It Opens Today...

Woo Hoo!!! TODAY is the day registration opens for our {Re}Committed Lives incourager group through the amazingly fantastic super-powers over at (in)courage!


In case you didn’t know, (in)courage is a captivating online community for women, full of daily encouragement and inspiration. And TODAY we are partnering with them as we kick off this fall session of (in)couragers community groups…

Groups made to connect women beyond just a blog post.

Groups built around common interests or themes,

Made for women just like you, by women just like you!

And we are honored to be serving alongside them this fall! 

They have Bible Study groups, Women in Ministry Groups, Motherhood Groups, Marriage groups, Empty Nester groups, Adoption groups, Professional groups, Student groups, Writing groups, and other Special Interest groups–including abuse survivors, chronic illness, depression, infertility, and hope for hurting families. Over 70 groups waiting for you … to walk alongside you in community!

S-E-V-E-N-T-Y!!!

What could be better than that?

Yet I know, many of us have been hurt or wounded in community, and we are hesitant to take a risk again–too guarded to open our hearts to this scary vulnerable thing called community.

But as Mary DeMuth says, sometimes the thing that has wounded us most, is the very thing God uses to heal us. 

And I promise you there is no safer, more loving place, than (in)courage for  you to begin!

(in)couragers are community and community is connection … and God meets us as we care for one another there. [Tweet that]

We have been planning and preparing and praying for you, that you’d come and connect, and be changed in community!

Each group is limited to 30 members, in order to facilitate interaction in the building of meaningful relationships, and we can’t wait for you to see what is waiting for you there.

Won’t you join us?

Join us and be changed by the power of community!

And don’t forget … tell a friend! There are chocolate and cupcakes waiting for you there!

May your fall be blessed beyond measure as you are touched by connection with others who understand!

With so much love and thanks for you…

Patty Mills and Arlethea Pressley
Group Leaders for {Re}Committed Lives

Cockfighting and Amazing Grace

“God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.” Ephesians 2:8-9 (NLT)


I can still remember the excitement of getting to miss church so we could go visit my “Grandpa on the mountain.” Because there were usually surprises along the way. 

An old service station at the bottom of the mountain where we would get root beers in glass bottles; a flea market where there were puppies for sale; the feeling that we were going to fall off the mountain as my dad drove way too close to the side. 



But always, as we started down the dirt drive towards the old house, my excitement turned to nervousness.

Pictures of my Grandpa in his youth showed a tall, handsome, slightly arrogant looking man. But after years working in the coal mines, his looks and health prematurely withered. 

He and my grandmother had divorced back before divorce was accepted as the norm. Both of them had bad tempers, but my Grandpa‘s violent temper was legendary. 

Did he really beat his brother with a tire iron? You know he used to run moonshine, didn’t you? So you mean he uses those pretty roosters in fights? Does he really hit them with his cane? 

I can barely remember him looking for the perfect stump to find fiddling worms for a fishing trip with my dad. Somewhere along the line, he started using a cane to walk.

More vivid are the memories of him angrily shaking his cane, demanding someone bring him “this or that” as he coughed and gasped for air. Somewhere along the line, an oxygen tank appeared along with a folded up napkin he kept in his hand for when the coughing fits hit.

And then came the appearance of an old Bible…

When they brought in the hospital bed, the old Bible and him became inseparable. He desperately clung to it, holding it tightly to his chest. Sometimes he would shake it at us while trying to tell us something very important that I could never quite understand. 

And I remember being angry. 

How dare you, I thought. How dare you try to act like you’re good now. Now that you are dying do you think you just get to grab a Bible and it will magically wipe out all the bad things you’ve done all your life? No, Grandpa, it doesn’t work like that. You haven’t done anything good. You don’t get to just go to heaven after all that stuff. 

A couple of weeks ago, my pastor started a series of sermons on grace. How grace isn’t earned and we can’t lose it.  None of us deserve it.  It is God’s free and amazing gift to us. Tweet this!

He became emotional as he reminded us of the criminal who hung on a cross beside our Savior. About the saving grace our Lord extended to him, just moments before He died. How he wasn’t required to jump off the cross and make amends to all those he had wronged, go serve the poor and minister to the needy in order to be granted access to heaven.

My years of self righteousness melted away and in its place sprung up humility and gratefulness. And I marveled in the wonder I felt knowing that the only requirement from God was to accept His amazing gift of grace, which is wholly sufficient.  Tweet this!


Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.” And Jesus replied, “I assure you, today you will be with me in paradise.” Luke 23:42-43 (NLT)

But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. Romans 5:8 (NLT)

For “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” Romans 10:13 (NIV)

Serenity Prayer and Zeal

Reinhold Niebuhr

“Each time he said, ‘My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.’ So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me.” Corinthians 12:9 (NLT)

Today marks two major milestones in my life…my 10 year wedding anniversary (I love you, baby!) and my 8 month divorce from cigarettes (Good riddance, you life sucking addiction!)

Lies! That’s what addictions are and they are straight from the devil because, honestly, how else can you explain the insanity of doing something that...

