Tina Byler 5/9/24 Tina Byler 5/9/24

15 Rules You Can't Argue With

15 Irrefutable Truths from somebody who has seen it all.

Occasionally a person reaches a point in life where they feel like they’ve learned a lot about living and had enough experiences to know a few things.

That usually comes before a massive crisis where they realize they know nothing about anything and in fact, their knowledge of life only makes them realize how little they know.

I recently turned 21 and am feeling that young, brazen confidence that I know all there is to know about life and love.

I’ve concluded that I should take advantage of this knowledge as I sit on the cusp of a crisis. Therefore, I’ve written down everything I’ve learned about life before the inevitable crash comes. Here is my complete and exhaustive list of things to do to lead a successful life on Planet Earth.

“I’ve written down everything I’ve learned about life. Here is my complete and exhaustive list of things to do to lead a successful life on Planet Earth.”

Water is life. Drink it. Jump in it. Float on it.

2. Carrying a water bottle with you everywhere you go is a sign of maturity. Do it and don’t freeload off of others’ water bottles.

4. Don’t let your mind wander too long in what could be.

5. Pick up a book instead of picking up your phone.

6. Don’t listen to the same song too many times.

7. Sleep is good, but don’t let it get in the way of other good things.

8. The only way to get a difficult thing off your to do list is to do it.

9. Naps ruin lives. Sleep at night, not in the middle of the day.

10. A shower and a clean face make a lot of problems shrink to their actual size.

12. Being late is a habit, not a lifestyle. You can change a habit. Don’t make people wait on you.

13. Hurry is a joy killer. Slow your life down so that you can drive slow and still be punctual.

14. There is no point in arguing about what tastes good. Don’t argue about food.

15. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Tina calls Northwestern Pennsylvania her home, and Queens, New York her sometimes home. She enjoys spending quality time with loved ones, reading captivating and educational books, spending time in coffee shops, and occasionally engaging in an active lifestyle via biking, rock climbing, hiking, and swimming. She values the power of words and loves to see writing change and impact lives. If you’d like to contact her directly, you can reach her at ***tina.thesimpledesignco@gmail.com***.

Tina Byler 4/25/24 Tina Byler 4/25/24

God’s Beauty in the Big City

I’ve been living in the largest city in the U.S. for 7 months. Here's what I've learned about God's beauty.

“Don’t you get tired of all the concrete?” “I would miss the trees!” “Don’t you want to get out in God’s nature and away from the city?”

I’ve been living in Queens, New York City for 7 months and people love to ask me questions like this. Maybe partly because I moved from a community in Pennsylvania (literally meaning Penn’s Woods) where trees are everywhere and towns are tiny and sparse. It seems like moving from that to the largest city in the United States should be quite an adjustment.

But I’ve found that God’s beauty and creativity is displayed everywhere on the earth, not just in nature. Over and over, I’ve seen God’s handiwork, even when I’m walking over miles of concrete.

“ God is all around me, everywhere I look.”

A father at a park sweetly sings a Spanish song to his daughters in the stroller. He pushes it carefully to avoid the bumps in the path.
There’s a magnolia tree on 51st that I’ve watched grow from buds to beautiful flowers over the course of several weeks. Its massive branches hang over the sidewalk and create a canopy of pink, sweet smelling shade.
A woman walking on my street smiled at me when I looked her in the eye and stopped to ask me how my day was going. Her face was bright with joy.
A beautiful gray cat lets me touch its soft nose.
An MTA employee cheerfully sweeps up trash on the subway car. He stops to joke with the kids on the train and makes them laugh. He leaves with a smile on his face.
The old ladies at the temple only spoke Tibetan, but they insisted I take some crackers from their table of snacks.
A police officer stands outside the elementary school directing kids and parents into the school. She welcomes the kids by name.
My neighbor is always smiling. He sells flowers and beautiful growing things at a little store on the corner.
As I sit at a large window, I watch a group of highschool students leave school at the end of the day, laughing, and sharing a pack of fruit snacks.
A teenage boy goes out of his way to open two doors for an elderly lady.
A small bush bloomed in the cold of February and kept blooming even after it snowed.

God is all around me, everywhere I look. There is beauty here in this place, and it makes me dream of a City that is yet to come;

The Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. It shines with the glory of God. The glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The glory and honor of the nations are brought into it and nothing impure will ever enter it.

Revelation 21

Tina Byler 3/28/24 Tina Byler 3/28/24

The Bible in One Week

How reading the Bible in one week changed my life.

Recently I, along with five close friends of mine, successfully read through the entire Bible chronologically in 6 days.

It was an incredible, even, dare I say, life changing experience. I don’t know if I can impart to you exactly what an impact it had on me. So I will only try my best to convince you to do it for yourself.

