This is the verse that struck me today out of Romans:
"No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man's praise is not from men, but from God."
- Romans 2:29 -
The pieces of this that strike me the most are the following:
1. We are followers of Christ based on the circumcision of our HEARTS, not by the law. Yes, we are to be obedient to Jesus and follow what He says but the beauty of our relationship with Him comes with a huge dose of GRACE. We are incapable of following the law perfectly on our own. We NEED Him and He honors a submitted and surrendered heart.
2. Our praise comes from God. His praise and whispers to us should be what define us and what govern our thoughts towards ourselves. We can't let what other people and the world says about us to define how we feel about ourselves. Jesus LOVES us so we should love us. He made us.
In the book that I am reading right now - "The Furious Longing of God" by Brennan Manning, he encourages readers to take time everyday to stand with open hands lifted toward the sky and pray "Abba, I belong to You". That's it...it's that simple. It may seem silly or make me uncomfortable but I know the power that that tiny prayer could have over me.
I love Jesus. It is an adventure knowing Him and following Him. I'm more willing than ever to take that adventure on.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Our Hope
After thinking about this today, I think its pretty safe to say that...
We are hopeless without Jesus.
There is NOTHING that satisfies like He does. Every need of your heart and soul and mind is met by His perfect truth and grace.
It's ridiculous how much we avoid Him and run from Him and try to do things on our own. Every time it ends in exhaustion, not always failure because God is so good that He makes good out of anything. But it drains us and leaves us frail and empty, striving for more. My heart longs for more of Jesus, yet I am so resistent to abide in Him.
As soon as I spend time with the Lord, listening to Him and believing Him, things begin to make sense and fall in line and burdens begin to roll off me. It's CRAZY how He works, it truly is.
It's CRAZY that we're in communication with the Creator of the Universe and that He is IN LOVE WITH US.
If you don't know the Lord and have never spent time with Him, I beg you to do so. Even if you think you got your life figured out. Even if you're happy......you've never known what life can be if you haven't met the one who knows exactly what you need and how those needs can be met.
Meet your Maker.
We are hopeless without Jesus.
There is NOTHING that satisfies like He does. Every need of your heart and soul and mind is met by His perfect truth and grace.
It's ridiculous how much we avoid Him and run from Him and try to do things on our own. Every time it ends in exhaustion, not always failure because God is so good that He makes good out of anything. But it drains us and leaves us frail and empty, striving for more. My heart longs for more of Jesus, yet I am so resistent to abide in Him.
As soon as I spend time with the Lord, listening to Him and believing Him, things begin to make sense and fall in line and burdens begin to roll off me. It's CRAZY how He works, it truly is.
It's CRAZY that we're in communication with the Creator of the Universe and that He is IN LOVE WITH US.
If you don't know the Lord and have never spent time with Him, I beg you to do so. Even if you think you got your life figured out. Even if you're happy......you've never known what life can be if you haven't met the one who knows exactly what you need and how those needs can be met.
Meet your Maker.
Thursday, April 22, 2010
2 Thessalonians
It's been a while.
2 Thessalonians 3:5
"Now may the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God and into the patience of Christ" (NKJV)
"May the Lord direct your hearts into God's love and Christ's perseverance" (NIV)
"May the Master take you by hand and lead you along the path of God's love and Christ's endurance" (Message)
"May the Lord lead your hearts into a full understanding and expression of the love of God and the patient endurance that comes from Christ" (NLT)
No matter how you say it, this brings me so much peace!! Because....it is what I need to be free and to live with all the life that God has given me and will continue to give me.
This is a season of breaking free and letting the Lord rule my heart which will guide me. It's time to stop thinking so much and dive in.
Thank you Jesus for starting to pry my fingers off of the control I've been holding on to for my whole life. Thank You for Your patience and Your love and Your peace and Your love that just keeps getting better and better as I see more of it. Thank You for adventure and for life and for my future husband who loves You so much and shows me these things daily.
I love You. It feels good to be back on here.
2 Thessalonians 3:5
"Now may the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God and into the patience of Christ" (NKJV)
"May the Lord direct your hearts into God's love and Christ's perseverance" (NIV)
"May the Master take you by hand and lead you along the path of God's love and Christ's endurance" (Message)
"May the Lord lead your hearts into a full understanding and expression of the love of God and the patient endurance that comes from Christ" (NLT)
No matter how you say it, this brings me so much peace!! Because....it is what I need to be free and to live with all the life that God has given me and will continue to give me.
This is a season of breaking free and letting the Lord rule my heart which will guide me. It's time to stop thinking so much and dive in.
Thank you Jesus for starting to pry my fingers off of the control I've been holding on to for my whole life. Thank You for Your patience and Your love and Your peace and Your love that just keeps getting better and better as I see more of it. Thank You for adventure and for life and for my future husband who loves You so much and shows me these things daily.
I love You. It feels good to be back on here.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
1 John 3
So I was planning on reading a few more chapters in 1 John and I read a few verses and came to these verses.
