New Start, No Promises

            For the past few weeks I’ve been contemplating restarting this blog thing. These thoughts come most often during my breaks because I usually find myself bored out of my mind and I need some kind of outlet. I first started this blog to connect more with God. I found that the only way I was really good at that was by studying the bible, and I mean study like taking notes, highlighting, etc. I’m sure you can get some type of idea of how I was reading by my earlier posts on Romans. I assume you’ve also noticed that it’s been a while since I’ve last posted. Well, there’s a pretty good reason for it and a few not so good reasons. Warning: the rest of this post is going to be very self focused, so stop now if you don’t want to read me talking about me. You’ve been warned.
            Basically for the last year, maybe a little more than a year, I haven’t really been “feeling” Gods presence. I’m not really sure when the falling out started or even why for that matter, and I still don’t. What I do know though is that I didn’t give up. One of my very wise youth leaders once told me that even when he didn’t feel God or when he didn’t really want to be around God he still went to church and interacted with his Christian community, so that’s exactly what I did. I kept going to Sunday mornings, doing bible studies, and hanging out with my “church friends” which are just my normal friends (that’s what partially kept me at the church). Eventually I just became too fake at church so I started stepping down from my roles like leadership, book clubs, and bible studies. This is when I really started questioning my faith.  
            We started a college group in February of 2014 and that started many things. Some really cool friendships started to sprout and my involvement in the church was once again a reality. What didn’t start though was the rekindling of my relationship with God. This past year has been quite a roller coaster of faith, or rather the lack there of. However, more recently I’ve been trying to reflect on why I am a Christian, why I believe in God, and what I should be doing/how I should be acting if I truly identify as a Christian. This process has really been the equivalent of trying to do something you know very little about. Like maybe you know the basics of it but doing it on your own is way harder than you thought it’d be. Thankfully I never really had to be alone. This is both a blessing and a curse though, because when your friends have faith it is easy to feel like you have faith too but it’s not always your own. Sometimes it’s easy to get caught up in it all and you forget that this relationship is solely between you and God, that’s the one that matters, that’s the one that holds your faith.
            An old friend once told me that I needed to be careful as a psychology major because she had seen a lot of them walk away from their faith. At first I disagreed with her but then I started learning some things and I started having questions, then doubts. I don’t know if it was just self fulfilling prophecy and because I had heard it before I thought it was happening but at some point I started to believe that God, Christianity, the bible was all just a made up story, simply a figment of our vast intellect. It was hard to come to terms with even thinking these things.
            I know it’s not a horrible thing to question your faith, the church, or even God but I felt like I was seriously losing my faith, and my relationship with God was already kind of sandy (that was a bad joke, just in case you missed it). So this kind of brings us to where I am now. I’m working on rekindling that fire. I know it might not burn the same and it will probably take a while to get it started, but in the end I hope it will burn brighter than it did before, that’s the goal. I know I’m not going to stop questioning things, that’s not the point. I just want to be okay with questioning them, okay meaning that if I hit a roadblock my faith will be able to withstand it and not crumble. This seems like an abstract idea to me right now but I think I can get somewhere close to that goal.
            I feel like a lot of people my age (and not so much my age) have struggled with faith in the same way I am. Many of us have walked away from the church in an attempt to acquire freedom or independence. I don’t’ think it’s so much that we “gave up on our faith” as we just couldn’t really find a reason to stay. Does that make sense? Not even that we are getting something for our end of the bargain but that there’s no spiritual pull. Maybe it’s us, maybe it’s the messages and we just don’t resonate, or maybe it’s just a time of change. What comforts me though is knowing that I can question it all and it doesn’t matter how long I’m gone trying to “figure out life” He will always be there waiting for me to run back to Him. That doesn’t mean I should just go out and do what ever the hell I feel like though! To me it means trying to figure out why you want to call yourself a Christian.
 On that note, that’s what this blog is going to become: a place to try and figure out why. To ask those questions that rattle our faith and to use the answers we find to strengthen it. I’m not going to make a commitment to this thing, but I’m going to try to use it more (but who knows it could take me another six months to post) and most of these will be much shorter.
 Thanks for reading friends

Romans 6

Hope all of your Mondays weren’t too rough.  As I promised Romans six is starting the week of everyday posts.  Monday is my first day of the week, because I run on a school schedule. I apologize if you consider Sunday the first day, but it’s just not.

