Jesus, bring me paper

Yesterday, my kids (niece and nephew) and I talked through how Jesus wants us to go to Him for all things. He wants us to be dependent on Him in every way, and how whenever we are scared, hurt, sad, or whatever, that the Lord alone can be our comfort or help. This is something we talk about consistently.

So today, my niece tells me that yesterday she and my nephew were playing and that after a while they got bored and wanted to color, and so my nephew, out of no where, asked Jesus to get him a paper and pencil to draw. LOL This lil lazy guy, figured since God can care for him and do anything, he asked him to bring him something to draw with!

Needless to say, I laughed a lot, yet was awesomely impressed with my nephew’s faith. Reminded me of Jesus talking with the disciples as they ask him who is the greatest. Jesus brings over a child and tells them, “Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” - Matt. 18:4

My nephew has a sweet faith in the Lord. He is very theologically sound, and will often inform people that Jesus IS God. Lol. I love that. During his vacation, we get to do daily devotionals, and being ever precocious, he always has some deep and wise application for the Word. It was very heartwarming to hear him being so dependent on God, that He would even ask Him to bring him paper and pencil. I read the story of the blind beggar to him a while back, and as he listened to me, he stops me and asks, “how long has he been a bagel?!” I was almost sad to have to explain that he was a beggar not a bagel.

I thought this was a very encouraging story, so I had to share. If a child can understand that God is able to do anything, and we can ask him for anything, and he can believe that and do it, WHY oh why wicked heart of mine, do I struggle to be like my four year old nephew who understands the simplicity of a loving God who cares about every single need, even one as little as a pencil and paper?

Such a great lesson, Lord of my soul. I hear you. Thank you.

Oh, and just to conclude the story, I asked my niece if she gave him the tools to draw, she said no, eventually my nephew got up to get it. Lol. God gave him the strength and motivation to get the tools himself, our Savior hears us. He doesn't always respond how we want, but He hears us. Praise Him!

“Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you.” –1 Peter 5:7 (NLT)       






Listening to CNN report on Sandy... Lord be with the ppl that desperately need you in the East Coast! Praying for you all!  

Family Tree

Found this photo of a Family Tree my cousin made, for our Reunion we had this year… made me wonder what that tree will look like in Heaven (the new earth). How can a King keep track of all His babies like this? It was such hard work for my cousin to put together all these names. I wonder how He sees us, Lord, I wonder how you see us. Days like this, I just wanna be with you already, Jesus. I miss you. In a weird, I know you’re here, but not close enough, way… “The Spirit and the Bride say ‘come.’” [Revelation 22:17] Is today the day I will finally be with you? I long to. Please come.

Listening to Future of Forestry's new album, Young Man Follow... I <3 you FOF... perfect sound for my mood... sigh

Hello World...

“Here’s the song that we’re singing… c’mon get happy!”… I have never seen an episode of that show, however I remember hearing that song.

There’s so much going on that I haven’t been around to write anything, so I’m gonna spew some random thoughts and confessions. If this is at all interesting, enjoy. If it isn’t, sorry?

1. Midterms should no longer be called midterms, I vote they be called “Madness makers, impossible to retain so much information tests that have the power to make you stress beyond your understanding, stupid scantron #2 pencil needing make you wanna kick and scream like a baby, moronic tests that you can’t ace.” LOL

2. I wish people could understand that Jesus isn’t like his children who have represented him poorly. (Which, duh, we’re human, we all mess up.)

3. … I’ve recently learned stereotypes are impossible to break…

4. My friend Lesly is one of God’s greatest gifts in my life. She gave me a gift that melted my heart. I love her. (That’s us, I’m obviously the brunette. :)

5. Je souhaite que je parle couramment le français déjà.

6. I wish more people were vegetarians.

7. I had dinner with a close friend and her four kids, (who I am happy to call friends also) last Tuesday that gave me hope for parenting. These kids are such reflections of their parents, who are such reflections of the love and grace of Jesus that it makes me, wanna cry. I’ve never seen children represent such great upbringing. I am humbled to be on mission with this family. Valentines loves you.

