I’m taking a break this week from blogging. Here’s a favorite post from my archives. ENJOY.

Through Twitter, the big twist in social networking today, I “met” author Donna Partow. I follow her tweets, she follows mine.

PAUSE. If you have no clue what tweets are, read this. UNPAUSE.

I’m reading her wildly successful Becoming the Woman God Wants Me to Be: A 90-Day Guide to Live the Proverbs 31 Life! Everyone else is on DAY 75. I’m on DAY 12! Hey, life happens. Two examples.

Example 1: My literary agent closed his agency before he sold my book proposal, and I’m scrambling in a good kind of way. I’m developing multiple streams of income and encouraging my kids to start businesses too. This explains my late start to reading Donna’s book, and I’m loving it.

Example 2: Donna’s website and online store crashed a week or so ago. She’s rebuilding it swiftly but has a ways to go. She described the ordeal as frustrating. What an understatement! Just imagine: Poof! No website! I pray that never happens to me or you.

A trooper, Donna continues to post her daily videos that correspond with each of the 90 days of her book while rebuilding her website. Me? I’d want to curl up with a spoon and a quart of Breyer’s chocolate chip ice cream. But Donna moves toward her goal with purpose.

And this brings me to the musk ox.

Donna wrote a powerful poem called ”Mighty Musk Ox Declaration.” To understand the meaning you need to know something about musk oxen.

Big and brown, musk oxen are not particularly pretty, but they stand their ground and protect their young against wolves and other predators. They form a circle around the vulnerable ones. A protective wall. This is highly unusual in the animal kingdom.

Is it also unusual in our churches?

On her site Donna asks, “Where are the women who should be mighty in the land? Where are the Musk Oxen? Where are those who will stand in prayer, forming a circle of spiritual protection around the weak? Where are those who will stand in the face of the devil and say, ‘If you want to destroy one more family in this church, you’re gonna have to GET PAST ME!’”

Here’s the poem. I asked her permission to reprint it here.

Mighty Musk Ox Declaration 

by Donna Partow

I have been chosen by God.  
He has called me
to be a spiritual warrior
in my own home
in my church & community
in this nation
even to the very ends of the earth.

In this critical hour
I take my stand
and I declare:
No devil in hell
No porcupine on earth
Nothing and no one
can thwart God’s good plan for me.
As long as…….
I choose to walk in peace.
With my soul at rest
and my body in motion.

I have absolute confidence
in my Father’s loving care.
God’s got my back.
I am standing in the gap
And I will not be moved.

I will maximize my life
for maximum Kingdom impact
I will fight battles worth fighting &
Tell stories worth telling.

Because I am — and always will remain –

A Mighty Musk Ox Prayer Warrior Princess!

Question: Sisters in Chirst, what about you? Will you take a stand?

You Are Beautiful!

Welcome to the Beautiful Warrior Award Wednesday!

Only 16, Maddy Curtis sings like. . .well. . .just watch. Simon had NOTHING mean to say. Woot.

Watch how she relates to her brothers too. 

She is a true Beautiful Warrior. Please pause my music player at the bottom of the page. Got a moment? Comment on what you like best about Maddy and whether you think she’ll so far on the show. Thanks!

You Are Beautiful, Lucy

Beautiful Warrior,

Life can toss dirt your way. Right? Here’s one way to handle dirty times.

You Are Beautiful, Lucy

THIS FORMER AMERICAN IDOL captivated the hearts of America with her winning smile, powerhouse vocals, and strong testimony of her faith. Her name: Mandisa!

In this music video, “Voice of a Savior,” she sings,

You and I are not that different.
We gotta void, we’re just tryin’ to fill it up.
Something that will give just a little peace.
All we want is a hand to reach to,
Open arms that say “I love you.”

Her words soothed my end-of-the-summer nerves screaming: get the school supplies start a new at-home business because we need money pray pray pray go to church sing sing sing write a blog post switch sub servers for my e-newsletter work work work pray pray pray do the laundry clean up the cat vomit wash the floor grocery shop pay the bills.

Bang my head on the keyboard.

Dream of Tahiti. 

When did I breathe?

I didn’t. Then Mandisa reminded me to listen to. . .

a voice of a Savior and I stopped my frenetic crazies. Will you listen too?

You Are Beautiful, Lucy

P.S. If you haven’t subscribed to my free eNewsletter “Cup of Joy,” please do. It touches the heart. Just type your little email addy into the little box here. Thanks.

Susan Boyle, nicknamed the “frumpy favorite” after she rocked the world with her “Britain’s Got Talent” debut, came in second. A dance troupe took first.

That’s just plain wrong.

I’ve never seen the dancers — they could be amazing — but I’ll never, ever forget Susan. While viewing her YouTube the first five or six times, my insides became happy-mushy and I teared up, tickled that a middle-aged woman, who NO ONE expected to do well — remember the smirks, the eye-rolling – knocked everyone’s socks off. Watch it HERE.

Yep, a barefoot standing ovation!

I am a fan forever.

Gotta lover her signature hip wiggle too!

Her debut video has the most hits ever in YouTube history –220 million!

Everyone who watches Susan Boyle on YouTube is crazy about her. Even Simon Cowell! But why? Really, why?

