Sometimes Blessings Come Disguised

I am sure you’ve heard this saying before: “Sometimes blessings come disguised.” It rings true to us for many reasons. We make plans and often times those plans don’t happen how we’d like or when we’d like. We see the bad in some circumstances, only to find out later that there was some good mixed in. Or if there was no apparent good to be found, we at least learned some good things through the hard times.

This is what I discovered yet again a few days ago.
The LORD took me through an amazing time of reflection and thinking, a time of renewal. He encouraged me to write out my story, the whole thing, from beginning to end. So write I did… and write, and write, and write. And what a freeing act that was. He showed me that through some of the difficulty and strife, through some of the pain and hurt that I had experienced, there were great blessings and lessons that I learned that I am only beginning to see now. He does not deny that some of those things were bad or that some of them hurt — because they really did — but He is showing me that He can make such beauty from ashes, from the fire of trials. But He can only make beauty and bring restoration and renewal if I surrender and let Him. This is a scary act, I know, because it is an act of giving up control. But it is an act of liberation and trust, an act of letting Abba Daddy take the reigns and lead me by the hand instead of running ahead alone to fall in a mud hole that I cannot climb out of by myself. He will certainly help me climb out and gently clean me up if I DO decide to do that… but He encourages me to walk next to Him, letting Him speak into every part of this journey called life. Because truly, that is the Good Life.
So here I am, LORD. Do with me and in me as You will, Abba. I am all Yours.

A Modern Day Easter Story

What a remarkable story this is, because of the AWEsome, remarkable God we serve! As I read this story of Alex, a man who’s going to graduate this May from the school at which I did PSEO, I am again reminded of the powerful LOVE that God has shown us, a love that truly can overcome death, hatred, and bitterness.

LORD, thank You for Your work in ALex’s life and so many others through him!

Most This AMAZING Day

“i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday; this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings: and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any – lifted from the no
of all nothing – human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)”

– e.e. cummings

 

I absolutely love this poem — the creativity it inspires in me and the imagery it conjures up in my mind. I referenced it in a conversation with a friend a few days ago and haven’t been able to forget about it since then. Then a different friend posted it on Facebook today! As I’ve been mulling over it the past few days, I’ve thought about writing a choral work with this text. I have many ideas for it and many directions in which I could take it, and I’m sure it would be a difficult task. BUT I am up for the challenge. Should I take it? 🙂

Another reason why I love it, particularly today, is because of this most amazing day in history. There’s a reason why today is called Good Friday. NOT because it was full of smiles and sunshine and lollipops. NOT because it was happy or playful or full of blue skies. No, this day is called Good because of the wonderful, unimaginable, indescribable, sacrificial, anguishing, painful, agonizing, highest LOVE that was shown on this day by the greatest Man, the most perfect, holy, gracious, merciful, just, beautiful, and righteous Man to walk this Earth. This Man was also God — Jesus, Immanuel. On this day over 2000 years ago, though, He was not Immanuel for long. He was no longer with us, that He might accomplish for us what we could never do for ourselves. For 3 torturous days He separated Himself from us and from His Father, that we might never be separate from God again. That’s not the end of the story, though, or I would definitely not find this poem very inspiring. No, our Jesus is ALIVE today, reigning with the Father at this moment! He conquered death so that we might LIVE with Him. How marvelous is our Savior’s love for us who KNOW Him!! 😀

So this is why I love this poem. And why I want to write a beautiful, moving piece of choral music for a great choir to sing, that it might be a blessing to others and bring glory to Abba. ❤ Maybe I’m too ambitious… or maybe I have a Great God Who is within me, Whose creativity can outshine my own in a heartbeat.

Faithfulness

The LORD has been teaching me SO much about faithfulness lately. He’s been showing me over and over how faithful He is. He never leaves me. He never rejects me. He never turns His face from me even though I sin and ignore Him or show apathy towards Him.

He’s teaching me what it looks like to be faithful in return. To obey Him not because it’s convenient, but because He calls me to obey. To be patient (suffer long) with those around me even though I’d rather go hole up in my room with Him. To preserve our Sacred time as precious, even when I don’t feel like I’m getting a lot out of it. To make prayer a priority. To YEARN for His living Word. These things all show my faithfulness towards Him and thus towards my brothers and sisters.

At P31 (a KnuHa event) on Sunday evening, we talked about the fruits of the Spirit. I immediately picked faithfulness because Abba’s been teaching me so much about it recently. We made crafts showing how He has been teaching us that fruit, or what that fruit looks like. Here’s mine:

IMG_0462

Abba, teach me more about Your Faithfulness! Stir my heart for You, that I might be faithful!

