Meet Our Regular Contributors :)

Encourage 365 has the greatest readers EVER! I'm not lying. The emails I've gotten and encouragement has been amazing. I love this site and pray it continues to grow and bless others. 

Along those lines, I'm SO happy to let you know that we have ! fabulous people lined up as regular contributors to the site!

Jan from She Fancied Herself a Writer and Fellowship of Christian Bloggers will be featured every first Thursday.

Rebecca from Undivided and Christian Online Magazine will post here every first Monday.

Mike from Life of Us and Saints will be blogging every Last Monday of the month at Encourage 365. 

Stacy from Daily Surrender to Jesus will be blogging here every 1st Tuesday.

And Kathy from Prayer and Praise will be featured every second Tuesday of the month. (She's also my sister :) )


Wendy from I Love Devotionals will be featured first Wednesday.


Stacey from Shakin' the Foundation will write the post every third Wednesday.


Suzanne from Unto The Least of These will write the post every third Tuesday.


WOW! We have been truly blessed with these people who are taking their time to write for this blog. I can't thank them enough and look forward to reading what God has laid on their heart!

If you have a devotional you'd love to have posted here or would like to discuss a monthly column, please email me at kellymartin215 (at) yahoo I'd love to hear from you.

God Bless You,
~Kelly

Linked with: On Your Heart Tuesday

New Blog Added to the Directory (and a new monthly writer!) :)

I'm happy to announce that a new blog has been added to the directory. Wendy from I Love Devotionals has been added AND she is Encourage 365 newest writer! Her devotionals will be posted once a month (we are still working on the details.) I'm so happy to have Wendy added to the Enc. 365 family!!


Here is what Wendy says about her blog: 



(This is the only picture I could find. Wendy, I'll change it if you want.)


I Love Devotionals: My names Wendy and I Love Devotionals. I write devotionals that try to help us see God better and remind us how much Jesus not only loves but likes us as we are. Devotional topics range from learning about God while doing laundry to discovering a biblical truth while caring for my husband who is fighting cancer. 


Lets pray for Wendy's husband as a group and Wendy too!


Please welcome Wendy by visiting her site and showing her some love. The people who blog on here and add their blogs work hard to give you God's message (lots of you, readers, are too and you know how they feel). Go and say hey to Wendy and to the other blogs in the directory if you have a chance.


If you'd like your blog added (or if you'd like to guest post), drop me a line at ohthatmomagain (at) yahoo (dot) com.


Thanks so much!

God Bless You!!


~*~Kelly~*~

Friday's with Stacy-- "Where the Rubber Meets the Road"

A new feature on this blog is Friday's with Stacy. Stacy is the wonderful blogger at Daily Surrender to Jesus and will be posting here every Friday. I'm so happy to have her! She is a sweet lady with a huge heart.

~Kelly

********************************************************

Hello friends,

Just a quick introduction because I may be a new voice for some of you… 

I’m Stacy. Passionate about Jesus. Heart-broken for orphans. Grateful for grace. Thrilled to be able to start sharing my heart with you here on Encourage365 each Friday.

I admire Kelly and her heart for the Lord, as well as her faithful commitment to share her heart on this blog daily for the last year.  I must be forthcoming with you all… Even a weekly blogging commitment seems a bit huge to me. Like my new commitment to share here each Friday for example. Huge. Exciting. And a tad bit scary perhaps. I may have to pull out my “Rescue me, I’m drowning.” card every now and then which Kelly has assured me I can use if I need to. J She’s so very gracious. Pray for me friends, (mostly because I’m the mom of 5 boys and that alone is enough to warrant a request for prayer, right? but also…) because I long to faithfully speak words of truth and grace in every opportunity I’m given.

I’m so blessed by this opportunity.

So may I start off today by simply telling you all a little about my own heart, and my own walk with the Lord? …

I cling tightly to the grace of God because his grace changes me and I desperately want to be changed into His likeness.

Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Philippians 3:12 NIV

I know I will find this transformation in the midst of the truth of His Word, and so I am convinced of my need to seek Him in His Word, every day.

You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:13 ESV

Seek Him in His Word, and seek Him in prayer. I’m an advocate of prayer. Prayer changes things. Prayer draws us closer to our savior.

Pray then like this: "Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” Matthew 6:9-13 ESV

Jesus gave this model for prayer, and as he taught his disciples he spoke of the need for our prayer to come from a heart that is genuine, sincere, authentic, without hypocrisy. I love to get to the heart of things.

