HANDBOOK 2009

Health:

1. Drink plenty of water.

2. Eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dinner like a beggar.

3. Eat more foods that grow on trees and plants and eat less food that is manufactured in plants.

4. Live with the 3 E's -- Energy, Enthusiasm, and Empathy.

5. Make time to practice meditation, yoga, and prayer.

6. Play more games.

7. Read more books than you did in 2008.

8. Sit in silence for at least 10 minutes each day.

9. Sleep for 7 hours.

10. Take a 10-30 minutes walk every day. And while you walk, smile.

Personality:

11. Don't compare your life to others'.
You have no idea what their journey is all about.

12. Don't have negative thoughts or things you cannot control.
Instead invest your energy in the positive present moment.

13. Don't over do. Keep your limits.

14. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

15. Don't waste your precious energy on gossip.

16. Dream more while you are awake.

17. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

18. Forget issues of the past.
Don't remind your partner with his/her mistakes of the past.
That will ruin your present happiness.

19. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone. Don't hate others.

20. Make peace with your past so it won't spoil the present.

21. No one is in charge of your happiness except you.

22. Realize that life is a school and you are here to learn.
Problems are simply part of the curriculum that appear and
fade away like algebra class but the lessons you learn will last a lifetime.

23. Smile and laugh more.

24. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

Society:

25. Call your family often.

26. Each day give something good to others.

27. Forgive everyone for everything.

28. Spend time with people over the age of 70 & under the age of 6.

29. Try to make at least three people smile each day.

30. What other people think of you is none of your business.

31. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick.
Your friends will. Stay in touch.

Life:

32. Do the right thing!

33. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.

34. GOD heals everything.

35. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

36. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.

37. The best is yet to come.

38. When you awake alive in the morning, thank GOD for it.

39. Your Inner most is always happy. So, be happy.

Last but not the least:

40. Please Forward this to everyone you care about

Ephesians 6:6

Not with eye service, as men pleasers; but as the servant of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart Ephesians 6:6

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2009!!!

WELCOME TO 2009.

Forgiveness For Former Meth Addict

Mia Evans interviews Heather and Josh Powers:

Heather Powers has traveled the world sharing her music, but most of all she likes quiet moments sitting in front of her piano. Her latest CD, Undone, is a moving collection of original songs.

Heather: I was singing ever since I can remember. I remember singing more than I do talking.

Heather’s childhood days were filled with making music. Her close-knit family lived in a quiet neighborhood, in Orange County, California.

One night everything changed. The peace and security she felt were stolen from her. Heather and her sister were home alone when a man broke into their home. He sexually assaulted 13-year-old heather.

Heather: He was brutal. He was beating on me. My sister was trying to beat him off of me. And I just cowered. I, I crumbled. We were able to scare him off.

Then, two years, later a boy she knew and trusted raped her.

Heather: Those two events so profoundly affected who I was growing into be. The shame and guilt was just overwhelming; I shut down in a lot of ways. I learned to live very externally and to keep pleasing, to keep being the person I felt that everyone wanted me to be, while I was drowning inside.

Mia: You married young. Was that an escape for you?

Heather: I lived in a very small town where everybody got married and it became almost a fantasy that just took a life of its own on. We did love each other, there’s no doubt about it, but we didn’t even know ourselves.

As the problems at home intensified, Heather developed chronic migraines. She added painkillers to an arsenal of mind altering drugs.

Heather: By this time I had developed a pretty strong addiction to oxycontin, vicodin, xanex and all kinds of things that would just kind of numb me out. The doctor that had been prescribing all these other medications finally said to me, “I think there might be some emotional stuff going on. That might be why you’re having such pain constantly.” There was something in me, I knew that the drugs that I was on had something to do with how numb and disconnected I felt from my whole life. And so I weaned myself off of them and in a two-week period of time I had what they determined was a manic break, which I ended up in a psychiatric hospital.

Within a few days, doctors released Heather from the psychiatric hospital. But she was still gripped by the pain from her past and her failing marriage. After nine years and two children, Heather filed for divorce.

Heather: I felt so unredeemable and so unworthy. The decisions I had made along the way, I didn’t feel forgivable. And so I felt like it was easier just to walk out. I was running from me mostly. And I knew what I was doing was wrong.

When Heather was a child, her parents taught her that God was a God of love.

Heather: I know I had experiences with Him, and I know that He was there and I know that I was saved; but there wasn’t that point where it became such a personal thing for me. He was not even in the equation at that point.

Heather continued her self-destructive behavior.

Heather: I was not afraid to try illicit drugs. I was living promiscuously, just anything to numb—for the moment—that sense of how awful and wretched I felt.

