The Pursuit.

I have to make a confession. Tonight, as I began writing in this blog, I was really angry. I saw something within the body of Christ that made me angry. It was wrong, it shouldn't have happened, and I was going to rant about it. I was going to condemn and let everyone know how frustrated I was with the situation and with how the church isn't acting like the church. I stopped writing and in the process I witnessed something that convicted me. I came back to my chair, sat down, and got ready to start writing again when I realized something. How am I any better than them if all I do is condemn them? Jesus said, "Let him with no sin cast the first stone." I have sinned. I have no business casting stones and making judgements that aren't mine to make. Christ called me to spread his love to the world. To tell the lost about Jesus' love and to disciple other believers. That is my calling. Judging and condemning are not my calling.  Sometimes I have a hard tim...

I have been listening to Jonathan David Helser a lot lately. One of his songs has been in my head a lot and I absolutely love it; so much that I am sharing it with you now. =) I will not be silent, I was born to worship. I will not be quiet, the voice of fear, you can hold me back no more. Worship is the key, worship is my destiny, Worship is the victory that releases the glory. I will not give up what is my inheritance, I was born to do great things. God is alive, he is inside of me. Open up the ancient doors, Release the keys. The key is turning, the hearts are turning. The key is turning, the King is at the door. The kingdom is coming! Release! I love the passion in this song. It's so beautiful. I want to live my life with that kind of passion. The kind that you can't subdue because it overtakes everything you do and every fiber of your being. =) I love Jesus so much. I want him to overtake every aspect of my life. It is such a beautiful thing to love and ...

This is probably the only time you will ever see me write something about this particular topic. This is because I feel like their are enough opinions out there about relationships and I don't want to add to the cacophony. I'm not knocking anyone's opinion or anything. But my opinion has most likely already been stated by someone else at some point. Anywho.. off my soapbox now. I have to admit that marriage is something that I think about a fair amount. I wouldn't say that I am obsessed with this idea, because I am very happy being single. I believe that for this season of my life the Lord has called me to be single, and he'll let me know that season is over by bringing the right man into my life. I won't lie.. I hope this season is shorter rather than longer, but I am content being in God's will. I hear from a lot of married people and/or people who are "happily" divorced, that marriage isn't really all that great. A lot of people say that I...

I'm writing here when I should be going to sleep.. but I have something on my mind. I really want Jesus to come back soon. Just saying.. sometimes I get so tired of life on Earth. I get tired of how humans are fleshly beings.. myself included. I am tired of imperfection. I don't mean that in a judgmental way at all. I really don't. I don't say these things directed towards anyone in particular except maybe myself. I don't think I'm being hard on myself either. I know that without Christ I can do no good thing, that HE is who makes me good. I want more of him. I want to be exactly like him. I dislike any parts of myself that aren't like him, because they aren't really who God created me to be anyway. In the same way, when I see other people mess up, I have started seeing more and more of how God sees them, and in that I see the potential. I see something beautiful and I hunger for them to be like Jesus too. One of my biggest heart's desires is to se...

I just had a random thought. I bet people who read this blog and don't know Jesus think I'm a little crazy.. haha. Maybe I am crazy. But I wouldn't have it any other way. So for those of you reading this who think I'm a little radical in my faith, loving Jesus makes me this way. Or rather, how much he loves me. =) I challenge you to ask him how he feels about you. Sit quietly and get really real with him. No bells and whistles, no fluff, just a simple, "God, what do you think about me? What do you feel  about me? Do you even  like  me?" One thing I can promise you, the answer to that last one is a resounding YES! So yes, I'm a little radical. But I am not radical for the mere sake of making a statement. I am radical because following Christ wholeheartedly is radical. We live in the age of comfortable Christianity, and following Jesus the way he actually calls us to in his word is  radical . You should try it sometime. Once you do, you'll never be t...

“No procrastination.  No backward looks.  You can't put God's kingdom off till tomorrow.  Seize the day!" (Luke 9:62 MSG) Ugh.. so convicted right now. Sometimes following the Lord's will is exactly the opposite of what I want to do. I have been battling with the Lord over a decision that I already know the answer to but don't like. I have never dealt with something like this before where I have been in physical agony over something the Lord has called me to do but I so desperately don't want to. I have been running from it for awhile now and I can't run anymore. I have to stop procrastinating. Right about now I wonder how Jonah felt when God told him to go to Nineveh. He had to have known that what God wanted him to do was the right thing and yet he ran in the opposite direction. Just like I have been trying to do. For the first time, I think I understood a little of how Jonah felt in that moment. In the past I have always thought of Jonah as being pride...

This will be short. I promise. =) I was just thinking about all the things I am passionate about and all the things I want to share with the world. Sometimes I feel like I have to apologize for wanting to share things with people, but then I realized something. Why should I apologize? The Lord has done amazing things in my life and I am super excited about everything he shows me. So I want to share it. I want you to be excited with me. =) There is so much that the Lord shares with me. Things and ideas that I feel like I will explode if I do not share. I am so excited about following Jesus! Aren't you??! Something I have realized lately is that not everyone is excited about being a follower of Jesus. It becomes commonplace to them. It should never be that way! The God of the universe created us and loves and and sacrificed the one that meant the most to him so that he would not be separated from us! I don't know about you but that makes me sooo excited! I want to jump up and...

I came across my old myspace page a few days ago. I know right.. myspace... One thing I noticed while looking through it though, was that I used to make lists of things I was thankful for/things that I loved. They were always random lists in no specific order. I remember that I did these lists to help remind me that there are a lot of things in my life I love. I was thinking I'd revisit my list-making habit and post one on here. With everything that's been going on lately I think it would be good for me to remember all the good that is going on in my life. After all, there is quite a lot of good. I tend to only write when I'm struggling with something that I need to process, and I fail to point out that the majority of my life is pretty great. This leaves you with a skewed version of me that makes it look like I am a bit of a drama queen and I feel sorry for myself a lot. That is simply not the case! So here's me, attempting to interject something uplifting and awes...

I have been fighting some pretty intense discouragement lately. I hate to keep coming back to the same thing, but here it is: it's really hard to be here right now. I never thought that I wouldn't want to be in the place where I grew up. I have always loved it here, and I still do, but when the Lord changed my life, EVERYTHING changed. The Lord restored me as a person in just 6 short months. I went from being a lost, broken, and insecure person to a found, whole, and confident woman in the Lord. The testimony that the Lord has given me is incredible. Sometimes I still can't believe how different I am. I don't even recognize that girl anymore. Who is she? I wish that for at least one day I could be someone else so I could see myself from another's eyes. I want to know.. do I look like Jesus? I hope so. He has radically changed my life. It's funny; I've heard that before.. but until it happened to me I never realized how inadequate that statement is in des...