Yes, today, September 24 is my birthday. How old am I, you ask?  I once heard Mary Kay say, "A women who will tell you her age will tell you anything."  So you will have to keep guessing.  :)

But I did want to reflect and tell you 5 things I learned this past year and 5 things I am looking forward to in the coming year.

1.  Get A Life Coach!  A year ago Matt and I got a personal Life Coach from Coachwell Pro and I also started group coaching with Kingdom Builders. Both with a different purpose and focus but both very beneficial. In places where I was stuck, they got me unstuck, helped dreams to become a reality, and have helped me do more than I thought I could.

2.  Help Other People Grow.  This year during our 21 Days of prayer I really wanted to help people connect with God and be able to spend an hour with Him and LOVE IT! In the Bible study Prayer Force, I learned how to pray the Lord's prayer in a practical everyday way and not...

Now that we're in the aftermath of Hurricane Florence, I think back to what we were going through when we heard it was coming our way. Thankfully, we don't need a storm to choose faith over fear before, during, and after the storms.

When the hurricane is coming straight for your house with 75/100 miles an hour winds, People are already fighting over bottles of water and everyone's saying it's the worst Hurricane in 60 years, fear begins to arise.

I want to remind you to choose faith.

Remember:
The 10 plagues didn’t come to Goshen where God’s people lived.
God provided manna and for the people to eat.
God filled up all the woman’s jars with oil and she never ran out.
Jesus fed the 5000 with a few fish and a few loaves.
Jesus spoke to the storm, Peace be still.

Miracles always came about where there was faith. Jesus couldn’t perform miracles because there wasn't enough faith in the town he was in.
So today choose Faith over Fear!

God is our...

I got to preach this weekend! Thank you, Matt Fry, for giving me the opportunity! I spoke on how to have a healthy heart from the passage of Psalms 119:112-114. I wanted to give you a recap of the sermon in hopes it will encourage you this week!

"I incline my heart to perform your statute forever, to the end.  I hate the double-minded, but I love your law. You are my hiding place and my shield;  I hope in your word"

Incline means to act upon or orient in a different direction.

From the verse above, God showed me three habits that will help YOU have a healthy heart! Feel free to speak these points aloud to speak them into existence! 

I incline my heart to perform Your statute forever.  I set my heart to obey Your Word.  I determine my heart will obey Your Word.  

Forever to the end, I want lasting change.  I don't want momentary change, I want lifetime change, I want generational change.

I hate the...

Hello, Amazing People!

I posted a blog a few days ago and challenged you to read 1 Timothy 3:1-13 (Passion Version) and then I listed all the leadership principles that are mentioned in that passage. Now, I want to look at each quality individually to see how we can use them to grow as leaders.

The first characteristic listed is to be "Without Blame - Well Thought Of."

I love how practical these are even in our lives today. We're going to look at each principle in 3 areas we need to lead in:  Ourself, Our Family, and Our Workplace.

How do you think of yourself? Do you think well of yourself? Many people don't think well of themselves, yet the Bible commands us to love others as we love ourselves. If we're not loving ourselves, how can we love our family and those we work with and lead? 

A few years ago I started listening to how I talked about myself. I realized that I was negative and not very encouraging to myself. I would do something and then beat myself...

Last week, our staff went to our annual Staff Retreat. We love to take the C3 staff families for a yearly getaway to learn, have fun, dream, set goals, play games, pray together, worship and laugh. 

This year I taught a session on what the Bible says it takes to be a leader in the church. However, as I looked at the things it takes to be a leader in the church, I realized the qualities I listed are qualities every leader should have. 

Also, I realized there are 3 areas we all need to lead in:

1.  Leading Ourselves

2.  Leading Our Families

3.  Leading In Our Workplaces

I took these leadership qualities from 1 Timothy 3:1-13.

I want you to read these verses from the position that God is good, He truly LOVES you, and is for YOU! He gives us these qualities for our good, so we can flourish!

