Nov 15, 2010

You'll Come



This is my new favorite worship song!! I heard it in worship last week, started working on learning to play it and then one of my teachers played it in class today! It is so beautifully written.

Here are the lyrics and the youtube link....check it out.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RmZFaruXhs

You'll Come - Hillsong
(Hosea 6) 

I have decided
I have resolved
To wait upon You Lord
My rock and Redeemer
Shield and reward
I'll wait upon You Lord

As surely as the sun will rise

You'll come to us
Certain as the dawn appears

You'll come

Let Your glory fall as You respond to us
Spirit rain
Flood into our thirsty hearts again
You'll come
You'll come

We are not shaken

We are not moved
We wait upon You Lord
Mighty deliverer
Triumph and truth
We wait upon You Lord

Chains be broken
Lives be healed
Eyes be opened
Christ is revealed 

Nov 4, 2010

500 views!!

There have been over 500 hits on this blog! Thank ya'll so much for reading. It means a lot that these words aren't just flying out into cyberspace! Now, all you bloggers out there might not think that 500 views is much to be excited about...BUT IT IS FOR ME!! Thank you, thank you, thank you!! And for whoever that 500th viewer was...I have two words for you. Brownie. Points.

yes, this is slightly creepy.

Nov 3, 2010

Relearning Joy

Something the Lord has been showing me these past weeks has been His abundant Joy. Over the last year and a half there has been a lot of stuff going on in my life that just robbed me of my Joy. I didn’t even realize it either! I just went through the motions of finishing high school and pulling myself together emotionally enough to get through the weeks.

As the months went on I pushed the pain aside and got it tucked away so it wasn’t in my face every day.  I had tried to fully express my heart to the Lord.  I had cried out to Him in the hard days and had made the decision to just move on.  But, still, if I thought on the losses and the changes that had come into my life, the pain returned and the sadness resurfaced all over again.  The pain I had tucked away in the back of my heart was affecting the abundant joy I had always had in the Lord. 

But the Lord is bringing me joy again! It is incredible to experience true joy from the Lord. True joy not only my relationship with God, but my relationship with brothers and sisters in Christ! God is breaking down the walls I’ve built up to protect my heart and helping me build new, meaningful, loving relationships.  He is taking my sorrow and turning it to gladness.

Then maidens will dance and be glad, young men and old as well. I will turn their mourning into gladness; I will give them comfort and joy instead of sorrow.”   Jeremiah 31:13

He is changing my heart and my way of thinking.

I want to share something with you. I wrote this sometime while in my senior year of high school.  It was a time when I was really hurting. I remember crying while typing it out. Writing helped me express how I was feeling about the loss of friendships in a season that had been so precious and fruitful ...

Sometimes I wish we could go back to those magnificent Summer days. When being a free spirit was what our hearts hungered for. When the cold grass under our feet made us feel alive, and we would lay in it while the seeping sun melted into night. That Summer when we would dance through the darkness; the stars would dance with us and the moon would laugh and listen to us as we sang to him, smirking in his giddy way, the way moons always do.

We would cast all our problems to the wind. Good friends and music was all we needed to become who we wanted to be. When a smile changed a disposition and a hug was all that mattered. A flash of lightening took your breath away from the beauty of the authority it spoke. We laughed more then we breathed, we loved more then we ever thought we could. 

Summer spoke to us as it dissolved the walls that we built up against each other. The walls fell down and we ran, as fast as we could together. There was a fire in us, and we trusted. We trusted the person running next to us wouldn’t cause us to fall. If we did fall, that friend wouldn’t push us down again, but they would help us up. Summer said, “trust.”  Summer said, “Abide in the moment.”  Summer told us to hold each others heart strings. Summer said, “These are the best days of your life!”  And we believed. All those incredible memories spilled from our minds, and rushed through our veins. 

Those were the days before the heartache set in. The days before, you had to drown your thoughts on the shoreline just to try to remember what life was really about because nothing made sense anymore. When Summer came it felt like a dream.  It swept you off you’re feet. But a wisp of joy turned into sorrows, a happy thought turned to ruins.

When I look at that dream, the dream of Summer, it wasn’t what it appeared to be.  Summer said one thing and did another. Summer lied, and never said it was sorry. Summer left me to a cold world full of ugly truths; it left me lying on the floor with my bleeding heart. And right when I needed Summer the most, when I needed its warmth, its love, when I thought Summer would be on my side, holding my hand, saying the cold would melt away and color will come back… When I needed that, Summer spit on me and told me I was worthless.

