Understanding God’s plan for you

August 14, 2021 Michele Anastasi

Finding direction, Marriage, Success & victory

I had to laugh when a good friend read last week’s blog about Gaspar and me making a Vision Board. She said, “That’s fine for you ‘crafty’ people, but my husband and I aren’t the creative types.” Little did she know that the vision board we made was just one of the things we did at our annual Marriage Retreat in May. And 20 couples—both creative and non-creative types—had a blast doing it.

Gaspar & Michele’s vision board created during the 2021 marriage retreat

Maybe making a vision board isn’t your thing, but you shouldn’t let that stop you from coming up with a vision statement for your marriage.

Few couples ever think about their life vision or articulate it. In our society, life visions usually sound something like this: Get an education. Get a good job. Get married. Buy a house. Have children. Make more money. Buy a bigger house. Enjoy a nice retirement. These aren’t bad things to want and may very well be a part of God’s plan for you, but it’s not all He wants.

Wait, there’s more!

The Bible teaches us that we have a God who created each of us, then brought us together for a purpose—more than for just our own happiness. What would your marriage be like if you asked, “Father, what do you want our lives to accomplish for You?” Interesting thought, isn’t it?

Simply put, your life vision is what you’re living for, your ultimate purpose, what your life is all about. It can be summed up in one sentence, or it may be an entire page. The important thing is that it clearly states the purpose and goals of your life together.

Where to begin?

Talk

Start by talking about your mutual goals and dreams. I know, it can be a little difficult to be open about something so personal, even to a spouse. One partner may feel the other won’t understand or may be critical. But you have nothing to lose and everything to gain.

Pray

Finding A life vision obviously must involve prayer since we are seeking God’s plan for us. There are so many things that we can do and many things that need to be done. So we need God‘s guidance in what His plan is for us. Just ask Him and He’ll show you—maybe not the full plan all at once, but He’ll show you.

Write

There’s something about writing a life vision that solidifies it in you mind and lends it added importance. It also helps keep you on track when life gets hectic. Read it often and it will bring you back to your priorities and what you really want to spend your time on.

As you talk, pray and write, two questions may help:

1) Does this vision speak to who we are? (Does it fit our gifts and strengths?)

2) If we focus on these areas, will we feel that we’ve fulfilled our destiny? Your life vision starts out with who you are and the gifts and interests God has put in both of you. But it needs to end by benefiting and helping others.

Yours, mine and ours

You may be wondering, “How do we combine our interests when we have two very different calls?” Combining two life visions into one calls for creative give and take. It’s sort of a yours-mine-and-ours approach.

In our marriage, Gaspar does a wide variety of things in the ministry that I’m not involved in. Likewise, I do women’s ministry, Bible Studies and Life Coaching—things that he isn’t involved in. But then, together, we share this blog, our weekly marriage group, and marriage counseling and coaching.

Christian couples can make an impact in many places: Community programs, schools, businesses, hospitality, encouraging and, of course, the church, to name a few.

It’s bigger than you.

Studies have shown that one constant in the lives of couples with strong marriages is their mutual devotion to a cause or purpose beyond themselves. This was God’s original plan, and following His plans and principles will always lead to happiness and success.

If you would like more details on how to make a Vision Board or write a Vision Statement, just leave your request and email in the comment box, we’ll be happy to send it to you. …

Drama in the airport

July 31, 2021 Michele Anastasi

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Marriage, Success & victory

The rude couple

A couple of weeks ago we were in the airport waiting for a flight. I can’t help it, but I’m an incurable people-watcher. Sitting directly across from us was a couple, mid to late thirties.

The husband went to get something to eat and a coffee for his wife. As she placed the coffee on the floor near her bag, he started ravenously eating his food—seriously, like a man who hadn’t eaten in a week. Food was falling everywhere and splattered her pants. As she tried to clean the food off of her, he just kept munching away.

I couldn’t help myself and my mother instinct said, “You better say sorry, or the rest of your day isn’t going to go well.” He ignored me and, shifting his weight in his seat, kicked her coffee all over her feet. She jumped up and headed to either the ladies room or to call her attorney. Can you believe he just looked at the mess and continued eating!