Heather’s new boyfriend, Josh, introduced her to the highly addictive drug, meth.

Josh: At that point in my life, I was at a point where I was using a lot and partying, and I kind of brought her into that with me. It’s one of my biggest regrets.

Heather: We’d go on weekend benders where we’d be up all night talking and hanging out with friends and it was a great way to totally not think about the reality of my life.

Josh: I hated the man I had become. And the way I dealt with hating the man I had become was drinking and using.

Heather: For me, one day after about a year, a year and a half, I just came to an end where I realized I couldn’t go on anymore.

Heather cried out to God for help.

Heather: God met me in such a way. He allowed me to know that even while I was in the midst of sin and destruction and the devastation of my life and that of my family’s, that He didn’t love me any more or any less than He had. He allowed me this safety to then begin to build this relationship with Him. That was my “Ah-ha” moment, that I knew He was real for me. And I knew that whatever it was that I was going to walk through, that He was there and that He hadn’t left. It was I who had walked away.

Heather immediately quit using drugs.

Josh: She was able to turn it over to God and really walk away from it and I didn’t have that. I mean, I had a hole inside of me that I could not fill. And it wasn’t until I went to treatment and the idea was put to me that I had to consider having a power greater than myself in my life.

Heather’s father began talking to Josh about the Bible, and Josh, too, became a Christian.

Josh: The most miraculous for me was the desire to drink and use was lifted from me. It was something that I battled since I was 13, 14-years-old. Praise God! It still is not there. It’s been lifted.

Heather and Josh just celebrated their seventh wedding anniversary and more than eight years of sobriety.

Heather: I was the chief of sinners. I was that harlot. His grace was so big that He came in and rescued me when I had walked so far and devastated and destroyed so many things around me. He’s always rescuing us from things, not just big things, it’s little things. He wants us—all of us, not just the catastrophes. He wants every bit of us.

Luann Prater: Needed to Forgive

“I loved my church,” Luann said. “My dad had made us go to church every single time the doors were open.”

Luann Prater always had an innocent view of God. She lost it, though, when she was 13. She was alone backstage in a church production when her youth pastor did the unthinkable.

“We were in the dark room together—he kissed me. I was 13. It scared me,” Luann said.

Then three months later the youth pastor’s wife called to ask Luann to babysit.

“I could feel my heart racing; I did not want to say yes. And she said, ‘Luann, I don’t want anybody else. If you don’t babysit then we won’t go out.’ Well I adored her, so I did. And when they pulled into the driveway when the evening was over I ran to the phone to call my mom. I was on the phone and he walked in the door and took the phone from my hand and said, ‘Wilma, you don’t need to get out tonight. I’ll bring Luann home.’ He didn’t take me home. He didn’t take me straight home,” Luann said.

The youth pastor took advantage of Luann. That night changed her life forever.

“When he did take me home, I stood frozen and forever changed, outside my home. Everything I knew about God had shifted. This man I had trusted betrayed my trust. And now I had no value,” Luann said. “I never sought God’s will from that point on. I just made decisions on my own.”

As an adult, Luann moved from one husband to another, always searching for someone to fill the pain in her heart.

“After being married so many times and feeling like you had not just become a two time loser, but several time loser. And you just get to the point where you think, am I ever going to get it right?” Luann said.

Her 4th marriage was to Dwight, a successful businessman who had a Christian background.

At that time her brother, Lon, challenged her to read a specific book of the Bible.

“I was 40-years-old and my brother, who had absolutely given his heart back to God, told me, ‘Luann, read the book of John and discover the real human side of Jesus.’ And I started doing that,” Luann said.

One story pierced her heart. It was of the adulterous woman whose life was changed when Jesus met her at the well.

“And when I hit chapter 4, I left skid marks. Because when I read the woman at the well this time, I saw Luann standing at the well. Right there, John preserved that story between baptism and healing, just for me. And for all the women out there who have broken lives and broken dreams and broken homes,” Luann said.

On December 6th, 1998, Luann says God spoke directly to her heart.

“God woke me up at 2:00 a.m. and said, ‘Today is the day. I don’t want you waiting around anymore; today is the day,” Luann said. “I was so excited. I got to church that day and guess what our pastor said? ‘Today is the day of salvation. Don’t wait.”

“And what was beautiful, I went home that afternoon and I called my dad. And my mom put the phone down by his ear and I said, ‘Dad, I’m back. Christ found this lost sheep today and I gave my heart back to Christ. I am a new creation.’ And she said he laid there and cried and smiled. Eight days later, he went home to see Jesus and rejoice with Him.
My dad promised us that he never stopped praying for his children. Not one day,” Luann said.

Her husband Dwight saw a complete change in Luann and it changed his life as well.

