Latest / The Woman at the Well Ministries Podcast / 310 | Throwback - Sacrificing Ourselves for the Sake of the Brethren

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310 | Throwback - Sacrificing Ourselves for the Sake of the Brethren · The Woman at the Well Ministries Podcast

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  Music.
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  Hello, friends, and welcome back to another podcast of Woman at the Well Ministries,
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  where we believe that all of us have to come to Jesus like the woman at the
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  well in John chapter four.
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  Our highest priority is making God real in your life.
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  Whether you are listening in our app, in your favorite podcasting app,
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  or on our website at watwm.org,
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  we invite you to sit down with us as we look to the scriptures to learn more
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  about God and to strengthen your daily walk with Jesus Christ.
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  Living her life for Christ, she's a happy girl.
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  Music.
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  She's a happy girl.
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  God gives different talents and gifts to each of us.
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  Sometimes your gifts and talents aren't what you want or what you feel you need.
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  They are, however, always what is best and what he wants you to have.
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  Join us in this program, Sacrificing Self for the Sake of the Brethren,
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  as Kim Miller of Woman at the Well Ministries takes us through Romans 15, 1, which says,
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  We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak and not to please ourselves.
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  Hello and welcome to this broadcast of Woman at the Well Ministries.
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  And this is one of these times when what we're going to talk about is a sobering thought.
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  And that is the thought of what our purpose is here and how it is we're going to live that out.
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  God told us that our purpose was
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  to be the light of the world and that we
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  were to be his witness and when
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  we begin to think about this verse in that light what we see is how Christ lived
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  his life and he lived his life without any thought of himself and he placed
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  every one of us above his his own self, and his own needs.
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  And he went about doing good, but the Bible says that he came that we might
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  have life and have it more abundantly.
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  We were the center of his attention, and we were his focus.
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  And he lived his life here, and he's living his life in heaven,
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  ever making intercession for us, in such a way that we, his primary focus.
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  Are being taken care of all the time by what he is doing.
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  He's blessing us. He's providing for us. He's giving us life. He's watching over us.
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  And in this verse, it says that we ought not to please ourselves.
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  And if you read the scriptures in the New Testament, you see Jesus often refers
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  that he's doing the will of his father.
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  And if you see the things that he does, he goes out of his way for the woman at the well.
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  He puts himself in harm's way for the same woman.
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  He takes care of her needs without her even understanding what those needs are.
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  And he patiently talks to her in such a way that she will embrace him and allow
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  him to help her and give her life for eternity.
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  Infirmity that's the kind of example that he
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  has laid out before us and in
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  this verse what he says is he says that
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  we ought to bear the infirmities of
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  those that are weaker than us that the strong are to bear the infirmities of
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  the weak and we ought not to please ourselves alt that word means that's what's
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  expected of us when we do that we haven't done anything extraordinary but we
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  have done what's been asked of us.
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  And we have lived the life that God has required of his Christians.
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  We don't get to heaven by works, but because we love him, we want to work for him.
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  And we are his eyes and his feet and his hands here on earth.
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  And he works in and through each and every one of us doing the will of God so
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  that others can be touched, that their needs can be met, and that his word can be fulfilled.
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  Do you know that you have the opportunity to be the answer to someone's prayer?
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  Perhaps it's as simple as walking into an assisted living home or a nursing
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  home or a hospital or just the home of a widow or a widower and having a conversation with them.
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  They may have been praying for days for companionship or for friendship or just
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  someone to listen to them.
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  Maybe perhaps you can put a little bit of money into some pot where everybody's
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  money is collected and it meets a vital need for someone else.
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  And maybe even that's a person who doesn't know the Lord as their personal Savior
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  and seeing the sacrificial giving and the love from people who don't even know
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  them or aren't like-minded to them causes them to wonder what makes you guys different than me.
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  And the next thing you know, your kindness and your work has come to allow them
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  to be able to find Christ as Savior.
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  You see, you may not see them come to Christ, but you may be the laborer that is laying down the seed.
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  You need to be about your father's business. The Bible tells us that we ought not to please ourself.
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  For many of us, we have plans way out.
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  And we are focused on what it is that we need to do for our family,
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  what we need to do for ourselves.
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  It's an amazing thing to me how much a person can find and carve out time for exercise.
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  And there's nothing wrong with exercise. That's something that we need to do.
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  It is the temple of God. We need to take care of our bodies.
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  But the Bible also says that bodily exercise profit us little.
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  We spend so much effort and so much time taking care of that,
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  but we will rarely plan out a time that we're going to sit down and read God's
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  word, or we're going to pray and have meditation.
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  It's interesting to me how our focus can be so skewed from the primary focus of who God is.
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  It's interesting to me that we can do all these different things,
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  perhaps even just for ourselves,
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  but when it comes to helping our neighbor or comes to doing something for someone.
