Be still

Ever since I had my concussion last January God has been teaching me the importance of being quiet. Something that I am not very good at. My life is always bursting with school, work, friends, ministry, culture, media and noise!
I'm the girl who never slows down and is always bouncing around from one thing to the next. My mind is perpetually spinning with one thought after another, with a continuous flow of tasks and to-do lists. While I'm awake there is never even a moment of calm in my mind.

But listen to this simple truth that has been speaking deeply to my heart lately.

"Be still and know that I am God."

    -Psalm 46:10

Friends in the busyness of a new week remember that intimacy with God requires stillness, attentiveness and quiet. We have to get off the busy highway of life to grow closer to God! If our mind is constantly full of other things then when will we be able to hear from God and allow him to gently whisper to us and remind us of who he is!

Dear friends be purposeful in your day and week to be calm and quiet before God. I know it's hard and there's a million and one things fighting for our attention, but it is so worth the effort! I am praying God blesses all of you this week with sweet intimate time with him where you get to pause life and simply be still and know that he is God! He wants to breathe life and peace into your stressed, anxious, overwhelmed heart, will you let him?

By Grace...

So these past two weeks have been filled with follow up appointments.
Where I get to meet with awesome girls on my campus who are interested in Cru (our Christian student ministry). Most of them have been eager to get
involved and grow in their Christian faith and that makes my heart fill with joy.

However, there's one thing that has really stood out to me. Most of them are not 100% sure of their salvation and whether or not they would go to heaven and be with God for eternity. They list reasons why they think they would, such as going to church, trying to put God first, one girl even gave me an extensive list of volunteer and service hours that she has done. Hearing them give me these answers over and over again breaks my heart. I see their desire to please Jesus, but they are missing the most beautiful, amazing, and freeing parts of the gospel! These girls are all missing GRACE! They feel as if they have to live up to some "Christian standard", be a good person,  follow God perfectly etc. in order to stay at that 100%.

As I've been talking with them, and explaining to them the beauty of grace, that we can never get to God on our own, all of our good deeds will never be enough BUT God is gracious and loving and came down to save us. Jesus died on the cross for our sins as a free gift so that we could be forgiven and have a relationship with God. My heart desperately wanted them to understand and feel the freedom of knowing our position in Christian.

Later after one of my meetings I realized that maybe God was using all of these encounters with these girls as a reminder for my own heart. I know all of these truths, but how often do I slip back into the rut of perfectionism and trying to earn my favor with God. He wanted to remind me that these truths are not just for these girls that I am talking to, but that they apply to me as well. That yes, maybe I have failed or slipped up in some ways lately, but that does not affect my identity in Christ, or the fact that God loves me unconditionally and I am his beloved daughter. Instead God wanted to use these girls to remind me to look up and find my perfection in Christ and not myself and rest in his work instead of striving in vain on my own.

Just like my heart hurts to see these girls not understand grace, God's heart hurts when I don't live in the freedom of that grace. Now that I know and have experienced true freedom, why would I ever want to go back to the weary days of perfectionism? Lord help me believe that my perfection is found in you alone and that your grace is there to cover all of my failures, that no matter how many times I fall and mess up you are right there to pick me back up again and remind me of who I am in YOU!

"But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ— by grace you have been saved—and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." -Eph 2:4-9

How God Changed my heart

Last night I had the awesome opportunity of being able to share a small part of my story at our campus ministry's meeting. I promised I share it with some of my friends who weren't able to make it so here it is! So grateful for all that God has done in my life. 

I grew up like any other church kid who was raised in a Christian home. I heard all the Bible stories in Sunday school, learned all about God and knew all the right answers in youth group. I knew how to talk the talk and I even knew how to live out the Christian life, how to serve others and memorize scripture. Yet everything I did was lifeless and shallow. Something was missing in all of my good Christian stuff. I felt empty and hallow.

My knowledge fooled me and those around me. I collected knowledge about God like one collects books on a shelf or memorizes history facts. Because of this there was no life or joy in my walk with God. I was following all of the rules, it had become about behavior modification to me and learning how to be good. Somehow in the midst of Sunday school lessons, youth groups and sermons I neglected and missed the most important part of being a Christian: having a personal relationship with God!

