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Showing posts from October, 2011

The Tale of a Church Planter

  The ups, downs, frustrations, joys and everything in-between on the roller coaster ride of church planting. I can honestly say that no recipe or formula for church building exists - God does not work in this way! D7 Church is proof of this. Not because we didn’t try, we did try just about everything. Our bookshelf is lined with books that tell you what works and what doesn’t work. Our computer is filled with files of blog posts from mega-church pastors, documents with strategy from other churches. We have attended conferences and visited other churches to try and learn about building a church.  It was only when we gave up and said so to God that we began to have breakthrough. This is our story. Cover Photo by Lorah Kelly   Available at: Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk | Kindle Contents: Introduction In the Beginning Never Cancel Do Not Grow Weary A Wolf and Abandonment The Least and the Small Pitch Up and Press On Build a Great Team Why Me? It’s Not About You

Being a Wife - Who is Not Independent

1 Corinthians 11:11 Nevertheless, neither is man independent of woman, nor woman independent of man, in the Lord. Men AND women are not independent, God made us both interdependent. This means that we both need each other. If you look at any marriage where one person doesn’t need the other then you will find an unbalanced, unhealthy and unhappy marriage. It doesn’t work. It wasn’t made to work. The design for marriage was interdependence. Three sorts of relationships exist, co-dependent, independent and interdependent. Co-dependence is a win/lose situation, independence is a lose/lose situation and interdependence is a win/win situation. Let’s take a closer look at what our relationships should not be and then end off with what they should be. This is a fascinating subject and warrants an entire book dedicated to it. I will briefly touch on it as best I can, but please do your own further study and gain a healthy perspective on interdependency. Co-dependence There are thre

Marriage Tip #13 - Keeping Winning Their Heart

I was telling Eric one morning how much I loved all the things he did to try and win my heart while we were dating.  It was his intentional words and cute poems he used to write for me that wooed me and made my heart melt.  Since those early days in 2004 until today, I have kept all his cards, handwritten notes and other cute things from him.  These are my treasures and if ever I had to leave our home in a hurry I would grab my treasure box, a small box in my desk full on little notes from Eric, my children and some even from friends.  As I was chatting to Eric about how I missed his efforts to win my heart I realised that I too needed to continue to win his heart as I once did.  It's the age old story of plank and speck syndrome ! Marriage can get pretty dull if we live only to get through each day!  Making an effort to keep marriage magical, mysterious and romantic is essential!  With that in mind I determined to find out what I did that won Eric's heart so that I could cont

Passion & Purity STUDY GUIDE

Passion & Purity Study Guide, based on Passion & Purity ,  is a practical, interactive workbook that will take you from a place of desperately needing to feel loved to a place of complete bliss.     Sound to good to be true?  It is possible, we all need to be loved most desperately and many of us have looked for love in all the wrong places. This study guide covers practical steps from my search for love, all the mistakes I made and finally the truth that I found that set me free.     Passion and purity can be yours too, it's not too late.  No matter where you have been, who you have been with or what you have done, there is still hope.  You can be pure again, you can find true love. Written as a fully interactive  workbook format, this study guide can be used for self study or small group study.  Buy your copy now from Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

Submission

I had the awesome privilege of being able to share the word at our church this past Sunday. My message was a result of spending most of this year asking God to teach me about submission.  What I discovered has totally blown me away and I hope what I shared impacted people as much as it impacted me!  In a nutshell, I highlighted the different sorts of submission from the Bible and tried my best to explain what exactly submission is.  This message also forms a part of a chapter on submission in my book, Esther or Delilah , which is coming out next year. In the meantime, have a listen to the message here .

Being a Wife - Who Wants to be a Wife

Being a wife is more of an attitude than a gender. You can get women that are clearly not wives, yes they are female but their attitude is that of a man. Don't assume that because you are married that you want to be a wife. You might be married but you might still be acting like you are totally independent.  “I am the boss around here!” “I make the decisions.” “I can take care of myself and provide for myself, I don’t need your money!” I am sure you get the picture. When a woman says things like that then do you really think she is a wife? On paper she might be but in her heart I think not. When you get married you become one with your husband. Mark 10:8 and the two will become one flesh. So they are no longer two, but one flesh. You take a completely different form, you are no longer your own but you are now a part of something new. 1 Corinthians 7:4 The wife does not have authority over her own body but yields it to her husband. In the same way, the husband does

