Hi Warriors in Christ.

Today, I want to share an unusual experience and an unplanned experiment. What happened to me proves what we allow in our ear gates matters to great degrees in the spiritual.

If you have known me for awhile, you know I LOVE to backyard garden. Since moving to northern California, I’ve learned that gardening has differing but small nuances from my Temecula backyard.

This spring has extended, damp and cool following the wettest winter in local memory. However, I was determined to expand my garden and plant early this year. Last year, the garden went in late because I was still unpacking boxes from our move in.

I asked my local handyman, (I love that guy. He is the bomb), to build me two additional garden boxes. One box was a conversion from an old queen box spring. (waste not, want not!) He pounded that one together and built another. He even went to home depot and hauled a truck load of grow mulch bags into my backyard.

So, now I have four boxes that the birds love to pick apart. I quickly learned to cover them with bird nets. After they ate the leaves down to the stem of the jalapeno plants. Sheesh! That’s been part of the learning curve. Tons of birds around here are plenty hungry. Grrrrrrr

On a sunny morning I went out to work. The bags of grow mulch needed treated with my crab and lobster shell mix, Epson salts, and some organic fertilizer. I put on the yard gloves and set up the portable backyard speaker I took from Mike’s office.

I was looked for some upbeat music that I could sing along and move me along as I work. And from my distant past, the band, Heart, came to mind. So I put on the Spotify playlist and worked for hours, listening to Ann Wilson belt her lungs out. I finished about half the work and left the rest for another day.

Again,  a few days later I went out to spend four more hours to finish up all the work. I was laying down stepping stones, funny signs, a windmill and fencing.

This time I set up Mike’s speaker to play a favorite worship playlist as I worked.

Now this is the interesting and unexpected experiment that occurred. Following the first work day when I came into the house to clean up and move on with other stuff, I noticed that after listening to the secular music, I felt in my spirit a melancholy feeling. Like a sadness, a longing for …… well for something I wasn’t really sure. However, I felt down and somewhat gloomy.

I didn’t really notate this odd feeling until the next time I came in after listening to worship for four hours. Following my second garden workday, I came in to clean up and I felt powerful, I was filled with hope, I felt the presence of God so strongly. As I walked into the bathroom, I passed through a shaft of light that was coming through the window. I turned around to pick up something, and there in the beams of light were dust particles but something else.

It appeared there was glittering gold shimmering, hovering in my wake. I marveled as I watched the glittering gold with fascination. And I whispered, “I love you, Father.”

That’s the precise moment when this lesson crystallized. I realized in that moment that listening to music that wasn’t centered in worship to God left my spirit in a sad and weakened state. But the sustained worship, strengthened, uplifted and drew the very presence of God.

Ok, sorry, Heart. Ladies, you can sing but next time I’m hours in the yard, it will be worship for me.

Have you had an experience like this? I would love to hear your story.

Be blessed on this day my friends. Lynn

carrots, sunflowers, zucchini, jalapinos

Tomatoes for Salsa

Potatoes, the starts, I brought from Temecula

Corn, radishes, lettuce

Last week we began a series on healing of a broken heart. And for most of you who are readers here at Thrive Ministries with Lynn Donovan have submitted yourself to the hard work of prayer and study to find healing.

I’m so proud of you. Healing takes effort, time and persistence. For more on the spiritual principle of persistence, I’m writing about that at SpirituallyUnequalMarriage.com. Click here for the first in that series.

However, how do you know if the healing efforts have been enough? Let’s look at our lives and consider seven aspects of our behavior that indicated we might have some more work to do.