“It was an incredible, even, dare I say, life changing experience”

We are far from the first to do this, but we loosely followed a plan by Shawn Hochstetler. He first did it in 2020 after being inspired by a group of Christians from a closed country who were risking their lives to read the Bible. When they finally had the chance to read God’s word, they refused to stop and read day and night until they made it to the last page.

We didn’t read day and night, but we did read for 10 to 12 hours every day with 4 short breaks throughout the day.

We read from a chronological New Living Translation Bible for easy comprehension and to read the events of the Bible in the order they happened, with the prophetic books, Psalms, and Proverbs interwoven with historical accounts and the book of Acts integrated into Paul's letters to the churches. Reading the Bible chronologically in such a short span of time gives a unique perspective to the Bible that I have never seen before.

Now when Jesus says, “You have heard that it was said,” and when Matthew or Luke or Paul mention prophecies fulfilled by the coming of the Messiah, I know exactly what they're referring to and the context of the original law or prophecy. Of course, I’ve always had a general knowledge of the Bible, but I’ve never understood it like I do now.

“I’ve always had a general knowledge of the Bible, but I’ve never understood it like I do now. ”

Knowing the Bible as one story with huge overarching themes and the same God over it all, as opposed to reading it as a collection of different books and stories and time periods, has strengthened my faith, given me an increased awareness of God’s sovereignty, and made the entire Bible come alive to me like it never has before.

At the same time, it's made me realize how little I know about the Bible. I don’t often choose to read from Leviticus or Jeremiah for my personal devotions, I would much rather read from Matthew or Romans, which means I often neglect parts of the Bible that I don’t find interesting or helpful to me.

“I had been missing huge parts of God’s story and character.”

In doing so, I have been missing huge parts of God’s story and character. Now I know the Old Testament is rich and no part of the Holy Word of God should be neglected or held up as more important.

Because the Bible works together beautifully as a unit, and I never would have picked up the bigger story by spending all my time in the New Testament or the books I enjoy reading. Furthermore, should we as Christians not be experts in the Bible? And how could I ever be an expert in the Bible if I didn’t study the whole thing?

I encourage you, no matter what part of the Christian journey you are on, to take a week out of your life and read the Bible. It’s a big commitment and takes a lot of work and we all have responsibilities, but as Ann Voscamp encourages, “Do hard and Holy things.”

Besides, is anything too hard when God is involved? And is any sacrifice too great when Jesus is the heartbeat of our lives?

“Is anything too hard when God is involved? And is any sacrifice too great when Jesus is the heartbeat of our lives?”

You can find more information on reading the Bible in a week here: Bible Week (notion.site)

Tina Byler 1/22/24 Tina Byler 1/22/24

House Keys in Holy Hands

We cannot share the gospel with people who could lose everything because of it, and not be willing to give everything in return.

Several months ago I read The Gospel Comes With a House Key by Rosaria Butterfeild. While most of what she wrote about has, more or less, gone in one ear and out the other, one thing stays firmly planted in my brain.

“Welcoming people into our homes and offering them a place at the table, a house key, and a warm environment is an integral part of the Gospel”

If you haven’t read it, The Gospel Comes With a House Key is about how life changing ordinary hospitality can be for unbelievers. Butterfeild shares her own story of how she came to know God through a family who invited her into their home over and over to share food, a safe space, and conversations that always came around to Jesus.

She believes welcoming people into our homes and offering them a place at the table, a house key, and a warm environment is an integral part of the gospel. She lives it out and sees over and over how neighbors and strangers become friends and are brought into the family of God over the dinner table.

“If you want to share the gospel with… anyone who will lose family and homes, the gospel must come with a house key.”

— Rosaria Butterfeild

In the middle of her book, Butterfield writes something, almost in passing, but after I read it, I had to sit and think for a while. She brings out Mark 10:28-31 where Jesus talks about leaving our houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, children, and land for His sake, and she writes, “If you want to share the gospel with… anyone who will lose family and homes, the gospel must come with a house key.”

She emphasizes offering a house key to those who will lose their own. We cannot simply go out on the streets, proclaiming the gospel and calling Muslims, Jews, people from the LGBTQ community, or anyone else who has everything to lose, to repentance. We must follow it up by giving them what they may have to sacrifice to accept the gospel.

They need to know who will take them in when their families and communities reject them. Furthermore, Jesus commands us to love, not just our friends, but also strangers, foreigners, and enemies. That includes refugees, orphans, the homeless, and the impoverished. What better way to be the hands and feet of Jesus, than to offer a home to those who don’t have one.

Sometimes it’s easier to preach and teach and share the gospel with someone and call it a day. But what should come after that is an invitation into a community who will take them in and be their family in Christ when they sacrifice for the sake of the Gospel.

