November 22, 2024

Captivating: Chapter 8 – Letting Our Hearts Be Deepened – Faith, Hope and Love (pp 144-149)

Deepening our hearts sounds like a no-brainer, right?  Who wouldn’t want to deepen our hearts, grow closer to God, enhance our relationships?  Well, when we find out the method He uses to do the actual deepening, we may be a little more hesitant.

To possess true beauty we must be willing to suffer.  Wait…what?  Yes, ladies, that is scary and makes me want to run too, but we must be willing to suffer.  “Why?” you ask?  Well, the better question is “Why not?”  As our authors state, “If Christ Himself was perfected through His sufferings, why would I believe God would not want to do the same with me?” Sometimes God leaves us in the painful places.  Not because He doesn’t love us, but because He does love us. His main purpose is not to make us happy, but to grow and restore us in an eternal weight of glory.  Cultivating this beauty will likely require waiting and tenacity.  It is in this time of waiting when we turn to our relationship with the Lord.

During the wait we must not sit idle.  Along with spending time with God, we need to be kind and gentle with ourselves.  We need to feed on beauty. We need to laugh, rest, refresh.  As women, we tend to put everyone else before ourselves, and we need to stop that.  We are important, and we need to start treating ourselves as such.

Unveiling our Beauty

 

Unveiling our beauty is not just a simple matter of putting on a nice outfit and some makeup.  It is hard, and it takes work, but ladies…the results are SO worth it!  Remember:  unveiling our beauty is our greatest expression of faith because we have to completely trust Jesus.

Unveiling our beauty is our greatest expression of hope, because we put our hope in our growing beauty through our relationship with Jesus.

Unveiling beauty is our greatest expression of love, because we are able to love like Jesus, with a sincere, inviting love.

Faith. Hope. Love.

Be blessed, sisters. Never forget how beautiful and loved you are!

 

LET’S PRAY:

Lord, I ask You to come along side of us.  We know You love us, and sometimes love means pain.  We trust that with these struggles comes a life more amazing than we can ever imagine.  Give us the grace needed to turn to You when we are unsure or feel as if we are faltering.  Help us remember to pamper ourselves because we deserve to.  We want to live confidently and fearlessly under Your guardianship.  Thank You for always being by our side.  In Your Holy Name we pray.  Amen.

YOUR ASSIGNMENT:

What are some of the ways you pamper yourself, or take some “me” time?  If you had one day to do whatever you wanted to, what would you do?  Let’s share!

Captivating: Chapter 8 – Offering Beauty – Of Course It Feels Risky (pp 138-142)

TrueBeauty

“The greatest discovery of any generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitude.” –William James

I challenge you to think about your “ugly” moments.  What’s in your heart? Is beauty being revealed to those around you when you gossip, when you think negatively, when you dwell in self-pity and despair?

Our “ugly” moments have one thing in common: our self.  We’re focused on how I feel, what I want, what I don’t have…you get the point.  It’s all about “me.”  In each of our authors’ examples of women who offered true beauty, these ladies did a 180 with the spotlight.  They focused their hearts, their attitudes, and subsequently, their actions on reaching out to people.  Healing begins when we reach out to those in need; we offer joy and beauty when we serve.

“The best way to not feel hopeless is to get up and do something. Don’t wait for good things to happen to you. If you go out and make some good things happen, you will fill the world with hope, you will fill yourself with hope.” – Barack Obama

True beauty is a condition of the heart.  I challenge you today to examine your own heart.  Where is it? What does it look like? How do you want God to change it so that He can work through you to affect the hearts of others?

Blessed is the one who finds wisdom,
and the one who gets understanding,
for the gain from her is better than gain from silver

    and her profit better than gold.


She is more precious than jewels,
and nothing you desire can compare with her.
Long life is in her right hand;
in her left hand are riches and honor.
Her ways are ways of pleasantness,
and all her paths are peace.


She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her;
those who hold her fast are called blessed.

Psalms 3:13-18

Praise Him,

 

Carissa

 

Let’s Pray

Heavenly Father, we thank You for Your work in our lives in the past, present, and future.  Lord, we know You have a plan.  Let Your will be done.  Help us to show the world our true beauty, the beauty You’ve instilled in each of our hearts.  We love You, and thank You for continually renewing us each day.  In Your Name we pray, Amen.

