John J Lenski, my earthly hero

You know, Grandpas are pretty special people.  I’ve watched my hubby John transition to the role eloquently these past few years.  I robbed the cradle (don’t think I told you that), and have been wondering for some time if the eight years between us might just show themselves one of these days.  I got a surprise, actually. Though, mercifully, you can’t tell by looking (at least not quite yet), my heart knows how John has matured beyond my expectations into a wonderful man of God in the course of our 29 years together.  I should never have expected less from God!  John’s a man with whom I am most definitely running to catch up and stay alongside.  He makes life fun.  He challenges me while treating me with the delicacy of fine crystal.  His life is pure entertainment to me and could best be described as my covering.  We live in covenant love, and to us, covenant love is like a private retreat!  In God’s workmanship, I am a direct recipient of the blessing flowing in to my husband’s life.  We certainly don’t have it all together, but together do WE HAVE IT ALL!

Another little surprise came along in recent days, and that was the announcement by our youngest that we’re going to be grandparents again.  John got all excited when the kids told us the name they’ve set their hearts on if we have a girl (we already have a pretty cool big brother who’s five…).  John emailed me from who-knows-where yesterday (he travels as a corporate VP), and I got such a rise out of how seriously he’s taken his role as our family CEO.  My adorable mate said, “God is full of surprises, and we’re already giving Him the glory!”  Then he spelled out the research he’d done on the meaning of the name our surprised parents have picked out.  We’re all really getting into this now.  Our oldest daughter Dayna had her say and showed her tender heart, too.  She loved her dad’s input as much as the baby’s parents, Erik and Sonya.  Here’s the skinny:  Lyla Rose (keep in mind that our little family lives on Coronado Island, San Diego):  L is for love everlasting…Y is for youthful, your eternal joy….L is for life, you live so well….A is for amenable, for your easy-going nature.   There’s a Persian meaning in the name that comes from the lilac tree and has the extended reference to “from the island”.  Cool.  Rose.  R is for realist…O is for openness to God…S is for serious in your quest and E is for most elegant.  And we all know a Rose is a Rose is a Rose!

I am one blessed woman.  God blesses in such rich ways.  Are we listening?  I love the verse from Psalms that says “The blessings of the Lord make one truly rich, and He adds no trouble or sorrow with it.”  Amen to that!

Sending love.

When I have moments that tempt me, I whisper to God, thanking Him for loving me and for the person who is teaching me to maintain relationships in love.  I can learn this.  I want to learn how to treat others the way I’ve been hoping they’ll treat me.  I remind myself that this person needs His love and help as much as I do.  The temptation leaves me, and I’m thinking “this isn’t as hard as I had been led to believe”.  But…yes, but….I’ll likely be tempted again.  My soul enemy tries to show my Deliverer that I can’t be trusted, but…but, he’s wrong.  There have been times when I wasn’t shaken, and I pray I’ll stand my ground again in the future.  I don’t want this mindset to keep me from God’s love and call any longer.

Your life is a song, meant to be a testimony to God’s love.  Give others the chance to share this melody and see how love honors everyone it touches.

On Valentine’s Day let’s agree:  Choosing love is unquestionably worth it!

There are so many lives to touch and so many wonderful opportunities to live out what we believe!  But…but, we still need so much from God! We’re all in our own process of restoration.  Can we see that God has us exactly where we can represent Him?  There’s destiny here.

It’s where we’re going that matters.

What if we made helping each other get there our new quest?  Let’s make that the art form we create together, and let’s be authentic about it.

Sending love…

Marsha

Taken from: “WWDKG: Woman With Destiny in the Kingdom of God”, by Marsha Lenski, Jebaire Publishing, 2011

God wants you and I to see the storm below and ride safely above it.  We each have gifts, dreams and our own circle of influence.  Women with destiny in His kingdom are liberated to soar above the world’s distractions as we pour our lives into those callings.  We love because He loved us first.  As we move in our purpose, circling our targets and aiming for victory, we choose the high road of obedience where we stay sheltered and unshackled.  His forgiving, unconditional love teaches us to understand the difference between seeking the His kingdom and seeking it first.  It’s your heart He wants.  It’s my heart.  Giving only a  little of ourselves doesn’t cut it.  If an offering means little to us, what makes us think for a minute that it means anymore to God?  Have you ever seen a half-baked cake?

As we surrender our hearts, the lure of the world’s sinful pull is diminished until it’s gone.  We don’t surrender grudgingly. We don’t do it to gain the favor of others.  We aren’t looking to be like someone else.  We surrender because we want this pure, amazing love offered so freely!  Our surrender is our way to love Him back. We run to Him because we’re sick of living in barrenness.

