Astonishing!

Today I started reading a book for the second time. The first time I didn't get through the first few chapters and then all craziness broke out and I completely forgot about it. To be honest, I don't think I've picked the book up since Christmas time as evidenced by the fact that today when I picked the book up to begin reading, I opened it up and found a Christmas card tucked away inside. And no, it was not being used as a bookmark. I heard of this book last fall and desperately wanted to read it. There was something about it that just struck a chord with me and I knew that it would be something that I would benefit from. Today as I made my way through the first few chapters (again) I found myself wanted to underline and star every sentence. I found myself writing endless notes all through the margins, something that I hadn't done the first time through. It was as though I hadn't really grasped the thought behind the text the first time I went through reading it. Today, however, the ideas were jumping out at me.

The name of the book is Dying to Live by Clayton King and the main thought between the front and back cover (or at least what I have gotten through so far) is just that. Realizing that our lives are more than just simple existences that end when we draw our last breath. In the very introduction of this book, I found one of the strongest points so far. It says, "I've been trying to get God to bless me and give me an easy life without giving Him any of me." I have read that same sentence over several times because I realized, today  mind you, that a lot of times THAT is exactly my mindset. I do things with the wrong motives, the wrong intentions, but still expect God to bless me through them. He finishes the introduction out by talking about true life and really "dying to live". He says, "And the way that life is discovered is by dying. Dying to your STUBBORN will, your CHILDISH pursuits, your SHALLOW dreams, your SUPERFICIAL selfishness." Because that is exactly what everything within us is-stubborn,childish,shallow,and superficial. We are all of those things without Christ but thankfully, we do not have to live our lives like that.

Another one of the biggest ideas I have gotten through this book so far is that Christ's purpose in life was to come as a sacrifice. To live purely and perfectly and then die the death of a criminal. Christ came to die. Why then, do we as humans-full of sin and evil-think that we deserve anything else out of life? Why do we think that our purpose is any different? I'm not talking about physical death here, I'm talking about dying out to ourselves. Dying out to the ambitions, dreams, desires, wishes, and ideas of ourself that will eventually lead to our demise regardless. The things of this world are not enjoyable in eternity. They are false promises and fake hopes. They do not sustain and they do not last. Yet we continually place our joy in them. I am speaking straight from experience here. The opposite of denial is acceptance, exalting. If we do not deny ourselves and follow Christ, then we are doing the opposite-we are accepting our sin, even exalting our sin and self and denying Christ. "If we live only for ourselves, we lose everything once we draw our last breath."

 Life is practice for death. If our life is centered around temporary things, what does that mean for us as we face death? An astonishing thing to really ponder on is that once we have reached death, we can't change anything. There are no more do-overs, no more repeats, no more chances. We get one life. What are we doing with it? What am I doing with it? Have I died to myself so that I can life a life of FREEDOM and JOY through the only one who has defeated death?

I  leave you with this question. What or better yet, Who are you living for-yourself or God? It's something I had to ask myself today and I found that as much as I wanted to say that I was fully and completely living for God, I couldn't and that to me was astonishing.

Being true to my word I wanted to include a video with this post. It's my current song obsession. We played this song several times at BCM this year and I have fallen deeply in love with it. They don't sing the second verse in this video but I want to include the lyrics to it because it's my favorite.

Oh Lord, please light the fire
That once burned bright and clean
Replace the lamp of my first love, 
That burns with holy fear.

Oh Lord You're Beautiful-Jesus Culture

Wake Up Call

This weekend has found me driving a LOT and with lots of driving, comes lots of music and little time to blog so here we go friends. 

In one of my more recent posts I talked about how my family is such a blessing to me. I love them, especially my nephew. It is such a joy to be an aunt and to have such a precious nephew in my life. Joy is truly exemplified in this precious little three year old. He finds joy in such the smallest things, like scented bubbles (that aren't even scented) or a new song. He loves music. I was riding with him in the car this morning and there was a song on the radio that he didn't even know and I look over and find him with his eyes closed, nodding his head to the beat, and just enjoying the simplicity of a good song. Let me remind you, he's three. One thing I really love about my nephew is that he loves to sing. He picks up a song and just latches to it and will learn it and sing it over and over and over. His new song is "Just the Way You Are". Let me just preface this by saying I've never been a big fan of this song but I find him singing it way too cute to not love so I wanted to share with you guys a little bit of the blessing that God has put in my life in the form of a small, three year old boy.