A 30-Day Spiritual Journey – Just Beginning

Well, today starts what I am going to call a 30-day spiritual journey! Yes, it IS required for a class that I’m taking called Biblical Worldview: Personal Responsibility… but I really DO want to take this opportunity to learn more about myself, learn more about my God, and grow in His grace and serving His people!!
There are three elements my professor wanted us to incorporate or focus on: fasting (from media, NOT food!), stewardship, and silence/solitude. This is a very open-ended assignment, so he is not telling us what he wants us to do specifically in regards to these three areas; he is telling us to be intentional in some way in each of these areas and write a 4-5 page reflective paper about the experience.
Below are the tentative plans I made for myself. I decided that they’ll probably only change if Abba leads me in a different direction throughout the 30 days. 🙂

Fasting:
I decided to give up Facebook. Yes, people do a lot of communicating with me through Facebook for even school-related things, but there are many other options for communication: calling, texting, email, etc. and I can take a 30-day break from it. I’ve been wanting to get rid of Facebook (in a short-term sense) for a while because I can get distracted so easily by it, and this gives me a perfect opportunity to do so! Because I usually only text or email for finding times to connect with people face-to-face, I decided it probably isn’t necessary or helpful for me to ban that stuff entirely… especially email — my profs probably wouldn’t like that! 😉

Stewardship:
Though most people think of stewardship as wise money-management, I think that it is SO much more than that. I believe that it is managing ALL that God has given us wisely, whether that’s time, talents, resources, friendship, skills, etc. I decided for this aspect of my journey to invest more in my current friends and to make some new ones! I don’t know how (and don’t really want to) quantify this exactly because I don’t want to force friendships, but I want to be able to love and serve others in new and Spirit-led ways.

Silence/Solitude:
I LOVE silence and solitude. I am really fed by the LORD when I actually take the time out of my day to be still before Him and seek His Face, even in times of His silence. Unfortunately last semester I really lacked in this area, and in hindsight I realize that it hurt me a lot more than I thought at the time. I want to be very intentional about how I spend my time in Scripture, in prayer, and in quietness before God, listening for His Voice and His leading. This I also do not want to quantify because I know that it will become a mechanical, check-list mentality for me if I do so.

Please join me in prayer for this next month as I discover more about my God, myself, and His world and leave room to foster a deeper relationship with Him. I would love to hear how Abba is working in your life through fasting, stewardship, and silence/solitude! And I’m sure there will be difficult days; if you feel led to encourage me, I would be humbled and honored! Thank you for being my brothers and sisters in Jesus and my dear friends.

Philippians 1:3-4

This Day’s Supplication

Be within me.
Be my Guide.
Go before me,
By my side.
Whisper softly to my heart
So I may hear You and not depart
From Your ways
All of my days.

Let it be.

Abba’s Children

I am Abba’s child. He loves me. He is fond of me. He cherishes me. And all of this… BEFORE I existed in time and space.  Abba made me. He shaped me. He breathed LIFE into me. He sustains me now. He holds my body intact, the sinews of my fingers together as I type this. He speaks each piece of this beautiful creation puzzle into being. I am Abba’s child because of nothing I did or can do. How FREEING! I am resting in this amazing truth, this inexplicable beauty, this magnificent goodness.
You are Abba’s child, too. He loves you. He is fond of you. He cherishes you. And all of this… BEFORE you existed in time and space. Abba made you. He formed you. He shaped you. He breathed LIFE into you. Abba sustains you now. He holds your body intact, the veins and muscles in your eyeballs as you read this. He speaks each piece of this beautiful creation puzzle into being. You are Abba’s child because of nothing you did or can do. How FREEING! Will you rest in this amazing truth, this inexplicable beauty, this magnificent goodness?

December 14, 2012 — A Day We Won’t Forget

Disgust. Sorrow. Anger. Grief. Sadness. Loss. Despair.
Hope. Purpose. Restoration. Light. Thanksgiving.

This is my response to Friday’s events at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Yes, I know this is almost a week late, but finals were this week and I had only heard what others had discussed, not read the details or seen the pictures myself.
Reading those details, I was horrified. Seeing those pictures of such sweet, lovely, hopeful faces of children… reading their stories and knowing that they have families, siblings, best friends, pets… it broke my heart. It brought tears to my eyes and an aching sorrow to my soul to think of anyone wanting to harm little ones like this. These are Abba’s little ones… little ones to whom Jesus said, “Come to Me!” with joy.
It left me asking Why? Abba, why these adorable little children? Why did they have to die? And why did their friends and siblings have to experience this inexplicable suffering, see their friends die, undergo this huge catastrophe? And I don’t have the answers to these questions. None of us do. Only God knows what is going on… what the purpose is for things like this. I know that He is completely sovereign, so there is a purpose for everything, but when there is such indescribable pain involved… children… I know that God weeps with His children. He weeps with His people who are facing this loss. He holds them. He holds the children, their families, their community. He sorrows with them, hurts with them, cries with them, comforts them, grieves with them. He didn’t create this world to be this way; He created humanity for delight, for peace, for joy, for freedom in obedience. Pain, sorrow, and unthinkable sin is what happens when we try to deviate from His intention for us. Father, may we return in repentance, bowing to You in forgiveness and sorrow. May we let You hold us, hold the children and their families. May we surrender ourselves to You. May we forgive those who cause this pain and grief upon us the way that You have unconditionally forgiven us.
You are the only One Who brings order out of this chaos that our nation has undergone this past week. You are the only One Who can heal the broken hearts of these families, these children, this school, this community. May we open our hearts for You do to Your work in them.
I give December 14, 2012 to You, LORD Jesus.

