The PF Women Team at our Annual Team Retreat ~ 2018 Today on Seth Godin's blog, he said: It's tempting to decide to make a profit first, then invest in training, people, facilities, promotion, customer service and most of all, doing important work. In general, though, it goes the other way. Yes, it does. If you are waiting to make a profit before you do these things, in my experience you're not going to make a profit. So many organizations, ministries and churches are struggling with financial issues. I know your pain. As anyone who follows our story knows, our ministry was in a ton of debt four years ago when I came on as director. Since that time, we've gotten out of debt and turned a profit every year. God has done amazing things through out team, for which we give Him the glory! I find that what Seth is saying here is absolutely true, with one disclaimer. For Christian leaders, spiritual disciplines must always be first. Before we started i...
I was so blessed by prayer, all night long and this morning. Last night before Larry and I went to sleep we just agreed together in prayer for a while over things we are believing for. I had a peaceful night of sleep - one of the first in a long time. Not that I haven't been at peace - just haven't had sleep! The church did 24 hour prayer shifts I personally had a shift early this morning and one right before Sunday School. I got up earlier than I normally do so I could be ready before my shift started, and I did my first shift outside on my patio. Joan called me to pray with me - she was the person before me and we prayed and I took over, and then when I was done I called Debra and we prayed together. Always such an incredible blessing to pray with her. I feel like she's going to come through the phone, it's so powerful when she prays. That woman is a serious intercessor!
God really moved in a mighty way in our service. We got out an hour later than normal. Most everyone stayed til' the end. Larry preached on miracles and then prayed for people. I had a difficult morning with some worship issues that pretty much distracted me a lot and had me very frustrated. The one positive factor regarding this was that although David was absent today with a work issue, (and I was worried as to how things would go without him) Rich was there and he's so good he makes the vocals sound as smooth as butter. Amazing. With all other issues I had to deal with, at least the vocals weren't one of them. But otherwise I wanted to pop a gasket. I was fried after church and on the way home I talked to Larry and he said to me, "Deanna, I know you were very frustrated and I totally understand, but realize - no one else really caught on to those issues but you and the people were very blessed and didn't really realize what was going on..." That does give me comfort...basically the people were blessed. That's the main thing that is my concern. Although I went through my own private torment over the stuff -as long as the church family was blessed, I guess it's alright and I just need to move on and realize the next Sunday is a new day and a chance to start over.
We had a great women's meeting tonight - I thought it was good attendance - an expectant spirit among them and believing for great things! I felt like things flowed extremely well tonight - I was pleased. We really do have an incredibly sweet group of ladies. We are blessed - I am blessed! I am glad to claim them as "my own." I know that every pastor/pastor's wife can't say that about their people. There are some who have to pray hard to love the people they pastor. In 98% of cases, I don't have to do that - they are just incredibly easy to love! In the other extremely small amount of cases, I just pray through and the support and love of the other people tends to buoy my spirits when depression over it threatens. As I said, I'm blessed. God, you are so good to me. So good.
Susan took lots of photos tonight. I will be able to post some once she gives me a copy of them on Wed...I wish I would have had my laptop with me tonight to download them but I didn't...so I'll post them later on this week.
What a great week in the house of God. The people of God are pumped! So expectant for what's ahead. And so am I. I have my frustrated moments in "the details" and in those moments sometimes I want to run away from it all. But after I've had my 10-15 minutes in my office or in a Sunday School room somewhere calming down over whatever just happened that has me so upset, I come to realize...I love people, I love my church, I love ministry...it was just that I had a bad moment. And that's all it was...a moment.
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