Put Him first.  Put Jesus first. It doesn’t matter where you’ve been.  It matters where you’re going. You’ll never want to settle for less again.

Taken from Woman With Destiny in the Kingdom of God, by Marsha Lenski, Jebaire Publishing, 2011

Christmas is almost on top of us before we get over Thanksgiving!  I’ve been resting many sweet thoughts on the joys I’m expecting this Christmas. I wrap packages from day to day and pray over each one and the loved one whose heart I want to touch. Prayer does change things. It does.  In these days and weeks of December we pray once again for peace and the end of civil conflicts that plague our planet, for starving people needing what God wants to pass through our hands, and for nations arguing unresolved issues day after day. We have the world’s answer.  We need to live by that resolve!  The love force in us must be nourished with every beat of our hearts until it overbalances destructive instincts. God’s love force!  How about that hurting, wandering husband, for instance, who returns to the wife who held tightly to God through the pain and loved anyway, and who now welcomes the best Christmas of all as she welcomes her repentent man home?  Yes! That’s love in its sweetest form.  It’s that kind of faith that pleases God and blesses the Savior we celebrate this season.

Somehow, by Divine light, we have got to see ourselves as people God loves, one and all.  May you know the freedom and joy of that kind of love gift at Christmas and always.

Sending blessings. . . .

“There’s a place in every woman’s life where she deserves a standing ovation,” Marsha declares from the very first word.  Every woman deserves to know a loving God agrees and calls her forward in a burst of heavenly applause. WWDKG is a lighthouse to wholeness and the secret that needs to come out:  she is a gift to her world!

WWDKG speaks to a woman’s Kingdom destiny and how it’s designed with the delicacy of a fine crystal frame meant to hold the original artwork of her legacy.  To God, her destiny will be as unique as the prints from the touch her fingertips leave behind, but it won’t be an accident!  Here is where a woman feels the exhilerating refreshment of letting God love her. . . pure, sweet and simple. . . the devotional for one woman or for many to read together again and again.  Lavish this one gift upon yourself or a lady in your life you want to applaud and encourage.  No woman who reads this book will be the same or ever want to settle again for anything less.

Marsha is the author of two previous books as well:  From Sinking Sand and Pure Intentions.  Each is filled to the brim with heart-passion to propel readers to an appreciation for their God-given uniqueness and call.  Marsha’s amazing and sometimes startling transparency will stretch your thinking and open your mind to the possibilities for healing, forgiveness and personal growth in spite of tremendous odds and impossibilities.  From her appearance on CBN’s 700 Club, Pat Robertson has said “Marsha Lenski’s story has touched a nerve in this nation.”  One womens’ ministry leader wrote of Marsha saying “she is a unique blend of steel and velvet.  The Lord has developed in her the ability to be strong when needed, yet also to be a source of comfort and compassion.  Whether you encounter Marsha as an individual, in a group or in her writings, everyone leaves knowing they’ve had a Divine encounter.”

With more than 25 years in ministry, Marsha Lenski’s passion and message is one of hope and encouragement.  She delights in having a part in God’s work to empower others through the love of Jesus Christ.

(Taken from Press Release files of IHN Ministries, November 2011)

 I believe Christian women writers and speakers are called out to testify of the power in the love of Jesus Christ that  gives a woman the dignity she is meant to own and appreciate.

Women who love God and know the secret of letting Him love them can enjoy Him like few ever do. My newest book, Woman With Destiny in the Kingdom of God  (don’t miss it!) is being used to point women to the truth about their tremendous value and how beautifully that truth can affect their unique roles in life. Before banging out the first sentence of that book or either of the other two, I sighed with expectation for the opportunity in my hands to teach, testify and train.  Ah, and then prayer. . .the great essential!   It’s important to  me to pray for God’s love to prepare others to hear from Him as He prepares me to write and speak.  I pray each will listen for His pointed word just for her because I believe it will be there.  As powerful as God is, He can’t answer prayers not prayed, right?

Being a Christian woman makes me keenly aware of the unique needs of Christian women.  Having been party to the games we women sometimes play has made me alert to warn against the trap of a victim mentality.  Desperately aware of  my own shortcomings, God can use me to warn and restore if I let Him.  So, I see transparency as another essential for committed Christian women writers and speakers.

Even the most gifted communicators can’t give away something they don’t have.  If His uncompromised Word  is not our own light and lamp, we’re faking it.  The third critical heart choice, then, for Christian women writers and speakers is humility, which, simply put, is agreeing with God about me.  It’s teachability.  We must first be the teachable ones, and it’s got to be our own way of life.  It’s the necessary precursor before attempting to persuade others to believe anything we might have to say.

