Monday, September 29, 2008

lagging

well here's a quick little update...as of right now I'm not obeying God like I should be. He's called me to do some things this semester that I've been slacking off on a little bit...but He's still good and he's not exactly beating me down for it. I admit, I'm a bit confused right now as far as life goes, but hey, it happens, and I don't need to make a huge deal out of it. I know God has everything under control, and that really is all that matters. He is good, the end. I just need to keep walking in the spirit. start learning a lil self discipline. Cause if I want to see great things happen, I need to be prepared. I see a lot of things going on that God is doing or is wanting to do, but how in the world do I bring that stuff here to earth? I certainly can't do it when I'm wallowing around in worldly worship or idolatry. I need to get my head up where it's supposed to be - in heaven. not here. because the longer I start thinking from the ground's viewpoint, the less I can see, and the more mistakes I start making. I need to see what God sees.

I LOVE this:

"Open our eyes to see the things that make Your heart cry. To be the church that you would desire. A light to be seen. Break down our pride and all the things we've built up inside - our earthly crowns and all our desires we lay at your feet."

I need to wake up and cast down the idols I've made...because I'm realizing I definitely have some, and I haven't dealt with them yet. I am putting hopes and dreams in places other than Jesus...satisfaction in dead-end creation.

It does not work.
It does not work.
It does not work.
It does not work.
It does not work.
It does not work.
It does not work.

How many times do I have to write or read that before I believe it to be true in my heart? It's true. I know that Jesus is better than anything else in this world.

Saturday, September 20, 2008

My Bio for national merit:

Sometimes at night I look at the billions of stars merely to remind myself that I am small. My life has been a difficult journey, an arduous struggle to remember that in all I do, I am nothing. My high school years have done more than just shape me into the unique character I am, allow me the opportunities I have been given, or simply give me some fun experiences; they have reminded me that the blessed life I have been given is neither deserved by me nor owed to me. These years should not be wasted on me, either.

Knowing my place and seeing things from God’s perspective are crucial to me. In the context of God’s plan, any talent or ability I have can only be credited to the grace of my creator. This causes me to put others before myself and to realize I am, in fact, only a small piece of the puzzle. Playing guitar unaccompanied is satisfying, but when complimented by the other instruments in my church’s praise band, I can both shine in my niche and provide the opportunity for others to excel in theirs. Likewise, my optimistic attitude and contagious joy don’t do much good when I’m alone but are a greater boon when I am teaching and “loving on” the elementary school kids at the after-school program of my church.

Undecided on a college major, or even a college choice, I continue to pray and weigh my options. I have been entrusted with wisdom and knowledge for a reason. With these blessings come great responsibilities, and I want a career that can channel every gift and talent I have so that I may serve others to my greatest extent. My passion for social justice leads me to want to do mission work during my college career or after. Furthermore, I want to attend a Christian leadership college in order to learn how to better serve the church.

Even so, my life is not centered about achievements or accomplishments as much as it is character. I am a man of my word. I live by the standard of absolute integrity in everything, from the biggest decision to the smallest detail. I strive to respect, love, and tolerate everyone unconditionally, knowing that I am undeserving of the unconditional love given to me. I am not insecure, but am confident in who I am, and though I value relaxation, I put an emphasis on hard work in all I do, making the most of what I’m given. Time is of utmost value to me, and when I have completed my life I want to have spent it wisely. I desire to leave a legacy of love and humility by taking responsibility in helping others while remembering that in the big picture I am nothing. As Helen Keller said, “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.” Just as there are billions of stars in the night sky, my light shines in the darkness as one of the billion. And I believe I can make this world just a little bit brighter.

Saturday, September 13, 2008

The Power and Wisdom in Prayer

Recently God has imbued me with some fresh revelation on prayer. It has been over the course of a couple weeks, and hasn't been more than random realizations or thoughts at different times. All that being said, I'm just trying to firstly remember everything I've learned, and then simply organize it here. Hopefully I will eventually finish this blog...


I wonder what the world would look like if the bible were true.

