Thankful Thursday - Miscellaneous Various Assorted Mixed Diverse Sundry

It is a delight to host Thankful Thursday this month. I have been a participant in this particular blogging venue since I began writing more than three years ago.

I count it as a privilege to share praises together as we honor the Lord for the awesome blessings He pours into our lives.

Next month we will meet at Grace Alone. December we will return to Women Taking A Stand.

My heart is full. At every turn I can see the Lord working in and around my life. My husband has been unemployed since January but today, I have never felt richer. I praise you Jesus for:

• The fall season ~ Cooler breezes, sweaters, the colors rust, gold, orange, brown

• The Love Dare Bible study

• Email from my bloggy sister Iris this morning at 6 am

• The 30 days – Mind of Christ experiment*

• Each and every reader who stops here

• My husband

• My son and daughter

• My family in Christ

What are you thankful for? Be Blessed, Lynn

*It’s not too late to join the rest of us on this journey, The Mind of Christ. Expect it to change your life. Read about it here.

Praising the Lord today! Hugs

Theme Song!

We're just days away from the kick off of the Mind of Christ. I hope you've decided to join us for the month of October to refocus our lives on Christ and put him back on the throne of our lives. I will tell you, God is doing some amazing things—some a bit painful. Yesterday he showed me another place in my life that I was acting out of selfish motivations. It wasn't pretty, but it was so wonderful, all at once. I know that might not make sense, but God's discipline is healing and relieving.

I have another song for you. I declare it our theme song for the amazing journey we're about to embark upon. You may recognize "While I'm Waiting" (by John Waller) from the movie Fireproof. It's a beautiful song and depicts so well the struggle and necessary heart for so many of us. Waiting is a part of every person's life, and often the trial itself for those of us in a spiritually mismatched marriage. I pray this song will minister to your weary hearts and strengthen you to keep waiting and trusting God.

He's there. He's working. He hasn't forgotten you. Let's watch together as God does some amazing things in our heart and in our lives.

Love you all so dearly and praying earnestly,
Dineen

Every Human Should Answer This Question

On Saturday I attended my annual writer’s conference for the San Diego Christian Writer’s Guild. Every year something profound comes from this conference and this year…… SO much more than I could dream or think.

Cec Murphy was our keynote speaker. Many of you know Cec as an author of something like a bazillion books as well as the bestselling author of 90 Minutes In Heaven. (I loved that book) I have been richly blessed to sit under his teaching a few times and Saturday was no exception.

Cec asked me a question on Saturday that sent my heart flying and ignighted a new fire in my being. I came home and called Dineen and asked her the same question. Now we are both filled with such amazing hope and determination. But, this question is not just for us. It is for you also. Are you ready?

 WHAT IS YOUR BLISS?

What is your bliss? What dream resides in you that gives you bliss. Absolute happiness, absolute…… bliss?

I want you think about it right now. Do you know what is your bliss?

I knew the answer instant Cec spoke the question. I KNEW. Without a doubt and with a full conviction to keep on keepin’ on.

If you have lost your bliss, God is calling you now. If you don’t know what your bliss is, the Lord, Almighty, has spoken your name. God is the giver of bliss. He has instilled in you a God given dream so big and wild that it seems unattainable. But God gave you that dream and more than anything He is waiting for you to live knowing and doing what gives you bliss.

Travel with us in the next 30 days to discovery. Doesn’t it make sense that if we allow the Lord to transform our minds and our hearts we will KNOW the answer to this question? Indeed we will.

It’s not too late to sign up today. I will get your envelope in the mail by tomorrow morning. Please email me with your mailing address and commit to this life-changing journey.

What is your bliss?

Be blessed, Lynn

Please email me

Ephesians 3:20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

Weekend Devo — Time to Worship

My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. — 2 Corinthians 12:9

Something's happening. Over a week's time, God showed me 2 Corinthians 12:9 at least five times, the last at a conference I was at last weekend, given in a moving devotional by a doctor who's a missionary in Africa.

Now these verses have shown up repeatedly in multiple places, and not just for me. Several people have been led to at least one of these verses. Lynn used Isaiah 43:19 in Monday's post introducing The Mind of Christ journey, and let me tell you, she and I hadn't even talked specifically yet. I was floored to see this verse  yet again.

For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? — Isaiah 43:19 (NLT)

For I am doing something in your own day, something you wouldn't believe even if someone told you about it. — Habakkuk 1:5 (NLT)

So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and at the right time he will lift you up in honor. — 1 Peter 5:6 (NLT)

These Scriptures have meant so much to me personally this last week. Yet I believe this goes beyond one person's interpretation. God seems to be moving in a mighty way, on the verge of revealing something very real and personal to each of us.