“After that day and that period of time she became a different person in her faith in the Lord. Through prayer, through the things that she did, it drew me,” Dwight said.

Luann is now a well known Christian writer for Proverbs 31 Ministries. Her web emails reach about 250,000 readers. She and Dwight live in the rolling hills of North Carolina.

“My favorite times, I’ve got to tell you, are when I’m on the big red tractor driving through the yard. And that’s when I can really be still and know that He is God. And He whispers to my heart and says, ‘Luann, when you started seeking me I started giving you all of this. I gave you the desires of your heart when you first got your priorities straight and sought me,’” Luann said.

Can God change your life?
God has made it possible for you to know Him and experience an amazing change in your own life. Discover how you can find peace with God.

Island Vows Renewed

The Bahamas, the number one tourist spot in the world, has beautiful beaches and breathtaking sunsets. But living here holds a hidden danger. They call it "island fever." It's the lure of sex, drugs, and non-stop good times. Island fever trapped Troy Aitken at an early age.

"At the age of 5, I was introduced to pornography through Playboy magazine. Then I started smoking marijuana at age 9," says Troy.

Troy's struggle with drugs took him in and out of prison, but one trip to jail changed his life. He served time at Teen Challenge, a faith-based drug program, and that's where he became a Christian. A changed man, Troy enrolled at Christ for the Nations Institute in Dallas, Texas. While working as a waiter, he met Colleen.

Says Troy, "She would always go off during her lunchtime and write songs poetically to the Lord, and she would share them with me after we got to know each other. I liked that."

"I was praying for a lot of those lunch breaks that the Lord would give him a godly wife," Colleen explains. "It never occurred to me that I would be the answer to that prayer, but that was on my heart to pray that."

Troy and Colleen married and moved to the Bahamas. Eventually Troy achieved success working for his father.

"In the world's eyes, on the outside, I seemed to be quite successful," he says. "We were able to procure this house, establish four companies, and still go to church with a nice car and a nice tie. So on the outward, we fit the bill of the prosperity message, yet my heart was far from Him. When I was at my pinnacle, at my highest fiscal year, I crashed. I began drinking, which led to drugs again, and then my wife and children left."

But even losing his wife and children wasn't enough to make Troy give up the drugs.

"We had money and drugs on the table, and the Holy Spirit came into the room and rested on me," Troy recalls. "I literally, physically, felt a thick presence of grace and truth that gave me the power to say, 'Do you have a Bible in this house?' I took the Bible and held it and hugged it and cried out to God. I said, 'Lord, please forgive me.' That led to me walking to my father's office. I said, 'I want to change. I've had enough.' "

Troy went back to Teen Challenge and opened his heart to the Lord as he'd never done before. And as he drew closer to God, his thoughts turned to his wife and family. Meanwhile, Colleen was on her own journey.

"The day that I left Nassau with my children I was in a place of devastation," Colleen says. "There was a sweet lady who was sitting in front of me on the plane. She turned around and she asked me why I was going to Dallas. I began sobbing, and I told her I was leaving my husband. He didn't want a family anymore. I just couldn't stop crying."

The woman handed Colleen a book that would change her life.

"The challenge in those pages," says Colleen, "was will you cry out for this work to be done? For the Lord will use you mightily if you will allow Him to break you. I wanted to be healed, but the Lord was saying, 'You must be broken first.' You feel God in the process that somehow it is a beautiful experience."

More than two years later, Colleen got an unexpected phone call from Troy's family.

"They called to tell me that he wanted to ask my forgiveness and would I call him," Colleen remembers. "They told me where he was, and immediately I knew the Holy Spirit was saying, 'Call.' "

So Colleen did.

"I was more excited to tell her about the Lord than worry," says Troy. "I tell you the truth. I knew God was up to something."

Colleen had to face what normally would have been a difficult decision: to remarry Troy. But she says she knew it was the right thing to do.

"The Lord made it vividly clear to me that that was His will, and He asked me to trust Him," she says. "He gave me promises, and He said, 'I am not bringing a liar and a deceiver back to you. I am bringing a godly man back to you. You can't look at him. You must trust Me. You must trust the work that I've done in his life.' "

The couple remarried on March 19, 2001, almost three years after they divorced.

"As Troy and I embrace this together and walk forward together, we really are just beginning our lives together in this way," says Colleen.

"We have love now that we never had before. It's not about me. It's not about Colleen and me," says Troy. "It's about how much God loves us, that He is doing something in us, and if we are willing to let Him, He is in the restoration business for anyone who's willing."



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The Agostos: A Marriage Revival

"I wanted somebody that would understand me. I wanted someone that when I said to them what I had gone through that I could have that shoulder to lean on as opposed to being judged."

