"Chosen Bride"

Good evening! If any of you follow me on instagram you saw my post of the short version of this poem last night, but here is the extended, edited version! It's just an outpouring of my heart and a reflection of all God has done for me...and it just so happens to rhyme. Enjoy and have a blessed evening :)

I've got so much more to learn
And so much more to do
But tonight I'm simply grateful
My heart belongs to You.

My heart was worn and weary
Before I let you in.
I'll never forget that precious night
When it would all begin.

All glory and honor belongs to You
Who opened up my eyes.
I am no more a prisoner
to this earth and all its lies.

No longer am I defined
by the mirror or others' thoughts.
Although I pushed and pushed you out,
it was me You persistently sought.

Now that I'm captivated
and have surrendered to You my soul,
in Your greater plan, Oh God,
I'd be honored to play a role.

I've come to learn that life with You
outweighs all other paths.
So away from sin I will run
and towards Your love so vast.

I fail You and I cave in
To the temptations of this earth.
I get wrapped up in past mistakes
I forget all that I'm worth.

But your mercy never changes.
Your love remains Divine.
There's nothing I would rather be,
Sweet Jesus, than your chosen bride.

The rough draft

Here & Now

Good evening! Hope everybody had a fantastic easter and is doing well! Tonight I had a realization/epiphany/reality check/convicting moment that I just had to share so I'm going to cut to the chase right away.

This year has contained so many blessings and so many defining moments and answered prayers and lessons learned and divine opportunities, yet I don't express my gratefulness nearly enough. In fact, for the past few weeks I've been wishing my time away. I've never been much of a patient person, but lately I seem to be struggling more than usual to refrain from rushing through life. At least once a day I find myself saying "I can't wait till summer...or for college...or to get married...or to discover what my career is..."(the list goes on for ages). While that is an average thing for an average high school student to do (wish they were anywhere but high school), I'd rather not be average. Not that I think I'm better than other high school students in any way, just that the average high school student doesn't live like they know the love of Christ because, well, they don't.

So instead of wishing I could just be out of high school where there seems to be a lack of Christ, I should make it my mission to bring Christ into it! I should use my time in high school to seize any opportunity to share what the Lord has done for me with as many lost souls as I can...because I was once one of them. I should team up with all the Christ-lovers around me to reach out to those who don't know about God's love or feel unworthy of it. How selfish is it of me to practically say "okay my first two years of high school I didn't really know God and it sucked, but now that I do I just wanna get out of here. I'll catch all you other lost souls later!" Sounds harsh, but hey conviction ain't always pretty!

In a wonderful book I am currently reading called Sun Stand Still by Steven Furtick, he addresses this whole "rushing through everyday" thing in a chapter called "Ignite the Ordinary." He talks about how God seems to take ordinary people, situations, circumstances, etc., and make them extraordinary. (I am just going to attach a picture of my favorite page from the chapter because his words are a lot more powerful than mine.) Sitting in classrooms all day seems more than ordinary and often seems like one of the least likely places for a divine occurrance to take place. But simply being kind to someone for no reason or maybe just leaving a note with a verse on it on your desk for the next student could make a huge impact. If you feel God compelling you to do something, even if it's a tiny tiny act or even if it might be uncomfortable, be bold and do it because He will most likely make something extraordinary out of it!

So here's my challenges for this week and the rest of life with Christ:

• don't wish away time, but instead seek to glorify God here & now
• look at school or work or any ordinary place with ordinary people as a mission field. People don't have to be starving or poor or far away to need to be shown the love of Jesus.
• don't wait for God to speak to you in some big, extravagant way. Be on the lookout for little clues and subtle opportunities.
• Show how grateful you are for all He has done for you by living to serve Him and His people.
• don't be selfish :)

Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take. Proverbs 3:6

Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need. Matthew 6:33

The page from Sun Stand Still. (hope this doesn't violate copywright issues)

Why?

Good evening lovelies. So sorry for not posting in a while! I try to only post when I feel God has put something on my heart that He wants me to share with others and honestly until this week, I hadn't really heard anything from Him. Well if I'm being completely real with y'all I have struggled with devoting time to God everyday and making Him priority over school and friends and numerous other things. This week I've gotten more on track and would like to share some things I've learned through devotionals, prayer, church, etc.

