Changed By Love

Changed By Love

Following the Lamb wherever he goes… Revelation 14:4

What is Happening in Atlanta?

This is really scary. This woman, Nancy Schaefer, who was supposedly murdered by her husband was a strong Christian woman who was investigating the Child Protective Services in Atlanta. She was a former state senator of Georgia. She was President of Georgia Eagle Forum, a well-known and respected Pro-Family organization that Phyllis Schlafly started in 1972. She and her husband were both strong Christians. Their deaths have been reported by the media as a murder-suicide, minutes after (or before, it seems) the investigation started. They don’t even say “alleged” when they report it as a murder-suicide. I thought investigations were done before these kinds of allegations were made.

I got this from Riley Dad’s Weblog at the link at the bottom of this post.

Senator Schaefer had been investigating and exposing the Child Protective Services. She had been working on exposing one of the most vile rings of child slave trafficking involving the Child Protective Services agency in Georgia (particularly in the Atlanta area). Her efforts had been thwarted by politicians of both parties and ignored by the media, but she pressed on – more details to follow, but here is the gist of it :

“Specifically in Georgia, former Senator Nancy Schaefer had found during the last few years that:
* DFCS in Georgia housed children in a foster home with a known pedophile who molested the children.
* DFCS in Habersham County failed to remove six children from a home where they are being abused and tortured.
* DFCS in Georgia turned two girls over to a California father who had a pornographic video business.“

Please read the rest of the article at Riley Dad’s Weblog.

It is very disturbing, but it’s better that we know it than that we remain unaware of corruption in our government.

http://rileydad.wordpress.com/2010/03/30/unbelievable-government-corruption-child-slavery-and-the-age-of-political-violence/

Developing a Unit Study on Early American History – the Spirit-led Way

We have been doing a unit study on Early American history… for a while now. Many moons ago, I asked Shawn if there was an area of history that he felt we hadn’t covered well enough. He said that he didn’t really know much about the Colonial period of American history.

So I ordered an Early American history lapbook from In the Hands of a Child.

I happened to get a book from Goodwill called Rehoboth by Angela Elwell Hunt. It was a Christian novel, but as I read it, I realized that it was about the Wampanoag Indians and King Philip’s war right after the time of the first Pilgrims. It told about the ministry of John Eliot to the Indians. I read it first, then I read it aloud to my oldest children. We all really enjoyed the story, told from the perspectives of the Indians, the white missionaries and the Indian missionaries.

I got the Time Travelers – Colonial Life from Homeschool in the Woods.

I made this model of Jamestown settlement that I got from Homeschool in the Woods.

I looked in my book All Through the Ages for some books about the Founding of America and the Colonial period. I found a book called This Dear-Bought Land by Jean Lee Latham about Jamestown and Captain John Smith. We had never studied Jamestown in depth, so I was happy to read a book by an author that I already loved from reading her book Carry on, Mr. Bowditch years ago. My children really enjoyed this book about Captain John Smith, and we really got a feel for the time period and the dangers they faced from starvation, poor leadership and organization, lack of people willing to work and hostile Indians.

Simultaneously, I read a book about Pocahontas that I happened to have, The Story of Pocahontas by Brian Doherty, a Dover book.

We watched the HBO mini-series about John Adams. Not being from a Christian perspective, it was slightly depressing. It lacked the element of hope and the strong biblical foundation that our Founders actually worked from. I read aloud a library book about Abigail Adams, a biography by Dorothie Bobbe.

We then studied Thomas Jefferson by reading books from the library about him. I read a book aloud called Thomas Jefferson: Champion of the People by Clara Ingram Judson. In reading about Thomas Jefferson, we also read about the Lewis and Clark expedition and the Louisiana Purchase. I read several other books myself for background information but didn’t have time to read them all aloud. We wrote an essay together about Thomas Jefferson.

I also read a library book called Grand Papa and Ellen Aroon by F. N. Monjo. It was about Thomas Jefferson written from the perspective of his granddaughter. It was a sweet book that was informative and enjoyable.

I got several videos by David Barton of Wallbuilders, and we watched some about the American Revolution and the Foundations of American Government.

Somewhere in there I read aloud Justin Morgan Had a Horse by Marguerite Henry. In this story, the main character, Joel Goss, went and fought in the War of 1812 and actually met President Monroe.

