I need YOUR help!

Hello readers!!

I would love to do something new on JOJ...but in order to do it, I need your help! :)

I'd like to interview different Christian young ladies + older women, asking them questions and formulating them into different posts for this blog! 

Here's where you come in - what are some questions you've wanted to ask a godly woman, younger or older? would it be about life, the future, the past, God, the Bible, relationships...what would you ask? :) Please post YOUR questions (any and all!) in the comments below, and I will use some of them in my interviews! 

Thank you so much! Looking forward to what you come up with. :)

{ Rachel }

Come out, come out, wherever you are!

Hello readers!

Here's a shout out to all you "secret readers"...maybe you read our blog, but have never commented. Or maybe you are a regular reader, and have commented before, for which we're grateful! I'm now inviting all of you who read our blog, to please comment, even if you never have before. Tell us how you heard about JOJ, a little about yourself, and whatever! We love hearing from our readers. 

Would you mind completing our short survey HERE? It's just 4 questions long, so will only take a minute. Your input is greatly appreciated!

If you can't get to the form, feel free to answer the questions below in a comment:

                                -Your name 

                                -What do you want to see more of on JOJ?

                                -Would you be willing to write for us sometime?

Looking forward to hearing from you!! 

Goodbye

Dear Friends,

It has been a while since I last wrote, I know. This wasn’t the way I wanted it to end. I decided long ago that when the end came, I would not let it set and make everyone wonder. But, sadly, it turned out that way anyway.

I know you’ll be wondering “Why?” In a way, I am, too. The Lord has really blessed JOJ, and it’s hard to understand why a ministry like this has to come to an end. I have received a lot of encouragement from all of you, and it is hard to say goodbye. I’ve loved every moment of my work here—even when I was up late putting finishing touches on a post, or editing a long-overdue magazine. But now I know the Lord wants me to say goodbye.

It’s time for me to make new footprints in the sands of life. Time to head another direction.

When JOJ first started, I was thirteen years old. At that point, I was working for a few days per year at a local vineyard. My life was full, but I had enough time to work on JOJ. This year, I began my first part-time job. My family and I moved twice since last December. As I get older, my school load has gotten bigger. Just less than a month ago, I got another part-time job (and, Lord willing, I will be quitting the first one in less than two weeks). I’m also working on starting my own website.

My life has become fuller. I no longer have the time I used to. I’ve grown a lot through JOJ, but now I feel the Lord leading me to pass it on. To say goodbye. I’d love to keep writing—sharing my heart with you—but I now have other ways to reach out to people. I believe it’s important to follow Him, wherever He leads.

I don’t know what will happen to JOJ from here on out—we’ll just have to see. Andrea is in nursing school, and is too busy to write anymore. Rhoda has also moved on. Rachel and Bonnie are trying to decide what they want to do. Please pray that they will have clarity of vision, and know what the Lord would have them do.

I love you dearly, sisters. I’m finding it hard to say goodbye. And yet, I know the Lord is leading, and I don’t want to get in the way of His will. Keep seeking Him—even if this is the last post on the blog, I pray that you will still be encouraged by the archives. We’ve all grown a lot, and I know that the Lord has blessed this ministry.

Thank you for all the encouragement you’ve given us over the past years, sisters! Keep on the straight and narrow path.

Here are two encouraging verses as I close:

“That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring.” —Acts 17:27-28 (emphasis mine)

“Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” —Proverbs 3:5-6 (emphasis mine)

Sisters, stand strong. The Lord is with you.

I’ll see you on the other side, if not before.
Esther

P.S. One more word of encouragement:

“And the Lord, he it is that doth go before thee; he will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed.” —Deuteronomy 31:8

New Year, New People, New Schedules

God has really blessed us this last year. In so many ways He’s proven Himself faithful time and time again. With the new year racing toward us at breakneck speed, we’ve been figuring out last-minute things in changes to the blog. Since the magazine is gone, the writers will now be writing directly on here instead of publishing them in the magazine. So now, I’m pleased to introduce….
 

Our New Writers

     Bonnie (New Zealand):
Bonnie is the second eldest in a homeschooling family of nine children. She plays the violin and piano and loves dancing and singing. Among other things, some of her hobbies include playing and umpiring netball, sewing, writing, climbing trees, crocheting and knitting, drawing pictures, taking photos and playing practical jokes on people. She blogs at Bonnie’s Blessings.



     Cosette (United States):
Hi! I am a Christian homeschool girl who strives to build her relationship with her Saviour, Jesus Christ. I live in Maine and love it! The best part about my life is the music in my heart that God provides day by day. Learn more about that music at Day by Day.