Hurt. Worry. Loss. Confusion. Pain. Sorrow. All present emotions in my town and in my school and in my friends lately. For reasons only the good Lord knows, there have been many tragedies in the past 2 weeks that have left the people around me hurt and confused. Why is our world so broken? Why do these horrible things happen to such good people? What am I supposed to do to comfort those hurting? One of my biggest questions that I just haven't been able to comprehend lately is this....If God knew at the beginning of time how corrupt and chaotic and broken our world would become, why did He even bother creating it? I know God didn't create evil, but why did He create the world if He knew evil would enter it and tempt His children from the beginning?

While searching for an answer, here are the main points I gathered...

• God knew how corrupt our world would become. He knew how many people would completely reject Him and go their own ways. He knew how many people would claim to be Christians but wouldn't put forth the effort to really get to know Him and develop a relationship with Him. He knew how each of His children would slip away from Him and how we would each choose something that we put before Him at some point in our lives. He knew that there would be wars, death, pain, hatred, and worst of all...wait for it...high school breakups (sarcasm, that's definitely not the worst). Anyway point is, God didn't just create this world and expect it to be perfect, our All-Knowing God knew Adam and Eve would eat the apple and He knew I would push Him away in the past few stressful weeks. He knew every person, place, thing, event, situation, and even our thoughts before they came to be.

• God created each of His children with a purpose. He took every event, situation, and tragedy and planned for something good to come out of it. He has this big plan all laid out for this earth and for every person in it until the day of His returning. He did give us free will, but He still knows exactly what will happen and desperately wants to guide us to what is best.

•  Because Heaven is the only perfect place and Christ is the only perfect person, our world is obviously not going to be perfect, in fact, it is far from it. That means that yes there will be tragedy and disaster and hurt and pain and temptation and evil. All of that is present in this world and will affect each of us at some point. But the good news is...

1. God has already won the battle! He has conquered Satan and has conquered death.
2. The Holy Spirit lives inside of us and gives us the power to overcome all the struggles of this world.
3. Our citizenship is in Heaven! Our short life here is nothin' compared to the eternity we will spend in perfect peace, worshipping the Almighty God in His Kingdom.

So here's what I have taken away from all this knowledge and here's what I hope you will take away from it! The evil of this world is not going to go away, but our God is strong enough to overcome it, and because He lives inside us, we are too! We may not understand why such terrible things happen, but we must hold onto the truth that this world is not our home and a day will come when we are worry-free, joyful, and surrounded by loved ones all worshipping our beautiful savior for the rest of our days. Meanwhile, spend your short, unpromising life here on earth living for Your Creator and serving Him and His people with your whole heart, mind, and soul. When you slip away, accept His forgiveness but don't take it for granted and put forth the effort to fall even more in love with Christ.

And they have defeated him by the blood of the Lamb and by their testimony. And they did not love their lives so much that they were afraid to die. Revelation 12:11

And because of his glory and excellence, he has given us great and precious promises. These are the promises that enable you to share his divine nature and escape the world’s corruption caused by human desires. 2 Peter 1:4

 

 

 

 

 

Our own savior...

We can't do it. We can't be our own savior. In fact when we're walking with God, we can't really do anything on our own. This claim seems obvious, but I'm not gonna just give you the typical "nothing is impossible with God" speech...okay well maybe I am, but don't disregard this post because you think you already know what I'm going to say. The reason I worry you will is that I've done the same thing. Over and over again, I've heard sermons on how nothing is impossible with God and how we need Him to accomplish our goals but I disregarded it because I already knew all of that. Yes, I did already know it but I definitely wasn't acting it out and applying it to my life. So here's the most important point that I want you to get out of this post...