Your Assignment

What’s holding you back from fully offering beauty to those in your life? Is it fear? Is it rejection? Is it a self-centered attitude?

Captivating: Beauty Flows From a Heart at Rest – Beauty is Inviting (pp 132-138)

When I read the description of the two women, I saw a lot of what I am in Janet and a lot of what I wanted to be in June.

Despite our various personality traits or where we may feel in our lives, despite how we feel about our journey, or how successful we feel we have been on this journey, it is reassuring to know that we are beautiful. In every woman lies a God-given beauty. A beauty that we hide through our striving to be what we feel we should be, a beauty that we hide after hurts in life have caused us to question this beauty.

“Beauty indwells every woman…So the choice a woman makes is not to conjure beauty, but to let her defenses down.” 

Right there, that’s the key—our defenses. The book describes these defenses as our normal means of survival. We set up these defenses around our hearts and minds and keep others out, while at the same time keeping ourselves in. These defenses stop us from being who God designed us to be. But how do we let our defenses down…how do we embrace this God-given beauty?

Rest. What is rest, and most importantly, what is a heart at rest. In today’s busy world, rest is not a word we hear very often. But rest doesn’t mean an opportunity to relax in a quiet room without interruption from others. In this sense, rest means the opportunity to be who God created us to be without striving to be what we think we should be, without having to hide who we are. “That the more His we become, the more ourselves we become; more our true selves.”

I always try to find a line or two in each section that speaks to my heart. In these sections it was the following two lines:

You are free to be you, it’s one of life greatest gifts.

Despite what life and others may say, I know deep down that God created me for a reason, He created all of us for a reason.  He knew what character traits we would have, and He placed them in us for a purpose. Through Him and His love we can all embrace who we are, and open our hearts to rest.

 

Cap_Ch8_TonyaE

We do not have to be a ‘June’ to be at rest, or to have an inviting heart towards others. Like so many other discussions we’ve had, we need to simply let God in, let Him in to heal us as we walk in faith. Let our true selves come out as He shows us just how beautiful we are. Let Him in to show us the reality of 1 Peter 3:3, 4

 1 Peter 3:3 and 4

Do not let your adornment be merely outward—arranging the hair, wearing gold, or putting on fine apparel— rather let it be the hidden person of the heart, with the incorruptible beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is very precious in the sight of God.

We need only to put our defenses down to let Him show us that we are inwardly beautiful.

Zephaniah 3:17

17 The Lord your God in your midst,
The Mighty One, will save;
He will rejoice over you with gladness,
He will quiet you with His love,
He will rejoice over you with singing.

He will quiet us with His love. He will lower our defenses with His love. He will allow our hearts to rest with His love. And He will make our hearts inviting with His love.

With Love,

Tonya

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Let’s Pray:

Rest, open, inviting, these are words that may not resonate with us, Lord, for we do not always see the beauty that You have placed in our lives and in our hearts. Our defenses and strongholds that we have created to protect us are stopping us from being the women You created us to be. Lord, please break our strongholds and help us to bring down our defenses through Your love. Thank You for Your love; a love that quiets, a love that heals, a love that allows us to see our true beauty through Your eyes.

In Jesus’ Name, we pray, Amen.

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Your Assignment:

We so often overlook our beauty because in our eyes our flaws stop us from seeing it. Today we are all going to post a trait that makes us unique, that makes us who we are. God has placed so many beautiful characteristics in each one of us. “We are free to be us. It is one of life’s greatest gifts.”

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 If you are interested in sending a private message to Tonya, please email her at TonyaEllison@girlfriendscoffeehour.com

Captivating: Chapter 8 “Beauty to Unveil” – Reading Assignment

Women are the essence of beauty.  Doesn’t that sound amazing?  There are days we may not feel like that…the flu takes hold, that overnight shift at work, it happens to all of us.  But isn’t is great to know that God sees us as beautiful no matter what?  He created us to be a beauty. This week we are going to take a look into seeing exactly what that means for us.  Here are our reading assignments for the week:

 

Monday: Jackie – Beauty to Unveil – The Essence of a Woman

Tuesday: Tonya – Beauty Flows From a Heart At Rest – Beauty is Inviting

Wednesday: Carissa – Offering Beauty – Of Course it Feels Risky

Thursday: Michelle – Letting Our Hearts Be Deepened – Faith Hope & Love

Friday: Edwina – Weekly Review

Saturday: Diane – Love Letters from God

LET’S PRAY

Lord, I ask You to come alongside each woman this week as we continue the study of Captivating.  As we look into what makes us beautiful, let us be open to the message You have for us, the lesson You want us to learn and the growth You want to see.  Thank You so much for Your love and grace, because without that we would be nothing.  In Your Name we pray.  Amen.