“They need to know where home is.”

“We cannot share the gospel with people who could lose everything because of it, and not be willing to give everything in return.”

The gospel demands sacrifice from us. Some more than others. We cannot share the gospel with people who could lose everything because of it, and not be willing to give everything in return. When we accept this reality, the gospel and hospitality cannot be separated.

Tina Byler 11/13/23 Tina Byler 11/13/23

A Story of Blazing Glory

A short story, inspired by Ezekiel 16.

Inspired by Ezekiel 16

The morning you were born, dew covered the earth in a cold shimmer. The sun peered over the mountains surrounding you and lit the beads of water on fire.

There you lay, where your mother had left you, among the cold, freshly cut field. There was no comfort for you. No swaddle to warm you, no soft place to lay your head. Only cold, short grass that was drenched in flaming dew. The sun tried its best to warm you, but its light was the cold light of winter and you felt no warmth.

You cried out in your misery, blood covered and pitiful. And yet no eye that saw you pitied you. No heart broke for you. On the day you were born, you were despised and rejected. And still, the sun peered over the mountains surrounding you, trying to warm you.

“I knelt beside you and took you into my arms and whispered, ‘Live!’”

On the day you were born, I passed by the field and saw you wallowing in your blood and in the mud of the cold, flaming dew. I knelt beside you and took you into my arms and whispered, “Live!” I cleaned you and made you flourish like a beautiful flower. As you grew, I cared for you and loved you in your misery and pain.

With the sun and mountains surrounding you, you became as beautiful as the day you were born with the flaming dew shimmering like glitter over the field. I clothed you in my own robe made of fine silk and adorned you with beautiful jewels and embroidered cloth and expensive leather. I anointed you with oil and placed a beautiful crown of glory on your head. I gave you food that tickled your tastebuds and filled your stomach.

You knew nothing but comfort and love from me.

You were exceedingly beautiful and treated as royalty.

You were redeemed and transformed.

And on the day the sun disappears forever behind the mountains that surround you, the splendor and majesty I clothed you in will shine brighter than the sun ever did, setting the dew on the fields ablaze forever and ever.

“This I did for you”

— The Lord Your Redeemer

This I did for you, declares Jehovah Go’El, the Lord your Redeemer.

Tina Byler 9/21/23 Tina Byler 9/21/23

Take More for Granted

When we lose something or someone we love, we begin to realize how much of life we take for granted. We often don’t know how much we have and how richly we are blessed until we lose it. It’s a fact of life that we may never be able to get rid of.

“We take small things for granted all the time and we won’t stop with a blog post. ”

But I’m not here to tell you to stop taking life for granted or to go play with your kids while you can, or call your mom before it’s too late. We take small things for granted all the time and we won’t stop with a blog post.

“Isn’t it a mercy... that God grants us the bliss of normalcy and taking things for granted?”

We wake up every morning, thinking everything will be the same. That everyone we love will still be there and the steady job we have will always be waiting on us. We assume that everything good in our life will keep being good. Of course we remember to be thankful for some things. What would a person be if they weren’t thankful? But no one is thankful for everything all of the time. Some might recognize that fact and think of it as a negative thing. And indeed, a thankful spirit is a necessity in a Christian life, but isn’t it a mercy that we can take things for granted? Isn’t it a mercy that we don’t constantly think about what we could lose; that God grants us the bliss of normalcy and taking things for granted?

We do not start our days scared that our house may be bombed.

We do not live in constant fear of losing our lives because of what we believe.

We do not worry about when our next meal will be.

We live taking the blessings of a safe shelter, security and freedom, and simple necessities for granted. Isn’t it a mercy that our lives are so normal that we take things for granted?

About the Author

Tina calls Northwestern Pennsylvania her home where she enjoys spending quality time with loved ones, reading captivating and educational books, spending time in coffee shops, and occasionally engaging in an active lifestyle via biking, rock climbing, hiking, and running. She values the power of words and loves to see writing change and impact lives. If you’d like to contact her directly, you can reach her at tina.thesimpledesignco@gmail.com.

Tina Byler 8/28/23 Tina Byler 8/28/23

Plastic Straws and Turtles

Plastic straws and turtles are two things I have become hyper aware of in the last several years. It all started with a TikTok, believe it or not, of someone making a funny video about wearing a green shirt and buying metal straws to support the turtles. What started as a joke about single handedly saving the turtles everytime I used a metal straw, grew into something more serious. I am by no means living a minimal waste life or actively saving the environment every hour of the day, but I have found that living more environmentally conscious often comes down to nothing more than thought patterns.

“What difference can I even make?”