After doing all of this reading and soaking in the time period, we are now putting together that lapbook I ordered from Hands of a Child. The children are writing about the things they have learned from reading (or hearing me read) many living books about early American history. The lapbook goes up to the era of the cowboys and the Gold Rush, so I have had Kelsey and Morgan read some books about Davy Crockett and will probably read a few novels about Westward Expansion before I end this unit. I have been finding a few books in our home library from this general time period and assigning them to different ones of the children to read independently.

We have been working on this unit for about a year. The lapbook is our culminating activity. I have learned so much about American History through this study. I have a much better grasp of what happened when and why. We are so blessed to be able to learn this way – all together. We have had many discussions that have caused each one of us to think deeply about the Declaration of Independence and the biblical foundations of our government and the principles of freedom that so many of our people have died for. And we have become even more thankful for the wisdom of the Founding Fathers and for the Constitution that they provided for us.

Here is our lapbook so far:

This is an example of Spirit-led homeschooling.

A Van for the Douglas Clan

This is the van we are believing God for. We have sowed for others to get what they need, and we believe that God will provide what we need. When Jesus needed a donkey to ride into Jerusalem for the Triumphal Entry, a donkey was right there at his disposal. When other people of faith have needed vehicles, houses, money, etc., God has provided them. Our whole family has been praying for a Savana van for about eight years. We sowed for it, so we don’t believe we will have to go into debt for it. So please pray with us for the provision of this real need.

Doing Spiritual Warfare and Getting Set Free

Wow, my brain has been turned on! We did some spiritual warfare and deliverance two nights ago, and since then I’ve had all kinds of ideas about ways to do things. I have figured out how to do things that I’ve had on to-do lists for months but just couldn’t seem to get accomplished. Suddenly, I know how to work things out that I just couldn’t get a handle on before.

Shawn identified some family curses that had been passed down to him through my side and through Gary’s side of the family. He shared them with us. Gary led us in prayer to break all of those curses in Jesus’ name, and I have felt different ever since. Shawn broke them over himself before he told us what had happened, but Gary went ahead and broke everything over all of the kids, too.

This is not the first time we have experienced deliverance and freedom from curses. We had always been under a spirit of poverty during our whole marriage. No matter how much money we made, it always felt like we were putting it in a bag full of holes. We knew what the Word says about how God wants to bless His people with prosperity and abundance, but we never saw it happening for us. We were faithful church attenders and very active in the church. We tithed and gave offerings. We were honest in our financial transactions. We didn’t spend foolishly. But we still couldn’t get ahead.

We finally got some CD’s from Arthur Burk about breaking curses off of your life. He is the founder of Plumbline Ministries. The Seven Curses CD’s were the ones we listened to. They also have renunciations you can go through after hearing about all of the curses. Gary and I went through and renounced all of the curses mentioned. Not long after that, everything changed for us financially. Someone surprised us with a gift of $20,000 not too long after that. Gary got a job that paid a whole lot more than he was making before. We were able to move into a house that was like new and big enough to accommodate our large family. We can buy what we want when we want – in moderation, of course. We don’t have too much month and not enough money any more. We don’t have to rely on food banks or thrift stores, although I still like to go to Goodwill and consignment shops. 😉

Basically, life is much easier and more enjoyable now than it was before we broke those curses. While I was in a Prophecy Room at IHOP-KC, one lady told me, “The time will come when you will be able to breathe again.” Well, that time has come. And I sure appreciate the peace and calm that God has blessed us with.

How to Hear God

If you want to learn how to hear God’s voice, I highly recommend the book Surprised by the Voice of God by Jack Deere. Its subtitle is How God Speaks Today Through Prophecies, Dreams, and Visions. It is available here. The author came out of the cessationist camp and landed squarely in the middle of the charismatic Vineyard Christian Fellowship, even being mentored by the founder of that ministry, John Wimber. He also wrote Surprised by the Power of the Spirit in which he describes how that transformation took place.

In Surprised by the Voice of God, Jack Deere gives many examples of God speaking to people in multiple ways in the Bible and in contemporary life. He tells how to accurately hear God speak through prophecies, dreams, visions, and other forms of divine communication. As a biblical scholar, he points out things that we laymen might miss in our regular Bible reading. For example, he goes through the book of Acts and shows that, with the exception of chapter 17, every chapter contains an example of, or a reference to, supernatural revelatory communication from God to his servants. He also tells fascinating stories of real people whose lives have been profoundly impacted by hearing God speak to them. And he shares personal experiences of hearing God speak to him in a variety of ways and the effect it has had on his spiritual life. He writes in a very personal, engaging style and reveals a sense of humor and humility you might not expect from a theology professor. I really enjoy reading his books.

