Me not being me!

The past 2 weeks have been so weird for me. I haven't felt like myself, I haven't acted like myself, and I've been extremely selfish and rude and discouraging to those around me. In no way have I exemplified Christ through my attitude. I have felt like the last 2 weeks I have constantly been in a dazed state of mind. When you get lightheaded and feel like everything around you is just jumbled, thats what I've felt like for 2 straight weeks.

I can't explain what was wrong, cause even now I can't think of why I was like this. It seems like it was a huge spiritual battle. In the past 2 weeks I have spent a lot of time in prayer asking God to take away the state of mind I was in and that I could have an attitude of humbleness and looking our for others. Yet I struggled so much to do these very things. It wasn't until this past Thursday that I finally started feeling a little more like myself, yet Friday afternoon I was still harsh. I have been so rude to all my friends, and despite this they have stood behind me. Friday though, one of best friends again continued to be there and tried to start conversation, but the first thing I did was make a rude and disrespectful comment. I care so much for these friendships, yet I nearly destroyed this one. After the comment I just started to think about what I have been doing, the way I have been acting, and how much I really care for these friendships. I have missed them so much this semester and my own stubborn attitude kept me from seeing this.

It's been a rough two weeks physically, spiritually, and relationally. I am finally beginning to feel like myself again. I'm again longing to use the gifts God has given me to help others. I want to be there for all of you. So I'm sorry for my attitude of selfishness and being a downer. Thank you all for sticking by me through this.

A Wonderful Break!

Many times when I go home on break I struggle with being away from everyone at school and struggle with being myself. This past Christmas break was the best break I have had since being at college. I felt more confidence in myself, I felt like myself. I felt much more peace about where I was, where things where going and knowing that God is in control. I thought a lot about this past semester and things that I need to improve on and how I need to change my focus from the self-centeredness to things not being about me at all. Everything is about God. John Piper's talk at Passion keeps coming back following his sermon and how God is a jealous God and it is all about Him, not about me but about Him. What a journey this past year and a half has been and I have had so many learning experiences and have had to evaluate myself many times to make sure my focus is on God.

I enjoyed a lot of time with my family this break and it was good. Looking over my schedule for the year of 2010 it appears that I will only be able to go home one weekend during this semester and I will have a week at home at the end of August, so it was good to spend a lot of time with my family.

I went to Atlanta for a four day college age conference called Passion and it was amazing. Being able to worship with 22,000 college students just lifted my spirits, knowing that the next generation does really care to make known the name of Jesus! It was encouraging and it was challenging. The speakers were terrific and really challenged me to be bolder and a brighter light.

Over the past couple months I have struggled with understanding God's plans and why certain things happen. It's been a struggle for me to not receive what I want but following God's path for my life. Towards the end of break I finally started receiving some freedom from my own desires and just gazing upon the face of God in awe saying here's my life, take it and make it new. Finally saying God it is all about you, refine my heart, let me die to myself and pour my heart and soul out to you. What a struggle though to give up on something we long for and to just step back and say, "God, where you lead I will follow!" I ask for prayer in this area. At points I struggle greatly with questioning why God has done what He has and have many times bring myself down with thoughts of my weaknesses. I pray that I would not gaze upon my weaknesses but always keep in mind that God has given me talents and that it's not about me. That I would pour myself out to His will, not mine. All of you have been so great, and have been such an encouragement! I thank you for your prayers, and continue to ask for prayers because the next couple months really are going to be a struggle and I know there is no greater weapon in the world than prayer! I really believe that, so please continue to pray, and please let me know if I can ever do anything for you! God Bless and have a wonderful day! With the love of Christ!

Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving is so great! Get all kinds of good food, watch some football, and get to see the whole family again. It's also a time to really reflect on the past year and everything that I have to be thankful for. That's one thing I love about holidays is the time to reflect. This past year has definitely been the biggest growing experience that I have had.

It's hard to think about all that has taken place in one year. I could not even start to describe everything that has happened (actually I have, but it's turned into a 35 page paper). I have developed my faith and have really challenged myself in what I really believe. I have been so challenged by friends in my faith and this past summer was such a great growing experience. Not having anyone there to keep me accountable, I had to challenge myself to keep faithful in my faith.

This semester alone has had enough growing experiences to write another 50 pages. God has made me take a hard look at myself, my goals, and where my heart really is. Before last school year, I completely relied on those around me. Over this past year, I have slowly begun to trust God for my every need.

