Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person with nothing to eat. Mother Teresa

"He resurrected my heart from the grave."

Shane and Shane

There was a speaker at First Glance last night and she gave this to the girls . I thought it was really good. Such an encouragement

I made her…she is different.

She’s unique.

With love I formed her in her mother’s womb.

I fashioned her with great joy.

I remember, with great pleasure, the day I created her.

(Psalm 139:13-16)

I love her smile.

I lover her ways.

I love to hear her laugh.

And the silly things she says and does.

She brings me great pleasure.

This is how I made her.

(Psalm 139:17)

I made her pretty and not beautiful,

Because I knew her heart,

And knew she would be vain…

I wanted her to search out her heart,

And to learn that it would be Me in her

That would make her beautiful…

That would draw friends to her.

(1 Peter 3:3-5)

I made her in such a way,

That she would need me.

I made her a little more lonesome than she would like to be…

Only because I need for her to learn to depend on Me…

I know her heart, I know if I had not made her like this

She would go her own chosen way

And forget Me…her Creator.

(Psalm 62:5-8)

I have given her many good and happy things…

Because I love her.

(Psalm 84:11, Romans 8:23)

Because I love her, I have seen her broken heart…

And the tears she cried alone.

I have cried with her,

And had a broken heart, too.

(Psalm 56:8)

Many times she has stumbled and fallen alone

Only because she would not hold My hand.

So many lessons she’s learned the hard way

Because she would not listen

To My voice…

(Isaiah 53:6)

So many times I have set back

And sadly watched her go her merry way alone.

Only to watch her return to My

Arms, sad and broken.

(Isaiah 62:2)

And now she is mine again…

I made her, and then I bought her…

Because I love her.

(Romans 5:8)

I have to reshape and remold her…

To renew her to what I had planned for her to be.

It has not been easy for her or for Me.

(Jeremiah 29:11)

I want her to be conformed to My image…

This high goal I have set for her,

Because I love her.

(2 Corinthians 2:14)

Take Two

So, sometimes I just post scriptures or quotes that I enjoy and other times I write responses. This is a response to a previous quote posted.

Post 1: The author of Rewriting Your Emotional Script, Becky Harling, said in her novel, "When you see a person holding a sign that reads, "Hungry," or someone waiting in line for a welfare check, do you jump to conclusions about his or her integrity or work ethic? When you see someone who is inebriated and lying in the streets do you feel that he deserves to be homeless because he struggles with an addiction?"(125). Why are we so quick to turn to judgment rather than mercy?

POST 2

RE:

Judgment Versus Mercy

The author of Rewriting Your Emotional Script, Becky Harling, said in her novel, "When you see a person holding a sign that reads, "Hungry," or someone waiting in line for a welfare check, do you jump to conclusions about his or her integrity or work ethic? When you see someone who is inebriated and lying in the streets do you feel that he deserves to be homeless because he struggles with an addiction?"(125). Why are we so quick to turn to judgment rather than mercy?

An issue is that people do not understand the types of poverty. In order to even begin to understand the poor, you must first know where they are coming from. The two different types of poverty: generational and situational. Generational poverty is poverty that has lasted longer than two generations and is often passed through families. Situational poverty is when an event happens, which causes poverty such as loss of job, death in the family, or poor decision that could be drug related. Poverty is a cycle entrapping people; it needs to be broken.

Not only do we need to fully understand the concept of poverty, but we also need to know how our culture is currently failing to deal with it. Our culture is failing, because we often times push ourselves above people by capitalizing every opportunity made available. We are also so quick to generalize the poor as welfare abuser, ignorant, thieves and drug addicts. People are currently abusing the system and do steal, but to say that every person that is inflicted by poverty is this way is an absurd excuse not to offer mercy.

Our culture lacks empathy. Someone once told me that the poor needed to help themselves, and there is nothing the average American can do for them. It's pretty pathetic that our country no longer helps one another out, because there was a time when people were dependent upon one another. When you could ask your neighbor for sugar or an egg. Unfortunately, we live in an independent society, where we do not need each other, nor do we desire to. We do everything on our own and would never admit we need help from another. Therefore, when someone is in need of help, they are inferior.