You don't have to do anything alone. Absolutely anything. Humans are weak, sinful, broken people and often lack the strength, courage, and passion to accomplish things on their own. But when we accept Christ into our lives, He lives inside of us. Let that sink in a little bit; the great, mighty, powerful, beautiful, all-knowing Creator of the heavens and earth lives inside of you. And with that piece of truth a light bulb should go off...With the power of the Most Powerful on your side, you can do anything. With the wisdom of the Wisest on your side, you can do anything. With the courage of the Most Courageous on your side, you can do anything. With the beauty of the Most Beautiful on your side, you can do anything. With the Mercy of the Most Merciful on your side, you can do anything. Get the point yet?

So how do we apply this to our everyday lives? With big concepts such as "nothing" (is impossible) and "anything" (can be done with God on our side), it can seem like this lesson applies more to the big scheme of things or just life in general rather than our day-to-day routines. But that couldn't be more false...

Life on earth is tough. No matter how much or little we have, no matter the magnitude of our struggles and burdens, every human suffers. Of course the love of Christ is the absolute most comforting thing when we're truly devastated and nothing is better than our Father's embrace when we're suffering great loss. But we don't just have to ask God to help us get through big things. We don't annoy Him when we ask for help in our small, everyday tasks. In fact, He longs for us to need Him. He takes delight in us when we rely on Him. He finds so much joy in simply revealing His presence to us.

There's definitely fault in only loving God and worshipping Him because of what He can give you. I am by no means telling you it's okay to only love God because of what He can do for you. That kind of selfish behavior is not true faith. But when we truly love God for who He is and we realize how much He loves us and longs to strengthen us, then it is 100% acceptable to turn to Him in any situation. Here are some examples (mostly from personal experience) of simple requests you can ask God...

• to help you get up in the morning
• to be able to tolerate someone that makes it really hard and to show that person love despite how they treat you
• to get through a test
• to help release feelings of envy/inadequacy/self-doubt
• to open your eyes to opportunities to share His love with others
• to be able to focus on Him in the midst of a busy week
• to be a more obedient daughter/son to your parents
• to be able to discipline yourself to commit more time to Him
• to be able to follow where He is guiding you when making a big (or small) decision, rather than what others want you to do
• to be able to have more positive, uplifting thoughts
• to see the beauty in each day
• to find ways to glorify Him in everything you do (yes even school)
• to be able to trust that He will keep His promises

The list could go on and on. And honestly, some of those requests aren't that simple and might be hard for you to ask of God. But I listed them because they are things I used to never think to ask God for help in. I used to have the belief that I on my own had to be right with Him before I was able to truly engage in a relationship with Him. But that's the beautiful thing about a relationship with Him...He meets you exactly where you are and says "come and follow me." No exceptions.

My prayer for myself and anyone reading this is that we will be able to seek God and rely on Him in all we do. That we will thirst for Him so much that the first thing we think to do in any unpleasant situation is ask Him for help. Whether we simply feel ugly because of a zit on our face or are facing a huge tragedy, I pray that we run to Jesus. Our strength, rock, refuge, redeemer, savior, and Prince of Peace. Have a great week! :)

You are of God, dear children, and have overcome them: because greater is He that is in you, than he that is in the world. 1 John 4:4

Evolve Weekend

Hey guys! Hope everyone had a rockin' weekend! Mine was beyond amazing, probably one of the best I've ever had! I went to a church event called "Evolve" and basically the whole weekend was devoted to worshipping God, hearing powerful sermons, having a blast with other Christ followers, and discussing/processing what God was telling us and what we were learning with smaller groups. Not only was I prophesied over by a complete stranger (I'll share more about this in a later post), but I learned a lot of other valuble, life-changing/ life-defining things this weekend as well as surrender some burdens and worries to God that I had been holding on to. All-in-all it was a powerful, moving weekend with God's presence feeling extra thick throughout every second. I took a lot away from it and want to share some tid bits of quotes, verses, and my own thoughts from this weekend with you guys with the hope that maybe something will speak to you like it did to me!

"When you take the limits off of God, He'll take the limits off of you."

"Get honest with God and He'll get honest with you"

For no word from God will ever fail. Luke 1:37-38

"Embrace the truth even when it doesn't make sense"
"Embrace the truth even when you can't see it"
"Embrace the truth and the truth will set you free"

"Like the virgin Mary had the son of God planted inside of her despite the fact that she was not perfect, everyone of us has a seed of greatness within them."