These verses are enough to meditate on for a lifetime I think.
3:16-18 - "By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. "
The greatest commandment is LOVE. Love comes in many different forms. People lay down their lives for others in many different ways. People serve others in many different ways. But the point is to do what God commanded us to do and love people. And not only that, but he is saying that it's not enough to just speak it....but sometimes actions speak louder than words!!
Aaron and I just finished reading the book, "Crazy Love" and theres a chapter in it that gives mini biographies of several believers who have just lived incredible lives devoted to following Jesus. After we read it, both of us just wanted to jump up and go out and do something of eternal importance. We wanted to serve and love and be Jesus to people who don't know Him.
Jesus wants us to be like that all the time. He wants us to live our lives for others with a sense of urgency. He LOVES us so intimately...and we should share that love with everyone around us.
Thank You Jesus for your undescribable love. I pray that Your love would pour out from me to everyone I encounter...because I can't do it on my own. But You are so good. Lord, put me in people's paths that You want to touch and speak to. Help me to live my life selflessly.
These verses are enough to meditate on for a lifetime I think.
3:16-18 - "By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world's goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth. "
The greatest commandment is LOVE. Love comes in many different forms. People lay down their lives for others in many different ways. People serve others in many different ways. But the point is to do what God commanded us to do and love people. And not only that, but he is saying that it's not enough to just speak it....but sometimes actions speak louder than words!!
Aaron and I just finished reading the book, "Crazy Love" and theres a chapter in it that gives mini biographies of several believers who have just lived incredible lives devoted to following Jesus. After we read it, both of us just wanted to jump up and go out and do something of eternal importance. We wanted to serve and love and be Jesus to people who don't know Him.
Jesus wants us to be like that all the time. He wants us to live our lives for others with a sense of urgency. He LOVES us so intimately...and we should share that love with everyone around us.
Thank You Jesus for your undescribable love. I pray that Your love would pour out from me to everyone I encounter...because I can't do it on my own. But You are so good. Lord, put me in people's paths that You want to touch and speak to. Help me to live my life selflessly.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
1 John 1-2
These chapters of 1 John make my heart feel light. They make me drop my burdens at the feet of the Lord and be swept away by His love and His goodness.
1:5, 7 "...God is light and in Him is no darkness at all." "But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin"
I was reading in the commentary part of my Bible and it said that "to walk in the light is to live in such a way that one is enlightened by the truth of who God is". I LOVED this description. Sometimes, we think that to "walk in the light" means to just not sin and to obey the commands of the Lord and do what we're supposed to do. But there's SO much more than that! Jesus is so much more than that and LOVE is so much more than that.
Who is God?? And what does it mean to live in such a way that we are enlightened by the truth of who God is??
God is grace. God is TRUTH. God is JOY. God is peace. God is strength. God is patience. God is magnificent. God is eternal. God is creative. God is everything...and most importantly God is LOVE.
There is so much to Him and the greatest part of it is that He loves us and He wants us to abandon our lives and walk according to His light. Sometimes that seems like a difficult thing but its not at all!!! It's freedom from ourselves and our sinful nature.
2:6 - "He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked"
Again from my commentary.....it talked about abiding as habitual obedience and gave the example of abiding to be like settling down in Christ or resting in Him.
I rarely rest in Christ. I need to do that. I'm pretty darn sure He's worthy of my trust.
2:16 - "For all that is in the world - the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life - is not of the Father but is of the world"
I don't want anything to do with any of that junk. I think sometimes we forget how set apart Jesus is and how set apart our lives should be if we are truly walking in the light. Not in a legalistic or religious sense but in our love and our joy. I think that Christians are much less loving, joyful, and risk-taking than we ought to be if we are truly "walking in the light". I think that the message Jesus brought is much lighter than people think it is. The gospel is much simpler than people think it is. But we like to overcomplicate things and make them heavy. Yup, I like to do that sometimes.
2:21 - "I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and that no lie is of the truth."
Father, help me to truly know this. Help me to know Your voice above anything else and help me to trust in Your truth. Help me to know and believe and cling to the fact that anything that is not part of Your truth is a lie.
2:28 - "And now little children, abide in Him, that when He appears, we may have confidence and not be ashamed at His coming."
Oh I long to have faith like a child. I long to live my life as a little child of God. I guess I should just do that, huh? Instead of letting other things tell me that I can't...that life is too complicated for that. I had a teenage student come into my classroom today and sit down looking like the world was about to end. I asked her what was wrong and she just said "life is really difficult". As soon as she said that I told her that it didn't have to be if she didn't want it to be.
I'm sure that's what Jesus wants to tell me all the time. He does tell me that all the time, its just sometimes I don't listen, haha. Silly me.