Linda had just moved from New York to live with family members in Florida when she found that person. At her new school, she met Rafael.

He recalls, “When I got to school that day, I saw a group of friends of mine, and I saw this new girl standing there. I said, 'Wow! That’s a new girl. She’s beautiful.' So I walked up to the crowd and introduced myself.”

Linda says, “As soon as I looked at him, I said, 'Wow.' I liked him at first sight.”

Linda and Rafael felt an instant connection and started spending time together.

“It was just a lot of talking at first. We fell in love that way," Linda says. "Me pretty much airing out all my feelings, all my frustrations and him doing the same thing having gone through the life that he lived.”

Rafael was coping with the loss of his mother. She was a drug addict and died from AIDS when he was 13. Linda had her own problems.

“I looked to alcohol as a refuge due to everything that happened in my childhood with my father drinking and the domestic violence that was in the home," she says. "I was sexually abused at an early age.”

But their troubles were just beginning. Linda was only 16 and Rafael was15 when she became pregnant.

Rafael says, “There were people that were telling me, 'You guys are too young to have a baby. Get rid of it.' 'Don’t worry about her. Women have raised kids by themselves before.' You know, 'don’t throw your future away.' But I was set on it. I was like, ‘I don’t care what it takes. I’m gonna stay with Linda, and I’m gonna raise this baby. We’re gonna have a family.'”

Rafael and Linda moved back to New York to live with Linda’s family. After the baby was born, the young couple realized they weren’t ready to settle down.

“We would still go to the clubs," Linda confesses. "We would still go to the bars. So that life didn’t change. It was like now I had somebody to join me at the clubs. I wasn’t drinking by myself. ”

Just three months after their first son’s birth, Linda got pregnant again.

“Because things were a little shaky at the time, we decided to just get married," Rafael says. "We were like, 'OK, maybe it’s time to make things right.'”

instead, they had more complications.

Rafael continues, “The problems really started once we got married, and things became very, very difficult My stepfather passed away, and we had custody of my brother and [our own] two children.”

Rafael worked hard to support his growing family. Then he met a man at work who made things even harder.

“One day he invites me to his house for lunch, and he pulls out a bag of cocaine. I had vowed I would never do drugs. My mother was into drugs, and she actually died of AIDS when I was 13-years-old. I always vowed that I would never use drugs. So I was like, 'Put that away. Do whatever you want but I don’t do that.' A week later, I don’t know what happened, but we ended up at the same house. He pulled it out, and this time I tried it. From the first time I tried it, I was hooked. I was addicted."

Rafael’s addiction grew. He was soon spending $500 a day on drugs.

Linda recalls, “That’s why we lost everything. Every single dime would go into his habit. We would get income tax check -- sometimes $3,000, $4,000. I never saw them.”

“It was a really bad situation," Rafael says. "Lying to my wife, wouldn’t come home. From the time I would get up in the morning, I couldn’t resist having it. So I’d do whatever it took to get it.”

Again, Linda became pregnant, but she couldn’t take it anymore. She packed up the kids and left.

“I arrived at my sister’s house. He never followed me," Linda shares. "He loved the drugs more than his family -- that’s how I saw it.”

Linda realized that the one who would love her and never leave her was God. She accepted Jesus as her Savior and began praying for Rafael. Just three months later, she saw a flyer advertising a revival.

"It said on the top that if you need a miracle come at 7:30.”

Linda needed a miracle in her marriage. She convinced Rafael to come along.

“We’re sitting way in the back," Rafael says. "He starts to preach his message, then he stops and he says, 'I’m not gonna preach yet. There’s somebody here that’s tired of living the way they’ve been living. The living God tells you today, if you give Him a chance, your life will never be the same.'

“A lot of people came, and they threw like boxes of cigarettes on the altar. But he kept insisting that the Lord was saying that there was still someone. He kept on and on until he finally just stood, right in front of our section. He said, 'Somebody in this section, today is your day.'”

Linda says, "I was just praying and praying. Finally when I opened up my eyes and I looked to the side, my husband was going to the front.”

Rafael opened up his heart to God and was immediately delivered from his drug addictions.

He says, “I instantly felt something change. I felt something right away. I said, 'Whoa, something happened here.' And I cried. I cried in front of that platform. My life has never been the same. I haven’t touched another drug, another drink since that day.”

Rafael and Linda are now teaching their children about God’s power and how He transformed their lives and brought them back together.

“We’ve had our ups and our downs like any family even after being saved. But there’s one thing that I think is the most important thing is that I have them there. I know that it’s because of God. God is powerful. You give your life to God, and God will take care of you."