Matthew 17:20
"He said to them, Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, Move from here to there, and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you." (context)

Now, don't get me wrong, I believe the bible is 100% complete and true and faultless, but follow me for a second:
How many times have we prayed or heard someone pray for something radical to happen? How often have we heard prayers like "please save so-and-so's life", "please let me become such-and-such", even "please let me marry her".
Yet how many times have we seen such things happen?
If Jesus wasn't lying, then that means if we even have the smallest amount of faith, anything can happen.
But this isn't the case...that stuff doesn't happen that often. Because if it did, it means that all kinds of people would not have died, and everyone would have their dreams come true, and quite honestly a lot of mountains would be in different locations right now.

Do you see what I'm saying?

Take that verse literally. "If you have faith like the grain of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, move from here to there, and it will move." I'm pretty sure that the grain of a mustard seed is one of the smallest if not THE smallest seed in all of creation. And it's metaphorically representing our faith. So that means that you can have little to almost NO faith, yet if you do believe, you can pretty much make anything happen.

So, either the bible isn't 100% true, or we have absolutely no faith in the power prayer has.

I believe the latter is true. I know that sometimes I can pray with some authority and faith, but a lot of the rest of the time, I'm simply petitioning God, hoping He'll do something but not really believing anything WILL happen. Now, don't get me wrong, there's a place for "prayer and supplication, and making our requests made known to God", but I feel like if that's all we're doing, we aren't getting much done but airing our grievances and wishing upon a star.

When it comes to really interceding for things, praying for revival and change, praying for healing, or for some kind of huge God-movement, we need the power of prayer. We can wish for it to happen as much as we want...but until we put some faith into it, and believe not only that something CAN happen but that something WILL happen, I don't think much will happen.

I remember when God first revealed all of this to me (I think it was at church, or slam or something, and it hit me in a matter of seconds), I thought...well if I simply believe, there's all kinds of possibilities! I could pray for God to turn me into a chicken, or move the rocky mountains to abilene, or, in all seriousness, for God to make his presence physically known in the room with fire from the sky and wind from nowhere. And I do believe that that stuff could happen, even though right now I'm not feeling very authoritative or that i have the faith for that crazy stuff...but that brought me to the great balancing revelation:

Authoritative prayer ALWAYS starts with wisdom.

Realizing the power that is held in prayer...and that old testament miracles CAN happen...brings both great faith and encouragement as well as reverance, fear, and respect. Because an understanding of the power inside of us shows us that we CAN'T abuse it. And that it can cause a lot of harm. For example, let's say we're in a prayer meeting and nonchristians are there. I could pray for God to send his physical fire, glory, and presence down from heaven, but, let's say that in that moment God gives me the discernment not to ask for that. I don't necessarily understand at the time, but if I had prayed that, maybe it would have freaked the nonchristians out and they would have never believed or come back to a church. Or maybe it would have been too amazing and it would have physically blinded all of us. I just don't know. I can't shoot out prayers like a shotgun once I realize the far-reaching effects intercession has. I have to first ask God to give me wisdom I need, and then pray in the spirit - making sure my prayers and intercessions align with God's will. Great power comes with great responsibility.

so thats all I can spit out for right now...I'll add thoughts over time. give me yours and I can maybe come to a better more rounded view of how to use prayer. Let's believe though.

Sunday, September 7, 2008

Light

It's easy to focus on the problem and push God to the back of our mind as our last resort for help.

I've done that a lot recently, but God has showed me a better way, through the imperfect man Mike Guglielmucci. He said that when we can learn to magnify and worship God, and choose what we magnify (when it would be easy to focus on the problem), and just lift him higher, bigger, stronger, more powerful (because that's what He is), we can see God for who he really is. it takes us to a place of clarity and peace. And we can focus on God. Focus is such a difficult skill to grasp, but I'm getting better every day.

Let's learn to put our attentions and affections solely on God. He's all I want anymore, really.

Saturday, September 6, 2008

Darkness

So here I am, sitting upstairs as usual on a night like this, wanting to punch a baby. I'm an idolater, I'm judgemental, I'm a hypocrite, I'm weak, I'm poor, I'm capricious and stubborn, I'm insecure, I'm fearful........


no longer.

