*This post is coming to you a few days early as our staff travels with Beth, which you will read more about below.
Hey, Everybody! It’s May! We are making progress, Girls! By now you are getting some verses down in your bones. I was thrilled two weekends ago when we had our clandestine Siesta picture after the end of our Albuquerque Living Proof Live and a bunch of them brought their spirals. Talk about teacher’s pets! Here they are:
OK! I’ve done a little video – a really, really short one this time – where I say my verses to you while I’m on a walk in our woods so this stands as my official entry for Verse 9! I’m doing memory work right now out of Ephesians Chapter Four and it is so powerful. As you’ll hear in this segment, God seems to have a tremendous partiality to the number ONE.
Y’all, I love doing this with you. I love an SSMT year. You are so dear to us. By the time you’re submitting your verses, I’ll be speaking in London at Hillsong Colour Conference. Our whole LPM staff is coming and many of our volunteers. Melissa is with me and will be heading up a short tour with our volunteers after the Hillsong conference ends, giving emphasis to several figures in Christianity who had tremendous influence on Spiritual formation. We are looking extremely forward to it. Her suitcase weighed 10 whole pounds more than mine strictly from books. Made me grin. The girl is a book nerd if you’ll ever meet one. We were so sad Amanda couldn’t come on this trip but she needed to be home with her very busy family this round. We miss her like nobody’s business. Would all of you please pray for us as we labor in this gorgeous field of harvest? Please ask Jesus to pour out His Holy Spirit lavishly upon us and to give us such hearts of love for every person we serve.  When I say, ask Jesus to pour out His Spirit, I mean like GUSHES. FLOODS, TIDAL WAVES of Living Water. Understand what I’m saying? PRAY BIG. Get in there with your faith if you’d be willing and ask God to be enormously present among us here. Ask for many to be saved, many to be delivered from strongholds, healed, and made whole in Jesus. Ask for multitudes to awaken to the breadth and length and height and depth of the borderless love of Jesus. Thank you! I owe you a debt of love which I gladly, joyfully pay.
Ok, Girls! Hit it with those verses!
Penny – Loganville, GA
“Ah Lord God! Behold, Thou hast made the heavens and the earth by Thy great power and by Thine outstretched arm! Nothing is to difficult for Thee,”
Jeremiah 32:17
NASB
Missouri city, TX Ashlie Black
Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, (â€2 Corinthians‬ â€3‬:â€4-5‬ ESV)
MarlaMae, Kimmell, IN
1 Thessalonians 5:18 (NKJV)
Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.
Jolene, Suwanee, GA
Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment!
James 2:13 NIV
Keri Lee Robbins, Las Vegas, NV “may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (â€Ephesians‬ â€3‬:â€18-19‬ NKJV)
Laura Blackman, Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, “It was not by their sword that they won the land, nor did their arm bring them victory;it was your right hand, your arm, and the light of your face, for you loved them.” Psalm 44:3
Turn my eyes away from worthless things; preserve my life according to your word.
Amy Storms
Joplin, MO
Psalm 119:37 NIV
betty jane pedigo
franklin ky
1 Thessalonians 3:12 “May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else just as ours does for you.”
Michelle K, New Baltimore, MI:
Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.
John 14:27 NRSV
Betty Murphrey, Wendell, NC
Hebrews 3:14 NET
For we have become partners with Christ, if in fact we hold our initial confidence firm to the end.
Hebrews 3:14
Erin Beil, Sneads Ferry, NC
Job 23:10 (NLT) But he knows where I am going. And when he tests me, I will come out as pure as gold.
Melody Williamson
Sevierville, TN
Isaiah 30:18 (NIV)
Yet the Lord longs to be gracious to you; therefore he will rise up to show you compassion.
For the Lord is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him!
Marilyn from Kansas:
NIV
2 Corinthians 5:21
“God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God”.
Bobbie Jo
San Angelo TX
We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, sure and strong. It enters behind the curtain in the Most Holy Place in heaven, (â€Hebrews‬ â€6‬:â€19‬ NCV)
Laura from Apopka, FL
They stubbornly tested God in their hearts, demanding the foods they craved. (â€Psalms‬ â€78‬:â€18‬ NLT)
You satisfy me more than the richest feast. I will praise you with songs of joy. (â€Psalms‬ â€63‬:â€5‬ NLT)
Geneseo, Illinois
John 12:24
I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds. NIV
Jess, Atlanta. “The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?” Psalm 27:1 (NIV)
Kathi Anglin Sykesville, MD
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.
Colossians 3: 1,2 NIV
Jennifer smith, Sydney Australia (colour). Do you see what this means—all these pioneers who blazed the way, all these veterans cheering us on? It means we’d better get on with it. Strip down, start running—and never quit! No extra spiritual fat, no parasitic sins. Keep your eyes on Jesus… (â€Hebrews‬ â€12‬:â€1MSG)
Margo, Burlington On “For the Lord is good, and his loveendures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.” Psalm 100:5 NIV
Lisa Atkinson in Chappell Hill, Texas
” Watch and Pray. ” Matthew 26:41(NIV)
Susie, Harrisburg, PA
I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand. ~ Isaiah 41:10 NIV
Eleanor
Memphis, TN
Ps. 119:3-4 ESV
Who also do no wrong, but walk in His ways.