1. Anger: Is there a slow burning resident of anger under the surface? If you are set off by triggering events and people, and rage manifests, there is some more spiritual work to be accomplished. And there can be a demonic oppressor that is contributing to your torment.
2. Are you overly insecure? Shame, blame and guilt seem to be your constant companions and you never feel good enough or worthy of love or acceptance? You feel the constant need for affirmation and encouragement. You are uncertain of your decisions.
3. Pride: This is the other side of insecurity. You may have thoughts such as: Because of my pain I’m going to show the world I’m better. I’ll take care of me. No one will hurt me again.
4. Are you overly independent? Do you refuse to accept help? This often manifest in inner statements such as: Because of my wounding, I can’t trust anyone. I don’t need anybody. I don’t trust God. Side note: Ahem, yep, this was me. Praise God He was so patient to help me unwind all this pain and wounding. Hallelujah!
5. Overly Sensitive: This is where we are offended easily. No one can say anything to me because I’m sensitive. Our culture today is in a constant state of offense. I’ll share this with you. A few years ago, the Lord said to me, “Lynn, the second you are in offense. You are in sin.” Ouch!
6. Excessively shy: This will manifest in avoidance. Because of the emotional bruises and feeling beat up, you won’t risk relationships.
7. Excessive need to control: Controlling of relationships, time, emotions and others. This is born from living and/or a childhood where there was no control. This is where we manipulate our circumstances to our optimal best because we cannot face uncertainty. I’ll admit, this one I still battle with. Lord help me!

My friend, if you just read through all of this, then you are a prime candidate for healing. And God is filled with love, mercy and forgiveness. And if you are breathing, there is always hope for healing and a better tomorrow.

Take the time to do the hard work of healing. I promise, as a child of God, who has done so much work in prayer and practice myself, it’s worth it. The peace, the truth and the reality of our loving God and Kingdom family is worth all your efforts.

To schedule a Healing Prayer session with me, Lynn Donovan, visit: HEALING PRAYER

Have a blessed day. Lynn

Hi Friends, Jeanne here. I have a question for you:

“Who is Elon Musk? What is he like?” 

If you asked a hundred people, you would get a variety of answers, including several, “I have no idea.” You’d probably form some concept of Elon Musk based on what you’d heard and read.  But unless you know Elon Musk personally, you’d have no way of knowing what he’s really like. 

“Who is God? What is he like?”  If you asked a hundred people, you’d a variety of different answers, again including several “No idea.”  But God is who he is, regardless of what people believe about him.

What is God really like?  Unless you know him, you’re going to take someone else’s word for it, just like you would with Elon Musk.  I was raised in a family that believed in God, that went to church regularly, that participated in “religious education.”  I had a concept of God that was influenced by what people said about him and by what I read. 

As a kid I was taught the Ten Commandments (and thanks to all that “Religious Education,” I can probably still recite them.)  Jesus even referred to the greatest commandment:

“Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul, with all your strength.”

My line of thought went something like this: How do you love God, an invisible being so far away? And who would know whether or not I obeyed this commandment?  In my mind, love was a warm fuzzy feeling.  Thinking about God didn’t give me a warm fuzzy feeling, but I could say it did and no one would know the difference. So, I could “check off” the first commandment and move on to worrying about the easier commandments like “Thou shalt not steal.” Is it stealing if you sneak a cream puff out of the refrigerator when you’re supposed to wait until after dinner?

When I became a follower of Jesus, I realized there is a whole lot more to the Christian life than going to church and trying to obey the commandments.  The question remained: how do I love God with all my heart, with all my mind, with all my soul, and with all my strength? I understood that this all-out love is much more than admiration, or general gratitude for a wealth of blessings.  But to be honest, I still didn’t love God this way right off the bat.  Rather, I spent years getting to know who he is and how he feels about me.  There is nothing that describes this process better than the phrase “falling in love.”

When you meet someone special, you think about them a lot.  You want to spend time with them, getting to know them, and sharing yourself with them. As time passes you become closer and closer until you can’t imagine doing life without them.  This has been my experience with God. 

The process is different than human romantic love, of course.  God is not going to keep you on the phone for hours or send you twenty texts a day.  His love-gifts won’t be delivered by a florist or UPS driver. I fell in love through the Word of God and the Spirit of God.  I read the Bible to learn what God says about himself.  I also learned prayer as a conversation, not a monologue.  The best part of my relationship with God is that he both listens and speaks to me. Often his voice is a gentle whisper; but occasionally he rocks my world with a virtual shout!