How do we begin to extend mercy? The least we could do for the poverty-stricken is meeting the basic needs of food, clothing and shelter. The problem is that we all assume it's taken care of by someone else; someone that makes sure our daily lives are not interrupted by beggars. If only we could become united and instead of pushing people down, we put them before ourselves. We can sacrifice our time and take action to promote change instead of being self-centered. To go even further than meeting the basic needs would mean becoming involved in a nonprofit organization and begin educating the poor on how to get out of the situational and generational cycles. Instead of judging the drunken man on the street and giving him condescending glares, we walked with him and help him out of his addition.

By beginning to meet the necessary needs, mercy can begin to be extended instead of judgment. You can be the catalyst that offers change to a community without hope.

"Christ is not a fashion fleeing away"

Norma Jean

Ephesians 3:16-19 (New International Version)

¹⁶I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, ¹⁷so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, ¹⁸may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, ¹⁹and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

"Fire goes out without wood, and quarrels disappear when gossip stops."

Proverbs 26:20

credit for photo:Rosi

I pray this over your life.

9 So we have not stopped praying for you since we first heard about you. We ask God to give you complete knowledge of his will and to give you spiritual wisdom and understanding.10 Then the way you live will always honor and please the Lord, and your lives will produce every kind of good fruit. All the while, you will grow as you learn to know God better and better.
11 We also pray that you will be strengthened with all his glorious power so you will have all the endurance and patience you need.

Colossians 1:9-11

photo credit: meredith rhinehart

<3

"So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and at the right time he will lift you up in honor." 1 Peter 5:6

Wisdom light my way into the dark. Your words, the melody that carries me. We can’t make a change ‘til we know who we are. What burns? The fire refining me.
Emery

Where?

Psalm 139

¹ O LORD, you have searched me
and you know me.

² You know when I sit and when I rise;
you perceive my thoughts from afar.

³ You discern my going out and my lying down;
you are familiar with all my ways.

4 Before a word is on my tongue
you know it completely, O LORD.

5 You hem me in—behind and before;
you have laid your hand upon me.

6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
too lofty for me to attain.

7 Where can I go from your Spirit?
Where can I flee from your presence?

8 If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.

9 If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
if I settle on the far side of the sea,

10 even there your hand will guide me,
your right hand will hold me fast.

“Therefore go and make disciples 

of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father 

and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to 

obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am 

with you always, to the very end of the age” 

Matthew 28:19-20

Mercy

"When you see a person holding a sign that reads, "Hungry," or someone waiting in line for a welfare check, do you jump to conclusions about his or her integrity or work ethic? When you see someone who is inebriated and lying in the streets do you feel that he deserves to be homeless because he struggles with an addiction? Oh, I wonder how often Jesus weeps because we choose judgement over mercy"Becky Harling.

Weeping.

Photo credit rebecca Roddenberry

"The face that Moses had begged to see – was forbidden to see – was slapped bloody (Exodus 33:19-20). The thorns that God had sent to curse the earth’s rebellion now twisted around his own brow…

“On your back with you!” One raises a mallet to sink in the spike. But the soldier’s heart must continue pumping as he readies the prisoner’s wrist. Someone must sustain the soldier’s life minute by minute, for no man has the power on his own. Who supplies breath to his lungs? Who gives energy to his cells? Who holds his molecules together? Only by the Son do “all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17). The victim wills that the soldier live on – he grants the warriors continued existence. The man swings.

As the man swings, the Son recalls how he and the Father first designed the medial nerve of the human forearm – the sensations it would be capable of. The design proves flawless – the nerves perform exquisitely. “Up you go!” They lift the cross. God is on display in his underwear and can scarcely breathe.

But these pains are a mere warm-up to his other and growing dread. He begins to feel a foreign sensation. Somewhere during this day an unearthly foul odor began to waft, not around his nose, but his heart. He feels dirty. Human wickedness starts to crawl upon his spotless being – the living excrement from our souls. The apple of his Father’s eye turns brown with rot.