If you don't serve on a church staff that's ok, I want you to be empowered to lead in every area of your life! Remember this, even if you're not in a high leadership...

 I want you guys to meet the people who helped me make all of this possible. I have had a great team that helped film, write the prayers, and handle all the details to make something like this happen.

Huge thanks to my husband, Matt Fry. He has encouraged and supported me to do the things God has called me to do.  

Thanks to Emily Floars who helped with the web-design and getting everything set up on the web.

Thanks to Dillon Parker,  he has made everything run smooth. He made the 21 Days Of Prayer filming possible and made sure all the prayers were written before we started. He has taken all my ideas, thoughts, and dreams and brought them into order.

Thanks to all the C3 staff that helped write different prayers and declarations.

Anisa Larson - Business Operations

Nate Fairfield - Executive Minister

Sarah Buss - Connect Groups & First Touch

Jen Waldon - Connect Groups & First Touch Ministry Assistant

Andrew Kurtz - Worship Director

Thanks to...

I love making Spaghetti, so I thought I'd share with you my favorite recipe! It's super easy and it turns out delicious!

After 21 Days of Prayer launched on Saturday, I did an Instagram live and made homemade spaghetti sauce. I was even able to use fresh tomatoes from a friend's garden! No worries if you don't have any fresh tomatoes, you can definitely use canned tomatoes for this sauce. Many of you have asked for the recipe so here it is!

Disclaimer:  I am not a food blogger so there won't be many pretty pictures, I am just giving you the recipe. Also, for my friends from Italy, I am not Italian, this is not my grandmother’s recipe, I found it in a magazine and I've made a few changes. There are probably ways to improve it if so feel free to share your input in the comment section! 

Enjoy!

Martha

Spaghetti Recipe 

Ingredients:

1 pound bulk Italian sausage (1/2 mild, 1/2 hot)

1 1/2 cup finely chopped onion

1  12-ounce can tomato paste

3...

Once a week, our C3 staff comes together for a special time of prayer, worship, and encouragement. This week we got to hear from my assistant, Emily Floars. I'm SO proud of her and wanted you to hear a part of what she shared, so check it out below!

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I've gone through a lot of change the past couple of years. And with that change, there have been a lot of exciting moments and opportunities. However, there have also been plenty of challenges and difficulties.

But if there has been one thing that I’ve learned over the past couple of years it's this. In the shifting of seasons, the difficulty of transitions, and everything that change may bring, in each and every single moment we are extended an invitation to discover something new about the character of God.

Truthfully, its very rare I consider difficulties to be any type of...

A few weeks ago I got away and turned my phone off for 5 days. For 5 days I didn't text anybody, I didn’t email anybody, I didn’t talk to anybody, I didn’t check Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, nothing. My phone was off. The big question people have been asking me is, “What was it like?” So let me share my experience: 

1. When I first learned I was going to have to turn my phone off I actually felt anxious! Then I had to remind myself, there was a day when I didn't even have a cell phone and when I went off to camp the only way I could communicate was through letters. And when I spent a summer in the jungles of Brazil I didn't have a phone... and I survived! So, I determined I would be ok and that I would live. :)
2. When the day came to turn off my phone, I found myself calling and texting people to say bye. I was sending reminders to people and last minute thoughts. Not to be disrespectful or make light of, but I felt how I...

I'm back after being gone for 10 days, and 5 of those days I was without my phone. Yikes! 

Jesus often withdrew from the crowd to a private place to spend time with the Father. I went on theQuestlife.com to withdraw from the things and noise of this world to spend time with the Father. It was the first time in my adult life that I have done anything like that. Now that I’m back to my regular life, I'm doing the same tasks and same things that I did before, but I feel different!

I’ll be sharing more about what it takes to detox from your phone, so stay tuned! But when you get away from the noise of the TV and social media and slow down a bit, you come away feeling refreshed. You have conversations with people, some are surface and some are deep, but you remember how to engage with people.

I am still unpacking all the things that God did and all that I learned, but I have time. I have learned I need to make time. Turn off the TV, put the phone down, get out...