This weekend we have our mission trip to Little Rock! About 30 of my awesome teens have signed up to spend their weekend serving their community. We are sleeping in our church building, eating in our church building, and even showering in our church building for the weekend!
Casey and I have been working on the details of this weekend for a while now. We have had plans for the different places that we were going to work for weeks. The past two days two of the different places that we were planning on helping called us and told us that they didn't need our help. So much for having everything ready and taken care of! No worries, this just gave us an opportunity to see God work out His plans!
Yesterday as plans started to fall through I spent some time praying that God would show us where to turn and who we could help. My prayer was that someone would call us or stop us totally out of the blue asking for help. I just knew that God was going to lead us somewhere special.
This morning as I walked into the church building I got stopped by a girl at church whom I had never spoken with before. She started telling me about the Compassion Center and their need for volunteers.
When I got into the office Casey and I sat down in Cash's (our college minister) office to talk about the weekend. He started telling us about a man that had emailed him just yesterday asking for a group of teens or college students to help with moving medical equipment this Saturday that is going to be sent to Haiti.
Boom! Just like that God opened two doors for us to serve on Saturday. We didn't even have to go searching, He sent them to us. The ways He works amaze me. I know I only get to see a little bitty piece of the HUGE canvas that He paints on, but it always leaves me wanting more.
I'm so thankful that the God of the whole universe calls me to come and follow after Him. What an honor to serve the most high King!
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Engraved
We all have those friends and family that we spend so much time with that we begin to be able to finish their sentences! We start to look and act more and more like the people that we spend the most time around. I remember a few years ago at Christmas we were playing our annual family game of Mexican Train dominoes (which I have won every year) and I had a moment that made me realize just how much I am turning into my mom. It would be hard to find a better woman to turn into. Something happened during the game of dominoes and my mom and I both started laughing and we started laughing the exact same way. We both stopped at the exact same time and then sighed the exact same way. Upon realizing what we had just done we started laughing again at the exact same time. Over the past 23 years I have spent so much time with my parents and siblings that we sound alike and often say things alike. I can usually tell you what my sister is about to say before she ever opens her mouth. We know each other so well because we have spent so much time together.
I pray that this will be true of my relationship with my God as well. I pray that I will listen to Him so much and read His Word so much that I will begin to look more and more like Him and that I will begin to sound more and more like Him. I want my heart to look more like His. I want to be so in touch with His will. I want to love people like He loved. I want to give the way He gives. I want His words to flow from me as soon as I open my mouth. But this can never be done through my power, it must be done through His Spirit for the glory of His Name.
"He must become GREATER; I must become less. John 3:30.
I have so far to go and so much growing to do. I know that this will never happen without effort. He tells us that when we seek Him we will find Him if we seek Him with ALL of our hearts. I'm so thankful that He doesn't hide from me when I come looking for Him. I'm thankful that my Jesus has given me His Words to read. What a blessing that He teaches me how to be more like Him. It's not a mystery; He makes it clear! His word shows us how He spoke, loved, and lived. May we seek His Words and treasure them in our hearts. May we engrave them on our hearts so that when the storms and hard times come they don't just wash away, they endure!
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
In the King's Presence
How amazing it is to be in the presence of The King! His beauty amazes me. I don't understand it! It blows my mind that He desires me so much. It blows my mind that He draws me so close. It blows my mind how He reveals Himself to me. I can't even begin to understand how much He loves me. It makes me wonder if He really knows me, if He really knows all of the mistakes I have made. It makes me wonder if He has seen all of the times that I have denied Him when He has given me the opportunity to share His name. It makes me wonder if He really knows that I killed His son. But then I remember... He created me. He knows me better than anybody else. He has never left my side. He has seen the times I have screwed up and has given me opportunities to try again. He knows every thought that I have ever had, and He loves me.
As I bow before Him I am reminded of how much I need a savior. I could never save myself. Isn't it refreshing to know that we don't have to save ourselves. We don't have to be somebody great. We don't have to measure up. So often the pressures of the world tell us to fight to be on top, that we have to be the best, and that if you can't do it by yourself then you aren't strong enough. When I come to my savior He asks me to totally reverse that. He says humble yourself before me. He says I am the best and the only true God. He says I know you can't do it by yourself that's why I am here and in your weakness I am strong enough. I trust that His grace is more than enough for me!
I still don't understand it and I know that I never will, but I will choose to live in His love! I will choose to bow before His throne. I will choose to follow my king. I know that better is one day in His court than thousands elsewhere. O how I long and look forward to spending eternity in His courts!
