life will be better. 

Proteins arrange themselves in chains of amino acids and those chains just keep on building themselves. Proteins quite literally build people. So eat your turkey breast, guava, black beans, cottage cheese, eggs, and fish (and so many more foods that are rich in protein) because these are the foods that strengthen and energize. 

But ultimately important is the spiritual meat of the Word of God. It’s what gives you strength for the hard days and energy for the tasks that have eternal consequences. Be a spiritual body-builder!

Hebrews 4:12ff is your body-building passage for today: 

For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat. For every one that useth milk is unskilful in the word of righteousness: for he is a babe. But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

Bless Your Heart by Cindy Colley

Happy for Diggers. Sad for Delays.

Posted on September 19, 2024

Please read this one if you are digging.

  1. Digging Deep has gone “big guns” this year. It’s larger than ever and we just did not anticipate this much growth in the study. We ordered what we thought was an overage of the deluxe study guides, but we are completely out. If you have ordered in the last three days, your books are now back-ordered and the time at which you will receive them will likely be about four weeks from order time. I regret this so very much! If you would like to make copies of the first two chapters of the deluxe study guide, as some have asked, please feel free as you wait for your hard copies. Alternately, of course, download the free copy from the website. If you ordered and wish to cancel your order because of the delay, let us know that, too. Please don’t copy past chapter two, though. (We may be losing our shirts with this back-order. But if we do, we will grab a terra cotta colored t shirt!)
  2. If you ordered prior to September 15th, your books should be en-route to you. 
  3. If you ordered in August and have not received, we trust that you have messaged us and we are checking on those orders today. In the midst of this amazingly wonderful time, our church email server (the one that Glenn used to process the orders), experienced a major malfunction.We believe we have all of your orders now and are trying to be sure that all of the August orders are on their way. By far, the vast majority of them have been delivered, but there are a few that are contacting us and we are working hard on those.  I am going to be busy today answering the individual texts I have received about those few stragglers. 
  4. The video podcast will be happening live next Tuesday night (9/24) at 7 CST. I hope you will join us here. https://thecolleyhouse.org/live-digging-deep-video-podcast. Please text your comments and we will have a great discussion. Pisa Soli will be co-hosting and she is always insightful and thorough. She (and the Soli family) has experienced a lot of the residual and awful effects of Genesis 2 (our anchor chapter this month) during the last year. All of the sadness that we encounter is resultant from the entrance of sin and death into our world, of course. This first conversation is predicated on that realization and can be helpful to us all as we grieve pain and loss. It also breathes into our desperate souls the hope of Calvary. Hope you are making plans to watch and text!
  5. There has also been a glitch this week in the dissemination of the Bless Your Heart blog. Thanks to Jennifer Benavides and Jack VanHook, this has now been repaired. This was yet another way that communication about the books, the shortage and your orders was delayed. We hope all is up and running now and we invite you to watch the blog and the Digging Deep page for updates as you study. 
  6. I cannot adequately express gratitude for the way you text. It is always kind. It is always gracious and forgiving. It is, in short, full of the Lord. (The tech, on the other hand, seems to be full of the enemy. It has truly been one issue after the other.) Huge thanks from the Colleys to the sisterhood. We are so very thankful to (and for) the diggers. There are thousands and they are in almost all states and Canada and South America and Australia. Perhaps you dig somewhere else. Be sure and let us know. Last night, I got a message from one of our members at West Huntsville who is traveling in Florida. They worshipped with a small church of 15-20 members in this little Florida port. There was a group of diggers in that church. If you travel while digging, be sure to post a photo with hashtag #whereintheworldisdiggingdeep. And I pray that, very soon, if you are waiting, Digging Deep will be in your mailbox. I will breathe a sigh of relief when that is accomplished.
  7. The Dig-A-Bits have begun. Watch for these on the DD facebook page.
  8. Invite others! Several have watched baptisms result from inviting. He is so faithful! The catch-up is easy through November. Also remember that previous studies remain available at https://www.thecolleyhouse.org
  9. Please pray that, in spite of these delays, the study will not be hampered and that souls will be around the throne in the great day as a result of women in the Word.  I pray the souls in my reach will be moving heavenward as I study these Conversations.