We’re often tempted to think that the problem of waste, microplastics, fast fashion, and pollution are all too huge to even do anything about them. We wonder if these problems may be less about the individual and more about large corporations. We ask the question, “what difference can I even make?” That question is valid and the fact is, pollution and waste are huge problems that will take immense efforts by millions of people to change or even slow. But we don’t need to talk about that now. We’re here to talk about plastic straws and turtles.

Because using metal straws became a joke about saving the turtles, I began to really think about every time I used a plastic straw instead of a metal one. I knew that my tiny effort was hardly making a dent in the pollution problem, but I soon started noticing other things. Like how often plasticware appeared at gatherings and how I would quickly throw out my slightly dirty plastic plate for a clean one. Or how easy it was to lose my plastic cup because I could just grab another one, or how convenient it was to pick up a couple bottled waters from the gas station on a long road trip. Or how I’d search out a plastic straw for my drink when I could just as easily have enjoyed it without one. How the vegetables I bought came wrapped individually in plastic for no apparent reason or how often I would ask for a plastic bag when I could have carried my purchases without one.

It was nothing but a joke at first. Something to laugh at because of course, that one time I used my dusty metal straw instead of a plastic one, could surely not make a difference for the entire environment.

“It was never about the plastic straws or the turtles.”

Or could it? It was never about the plastic straws or the turtles. It was always about thought patterns and the cumulative effect of a lifestyle.

About the Author

Tina Byler 7/27/23 Tina Byler 7/27/23

This I Believe

Until you believe what you know, your lifestyle won’t change.

People who grow up in Christian settings are taught from a young age that God created the world, Jesus is the son of God, Jesus died on the cross for our sins, God has endless grace and love for us, and we are forgiven of our sins if we ask. Theological ideas and patterns of thought are emphasized over and over till they can be repeated from memory. Children are taught an almost endless array of biblical knowledge that they can discuss in casual conversation by the time they are teenagers. The question is do they believe what they know?

For any of us who know all the things the Bible says, do we believe that God, beginning with nothing but Himself, created everything, from the cosmos that are billions of light years away, down to the very atoms that make us? Do we believe that Jesus was fully God and fully man? Do we believe that God truly forgives us of all the wrongs we have done when we simply ask him for forgiveness? Do we believe that His grace covers everything every day of our lives?

“It is one thing to know, it is something completely different to believe.”

It is one thing to know, it is something completely different to believe. If we do not believe what we know about God, we can easily go an entire day without talking to him, or reading His word, or asking for forgiveness. We live stuck in guilt and shame, never quite knowing the full potential of the characteristics of God. If we do not believe in God and all the things He has promised, He has no value to us. A lifestyle like that leads to spiritual dehydration, but until we believe what we know, our lifestyles won’t change.

“Until we believe what we know, our lifestyles won’t change.”

When we truly believe the things we know we can live free from guilt and the burdens of past sins because God forgives. We can live in preparation for eternal life with the living God because eternity is not just a concept. We can live renewed everyday by God’s grace because his mercies are new every morning. We can live without worry because He takes care of all His creations, even the sparrows. We can live courageously because God did not give us a spirit of fear, but of power.

This temporary world offers knowledge, but God offers more. He calls us to something higher. Our lives can transcend knowledge. We can live in the power of believing what we know.

About the Author

Tina Byler 6/23/23 Tina Byler 6/23/23

When Prayer is Dangerous

Do you dare to pray dangerously?

When I first heard the term “praying dangerously,” I was still a young teenager trying to understand a real, conversational relationship with an almighty God. At the time, I was amazed that I had never heard about this idea before. I was captivated by it and at times a bit scared to think too deeply about it. Since then I’ve been slowly learning to pray dangerously and wondering why we don’t talk about this more.

What does it mean to pray dangerously? A dangerous prayer is asking God for opportunities that do not immediately benefit us, with no thought of ourselves; asking God to give us opportunities of growth, chances to show His love to others, or opportunities to share the gospel.

“When praying for opportunities to grow, one cannot pray timidly. ”

When praying for these things, one must pray in complete faith that God will hear the prayer and answer it. Of course, faith in prayer is always necessary, but when praying for opportunities to grow, one cannot pray timidly. Because when we pray for things that are completely aligned with God’s will and what He teaches, does He not answer them?

John writes in 1 John 5:14, “This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.”

Of course God will answer those prayers! If you ask Him to, God will give you many opportunities to exercise your patience, or act unselfishly, or to share God’s love with others.

“Am I willing to walk through the doors God will inevitably open?”

The question then is not, “will God open those doors,” but “am I willing to walk through the doors God will inevitably open.” Therein lies the danger. Will you risk asking God for things that will stretch you and possibly be uncomfortable for you? Do you have the courage to ask God to give you a heart that beats the same rhythm as His? Do you dare to pray dangerously?

About the Author