We left off with Paul telling the Christian in Rome about sin and we meet back with him talking about the same thing, sin.  However, this time Paul discusses freedom from sin.  The first few verses are summarized very nicely in verse 10: “For the death that He died, He died to sin once and for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.”  Or in lyrical words, “He became sin that knew no sin.”  When Jesus died sin died with Him.  Not in the sense that sin is no longer in this world, because that is definitely not true, but in the sense that sin can no longer find a home in us.  Having been freed from sin, we no longer have to be slaves to it. We are now slaves of righteousness (verse 18). 

We become slaves to whom or whatever we serve ahead of God. In verse 16 Paul says, “we are either slaves of sin resulting in death, or slaves of obedience resulting in righteousness.”  And in verse 12 Paul warns us to “not let sin reign in our mortal body so that we obey its lusts.”  All of these verses bring about one idea, freedom in eternal life.  I mean, seriously, what’s more freeing than living forever?  But of course with freedom comes responsibility.  Choosing to follow God could be one of the most difficult decisions we ever make.  I don’t mean accepting him in the way most of us do, with saying “yes Lord, I believe you died for my sins…etc.”  I mean giving yourself to Him wholeheartedly; giving up your old life and becoming new in Him.  “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus” (verse 23). 

One of the verses that I really think helps us realize what died from sin means is verse 13: “…present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead…” Although it is a bit weird I really love the way it puts it.  We are to give ourselves to God like brand new gifts, as a person dead in sin and new in God.  Once we give our lives over to God we become free in Him, in righteousness.  I feel like a lot of people think becoming a Christian mean that you have to give up all your fun, and I suppose for some that may be true, all depending on what their idea of “fun” is.  However for most it is not too big of a sacrifice, because when you think about it God isn’t asking you to kill your only child.  Yet He did that with out us even asking Him to.  The point I am trying to make here is that when we become more and more like Christ we gain more freedom because that life becomes what we want to live and God presents us with endless opportunities, but when we live in flesh all we have are the things of the world and things that will only last as long as we do.  Gods will and His gifts are better than Anything we could ever plan for ourselves or think up of on our own, and if you only take one thing from this post tonight I want it to be that. 

Gods will and His gifts are better than ANYTHING we could ever plan for ourselves or think up of on our own

Also, if you guys have any pray requests or whatever feel free to head over to this Facebook page and post 'em. 

Youth is Wasted on the Young

So I know my post have been quite me focused lately, and I promise my next post will be Romans 6, because honestly…we should have already been done with Romans. I am slacking. But I have challenged myself this week to post Everyday! For this week…

Anyways, this post is about something that has kind of been on my heart lately…it’s about being young. About being so busy with trying to figure out what we are supposed to do that we don’t take time to figure out what God wants us to do. I feel like the idea of Gods plan for us has been following me around. It has been a topic within the youth group I am a leader at, Temper, it was in Sara Bartons post (if you don’t know what I am talking about go check out my last post), even in the new song "Wake Me Up" by Avicci. It has just been lingering around me all week. 

The verse that stands out to me when I think of young (life span wise) Christians is...

Timothy 4:12 – Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity.

I love this verse! “Don’t let anyone look down on you” as a Christian and a kid I really never appreciated people looking down on me, and now as an older kid I still don’t and try not to do it to others.  I feel as though we can all learn so much from each other. I know for a fact that the junior high students at Temper have taught me a ton, and have heard the same from other leaders in the group. Next, “set an example.” I know this is cheesy, but…be the change you want to see in the world. When you want more people to come to Christ be their light. If you want your parents or family to stop fighting, use Gods peace. Let others see what you are and make them want to be like you. We need to use the gifts God gives us the way He intended them to be used: in speech, conduct, Love, Faith, and purity.  I feel like love is the most important thing here, because sometimes all someone needs is someone else…an example.

Wait On The Lord

Alright friends. I have been slacking hard-core lately. I’m calling myself out on this because I really wanted to stay on top of my reading and blogging. However just like usual, when I set out to stay focused my life becomes clustered, as I am sure many of you have also experienced.