Below is a video of the Revelation Song sung by Kari Jobe of Gateway Worship. This is one of the songs we worshiped to at that conference the final day. During it, I heard God say, "Watch what I do" repeatedly.

I hope you'll play it with the intention of soaking in our wonderful Savior Jesus and his amazing holiness. Let's prepare our hearts for this thirty day journey to put Christ on the throne of our lives and to truly have the mind of Christ.

I don't want to miss what God's about to do. I hope you don't either.

Praying and believing,
Dineen

You're Outahere!

I have a question for you.

Do you ever just get tired of being sick n’ tired?

I’m sitting at my desk thinking back upon this crazy journey, my unequally yoked marriage. As I mentally walk through the months and years of my past, I am remembering how I at times would cling to my disappointment, my anger and the unfairness of it all. My unfulfilled expectations would rise, front and center in my mind and that is when it would happen.

Enter stage right: Satan and his minions arrive to perpetuate my thoughts of discontent. Heaven forbid that I would be cleaning house that day because those negative thoughts would course through my brain over and over as I moved from room to room flipping the dusting rag around followed by frenzied vacuuming.

I would get worked into a ridiculous mess.

What a waste of time.

Well I am sick n’ tired of being sick n’ tired.

I am sick of my selfishness. Sick of thinking about the “what ifs” and I am ready to live differently. I want to live in the presence of Jesus where my selfishness fades away in the absolute brilliance of something far more profound.

Are you tired of being sick and tired? Did you say, "yes?" Then you just said yes to God.

So please walk a new path with me, Dineen and Angela. We are about to discover what it really means to have our minds and our hearts transformed into Christlikenes.

The beginning of this journey is Friday, October 2, 2009: 30 Days ~ The Mind of Christ.

To begin your journey, I have something I must send you. I will mail you an envelope. So, please email me now and commit to 30 days in October to discover what this scripture really means.

Romans 12:2 Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

So many of you have registered already. What a blast and what amazing fulfillment await us as we travel these 30 days together. I can’t wait.

One more thing. Say goodbye to Sick n’ tired because he’s outahere!

Be blessed, Lynn D

Please email me

30 Days - The Mind of Christ

Over two months ago the Lord woke me up in the middle of the night. He gave me another idea to share with you. If you have been reading here at Spiritually Unequal Marriage for a while, you might remember the Kingdom Assignment. It was an amazing experiment in which many of us participated in last November. What a humbling and triumphant experience it was. God has the best ideas! (to read some of the posts, click on the Kingdom Assignment in the sidebar.)

This new idea that God gave me is similar except this time, the Lord wants to do something for you.

Today we are going to prepare and step out into another experiment. The Lord said it is a perfect time to prepare us for a major shift in our soul and lead us into the most amazing season of our lives.

Just like last year, I want to mail you something important to start our 30 days together. We will walk a new path together each day in October. Beginning Thursday October, 1, 2009 every post here at Spiritually Unequal Marriage will be centered on this specific journey.

So, today, pray and ask the Lord if you are in… It won’t take a ton of time. But, it will change you. It will transform your mind to be more Christ like and will change your heart into the likeness of God. If you want to be part of this challenge, Please email me privately your mailing address. I won’t share it with anyone. I only plan to mail you a single envelope just like last year.

Romans 12:2 Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

 Find out what this verse really means. By the end of next month you will gain new perspective.

Do you need a miracle:

• in your marriage
• with your teenager
• your boss
• in the overwhelming schedule you keep
• with the pain of a lost relationship
• bearing the hurt of betrayal
• because you have lost a loved one

All of these things will fall into proper perspective and their proper place. You will see the Lord first then the struggle.... well it will just.....( tune in and find out) 

Isaiah 43:19a

For I am about to do something new.

See, I have already begun! Do you not see it?

I can’t wait.

Say YES to Jesus and then watch as Christ does something new before your very eyes.

Be blessed, Lynn

Please email me

Weekend Devo — Grace

"My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." — 2Corinthians 12:9

God has brought me to this verse four times in one week. Each time I’ve prayed over a specific ongoing issue, he’s bought me back to or reminded me of this verse.

Years ago I remember asking someone at church what exactly grace was. He said, “It’s God’s unmerited favor.” It’s unearned. Christianity is the only faith that doesn’t require us to earn our way into heaven, because of God’s grace. And his mercy.