   Rhoda Newton (New Zealand):
Rhoda Newton lives in the beautiful South Island of New Zealand, with her parents and four younger brothers. She was baptised into the Reformed Church of Oamaru as an infant, and joined the church as a communicant member in November 2012. She and her brothers have never been to school. She blogs at Serving With Joy, with the aim of encouraging young women to serve God whole-heartedly, never forgetting the joy of life in Christ.

 
     Andrea Groff (United States):
I’m the oldest of 8 children and a college student pursuing a degree as a Registered Nurse. I served on the mission field for two years in Nicaragua as a personal worker—teaching Bible studies and visiting the natives. Mission work is my heart’s cry. I blog at Committed To His Service.
 
 

Our New Schedule for Posting on the Blog

With the new year, we’ve come up with a weekly format for posting here:

day of the week	subject	author
Sunday	Devotional	Esther
Monday
Tuesday	Edifying Words1	Rachel
Wednesday	Recipes2	Team/You3
Thursday
Friday	Story/Article	Team/You3
Saturday

      ¹Edifying Words—little bits of what used to be put in the Encouragement Page
      ²This would be once every two weeks
      ³Team/You—this will be supplied both by the JOJ Team and by you, our readers

I would do a short devotional (well, something along those lines anyway…) on Sunday—and try to keep it to three reasonable-length paragraphs. :) I don’t think I have that many problems coming up with an article like that.

Rachel will be doing the “Edifying Words”. She was the one who gathered things together for the Encouragement Page, but since the magazine is gone she will just switch to doing that on the blog (unless, of course, she has something bigger to share—which would be fine as well!).

The recipes would also be a carry-over from the magazine. I still have one recipe from being submitted to go into the magazine left, which we can hopefully post sometime in January. I think it would be nice if we shared one recipe every other week or so. This is something that we want you, our readers, to help with—if you have a recipe to share, feel free to drop by the Submissions page where you can send it in. If we have no recipes, we won’t post any. But if we do we’ll try our level best to get it posted! :)

Friday, the “story” day, would also include articles that our team members write, or possibly guest posts if anyone wants to do that.

Hopefully, the weekly schedule can run something like this:

1st Friday of the month	Bonnie
2nd Friday of the month	Cosette
3rd Friday of the month	Rhoda
4th Friday of the month	Andrea

Monday, Thursday, Saturday, and every other Wednesday are free. This is where the best time would be for you, our readers, to do guest posting. Remember, a community like this is not only held up by those who write—it’s also made up of those that read. :)

Alright. This turned out long enough! Hopefully it’s all understandable. :)

Many blessings,
Esther
for the JOJ team

New Magazine—Issue #8

Well, it’s high time for this to finally get published! I finally finished the last round of proofreading last night, and now everything is printed and ready to go.

Please be sure to read the “Dear Friend” article (page 3). In there you’ll see a very big decision we’ve made about this magazine. It was a hard decision to make, but I’m glad God is still leading. :)

This magazine has another article on dwelling in God’s love, one about loving others, a couple recipes, and some very practical encouragement in it. Oh, yes—and Rachel has gotten together another good page of little bits of encouragement.

Click on the picture or go here to read issue #8.

We pray you’ll be encouraged by this final issue!

Blessings,
Rachel and Esther

October Wallpaper!

I want to apologize for not posting a wallpaper for September. With the giveaway going on, it slipped my mind until it was near the middle of September! 

Here it is...the October wallpaper! :) 

(Click and save image to your desktop and enjoy all month long!)
Please do not use these images for any other purpose other than personal enjoyment on the desktop of your computer!!!

Enjoy this month's wallpaper! If you enjoy using the wallpapers, please tell us! :)

New Magazine!

Hi, friends!

I’m just dropping in quickly to say that we’ve just completed another magazine! :)

This one covers a lot—from prayer to answered prayer, dwelling in God’s love, memorising scripture, recipes, and a couple stories. Hopefully you’ll be able to find a nugget to take away when you’re done reading! :)

Click on the picture or go here to read Issue #7.

God bless!
-Rachel and Esther

Don't forget!!!

Don't forget ...

to enter our giveaway below! :) 

It ends tomorrow (Sept. 11 NZT) so don't wait! ;-)

Hope you enter! :D

Rachel for the JOJ team

A Look Back (and giveaway!)

Well, this is the 100th post on Jewels of Jesus, and we thought it might be nice to have a small giveaway. First, though, we’ll have a look back.

God has been very good to us this past year. Almost exactly a year ago (it will be a year on the 13th), He led us to start this blog. At that time, there were just two writers—Tiffany, and myself. A lot has changed since we started this new venture, there has been some sad points, but over all God has ruled with grace and love.

