Back in the 80’s Bart and Justine are sitting at the kitchen table when Justine notices, “WOW! I’ve had a few minutes of no pain! What a Wonderful feeling that is!”

Quickly the devil plants a thought in her mind, “I deserve to hurt. I didn’t listen to God when He showed me the dangers of motorcycles!”

Fifteen years later, a new pain develops her tailbone making life more difficult. Realizing she needs help she cries out, “God, we are moving to a house with 2 acres. I need to be able to work in the yard.”

God replies, “Go to the radio station, ask them pray for you.”

Obeying, Justine asks for prayer, but nothing happened. Leaving the station she questions,

“What’s up, God? Nothing happened!”

God impressed upon Justine, “JESUS ALREADY PAID, you don’t have to pay!”

Seeing the cross, Justine grasps the concept, what Jesus did trumps what she didn’t do.

“JESUS ALREADY PAID! I DON’T HAVE TO PAY!”

The pain left before she reached her vehicle.

1 Peter 2:24 He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed.

I don’t know what you think: I actually Believing God when He said, ” Have Faith and Don’t Doubt … Speak to the mountain … it Shall Happen”. Matt 21:21b

I started To Practice, “Speaking to the Mountain”, by telling mosquitoes they are not allowed to bite me or my family!

A few years ago, I started talking to the mosquitoes; telling them they were not allowed to bite me while weeding my garden.  They ARE Listening!

Bart is frustrated; he is spraying on Deep Woods Off  and still getting bit by mosquitoes; I am NOT getting bit by mosquitoes!

I TALK TO the mosquitoes saying, “I am in Covenant with The LORD, ‘yad hay vav hay’ (the Name Of God in Hebrew) both under the tithe and Jesus Paid the price for me to walk in the Blessing not the Curse!”  I tell Satan, “Satan, take your nasty bugs and flee from me, I am a Child of God and Protected in the Blood of Jesus!”

This is one way I PRACTICE the Walk of Faith in Jesus and His Word; Listening to Holy Spirit, and Father God to guide my every step: Most days.

This summer, we have an over abundance of dragonflies in our yard; Bart looked up dragonflies on the internet, he found they eat mosquitoes!

My thought: God sent Dragonflies to aid us in getting rid of our mosquitoes!

The mosquitoes found their way to my skin today; while I was running, I stopped to talk to neighbors and found it is difficult To Talk To the mosquitoes, in the middle of  a conversation with a neighbor.

Words have Power: Talk to your problem! Speak the Solution!

My life began in September the sophomore year of my college experience; I told God, “I WANT what they (the Inter Varsity Christian Fellowship College Students) have!” He Changed me at that moment! I was filled with a Joy and a LOVE that I had never known before!

MY SPIRIT: I tried all my life to read the Bible and get close to God, but I couldn’t. I remember one day asking Him if it was ok with Him if I used His name in vain to become part of a group of kids. He didn’t respond.

On that day in September, when I told God I want: He Answered! He gave me the ability to read my Bible and understand it; I read every day and enjoyed myself! Friends told me I am doing too much studying and I will get bored and quit; I didn’t listen to them, I was a sponge, soaking up everything about God that I could!

Looking back into my old journals, I was very surprised: Joy and Thankfulness fill the pages, even tho I was in emotional turmoil! My spirit went from being dead to being alive; as my bible says in 2 Corinthians 5:17; I became a new creature! Jesus said, I need to be born of the Spirit! I am!

MY SOUL: Personally and emotionally, I was a mess: I fought depression, PTSD, anxiety, and constant fear among other problems: BUT there was a JOY inside! GOD DID something inside me!

I have learned how to “renew my mind” and to “take every thought captive” as Paul writes in hie letters to the church. The way to do this is to realize what you are thinking and when thoughts like condemnation bring you down, kick them out, and replace them with God Thoughts: Love and Redemption. Jesus is making me more like Him each and every day!

God Shows Himself through the cracks that form in me as I grow and become more like Him! For example, my last day of work in KY, I was saying goodbye to my supervisor; she complained to me about a coworker who had started to come to work drunk. In response I asked, “what happened in her life, that is so bad she can’t handle life without drinking?” the words coming out of my mouth were not mine.  Up until that point I had complained just like my supervisor. They were God Words showing through my growth cracks!

MY BODY: It does what it has been doing, when I sat all day every day that is all my body did.  God healed me from pain and gave me nerves to let my back muscles gain strength so I could get strong and learn to run! As God gave me healing and strength I asked God to teach me how to clean my house because I had sat in pain for so long I didn’t know how to move.

The way I transform my body and my soul is to walk by the Spirit of God, listening to His leading; I am getting better at following the Spirit I successfully: Yesterday, I followed God to the bread department in the grocery store and found my bread on sale!

Sometimes I fail: Last week, God was pointing out brown sugar; I told Him I don’t need any. Later at home, I was making cookies and found I needed brown sugar; if I had listened I would have had what I needed.

He leads me in other areas like my running; He is the one who pushed me to run every day and run 2 miles even when I had to walk half of it. Mostly He is training me to listen and follow.

All of me is changing: My Spirit, Boom: Made New in one moment in time! My Soul being renewed as I work with God to change my thoughts and actions! My Body is being trained to be active instead of sedentary.

God is Good

How many times do you have to learn a lesson?