Susan Boyle isn’t pretty. She’s got:

bushy eyebrows,

mangy grey-brown hair (until she got a dye job), 

out-of-style clothes,

and she’s a little pudgy.

Let’s be honest. Each of us has an issue with our looks.

You. Me. Everyone.

I’m in my 40s and I have skin blemishes that my 13-year-old daughter lovingly calls “backne.”

“Hey, mom.”

“Yeah, Julia.”

“You’ve got backne.”

“Backne???”

“You know, pimples on your back!”

“Oh, thanks, Julia. So kind of you to notice.”

Backne and wrinkles! Err! 

True beauty is not your bra size,

 or your waist measurement,

or your hair color,

 or the size of your nose or ears or feet.

Magazine and movies, television and toy stores tell us women that to have worth, to matter, to make a difference, we gotta be beautiful on the outside! And look nothing like Susan Boyle! The media has ripped her apart like sharks.

True beauty begins in the heart and shows itself in one’s character.

1 Peter 3:3-5 says: “Your beauty should not come from outward adornment. . .Instead, it should be that of your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God’s sight. For this is the way the holy women of the past who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful.”

So how do we become women of inner beauty?

I’ll tell you a beauty secret: When you said, “Yes, Lord, I’m yours,” you became beautiful, holy, perfect. You are beautiful now.

All because of Jesus.

As you become more and more like him, your inner beauty increases. . .more and more. 

This isn’t what the world says. The world says: Lose weight, work out, get highlights, use this cream, that lotion, try botox.

You will never measure up to the world’s definition of beauty. It’s impossible.

Even supermodels are airbrushed.

I give you this challenge:

Believe God, who says you are “fearfully and wonderfully made.” Here “fearfully” means you were made with the deepest respect by your Creator.

When Satan whispers that you have no beauty, say. . .

“You liar! God made me beautiful. I am beautiful.”

Repeat it to yourself as often as necessary!

It’s the truth.

No matter what the tabloids say, Susan Boyle is truly beautiful too.

Even if she came in second.

You Are Beautiful, Lucy 

I’m taking a break this week from blogging. Here’s a favorite post from my archives. ENJOY.

Through Twitter, the big twist in social networking today, I “met” author Donna Partow. I follow her tweets, she follows mine.

PAUSE. If you have no clue what tweets are, read this. UNPAUSE.

I’m reading her wildly successful Becoming the Woman God Wants Me to Be: A 90-Day Guide to Live the Proverbs 31 Life! Everyone else is on DAY 75. I’m on DAY 12! Hey, life happens. Two examples.

Example 1: My literary agent closed his agency before he sold my book proposal, and I’m scrambling in a good kind of way. I’m developing multiple streams of income and encouraging my kids to start businesses too. This explains my late start to reading Donna’s book, and I’m loving it.

Example 2: Donna’s website and online store crashed a week or so ago. She’s rebuilding it swiftly but has a ways to go. She described the ordeal as frustrating. What an understatement! Just imagine: Poof! No website! I pray that never happens to me or you.

A trooper, Donna continues to post her daily videos that correspond with each of the 90 days of her book while rebuilding her website. Me? I’d want to curl up with a spoon and a quart of Breyer’s chocolate chip ice cream. But Donna moves toward her goal with purpose.

And this brings me to the musk ox.

Donna wrote a powerful poem called ”Mighty Musk Ox Declaration.” To understand the meaning you need to know something about musk oxen.

Big and brown, musk oxen are not particularly pretty, but they stand their ground and protect their young against wolves and other predators. They form a circle around the vulnerable ones. A protective wall. This is highly unusual in the animal kingdom.

Is it also unusual in our churches?

On her site Donna asks, “Where are the women who should be mighty in the land? Where are the Musk Oxen? Where are those who will stand in prayer, forming a circle of spiritual protection around the weak? Where are those who will stand in the face of the devil and say, ‘If you want to destroy one more family in this church, you’re gonna have to GET PAST ME!’”

Here’s the poem. I asked her permission to reprint it here.

Mighty Musk Ox Declaration 

by Donna Partow

I have been chosen by God.  
He has called me
to be a spiritual warrior
in my own home
in my church & community
in this nation
even to the very ends of the earth.

In this critical hour
I take my stand
and I declare:
No devil in hell
No porcupine on earth
Nothing and no one
can thwart God’s good plan for me.
As long as…….
I choose to walk in peace.
With my soul at rest
and my body in motion.

I have absolute confidence
in my Father’s loving care.
God’s got my back.
I am standing in the gap
And I will not be moved.

I will maximize my life
for maximum Kingdom impact
I will fight battles worth fighting &
Tell stories worth telling.

Because I am — and always will remain –

A Mighty Musk Ox Prayer Warrior Princess!

Sisters in Chirst, what about you? Will you take a stand? How?

You Are Beautiful!

I had planned on sharing Scripture today that speaks to your beauty, your strength, your God. Then this YouTube video landed in my mailbox. She is a picture of a beautiful warrior for Christ. She may only be 12, but she handles a sword with excellence.

Her topic: why abortion is wrong. Her location: a public school classroom.

Please pause my music player at the bottom of the page before you watch.

If you have a moment, leave a comment.

You Are Beautiful, Lucy