An Adventure in Ministry

It is rather apt that I have chosen to write this blog post now as Paul and I have just celebrated our six year wedding anniversary. I’m not ashamed to take this opportunity to share some of our gorgeous wedding photographs with you! Although in the grander scheme of things six years married may not be a long time, through our marriage we have faced caring for my terminally ill mother-in-law and later seeing her  pass away; navigating bringing up Paul’s three teenage daughters. We have lost jobs, friends ,   dreams and have also spent nearly all of our marriage trying to conceive children.  Not only have we faced all these difficulties, but we have spent nearly four years working in partnership in ministry. So we not only live and socialise together, but we work together every day too and I am proud to say that it has never been stronger! I don’t say this to brag, but through some pretty big struggles we have learnt some really important truths. ...

"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that testing your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything"  James 1:2-4 As you know, this year I asked God to give me a word to take with me through 2018, and I he gave me the word Joy. I decided to take some time to study what exactly Joy means and where we can see it used in the bible. The verse from James was one I came across immediately. At first I skipped straight past it, as I wanted my word to mean that everything in the next year will go great and that I might have a rest from trials and struggles. However,  I soon felt the Lord lead me gently back to it.  As I began to really get to grips with this verse, I started to question how joyful I actually am, and whether it manifests itself in times of trial in my own life.  James calls us to consider it 'pure joy' ...

As many of you know I write devotionals monthly for   www.herbinderproject.com   and www.quitewomen.com  and I recently wrote this devotional. I really felt this morning someone needed to read this x x x                                God’s word promises us that he will give us the desires of our hearts if we live a life sold out to him…but he doesn’t say when! I remember when all my friends started to find long term relationships and get married. It was a really difficult time. The desire of my heart was to be a wife and a mum, but I couldn’t see how God was going to do it! I blamed myself for the long wait…I thought I wasn’t good enough, pretty enough, funny enough! But then I came to a realisation, a God given realisation. God asked me what I was focusing on; my desires or God. You see, we have to be focused on the right things. We must choose to fix our eyes on Je...