Book club met last week to discuss the book, “The Girl on The TRAIN” by Paula Hawkins.  As Justine picked up the  book to read for the May meeting, her head was filled with the thoughts that she ruined the last book club meeting and maybe she should quit going: Justine took hold of that thought and tormented herself for 20 hours about how horrible she was.

The first words spoken about the book were. “I don’t like any of the characters!”

Justine quickly responded, “I like all the characters!” Then the thought of the men in the book came to mind; she knew she didn’t fully tell the truth, she didn’t like Tom much at all and Scott has some issues, but she didn’t mention it.

What she should have done is ask, “What about each character did you not like? Wasn’t Cathy acting as a Good Christian should; helping someone in need or was she just gullible? What about Megan? Wasn’t she just a broken girl struggling because she feared the secret she held would ruin her life? How hard is life with that kind of secret? What about how Rachel still thought about life with Tom after she found out his secret?”

Justine has always loved the books that have the downtrodden rise from the ashes; it gives her hope that she will also rise from the ashes.

Later on in the conversation a fellow reader mentioned,  “The characters have no depth.” Justine opened her mouth standing up for the characters and said,”I was like them just few years ago;  this book club has helped me to change and grow: years before that I was much worse and none of you would have liked me.”

Not one person responded.

Justine remembered, God doesn’t tell you something for you to be condemned; it is Satan or yourself giving you bad thoughts. Even though she knew it was a lie, she couldn’t pull herself out of it: God kept working to set her free!

God was whispering to Justine, “Come to Me!” She went to the computer instead. The next morning, God was pulling her, “Come, spend some time with ME!” The television was a wonderful distraction! God finally had his way during the Easter Service and set her free from her self condemnation during the Praise and Worship!

In the book, Rachel didn’t have any support from people around her; she turned to alcohol to drown out the feelings of insufficiency, and inadequacy: this causes her to shrink and not grow as a person.  Justine hid behind the television: the moment she walked into the house the television was turned on for the noise to block out her thoughts. At night, the radio and the television or tape/CD/podcast to help her to fall asleep: anything to block out the thoughts that fill her mind.

The wonderful thing about learning a lesson again is it sticks with you a little bit longer. Today, Justine was leading a Bible Study and she talked to much and didn’t give the other people much chance to speak; she had the chance to condemn herself all day again, But she  remembered the lesson she just learned and asked God to cover her mistake and let it go.

Happy Late New Year,

It has been about 6 years of Transformation and Miracles!

Five and a half years ago we Began a new life in a new church: God moved us to begin this process of Transformation. Michelle graduated high school in 2012 and started at the community college.  She moved out a year later and has been earning her keep and paying taxes ever since. At this point in time she is working at a dry cleaners and is setting her hopes for management .

Bart is still working at the same place; the name has changed 3-4 times and it is in the process of changing again: new owners. For a year or two Bart was working half-time in Texas; he was racking up the frequent flier miles and motel points. This last year he finally said he had enough and said, “No more travel!”

We  had to take down our beloved Maple tree out front.  It took out 2 cars; one was Michelle’s bug and a neighbors car; we didn’t want to lose the house. We put in a fireplace insert to heat the house with the beautiful tree we loved; it all happened at the perfect time as the temperatures dropped to some of the most brutal winters in a long time.  Bart has taken up cutting wood with a chainsaw and splitting trees with a maul; he has worked very hard on some 5 foot in diameter pieces of wood, sometimes spending more energy spliting the wood than the heat they gave heat but he gained muscle!

Justine has had the most change in the last 6 years. Six years ago she was thinking about getting  a cane to help her stand up; anytime she walked 1/2 mile she would loose feeling in her left leg.

BUT GOD!!! It has been 5 years since God gave her a miracle of 5 new vertebra to replace the ones that were broken and fused in her accident 30 years ago. She has been SET FREE from constant pain that she lived with for 28 years! She asked the doctor, “Can atrophied muscle get stronger?” The doctor said, “they can, if their are nerves connected to the muscles.” Justine asked God, “Please connect the nerves (that were cut in the scoliosis surgery in 1976) back to the muscles.”

God has been at work to grow nerves and they are still is growing and connecting to the muscles. This has led Justine to run, she couldn’t run before because it takes back muscles to lift legs and arms, who knew?  She has done two 5k races and runs between 1-5 miles most every day. Justine no longer limps or leans forward; she stands strait and tall and confident. Her mother told her last year, “You are no longer my handicapped child!”

Emotional changes: Justine has been set free from the nightmare of her childhood and is becoming a new person! She is trying new foods and driving places like St.Louis and Louisville to Volunteer at Joyce Meyer Conferences; Watching God at Work! Justine has also started to volunteer at the Kalamazoo Gospel Mission with the children. Justine Believes God has a plan to use her to help broken women become the people God has planned.

Zachery, Michelle’s dog, is 18 years old and still hanging on; I believe he will make this Christmas but I believe it will be his last. Charlie, was brought to us by Michelle 3 years ago; he is 5 years old and he arrived with many emotional issues; he has now found a home and security.  Sam has just joined our family; he was suppose to be Australian Shepard/Border Collie and has turned out to also have some Shar-pei in him, lots of extra skin and sharper hair.  He is beautiful and sweet  and talkative about 4 months old at this point. We still have Fluffy, Michelle’s cat who might join her this next summer and Grace, the fat cat who hunts very well!

We have a full house, becoming very busy at times. Happy New Year  to all  and God Bless each of you with Great Health, Love, Joy, and Peace in Jesus! Amen!

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