Captivating: Chapter 7 – Cultivating Intimacy (pp 127-129)

We live in a very busy world.  I know I can personally attest to that.  We look at our schedule or our smartphone and we see “the list.”  We wonder if we will have time to get from work to appointment A on time, and then will there be time to eat before class B starts?  There is work, friends, family, ourselves…oh! and God.  Where do you put yourself on that list?  More importantly, where do you put God?

The key to enhancing your relationship with God is a simple one.  You need to spend time with Him.  Think about it, it makes perfect sense.  If you have an acquaintance you want to get to know better, what do you do?  You talk to them, hang out with them, get to know them, and possibly become friends.  If you have a man you are interested in, you date them, talk to them, learn more about them, and it can possibly lead to a more intimate relationship.  Isn’t that what we want?  Intimacy with our Lord?

What exactly is intimacy?  According to Dictionary.com intimacy is  a close, familiar, and usually affectionate or loving personal relationship with another person or group.”  Yes!  That is what I want!  I want an affectionate, loving, personal relationship with God!  And the amazing thing is that it is ours for the taking!  He offers it freely and with no strings.  All we have to do is spend time with Him, and it’s ours.  Wait.  Spend time with Him.  Time?  Who has that to spare?  That in it’s essence is the problem.  God doesn’t deserve our “spare time.”  God deserves to be a priority.  He should be coming first on that daily to-do list.  No exceptions, no excuses.  I know…I get it…I am a single mom.  I have to-do lists as long as my arm and leg.  I run my home.  I run ministries.  I have my own business.  Trust me, I get it!

Sometimes we have to get creative with our time, and sometimes we need to get out of our comfort zones.  I am not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination.  But at the same time, I am exhausted by the end of the day, so I had to make a decision.  What I do is get up at 5:30 in the morning so I can have my quiet time with the Lord before I have to get my son up for school and the craziness of the day begins.  Do I LIKE getting up that early?  No.  No matter how long I have been doing it, it’s still no fun when that alarm goes off.  But is the tradeoff worth it?  Without a doubt!  That quiet time with God is what sets my day straight.  There may be a day I miss, and it may not seem like too big of a deal, but let that one morning turn into 2 or 3, or even more, and it only means trouble.  I can feel a difference.  Something will be nagging at me, or I will feel burdened and I won’t know why until I realize that it has been 4 days since I spent time with God, and then it’s like “Duh! No wonder!!”  It makes a difference.

So now I ask you to look in the mirror.  Where has God been on your list of priorities?  No matter the answer, there is a beautiful reality.  It’s ok.  Whether He has been at number one, or He has been relegated to “if I have time,” God is still there, He is still waiting for you.  He is not mad, or standing with a checklist checking off how many days you have spent with Him. He is just waiting for you to come back.  He loves you! He longs to spend that time with you, and He will delight in you the very second you return to Him.  That is so comforting to me.  If you don’t already, I hope you will set aside the time you need to spend with Your Father.  The change you will feel will be worth it.  Intimacy with Our Savior?  What could be better?

 

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LET’S PRAY:

Dear Lord, we long for an intimate relationship with You.  Please help us to clear our schedules and make the time we need to spend with You.  Sometimes it seems too hard in the craziness of life to set aside time.  Help us in our weariness, in our busyness, even in our laziness to realize that You are worth it, and that intimacy with You is timeless.  We love You, Lord, and we thank You for Your never-wavering faithfulness.  In Your Name, we pray.  Amen.

YOUR ASSIGNMENT:

Share your routine for spending quiet time with the Lord.  Do you have a specific time each day?  Does it change depending on the day?  If you haven’t been spending time with Him regularly, share some strategies you can implement to make it more consistent.

