Deanna Doss Shrodes

Readers ~ I asked you in this post on Saturday to pray for one of our precious Northside babies, Jedidiah Lilly, who was born with two holes in his heart. He has spent most of his 4 months of life in the hospital. After his last operation he was not supposed to have any more for a few years, however he took a turn for the worst a few weeks ago and had another procedure and things weren't looking good. I asked you to pray Saturday and just four days later I just got this letter:
Pastor Deanna,
I hope you are having a good day. I just wanted to let you know that Scott took Jedidiah to the doctor yesterday and they ran an EKG on him and they said his heart looks really good and they even took him off the oxygen that he had to have once a week. They also said that he won't need another surgery till he is 3 years old. I was so excited to hear that. He's still in alot of pain but he's doing good. Thank you so much for your prayers and encouragement.
I LOVE YOU, Susan.
PRAISE THE…

My dear friend/mentor, Sis. June Coker, just sent me this and I think it's really important for us to pray these over this election. Whether we pray this exact outline or not seems not to be the important thing here; what is important is that we PRAY. The scripture references, however, are wonderful. It is critical that Christians pray for the coming elections. There is amazing power in united prayer. Please print out this prayer guide and pray daily until the election. Pray with others whenever possible. The power of prayer can overcome any obstacle or ungodly influence and, indeed, do great things! Psalm 86:14-17 - Pray that the Lord would defeat those who have no regard for Him in this election. 2 Cor. 12:9 - Pray that the Lord would empower and enable his man in any area of weakness. II Kings 13:16 - Pray that the Lord would put His hands on the man of His choice for president (and his team) and guide them in this election. Proverbs 1:5-6 - Pray that God's man will listen …

I will soon be in my beloved Africa in just a few more weeks. Can't believe it's actually this close! I just got my malaria meds the other day and it really made it reality! I saw this video today and it served to do three things: 1) Remind me how beautiful parts of Africa are! 2) Reminded me how beautiful the animals there are. Yes, I saw lots of them up close and took pictures! Last year I saw them in Nairobi, but this year I'm going to see them in Nakuru. 3) This really gave me a laugh. You aren't going to believe this video. Watch and remember to watch where you're going!

Okay, so I'm a little bit stoked!
Sunday the board of directors came to the platform and announced the plan to the church for Pastor Appreciation. They are sending us on a vacation --just Larry and I! A romantic one...it's going to be awesome. And that's not all...they are also going to be taking an offering to do some special projects in our home. Yippee!
We're also going to dinner with the board. Very excited...I love spending time with all of them, always. Can't get enough of it. You know a lot of pastors have the worst problem in the world with their board and I thank God that's not the case with us, in fact it's the opposite. We just love hanging out with them as much as possible.
The vacation and special project thing are going to be presented to us on Sunday night, November 23 at our annual Thanksgiving dinner and they are also celebrating the 7 year mark of us being the lead pastors here. Seven is a year of completion and I believe we have completed a …

Pasco County schools are off today so I'm home with my kids. This morning after she woke up my daughter Savanna came in and climbed in bed with me and snuggled up. She said, "Momma, why do you have so many nicknames for us?" I said, "Well, I've heard it said the more nicknames a person has the more you know they're loved. So that's why I give you kids lots of them."
"Well I don't understand some of them. Like, "what's a beeber?"
"I made that up," I said."
She answers, "well what's a teeber?"
"I made that up too," I said.
"Momma, don't you have to get permission from the government to make things up?"
"Well honey, we might if some people have their way..." Let's hope that no matter who wins this election that FREE ENTERPRISE will continue! May all Americans see the light of the dangers of socialism. Let freedom ring!

That's what this morning was! The Holy Spirit absolutely took us into overtime. Seriously.


What a service!!! Worship was amazing. We did Freedom Reigns with a bridge that I found online that another church did (haven't heard it anywhere else) but it says, "We shout to every wall come down! We shout to every wall come down! We shout to every wall! We shout to every wall there is freedom!" It was time to declare it today...any remaining wall was coming down!

Great worship and special music time. I did a song right before Larry preached and the majority of the church jumped to their feet and were singing and dancing to it and the place just erupted. I couldn't help it -- started preaching a few minutes as the people were shouting and the song ended...just went into a powerful exhortation but it was time for Larry to take the pulpit so then when I came off the platform, Debbie handed me a paper she had written on and it said, 'WE ARE IN A BREAKTHROUGH!!!!!!!!!!&quo…

If I can't have another one, I'm at least going to hold everyone else's and enjoy them as much as I can!

I especially love this baby...He's an extra special miracle. I'd like to introduce to you Jedidiah Scott Lilly! He is Susan's nephew, and he's 4 months old.