All the sweet words it whispered in my ear, saying how, “it could be like this forever,” those weren’t true. Had all the joy been false? Was everything we thought we knew not really what was said? 

But I realized something, dreams have to end. You can’t stay asleep forever. If you live in a dream, you're not really living at all. Summer was like a deep slumber.  Sometimes when we're in a deep sleep somebody has to shake us awake so that we can be a real, living, breathing person. 

If we could go back to that Summer we knew, would we act the same knowing what we know now? In truth, we needed Summer.  We needed the Good.  Even more so, we needed the bad. Because unless we experience the bad, I don’t think we would even remember how good, Good really was. Unless the ugly, nasty, faulty part of that dream came out into the fresh air, that ugly part would have never choked on the clean, clear, simple goodness that we took for granted. And we would have never known it was hiding anything. We wouldn’t have seen under the skin, under the outer layer that was deceiving us. 

I’ve forgiven Summer for the lies it spoke, even though Summer isn’t really sorry.
I’ve come to a place were I’ve accepted it was a dream.  A dream that hurt and left scars that will never fully heal…

Would I go back and change summer? Would I have done something different? 

No. I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t change one moment, one I love you. I cherish those times and still miss them. I still miss the way things used to be…those glorious nights when we lived in our dreams. Nothing will ever be the way it used to, and the reason is because we did trust and it made us trip. But tripping up at times means growing and growing means becoming one step closer to who we were created to be.”


I haven’t shared this with many people. It’s something I’ve held onto…as I feel…in some bitterness still. As I read it now, there is a part where it says” I’ve forgiven”. But at the point that I wrote this I hadn’t forgiven. I wanted to.  I wanted to forgive as I have been forgiven…but it never truly came to pass in my heart…until now.  

And I don’t miss “the way things used to be” and I don’t desire to “go back.”  God has brought me to a new land, where there are sweeter things to taste and more of His goodness to drink in! I am being given an abounding-God-sized-heavenly- joy that only comes from being right where He wants me to be.
I am letting it all go…because I want the JOY of the Lord instead!
(If you just read this whole post… I love you. Sorry it was so long.)

Oct 25, 2010

This Is A Title

WOW, haven’t blogged in quite a while! Sorry!
I’ll share with ya’ll a little about what’s been going down. Classes got back into full swing after wilderness.  I tried to write a blog post about it but there was so much that happened I couldn’t even articulate it!. Maybe I’ll give a swing at some point.

Twice a week we have days when we do outreaches and service projects. On Wednesday our group (everyone who was in my wilderness family) was assigned landscaping. We served right around the corner from the school. In groups of three or four some of us cleaned windows and some picked up trash. I was with my gals, Molly and Alysha.  One of the Impact interns named Nick was leading our group. We walked along the sidewalks we picked up cigarette butts, bits of paper, trash and old cups. After a little while we met a man riding his bike. His name was Rick. We talked to him a bit and then asked if there was anything he needed prayer for. He said no, but that we should go and talk to his two homeless friends around the corner.  Nick asked us if we wanted to go and talk to them and we were totally up for that! 

Their names are J.R. & Joey. We went and talked to them and prayed for them.  I didn’t get a chance to personally talk to J.R. because Nick was speaking to him but us girls got to talk to Joey a bunch.  Joey shared with us how he became homeless.  He shared that he drinks and doesn’t know why and that he fears death. Molly really blessed me by her boldness for the Lord.  She just kept sharing with him in such a loving manner and encouraged him to draw close to God.

We found out that the next day was Joey’s birthday, so we planned to surprise him with cake and a card.  After class on Thursday me, Molly and Alysha got two dudes (Dez and Eric) to go with us and headed out to find J.R. and Joey.  We walked around for a while until we saw Rick.  We thought he might know where Joey was. He told us that they went to the library and wouldn’t be back for a while. We left the cake and card at the spot where they normally sit. Hopefully Joey saw it.   

While we were talking to Rick, Eric started sharing the Gospel.  It was super sweet to just see this brother’s love for the Lord pouring out in his speech. We prayed with Rick and he received the Lord.  I pray he actually knew and meant what he was praying.  Hopefully we will be able to check up on him and see how he is doing this week.   

These brothers and sisters have been such an amazing blessing to watch and learn from. Their confidence in the Lord and love for the lost is truly inspiring! If I had a scripture to describe this week it would be this…

 “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners. “    Isaiah 61:1

We’re gonna PROCLAIM IT! What whaaattt!!!   Well, I’ll leave it at that.  I hope this encouraged you, if I talk to those guys again, I’ll definitely write about it!