8. I wish I knew people who wanted to appreciate jazz with me.

9. I know the battle isn’t over, but drawing my sword gets so tiresome.

10. I wanna hug everyone who sends post cards into post secret.

11. I have a friend who is raising four kids, and is loving her unbelieving husband in a way that I am sure, I am sure of this, L.G.G., that Jesus smiles when He watches you. Hugging you today, felt like home.

12. I want my philosophy professor to turn back to Jesus.

13. Today is one of my Pseudo-son’s birthdays. I’m way too young to be his mother, but I’ve been in his life since he was a kid (youth group). He’s in the Navy, at diving school. He’s busy training to swim 1000 meters in minutes, and I’m busy thanking the Lord for making him. He’s a superhero. You inspire me D.C.

14. I wonder if my dad will make it to the one-year mark.

15. Post-it’s genuinely, genuinely make me happy! (99¢ Store!)

16. I LOVE THIS WEATHER!! It makes me so joyful… and pensive.

17. When the Levees Broke makes me feel so stupid and horrible for being too young and unaware in 2005 to jump on the first Red Cross or Emergency Rescue plane to help! I love you New Orleans. I am so sorry… Thank you Spike Lee.

18. I think meeting and chatting with Charlotte Gerson, and Philip Petit would be amazing!

19. I think the Lord’s reply in Jonah 38-42 is the best way to talk myself out of growing cold and ignoring my Savior. It’s hard to believe, that we forget such unfailing love.

20. I’m sorry for being distant Lord. You’re consumed with me, and I am too. I want to be consumed with YOU.  

I'm listening to Nico sing "These Days" 

Hands Up

Been reading Romans 6,7,8 and just truly feel like I beat myself up for everything and that's not God's will for me. I take on too much stress. And its stupid!!! There is so much freedom to be had to she who is willing to believe and bank on God's promises!

For years I thought all I was, was a mistake. An accident. A cruel joke God was playing. And all I ever was, was a depressed, mistake, an accident, a cruel joke God was playing. 

No matter how much therapy a person can have, nothing can change you, like the finger of God. A moment when He touches your life and shows you how better life would be, if you knew Him, clung to Him, chose to answer His call.  In Psych class, we're learning about behavior, and it kills me to think how some people look at the outward behavior and think they can come to some resolve to work hard to change it. Obviously, I know not all people feel that way, it's just a general observation. However, I used to be that way. I felt like I was nothing, therefore, I was nothing.

When He called me to Him, I answered, and alas, He told me I am His beloved, His treasure, worth dying for. And at first I thought, "why is this infinite God calling a nothing like me?" And as time passed, you know what I realized... I am His beloved, His treasure, and worth dying for. Not because I think I am, but because He says I am! Jesus paid the price for me to be free in Him, why add stress to myself? This world is stressful enough, without my two cents. He says I'm worth DYING FOR! And, because He said so, it is! 

The enemy wants me to be weighed down by the temporary pleasures of this world, he wants me to feel obligated to give works unto a mighty God who has called me from darkness into marvelous light. He wants me to add pressure, and rules and commandments to my faith, but, the gift of God is LIFE through Christ Jesus, His Son. It is a gift of grace and mercy. A Holy God coming down to a sinner like me, and transforming me from sinner to saint, from death to life.  In Jesus, because of the cross, I am free. And no work I do can ever do for me what Christ did on the tree. I've been self-centered, and proud, giving myself more stress and worry, and for what?  

I suppose I'm thinking too much as I sit here and do homework, but I just felt like it was worth mentioning, to God, and to you!  

I surrender.

What about you?

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. -Romans 6:23

Listening to the fan whirling, as I avoid studying for Psych!!

Home Sweet Home

So for the past week and a half, I've had the worst pain in my neck. Literally. It’s a tightness on my right side, that turned into the feeling of a ligament being crushed. I think it all started from sleeping wrong, but as the time has progressed I think it’s also stress induced. A friend of mine recently told me, as many friends have thought for years, I’m sure, but she told me I am really hard on myself. I even asked her to repeat herself when she said it. LOL.