But thankfully God didn’t leave me there, at Cru’s winter conference- INDYCC God used the testimony of a friend and one of my leaders, to show me how deeply Jesus loved me and how he desired to intimately know me and infuse life into my relationship with him!

At the moment God opened my heart and showed me that although I had known all about God and even did things to serve God, I didn't actually truly know God. That night God was gracious enough to show me what was missing in my life and that was him! I was missing a personal, powerful connection and relationship with Jesus Christ! Ever since then my life as a Christian has been completely different. There is now so much joy and grace that motivates what I do.

        Some things may still look the same on the outside like reading my Bible, but the motivation behind it is how different, for example I now study God’s word not to simply gain knowledge, but to know him. I spend time with him and talk to him because I love him and I want to grow closer to God and know more of who he is instead of only praying when I need things from him! Before I simply knew about Jesus, but now I truly know Jesus like a friend and having that real personal relationship with Jesus is what has changed everything for me; and brought joy, life, and grace into my walk with God!

Life is like a puzzle!

Anyone who does large puzzles knows that you always want to start with the border first. You dig through the box and find all the edges and then quickly put together all the pieces to make the border of the puzzle. This part is always my favorite part, because I get to make the framework for the puzzle and it's also the easiest part to, there are only so many edges and so it's easier to put them together and find the right matches and it goes by a lot quicker then to rest of the puzzle. 

I think life is a lot like that. We love the exciting parts of life the parts that seem productive and fruitful or adventurous or new, like starting a new job, traveling or seeing a ministry blossom. But then we dread and don't appreciate the harder, more mundane parts, the parts where there are a million yellow puzzle pieces that all seem the same, where we have to seek joy even in the midst of the mundane tasks of life like writing papers, studying, and working. The parts of life that seem painful and cruel the pieces that frustrate us so much that we'd rather leave them in the box. But it's in these hard times where we see the most growth. The times where relationships are in shambles, where there is hurt, where circumstances seem to overwhelm us 

 You see a puzzle would look pretty silly if you simply left it with just the frame together and a few random pieces inside it would be empty and would be a broken picture, it wouldn't be able to display it's full beauty and purpose.

That's much like us, without the hard parts of life to refine us, change us and help us to grow we would be like an incomplete picture, we would be lacking the character, wisdom, faith, love and Christ-likeness that is only born through adversity, fighting temptation and learning to trust God. Those times when you're forced to completely rely on God because you are at your wits ends and he's the only one who has power over the situation or you who really truly understands the depths of your pain! Yes it's in these seasons and times where God is gently placing more of the challenging pieces of the puzzle into our lives and oh just wait and see when he is finished what a glorious, beautiful masterpiece it will be! 

So yes, sometimes I'm impatient, and want to rush past the boring parts of life or sometimes I seek comfort and ease and want to fly over the valleys of darkness instead of trudge through the middle of them. But oh it is so worth it to persevere, to blossom and grow and not stay stagnant and I for one do not want to rush the beautiful picture that God is putting together in my life piece by piece! 

My friend be encouraged God is doing wonderful things in your life and heart and making something beautiful out of all the chaos, mess and pain! And for now while the picture is still in progress and still incomplete simply take that step to trust him and rest in his promises and faithfulness! He has never left us and he won't start now!

