Dear Lord; Happy Thankful Thursday Father!<\/p>\n
Well Father, it\u2019s certainly been a see-saw of a week for me so far.\u00a0 I knew before it began that this five day period was to be filled with new challenges, anxiety-ridden trials and stressful situations, and it\u2019s absolutely lived up to my expectations.\u00a0 Fears of the unknown held positions all around me, while whispered messages of doubt taunted me from deep within.<\/p>\n
Thankfully, I clothed myself appropriately for these battles I\u2019ve faced\u2026<\/p>\n
I armored up.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n \u201cTherefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.\u00a0Stand therefore, having fastened on the belt of truth, and having put on the breastplate of righteousness,\u00a0and, as shoes for your feet, having put on the readiness given by the gospel of peace.\u00a0In all circumstances take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming darts of the evil one;\u00a0and take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God,\u00a0praying at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints,\u00a0and also for me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of the gospel,\u00a0for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak.\u201d \u2013 Ephesians 6:13-20 (ESV)<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The challenges have come, and were conquered.\u00a0 Anxieties flooded my waking mind, and were dispersed.\u00a0 Fear gripped my heart, and was silently sent away.<\/p>\n Wrapped in Your divine protection, those things that prey in the dark corners of my mind and hide in the deep recesses of my heart don\u2019t stand a chance.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n Thank You Father.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Continuing from last week\u2019s Thankful Thursday<\/span><\/em> list Lord, this week I\u2019ve been particularly grateful for:<\/p>\n 316. A big batch of homemade chimichangas shared with good friends.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 317. A fantastic first gathering for our Small Group Study<\/a>: Treasures of the Transformed Life.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 318. Being married to a lady who can always make me laugh.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 319. Those moments where Your presence overwhelms me<\/a>.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 320. Having the complete Armor of God at my disposal each day (Ephesians 6:13-20).<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 321. \u201cStill\u201d time spent in Your Word each morning<\/a> before the household awakens.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 322. Sharing a big homemade breakfast with friends after church on Sunday.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 323. Long weekends spent in the company of our \u201cextended family\u201d.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 324. The encouragement I\u2019ve received recently from friends.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 325. A fun and successful dinner party we hosted last Saturday night.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 326. The strength You provided me to work through my anxieties this week.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 327. New non-stick cookware from Kitchen Aid to replace our 15-year old aluminum set.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 328. The information and resources to expand PhatherPhil.org that Google offers for free through Analytics and FeedBurner.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 329. A bushel of fresh-picked apples from a local orchard.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n 330. Tickets for the family to attend a John Waller concert in Dover tonight.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Heavenly Father,<\/p>\n We thank You Lord, for all those Blessings You bestow on us each day; both those that shine as brightly as the sun, and those that glow softly as a candle in the night.\u00a0 For all of Your many gifts of grace in our lives Father, we give thanks.<\/p>\n In Jesus\u2019 Name we pray,<\/p>\n Amen.<\/p>\n ~Phather Phil<\/p>\nPin It<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
![Pin It<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dear Lord; Happy Thankful Thursday Father! Well Father, it\u2019s certainly been a see-saw of a week for me so far.\u00a0 I knew before it began that this five day period was to be filled with new challenges, anxiety-ridden trials and stressful situations, and it\u2019s absolutely lived up to my expectations.\u00a0 Fears of the unknown held […]<\/p>\nPin It<\/a>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1462,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[961,1978,1975,1976,168,419,12,219,829,1000,43,915,1942,282,1980,7,361,967,1972,741,1830,15,173,6,211,53,228,24,110,208,276,1495,815,59,427,782,444,140,593,916,520,269,839,879,206,1325,355,824,141,203,506,1977,670,448,1721,25,217,205,344,591,254,629,732,1965,1917,95,86,384,1979,103,631,114,40,1034,226,1005,430,1265,1966,785,481,49,565,348,1302,723],"class_list":["post-1463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-emails-to-god","tag-anxieties","tag-anxiety-ridden-trials","tag-armor-of-god","tag-armored-up","tag-bless","tag-blessing","tag-blessings","tag-church","tag-company","tag-concert","tag-courage","tag-dear-lord","tag-dinner-party","tag-divine","tag-divine-protection","tag-doubt","tag-encouragement","tag-ephesians","tag-esv","tag-evil","tag-extended-family","tag-faith","tag-father","tag-fear","tag-fears","tag-flood","tag-friend","tag-friends","tag-fun","tag-gift","tag-gifts","tag-good-friends","tag-google","tag-grace","tag-grateful","tag-grip","tag-happy","tag-heart","tag-heavenly","tag-heavenly-father","tag-household","tag-jesus","tag-john","tag-just","tag-meditation","tag-meditations-monday","tag-message","tag-messages","tag-mind","tag-moments","tag-morning","tag-new-challenges","tag-night","tag-overwhelming","tag-overwhelming-presence","tag-peace","tag-pray","tag-prayer","tag-protect","tag-righteous","tag-salvation","tag-saturday","tag-situation","tag-small-group","tag-small-group-study","tag-spirit","tag-strength","tag-stress","tag-stressful-situations","tag-success","tag-sunday","tag-thank-you","tag-thankful","tag-thankful-thursday","tag-thanks","tag-tickets","tag-time","tag-treasure","tag-treasures-of-the-transformed-life","tag-truth","tag-week","tag-weekend","tag-whispered","tag-word","tag-word-of-god","tag-words"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/10\/Armor-1-Cropped.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p18mMc-nB","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1463"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1468,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1463\/revisions\/1468"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}](\"http:\/\/pinterest.com\/pin\/create\/button\/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.phatherphil.org%2F%3Fp%3D1463&media=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.phatherphil.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2011%2F10%2FArmor-1-Cropped.jpg&description=Inspirations+from+Phather+Phil+-+Thankful+Thursday%3A+Armoring+Up\"){kind=link}