 

The next song I want to share is one you have probably heard but I love it still. I want to challenge you to forget about the fact that you have heard it before but to just listen to it. It's a song of praise. It reminds me a lot of 2 Samuel 22 when David is praising the Lord for delivering him. David is pouring his heart of thanksgiving out to the Lord and I was convicted when reading this passage that so many times I forget to praise and thank the Lord for answering my prayers, for delivering me from my enemies, for providing for me. Sometimes I become ungrateful and this song and 2 Samuel 22 reminds me that the Lord deserves praise for all because He alone is all powerful, He alone is magnificent, He alone is worthy of our praise and He is strong above all. 

Your Love is Strong-Jon Foreman

The next song came late one night as I was coming back from spending some wonderful time with some dear friends. I realized that I take their friendship for granted so much. I love each and every one of them but there was a time when they weren't in my life and I felt the same way that is described in this song. As I was driving across the mountain and listening to this song I was convicted on how much stock I put into spending time with my friends. I'm not saying that time with friends isn't needed or well deserved but when it becomes something that you can't function without, it's a problem. The Lord has been blessing me with time to spend alone and with Him. I sometimes forget that my relationship with Him should come before any other relationship and that's what I think this song is really pointing to. When we feel alone, when we feel like we are out of place or out of sync with the rest of the world, we have someone that loves us unconditionally and so much that He gave us His son and His son gave us the greatest gift of all, His life. He gave His life for us and that is something that should take our breath away every time we think about it. We are never out of place or out of sync because He loves us. 

Bleeding For You-Sixteen Cities

Today as I was driving back to Athens, I had the wonderful opportunity to have an amazing conversation about God and our walks with Him with a friend. It's amazing how so many times we as Christians don't want to talk about the times that we are struggling in our walks. Those times happen and sometimes we have lost that passion that we once had. Most of the times, we equate that feeling with failure and inadequacy in our walks with the Lord. In truth, we are all inadequate but that is the beauty of His grace. He doesn't love us because we deserve it. He doesn't love us BECAUSE of who we are, He loves us IN SPITE of who we are. I'm sure a lot of us, if not most, have had those times when we felt disconnected from who we were created to be and this last song is just talking about begging God to help us rediscover Him. Because in truth, we can not be revived on our own. We do not make ourselves a new creation, but God creates in us a new self. I really love this song. I love the truth and honesty in it. I hope you guys enjoy! 

Rediscover You-Starfield

I encourage you guys to read all of Isaiah 43 and really dwell on what the Lord is saying. I find this such an encouraging passage and hope you will as well. 

"But now, this is what the LORD says—
   he who created you, Jacob,
   he who formed you, Israel:
“Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
   I have summoned you by name; you are mine. ² When you pass through the waters,
   I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
   they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
   you will not be burned;
   the flames will not set you ablaze." 

Isaiah 43:1-2

Start of Something Good?

Yes my title is inspired from the wonderful Disney channel classic, High School Musical. I won't deny it, I am a sucker for those Disney Channel musical movies. I actually just finished watching Camp Rock 2. Judge if you must. But all joking aside, today as I was driving to work I decided that I would do something new with my blog. Instead of just writing and writing and writing, I would write and include links to some of my favorite music for the day. So today is the first day I am going to do that.

I have been reading in Ruth lately and I really love what I am learning from this book. Ruth changed her entire life to stay with Naomi. Out of loyalty to Naomi? Maybe. But maybe she tasted a bit of Naomi's God and yearned for more. Psalm 34:8 says

"Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him."


If Ruth did get a taste of what God is, I can only think it came from Naomi. What a life of reckless abandonment that others are affected by her relationship with God. I yearn for that in my own life. Ruth left all she had known and turned to a new life, a new way of living, a new God. 


"But Ruth replied, "Don't urge me to leave you or to turn back from you. Where you go I will go, and where you stay I will stay. Your people will be my people and your God my God." Ruth 1:16


As I was pondering this, a song came on that kind of fit my conviction. I want to live a life of reckless abandonment that others are affected by my relationship with Christ. That others see a difference in me, a difference in who I once was and a difference in me from the rest of the world. I want to be sold out and unashamed for Him. So these two songs that I am putting on here just sum up my mindset today as I was taking my daily drive to work.  

Jesus Culture-Rooftops--Amazing song of pure unashamed worship

Chris August-Starry Night--I love this song. The chorus gets me every time. 


I hope you guys enjoy!

Rear View Mirrors

Beauty. What does it truly look like? We've all heard the old cliche "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." What truth that statement holds. Beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder, but unfortunately a lot of times we don't exactly see it. David Hume wrote, "Beauty in things exists merely in the mind which contemplates them."