This semester I have learned a lot about friendship. I have had to fight to keep friendships for the first time that I can ever remember. I have not done a great job of doing this, instead I have many times thought I just wanted to give up. At times I have been so frustrated with my friends that I don't really want to fight for my friendship. Over the past few weeks I have discovered how special my friends are and how much they have done for me and how I really do want to fight for their friendship. Between fighting for friends, developing new friends, and the changes in other friendships, it has been a test, challenge, and adventure. God has shown me so much through them.

There is so much to be thankful. God has done so much. I'm so thankful for everything, and for being able to have a personal relationship with the One who created everything we see. God is good, all the time!

Perfect Love!

What an incredible past week it has been! I have learned so much about God and have been filled with His peace. God just took my pride and humbled me. At a point where I was being very prideful, I had one of the most humbling experiences. Sounds nice, but definitely not an easy thing to have attacked. It's so hard to throw yourself into something, and not end up achieving what you set out to do. I became so focused on my own desires that I failed to look to God to lead me and guide me and use me as a vessel to lift others up. So the experience was painful, and even now, it does still hurt, but I have been humbled.

I turned to God and spent more time in prayer and reading the Scripture that God has given me. In a time where I always thought I would be angry and have no peace about the future, God filled me with His incredible peace. When we struggle to achieve something and come up short, it's so hard to trust God that things will work out even better. And this has been a struggle for me over time, but this past week I felt God wrapping His arms around me, saying "I love you!!" I watched Rob Bell's Nooma Rain this past week and that's what I felt like. I'm going through a huge storm and I'm scared, but God pulls me close to Him just repeating, "I'm here with ya, I love you, your going to make it!" What a feeling.

Tonight I was reading through 1 John, and really looked at the love of God. One topic that several people have told me they are struggling with is fear. So many times I find myself falling into fear of so many different things. Many times I do not know how to respond, because I find myself struggling with it. Sure we know that God is in control of the future, but Satan comes in with his lies and gets us to really question ourselves and question God. But the topic of Love has been so strong, and tonight as I talked with 2 of my friends, the topic of Love came up and I stated how I can not even fathom the Love God has, because it is so perfect. Our earthly definition of love is so far from perfect, and the term becomes more and more loosely used, giving it even less significance and less meaning. God's Love is PERFECT! It's so awesome to know that I serve a God who created everything, but yet is personal enough and cares enough, to have a personal relationship with me and to pour out His Love for me. 1 John 4:16- 18 reads, "God is Love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like Him. There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love." Dealing with fear, God has given us His perfect Love, and if we live in Him we have nothing to fear. Easier said than done, but God's plans are so much bigger than our own and we can't even imagine what is ahead of us. It's so exciting all the things that God will do. It's so exciting the things He has done.

This past week has just been a time for me to seek out the greatness of God. I have spent so much more time in silence in the past week than I normally do, and it has been absolutely incredible! Constantly surrounded by the noise of this world, it was such a great blessing to just sit in silence. I went to the Prayer Chapel here on campus several times, and just sat and gazed upon the sculpture of Jesus praying in the garden, committing himself to the task of dying for our sins. As I sat in silence, just remembering what He has been done and how Satan has been defeated, God just filled me with a sense of peace. In the silence, that is when God has been working in me. When I just give Him time to speak, instead of me always asking for something or talking, allowing Him time to come to me.

The image that has filled my head this past week is me, walking towards God with my head hung low because of the sting that I received. At the time feeling so weak and like I failed, God ran towards me and wrapped his arms around me. As I sat in the prayer chapel the first time thinking about this, as God wrapped His arms around me I just felt myself place my head against His chest and I literally wept. Feeling so weak and like I was not worthy of His love, He held me and kissed me saying, "I LOVE YOU!" I realized that I did not fail. God did not want to see me hurt, but it was something that had to be done out of Love. God has been telling me, "My plans for you are so great, better than you could ever imagine." This has been a time of growing and learning how to Love. Through it all, God is there and I take joy in knowing that no matter what, God Loves me with the Perfect Love.

"But He said to me, "My Grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." There fore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

Finding God in Silence

Over the past 3 days I have spent a lot of time in silence. It's hard for me to do this as the world is just filled with clutter. We constantly surround ourselves with noise. We listen to iPods, watch television, we surround ourselves with friends, listen to the radio while driving. There is constant clutter. At school I have found so much peace in just shutting off music or the television and just finding listening to God. On the way home from school last night, I was listening to the radio and the music was just cluttering my mind, so I rode the last 45 minutes in silence. It was so good to just talk with God in silence. Though maybe I did not receive any answers, I was able to just talk with God and it was so good. It allowed me to get frustration out, and to just tell God verbally my feelings. Sure I know He knows my heart, but it's always good to say it out loud.