Truth is, I don’t think I’m hard on myself. But my heart is deceitful and desperately sick [Jeremiah 17:9] so I know not to trust it. So counter-cultural isn't it? The fact that the Lord says that our hearts are deceitful, and our culture tells us to do what our hearts say, “is this guy right for me?” “Listen to your heart.” But, as many, many Lifetime movies will show you, your heart often lies to you! Tori Spelling in “Mother may I sleep with Danger” comes to mind. LOL. My mom was a Lifetime junky okay, don’t judge! LOL

My heart tells me I’m not hard on myself. It also tells me I am doing nothing wrong before my Holy God. It tells me to indulge in sin and to live it up, cause you only live once! It says to eat, drink, and be merry. My Spirit says, stop. It tells me that whether I eat or drink, do all things to the glory of God. [1 Corinthians 10:31] This morning I was enjoying some peace and quiet, which in a full time students life is a RARE event, however it was quite exquisite and peaceful, thank you Jesus!!

Anyway, I got to read 1 John, and I am very particular about John. I love him more than any other writer in Scripture. And it’s not so much him as a person, just his words, his faith. I suppose those are things that make him, him, so yeah I guess it’s him I like. LOL. I am very partial to Johannine literature and I was reading in 1 John 3 and I got to verse 6 and I’ve been meditating on this all morning!  “No one who abides in Him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen Him or known Him.”

For years I’ve been saying how convicted I am with my life, because if I really knew Jesus and I really encountered Him when I meet with Him my life would look different! I’d be transformed! I wouldn’t cling to habitual sin like I do! This passage just hits my heart like none other. I know, and YOU know were not called to perfection or to be completely without sin. Only God is, and that’s not what we’re meant to be. However, I have struggled with habitual sin for years now and I get the sneaky suspicion that when He said “it is finished” He meant it for you and me, about ALL sin, not some sin, or most sin, but ALL sin!

How do we die to ourselves, take up our cross and follow Him? [Mark 8:34] by doing exactly what this verse says! We must abide in Him if we want to see sin put to death in us! It reminds me of coming home, after being away for a while. The saying, “there’s no place like home” is true. Long before a little braided girl in ruby slippers clicked her heels three times, the Lord had already put eternity in the hearts of men. He created us to have a longing for Him, a craving and yearning that only His Spirit could fill. Until we reach the heavenly throne room where we stand before our King, our homes are meant to be in Him now. We are made to abide in our abode, Jesus Christ. How do you know Him and what He wants of your life, unless you encounter Him and obey Him?

We can’t put to death the sins we chose to abide in, instead of Him, unless we’re willing to let Him kill them. His Spirit empowers us to conquer, but do not be mistaken, even though we’re to be victorious over sin, we don’t do it on our own power, thus my friend’s observation of me being too hard on myself was so true and convicting. I get stressed and weary when I go at it on my own strength, when I think “I should be better by now! I should have changed this a long time ago! I know better!”

And my King says, I should worry about nothing, and consider the lilies and the sparrows, cause they neither toil nor work, yet He takes care of them. In fact He even says, I am worth more than many sparrows. That I am to neither fear, nor worry, because He’s got this. “Why even the hairs on your head are all numbered. Fear not; you are of more value than many sparrows.” –Luke 12:7…. SIGH… Not even the best lover could know you so intimately!

He knows me. He knows you. And even when we know better, in the face of sin, our Daddy’s got this! He took it so I wouldn’t have to burden myself with it. So I wouldn’t have to strive so hard to defeat it on my own power and will. What an amazing God we serve! I’m called to abide in Him, to keep me from sin, to meditate on Him, to make Him my all, my hopes, my dreams, my everything, and He’s got the rest. I can’t wait to see Him and have those deep convos we gals like to have with our guy. Where you sit for hours and time flies and you learn more and more about him.

Only in this situation, He’ll already know every deep and intimate detail, and He’ll listen as you speak it and He’ll care deeply about it! I wonder if He’ll have an answer when I ask Him if He has to recount the hairs on my head, when I pluck those two stubborn white hairs that grow on my left side. I’m sure He will! He knows me better than I do, and surprisingly, loves me anyway!