His Father! He must face his Father like this!

From Heaven the Father now rouses himself like a lion disturbed, shakes his mane, and roars against the shriveling remnant of a man hanging on a cross. Never has the Son seem the Father look at him so, never felt even the least of his hot breath. But the roar shakes the unseen world and darkens the visible sky. The Son does not recognise these eyes.

“Son of Man! Why have you behaved so? You have cheated, lusted, stolen, gossiped – murdered, envied, hated, lied. You have cursed, robbed, overspent, overeaten – fornicated, disobeyed, embezzled, and blasphemed. Oh, the duties you have shirked, the children you have abandoned! Who has ever so ignored the poor, so played the coward, so belittled my name? Have you ever held your razor tongue? What a self-righteous, pitiful drunk – you, who molest young boys, peddle killer drugs, travel in cliques, and mock your parents. Who gave you the boldness to rig elections, foment revolutions, torture animals, and worship demons? Does the list never end! Splitting families, raping virgins, acting smugly, playing the pimp – buying pornography, accepting bribes. You have burned down buildings, perfected terrorist tactics, founded false religions, traded in slaves – relishing each morsel and bragging about it all. I hate, loathe this things in you! Disgust for everything about you consumes me! Can you not feel my wrath?”

Of course the Son is innocent. He is blamelessness itself. The Father knows this. But the divine pair have an agreement, and the unthinkable must now take place. Jesus will be treated as if personally responsible for every sin ever committed.

The Father watches as his heart’s treasure, the mirror image of himself, sinks drowning into raw, liquid sin. Jehovah’s stored rage against humankind for every century explodes in a single direction.

” Father! Father! Why have you forsaken me?!”

But heaven stops its ears. The Son stares up at the One who cannot, who will not, reach down or reply.

The Trinity had planned it. The Son endured it. The Spirit enabled him. The father rejected the Son whom he loved. Jesus, the God-man from Nazareth, perished. The Father accepted his sacrifice for sin and was satisfied. The Rescue was accomplished."

-Joshua Harris

Missing Latin America.

1 Corinthians 1:26-27

"Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong."

... amazed by God's love.

Crazy Love

So, i am currently reading this book called Crazy Love. Its pretty awesome. I am reading about how we are just a mere spot in Gods story.

"To  be brutally honest, it doesn't really matter what place you find  yourself in right now. Your part is to bring Him glory-- whether eating a sandwich on a lunch break, drinking coffee at 12:04AM so you can stay awake to study.. The point of your life is to point to Him. Whatever you are doing, God wants to be gloried because this whole this is His."

It also talks about how fragile life is... the author is right it is soo fragile. We are so weak. Although we try to control our lives, we actually have no control. And honestly who are we to try to control everything.

For me this year has been a journey of me letting go of not knowing what my life was going to become and letting Him do what He wants.

"If life were stable, I'd never need God's help. Since it's not, I reach out for Him regularly. I am thankful for the unknowns and that I don't have control, because it makes me run to God."

Such as good quote.. 

Discipleship

"Those who are constrained by the love of Christ will count no sacrifice too great to make for Him" True Discipleship.

"Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind." Luke 10:27

To be made new.

Psalm 51:1-8

Have mercy on me, O God,

according to your unfailing love;

according to your great compassion 

blot out my transgressions.

Wash away my iniquity

and cleanse me from my sin.

For I know my transgressions,

and my sin is always before me.

Against you, you only, have I sinned

and done what is evil in your sight,

so that you are proven right when you speak

and justified when you judge.

Surely I was sinful at birth,

sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

Surely you desire truth in the inner parts;

you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.

Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;

wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.

Let me hear joy and gladness;

let the bones you have broken rejoice.  

This is my prayer. I am not perfect, I'm sinful and I am broken, but Christ's love and mercy is incredible. I am glad I can rest in His forgiveness and that He can wash me and make me new.

This lyric has been one that has stuck out to me this week.."You never asked me to repay the price You paid.. He lived and died for all and everything." Attack Attack..