Captivating: Chapter 7 – What Does God Want From You?

When I was a child, I had a “best friend.”  All of my other classmates knew that she was my best friend not just by the fact that our names rhymed (my name is Carissa, her name was Larissa), but because we were always together – on the playground, in the classroom, even outside of school.  And we got along famously, too. It didn’t matter if we were running around outside in the woods or doing our stinky homework together – we were always having a ball.

As I grew older, we grew apart, like many relationships do.  Since then, I’ve been in search for a friendship like that.  I’ve been searching for a buddy who “gets me,” someone I don’t have to be anyone but “me” around.  I don’t have to explain my weirdness or hide my oddball nature.

Maybe you’re like me. You’re still searching for a relationship, whether romantic or not.  One where the other person just “gets you.”  Do you know that God “gets you?”  You don’t need to hide your true self from Him; He created you to be just the way you are.  So when you’re talking to Him and spending time with Him, you can just be yourself.  He is your oldest, most true friend.  He knew you before you were even born! Jeremiah 1:5

“Jesus loves you.” A common phrase, probably one we’ve heard a thousand times.  So with any solid relationship, affection is a two-way street.  I’ve always been told, “Carissa, YOU choose your friends.”  So I ask you: Have you chosen God?  Do you love Him as He loves you?

Because you are created in the image of God, your desire to be romanced is the same as our Father’s.  He desires our love and attention.  “He wants to pour His love into your heart and He longs to have you pour yours into His.  He wants your deep heart, that centerplace within that is the truest YOU.  He is not interested in intimacy with the woman you think you are supposed to be.  He wants intimacy with the real YOU” (page 121).

WhatDoesGodWant

Our authors point out that we were made to worship.  I’m not talking about singing hymns or praise songs in church every Sunday or while you’re driving in your car.  I’m speaking about worship as “what we give our hearts away to in return for a promise of Life” (page 123).  That “Life” our authors reference—I believe that’s the part of our hearts that was created to be filled by only One Being: Jesus.  It’s unable to be filled with anything else; not money, not success, not a man, not a family, not anything else that this world can offer.  Only Jesus can give you the Life and the Love you need so desperately. So I ask you: Have you let Him in? Have you given Him your love that He so desires?  Do you know your true Father—the One who loves you just the way you are?

I love the lesson about Mary versus Martha in Luke 10.  “[Mary] dropped everything and sat at His feet, fixing the gaze of her eyes and the gaze of her heart upon Him.”

So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.2 Corinthians 4:8

I pray you fix your eyes on Who is unseen right now, but Who we will soon see one glorious day in Heaven—our Father and ultimate Lover, Jesus Christ.

Praise Him!

Carissa

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Let’s Pray:

Father in Heaven, I thank You for Your unconditional and unsurpassed love.  I pray that You become our focus, that each day we start by fixing our eyes on You.  You alone can fill the missing relationship in our lives.  You alone can give us the love and attention we crave.  I pray that we can better show You how much we love and adore You, too.  In Your Precious Name, Amen.

Your Assignment:

What have you given your heart to? What are you worshipping daily? What is distracting you? Make a list. Share it here with us, in the comment section, if you wish.

Jesus is the only One worthy of our heart’s devotion. Mary recognized who Jesus was—the Source of all Life. Love Incarnate. She did what you and I hope we, too, would have done. She dropped everything and sat at His feet, fixing the gaze of her eyes and the gaze of her heart upon Him.

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If you would like to contact Carissa in regards to this blog post, please email her at: Carissa@GirlfriendsCoffeeHour.com

Captivating: Chapter 7 God as Lover – Opening Our Hearts to the Romancer (pp 113-119)

Yesterday in church our pastor spoke of a love so deep and passionate that it saves lives, it saves hearts and heals the wounded. It changes the course we are on; it sacrifices itself for us and places our best interest above itself. This love gave His life for us. He died on the cross for our salvation, so we wouldn’t have to pay for our own wrongdoings. A love that chose us, a love that is available at all times, day or night.

This love does not come from a man.

This love comes from God.

I can relate to the analogy used of a wilting flower. When we feel loved, desired, and pursued we seem to come to life, we perk up, and we feel beautiful. “Her (our) heart begins to come alive, come to the surface, and her (our) countenance becomes radiant.” Our heart comes to the surface; that thing we have tried so hard to build walls around and protect comes back to life.