 Thank you all so much for all your love, prayers and support!
XOXO

  

The Fox The Crow And The Cookie

I love songs that tell stories! Mewithoutyou is kind of an unusual band and not everyone likes them...but whatever. These are the lyrics to their song called " The Fox The Crow And The Cookie". You could watch the music video on youtube...it is pretty sweet!

I really love this song because when I hear it I feel like I am in the scene watching it all play out. The crow watching for his chance...the fox already in flight. Much of the album is based on fables and when I found that out I researched fables ( yeah, I'm a nerd) and discovered I loved Aesop's! If you have never read them before...you should. They are grand!  Anywho... here is the song. :)
 






~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Through mostly vacant streets, a baker from the outskirts of his town
Earned his living peddling sweets from the ragged cart he dragged around.
The clever fox crept close behind, kept an ever-watchful eye
For a chance to steal a ginger spice cake or a boysenberry pie.

Looking down was the hungry crow, "When the time is right, I'll strike

And condescend to the earth below and take whichever treat I'd like."
The moment the baker turned around to shoo the fox off from his cart,
The crow swooped down and snatched a shortbread cookie and a German chocolate tart.

Using most unfriendly words that the village children had not yet heard,

the baker shouted threats by canzonette to curse the crafty bird.
"You rotten wooden mixing spoon! Why you midnight winged racoon!
You better bring those pastries back, you no-good burned-black macaroon!"

The fox approached the tree where the bird was perched, delighted in his nest.

"Brother Crow, don't you remember me? It's your old friend Fox with a humble request.
If you could share just a modest piece, seeing as I distracted that awful man."
This failed to persuade the crow in the least, so the fox rethought his plan.

"Then if your lovely song would grace my ears, or to even hear you speak,

Would ease my pains and fears." The crow looked down with a candy in his beak.
"Your poems of wisdom, my good crow, what a paradise they bring!"
This flattery pleased the proud bird, so he opened his mouth and began to sing:

"Your subtle acclamation's true! Best to give praise where praise is due.

Every rook and jay in the Corvidae's been raving about me too.
They admire me, one and all. Must be the passion in my caw!
My slender bill known through the escadrille, my fierce commanding claw!"

I got a walnut brownie brain, and molasses in my veins,

Crushed graham cracker crust, my powdered sugared funnel cake cocaine.
Let the crescent cookie rise. These carob colored almond eyes
Will rest to see my cashewed princess in the swirling marble sky.
Will rest upon the knee, where all the visions cease to be
A root beer float in our banana boat across the tapioca sea.
When letting all attachments go, is the only prayer we know,
May it be so, may it be so, may it be so, oh.

Oct 8, 2010

Why?


WHY IS IT THAT WHEN PEOPLE TYPE IN CAPS IT FEELS LIKE THEY ARE YELLING AT YOU? I don't get it.

Oct 6, 2010

The Wonderful Artist!



'It was a bright and sunny morning in the pleasant time of summer,
when one of those black monks emerged from the abbey portal, and
bent his steps towards the house of the fair sisters. Heaven above
was blue, and earth beneath was green; the river glistened like a
path of diamonds in the sun; the birds poured forth their songs from
the shady trees; the lark soared high above the waving corn; and the
deep buzz of insects filled the air. Everything looked gay and
smiling; but the holy man walked gloomily on, with his eyes bent
upon the ground.”
  

I took this from a page out of Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens, one of my favorite authors.
I think it’s such a vivid picture of creation and man. I’m not sure it was meant to be written that way but that’s how I see it.  God’s wonderful creation spilling forth to display His splendor and yet… we walk with our heads down. What would happen if we looked up?  What if we just spent time breathing in creation, marveling at the glory of God through His artwork?


My siblings are into art. Becca is into painting eclectic and vintage looking things,  Josh is into sketching whatever he finds interesting and Paul is into…capturing the “moments” with cartooning. *coughcough*


I, on the other hand, rarely have the patience to sit down, keep my hand steady and endure the painful process of drawing, erasing, drawing, tilting you’re head, checking the picture, checking the color, checking the line, drawing, tilting, lining and so on and so forth.

That, my friends, is why a camera is a beautiful thing! *SNAP* moment captured.  

Oh look…someone is about to eat 3 hotdogs in one bite! *Snap*moment captured.

Oh my, that dude is about to do a dubble back flip! * SNAP*moment captured.