I am definitely going to keep trying to stay up on this blog because I need to, but since I havean’t posted in a while I thought I would through a couple of interesting and thought provoking verses your way, mainly just to distract you till I get my crap together. ;)

So for me lately school and I guess ‘family drama’ has been consuming my life and just as usual I am putting my will before Gods. This is literally the most difficult thing for me. I am so prideful and just cannot give everything to Him. Which is why I have such a difficult time staying steady in my faith. So, I have been meditating on Psalms 42 lately. It’s a pretty intense piece of scripture. According to This Video the Psalm is David “in a fight with himself.” And I think we all kind of feel like David sometimes.  We feel like we are fighting against ourselves in hopes that we will be able to find what we should be doing, or want to be doing.  But again, we need to but our “hope in God.”

This video has basically been getting me through this hard time. The guy is Matt Chandler.  In the video he tells us that we need to “wait on the Lord.” Why? He takes it straight from scripture, Isaiah 40:31 – Because those who wait on the Lord He will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint. And that’s a promise!

Psalms 27:14

So, if you’re like me and find yourself more on the prideful end of the spectrum take a second to watch the video, read the psalms, and try and find a reason not to put all of your hope in God. And if you find it, let me know, because from what I read and saw His promises looked a whole lot better than what I could even dream up.

Have an awesome week friends.

Here is Psalms 42:

1 As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. 2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? 3 My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me all day long, "Where is your God?" 4 These things I remember as I pour out my soul: how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God, with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the festive throng. 5 Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and 6 my God. My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon--from Mount Mizar. 7 Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me. 8 By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me-- a prayer to the God of my life. 9 I say to God my Rock, "Why have you forgotten me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?" 10 My bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me, saying to me all day long, "Where is your God?" 11 Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Savior and my God.

Here’s the link again to the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVnt7kJ6NE4

Go watch it,

AND

Here are some of those inspirational / thought provoking verses I said I’d include:

Philippians 4:6-7

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”

1 Peter 5: 6-7

“Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.  Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.”

Proverbs 3:5-6

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.”

(This is my favorite verse, just thought I’d let you know).

Joshua 1:9

“Have I not commanded you?  Be strong and courageous.  Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”

Hosea 6:1

Come, let us return to the LORD. For he has torn us, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bandage us.

LASTELY, READ THIS:

http://dailybibleverse.tumblr.com/post/169230615/when-god-breaks-your-heart-its-not-because-of

It talks about why God breaks us before He fixes us. It’s lovely.

Romans 5

Sorry it’s been so long, I have definitely not been keeping up with my reading. School has really started now and the homework is piling on, and things within this household have been a bit hectic to say the least.

Anyways! Glad to be getting back in the groove.

Romans 5! It is almost like a praise report. It is Paul’s response to the “good news” and he is urging his readers to rejoice with him in both hope and suffering. In verse two and three Paul gives us a wonderful recap of what Jesus Christ gave us.               

2-through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand; and we exult in hope of the glory of God. 3-And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance…

We have been shown what it means to live by faith and what kind of life that prevails and as Christians accepting God is accepting that faith, that relationship, and by accepting both faith and a relationship we are showered with grace. In 1 Corinthians 13:13 Paul says “faith, hope and love are at the heart of the Christian life.” And when God’s love fills our lives it gives us the ability to reach out to those around us.

The other part of this I want to focus on is the comparison between Adam and Jesus. I really love the way verse 12 is worded: “Therefore, just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sinned—.“  Just as sin entered this world through Adam it left it (kind of) through Jesus. Adam is the counterpart of Jesus here, and just as Adam represents human creation, Jesus represents a new spiritual humanity. Ugh! I love, love, love this! Then in verse 20 Paul tells us “…where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.”

We are showered with abundant grace and love from God, and we deserve none of it! He has given us so many chances, I have asked for forgiveness SO many times for the same times it’s ridiculous that He forgives me knowing that I will ask again the next day. Humans are so impatient! It would hardly take us 3 times of one action to no longer forgive a person for whatever they did, and God has put up with it for centuries! This totally convicts me! God is so patient! Who are we to test that? But we do. Like when your sibling “isn’t touching you” we “aren’t sinning.” We push the boundaries of sin and I for one need to truly work on that.

SO. My challenge for you:

1.     Be more patient, in every aspect of you life for AT LEAST 5 days. A work week, that’s it. Just try it.

2.     At the end of your day try to list your sins. Not to put yourself down, simply to see, and maybe since you’re more focused on it you’ll do it less.

Let me know.

Song of the day:

Ode To A Patient God

By: The Arrows

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwU-8yPAgPY&feature=share&list=PLwzbTu8seepvuSvg-OpLFt3zuBr-WVR-v