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October 2008
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More than Music Inc. Newsletter
Revolutionizing the culture at large one heart at a time until everyone on earth knows and lives the love that is in Jesus Christ.
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Greetings!
I, Stephanie Pauline, am going to break from my
sabbatical here to address you all, then next month
we
will hear from the Secretary on our Board of Directors,
Jennifer Swanson.
As always, God is doing
awesome things in my heart and through MtM. A few
of my songs have now had 12 consecutive weeks on
the CRW Global Chart in America and on the NCM
Euro Chart as well. Millions are hearing these songs -
all around the world. I am so thankful and humbled to
be used as I am with all my quirks and foibles. My life
is truly a testament to the amazing grace and
faithfulness of God.
Please take a minute to
review
the highlights of last month's service and read over
the
"From the Heart" section as well. I trust you will be
blessed.
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- * The song, "Anything to be with You", off the
acclaimed album, "Rush the Sea", is now number 11
on the Euro NCM Chart. "Love Never Fails" is still in
the top 40 on the same chart for 12th straight week
and
running. The songs "Love Never Fails" and "I Will" are
still in the top 20 on the CRW Global AC and Inspo
Chart, again for 12th straight week and running. All
this great news means that Stephanie Pauline is
being played on over 500 stations now all around the
world, with about 100 of those being right here in
the
US! Praise God! We trust this is only the
beginning!
Please pray that God would continue to give our
songs
favor and use them to draw many to Himself.
- Kathy Morford is now in full throttle, booking for
the 2009 tour. Our goal is to do over 80 concert dates,
with 25 of those being in detention and drug rehab
facilities. We are so excited for next year's
ministry
and we are trusting God for His provision and
blessing. Stephanie will be bringing her toddler and
son along to most of these concerts, so she is
currently looking for a personal assistant to help with
the kids during concerts and to help with other day to
day
responsibilities. Just pray
that the right team of people, sound engineer,
percussionist, etc., will come around her to make this
next leg in her calling all that it is meant to be. Pray
also that doors would open before Kathy, and that our
tour would be divinely blessed. Pray for those we will
be ministering to that God would even now begin to
prepare hearts, that His Spirit would bring healing to
many.
- We have submitted a grant request to Woodmen
Valley Chapel, through our integral ministry partner,
Southern Colorado Youth for Christ, for funding for 15
of
these 25 drug rehab and detention facility concerts.
We are anxiously awaiting their decision. Pray please
that it will be a resounding "Yes!" We are still
looking for funding for the other 10 of these 25
concerts that are
SUCH a VERY important expression of the heart of
what we do and why. Please let us know if you would
be willing to bring this request back to your home
church on our behalf or if you have any other creative
fund raising ideas! Perhaps you would be
willing to personally sponsor a concert, and thereby
bring this much needed message of hope and
healing to those that are incarcerated or dealing with
the ravages of addiction. We welcome your support,
and covet your prayers!! Please contact Kathy Morford
at cure9090@msn.com to find out more about
supporting a concert.
- Stephanie Pauline performed at a benefit
concert
for a mission team from Pike's Peak Christian Church,
(pictured above). She also did two radio
interviews,
(on KTLF, and Power 88), one of which will be
featured
on the site, and available for streaming later this
week. To find out more about the orphanage and
school in India the mission team from Pike's Peak
Community Church is going to help with you can click
on the link below. It looks like an awesome minstry
and we were so thankful to be able to help. Pray for
the team as they embark on their life changing
mission.
- We have a couple other important, impending
needs before we set out on tour next year. We
need a
lap top so Stephanie can stay in contact with her
ministry partners and team while on the road. We
need a 10 x 8 or 8 x 6 enclosed trailer to haul
our
gear behind Rosie, the Tour Bus. We need a
newer
concert keyboard. Perhaps a touch sensitive,
weighted key Roland or Yamaha. We could also
use
a GPS system, although that is not as
pressing as the
other needs. Please pray about
these ministry "needs" and ask for God's provision. If
you can
help supply these items or know of someone who
could please let us know right away.
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By Stephanie Pauline
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We Know that Christ Loves us in This...
The end of
that verse in Roman's 5 is: "We know that God loves
us in this: while we were still sinners Christ died for
us." I have the great privilege of intimately knowing
myself to be a sinner of sinners. No matter what God
brings in lieu of blessings in my life, still God knows
the me I was, and so do I - curled up in a ball at 18 too
frozen to gather up my son and leave a man who beat
me - too afraid to feel, too hurt to ask God all the why's
I had burning in my heart, dying inside. The glory of
knowing that is in the fact that every bit of what has
happened since is so clearly the result of the heart
and doings of this God who so loves me. I was
absolutely incapable of saving myself, let alone saving
my son from the devastation of the hellacious life in
which we were immersed. God did what I couldn't. He
loved when I hated, hoped when I despaired, and
saved when I had given up.
We all have sinned, the Bible says. Some of our sin is
more blatant than others'. Some of us can cover and
cower enough to let the Spirit pass over us and on to
the next "sinner". I thank God that I didn't have that
option; my sin was flagrant and undeniable. I had sin
so appalling and apparent I couldn't help but splash
around in the mess of it until God could truly come to
my rescue. You see I can't claim, before the light of
truth and the Spirit of the God who knew me then and
knows me now, to have any right to love, and in that, I
discover over and over again that Christ truly loves me.
It's in finding ourselves unworthy and yet loved that we
begin to understand the nature of true love. Love
doesn't
give to get. When we have nothing to offer - it gives.
Just because. Love loves because it IS love. It in itself
is reason enough. When we have nothing to offer
Him - He gives us His life. Now we begin to know
love. Not something we can manipulate, or earn,
conjur or control. Not love of the human kind, but an
altogether different kind of love.
As God is eternal and beyond us in every way, infinite,
like the boundaries of the cosmos that are ever
widening - so our best, even today, is that speck of
earth in the universe; an infinite fraction of what love is.
I have found in my walk over the years that whether our
sin is overt or not, if we dig, and really allow God to
search our hearts, we will find that we can agree with
Paul in his tearful plea "I am the greatest of sinners." I
would even say that until we have been
convicted
about our sin to the point that we are sincerely laid out
on the floor, bare in the dust of our hearts, crying out
with Paul, well, we hardly know love. May we all see
that
none of us have any claim to love. It was given. A gift of
great grace. Undeserved. Simply received. Jesus
speaks of the woman at His feet. He says, "She who
has been forgiven much, loves much." May we all see
that we have each been forgiven much, an infinite
much - and through that may we love much!
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With all that is going in the world right now and in our
country there is no better time to be on our faces,
humbled, contrite, and ready for God's Spirit to move
in
and through us. All the political platforms promise
change of one kind or another, but only God can truly
start a revolution. We don't just need a new way of
doing things - we need a new way of being. A LIFE
worthy of the Word, not ever waffling between
clammoring, and cowering - but receiving from the
True
Source then giving that gives not for gain, but purely for
love. Only God - Love - can do that in any heart. May
God continue the work He has begun in each of us.
As always thank you for your support,
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