Today I went for a nice, somewhat hard run. This is where I find God the most. At one time I liked running with my iPod, but lately I have left it behind and have just used running as a way to talk with God and find silence. A little before the halfway point of my run, a light rain started. I absolutely love running in the rain. It is the best feeling in the world. The silence is so good, as I'm more observant of the creation around me and I'm just more in awe of God. It gives me a chance to listen to God and also just talk with Him.

I've tried to be more consistent in my time with God and make sure that I'm making time for Him, and over this past week, I have learned so much. I challenge everyone to just find more time in silence, and just listening to God. It can be hard, cause we want to always be doing something, or find it uncomfortable to be in silence, but it is so peaceful to have silence and it allows God to show you so much. Take joy in just being able to spend one-on-one time with our Father in Heaven.

God's Guidance!

So much happens in just a month's time. It's hard to even remember everything that has transpired over the past month. It's been a good semester of school to this point, and the workload has finally started to pick up. I really am learning a lot in my education classes and really have been improving in areas that have been points of weakness as far as teaching.

Last week I found myself sick with the swine flu, so I went home and missed three days of classes, so I'm trying to get completely caught up from that. This whole semester has been full of good experiences and I have found myself in many new situations.

These new situations have caused some confusion for me though. Trying to seek out where God wants me to be for my future has been hard. I feel like I know God's call and I have felt confirmation from many different areas regarding this circumstance. I don't understand a lot of things right now. I don't even completely know where I am at right now, or what I should do. I know what I feel, but I don't know if this is personal desires or if this truly is something from God. At points I feel completely at peace with everything, knowing God is in control. At other points though, I know that God provides opportunities for us and that we have to take the next step. It's hard to know when the time is right to take the step or if patience is needed and to just wait.

So where to next? One thing thing that I have been lacking is a consistent prayer life and reading of the word. In fact even a existence of this would be nice. I struggle so much to take time away from my day to really meditate on what God has for me. So as it is time to decide which way I should go, I'm trying to dedicate my time to prayer and listening to Him. Pray for me over the next two weeks as I listen for God's guidance and direction. I need clarity of mind and to just open my heart up completely to Him and allow Him to mold me. I thank you all again for the support of me and all the encouragement that I have received over the year. Thanks so much! God bless!

Peace!

Wow! What a last 2 weeks! Seriously feels like it’s been a month since I was at home. It’s just been such an incredible 2 weeks of joy, growth, and most of all, peace! One thing that I have been searching for in the past year is complete peace with everything. Starting about two weeks ago I have had more and more peace and at the beginning of this week I finally gained complete peace about everything. After a tough summer spiritually, God has just wrapped me in His arms, telling me well done. This summer was such a big test for me. During summit last night, when Dr. Tim Elmore told us to just imagine going to heaven and seeing God face to face, I imagined myself walking towards God with my head down just completely exhausted and God just wrapping His arms around me telling me well done, you passed the test. It is the best feeling ever, and I just wept as everything I have struggled with over the past year was just thrown away with God saying, “I LOVE YOU!!!”

What an awesome feeling! Last night was just such a God night. God broke me down and brought me to a point where His Holy Spirit just filled me, and I was so at peace and just relaxed. Going into one of the most nerve racking things I have ever done in my life, God just filled me with His love, and I was so calm and relaxed, in a time where I always thought I would be tense and nervous. That was just the Prince of Peace working in me.

God has just surrounded me with the most incredible friends that I could ever ask for. Through everything over the past year, when they probably just wanted to slap me and say get over it, they instead stood with me and just poured out their love and encouragement to me. Oh what an experience it has been.

Ever since I got home from North Carolina, I have just been filled with joy. The past 2 weeks I just feel like I’m overflowing with joy, just knowing that the God I serve really is bigger than anything I will face. Knowing that God, the creator of everything, is in control of my future. I have nothing to fear. I have read the back of the Book, and we WIN!!!!!

Since I have returned to school I feel like a completely different person. Never have I experienced this kind of joy in my life. The Holy Spirit has just been working in me. The Sunday I spoke at church was when I really did tell God just to take total control of my life. Saturday before I spoke I was so sick and I could not think clearly. I seriously could not put a complete sentence together and it was at this point where I fell to my knees behind the pulpit and just told God to take complete control and just use me as His instrument.

Sunday morning God just completely took over cause I was still sick and I could not make sense of anything, but once I started speaking God just took over and I don’t even remember anything I said. It was incredible! And since then God has just continued blessing me with His words and movement in my life. There is so much I could say, story after story of how God is just working and moving and transforming. It’s so awesome to have this complete peace. Last night just lifted so much weight and stress off of me and the whole situation has just been so filled with prayer, and I have seen the power of prayer. So thank you everyone for you prayer and support. It means so much! I love you all! God Bless!!!!