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Hello friends,

We just wanted to send a friendly reminder that our monthly eNewsletter will be sent out in the coming days, so watch your inbox.

This short monthly e-publication is a fun way to learn about “breaking news,” helpful studies and take-home tips to help you build a StrongFamily.

If you're not already part of the StrongFamilies community and want to receive our monthly updates, please visit our website here and sign up for the emails.

At StrongFamilies, we never have, nor will we ever share your email address with anyone else. You may unsubscribe to the newsletter anytime you choose.

Thank you for being a vital part of our family.

Win - Win Photo Shoot!

A few weeks ago, we did a StrongFamilies photo shoot with Kate Williams of Life By Kate. You will be seeing some of these images on our website, seminar manuals, and other SF materials. These are real families, they are beautiful inside and out. We truly had an incredible day doing the shoot.

Kate will be doing another SF shoot for us in October. If you are in the Phoenix area and are interested in doing a FREE photo shoot it's a win-win for all of us.

You will get copies of the pictures for personal use and SF gets to use them on our website, and other media! We are looking for singles, couples and families of all ages and walks of life.

If you'd like more information, add a comment here with your email address or send us an email at ktrent[at]strongfamilies[dot]com. We will only have limited spaces available, so let us know if you're interested as soon as possible.

We look forward to hearing from you!

A New Partnership with Focus on the Family!

Check out this picture of the view when I walk out of my hotel – it's The Empire State Building! Wow!

If you're reading this on Tuesday(9/21) then we’re just a few hours away from officially launching the Institute for the Blessing and Focus on the Family strategic partnership with a national broadcast! Jim Daly, President of Focus on the Family, will be doing an interview with Tony Wheeler and I that kicks off our effort to bring the message of The Blessing to a whole new generation of parents.

We'd love it if you would pray with us today, that we can clearly present this timeless message in a way that stirs the hearts of parents of children young and old in these challenging times. Five radio stations here in the New York area have been promoting this event, and there’ll be a Christian comedian and lots of people from the area who make up the “studio audience". It’s kind of like a seminar, that’s a radio program – so I could sure use your prayers!

Hey, if you're reading this in the Big Apple, why not consider coming to the free event tonight at the Manhattan Center? Here's a link with more details and registration info.

This is just the beginning – but what a place to announce to the world that God’s timeless message of The Blessing is indeed the place where hurting can end, and love begin.

John Trent, Ph.D.
President

New Institute for the Blessing Facebook Page

Good news!

We now have a Facebook page for "The Dr. John Trent Institute for The Blessing at Barclay College".

Check it out and click the button to “like” us!

From there, we'll keep you posted on events and updates and share inspirational words and suggestions for using the elements of "The Blessing" in your everyday lives.

Post a note about how the Blessing has affected your life or something encouraging on the wall too, if you’d like!

Oh, and share the page and invite your friends to “like” us too!

Please Pray for our Big Meeting today!

Hey, StrongFamilies friends,

After months of prayers and planning, I'm at Focus on the Family today for a huge meeting. From this meeting could come a partnership between StrongFamilies.com, The Institute for the Blessing, and Focus on the Family, to take the message of The Blessing to a whole new generation of parents. If you'd like to read more about this, I've included the StrongFamilies Prayer Team Special Prayer Update below for you to read. Of if you've just got a moment, we'd ask for your prayers for the Lord to open the door for us to work together in sharing this life-changing Biblical message!

I'll post in the future about how the meeting went -- but thank you so much for your prayers today!
JT

StrongFamilies Special Edition Prayer Request!
August 31, 2010

We’re only a day away from our September prayer request email, but after months of all of you praying for us – today is the day!

I wish you could pull up a chair with us in the main boardroom at Focus on the Family (next to what used to be Dr. Dobson’s office). Today we have our major, and supposedly our final meeting with folks from StrongFamilies, The Institute for the Blessing, and Focus on the Family. After months of discussion – this is the “decision” meeting regarding all of us working together to take the message of The Blessing to a whole new generation of parents and people!

In the room will be a “who’s who” of FoF folks. If they decide to move forward after this meeting, the next thing would be for Dr. Wheeler and I to fly to New York City in September to launch the partnership with a national radio broadcast (in front of a huge live audience). But before that “launch” comes – comes this huge meeting and the decision to move forward together or not.