When God pursues us, which He does passionately our hearts come back to life. The hearts we tucked away so long ago begins to desire to become what it once was, it begins to talk to us again, to share our desires again, and all because it is being pursued. This only happens when it is pursued by God. When we allow our hearts to truly know God, and when we seek that intimate relationship with God our hearts will begin to grow into the heart God intended for us to have all along. 

Potter and His clay

Shepherd and His sheep

Master and His servant

Father and His Child

His friends

Bridegroom and His Bride

All of the roles God plays in our lives are meant to guide, love, and protect us. They are meant to offer protection and caring. A potter knows the clay he is working with, he knows what it is going to be in the end. A shepherd knows each sheep by name and does everything to guide and protect them. A master knows his servant and accepts them into his family. A father knows his child and loves them unconditionally. Friend’s support and offer companionship. And a bridegroom loves his bride to no end.

Like the book says, God has been passionately pursuing us since before we were conceived. He knows our heart better than anyone, even ourselves, and He has been here from day one, loving us!

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Let’s Pray:

Dear Heavenly Father, Your pursuit for us is what makes us feel beautiful. Your love for us is what awakens our heart. You have been passionately pursuing us since before we were born; You alone know what our hearts truly desire and what our hearts truly need. Thank You for knowing what our heart can be; thank You for molding it into that image. In Jesus’ Name, we pray, Amen.

Your Assignment:

This assignment has 2 parts:

Part 1: God plays many roles in our lives; they’re listed in the post. What are some Scripture references that refer to these roles?

Part 2: God shows us His love and His presence through things that romance us. What has God used in your life to show you that He is always there?

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 If you are interested in sending a private message to Tonya, please email her at TonyaEllison@girlfriendscoffeehour.com

Captivating: Chapter 7 Romanced – Longing for Romance (pp 111-113)

Jeremiah31_3

I remember the first time that I heard the above words some few years ago.  My sister, who was staying with me at the time, had just gone to visit my parents in another city.  I felt so alone that evening and I decided to listen to music in order to drown out the silence that was in the house.  I had just bought a new praise and worship CD which contained a song based on Jeremiah 31:3. “I have loved with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with my loving kindness.” The song was so overwhelming; and I felt like God was speaking to me directly.  God LOVES me with an everlasting love.  I can’t express the exact feelings that I felt then but every fiber of my body felt that love.  I was so in awe of God for reaching out to me and telling me how much He loves me through that song.  My loneliness was replaced with God’s presence; it was an experience that I will never forget.

Each one of us wants to feel loved and to be romanced; we want to know that we are special to someone.  There is something about love that changes the way we feel and look at ourselves.  When I am first in love with someone I see things differently…I tend to smile at anything…what could easily annoy me does not bother me at all…the way I walk and carry myself…the time I take to look beautiful…happiness bubbles from inside my heart waiting to burst.  The day dreaming and secret messages that are shared with my loved one all seem to make my world beautiful—like I am on top of the world and nothing can touch me.  I feel special, worthy, and beautiful!

I have come to the understanding that I don’t need to wait for a man to feel special, worthy and beautiful every day because there is Someone who already makes me feel these things and so much more.  His love for me is eternal.  His romance is for eternity.  The romance that the Lover of our Soul, Jesus, has for us.  This romance is ours to experience every day.  It began long before we were born. “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you” (Jeremiah 1:5).  Yes, that’s how much God knows (and loves) you and me.  He pursued us way before we came to be and He will never stop.  Like the great lover that He is, He woo’s us with everything that He has created: the flowers and vegetation, the beautiful sunset, the blue skies, the glorious mountains, the enormous lakes and oceans.  Everywhere we look, we are enchanted by the beautiful things that He has made for us to enjoy.

I always wondered why the Song of Solomon was in the Bible until I realized that it was a love message from God to us.  God is so romantic that He dedicated a whole book for romance.  Wow, that’s something not to be taken for granted.  This book beats all the romance novels that you and I have read by far.  The way the writer uses words to describe different animals to reflect the beauty of a woman is intriguing.  The love that is shared between the two lovers is mesmerizing.  I hope you find some time to read this book and embrace its uniqueness, and experience the romantic side of God.