I am just in awe of Christ and what He did so that I might have life.

This "good morning" get me everytime..

"I am a new creation in Christ; the old has gone and the new has come."
2 Corinthians 5:17

Bro, Ashley's Here by Attack! Attack!


As I stare through these tears,
I see your lips start to turn.
This world is so un-perfect,
this love is so un-worth it.

Won't be mistake for another love song,
I won't go away I won't be done wrong.
Tell me, tell me to, to live like you,
tell me, tell me, and I'll follow through.

Get up, get up, He's calling your name,
you don't have to be something you're not.
Get up, get up, He's calling your name,
you don't have to be something your're not.
Someday came suddenly and now I'm left standing here.

As I stare through these tears,
I see your lips start to turn.
This world is so un-perfect,
this love is so un-worth it.

When you're here I don't need all the things I had,
Once before I was someone but that's not who I am.
I'll be the best I can for You,
I'll take this chance You will be true.
Tell me Your reason why,
tell me why You're alive.

To give to You my sin,
to give myself again.

And this is my call to the faithful,
I'll be for only You.
Doing what You, have called me,
no one could ever understand,
my shame You took with those nails in Your hands.

Get up, get up, He's calling your name,
you don't have to be something you're not.
Get up, get up, He's calling your name,
you don't have to be something your're not.
Someday came suddenly.

Here's to selfish living out the window,
here's to the Holy Ghost, I will be faithful.

Here's to you I bring you new life.
Here's to you I bring you new life..

Lead me Lord.

Gods good morning to me.

I woke up to a friend that needed encouragement this morning. So, I went to the bible just looking for how she could be comforted by God promises.

"Rejoice in the Lord always, I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanks, present your present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends tall understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."

Philippians 4:4-7

There is a lot of depth to this versus.  "Rejoice in the Lord always, I will say it again: Rejoice!" 

I like how from the beginning it puts us where we need to be. Thanking and rejoicing that we have Christ. That rejoicing being in any circumstances, including suffering.

Foot note: Anxious: self-centered, counter productive worry not legitimate cares and concerns for the spread of the gospel.

I like.. "but in everything, by prayer and petition,"

Then it goes back to thanksgiving. I love how the Lord cares about what we think. So, much so that he listens to our requests and that we are even able to make requests to Him. Then at the end we see God giving peace that being totally opposite of anxious. 

I just getting really excited to know that God has a plan for my life and that nothing can stop what He has called me to.

Jeremiah 29:11 "I know the plans I have for you,"says the Lord,"Plans for good and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope."

So, not even that bad great on a test will stop what God has called me or even you too. Be encouraged in knowing that God loves you and he makes the impossible, possible.

more to come.. off to class for now.

peace.

I have decided, I have resolved, To wait upon you Lord.

This past week I gave up my normal spring break to find something more. Before spring break God had been working on me with these few scriptures.

"If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me." Matthew 16:24

"So likewise, whoever of you does not forsake all that he has cannot be My disciple." Luke 12:33

I have been working through what does it really mean to forsake all? And what if it is totally literal and that is what we are to do. I want to be in a spot where I am always dependent upon Christ to get me through. Now, as I am going through college I want to learn to be a good steward of my money. 

God has been working on me in "my plans" for my future..

Before spring break if someone was to ask me, "Jessica, where do you see yourself after college?"

I would reply that I really don't know because God hasn't showed me. Although I would say this I would become filled with anxiety and panic at the fact that I don't know what God has for me after school. I would then try to figure out what "my plan" for my life would be..

 All I know is Cody and I are getting married and sometime in the future we are called to Latin America, which requires no debt.

Through weeks and weeks of learning and the many speakers that are doing radical things with there lives, I have finally been able to trust the Lord with my future. I might not always be able to do this, but at this point I have peace. I must die to my plans of my future and grab on to what Christ has in store. This has been a work in progress. I have realized that I have trouble trusting and with God it doesn't come easy, but with this past school year God has taken the challenge and proven himself trustworthy. He has slowly changed my anxiety so, when I was asked this spring break what I was going to do after college I had peace.  I know that I can put my trust in Him and no matter what he is calling me to He will get me there in a way in which I am ready for that adjustment in my life. Through the speakers I realized that sometimes things are like a puzzle where God gives us a piece at a time. This piece is what we work on before we are granted the next. 