Tomorrow we present 11 areas where we could work with Focus to spread the message of The Blessing to others. (From working together on a “Blessing Institute Book line, to online classes on the Blessing, to seminars, to radio programs, to sharing music that “Blesses” others, to passing out a million “Blessing coins” and more.). I’ll send you a “What happened at the meeting!” update, along with a very busy September Prayer list on September 1st. But months of prayers these past months will end, and we pray, begin with tomorrow’s meeting here at Focus on the Family.

Here’s my prayer, “Lord, thank you that as we walk into that huge Boardroom tomorrow, we know You’re walking beside us – and that You’ve been there ahead of us as well. We know the word “life” means movement – and we ask for your guidance and favor as these ministries consider moving forward together to better share Your message. We ask if this strategic alliance could further Your Kingdom, then every door would open tomorrow. Lord, we know there are so many hurting families and individuals out there. And we know as well that Your concept of The Blessing jumps off the pages of Scripture and can bring love, hope and healing to men and women who need help so much. So Lord, we humbly ask that all our prayers and months of working toward this one meeting will end up with many thousands more “living the Blessing” in their homes, churches and communities, for Your glory and honor.

Amen and thank you for your prayers! JT

John Trent, Ph.D.
President, StrongFamilies.com
Founder, The Institute for the Blessing at Barclay College

Note: If you're not already on our prayer team and would like to be, please shoot us an email at friends@strongfamilies.com and we'll be happy to include you.

Win an Autographed Book!

Don't forget about our drawing to win an autographed John Trent book when our StrongFamilies Facebook page reaches 500 "LIKEs". We're inching closer and closer to that magic number. Remember, everyone who recommends it to their friends will be in the drawing along with your friends.

We'll also do another drawing when we get to 1000 "LIKEs" so keep up the great work!

Click here for more details about the contest.

Slight Change of Plans for the Half Marathon

So it looks like I'll be running the half marathon in Scottsdale instead of Chicago this Sunday. Let me fill you in on how that has all come about.

Frankly, we've been facing some tremendous challenges with my wife, Cindy. For those who haven't heard, Cindy experienced some serious chemical burns on her hands. Even though her hands have healed on the outside, the nerve pain continues unabated (picture your hands on fire and from there, overall pain shoots through your body and makes it terribly hard to sleep). We've been to a number of doctors, and are extremely grateful for all the folks who have been praying. We have seen some improvement, thank the Lord. However, we just need her brain to start saying "There's no reason to hurt anymore!" and for the pain to stop! (Not being able to sleep for more than 20 or 30 minutes at a time makes everything in life more challenging).

So that leads me to the change of venue for the race.

If you've seen earlier posts or visited our website, you'll remember that I was supposed to go to Chicago this weekend and run the Rock & Roll 1/2 Marathon. That's our big summer fund-raising event for StrongFamilies, with people sponsoring me per mile, and all the funds raised going to build strongfamilies. However, with Cindy in such tough shape, I've had to cancel trips last week, and I can't fly out to Chicago this week as well.

So, Cindy came up with a great idea (I think).

This Sunday at 5:00am here in Phoenix (the same time they step off in Chicago), I'm going to run the "Cindy Trent is Going to Get Better Scottsdale Canal 1/2 Marathon!" Meaning, I'll just use the Nike+ GPS on my shoe (which posts to our StrongFamilies Facebook page), and will run the 13.2 miles here in town so I can be with Cindy this weekend.

I'm going to send out an email to all those who have already agreed to sponsor the race in Chicago, to explain the situation. I simply can't leave Cindy right now, so while people can certainly pull their sponsorship, I'm still going to run the 13.2 for StrongFamilies.

If they'd like, or if you'd like to help the ministry, then just email jefft@strongfamilies.com (that's Jeff Thibault, our director of training for StrongFamilies) and let him know you're in for the "Cindy Trent is Going to Get Better" run as a sponsor!

As a ministry, all gifts are tax deductible and go directly to helping us help couples, singles and families!

Thanks for your prayers and understanding!

John Trent, Ph.D.