Here’s the reference I use as a personal plumb line:  “Blessed is she who believed, for there will be a performance of that which was told her from the Lord.”  Luke 1:45

Giving back from the treasury ot what God Himself has deposited in to our lives is the unquenchable passion in the heart of anointed Christian women writers and speakers.  It’s Divine privilege of the highest portion.  It’s a sensational way to live.

Sending love,

Marsha

The proprietor was a woman we thought to be pretty amazing.  Gisela is a 72 year old German woman whose husband had run a successful business growing rare african violets.  We learned they had bought this property using Gisela’s inheritance, and she was hard at work, seemingly running it alone.  So lonely, she began to visit with us every morning at 7 a.m., when she brought the loaf of bread she had just baked for us. A remarkable story, but so sad.  Her husband now has Parkinson’s disease and dementia, and her family has distanced themselves from the business and the property. One morning Gisela told us about her parents from Germany and how she missed them.  She shared how difficult it is becoming to tend to her husband, the business and this 100 acre property with two cabins she now rents out to help with living expenses.  We told her how beautiful everything was to us and how the comforts and joy we were experiencing meant so much to us.  She began to cry just a little when we commented on her good work, and I asked her if she believed in God and prayer.  I could see she needed a touch from Him.

Gisela told me how disappointed she was in God because she had waited 18 years since her mother’s passing for a sign she said her mother had promised to give her when she got to heaven, and there had never been a sign.  Her heart was badly broken.  I held out my hands and asked if I could pray with her.  Those bruised hands were shaking, but she held them out to me.  I only had a moment, I could tell from her anxiety, and I cried a little, too, asking God to give her a sign of His love for her each day for the rest of her life, so she could be comforted.

Gisela hugged me.  I smiled at her and she went on her way to the next task awaiting her.  She smiled so much more the rest of the week, and gave us three lovely african violet plants to take home with us.

God knows our needs, and He understands loneliness and heartbreak.   Everytime I look at those purple african violets now, I think of our Divine appointment, and say another prayer for Gisela, a woman to whom God tenderly offered destiny in His kingdom one pretty October morning.

Kennidy K. Eiden, ready for that championship tournament

There’s a beautiful young lady, just turned 14, who’s on a path to womanhood who makes her family smile with a great deal of pride. I don’t know her as well as I’d like to because she lives far away on the other side of this great country, but when we get time to share our lives I marvel at her maturity, her discipline and her accomplishments. Kennidy Eiden allowed me this interview so you and I could see life from the eyes a young girl filled with the hope and joy of approaching womanhood. I asked her to answer a few questions via email. I was digging a little, admittedly, because her point of life and her view of life I knew would refresh me and set a fire under many of us. Kennidy is about to begin high school in a few weeks. She’s going to take that school by storm, I just know it, because she’s shown a pattern of excellence and success in her young life already. Meet Kennidy.

Q: Now that you’re a teen-ager, how do you view life differently?
A: As kids, we want toys and games. We don’t have much to worry about. Things are handed to us. As a teen-ager, I’ve started to realize how life is not always easy. I see life as hard sometimes, but you get rewarded along the way, like finding someone you love or having children.

Q: Who are the women who have influenced you the most and why?
A: My mom has influenced me the most. Mothers and daughters have a special bond that cannot be broken. I see in her the person I want to be. She has a good job and a great family. She is always there to support me at my volleyball tournaments or with my schoolwork. She raised me to be the person I am today. As I see my mom deal with situations, I couldn’t think of a better way than the way she handles them. She puts others before herself. She is an awesome mother. The way she is raising my siblings is how I wish to one day. She has been there through everything and I hope to be as great a person as she is. My little sister Sidney may not be a woman, but she has influenced me also. She is this little, happy energized girl. She has her bad moments, but I love her. She takes me back to being a kid again, not having a care in the world. She’s taught me to enjoy life and that it’s okay to act like a kid sometimes.

Q: How important are friends as you get older?
A: I think friends are important no matter what age you are, but even more important as you grow up. When others run out on you or maybe your parents get mad at you, or when life isn’t going your way, they are the ones you can depend on. Friendship is another bond that is very hard to break. Once you find that one great friend, she is in your heart forever. My best friend and I are going to different high schools this year, but we are still best friends.

Q: Does a relationship with God have any value to a girl approaching womanhood?
A: A relationship with God has great value. He is someone you can tell everything to without judgment. He is always there no matter how many mistakes you make. Sometimes teen-agers think there is no one there to talk to, but it’s comforting for me to know I will always have God.

Q: What’s the hardest part about growing up?
A: It’s the responsibilities you gain quickly. You start driving and working. School gets much harder and you do the best you can to make the best decisions. I think I can handle the responsibilities with the help and advice my parents have given me.