A brief outline of JOJ’s history:

1. The first magazine was published in September, 2011.
2. We had published two more by June 2012, and then in September 2012 we started this blog.
3. On September 13th, Tiffany posted the first post.
4. Posting on here continued fairly sporadically until December 2012, when we asked for writers and Rachel joined our team (I really don’t know why I didn’t announce her myself…oh well. :)). After Rachel came along, she was able to hold up the posting part very well. I was very thankful for that! :)
5. Near the end of June, Tiffany decided to leave. That left two writers/editors—Rachel and me.
6. At that time, we asked for more writers. And, praise the Lord, you were there! I’d have to say—I’m feeling very blessed right now.
7. Currently, there are three writers besides Rachel and myself. We have started a small Google Group, where we can write, edit each other’s writings, and encourage each other. (If you want to join, we’d be very happy to have you with us, but don’t feel pressured in any way!)

Now, almost a year after starting this blog, we’re amazed at how God has worked. And very blessed, too. So we’d like to share with you some blessing, too!

Rachel and I have both picked out a book, and we will give them away to two winners. One will get Rachel’s book, and one will get mine.

I’ve chosen Twice Freed, a book by Patricia St John about the slave Onesimus. I’ve never read the book myself, but Mum has and really, really liked it. I’ve read other Patricia St John books though, and they’re all excellent.

Rachel has chosen a surprise book. Well, to actually tell you the truth she hasn’t chosen one yet—she has several choices, and she’s having a hard time deciding. So the winner of her book will get a surprise. :)

Please enter using the Rafflecopter form below. For those who were wondering—yes, this giveaway IS open to international entries.

The giveaway will close at 12 am NZT on the 11th of September, and we will announce the winner as soon as possible.

Once again, we’d like to thank all of you for your support this last year. Thank you so much for praying for us, and sending us words of encouragement. May the Lord bless each one of you!

Esther, for the JOJ team.

Changes (part 1)

This last week has been full of challenges, tears, and thanksgiving. Among other things, there have been some changes to the Jewels of Jesus team. On Sunday, Tiffany sent an email to Rachel and me, telling us of her decision to leave the JOJ team. For me, it is heart-wrenching to see her go. She’s been an incredible encouragement to me, as well as a faithful writer for the JOJ Magazine and an ‘old faithful’—she’s been an editor ever since the magazine was born back in July 2011!

While it is sad to see her leave, I can understand where she’s coming from and why she decided to go. We’ll miss her as an editor (although she said that she is still willing to read over our articles and check for any problems!), supporter, and also as a pillar of the group. Even though she’ll be gone from this end of things for the most part, I’m still thankful for our friendship. Over the past few years, we’ve become good friends, and although our friendship has had some rough points (at least, from my perspective!) we’re still good friends and I’m really thankful to God for bringing us together.

After I got the email from her, and talked on the phone for an hour, I spent a lot of time in prayer, trying to decide what to do and where to go from here. We basically had two choices: Keep the magazine and blog going, or drop the magazine and just keep the blog. From the stats I heard from Tiffany, not many girls we know are reading the magazine when we give it to them. That was discouraging! I began to wonder if it’s really worth all the effort that goes into writing the articles, designing the magazine, editing it, and finally printing it?

Part 2 will be in the next issue which should come out in about 3 weeks.

What are your thoughts—do you read the magazine enough to make it worth keeping going? Or do you not bother, and just read the blog itself?

--------------------------------------------------------------

We’d like it if you could fill out the following form—reader support is very important in what we decide.

Thanks for your input!

- Esther

Surprise!!! :)

We have a little surprise for you! :)

Jewels of Jesus will have a free monthly desktop wallpaper for our readers to enjoy! Lord willing, we'll try release a new wallpaper for each new month.

If you have a picture that could make a nice wallpaper, please send it to us at this email. Whether if we use it or not, we'll love seeing your pictures! :)

SO! For this month's wallpaper....

(Click and save image to your desktop and enjoy all month long!)

Please do not use these images for any other purpose other than personal enjoyment on the desktop of your computer!!!

Enjoy this month's wallpaper! If you enjoy using the wallpapers, please tell us! :)

The Fruit of the Spirit ..... And an Announcement!!!

Hello Everyone! 

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance: against such there is no law."

~Galatians 5:22-23~

"God develops the fruit of the Spirit in your life by allowing you to experience circumstances in which you're tempted to express the exact opposite quality. Character development always involves a choice, and temptation provides that opportunity."

--Rick Warren

What has the Lord been showing you recently?

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And the announcement ??? :)

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Issue #5 of Jewels of Jesus!!! :D

Click HERE to read this issue! 

Have fun! And once you've read it, tell us what you think! :)

~Blessings~

Rachel for the JOJ team