Another passenger, also watching, went for some paper towel… Finally the husband got the hint, stopped eating and attended to what was left of the mess. Wow! Where has care, kindness and even simple manners gone in today’s marriages?

If this were an isolated incident I probably wouldn’t be writing this. But being a people-watcher and traveling a lot, I see such bad behavior and downright rudeness in couples. I was so upset I started writing about what happened in my journal. I didn’t really think it would end up in this blog, but God knew and He already had the ending planned out.

The desperate couple

Several days later, there we were in the airport again. The last thing you want to hear after two flights and a long trip is that your bags are on another plane, and there will be a slight delay. So back to people-watching… You’d think I would have learned my lesson by now.

I didn’t hear this couple say a word, but I knew they were Christians. We started talking about the delay, making small talk. They were returning from a trip to see a new grandbaby. Asked if we had been on vacation, Gaspar shared about the church and that we were away writing new material for our Sacred Marriage group. That’s when they shared their story.

Up until a few years ago their marriage had been in deep trouble. They were going in separate directions, totally shut down to each other. Then, struck by a series of painful events with nowhere else to turn, they turned to the Lord. They leaned on Him, sought His will and, most of all, reconnected to Him as a couple. And in the process, Jesus transformed their troubled marriage into an awesome one.

What a different story from the other couple! I suddenly felt very sad that we hadn’t had the chance to tell them about the Lord. But since then, we’ve prayed for God to put believers in their path.

Every couple’s greatest need

The only way to have a healthy, thriving marriage is with Jesus. He is what every marriage needs at its center. If you let Him, God will give you the relationship you’ve always longed for. He will make a good marriage great; get a struggling marriage back on track; and bring a dead marriage back to life. He does what no one and nothing else can.

Marriages are hurting today more than ever. My husband and I feel the Lord leading us to take a slight detour with this blog and focus on marriage for awhile. We would love to hear your thoughts. Are marriages today changing? If so, why? Do you see changes in your own marriage? …

Your marriage wins with a good coach!

July 24, 2021 Michele Anastasi

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Making positive change, Success & victory

We recently added Marriage Coaching to the services we offer at our Breaking Free Living Well Counseling Center. When I (Michele) received my certification as a Life Coach this past November, we realized life coaching is a perfect tool to assist people in learning how to live well, especially in marriage.

Of course, there’s nothing better than inner healing prayer and counseling. Why? It helps couples break free from past hurts and negative behaviors they brought into the marriage.

Miracles happen every day

We see miracles every day! Couples come in on the verge of divorce. Then, after receiving Stop Hurting Start Healing prayer and counseling, their hearts amazingly soften and change. Husband and wife develop a renewed desire to forgive each other and work at their marriage. It’s at this point that marriage coaching becomes so beneficial!

I (Gaspar) am also excited about the marriage coaching program we’re now offering. It’s the next step and follow-up for a couple who have gone through Stop Hurting Start Healing. In our sessions, Michele and I diagnose the couple’s problems, pray for inner healing, counsel them and prescribe solutions.

Go “all in”

Coaching facilitates conversations between couples and teaches them useful skills. That way, husbands and wives can use those learned skills outside of the coaching sessions to develop their own solutions. However, marriage coaching serves only couples who want to grow and change. These are husbands and wives who are willing to work the process together in order to accomplish something they both want.

The couple doesn’t have to come to the coaching session knowing exactly what changes they want to make. As coaches, we help them to clarify how they want to grow by asking insightful questions that can draw out their thoughts, feelings and desires. We then take them through exercises that help them communicate to each other what they want.

“We” wins

In time, couples start to focus on the “we” in their relationship. That’s one of the most important things that marriage coaching accomplishes. Husbands and wives emerge, no longer as two individuals just living for self. They become a team embarking on a journey to fulfill the purpose God has for them as a couple. And, make no mistake, God indeed has a plan for you and your marriage. Let’s discover it together! Sometimes winning takes a good coach.