I am loved. You are loved. We are loved, by the King of Kings, and Lord of Lords. Hears every prayer, every need, every care of this world, and still makes time to encounter a broken girl reaching for the hem of His cloak.

WHAT A MIGHTY KING!

   

 

  

Listening to Phil Wickham’s "Mystery"… SUCH A GREAT SONG!!! Makes me miss you Charlene. :)

KILLING MY GOLIATH

So, in cleaning out my docs on my computer, I came across a spoken word poem that I wrote perhaps a year or two ago. As I read, I thought how fitting it was to how I am currently feeling. So, I share with you now.  

Me Against Me

by Val

There’s a war

Waging, raging,

Aging my soul

Breaking my spirit

Breaking all self control

A virus, a sickness

A poison breeding death

Ripping away the righteousness

Killing God’s holy breath

That once was on me

Baptizing me with fire

Turning my insides black

Turning me into a liar

Refusing the truth

That once set me free

Choosing the chains

That put Christ on the tree

What I do I hate

What I hate I do

I want desperately to follow what’s true

But the battle rages, ages my soul

Breaking my spirit

Breaking all self-control

It’s me against me

And the battle’s too heavy

 It’s me against me

And my spirit is weary

How long will this last?

How long will this last?

The leaven has leavened

And the lump is too vast

I’m sinking, I’m drowning,

Cause my flesh cant say no

I claim your all I want

But I can’t seem to let go

What am I grasping

In hopes of satisfaction?

My heart is sick and deceitful

Causing too much distraction

I don’t think I have anymore fight

The scales of deception

Have robbed me of sight

Life has become a comatose night

I’m fading to oblivion

Cause I can't see your light

Your word is a beacon, a heavenly spark

Your promise brings healing and lights up the dark

It’s me against me

But YOU swear by YOU

I’m free for freedom’s sake

Cause YOU are the truth

As a believer AND follower of Jesus Christ, do you ever find yourself clinging to sin more than clinging to God? You ever feel like for some reason you find your identity in the things that keep you farther from God? Caught in a Romans 7:15 feeling like Paul did, "For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate."

I've been thinking a lot about how the Lord hates my sin. How I wish I hated it too. I don't know when fear became so big and my BIG GOD became so small? What does it take to let the world numb you to your own sin? 

I know my identity in Jesus. I know I am, we the Church, are called to be Holy, [Lev.11:45, 1 Peter 1:15] a Royal Priesthood, a chosen nation [1 Peter 2:9]. I know He’s called us to abide in Him [John 15:4] and to resist the devil and he WILL flee [James 4:7]!! The Lord tells us if we draw near to Him [God] He will draw near to us [James 4:8]. He promises to be faithful to complete what He starts in us [Phil. 1:6], and He doesn’t lie [Numbers 23:19, Hebrews 6:18, Titus 1:2]. No one else in the whole universe can swear by Himself [Genesis 22:16, Hebrews 6:13] and do it!! Thus, He is trustworthy.

But, what erases all this knowledge in the face of sin or temptation? Does the moment ever go by that unhurried, in a uber slow moment a la matrix, where your whole world slows down and can see yourself taking the pill, or saying the words, or giving into the anger, the gluttony, the greed, etc. In my experience, it’s never that slow. All of life is hurried, so our dependence on God is just as hurried.   

In this poem, I was speaking from a place of acknowledgment of sin, where I knew I needed and still need the Lord to help me kill the giant in my life. My favorite part of the story of David and Goliath is the fact that nothing deterred David. He knew nothing about the giant, He just knew that, that day, the Lord would help him defeat Goliath.

Thus my starting point… I know not what’s to come as I wage war against the things that keep me from Jesus, but since my King never lies, and He’s promised to finish the work He started in me, I am gonna take Him at His word.

Let’s face Goliath, not with sticks or stones, but with TRUTH and POWER!

“For God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.”- 2 Tim. 1:7 

While writing this, I was listening to DavidCrowder*Band’s “You’re Everything”