Happy New Year!

A Very Merry Christmas to You!

With the craziness of 2016, I have seen the good and the bad in life, but I have also seen God work in so many ways! I am so grateful that God has given me another year to live life, learn, and even grow!

My prayer for you this Christmas Season is that you find God's goodness and His Love!

Thankful Beyond Words!

Happy Thanksgiving!

After a year of craziness, being a new grandma, and so much growth in our family, I can tell you that I am thankful for all that God has done in our lives. Not always is everything easy, there are ups and

downs, but I know that God is with us every day and everywhere we go.

We have watched our children grow into amazing adults, we have added this new bundle of joy who is now 10 months old and a very active boy. We have moved into a bigger home to allow room for our daughters and Lucas to stay with us a little longer. We have seen job changes, vehicles work, die, and work again, We have laughed, cried, and laughed again. We have seen God show up in so many things and we have seen Him come through, in the nick of time.

We have said "hello" to new lives and we have said "goodbye" to several loved ones, friends, family, and others. Our hearts have been full of joy, sorrow, wonder, and surprise, but through it all, God has walked with us, holding our hands and hearts.

I pray you and your family has a fantastic Thanksgiving and we pray you are able to take the time to share with your family what you are thankful for this holiday season.

With all our love,

The Clausens

No Strings Attached!

1 John 4:7-8, 11


"Beloved, let us love one another. For love is of God; and everyone that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also love one another."

This scripture tells us that we are to love others as God has loved us. As He loved us... what does that mean? Verse 9 tells us that God loved us so much that He sent His son to die for us. That we might live through the shed blood and death of His son on the cross. Verse 10 tells us that Christ was our substitution for us, for our death for our sins.

He isn't telling us to die for one another... John is telling us that we are to love one another, as God
loved us. That He loved us sacrificially, that He loved us with every fiber of His being! We can't even have a small ounce of compassion or love for our fellow neighbor, for a coworker or someone we see out in public, but God extends that love to us everyday!

If you say you love, don't be afraid to show it to others. Lend them a word of encouragement, a smile, let them know someone is praying for them, then pray for them. Not always do we have to do something monetarily to show someone that we love them, but sometimes someone you know may need that too, even if we don't know it. All God is asking you to do is love one another! Show them the love you want to see for yourself.

He did, over 2000 years ago, He showed us just how much He loved us. Neither you or I can ever repay that gift of love, it's a gift. He wants you to share it with others, freely, with no strings attached. Can you do that today? I know I am going to give it my all!

Now There's None!

Being a mom isn't that easy, but oh is it rewarding. Watching your baby girl, the last one in the nest

walk across the stage and receive her diploma is so rewarding, yet strange. Already so grown up and independent that I don't feel like she needs me at all, but also watching her crawl into my arms, crying like a baby when she realizes it is almost over and she has finally completed the struggle of what was high school for her.

I must accept the next step of this stage of life, so proud of the woman she is becoming, knowing that I have to trust in what I have taught her along the way will be enough. I pray that my prayerful influence and God's Word screams loud enough above the crowds trying to pull her away. I am so grateful for the time God has given me with KayCee, and for letting me be her mom.

Ministering to the Heart of a Kingdom Man

As we set out this week, I just really felt impressed upon this morning to encourage all the wives to pray for your husbands, we need to hold our husbands up in prayer and let God have His way in our husbands lives. God wants our men to step up and be the man He created them to be, He wants them to show our children what a Man of God, A Kingdom Man looks like, so they have examples for their own lives.

I know that some of you are thinking, "my husband is the leader of my home, he is a man of God... I don't have to pray him into the Kingdom," God has given so many of us a good, righteous, Holy man for Him, and that is wonderful that God has so many men already working on His behalf, Here is the thing, Satan knows it too, that is why we need to continue to Hold them Up, Bind Satan in their lives, and ask the Holy Spirit to give them encouragement, minister to their hearts from the inside, and strength as they lead our families. Everyday, each one of us need to thank God for our husbands, Speak to God the husband you see in Him. The virtuous woman LIFTS her husband up to the position she sees in him by speaking it out loud and claiming the promises and the word of God on their husbands. 

We help our husbands become that man for God's Kingdom through our prayers, ministering to their hearts in love, peace, and encouragement. God will lift them up to their place of HONOR in the home, through your prayers and words. "If you are faithful in the small things, we will be suited for the great things God has planned for you." You just have to be faithful to this for your husband.

We, as a society of women, can work with God to bring to life, restore, and encourage our Kingdom

Husbands and Fathers, but we have to do it, be faithful, and strong in their stead. Stand in the gap for your families. Satan is working hard to bring down the Kingdom men in our lives who are striving to Be what God wants and needs them to be in our world, and it is the strength and prayers of the wives that will help keep our men strong in the Lord. We have to bind Satan in his attacks, and continue to help our men in their position to LEAD OUR FAMILIES!!! 

Letting Go

As a parent, I always want the best for my kids, I have known the joys of raising my kids, the laughter and the tears, I have known the grief and sadness of watching them go through pain and trials that no child should have to go through, having to face grown up situations and been hurt so badly by the ones who are supposed to love them. I have watched my beautiful babies grow up into the most beautiful, wonderful, loving and caring grown adults in spite of the trials they have had to face as young children.

I sometimes wonder why God allows our children to go through the trials, pain, grief, and sadness that they have to face at such young ages. I wonder why He would allow hearts to be broken and bent who are supposed to be happy and free to live life without struggle until they are older. I ask God, why He would let my babies go through all of this, because they don't deserve the heartaches they have had to go through because of adult issues that they shouldn't be involved in. That is when God reminds me that these precious children, are just entrusted to me, to raise, teach, and bring up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. They are not mine, they are His. I struggle with that honest truth, the truth that we all must face as Children of God, that sometimes, no matter how hard it is, I have to let go of my children, let go of the decisions, opinions, and guidance, to allow God to step in and lead them the way they should go.

Proverbs 22:6 "Train up a child in the way he should go; and when he is old, he will not depart from it."

I know now, that through great trials comes great power and wisdom in the Lord. I know that God has been preparing me and my children for the work He has called each of us to do and these fiery trials bring us the Godly Character, Love, and Strength to do what has to be accomplished for Him.  Even through their great pains and trials in their young lives, God has been using that to prepare them, to give them a foundation in trust in Him. As a mother, I wanted to protect them, to keep them from harm, but I know I could not protect them from everything, no one can. I had to learn to let go of the situation and let God have His way in each of their lives. It is the hardest thing I have ever had to do, but knowing they are in His hands gives me the strength to let go.

Proverbs 21:21 "He that followeth after righteousness and mercy findeth life, righteousness, and honour."