Category Archives: love and marriage

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Count Your Many Blessings…(aka Happy Thanksgiving 2010!)

Hello World,

Jenise & her new hubby on their big day...

I know the day after tomorrow, the United States will be awash in the commencement of the Christmas season. And it is the most wonderful time of the year, but I think the Lord does want us to celebrate His many blessings that He has lavished on us…And Thanksgiving is the perfect time to do so…The best way that I know to celebrate His many blessings is to count them or make a gratitude list…And let me share a secret with you…When life is hard and nothing seems to be going the way that you had expected or hoped for, making a gratitude list has an uncanny way of reminding you that your circumstances could be worse, thus inspiring hope for the future…And without further introduction, I present my Top 20 gratitude list for 2010…(in no particular order…)

1. Jehovah-Rohi(My Shepherd), Jehovah-Jireh(My Provider) and Jehovah-Shalom(My Peace). I’m thankful for the relationship I have with the Lord, who is my savior and my friend. Even when I don’t understand His ways, which is often, I just couldn’t live on this Earth without Him…

Jenise's bridesmaids on the way to the wedding in the limo...

2. The sermon I heard on New Year’s Eve about Joshua finally leading the Israelites into the Promised Land after they wandered for 40 years in the desert…This sermon inspired me to claim my entrance into my own personal promised land this year, and it is happening saints, Hallelujah!

3. My family. I don’t know how people live hundreds of miles away from their loved ones…My family is my rock…

4. R, who has been my biggest cheerleader this year…

5. The wedding of Jenise, one of my best friends…After suffering a heartbreaking relationship loss years ago, she is finally the wife to a man who truly loves her…

6. All of my girls…you know who you are…

7. Nevaeh Publishing LLC

8. Tiffany Warren and The Faith & Fiction Retreat

9. My favorite author, Catherine Marshall, whose words and influence continue to inspire me even after her death…

10. My job…

11. Traveling mercies…

The beautiful bride...

12. My formal financial coach who has taught the value of keeping track of every penny and making the best use of my resources…

13. My various spiritual and religious communities…

14. My line sister, Lola, who has an incredible story of hope, faith & victory…

15. Inspired Sistah, whose words and encouragement has inspired me to live on top of the world…Go Tangie Go!

16. All of my many adventures this year from covering the ABC News “Nightline Face-Off”: Why Can’t a Successful Black Woman Find a Man? to calming down a chick who wanted to start a fight with one of my girls at the Phipps movie theater where we went to see Sex and the City 2. Hilarious…and pitiful at the same time…

17. The 31st Annual Christian Women’s Retreat. I thoroughly enjoyed being the featured speaker, particularly since I had to study this Bible verse…

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.  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.

Romans 12:1-2

18. My blog. Not only is it a way to satisfy some of my creative urges, I have learned so much from writing and the people who appreciate my writing…thank you very much…

19. Spiritual Discernment…

20. Books…They are one of the loves of my life…

Any thoughts?

All of us...

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We Don’t Have to Take Our Clothes Off…

Hello World!

Yay! We get an extra hour of the weekend baby!

Sooo…check my title…remember that song that song from the ’80s? If you don’t, check the video below…

I remember when I first heard this song…I think I was in the sixth grade…I thought it was so revolutionary because of its message… some of the lyrics are below…

Not a word, from your lips
You just took for granted that I want to skinny dip.
A quick hit, that’s your game.
But I’m not a piece of meat, still you like my brain.
Night is young, so are we.
Let’s get to know each other better, slow & easily.
Take my hand, let’s hit the floor. Shake our bodies to the music.

Maybe then you’ll score.

I’m not even sure a song like that would even be played on the radio now….Anywho, by now, you are probably wondering why I’m writing about this song…well, we all know that premarital sex is frowned upon in the Bible, and I wrote about the topic more extensively last year – so much so that I won’t repeat myself…But as it turns out, a new study has confirmed that holding off on sex promotes more satisfying relationships….

Below are a few points from an article on the study in “The Washington Post.”

  • 642 people in relationships were interviewed.
  • 56 percent of them had waited until they were seriously dating, engaged or married before getting down with their significant other.
  • Participants in the study were asked to rate their emotional and physical satisfaction in their relationships from 1 to 5 with 5 being very satisfied.
  • Those that are started out as nonromantic sex partners gave an average rating of 3.8 while those who waited until their relationship was serious had an average rating of 4.2.
  • According to the researcher, University of Iowa sociologist Anthony Paik, it’s not the early sex necessarily caused problems. However, it did seem that most people that started their relationship as a “casual fling” were “predisposed to lower relationship quality.”
  • Paik’s final point – “So for those looking for happily committed relationships, Paik has a strategy to suggest: “Delay sex. That way you kind of select out those individuals who are predisposed to not look for a long-term relationship. ” That advice, he acknowledges, “is like what one’s grandmother would probably say.”

 

Any thoughts?

 

 

 

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To beat a dead horse…(or black women are the mules of the world – Zora Neale Hurston)

Hello World,

2010 must be the year of “Bash the Black Women.”  From “Why Can’t a Successful Black Woman Find a Man?” to “What Chilli Wants”, the challenges of the love life of black women have been on display for the world to dissect, theorize and criticize…And now our issues are the subject of an increasingly popular cartoon featured on YouTube…

So what do you think? Is there some truth to this funny video? Or we just an easy target at this point?

Hopefully, next year, some other population group will be the topic of discussion…Thankfully, however, there are some black men who are willing to discuss their love woes and related issues on the Internet….

1. Until I Get Married: Inside the Mind of the New Bachelor

2. Baby Daddy Diaries

3. Giving Love A Chance

Check these brothers out. Let me know what you think.

Any thoughts?