Stars

The promises of God 

are as sure as the stars 

they are constant and true

faithful like the dawn

Yet we are quick to doubt 

and prone to forget

when the storms and winds come 

we wonder if God is really there

But just as the stars shine brightest 

on the darkest nights 

God's promises ring loud and true

even through the storms

Some nights are so full of clouds 

that you may not see the stars

but even when the clouds cover them

you know the stars are still there

They are simply hiding behind the clouds 

waiting for the storm to pass 

and when it does they will emerge

and shine even more brightly

reminding you that they are still there 

and haven't changed

This is the same with God's promises

they may be hidden by the storms of life

 but they are true and real

and he is faithful and unchanging 

So even when it's hard to see 

and hard to feel God's hand 

remember to not be blinded by the storm

that's right in front of you 

but instead look past it and see the stars  

and feel his arms wrap around you as he whispers 

Do not fear, for I will never leave you

or forsake you 

South Asia

I was a normal college student making normal plans for my summer like getting observation hours in and hanging out with friends and family.
But somewhere along the way I realized that my plans for the summer were not God's plan for my summer.
The next thing I know I'm raising support and packing up my things to spend 6 weeks halfway across the world. Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined myself spending my summer in South Asia alongside 17 strangers... It's funny how God works sometimes!

We all met up at briefing and quickly these strangers worked their way into my heart and before I knew it they became my family and we bonded in a way that only God could have done.

They supported and encouraged me, they challenged me, and inspired me with their faith, boldness, passion and love for our savior. They pushed me when I wanted to give up and patiently listened when my words were jumbled. Never before had I experienced such an intentional, caring, and selflessly loving community.

The days were long and hot and sometimes seemed like they would never end. Many times I crawled in my bed with the weight of discouragement crushing down on me. This city was broken, dark and full of so much pain and suffering. It felt as if I was helpless to do anything and all my efforts were in vain!
Yet as the weeks went on God reminded me that yes I couldn't fix this city, but that I didn't have to, that wasn't my job! God had called me here to love this city and it's people and to share his amazing grace with those he placed in my path. I didn't have to carry that burden because that was God's! I cannot change hearts or the devastating poverty and injustices that I saw, only God can do that!



But what I did have was his amazing unrelenting love and the message of hope found in the gospel and that was what God was calling me to bring to the city and share with the amazing people he placed in my life! He showed me that if all I did was give one person hope through the gospel that was enough! That's how deeply he loves his children, that he would send people halfway across the world just so that they would know his love!

Through the brokenness I saw first hand the effects of sin and the consequences of choosing our own way over following God. It's heartbreaking to see, but it's even more amazing to know that God has a plan of redeeming and restoring the whole world to himself! That even though we made the brokenness, God made the way of redemption throng the cross and he
is actively restoring everything to himself and that brings so much hope to my heart!

I'm grateful for the friendships I was able to make with students and the ways that I saw God slowly begin to work in their hearts as they heard the truth of who God is and his unconditional love that's not dependent on our works! Barriers were broken down in their hearts, as many of our friends for the first time began to understand who God is and his life changing grace!

I came to South Asia thinking that I was going to come and save the world, but what I didn't realize was that instead God was going to work in my heart in ways that I could never have imagined and work to build my character and make me more like my savior!
Yes, I was able to help with human trafficking, tell students about Jesus for the first time and love on street kids, but they showed me what joy in all circumstances looks like, what it means to be in awe at the idea of forgiveness and grace and what it looks like to have a foundation of faith and hope even when you work  in a place full of darkness and injustice.

So while my summer may not have played out exactly as I had planned I'm kind of glad. I'm grateful to have had the opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus, to share the truth of the gospel to those who desperately needed hope, to learn to love radically and selflessly like Jesus and to have my heart wrecked in the best possible way!

Street Kids

Rupees miss, please 

Echoes in your ears

Lingering long after you've passed on 

The gentle tickle of your arm 

Feels ever present even when they're gone

Those big round eyes looking up at you with hopelessness and desperation 

It's too hard to bear to see such pain in a body that should contain such joy  

So ashamedly I look away unable to handle the sadness in their face 

Yet again my heart breaks as it has over and over again 

The more times I witness it the stronger I feel my heart breaking 

I don't think I will ever get used to this particular sight and sound 

And maybe that's a good thing 

I want my heart to hurt with those who hurt even if it's hard 

To see them as valuable no matter how small or poor they are 

To remind myself daily that they are created in the image of God and have so much more worth than they know or have ever been shown 

So while it kills me inside and sometimes I'd rather just pass by 

instead I will do my best to instill love and hope to them to give them a smile, a treat and ask their name 

I want to do what I can to place even just a little bit of worth and value into their dear little lives!