Blog Post on Thanksgiving Day Did you expect a blog post on Thanksgiving Day? Are you expecting this post topic to be on Thanksgiving Day? Well, it’s not. However, it’s Thursday, and I committed to blog on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Why it wasn’t instantly obvious to me when I began researching this blog themed around
Wisdom: Another Gift Given for Sanctification Wisdom, another gift given for sanctification, could be the completion of a set composed of discernment, truth, and wisdom. It’s important to people and to God, because the listings for wisdom in my concordance take up two-and-a-half columns on a three-column wide page. As you might expect, a large
The Next Gift for Sanctification—Truth The next gift for sanctification is truth. Receiving truth from God is a vitally important gift for sanctification because Truth is part of God’s character. God the Father said as much when He told Moses His name was I AM. Jesus told his disciples, and therefore us, “I am the Way,
Author Leanna Sain has a new book release. Hush – by Leanna Sain She dreams of a murder before it happens. A young woman is strangled while her killer sings the words from the lullaby,“Hush, Little Baby.” Lacey Campbell’s life is full, but not idyllic. As head chef for a chic restaurant and primary caregiver
Gifts Given for Sanctification Gifts given for sanctification begin the changes which transform us to resemble Jesus while we still live here on earth. The first one we’ll look at is discernment. Why is that important? According to Webster’s Dictionary, discernment, among a group of synonyms, stresses accuracy in the quality of being able to
Joy celebrates her new release, Meant For Her.
For me, it wasn’t during the reading of a novel, although there have been times when I’ve thought – I could have done this and done it with more depth – but no, for me it happened when my family moved to Constantine, MI within the last marking period of my 8th grade.
Since my English teacher didn’t feel it was fair for me to take the same exam her students would take, having been learning for the entire school year, she assigned me a short story. I’d never done anything like that, but I went home, started the thing, went back to school the next day, and finished it there. My teacher graded it that evening and the next morning, she asked me to meet with her after school let out that afternoon. She told me I was a gifted writer and advised me to seek all of the writing or writing-related courses I could throughout high school and college.
Shortly after that, a missionary came to our church and conducted a series of meetings. One evening his topic was on allowing God to show us in the way He would have us go. Immediately, the words of my English teacher came to mind. I prayed about that relationship between what she’d said and what that gentleman had said.
God affirmed His call for me to write so many times following that. He has never allowed me to let it go either. By the way, I got 100% on that handwritten short story.
Each author has a different method and each book has its own timetable, for sure. In the case of Meant For Her, I actually wrote the story in 2012, but after numerous pitches and three contract offers from publishers who wanted me to take out one or more elements my agent and I both deemed were too important to be deleted, and after long stretches of sending out queries and going to conferences with MFH, we made the decision for me to independently publish the book.
Meant For Her was actually written within a six week period in 2012, but not been published until 2019. I learned a valuable lesson in that. No matter how little or how much time is spent writing, revising, pitching to agents and/or publishing editors, God’s plan for publication is never early or late, but always on time.
I enjoy the self-editing phase after setting the book aside for a period of time. Going back to it with fresh eyes, seeing the places I can deepen, strengthen, tighten the story is probably my favorite part after actually writing a complete novel.
What do I dread? Marketing and promotional work for the novel. I’m a writer, not a sales person. I’m depending heavily on the Lord to bring me opportunities to market and promote Meant For Her. Having prayed He’d do that, I’m seeing it happen rapidly. I praise Him for that. There is still much to learn, I’m asking Him to show me where to find the RIGHT material for just that as well.
Excerpt
“I cannot travel your road any more than you can travel mine, but I can say with certainty God has our journeys mapped out in such a way that whatever detours we’re forced to take, He gets us to the best possible destination of joy at the end.” Meant For Her
Christian Contemporary Romantic Women’s Fiction
~ Had it all truly been ~ MEANT FOR HER?
Kidnapped, raped, brutally beaten, and left for dead, Candi Reynolds becomes a prisoner of fear. Faced also with the impact of the unexpected break-up with her fiancé, and an unwanted pregnancy resulting from the attacks, she believes God has forsaken her. Choosing to move back to the Michigan horse farm, owned by her older brother, Dr. Cam Reynolds, Candi essentially goes into seclusion.
Dr. Patrick (Mack) MacKevon, long-time friend of Cam’s, watches from the sidelines at the farm, where his horses are stabled, while Candi struggles to regain a sense of normalcy. His own big-brother tendencies develop into a much deeper emotion over the months he prays for her.
Is it possible for Candi to put all the pain and trauma behind her and renew her former relationship with the Lord? Will she allow her heart to open enough to discover authentic love while making decisions of victory on her personal journey to joy?
Email joyjournaling@gmail.com
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Website https://www.joyaverymelville.com
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Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/author/joyaverymelville
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Jesus’ Fourth Gift is Sanctification Jesus’ fourth gift is Sanctification. Some of you following this are relieved to learn that this is the last gift with a heavy-weight topic. For the purposes of this post we’ll concentrate on one portion of Webster’s definition: 2b. The state of growing in divine grace as a result of
Jesus’ Third Gift is Justification Jesus’ third gift is justification. In my previous post, I used the analogy of a facet in cut crystal. For today I’d like to suggest that we think of Jesus’ third gift, justification, as a color sent out by the facet righteousness. But who sees the color? Like salvation and
Jesus’ Second Gift, Righteousness Jesus’ Second Gift is Righteousness. This isn’t because it’s less important than salvation. Nor is true righteousness anything resembling two flawed human-based behaviors: works righteousness, and self-righteousness, which many people find burdensome and disagreeable. What then? On Tuesday, I used the concept of a-box-within-a-box. Let’s switch word pictures, because one of
Jesus’ first gift is Salvation. Have you ever had someone give you a large gift, but when you unwrapped the box and opened it, you saw another wrapped box, and another one inside that? The friend at your party intended it as a joke, and to make you work until you found the final good