As I bow before Him I am reminded of how much I need a savior. I could never save myself. Isn't it refreshing to know that we don't have to save ourselves. We don't have to be somebody great. We don't have to measure up. So often the pressures of the world tell us to fight to be on top, that we have to be the best, and that if you can't do it by yourself then you aren't strong enough. When I come to my savior He asks me to totally reverse that. He says humble yourself before me. He says I am the best and the only true God. He says I know you can't do it by yourself that's why I am here and in your weakness I am strong enough. I trust that His grace is more than enough for me!
I still don't understand it and I know that I never will, but I will choose to live in His love! I will choose to bow before His throne. I will choose to follow my king. I know that better is one day in His court than thousands elsewhere. O how I long and look forward to spending eternity in His courts!
Monday, October 10, 2011
My Daddy always told me Life isn't fair!
This week for one of the Bible studies I have been doing we were asked to read Isaiah 53 and replace all of the our/us/we with my/me/I. Reading through Isaiah 53 with the words changed sounds like this...
"He was despised and rejected - a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. I turned my back on him and looked the other way. He was despised and I did not care. Yet it was my weaknesses he carried; it was my sorrows that weighed him down. And I thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins. He was beaten so I could be whole. He was whipped so I could be healed. I like a sheep have strayed away. I have left God's path to follow my own. Yet the Lord laid on him all of my sins." Isaiah 53:3-6
Wow! How often I forget all that my Savior has done for me! So often I place the blame for his death on the sins of others and forget that I am equally deserving of hell. Without His grace I have no hope. I am guilty. It was my weaknesses he carried. It was my sorrows that weighed him down. He was beaten so I could be whole. He was whipped so I could be healed.
So often we complain that life isn't fair. You want to know what's not fair, that Jesus took on all of my sins and sorrows and was crucified on the cross when he did NOTHING wrong yet I get the reward of heaven. Praise God that life isn't fair! If life was fair I would have no chance of heaven. My savior has done far more for me than I could ever repay.
Robbins says it like this, "The closer we are to the blazing light of Christ's holiness, the more we will be aware that we fall pitifully short of his righteous standard."
In 1 Timothy 1:15-17 Paul writes "Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners - of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his UNLIMITED patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life. Now to the king eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever!"
Thank you Jesus for saving me! Without you I have no hope. You have transformed my life. I need your grace. I need you. Only through you do I have any power. Only through you do I have life to the FULL! Only through you do I have the hope of heaven!
Holy God, I pray that I will never forget the significance of the sacrifice of your son on the cross. Thank you for not being fair!
"He was despised and rejected - a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. I turned my back on him and looked the other way. He was despised and I did not care. Yet it was my weaknesses he carried; it was my sorrows that weighed him down. And I thought his troubles were a punishment from God, a punishment for his own sins. He was beaten so I could be whole. He was whipped so I could be healed. I like a sheep have strayed away. I have left God's path to follow my own. Yet the Lord laid on him all of my sins." Isaiah 53:3-6
Wow! How often I forget all that my Savior has done for me! So often I place the blame for his death on the sins of others and forget that I am equally deserving of hell. Without His grace I have no hope. I am guilty. It was my weaknesses he carried. It was my sorrows that weighed him down. He was beaten so I could be whole. He was whipped so I could be healed.
So often we complain that life isn't fair. You want to know what's not fair, that Jesus took on all of my sins and sorrows and was crucified on the cross when he did NOTHING wrong yet I get the reward of heaven. Praise God that life isn't fair! If life was fair I would have no chance of heaven. My savior has done far more for me than I could ever repay.
Robbins says it like this, "The closer we are to the blazing light of Christ's holiness, the more we will be aware that we fall pitifully short of his righteous standard."
In 1 Timothy 1:15-17 Paul writes "Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners - of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his UNLIMITED patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life. Now to the king eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever!"
Thank you Jesus for saving me! Without you I have no hope. You have transformed my life. I need your grace. I need you. Only through you do I have any power. Only through you do I have life to the FULL! Only through you do I have the hope of heaven!
Holy God, I pray that I will never forget the significance of the sacrifice of your son on the cross. Thank you for not being fair!
My Girls
This is just a little glimpse of why I have the best job in the world. I love these girls so much!
I hope and pray that they will fall more and more in love with God each and everyday!
God has been so incredibly good to me! He has called me to love and disciple these girls and has filled me with more love for them than I ever knew was possible. They truly are my little sisters. I am so blessed that we get to share our lives together!
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