I also believe that the Word of God is practical and applicable as much as it is spiritual and poetic and profound. So I don’t want to let the poetic wording dance across my eyes without allowing it to sink in and change me. I look at the Word and ask… What does this look like “where the rubber meets the road”?  You know, how do I apply it? And I’m grateful when the Lord shows me practical applications such as this…

P= Praise: Recognition of who God is, (He is our creator, our sustainer, and provider. He is holy, loving, wise, sovereign, etc.) and recognition of His blessings in our lives; giving thanks for His faithfulness. (Hallowed be your name. Matthew 6:9)

R= Repent: Recognition of who we are and our great need; a sincere examination of our hearts, and confession of sin. (Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Matthew 6:12)

A= Ask: We do not have because we do not ask. Go boldly before His throne and lay bare the requests of your heart. (Give us this day our daily bread. Deliver us from evil. Matthew 6:11 and 13)

Y= Yield: To relinquish, surrender, or submit. To make sure we are asking with right motives and a heart that says…  “Though I may ask for this cup to be taken from me, not my will, but yours be done Lord.”  Yielding to the will of God is vital.  We yield because we trust. (Your will be done. Matthew 6:10)

“His will, not mine” is the voice of my personal blog, Daily Surrender to Jesus. Because surrender, or yielding to God’s will; loving Him with our whole hearts and trusting His plans for our life, that, my friends, will bring forth love, peace, joy, and hope.

So this is a small sample of my heart. I hope you will choose to meet me here on Fridays and allow me to continue sharing more with you. I look forward to getting to know you all better as well. In fact, I feel compelled to include a link, perhaps each week, to one or two of your posts that spoke to my heart this week. God bless you friends!

Shared from my heart ~ Stacy

A little weekend reading? Visit…

 You Can’t Take it With You

 How Big Are Your Legs?


~*~*~*~

A Note From Kelly: Stacy, I can't thank you enough for this and for your commitment to doing this every week (and yeah, even with the 'HELP' card ;) ) You have truly blessed me, friend!!

LINKED WITH: FAITH FILLED FRIDAY @ BEHOLDING GLORY

Prayer Ministries International

A few weeks ago, I found a website called 'Prayer Ministries International'. I clicked the link and instantly knew I had to sign up for it.

It is a website that takes prayer requests. Then the founder, Deb, sends emails to everyone who has pledged to pray for the requests. It is a great way to get prayers out and help people.

I signed up to be a prayer partner and got my first email yesterday. Without giving specifics, I was amazed by the amount of people from all over the world (not just the country.... the world!) who were asking for prayer.  Folks, there are a lot of people hurting!

Sometimes we don't have a lot of money and can't donate to help causes even when we want. Prayers are free... but they help so so much! And, truthfully, they help more than money ever could. You how know you feel when you know someone is praying for you... it lights up your spirit much more than dollars and cents.

I'd like to encourage you to stop by Prayer Ministries International and look around. I also encourage you to become a Prayer Partner. It doesn't cost you a dime and Deb does all the work sending you the prayer requests, but it's an amazing ministry and you can help so many people!

Matthew 18:20

"because where two or three have come together in my name, I am there among them."

God Bless You,

Kelly

Help When You Need It

(from pinterest.com)


Today has been an interesting day to say the least. One of the awesome things that happened was that Stacy from Daily Surrender to Jesus sent me an email asking about the blog directory-- then sent another saying she was sorry, and sad because I'd stopped posting here.


We got to talking and discussing ways to keep the devotional directory active and running when I didn't really have the time to devote to this site.


We talked about a lot of things, but I decided that it would just be easier to 'open' this site again instead of moving everything around. 


Stacy was nice enough to offer to help me here in the midst of all the chaos :) She will be a contributor/columnist every Friday (unless her own life gets nutty like they do sometimes). 


Also, my sister, Kathy, has thrown her hat in the ring and offered to write every 2nd Tuesday of the month (I chose that day because I could remember it... it's nursing home singing day to church ;) ). 


Friends, I'm so beyond words as to how I'm feeling right now. I'm excited and so happy to have this blog back going again... and not just from me... from others pitching in. It means so much...


And that's not all.


Every week, we will feature one of the 365 blogs on a special day (I'll email you and ask if you want it, of course). Those details aren't worked out completely yet so stay tuned.


So, that's what's going on. We are back up and running! And I'm so thankful for Stacy, Kathy, and all of you who are here! 


God Bless You,


~Kelly


Linked with: On Your Heart Tuesday