Hey! That guy is gonna ninja kick through the dry wall! * SNAP* (Picture of random person’s tee shirt blocking shot….  You give some you take some.)  

The last time I tried to draw a picture, or make a… err…umm… “Piece of art” was a fail. We had just watched the new “Alice in Wonderland” and I felt “inspired”. I grabbed some paper, my brother’s colored sketching pencils and I drew!  I drew clocks, swivels, swirls, circles, eyes and music notes. Lines of color streaming across the page, trees growing from abstract looking grass.  All the while hoping it would look interesting, that it would have depth and it would strike thought!
I asked my brother his view on the subject to which he replied, with confusion, “What is it?”  Then Becca had a look at it…and I won’t tell you what she said, but it made me want to never see that picture again.
 
The conclusion was, I am not an artist. No matter how hard I try, how inspired I’m feeling. It’s just not my gifting. I have the artistic capabilities of a small child…But God is a wonderful Artist!  



“When there were no oceans, I was given birth, when there were no springs abounding with water; before the mountains were settled in place, before the hills, I was given birth, before he made the earth or its fields or any of the dust of the world. I was there when he set the heavens in place, when he marked out the horizon on the face of the deep, when he established the clouds above and fixed securely the fountains of the deep, when he gave the sea its boundary so the waters would not overstep his command, and when he marked out the foundations of the earth. Then I was the craftsman at his side. I was filled with delight day after day, rejoicing always in his presence, rejoicing in his whole world and delighting in mankind.”
                                                     Proverb 8:24-31

Oct 1, 2010

First Week Of Impact

The first week of classes has been intense! The Lord has some incredibly passionate people who love and want serve Him.

This week is called “Rock The House” week and its theme is loyalty.  The teachings have been focused on our loyalty to God.  The continuous challenge presented has been if we care about ourselves or if we care about the things of the Lord.  Our teachers have been breaking down what Loyalty is and in each class challenging us to run after it.  

George Clerie  (Director of The Rock University) rocked my world… as usual.  On Wednesday he was speaking about how Jesus lived.  He didn’t live in a nice house.  He didn’t have a bed.  He didn’t live “the American dream”.  He lived life out of the ordinary. We’re always saying, “ I wanna live like Jesus.” George has challenged us to consider if we are really believing if Jesus is worth risking it all? And, do our choices and our lives reflect what we say we believe.  Are we willing to give over all our comforts, all our wants and all our “stuff” to preach the Gospel and reach the nations for Jesus?

“When Jesus Christ calls us to follow Him… He isn’t calling us to a reasonable life of service… but to a radical life of sacrifice.”  ~ Pastor George Clerie

That really spoke to me. That is something I desire.  I desire to live a life of sacrifice for the One Who gave it all to secure my eternal life with Him.

Sarah Macintosh was leading us in the song “More Than Enough”.  It says, “ All of You is more than enough for me”. 

Jesus gave me His ALL.  Why shouldn’t I give all I have back to Him?

Mark Schnieder ( one of the founders of S.E.N.D Ministries) taught very passionately about the eyes of God from Revelation 19:11 and 1 Chronicles 28:9. He talked about the wickedness of man and how Gods eyes see our wickedness and still He has mercy and grace…. and wants for all of us to follow Him.  Mark spoke of the struggle to say no to self, and he boiled it down real simple like:  “Fix your eyes on the one who has His eyes fixed on you.”  He concluded by sharing, “God is calling us to be a generation to carry His fire to the ends of the earth.”

 There have also been some sweet moments and I’ll share a few with you…

On Tuesday, right before the end of classes for the day, the teacher asked us to turn to the person next to us and pray for them.  Myself and two women named Claudette and Sarah came together and started praying.  Sarah prayed and started by saying “ Lord, I thank you for Sarah and Claudette”. Claudette started crying and she said “ Lord, thank you for bringing me two Sarahs! It is truly a miracle!” It was the sweetest thing.   After we prayed she told us that the Lord was using Sarahs all around to pray and speak to her.  I’m glad I could be part of the “ Sarahs.”

I met another lady named Melissa who sat next to me on the very first day of class. The Lord has called her to go to Haiti and start an orphanage.  That was super encouraging to me that she has such a heart for kids, for the lost, lonely and hurting kid’s of a place so destroyed and abandoned.  I will definitely keep her in my prayers as she embarks on this grand adventure with the Lord.

I have also heard amazing testimonies of how the Lord has spoken and lead His followers into His promises. It’s been an amazing week!