My personal journey of learning how to hear God’s voice began when I realized that I was never sure if I was hearing from God or from my own mind or from the devil or what! I asked the Lord to help me hear Him better. Gary had just lost his job at the end of 2001, and I asked God to do this for me because I knew that His people really need to be able to hear His voice and know it’s Him, especially as we get into the last days and deception gets stronger. So I prayed for God to speak to me clearly. The thought came to me, “Buy yourself a new dress.” I laughed. I thought, “I don’t buy myself clothes. Everything I get is for the kids. I don’t buy dresses. I don’t even wear dresses! I don’t want to buy myself a new dress. Gary just lost his job. We have no money. And I’m supposed to go buy myself a new dress?” So I realized it must be God telling me that, because I certainly wouldn’t have thought of it myself. So I told Gary what had just happened, and he said, “Let’s go shopping.”

We went to Elder Beerman’s, and they just happened to be having Clover Days sales. They had reduced prices on their most expensive dresses, so that you could buy a $100 dress for $10. I couldn’t believe it. I was so excited. I started trying on all these fancy dresses. Most of them were long dresses, and I wondered where I could even wear them. I decided that I really liked 3 particular dresses – 2 long, fancy ones and one more practical knee-length dress that I could wear to church. We bought all 3 of them and took them home. I felt so good about my bargains, and it was fun having some new dresses in my closet. The next morning I woke up to hear these words: “I only told you to buy one dress.” Oh no! I asked the Lord to forgive me for disobeying Him and asked what I should do about it. I knew that I had to take two of the dresses back. But which two? I prayed and asked the Lord and tried to figure out with my mind which dress would be the right one to keep. The logical choice was the one I could wear to church. But somehow I didn’t think that was what He wanted. I started to understand that when I ask God His will, I’m not supposed to use my mind to figure out what makes the most sense. I’m really supposed to listen to what He says. I just couldn’t figure out which dress I was supposed to keep, so I asked the Lord to bypass my mind and speak to my spirit. When I did that I knew I was supposed to keep the red dress. We drove back over to the store and took the other dresses back and got the money back for them. My favorite one had really been a sparkly sapphire blue long dress, and I secretly wished I could have kept that one, but it was not to be. The whole thing turned out to be a real test of obedience for me.

After that, I started really paying attention to my spirit and what God was saying to my spirit instead of mentally figuring out what made sense to me whenever I was supposed to be consulting God about something. I read several books. One was by Joy Dawson called Forever Ruined for the Ordinary available here. It was an eye-opening book in which she talked about ways of seeking God’s will that are similar to the Urim and Thummim that the Old Testament priests used. She taught that we need to put our soul and our flesh in submission to our spirit. From her book, I learned to pray that God would bypass my mind and speak to my spirit- that it was okay. When I did it earlier, I wasn’t sure it was right. I learned to ask God yes or no questions. I learned that we need to bind anything that would keep us from hearing God speak to us. Then I learned that we can feel and hear our spirit somewhere near our stomach region. We started asking God specific questions about whether we should go to a certain place or if we should do a certain thing. We would phrase it as a question that could be answered yes or no. We started to hear in our spirits the answer to the question. We learned to stop thinking and start listening with our spirits.

We have been doing this for a couple of years now, and it’s getting easier to hear with our spirits. After we hear His answer, it’s up to us to obey even if what we heard seems crazy. The Lord has used this to give us such assurance that we are really hearing from Him and not just muddling along in life, hoping that we’re pleasing Him and doing His will. He has taken us through some really hard times, but being able to hear clearly from Him has made it easier than it would have been and has helped us to make right choices when they seemed to be illogical and even harmful to us. We know that we’re hearing from God and not some other spirit because we bind anything that would keep us from hearing from Him. This includes demonic spirits. We know that we’ve been hearing His instructions because He has delivered us from an impossible situation of homelessness, hopelessness and despair and has brought us into a place of abundance, prosperity and joy.

You CAN hear God’s voice! You have to learn a whole new way of listening, though – with your spirit, not your mind.