A Lifelong Process

I found this quote in my journal from about a month ago.  It really struck my heart this morning.

"I am in a lifelong process of teaching my heart to desire God only and to love Him above all else.  He said I'm worth it over and over again while on the Cross.  I will tell my heart over and over again, 'He is the only way.'"

The Ultimate Soldier

Yesterday I found myself thinking about soldiers and the sacrifices they make and I began to get choked up.  I know I'm not the only one who can't watch the soldier returning home videos without tearing up. (Okay, maybe sobbing)

Thinking about these brave men and women led me to think about Jesus.

Jesus, a soldier who left the comfort, safety, and pure perfection of His home and went into battle knowing that He would die - the worst and most humiliating kind of death at that.  And He still went.  And He fought.  And because of His Sacrifice, freed me from the ultimate bondage and slavery of sin.

Why does the reality of that not hit me the way it does when I think about American soldiers?  Why does it not bring me to tears every time I think about it?  Why do I not honor God with the passion I would honor a soldier returning from war?  Why do I not celebrate every day with my living Jesus the way a family celebrates a soldier that has come home?  Why do I not thank Him for the freedom He died to protect the way I would our amazing soldiers?

I am so thankful for the ultimate Soldier who fights everyday for my soul.

He has, is, and will prevail.

He is victorious.

"The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still." Exodus 14:14

College

Wow.  It's been a long time since I've been on here.  And it's August.  And I leave in August.  In 20 short days.  Crazy.

This summer has flown by faster than I could have ever imagined or wanted.  I'm thankful for every fun, relaxing, crazy second of it, but not ready for it to over.  I feel bad for my former classmates who are so ready to "get out of this place" and "move on to better things".  Yes, college is exciting and independence is as well.. but how miserable do you have to be to be so anxious to leave?

There are so many people, things, and aspects of home that I am not ready to leave.  My loving parents.  My sweet boyfriend.  My best friends and sisters in Christ.  My amazing YoungLife leaders.  My rotten cat.  The community I feel at home with.  The wonderful families I babysit for.  The winding drive up Bent Mountain.  My comfy bed.  My faithful car.  This place is home and always will be, how could I be excited to leave it?

The Lord is doing big things in Roanoke right now.  I see them so clearly and it excites me.  It is hard to believe that soon I will not be present to see these big things continue.  But the Lord is faithful and I know He is and will continue to do big things in Harrisonburg as well.  And I am confident that my sweet sisters here in Roanoke will keep me updated.

Ecclesiastes 3:1 - "There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens."

Now is the time for "See ya later".

Club Talk

So this is super late... but, I gave my first ever club talk about 3/4 weeks ago!  Wow, what a feeling.

So many emotions were running through me all at once - excitement, nervousness, hopefulness, peace, joy, blessed.  I mean, how many other high school seniors get the chance to stand up in front of 100+ peers and in a totally unintimidating way talk about their life and the most important aspect of it?  I can imagine that it's not that many.

I didn't get nervous until I was about to go up, which was so cool because I figured I would be really nervous.  The Lord totally calmed me, He assured me, and I was confident that He could do it through me.

Now, no more club talks to worry about until at least a year from now when I will hopefully have just gotten placed to lead at a high school.  There is much relief in that statement.  There is also much anticipation.

I can't wait to see what the rest of this years holds.  I can't wait to hear my best friends give their club talks.  I can't wait to see the Lord move even more.  I'm so blessed to be a part of something as amazing as what is going on at Hidden Valley this semester.

On hearing this, Jesus said, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick."

Inspiration

"For what it's worth: it's never too late or, in my case, too early to be whoever you want to be.  There's no time limit, stop whenever you want.  You can change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing.  We can make the best or the worst of it.  I hope you make the best of it.  And I hope you see things that startle you.  I hope you feel things you never felt before.  I hope you meet people with a different point of view.  I hope you live a life you're proud of.  If you find that you're not, I hope you have the courage to start all over again."

I don't think this quote is supposed to relate to Christ, but dang it works.

Bye Bye Chocolate

Today is the first day of lent.  It's interesting to me how much I've heard about the start of this event in the last two days.. It seems to be the buzz around school.. "What're you giving up for lent?" "Oh I'm giving up this..." or "Well I am giving up that.."

I can't help but question, why are you giving something up?  Quite often I think people give something up for lent because they don't want to be left out.  They don't want to be the only person not giving something up.  Even more often I think people give something up because they see a personal benefit that would come from it.  Something such as saving money by buying less food or clothes, or losing weight because they're giving up fast food or candy.

But the real reason one should give up something for lent is so far from these reasons given.  Lent is a period of 40 days - not a coincidence that Jesus was in the desert for 40 days without food being tempted.  The giving up is supposed to represent the giving up that Jesus did during this time.  The purpose of lent is to give up something so that when you want to do, eat, or go to that thing, you instead think of Christ and His sacrifice for us and don't.

It's been difficult for me to decide the right thing to give up, because I was really trying to have the right motives behind my giving up.  I chose chocolate - something I eat often but would not be unreasonably hard - also something that I don't buy a lot and don't eat enough of to experience weight loss without it (trying to defeat any ulterior motives).  Of course, this morning was campaigners where I always eat chocolate chip pancakes and drink chocolate milk...  Chocolate is good, but the Lord is Perfect.

"Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.  After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry." - Matthew 4:1-2

If You Can Dodge a Wrench...

Last night I played in the Roanoke YoungLife Dodgeball Tournament with 9 awesome friends of mine.  And we won.  I was so excited and so proud of my team at the end of the night, but I realized after I got home that I took so much more away from the tournament than the pride of winning the Golden Squeekie.

I sat out the in the championship game, as there were 9 of us who wanted to play and 8 on the court at a time.  I was bummed.  I really wanted to play.  But when my team won, I realized that they didn't need me to accomplish something great, but they wanted me.

Much like how Christ doesn't need me to be a part of His plan, but He wants me to be and invites me with open arms.  And boy does He accomplish something great.

"Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen." - Ephesians 3:20-21