Secure on the Rock STUDY GUIDE

Since the Hope's Journey STUDY GUIDE has been selling three times as fast as the actual book , I thought it would be good to let you know about the Secure on the Rock STUDY GUIDE too. This book is a very practical workbook that will take you from any form of insecurity to a place of freedom and security. Based on the book, Secure on the Rock , the study guide covers practical steps from my journey of extreme, unreasonable, controlling insecurity to freedom in security. It is written in a fully interactive workbook format and can be used for self study or small group study.  Buy your copy now from Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk

Time to Laugh

"A merry heart does good, like medicine" - Proverbs 17:22 Do you have anything funny to add?  Let's start today with a good wholesome chuckle together :)

Being a Wife - Who Builds Her Husband

Have you ever noticed how little is said about the husband in Proverbs 31. It pretty much says that he trusts her (v11), he praises her (v28) and is known in the gates, when he sits among the elders of the land (v23). Could it be that all that she does is the  reason for his honour at the gates?  Verse twenty three seems quite out of place, stuck right in the middle of a detailed description of all the work that she does. But he's not really out of place. He is actually perfectly placed. Our work is what we use to build our husbands up with. It is when we gladly lay down our glory that our husbands are lifted up. It is in the midst of all her work that her husband sits as an elder at the gate. Her wise use of time, talents, treasures, and her words is what glorifies him.  As wives our role is primarily to build our husbands. Everything we do should be to lift him up and not to lift ourselves up above him. Don’t worry, you will never lose. Do you notice the final verse of Pr

Being a Wife

Being a Wife is a follow on from Being a Woman where we go into the Biblical role of the wife in depth.  A refreshing read on being a wife with lively, real discussion with a group of every day ordinary women - it's NOT at all what you might think. Available on: Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk | Kindle Contents: Invitation Heterosexual or Not? The Five Stages of Marriage Being a Wife      Who Wants To Be a Wife      Who Builds Her Husband      Who is Not Independent      Who is Not Independent II       Who Helps and Protects      Who Is Not Deceived      Who Does Not Complain      Who is Satisfied      Who Does Not Grow Cold       Who Does Not Retaliate       Who Expresses Her Feelings       Who Enjoys Sex      Who Understands Submission      Who Chooses Submission      Who Shows Respect      Who is Happy      Who Desires God       Who Knows Jesus Purchase Options Full Set Study Notes£20.00 GBP Individual

Free to Be Me

I can't do this, it's too hard!" "Well I am going to do it because I have decided that I can." "But it's too painful, surely I will die if I keep going!" "Nope, I will push through, I will run until that tree over there, no matter what it takes." This was my conversation with myself one morning. I had set a goal for where I was going to run to but half way there I wanted to quit, I was running out of breath and my legs were turning to jelly. The goal was in sight though, near the end of a very long and very beautiful Cotswold country lane. I decided not to quit! No matter how my body felt or how much moaning I was doing in my mind, I had to reach that tree. So I ran without quitting. Then it happened. You always hear of it but I experienced it, I broke through the wall. It was as if there was literally something keeping me back and once I had broken through it, I was free! I could run and run and run, it was wonderful. The tre

I Don't Know How She Does It

Sarah Jessica Parker stars in a sparkling comedy about a mum juggling marriage, children and a high-powered job.  It's a really lovely movie that leaves you feeling warm and squishy inside rather than grossed out because you've seen things you really didn't want to see - which is the response I have had to most movies I have seen lately. I highly recommend this movie if you want to laugh and cry and leave the cinema feeling good about your life - whether you are a working mum or not!  You can watch the trailer here . I have also found a fantastic website that you can use to check out a movie before watching it - it really helps me not waste time watching rubbish movies.  See for yourself at www.movieguide.org

And the winner is...

Congratulations Samuel ! You have randomly been selected as the winner of our Pink Blush Giveaway . I actually did it twice and you came #1 both times so it's definitely meant for you!  I hope you enjoy these beautiful flowers. Thanks to all of you who entered! We will do another giveaway soon.

Money Matters - Introduction

Today I read about four hundred young girls that were rescued from the sex trade. What shocked me most were their ages - age two to age fifteen! Immediately after reading this I went into my two year old daughter’s bedroom and watched her sleeping peacefully. It was impossible to imagine her not being tucked up safely in her bed sleeping as peacefully as she was. I could not imagine what sort of person would want to have her for their sexual pleasure! Turning a blind eye to this information and all sorts of other awful stories from around the globe was no longer justifiable. Saying that there was nothing that I can do about it at that point in time no longer worked as a reasonable excuse as I knew ‘one day’ would never come. Today is that day. Today is ‘one’ day. Today is that day that I stop justifying my passivity and start making a plan to do something about it. I will be plagued by the thought of this two year old in the sex trade forever if I don’t do something about it