Q: What’s the coolest part of growing up?
A: Driving! You’re able to get to places on your own without having your parents take you (spoken by someone not yet owning a permit). I think it’s cool some of the freedoms you get. Your parents trust you more. I am looking forward to growing up and becoming the woman I want to be.

Well, Miss Kennidy, as your maternal grandmother, let me say how much I am looking forward to watching you grow in to the beautiful woman God is obviously crafting you to be. Love you, Girl, for always!

And for all of you out there who appreciate parenting and grandparenting, thanks for letting me brag a little bit here. Until next time, sending blessings to you all.
Marsha

The draught with which we’ve been plagued this summer dried up the creek behind the trees. It’s the only water source for critters all around the property. Margie knew the deer were desperate, and she set out a large bucket of fresh water for them every day. I know what a kind and generous heart this lady has, and I knew how anxious she was to help this little family from her little forest.

They came alright. The buck was certainly looking for something, but still cautious. Margie watched as the three of them neared the bucket the first day they spotted it. The buck got the closest, sniffed carefully once or twice, then hastily bounded away with the clan, never touching the cold, clear water in the bucket. He must not have been thirsty enough to trust then, but they were back the next day. Same scene, much to Margie’s sorrow, because she was well aware of their thirst. Temperatures were in the high 90s, the yards were baking for miles around. It wasn’t until the third day that the deer were brave enough to bend down and drink from that bucket. I wish I could have been there to see it, but I loved how Margie told me all about it, because I appreciate her compassionate spirit so much.

It’s like that between some people and God. He’s made a way for us to drink from the wells of His Living Waters and never thirst in our soul again. His open arms have gone to the farthest extreme to win our hearts and our trust when He gave His Son’s life up for ours. He is the generous and loving God Who delights in giving us His very kingdom. He spares nothing to protect and provide for His own who love Him. No one outgives Him.

And here’s us. We might creep a little closer to check out His motives — even ask about what He offers in His Word, thinking either it’s too good to be true, or He’s standing behind all of us with some big stick waiting to crush us with one blow if we can’t live up to some impossible standard. Rubbish.

We are so needy, and He is so good ALL THE TIME. His love saves and restores and protects. The deer had to let go of their inhibitions. We have to let go of our sin. Why is that hard when real living is as easy as surrendering to the cooling, soothing clear Voice of Love and promise?

“As the deer pants for the water brooks, so pants my soul for You, O God.” Ps. 42:1

Come to Jesus. He’s watching at the window, only a prayer away.

Until next time, sending love.
Marsha

I’ve seen so many women living in performance mode, wanting me to join them on the same stage and prove myself so they’ll accept me. It’s like a school girl game, and it often begins in misunderstandings and jealousy, then ends tragically in crushed hearts and rejection. One woman said to me once, “I’m keeping you at arm’s length and I’m watching you”, after I had accepted the role of women’s ministry leader at a large church.

You what?! What was she misunderstanding about my heart to bring unity among believing women in my circle of influence? What was she threatened by? I only wanted to help! Did I dress too nice, look too pretty, or have too big a house or something? Come on, now. Let’s all grow up.

This handicap can turn the atmosphere of a church into a circus of painful emotional acrobatics. I’ve been guilty, too, and I hated it. I asked God about it, realizing there was likely as much hurt in the church among women as outside it. Maybe even more. That’s sad.

What does ‘loving each other’ really mean? How can we help each other avoid the trap?

The first important step, I believe, is to let the Lord love each of us as an individual, as a Woman With Destiny in the Kingdom of God. It’s the love you and I have always wanted, the one that satisfies and never fails. His love has no pre-qualifications and no hoops to ever jump through. It’s the love that calls us to a heavenly stage where we are each applauded for who we are, not for what we can or can’t do, or what we do or don’t have. Why in the world would a woman not want that when it’s all we’ve ever hoped for? Run to His arms, His open arms, agree with Him about you, and let Him love you.

And always, understand that hurting people hurt people. Not every woman who prays the sinner’s prayer has totally grasped the love that requires no performance. We get trapped in old thinking that makes us fight and claw our way into the limelight or, in some cases, hide in the shadows– both choices stemming from some kind of desperate fear. Ask God, and He’ll give you a glimpse into the heart of a woman who needs an example, not a critic or a competitor. The capacity to which we let God love us is the way we’ll love others. God’s kind of love has no fear in it. None. It’s selfless; no stage necessary.

When you and I let God, through Jesus, love and heal us, we’ve got something real to give away to others who are trying to find that love in the wrong place and the wrong way. We can live to prove the rumors and the gossip and the slander wrong. God IS Love, and He Himself is our defense.

We don’t need to scramble for the microphone, Ladies. We don’t need the limelight. We don’t need the shadows. We need each other. And the deeper we go in to these last days, the more it will be true.

Sending blessings,

Marsha