"You don't have to be great to start, but you have to start to be great."

We so often get caught up in finding out God's next step for us and His purpose for us but sometimes we just have to stop and remember that our sole purpose is to be His. If we don't know exactly where God wants us to go next, we shouldn't stress and force ourselves to try to hear from God, but instead just focus on becoming more like Him and readying ourselves for whatever He plans to do with us next.

"God will meet you wherever you are and say, 'follow Me'."

 Now all glory to God, who is able, through his mighty power at work within us, to accomplish infinitely more than we might ask or think. Ephesians 3:20

"You can choose to let God turn divine moments into defining moments"

"God looks for people who refuse to compromise destiny for a temporary thrill."

"We are salt and light in this world." (What this means is that just a little salt changes the flavor of anything and just a small match lit in a dark room makes all the difference. We as followers of Christ are to step out and unashamedly be the salt and light our school/community/workplace, no matter how uncomfortable or scary that might be. We're never going to make a difference and really truly show people the love of Christ if we waste all of our days just fitting in.)

If he calls you, say, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening.’ 1 Samuel 3:9


Thanks for reading! My prayer is that the Lord spoke to you through something on here and that you will let it drive you this week! Have a lovely week:)

Falling in Love...

...anyone who's ever done it would probably say that it's one of the best feelings in the world. Whether the relationship worked out or not, the actual falling in love part of it is amazing. When we fall for someone, we fall for everything about them−their personality, looks, talents, flaws, voice, laugh, smile, everything. All we can do is think about them; they begin to consume our brain. We entertain our mind with the thought of spending forever with that person and begin to feel a sense of security that someone loves us back. The problem is that with humans, sometimes we discover that the person we fell in love with is not who we thought they were or this person doesn't love us in the same way we loved them. Rom-coms and Nicholas Sparks novels may make us believe otherwise, but this earthly kind of love is not all it's made out to be.

Don't get me wrong, God has a person set aside for each of His followers that will love them right and that will make them beyond happy. But even these Christ-centered, strong relationships have their flaws and aren't as perfect as we imagine them to be. What I'm getting at is that no earthly love−good or bad, healthy or unhealthy−compares to the love that our Heavenly Father has for us.

For the past few months, I have learned what it is like to fall in love with God. It's not just this cliche phrase to me anymore. I've heard time and time again testimonies where people were changed by God and "fell in love with Him." But now I know for myself that falling in love with God is truly one of the best feelings in the world. Here are the main three changes that have occured within me as I have fallen in love with God and continue to do so:

• When we fall in love with Him, we stop asking and start praising. We don't constantly think about all that He can do for us and He can give us, but instead we begin to appreciate all He has done for us and all the glorious things He has created. We actually take the time to stop and look at the beauty around us and realize that it's all God's doing. We stop and look at the sunrise and tell God "Wow, you're beautiful." We stop and listen to the laughter of our little brother and give him a big hug and thank God for such a blessing in our life. We stop and look up during worship in church and see all the people around us singing praises out to our creator and we thank God for a sense of community and for tangible proof of His love for us. The list could go on and on; these are just a few particular things I began to notice as I fell in love with God.
• When we fall in love with God, we begin to think of the glory of heaven more often than troubles of this earth. We know that our life on earth is merely a vapor. Our short time here doesn't even compare to the eternity we will get to spend with our creator in Heaven. So why spend our whole life focused on earthly things? Why try to make our lives here on earth so comfortable and so perfect when truly our home is in Heaven. When we fall in love with God, we know that one day we will stand at Heaven's gates, free of all the evils, hardships, and sin of this world. Nothing else matters in our life but how we devote it to God. We are to spend our time here on earth preparing to go home to our Father in Heaven. We know that our Heavenly throne awaits us and that our life on earth doesn't even compare to it, no matter how blessed or fortunate we are. And we should desire to make this known to as many people as we can in our time on earth. People who are in love with God know that there is nothing better than being in a relationship with Him and desire for others to expirience it to. They spend their whole life spreading the Good News and serving those around them.