If you are interested in getting coached personally or as a couple, please visit the Breaking Free Living Well Counseling Center website or call 239.244.3912. Feel free to share your thoughts below.…

Don’t just believe…Act!

July 10, 2021 Gaspar Anastasi

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Making positive change, Success & victory

Most Christians know that the will of God is His word and that His word is His will. But we’re not supposed to just believe in God’s word. We’re to demonstrate it!

There’s a big difference between knowing the right thing to do and actually doing it. Our job is to genuinely demonstrate to the world who God is and His will for us.

The power of the miraculous

Romans 12:2 says, “And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”

Did you catch that? We are to prove the will of God to the world. That proof is exhibited through miracles. Miracles provide irrefutable evidence of God and His will to every human on planet earth.

The Apostle Paul said it this way in 1 Corinthians 2:4: ”And my speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power.” In other words, Paul proved that the God he was preaching about was real by the miracles he performed, not by his eloquent speech.

Like Paul, you can operate in miracles and present the true Bible Jesus to the world. We serve a powerful omnipotent Savior, not a counterfeit religious character with no power to change our lives or circumstances! Here are some points to help you demonstrate God’s power.

How to demonstrate His power

1. Have a consuming love for God’s word. Smith Wigglesworth, the famous Englishman of faith who lived in the early 1900’s, never went more than 15 minutes without reading God’s word. Today we label people like him religious fanatics. But very few people have walked in the miraculous like Smith Wigglesworth.

2. Have an overwhelming confidence in the word of God and the God of the word. Know that He meant what He said and said what He meant. Believe that God’s word is the final authority in any given situation. His word cancels everybody else’s opinion. God tells the prophet Jeremiah that He put His word in his mouth. And when Jeremiah declares it, God will hasten to perform it.

3. Speak, declare and confess God’s word. Let God’s opinion (the only one that counts) be released concerning your situation. When you say the same thing God says and believe what you say, watch out! A miracle is just about to manifest!

Let your words be few

4. When you’ve walked out the first 3 steps, keep your mouth shut. When you speak God’s word about the circumstance, nothing else is needed. Just “be still and know that He is God”. We try to help God by adding words that are often negative, cancelling out what God started.

The more you speak, the greater the risk of opening the door for Satan. The less said the better. However, if you can’t hold your tongue, use it to praise God! Exalt God with your words, giving Him access to the atmosphere around you. God inhabits the praises of His people. Remember, the world needs to see the Jesus we love, the real Jesus. Prove His will to them by putting His will on display. Demonstrate His word and His will to a lost and dying world!

If this blog has been a blessing to you, please take a moment to comment below.…

Declare your independence

July 3, 2021 Gaspar Anastasi

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Getting past the past, Making positive change, Success & victory

The greatest battle ever fought on the face of the earth was waged—not for the freedom of any one nation or people—but for the liberation of all mankind. This battle of all battles took place on a lonely hill in a small corner of the world. Not a single weapon was fired, and just one Man died.

The war that was won

Now 2,000 years later, the events of that afternoon continue to shake the universe. Jesus, hanging on a cross against a darkened sky, cried out one final time and yielded up His spirit. A massive, rock-splitting earthquake shook the planet. The veil that had hung quietly in the temple for hundreds of years, symbolically separating a Holy God from sinful man, suddenly tore in half from top to bottom. Graves were ripped open and the dead rose and walked out alive.

Jesus’ death was so catastrophic that the soldiers who guarded Him —men who moments before mocked Him and gambled for His clothes —“feared greatly saying, ‘Truly this was the Son of God!’” (Matt. 27: 45-54)

An eternal triumph

Jesus descended into hell, triumphed over satan in his own domain (Col. 2:15), took the keys of death and the grave (Rev. 1:18), rose from the dead the third day and gave you and me the freedom to inherit eternal life (Rom. 8:17). This was no small fistfight. It was a thorough, humiliating defeat that still sends satan reeling every time a man or woman of God speaks the name of Jesus in faith.

What Jesus won for us was independence from satan’s domination and the freedom to choose heaven or hell, eternal life or eternal death. Up to that point, satan had held all of humanity captive. He had narrowed our choice of eternal destiny down to one: Hell and everlasting damnation.