True Life

Patience. Tolerance. Long-suffering.
Self-conciousness. Hopefulness. Let down.
Sadness. Sorrow. Love. Struggling.
Trying to follow Jesus.
Trying to do what He says.
Trying to implement wisdom.
Blown off. Rejected. Ignored.
Disrespected. Teased. Back-stabbed.
Cold shoulder. Left out. Against me.
He said it would be like this.
He said it would be hard.
He said there would be pain AND joy.
I accept the challenge.
I surrender all.
I give up what I think is life to find True Life.
They reject You really, not me.
They are intimidated.
They don’t understand Your love and grace
to be more than rules and regulations;
Boring. Non-relatable. Apathetic.
But You are so much more.
You are Jesus, friend.
You are Spirit, with us.
You are Abba, Daddy.

First Two Weeks at NWC!

Hola! I’ve been so busy I could hardly think these past two weeks… but I think I’ve finally figured out somewhat how to manage my time well and get all the papers, readings, and assignments done! It has been such a blast getting started with classes, meeting SO many new people, and learning from amazing professors.
I have met many music majors and had some very fun conversations with some of them! I am in Counterpoint this semester. Counterpoint is an upper-level music theory course in which you learn how to analyze and write independent melodic lines that work together to also create vertical progressions. I am in a small class (6 total students) and everyone else knows each other already, but I have known the answers to questions and been able to answer a couple that I knew I had correct. My professor, Dr. Danek, has a crazy memory. He plays in class many excerpts from inventions and fugues while we are learning the concepts and tells us important things to remember about each of them.
I have been able to unofficially tutor a music theory I student already this semester, too! I am going to talk to the Alpha Center about tutoring because it’s a wonderful program: students get tutoring free and the tutors are paid by NWC! COOL deal. 🙂
I am in 3 honors classes: Public Speaking, Old Testament History and Literature, and History of Western Civilization. Speech is fairly straight-forward; Rhetoric with Mr. H prepared me well last year. 🙂 OT will be lots of paper-writing, but I think I will be very satisfied with the results at the end of the semester. West. Civ. will be SO much reading. We have a huge course packet filled with articles, plus 6 additional small books to read this semester. Good thing I’ve read some of these already with Mr. D and Mr. Phillips! It will be much easier to skim and remember rather than learn brand new material. In honors classes professors don’t give tests or quizzes, so we just do big projects and write many papers. I personally think this is pretty nice! It will certainly make finals week MUCH easier.
I have visited 2 different churches so far and will visit another new one this week. I really liked Bethlehem Baptist the first week; I would like to go back and visit again maybe next weekend. I was very convicted by Pastor John Piper’s sermon on the end of 2 Timothy 4. For worship they took hymns and “modernized” them (for lack of a better term). I enjoyed that immensely! Last week I went to Real Life Church. It was their Youth Sunday, so their youth praise team led worship and the youth pastor spoke about impacting youth. It was very interesting listening to a sermon like that from this side of high school; every time that I remember, I was IN middle or high school when hearing sermons like that. It was a strange feeling to realize that I am not one of them any longer and I now have a different role to play in impacting youth. I have the same role to play in college life that I used to in high school, but it looks different. That is something I have been thinking about and praying about a lot this week: what does it look like to impact college students? High schoolers? Middle Schoolers?? Wow… that requires some more thought.
Please be in prayer for a new friend of mine, Wade Weeldryer. I have not talked to him very much, but he is in two of my classes. His mother just died on Thursday evening from battling a very painful cancer. While his family is rejoicing that she is no longer in pain and that she is with her Savior, they are still grieving her loss.
You can also pray for the spiritual life of the students on this campus. I have seen some on FIRE for our LORD, but I have also seen some who need Him so badly…. it breaks my heart to see them searching for fulfillment in the wrong places. I want to be a light here; I don’t know what that looks like or how God might use me, but I trust that He can and He will, if I let Him. And I WANT Him to use me, even if I’m not “popular”…. I’ve never been popular, so no worries there. 🙂 God has given me an urgency for this campus; may He bring this to action here at Northwestern College. Go Eagles! Go Jesus!! 😀 Thank You for LIFE.

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