But the fucking sin keeps coming back into my life, and I am SICK of what it does to me and what it makes me do. I passionately LOATHE sin. God took me from point A and moved me up in altitude to point B, and Satan is somewhere in the middle contending for my soul to revert back to the ground, where it used to be. But I'm not gonna have one bit of that. Earlier today I kind of realized that I hate hanging out with some of my friends, and worse, I realized that a couple of people I've been hanging out with I don't really even like. It's crazy how God is (or maybe he's just using satan to) drawing me more towards friends from school that don't really love Jesus and away from the ones that sometimes do. Because He's teaching me a lot of compassion. I see the good in people. I see the potential of my dead friends, and I see what they COULD be. And you have no idea how badly I want them to get there.....my heart is really breaking apart over their blindness. it's killing me. That's so good though, now that I think about it. God is going to be doing huge things soon at my school and at my church. It's just funny how it all plays out.
Because today I woke up at 11:30 In Albany Texas, my hand dangling behind the bed clutching the headphones to an mp3 player I vaguely remember holding on to the night before, my heart feeling like it was somewhere else. I remember listening to music on the way home and kind of falling into a trance as I watched an airplane flying high in the sky, just wishing I could get away, feeling the arms of so many angels and true siblings lifting me up into the sky...towards heaven. You see, I had the worst day ever. I was with a lot of people I was frustrated with and they were all doing things that frustrated me. I did not want to be around a single one of them. I prayed several times that God would help me get over my inhibitions...but it was still so hard. The whole morning I spent in agony, wasting my time with them, waiting for them, judging them. I saw through every facade they put up and I could see so clearly what they were all trying to do by staying the night there in albany. Well most of it boiled down to one person, but I don't really want to talk about that, because it would be very wrong of me to. I'm not posting this on facebook because none of this part of my heart should be an advertised thing, but I still want the right people to have access to it so that when their trail crosses this marker it may lead them astray the path they're sleepwalking down. Now, as a sidenote, a lot of this crap can be chalked up to simply being around a group of people too long and too late. But because of the few that I'm thinking about, that's not the majority portion of my angst. The majority of my frustration is that when a girl likes a guy or a guy likes a girl, and they start devoting more than 1% of their attention to that, God gets screwed over. And no one wants to live for Jesus anymore, outside of the conveniences of their facilitated religious games or occasional holy spirit sprees. None of what I'm saying is absolute, but from what I see, it is true across the board around half the time. Of course, every time and every person it is different. But with the people I was with....it was just what I thought it was. A lot of impressing, a lot of veiled intentions. A load of crap, if you ask me.
When is someone gonna be real, be transparent, and live their whole life for Jesus? It hasn't happened enough...
It was so good though, when I finally escaped to be able to hit drums and get away, even if only for a little while. And it was even better to be able to escape completely and worship Jesus in my car, repenting of my hard heart and judgemental thoughts. I just want to throw all this off me and RUN.
It all came back later that night though, when I ended up hanging out with everyone again. And the breaking point for me tonight was the fact that they wanted to watch a movie. A MOVIE. I have watched movies FAR too many recently. And all I see movies as right now are breeding grounds for flirtation. A complete waste of time! There was no way I was gonna stick around and endure through that...the valley of the shadow of the waste. Why doesn't anyone want to do things that are worthwhile anymore? Like....for example....being christians? You know, feeding the hungry, telling people about jesus, healing the sick. Oh, I forgot. movies.

I'm glad I left. God has blessed me through this day...as hard as that is to grasp. I just know that I am sick of satan tripping me up and bringing me down over and over again. God must be doing something big in my life for me to be getting attacked this much...gosh...no one knows the depth to which I've suffered the past week. Nor do they know the joy it has been. so paradoxial. but so true. I'm not perfect, God is, he's making me perfect, he has huge plans for me this semester, satan doesn't like it, it hurts, but i like it a lot. Jesus is lord. The end. I'm done focusing on this. Jesus is coming back...I can't wait.

(disclaimer...sorry for the profanity...I was really really REALLY mad at satan when I wrote this, and I don't think I'll change it now, even though it may offend you or rub you the wrong way. I don't use that kind of language. but this is, i guess an exception. To change it would be to not be 100% real and honest and transparent. And it would not be true to myself and what I was going through. so, sorry, but the f-word stays...as hard as it is for me not to edit.)