You have commanded your precepts
to be kept diligently.
Karen, Saint Petersburg, Florida
He revealed His character to Moses
and His deeds to the people of Israel. -Psalm 103:7
Dori
Meridian, ID
2 Corinthians 12:9
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
Therefore I will boast all the more gladly in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
ESV
Giovana Cavarretta, Boca Raton, FL
A fool always loses his temper, But a wise man holds it back. (â€Proverbs‬ â€29‬:â€11‬ NASB)
Jeannine Hale
Eagan, MN
Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, “children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation.” Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky
Philippians 2:14-15 NIV
Leigh Ann, Atlanta GA
Ephesians 2:14-16 (NIV)
For He himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that He might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.
Selena – Cordele, GA
Because of the Lord’s faithful love we do not perish,
for His mercies never end.
Lamentations 3:22, HCSB
Shannon Davidson, San Juan Capistrano,CA “And we all, who with unveiled faces reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” 2 Corinthians 3:18 NIV
Matthew 6:25-34The Message (MSG)
25-26 “If you decide for God, living a life of God-worship, it follows that you don’t fuss about what’s on the table at mealtimes or whether the clothes in your closet are in fashion. There is far more to your life than the food you put in your stomach, more to your outer appearance than the clothes you hang on your body. Look at the birds, free and unfettered, not tied down to a job description, careless in the care of God. And you count far more to him than birds.
27-29 “Has anyone by fussing in front of the mirror ever gotten taller by so much as an inch? All this time and money wasted on fashion—do you think it makes that much difference? Instead of looking at the fashions, walk out into the fields and look at the wildflowers. They never primp or shop, but have you ever seen color and design quite like it? The ten best-dressed men and women in the country look shabby alongside them.
30-33 “If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen—don’t you think he’ll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.
34 “Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.
Brenda Gerber from Grafton, OH
II Samuel 22:31 (NIV)
As for God, His way is perfect: the Lord’s Word is flawless; he shields all who take refuge in Him.
Emily, Elk Grove, CA
Beginning memorization of 1 Corinthians 13…
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. (â€1 Corinthians‬ â€13‬:â€1‬ ESV)
Kayley Hibbert • Camp Point, IL
Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. (â€Ephesians‬ â€4‬:â€29‬ NIV)
Joy West Monroe, LA
“and to know this love that surpasses all knowledge-that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” Ephesians 4:19 NIV
Brockville, Ontario, Canada
“Yet if you devote your heart to God and stretch out your hands to him, if you put away the sin that is in your hand and allow no evil to dwell in your tent,
You will surely forget your trouble, recalling it only as waters gone by. (â€Job‬ â€11‬:â€13-14, 16‬ NIV)
WheatRidge, Colo.
I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come I say: My purpose will stand and I will do all that I please …
What I have said, that will I bring about; what I have planned, that will I do.
Isaiah 46:10-11 NIV
In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.
Ephesians 6:16 NIV
Sheila H., Mitchell, Manitoba, Canada
“Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us…” Ephesians 3:20, NIV
Nina, Stigler, 1 John 3:19-24
This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God and receive from him anything we ask, because we keep his commands and do what pleases him. And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us. The one who keeps God’s commands lives in him, and he in them. And this is how we know that he lives in us: We know it by the Spirit he gave us.
Stephanie from Ennis, Texas. I’m learning Isaiah 53, in response to our pastor’s challenge.
My verse 9 is Isaiah 53:2 (ESV)
For he grew up before him like a young plant,
and like a root out of dry ground;
he had no form or majesty that we should look at him,
and no beauty that we should desire him.
Jenni, Pittsburgh, PA
Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, “Let me take the speck out of your eye,” when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye. Do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you.
Matthew 7:1-6 ESV
Shelley, Brigham City, Utah
Matthew 22:37, ESV
And he said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.
Dana Nance
Blue Ridge, Tx
The Lord works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed. He made known his ways to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel:
Psalm 103:6-7 NIV (1984)
April Hughes, Escondido,Ca.
Zechariah 4:6 ESV
Then he said to me, “This is the word of the Lord to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of hosts.
2Cor. 12:9 B NIV. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weakness so that Christ power may rest on me.
Alycia Johnson . Granada, MN.
Jessica, Vicksburg, MS, “Not one of the good promises which the Lord hadmade to the house of Israel failed; all came to pass,” Joshua 21:45 (NKJV)
Ellen Hollenshead, Albuquerque, NM. O Lord, who shall sojourn in your tent? Who shall dwell on your holy hill? Psalm 15:1, ESV.
Kathy Wilson, Chandler, Arizona.
As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.
Ephesians 4:1
NIV
Cindy from San Angelo, TX
John 14:1 NIV
Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God, trust also in me.