Saturday, April 29, 2006

Praise!!!

well things are going better because god has definately lifted this beast from me!! this last week...wow i have just felt so relieved and at peace...i am now able to talk to my ex and actually have a good and meaningful conversation!! praise be to god who lifted this from my shoulders and mind!! THANK YOU GOD!!!

anyways i had an awesome weekend hanging with my girl "duckie"...wow a weekend of laughs. thanks for that doll!!

so today i went to this conference (girls journey of faith) with my gracie, and it was so cool!! i seen my old teacher who i discovered was a christian, which was pretty darn cool. and also i was just challenged a lot to go deeper in my walk with god and to really search for him and, in a sense, myself. and just to get deeper in my faith and more grounded in my morals. which was really good. i needed that. and on friday, at youth (which i totally love and is like one of the best things in my life!!) we were talking about spiritual fullness and it was good cuz i actually got stuff out of it (it was deep enough for me!! haha) and i really had a good little chat and prayer with god. and i wrote it down so i will remember! yay me! anyways another awesome thing about friday was that i had brought my friend caitlin (not a christian--but i am praying for her hard core!!) and yeah so it was a worship night, and i was kinda worried that she might feel a bit out of place or whatever. but she still wanted to come and all so that was good, she's at least open to the god idea. so we were singing songs (ben's band was there--awesomeness!!), and i just decided that it wasn't worth it for me to worry about caitlin, so i just gave it to god and sang with my heart and soul--i put it all in for god. and i think maybe that had some effect on caitlin. cuz i was just laughing, and singing, and just worshiping god, and i think she saw that and wanted what i had--that freedom. so then after that when we did the quiet-time-self-search thing (as i explained before) we all went off and did our thing, including caitlin. then afterwards caitlin and grace and steph and me got together in a little group and just kinda talked about the questions. and i was the un-official leader of the group, which i didn't mind cuz i have been praying for god to use me and give me opportunities where i can share and pray out loud and get more comfortable with being open in my faith. and let me tell you, god answers prayers!! cuz i got to lead this little group for like 10 mintues (good starting time!!) and then i just said let's pray and we opened it up and grace started and then steph prayed and caitlin prayed (i think a bit out of peer pressure but hey! she was praying!) and then i wound it all down and man god musta been at work with these girls cuz i had caitlin tearing up and grace and steph very touched...so thank you god! like i said...PRAISE BE TO HIM!!

(verse 1)
I stand before You, Lord
And give You all my praise
Your love is all I need
Jesus, You're all I need

(verse 2)
My life belongs to You
You gave Your life for me
Your grace is all I need
Jesus, You're all I need

(pre chorus)
Hold me in Your arms
Never let me go
I wanna spend eternity with You

(chorus)
And now that You're near
Everything is different
Everything's so different, Lord
And I know I'm not the same
My life You've changed
And I wanna be with You
I wanna be with You

(lyrics from "Now that You're Near")

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Struggling

GOD PLEASE GIVE ME PEACE AND FREEDOM FROM THIS BEAST. I AM STRUGGLING SO MUCH WITH PAST EVENTS. I KNOW THAT I DO NOT NEED TO WORRY ABOUT THE PAST, AND I DO NOT NEED TO BORROW TROUBLES FROM TOMORROW. YOUR WORD HAS PROMISED ME THAT IT IS ALL TAKEN CARE OF. AND YET GOD, I AM STRUGGLING WITH THIS SO MUCH. WHY CAN'T I JUST LET THIS GO? I KNOW I DID THE RIGHT THING...I TRULY BELIEVE THAT. WHY WILL THIS BEAST JUST NOT LET ME GO? PLEASE, OH GOD, GIVE MY MIND PEACE, AND FREEDOM FROM THIS BEAST THAT IS CONSUMING ME...IT IS TAKING OVER MY LIFE.

This prayer is sent up to heaven on urgent business--I have things in my recent past that I can just not seem let go of.

This break up has had so much after effect...

Why does doing the right thing come with so many side effects?

Friday, April 14, 2006

The Poem

this is an amazing poem that my friend found me that really made my day today--to me it makes complete sense and i love it so much!! hope you enjoy it too::


Sometimes you gotta run away,
So you can see who will run after you.
Sometimes you gotta talk quieter,
Just to see who's listening.
Sometimes you gotta step up in a fight,
Just to see who's standing by your side.
Sometimes you gotta make a wrong decision,
Just to see whos there when it all falls down.
Sometimes you gotta let go of the one you love,
Just to see if they love you enough to come back

Sunday, April 02, 2006

Sacrifice

Today at church it was all about worship, in many different ways and forms. and the service was really different, which was really neat. It showed me a lot of things, and, in fact, it was really moving. I had so much trouble keeping my tears in.
But that's beside the point.
They had an altar that they had made, that had flames (not real ones) coming out of it. It looked really neat. And they wanted you to write something down that you wanted to surrender to God, and to throw it into the altar. You were sacrificing a part of your life to Him.
And while I didn't get up and throw anything into the altar (I really would have broke down then) I did make a promise to God--a sacrifice, surrendering part of my life. And I chose to surrender to God my language--cuz God knows it isn't always the greatest! My language is something that I have really been wanting to clear up, and God has really been putting it on my heart these last few months to work on that. So today, I finally made the sacrifice of my language, which, in some ways, is also sacrificing my reputation (haha) and what people may think of me.
But I think that this will teach me something; of what I am yet to learn.
And I know that God has something planned for me. Something important...because with God, there are no small parts.

Some lyrics of a song that really struck me this week--
"In Christ, there are no goodbyes"
And that really got to me. Because a lot of my friends are not Christians...and it hurs to think that if we all died today, I wouldn't see most of them ever again.

Here's a quote I heard a while ago--
"I'd rather be standing at the gates of heaven, seeing my friends go into hell and hearing them ask 'why didn't I listen when you told me about Jesus' than 'why didn't you tell me'".
And that is the truth. Not that I'm wishing that my friends will go to hell or anything, I wouldn't wish that on anyone! But I'm not as open about my faith as I should be, and I know that.
So, in a way, since I'm saying that I want to be more open about my faith...I am, once again, sacrificing my reputation.
This is all good and well to say, but can I do it...
Well, I guess this blog will just have to keep me accountable!