Stasi Eldredge writes, “God longs to bring this into your life Himself. He wants you to move beyond the childlike ‘Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so.’  He wants to heal us through His love to become mature women who actually know Him. He wants us to experience verses like, “Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her” (Hosea 2:14). And “You have stolen my heart, my sister, my bride” (Song of Solomon 4:9). Our hearts are desperate for this. What would it be like to experience for yourself that the truest thing about His heart toward yours is not disappointment or disapproval but deep, fiery, passionate love? This is, after all, what a woman was made for.” (pg 113)

Jesus is our Bridegroom and we are His Bride.  I pray that you will accept Him to romance you the way your feminine heart needs because YOU ARE HIS DARLING!  “How beautiful you are, my darling” (Song of Solomon 1:15).

Be Blessed,

Jackie

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LET’S PRAY:

Lord, how wonderful it is to know just how much You love us.  You loved us even before we came to be, and You are coming to take us with You as Your bride.  May we experience this romance with You every day.  In Jesus’ Name, Amen.

YOUR ASSIGNMENT:

How comfortable are you with the idea of Jesus being your “Bridegroom” and you being His Beloved?  Is this a relatively new category for you to think about in your relationship with Him?

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If you are interested in sending Jackie a private message in regards to this blog, please email her at: Jackie@GirlfriendsCoffeeHour.com

Captivating: Chapter 7 Reading Assignments – “Romanced”

Ah…romance!  The sound of that word can cause different reactions in different women depending on where you are in your journey.  That is completely normal but deep down inside I think we all long to be romanced.  Let all your preconceived notions go as we hear about what it means to be romanced by our One True God.  Here are the reading assignments for the week:

Monday: Jackie – Romanced – Longing for Romance

Tuesday: Tonya – God as Lover – Opening Our Hearts to the Romancer

Wednesday: Carissa – What Does God Want From You – Adoring Hearts

Thursday: Michelle – Cultivating Intimacy

Friday: Edwina – Weekly Review

LET’S PRAY:

Dear Lord, I come to You today, heart in hand.  I ask You to reach out to each and every woman reading this.  Comfort them, love them, romance them as only You can do.  I pray that through reading this chapter we will trust in that love completely and live in the knowledge that You are the love we most need.  In Your Holy Name I pray, Amen.

 

Captivating: Chapter 6 Review – Healing the Wound

This week an issue we all struggle with has been addressed; join me as I recap what was said by our bloggers.

On Monday, Tonya reminded us that despite our wounds, despite our hurts, despite the past that we as women carry, God is not done with us and He will do everything it takes to rescue us and set our hearts free. All we have to do is allow Him.

Then on Tuesday, Tonya again shared with us that God is knocking and asking us to turn the key over to Him. He is asking us to unlock the door and let Him in to begin the healing work He wants to do. He is asking us to stop believing the lies of our hurts and to remember the healing message in His truths. God wants to make our hearts the complete masterpiece He designed it to be.

On Wednesday, Carissa asked a very important, life-changing question: “What burdens are you still carrying?”  When we forgive, a burden is lifted. Once we forgive and let go of those hurts, we can fully receive the healing that is promised by God.

On Thursday, Michelle said that no matter what your experience with your dad, you have a Heavenly Father that loves you and cares about you more than any human father can, no matter how amazing they are.

RightfulPlace

Girlfriends, I have been hemmed in by God. For years while we were still dating, my boyfriend then, was my everything. I did everything for him and forgot all about my Heavenly Father, He had no place in my life. I could not wait to get engaged and when that happened, I could not wait to get married, it was truly magical. But something was missing. God had no place in my life.  For a while everything was great, until God with His gentle firm hand started to hem me in.  He showed me that He wants to be my first love and once He has His rightful place in my life, everything else will fall into place. Believe me it did not happen overnight—it’s a process—but one that is worth the wait.

Let’s put God first and allow Him to work in our lives.

Be blessed.

Edwina

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Let’s pray:

Lord, You are so good to us!  You continually draw us to Yourself desiring to heal us and bless us and show us our worth to You.  please help us, Lord, to allow You to do Your mighty work in our lives.  thank You!!!  You are our loving, heavenly Father…and we love You so much!   in Jesus’ name, we pray, amen.