Striving for a Virtuous Life

Welcome to a new series that I am very excited about, friends! I have been thinking about this for a few months now and have decided that the new year is a perfect time to start this out. The idea of this series is that each month, I am going to focus on a virtue that I would love to see grow in my life. As a daughter of the King. As a newlywed housewife. As a chronic pain sufferer. As an almost 30 year old that hasn’t accomplished all  that she had dreamed of. I know for a fact that I’m not alone in any of those qualities, especially that last one.

I am excited for this series to encourage you, my dear family and friends (for if you are a reader, you are my friend!) and myself as we go along.  I pray that as you read this each month, your heart will be touched and motivated to grow these virtues in your own life.

A few ‘boring’ things before we get started – I will get all my meanings from dictionary.reference.com unless otherwise stated. For my verses, I will be using my Complete Jewish Bible, unless otherwise stated.  There, I think that covers it.

To start it off, I thought I would first touch on the word  ‘Virtue’. I had intended another word for this post but after mulling it over for a few days I decided that it only made sense to use the word that is the defining word for all the other qualities I’m going to be talking about!

Virtue – 

• moral excellence ; goodness; righteousness
• chastity; virginity
• a particular moral excellence
• a good or admirable quality or property
• conformity of one’s life to moral and ethical principles; uprightness; rectitude

“Virtue is a rather formal word, and suggests usually goodness that is consciously or steadily maintained, often in spite of temptations or evil influences.”

Let that sink in for a minute. Read it again. Right? I found it when i searched ‘goodness’. I wrote it down so fast on my pad of paper that I misspelled several words. Consciously. Steadily maintained. In spite of.

That is what this series is all about. Consciously and steadily working on being a Godly woman.

Isaiah 58:11 – “Adonai will always guide you; He will satisfy your needs in the desert, He will renew the strength in your limbs; so that you will be like a watered garden, like a spring whose water never fails.”

and Hebrews 11:1 – “Trusting is being confident of what we hope for, convinced about things we do not see.”

I wanted to share these verses as reminders that all we do is not in vain. Faith in Jesus is not an empty belief just to satiate a longing for this life alone. It is the answer for peace in this life, and the one afer. I appreciate Isaiah 58:11 so much right now. What with all I am going through physically, it is wonderful to hear that promise.

Philippians 4:8 “Keep doing what you have learned and received from me, what you have heard and seen me doing; then the God  who gives shalom (peace) will be with you.” 

We are promised peace if we strive to do as our Lord teaches.

Ephesians 4:2-3 “Always be humble, gentle and patient, bearing with one another in love, and making every effort to preserve the unity the Spirit gives thorugh the binding power of shalom.”

The words that stand out to me here are ‘making every effort ‘ – this isn’t a sorta-kinda-try to, but rather a full hearted, focused attempt at maintaining the unity between ourselves those around us.

Proverbs 31:30 ” Charm can lie, beauty can vanish, but a woman who fears Adonai should be praised.”

Yes, it’s wonderful to be, and feel beautiful but the outward beauty that we strive for every day, isn’t the beauty that will last through the years. We all know this. But we get pulled in by the world sometimes and this is a call to re-focus ourselves on the fact that true beauty is being one who fears our Lord.

2 Peter 1:5 “For this very reason, try your hardest to furnish your faith with goodness, goodness with knowledge, knowledge with self-control, self control with perseverance, perseverance with godliness, godliness with brotherly affection and brotherly affection with love.”

“Try your hardest to furnish your faith“. Just like my OH and I are talking about furnishing our new house, we need to diligantly focus on our inward ‘house’. This is one of my favorite verses – my writing-self loves how it is written, the repetition of each word to transition on to the next – but also how each attribute, each virtue, builds on the previous.

Our love for Adonai is what drives us to maintain virtue in a world that mocks, ridicules and condemns such morals. I urge you friends, and myself, to stand strong in this fight. To surround yourself with others who will build you up, not tear you down, in this daily struggle to maintain morality and preserve unity.

Here are two printables I made to help the reminder of what is truly important!  I did one black and white for those of you, like me, that don’t have the ability to print in color. I hope they work, please comment below if they don’t!

i do hope you’ve enjoyed the beginnings of this series! Happy Monday, and come visit again soon!

~Laura Starr

Tags: living a virtuous life, verses on virtue, virtue