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  Else, we finally come to the point in our minds that we say, I just don't have time.
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  That would just take too much time away from my family.
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  Family time is wonderful. Pack your family up and take them to visit that person who's lonely.
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  Pack your family up and take them to do some work for someone who isn't able to get it done.
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  Gather your family around the table and in the kitchen and begin to prepare
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  a meal for somebody who A, may not have one.
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  Or B, hasn't had a home-cooked meal in a long time because they're all alone. or maybe they're sick.
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  Have that be a family legacy. You know, it's wonderful when you hear people
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  talk about their childhood and the things that their parents taught them and
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  the family traditions that they have.
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  There's no greater family tradition than when someone talks about as a child,
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  their family was doing the work of the Lord together.
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  And we're always so fascinated by those families that sing sing,
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  and they have wonderful testimonies, and they serve the Lord in the churches, and that's great.
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  But there's many a family who come together in the service of the Lord and meet
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  the needs in their communities and in their families because they're planning
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  their lives around the will of God and the work of God.
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  They're not planning it on what they want to do, and they're sacrificing their
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  flesh so that they can grow their spiritual self.
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  They are feeding their spirit and they're starving their flesh.
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  And that's the kind of life that lives the richness of God.
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  In Romans chapter 15 and verse 7, he says, wherefore receive you one another
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  as Christ also received us to the glory of God.
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  Do you realize that Christ received you just the way you are.
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  He didn't expect anything from you. He didn't require anything of you simply
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  to believe and to love him.
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  And as you grow to know him, you want to be around him more.
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  You spend more time with him in his word, more time in prayer.
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  He begins to allow you to do things for him, a privilege to serve the Lord. That's what it is.
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  He allows you to be part of blessing others. He allows you to be part of helping
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  others come to the kingdom of God.
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  And he loves you. And he helps you to be who you need to be.
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  Not through condemnation. The Bible tells us there's therefore now no more condemnation
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  to them that love the Lord.
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  But he sees you where you are. And he knows your need.
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  He knew your greatest need that man or woman would ever have before any of us ever were born.
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  Not only could he see your need. he fulfilled
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  your need and after fulfilling your need
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  by dying on the cross of calvary and paying for
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  your salvation paying that debt that he didn't know he then stayed with you
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  walking with you and talking with you and patiently molding you into what you
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  ought to be and just like the potter if something went wrong he didn't throw the clay away way,
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  he just began to mold again and make you pliable in his hands,
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  a servant willing to serve God when he asks.
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  That's how Christ receives us.
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  He receives us as we are. He clearly sees our need.
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  He provides our need and he sticks with us.
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  Now, we're told in Romans chapter 15 and verse 7 that we're to receive one another that same way.
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  When you look at that coupled with verse 1 out of chapter 15,
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  there's no way that you can come to any other conclusion other than we need
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  to be seeing our brothers and sisters in Christ and our fellow people in our
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  community through an eye that sees them just as they are,
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  loves them enough to give all you
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  have to give christ gave his entire self and then once he can see that need
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  nothing kept he held nothing back so many of us will see a need and the lord
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  will put on our hearts that we should give fifty dollars to something and we'll give twenty,
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  well we've done something but we didn't receive that person as christ has received
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  us and then when Christ saw the need and he gave all that he had held nothing
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  back he stayed with them and he continued to mold them and help them and he
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  never expressed condemnation,
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  we as fellow believers have got to be there for those who are weaker than we
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  are in spirit in physicalities, in mentality,
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  whatever that weakness is, we need to step in and strengthen them.
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  That's the calling of Christ on our life. And we'll never get there until we
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  learn that it's not about pleasing us that matters.
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  It's about pleasing him. And the only applause that you need to seek is the
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  applause of nail-scarred hands and that Jesus would say to you,
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  well done, thy good and faithful servant.
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  You've been faithful over a few things. I will make you ruler over many.
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  Music.
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  Thank you for joining us in today's podcast. You can visit the show notes for
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  quotes from today's podcast and scripture references.
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  We pray today has been a blessing and we encourage you to reach out to us through
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  our app, our website, or our Facebook page.
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  You can find our app by searching for a woman at the well ministries in your
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  app store or through our website at watwm.org.
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  We're on Facebook at facebook.com slash watwm. If you visit our website,
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  you'll be able to subscribe to Bible Bits, a daily devotion written by Kim and
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  delivered Monday through Friday by text message.
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  Woman at the Well Ministries is a nonprofit organization dedicated to serving
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  our Heavenly Father, and it is through your loving and generous support that
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  our ministry continues to bless others.
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  To learn how to partner with Woman at the Well Ministries, please visit our website.
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  Thank you to the gospel group Pledge Creek for letting us use their hit song, Happy Girl.
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  We greatly appreciate your prayers. We are praying daily for our listeners.
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  Remember that God loves you.
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  Music.