Today I was heading out of my hometown back towards Athens and if you know me at all and have ever had a conversation with me about where I am from, you have heard me say two things. First, that you've probably never heard of my town because it is tiny. Second, it's in the middle of the mountains and it's absolutely GORGEOUS. Now I want to note that I didn't always think my small podunk town was striking until I left it. Now I get excited as the mountains start popping back up on the horizon as I drive back into town. It's one of those things I hope to never get over. But in the twelve years or so that I have lived there, I never really realized the beauty that surrounded me every single day as I drove to and from school, drove around town, drove 30 minutes just to reach human civilization. Every day I lived in the midst of this beauty and my eyes were closed to it. Only when I left did I see it. Today, as I was once again driving away, I looked in my rear view mirror and the sight took my breath away. I was on Taylor's Ridge and the view from there is awe inspiring. But today instead of looking at the view as I was approaching it, I watched in as I passed and it was even more breath taking, dangerous yes, but absolutely gorgeous. The thought struck me, how have I missed that view for all of these years? How have I been missing the natural beauty that surrounded me every day as I walked through the motions of my life.

Then another thought hit me even harder. If I am missing such blatant physical displays of beauty that God has surrounded me with, how much more am I missing? A song came on my playlist as I was driving back and it just hit a nerve. Maybe it was because I was a little torn up about leaving or maybe it was because of the conviction I had just had, but it hit a nerve nonetheless. The song wasn't necessarily about God, but in reality everything is about Him isn't it, or at least it should be. The song was talking about love and running away from it (I know it doesn't seem to connect with my last train of thought but bare with me, I promise this is just one long train). I'm a little bit of a pessimist. I helped found the Junior Optimist club at my middle school and my dad always told me that I was the most pessimist optimist he had ever met. I expect the best but hope for the worst (seems a little backwards right)-in people, situations, relationships, any outcome really. I wouldn't even say I expect the best though. I don't really expect anything a lot of times, but I do hope that the worst occurs because I can handle bad. I have known a lot of difficult situations growing up so to me, bad news is second nature. To me, living with a difficult situation overhead just seems normal. Chaos and tragedy have been such a big part of my life that I know how to handle that. What I can't handle is good.  I run away from anything that looks like good, or in the words of the song, anything that looks like love. So here's the connector.
Love.
God loves us----me.
God IS love.
God is good.
God is love. God is good. Love is good.
God's love is good.

He loves us. He doesn't promise crystal clear sunshiney days but He loves us and that means that we should have unfathomable joy and maybe get the opportunity to have a few crystal clear sunshiney days. God has blessed me with so much but instead of recognizing the beauty that I've been living in I've been searching for the part where something bad happens. I've been running away from the good and searching for the bad. I've been waiting to find something, the smallest thing, that will prove to be a disappointment. Instead of cherishing the beauty that God has blessed me with, I've been anticipating disaster. So here's my point-live in the moment. If we are always looking for the next thing, we are missing what God has given us NOW. I don't want to wait and have to look in the rear view mirror to see the beauty of what God is doing, I want to live in it, recognize it, see it, cherish it, bask it, be grateful for it, praise Him for it, be awestruck by it, love it NOW.

Here are just a few things that are in my NOW that God has blessed me with:

1. Family-they may be crazy, we may have a few dents and insane moments, but I love them. They are wonderful and encouraging and although some relationships aren't as great as I would hope, I pray that they grow. He has blessed me with a wonderful father and an amazing older sister with both I am extremely close. And I admit sometimes I wish I had a more normal family, but then I would have no crazy stories to tell.

2. Friends-I am blessed with the amazing opportunity to live next door and with some of my dearest, closest friends. We have the chance to share in so much with each other just because we live so close together. I couldn't ask for a better support or source of encouragement. These girls are amazing and to think, I didn't even know them that well when we moved in.

3. BCM-This is my family away from home. I love this place and to have the chance to see it change and grow is amazing. The friendships I have made with other students and with the campus ministers are each their own blessings. The opportunities I have been given through this ministry-using my talents, abilities, gifts, for Him. It's been such a strong light in my life and I am so thankful to have found a place to call "home".

4. Opportunities- Finally, the Lord has given me some amazing opportunities for this summer, some of which I was hesitant to take. He has given me a chance to rest and a chance to serve. He has given me a chance to spend some time with a family and kids that I love to pieces AND a chance to once again use my talents and abilities that He has given me for Him. He is giving me the chance to go somewhere new and work with kids that I don't know but will hopefully build relationships with by the end of the summer. And He has given me the chance to be a part of a church family that is going out and serving in their own community.

These are pieces of the beautiful things that God is placing around me. I'm reminded of the song by Gungor, "Beautiful Things".

"You make beautiful things. You make beautiful things out of the dust. You make beautiful things. You make beautiful things out of us."

Beauty.