My prayer now is that God would help me fully understand what his grace means in my life. For a perfectionist and overachiever like myself, this a difficult journey, to let go of my attempts to earn God’s favor and understand that I’m already acceptable in his eyes. In fact, there’s nothing I can do to make myself more acceptable.

Jesus already took care of that.

Praying and believing,
Dineen

The Prizes of Victory

“I’ve prayed, but nothing’s happening.”

I felt my daughter’s pain. Not just over the health issue she was struggling with but also her confusion that God hadn’t taken the condition away.

How often had I prayed over several issues in my own life—some for years—to see nothing change? Through those years I’d come to learn about God’s faithfulness and his desire for me to learn from trials, not just get through them. I’d come to trust him and his plan, and to realize that though circumstances may appear nothing’s happening, something definitely is. Yet to encapsulate years of learning about God and my growing faith to a handful of words is a tall challenge. Plus, I still shared her frustration at times.

I recently read a devotional in Streams in the Desert, which spoke of this perseverance in the face of trials. The author made a connection to Romans 8:37, “No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us,” stating that in walking through the trial and seeing adversity as tools of learning, we become more than conquerors.

Here in lies the victory, that we see the things working against us as key elements to further our journey and growth. I read this verse many a time and had even asked God to make me “more than a conqueror.” But it wasn’t until reading this devotional that I realized God was already answering my prayer in these difficult times. I was learning to lean on God and depend upon him, despite the situation and in spite of the ongoing issues. In the midst of difficulty, I was already victorious.

Again, I was amazed at the synchronicity between everything in our lives and God’s plan. And here’s the final piece to this puzzle—one that blew me away. When we obtain this is attitude of seeing trial as important to becoming the people God created us to be, we’re not only conquerors, we discover the prizes of our victory.

The peace that surpasses understanding (Phil. 4:7) and the joy in the midst of trial (James 1:2-3).

Praying and believing,
Dineen

The Enemy Never Gives Up But Neither Does our Great God

This month we meet at Women Taking A Stand and I will see you here again for the month of October and November at Grace Alone.

I find it fascinating and somewhat interesting that a great number of my Christian friends have experienced sever and heavy spiritual battles over the past five days.

Dineen, has a faced raging battle this week and right before she is heading out of town to her annual writers conference. Exactly like last year. Almost an identical repeat.. So strange.

Many of you over at 1Peter3Living experienced extreme conflict. You faced issues dealing with health, marriages, spouses, finances, a multitude of setbacks and defeats.

A ton of you who I know through blogging have been deeply affected by evil. I know a couple of you who live in Florida were smacked in the teeth with unexpected ferocity. In Kenya, the woman with the cow and her entire family faced an immediate crisis. They were desperate for food and water.

Not to be spared, women in my church here in town, my BFF Pam was hit severely hard yesterday morning and the day before that, it was me.

What is going on?

I can’t explain why we were all hit at once. I don’t know why it was so severe and painful. I have asked the Father about it but I am not certain the why of it all nor the simultaneous timing and the sheer number of believers affected this week.

What I can explain is this. Each and every one of us will rise again. We will stand once more following our blows and be stronger the next time. We will rise to our full stature propelled by our mighty and powerful God. We will not back down, we will not surrender, we will not give in nor allow the enemy even an inch into our lives and the lives of our family.

One day in the future perhaps we will see the whole picture as to what is going on in the spiritual realm….. And you know what we will see?

Our prayers.

For one another, for protection, healing, fortification, calmness, steadiness, forgiveness and, and, and.

Just this week alone I have been an active participant in a fantastic experiment. God never does anything simple in me.

Never.

I can’t wait to share it with you. I think I am still numb from how God placed everything to come together in this strange week. Watch for this story over at Laced With Grace on October 9th.

Stay strong. If you need prayers of protection, just let me know. I am a warrior chick. I will stand in the gap for you. Hugs, Lynn

Free To Be Me Scholarship

 

 

From my friend, Joanne at One So Blessed:

 

The Free to Be Me Conference is right around the corner. Are you praying for the blessed opportunity to attend? Have you always wanted to meet your blog-friends in person? Would you LOVE to go, but have been asking God for a financial miracle?

 

How does a scholarship for this amazing two-day conference sound? Did I mention you'll be leaving the kids and dirty dishes behind?

 

Girls, get ready...one lucky gal is going to receive a $100 scholarship! Which means admission to the Free To Be Me conference will be... FREE!

 

Here's all you have to do: Hop over to One So Blessed and leave a comment. The winner will be picked on Sunday, September 20th. Which means I'll be seeing one of YOU in Florida.

 

It's as easy as that.