When people fall in love, sooner or later they realize that their beloved isn’t quite perfect, but I’ve never experienced that with God.  Not only does he never hurt me, but he always forgives me when I hurt him.  He doesn’t hold grudges, and if I run away from him, he follows me and welcomes me back the moment I turn around.  He only wants what is good for me, no matter what it costs him.

There were plenty of times in my past that I thought God was being unfair or unloving, but I was wrong. The evil that’s in this world is not from God at all, but from our enemy. The devil and his minions attack us and try to make us think that it’s God doing it.  He’s so good at it that even many Christians don’t realize that God is essentially being framed, but that’s a topic for another day.

I have come to know that God can be absolutely trusted; that his plans for me are far better than anything I could think of for myself.  I have begun to experience the joy of his kingdom right here, right now. 

I can’t give you a shortcut to this place, but I can assure you that if you honestly seek him, you will find him.  It will be worth everything you have to know and experience how much he loves you.  There was a time when truly loving God seemed impossible to me.  But now I can say without reservation that the more I know him, the more I love him, and want to know him more.

How about you?  How have you experienced the love of God?  As always, your comments and questions are welcome!

A Demand On Faith

Is it possible to place a demand upon faith? Are we able to reach out for Jesus as the woman in our story did and receive healing?

Let’s unpack this today, shall we?

I’m sure you already know the answers to these questions. But how do we actually go about placing a demand upon our faith in a practical sense. You know I’m all about the practical. Tell me how….

Remember I shared in earlier posts that this woman was desperate? Well, that is how I would describe the mindset of those who are in absolute belief. Walking with Jesus and reading the Word is how our mind is transformed.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is--his good, pleasing and perfect will. —Romans 12:2

When we begin to BELIEVE the Word and choose to reject the lies and the liar, that process loosens the grip of the devils. And as we learn to take thoughts captive to Christ, we then dictate our thoughts, our belief systems, our truth.

We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. — 2 Corinthians 10:5

The process is different for every person. Some people languish in the world’s thought patterns and others seem to jump right in. Now I will also say here, sometimes Jesus does whatever He wants. He heals people instantly, He heals alongside physicians, He will heal through a process.

My experience is that He mostly heals through a process because Jesus wants me to learn a number of lessons along the way.

The lessons:

• Developing my faith and intimacy with the Healer.
• Grabbing with a tight grip and in full faith to scriptures. Looking up passages. Listening to them on YouTube at night. Reading them, praying them, reciting them. BELIEVING THEM.
  Leaning to pray with faith. This is learning to issue decrees, edits and engaging the angelic realm
• Learning what demon I might be up against and how to bind it.
• What my responsibility is in the natural. Healthy eating, physician treatment after praying for revelation.

So much of my supernatural healings, and there have been a number of them, involved a process which contained different lessons. These are just a few that rattled off the top of my head.

Receiving healing is possible. I think on Monday, I’ll pop a video in here and share a few of my supernatural healing stories. And one that wasn’t.

BTW, one of the most powerful tools of the Kingdom is TESTIMONY. My testimony, the testimony of others, becomes a springboard that can launch you into the same experience. THAT’s how we build our faith.

The disciples watched Jesus. This built their faith. He sent them out two by two and they began to do the same as Jesus. And their faith became so powerful for a few of them that we find this miraculous account in the Word:

The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people. And all the believers used to meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade. No one else dared join them, even though they were highly regarded by the people. Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number. As a result, people brought the sick into the streets and laid them on beds and mats so that at least Peter’s shadow might fall on some of them as he passed by. —Acts 5: 12-15

THIS is what is available to those who believe!  Hallelujah! Love and hugs, Lynn

And Jesus said to him, “‘If you can’! All things are possible for one who believes.” — Mark 9:23 ESV