I am so thankful for God patience with me when I am stubborn and don't want to submit.

Love.

Lately I have been pondering this thought: It breaks my heart when people walk away from Christ. I have been learning that sometimes people have to walk away in order to really find Christ. God's love is just so amazing that even when we sin or walk away His love for us is the same.  I just can't wrap my mind around His love.

"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? As it is written:

For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered sheep to slaughtered. No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creations, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." Romans 8:35-39

I posted lyrics below. I think that if you think this is about a boy and a girl love you are missing the point.

Emery: Ten Talents.

Last night I had a dream, that you decided to leave me,

and no matter what I said, my persuasion fell upon your deaf ears.

Don't leave me here alone. I'm not so good on my own.

I'm not so good. I'm not so good on my own.

Is it too late? Am I too gone? Is there something I should know?

Am I working for nothing? WIll there ever be anything to show?

Is it true? I don't know what the storybooks have told.

Though I wouldn't be so bold to say so.

Will I do what I'm told? Will I play my hand or fold?

WIll I stand my ground and hold?  I would like to think so.

But if I just walked way, would you still save me?

Or would you take back all that you gave me?

Is it took late? Am I too gone? Is there something I should know?

Are we working for nothing? IS there anything to show for the service?

Is it worthless? All the waiting is the hardest part.

Come home my dear because I love you. I love you still.

It's a slap in the face when I fell my complacency grow. 

It's the thrill of the chase, when you catch it you just let it go.

I take for granted the grace that is given me daily I know.

How can you say that you love me  when all that I want.

All that I want is your blessing and then I am gone.

Nothing I do can make up for things I have done.

Your love is all we need. We're gonna make it.

So let's close our eye tonight and just believe.

---------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks for reading. Peace.

I need to invest in an umbrella.

So, this morning at a bible study we studied faith. We are reading a book called True Discipleship. I highly recommend it. Here are some quotes and scripture that really stuck out to me. Some of this is opinion and a lot of these is taken from True Discipleship. I have labeled.

TD:"If God commands, He enables. If He bids Peter to walk on the water, Peter can be sure that the needed power will be give. If He commands us to preach the gospel to every creature, we can be sure of the needed grace." 

Me:So,  God tells us to go lib and do some thing. All trust is in Him that we will be able to fulfill the task that he has promised. I have been thinking this week about how what in our hearts is holding us back from going all the way with God. Are we afraid that God couldn't fulfill that need in our hearts??

TD:"Faith begins where man's power ends."--- "Humanly speaking, it was impossible for Abraham and Sarah to have a child, But God had promised, and to Abraham there was only one impossibility--- that God could lie."

"Faith claims His promise, "If you can believe, all things are possible to him who believes."

Me: All i have to do is believe, but yet so many times I hold myself back.

TD:"Actually, faith is most reasonable. What is more reasonable than that a creature should trust his Creator? Faith in the Lord involves no risk whatever."

Me: No risk?? My thoughts were that it does involve a risk for me because what if  I fail.. Then I was reminded that its not me it is Him. Lack of trust  on my end.

Lastly,

TD:"Faith truly glorifies God it gives HIm HIs proper place as the One who is completely trustworthy. On the other hand, unbelief dishonors God it charges Him with lying"(1John 5:10)

Me: We are such a culture that needs proof by sight. We need to take hold of what He is saying in the Word and trust in Him. Its not through us, but through him.

Thanks for reading.

Me: Good stuff..

random.

So, i created this blog.. for no real reason. I figured I could put down some cool thoughts maybe some cool pictures??

We'll see how this goes:)

Alive in Christ...

Therefore, as you received Christ Jesus the Lord,so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.

Colossians 2:6-7