"But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from there, the Lord Jesus Christ, who, by the power that enables him to bring everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will be like his glorious body." Philippians 3:20-21

• When we fall in love with God, we long to do His will alone. My life used to be a comfortable mixture of doing some of what I wanted along with doing some of what God wanted of me, just enough to feel like I was a good person. I ignored God any time I felt Him calling me to do something out of my comfort zone and only did good deeds to avoid feeling guilty. But when I began to fall in love with God, I couldn't just ignore what He was telling me to do anymore, even if it was scary and uncomfortable. I started to realize that He is so much wiser than I am and His path for me is the best possible way to go. As I discovered more about what He'd done for me and how much He loves e, I began to long and thirst to serve Him. My days of ignoring Him when He was calling me turned into begging Him to guide me where to go next. I still sin and have selfish desires, but now the sole purpose of my life is to follow Him, not to make my own comfortable plans for myself.

I am by no means claiming that those who are in love with God are perfect in any way or that falling in love with God will make your life perfect. I simply mean that falling in love with God is the absolute best feeling in the world, and unlike it often does when we fall in love with humans, the feeling doesn't fade away. In fact, it increases. The more we begin to know God, draw nearer to Him, and essentially fall in love with Him, the more joyful and fulfilling our lives will become.

I look back at my life before I gave my heart to God and see that I was missing out on so much. I am living, breathing proof that God's love outshines absolutely everything and would love to share with anybody all the great things He's done for me and that I have learned since falling in love with Him. So if you are alone this valentine's day, hit me up and we can talk about the greatest love story of all time. Or just crack open your bible and read about it yourself. Happy valentine's day everyone! :)


"When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God." Ephesians 3:14-19

 

Unfathomable

How do humans with such tiny brains (no offense fellow earthlings) grasp such huge concepts such as eternity, unconditional love, the creation of the universe, and a plan that was created for us far before we were born? It can definitely be hard sometimes and we forget all too often how truly righteous our God is, but diving into scripture is the best way to get a clear picture of God's greatness.

What's God's next step for ME? What does God want of ME? Why did God create ME this way? How can God help ME in this situation? Why is God doing this in MY life?

I ask myself each of these questions at least twice a day...which is great and so important if I want to whole-heartedly follow God's path for me...but I so often forget the most important part and that's who God is. I get so wrapped up in my life and making sure that I center it around Christ and me, me, me, that I forget to simply worship God for His greatness and reflect on the beauty of who He is and what all He has done.

I think the main reason we so often forget how truly glorious God is is that we are constantly surrounded by flawed, broken, messed up humans. Seeing the self-seeking, greedy, and envious nature of humans, including ourselves, makes it hard to imagine a perfect God without all of that junk. When Genesis 1:27 tells us that God created us in His own image, that means that He put some of His compassion, love, grace, unselfishness, and wisdom into each of His children. But because sin was brought into this world we also all have some evil characteristics about us. But God isn't sinful, He is perfect. Think of the most kind-hearted, cheerful, God-seeking, "wouldn't-hurt-a-fly", type of person you know. Even they have a sinful nature and cannot compare to the perfection of God. His love is immeasurable, His beauty is indescribable, His wisdom is infinite....and He is worthy of all praise and worship, even though the world often fails to give it to Him.

I encourage you to think of everything beautiful about the earth, the universe, yourself, your life, others...God created it all and should be worshiped for it.
Here are things that remind me of God's greatness

• the colors He paints in the sunsets/sunrises
• the smell of rain
• how every single person on earth has a different laugh
• the way He has an individual plan for every single one of His children that all weave together to create a even bigger plan for the earth as a whole
• the way He created the Heavens and earth in only 6 days and I can't even finish a novel in 2 weeks

That's only a teeny, tiny fraction of the list of amazing things God has done and created. He's awesome, just awesome. It's so important to focus on what God is doing in your life and how you can follow Him and what He wants you to do and what's best for you but sometimes we need to just stop, breathe, and thank God for who He is. I personally like to jam to worship songs in the shower and then lay in bed and count the reasons why God is worthy of praise. But however you choose to worship Him simply for who He is, my prayer is that you will have a renewed spirit. If this awesome God is for you, who can be against you?

"Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations." Psalm 100:4-5