Have everlasting freedom

The freedoms we Americans celebrate on July 4th are great and they came at the price of much bloodshed. But the freedom to vote, the freedom of speech, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are only temporary, earth-bound privileges with no eternal value. The freedom for which Jesus shed His precious blood is available eternally. But like any other freedom or right, we must exercise it.

So how do we exercise our right to eternal life? You must choose whom you will serve: satan or Jesus Christ. Understand this: If you have never accepted Jesus Christ, you are still in bondage to satan. Confess that Jesus paid the price and defeated satan, that Jesus overcame death and rose from the dead and believe it in your heart.

By confessing Jesus as your Lord and your Savior, you effectively declare your independence from satan and from sin (Rom. 10:9). You have a legal right to heaven and all the blessings of God. Don’t let satan trick you out of it. Let today become your Independence Day from sin, sickness and death!

If this blog post has been a blessing to you, please let us know by commenting below.…

You must go back to go forward.

June 19, 2021 Gaspar Anastasi

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Finding significance in life, Making positive change, Success & victory

Our past influences us in one way or another: How we were raised, our parents’ weaknesses and strengths, the culture we were raised in, our past memories, the belief systems we were taught, etc. Of course some of those influences were positive. On the other hand, others were destructive. They may have already sabotaged relationships, finances, lifestyles and especially our walk with God!

Understanding this fundamental truth equips us to begin breaking out of the boundaries set by past influences. These hindrances keep us from experiencing the kind of success for which God created us.

Sins of our fathers

The Bible has a lot to say about these things. It teaches us in Exodus 34:7 that the iniquities of our fathers are carried down from generation to generation, even up to the fourth generation. Have you ever said, “I never want to be like my father or mother” because of their destructive habit patterns? But then you wound up doing or saying the same things? Do you realize you probably think, cook, keep house, work, act, believe and relate to others the same way your parents did?

Two things from my childhood stand out to show me the need to go back… in order for me to go forward.

My backstory

Because my father, his father and his 3 brothers operated a 24-hour, 7 days a week family business, our family life was completely enmeshed with our work life. Everything in our lives was intertwined with operating the business. Holidays, birthdays and everyday life incorporated work. There was no separation. I learned early in life that family and work were one and the same.

As a result, I became a workaholic. That didn’t change even after I was born again. I sought to keep every family member involved in the work of the ministry. It just seemed natural to tie together family and work. I embraced this way of life as a child—along with many other faulty beliefs. It pulsated in my DNA, affecting me even after I accepted Jesus as Lord.

My mother was a great woman, but an absolute perfectionist. Therefore, mom unknowingly instilled in me a performance mentality. She showed me great love when I performed in ways that pleased her. But she withheld love when I didn’t live up to her expectations. (My mother thought she was helping me by controlling me in this way.)

Because of this, I became not only a workaholic, but one who worked hard for approval and acceptance. I was one driven, performance-oriented person! You can imagine the trouble that caused in every area of my life—including my family and my marriage.

Stuck in the past

When I gave my life to Jesus, I still lived under the same influences and suffered the same problems as I had before I became a Believer. Unfortunately, I was taught early in my Christian walk that if I wanted to move forward I should never look back. I was stuck!

You probably have a similar story. We need to break that religious tradition by having the courage to look back and honestly examine our family and cultural upbringing. Our emotional healing and future success as children of God depend on it.

Free yourself to go forward

We have to go back before we go forward and here’s how:

Get out of denial and break the religious myth that after we’re saved, we don’t have to deal with our past. 2 Corinthians 5:17 is talking about our spirit, not our soul.
Don’t deny your feelings. Listen to them because they reveal where and who you are on the inside.
Break ties to your family culture. Remember, you’re in God’s family now. So adopt His culture. Jesus said if you don’t love Him more than your mother and father, you aren’t one of His.
As the Holy Spirit reveals past things, crucify them by repenting and denying them access to your life again.
Finally, embrace your new family’s culture and beliefs. YOU CAN’T GO FORWARD UNTIL YOU FIRST GO BACK!

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