We have been praying for Jedidiah even before he was born. He was born with two holes in his heart. He has spent most of his life in the hospital, hooked up to machines, unable to be held. Last week he had just been out of the hospital for a few days and his dad, Scott, brought him to church. Right away I said, "ooooohhhh let me have him!" Susan said, "Scott, I told you this was going to happen...Pastor Deanna will take that baby from you in a second!" And with that, somebody promptly pulled out one of the rocking chairs out of the nursery, and brought it outside where we were having our friends day lunch and I rocked the baby while Scott got a chance to eat, uninterrupted. Oh jo…

Now you know why Cathy and I were so excited about
what we found and put together!



We're leaving it up for a while til' the next season...














This was what we put in our breezeway ...















We also had a huge mum in a basket out at our entrance with a little sign that said happy harvest but we didn't get a photo of that...maybe next time! I will share more pics of our friends day over the next week!
*Special thanks to Lourdes Manners for taking these pictures!

It was exactly three months ago today that I wrote this post to my blog readers, asking you to pray for me. I chronicled each day of my darkness for three months here on the blog. I shared the veil of hopelessness that seemed to be draped over me. Not all the details, just the overwhelming sadness in my heart. It has been a rough season in ministry and I have been pretty transparent here about it on the blog.

I thank God for the strength of my family - my husband, children, my sister and mother in law in particular. Without them, I never would have stayed sane. My husband was going through his own pain but he was always there for me.

I went to the office and worked, and of course I was at church services. However, any moment I wasn't doing that I stayed in my bed. If I wasn't such a responsible and committed person by nature, I would have just quit. I did delve into God's word, prayer and worship like never before. Aside from those three things, I just wanted to sleep my l…

I can't remember the last time I saw gas for under $3.00!! I was so excited when we stopped for gas on the way home from work, I had to take this photo to celebrate!

To all of you who posted a comment or emailed me yesterday, you're right...new life is springing forth. I'm flourishing, and that's what I wanted you to know by my picture post yesterday.
Not to drag this out or anything but there are about five people I have needed to personally email or call to give the 411 before I post anything else. My close friends who have stood by me so faithfully day and night, and hashing out the details of my life deserve not to read it in a blog post. Just like I posted on August 1, God had something to teach me about pruning and flourishing. For three months I was waiting for the plant (and my life) to flourish again. I have two more people to e-mail or talk to and then I'll post more...I promise!
In today's news, I got a blood test this morning. This is pretty significant. Hang on and you'll understand why. I would rather have a baby than a blood test. Each time I've had my children, I asked the nurses, "do I have to have …

They say a picture is worth a thousand words.
If you are a regular reader of my blog you might have a hint as to what this means...
If you are a new reader you'll have no clue, but this post might help you a bit.
Like I said, a "report" is on the way! Stay tuned!

Tonight was ladies night at my home and what a time we had! My goal was to make it a more intimate gathering at my house for dinner and a movie...everyone was invited but with schedules and such I knew many would not be able to be here. We have many women who, with their own work issues and many going back to school and child care, etc. couldn't make it. But 20 ladies gathered at my home last night and we shared dinner and I had a movie planned but played it by ear, (I thought they'd probably want to talk instead) and that was right. The noise at my house was so loud you could barely hear yourself talk at times! I'm serious. From the second everyone got there they were so immersed in talking I had to quiet them down to pray before we ate. So cool that they were connecting that much.

Some of my precious new ladies came such as Yisenia, Elizabeth, Rebecca and Shelley. These are women who have been coming to church regularly for about 2 months now and it feels like they've…

I have some exciting news this week ~ I can't wait to share it, but first I have to call and e-mail a few bff's and tell them personally and not let them read it on my blog. :-) I owe that to my close friends. But just wait, I have great news.
In the meantime, here's the majority of what I did yesterday...
Woke up.
Went in to make sure Jordan was up for school. Bedroom light on. Bathroom light on. His door open. I hear him milling around, assume all is good. I lay back down for some extra zzzz's before getting Savanna up. Big mistake.
Saw Savanna off to school and got ready for work. Came out to leave for work and noticed Jordan had gone back to bed and was laying there sound asleep. Very frustrated. (Me, not him...) Wanting to wring his neck but I don't want to be late for work. Decided for once to deal with it later. Went to work. Read some devotional things on the way to work as usual. (Larry drives) Busted through a ton of work in a few hours. Probably 7 things …

What??? Lucretia Noble's White Chocolate Fudge Cake! (Lucretia is wife to Pastor Perry Noble, Lead Pastor of Newspring Church, Anderson, SC) My friend Pastor Tara and I read Perry's blog daily -- I highly recommend it! And he has highly recommended his wife's cake to everyone near and far. I mean the man RAVES about this cake like it's so good it could make a tadpole slap a whale. Seriously. So he put the recipe on his blog and Tara decided to go for it and make it and she too raved about it. You can read about her experience with making it here. So I said, "I've gotta see for myself what's going on here..."
I decided to make the cake tonight in preparation for a special ladies night I'm having at my home tomorrow night. We are having a dinner and I have lots of people coming over and I decided this would be the perfect time to try out this recipe. (If it flopped we'll still have plenty of other things but it doesn't look like it's goin…