• kills
• controls
• drives a wedge between yourself and your spouse
• negatively influences and impacts your children, family and friends
• drains your finances
• compromises your job
• corrupts your life and causes strive, fear and turmoil
• and consistently separates you from a holy God

 No one in their right mind would choose that, right? But there’s the rub…addiction says,

“Don’t worry about all that stuff. It doesn’t really matter. It’s not really a sin. You’re not hurting anybody. Nobody even really knows. Plus, I’m not all that bad. Other people do me all the time. You should be able to do what you want and you want me, right? I make you feel good. There’s nothing wrong in that. I’ve always been here for you. I’m your best friend. You can’t live without me. You can’t cope with life without me. Who will you turn to?”

I’ve been there before lots of times with cigarettes (and other addictions) and have even mustered up the willpower to quit, one time for almost a year.

But you know what? You can’t truly beat addiction without God. Tweet this!

Because that same self that wants to quit is the same self that wants to keep doing it and it takes God to remove that desire. 

If you prayed right now for God to remove the desire for that addiction He will answer that prayer and your head is gonna spin at how quickly and completely God will remove that life sucking addiction from your life.  When I prayed that prayer 8 months ago, I tested God to see if He’d really answered my prayer…I tried to smoke and (1) it tasted awful and (2) I felt like Jesus was sitting right beside me in my car, looking at me with the saddest puppy dog eyes you’ve ever seen in your life and my heart was so heavy with the weight of his disappointment that I couldn’t throw that cigarette away fast enough!  And I haven’t picked one back up since.

Some people might say that I have an addictive personality but I like to call it the spiritual gift of zeal (as a sweet friend tagged it the other day).

It’s my God-given desire to jump in with two feet, guns a-blazing, throwing caution to the wind, doing it on a large scale, louder, bigger, and better. My zeal begs the question, “If one is good, then 10 must be better, right?”

But, like all of our spiritual gifts, if we don’t lay them at Jesus feet, give Him complete control of them, constantly pray for guidance, keep in the Word, surround ourselves with Godly people…the devil will try to get us to use our gift for him. Tweet this! 

And though our God is mightier than the devil, He gives us a choice in how we use those gifts or if we even use them at all. Tweet this! 

My challenge to you today is to take that unhealthy addiction - pornography, drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling, whatever it is - and give it to God. He promises to replace it with something more fulfilling that gives you...

• freedom
• enhances your life
• builds unity between yourself and your spouse
• positively influences and impacts your children, family and friends
• bolsters your finances
• improves your job
• brings joy to your life and causes peace, love and civility
• and consistently draws you closer to Him

“And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.” Philippians 4:8 (NLT)

 

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.” Matthew 7:7 (NIV)

Prison Time and Marriage

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11 (ESV) 

I’ve only been to prison once and that was to notarize a document. But when those iron bars clanged shut behind me, it gave me chills. 

I’ve thought about that day a lot lately because my sweet “I’m in love with Jesus” friend has been called to take the Good News to the women at the Julia Tutwiler Prison. 

The headlines have been full of reports of abuse going on at that prison - unspeakable things happening - and honestly, until just recently I thought:

“So what? I mean, they are prisoners so whatever happens to them is pretty much their own fault for going and breaking the law to go to prison in the first place, right? 

And I’m sure they’ve done unspeakable things to others so ‘an eye for an eye‘, isn’t that in the Bible?” 

But, boy, once God rooted out my pride and showed me how much worse I deserved for all the unspeakable things I had done, for all of His laws that I had broken, and then He showed me His love, mercy, grace and forgiveness by choosing to take me back into His fold, His prodigal daughter, and wash me clean as snow and cover me in his righteousness...wow, my heart goes out to those women. 

But one woman in particular: my aunt. 

She‘s in that prison for murder right now and probably for the rest of her life. 

I pray that she’s hearing the Good News from my friend…that she has cried out to God from behind those iron bars and received His saving grace and mercy. 

I wonder how many times she has she wept over the life she took…and how many times the victim’s family and friends have wept. I wonder if she even knows that her son is getting married next month…

My husband and I will celebrate our 10 year anniversary this Thursday, August 1.

We had planned to memorialize it by recommitting our vows to each other and our marriage to God - just the two of us, our girls, and our awesome, Holy Spirit filled Pastor.

But we received news yesterday that my grandmother had passed away and though we are celebrating her going to be with Jesus and my Grandpa, we are sad, too. So we’ve put our plans on hold until we see how God wants to shake that out for us.

Besides, I recommit my marriage to God (and my life and my family) pretty much every morning so I’m okay with waiting on the formality…but I’m still super excited that we both would want to officially remarry each other because, at one time, we both felt kinda like prisoners in our marriage.

The “till death do you part” sounded like a life sentence because it seemed like we were angry with each other most of the time because we couldn’t figure out how to make each other feel loved*.

God continues to astonish me with His miracles in my life, but I guess working miracles in people’s lives are like his trademark thing, isn’t it?

*Gary Chapman’s Five Love Languages book.

“You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire.”  Matthew 5:21-22 (ESV)

“I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.”  Matthew 25:36 (ESV)

"I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.” John 16:33 (ESV)