1:5, 7 "...God is light and in Him is no darkness at all." "But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin"
I was reading in the commentary part of my Bible and it said that "to walk in the light is to live in such a way that one is enlightened by the truth of who God is". I LOVED this description. Sometimes, we think that to "walk in the light" means to just not sin and to obey the commands of the Lord and do what we're supposed to do. But there's SO much more than that! Jesus is so much more than that and LOVE is so much more than that.
Who is God?? And what does it mean to live in such a way that we are enlightened by the truth of who God is??
God is grace. God is TRUTH. God is JOY. God is peace. God is strength. God is patience. God is magnificent. God is eternal. God is creative. God is everything...and most importantly God is LOVE.
There is so much to Him and the greatest part of it is that He loves us and He wants us to abandon our lives and walk according to His light. Sometimes that seems like a difficult thing but its not at all!!! It's freedom from ourselves and our sinful nature.
2:6 - "He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked"
Again from my commentary.....it talked about abiding as habitual obedience and gave the example of abiding to be like settling down in Christ or resting in Him.
I rarely rest in Christ. I need to do that. I'm pretty darn sure He's worthy of my trust.
2:16 - "For all that is in the world - the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life - is not of the Father but is of the world"
I don't want anything to do with any of that junk. I think sometimes we forget how set apart Jesus is and how set apart our lives should be if we are truly walking in the light. Not in a legalistic or religious sense but in our love and our joy. I think that Christians are much less loving, joyful, and risk-taking than we ought to be if we are truly "walking in the light". I think that the message Jesus brought is much lighter than people think it is. The gospel is much simpler than people think it is. But we like to overcomplicate things and make them heavy. Yup, I like to do that sometimes.
2:21 - "I have not written to you because you do not know the truth, but because you know it, and that no lie is of the truth."
Father, help me to truly know this. Help me to know Your voice above anything else and help me to trust in Your truth. Help me to know and believe and cling to the fact that anything that is not part of Your truth is a lie.
2:28 - "And now little children, abide in Him, that when He appears, we may have confidence and not be ashamed at His coming."
Oh I long to have faith like a child. I long to live my life as a little child of God. I guess I should just do that, huh? Instead of letting other things tell me that I can't...that life is too complicated for that. I had a teenage student come into my classroom today and sit down looking like the world was about to end. I asked her what was wrong and she just said "life is really difficult". As soon as she said that I told her that it didn't have to be if she didn't want it to be.
I'm sure that's what Jesus wants to tell me all the time. He does tell me that all the time, its just sometimes I don't listen, haha. Silly me.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Philippians
I have read the book of Philippians tons and tons and tons of times. There are some incredible verses in Philippians that inspire and change hearts. But sometimes its hard to connect it to reality (like many other parts of the Word). We often read the scriptures as a bunch of principles rather than reading them as if they are the bread that fuels us.
This book is very convicting. Paul describes his walk with the Lord and his relationship with the Lord in many different ways. Plus, Paul is writing this while he is imprisoned for sharing his faith. I mean if you think about Paul's situation, it sucks. While I was reading this book, I tried to imagine a situation I've been in that was just really really crappy....and I tried to remember if I felt the same way about Christ that Paul did.
1:21 - "For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain"
Is Christ everything to me? I say that He is and I know deep down in my heart that He is but I definitely don't live like that all the time. Yesterday, my pastor spoke about "clinging" to God and asked if that's how we lived our lives....clinging to God. I think the hardest part of that for me is letting go of all the other junk that I want to try to control that is necessary to let go of so that I CAN cling to God.
1:27 - "Only let your conduct be worthy of the gospel of Christ"
This is also convicting. I want everything I do to radiate Christ. I don't want to love Jesus or do things because I feel like I have to or in some sort of legalistic sense. I want to live out Jesus. I want to interact with people the way He did. I want to love people the way He did. I want to live out the freedom that He has given us and not be strapped down by rules and regulations.
His love is incredible. His love goes beyond anything I could ever imagine and I think I've learned that more this past several months than ever before. It's like the more you learn about Jesus and His love, the more of a mystery He becomes because its just so hard to fathom that He could be THAT good, that He could love you THAT much. But I think when we start to grasp that and walk in that daily, that is when we will walk out the gospel without even trying.
2:12 - "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling"
Relationships take work. To be in a relationship with Jesus takes work but I believe it could be the greatest way to possibly live your life. It is the biggest adventure you could go on. Sometimes it's hard or scary or boring but that's how it is with any relationship.
3:13 - "...But one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus"
God is constantly renewing us which is so incredible because He knows that we need it. He knows that we are human and that we'll screw up....but He allows us to forget things from the past off and shake off those mistakes and failures so that we can press forward, getting closer and closer to Him each day. As we get closer and closer to Him, we become more and more like Him.
4:13 - "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me"
You hear this all the time from people who walk with Jesus and from people who don't. It's become so cliche and its something that just comes out of our mouths. But I guess the question I'm asking myself now is if I really believe it? If I do believe it, then why do I worry about foolish things and hold on to burdens?
I think that my prayer today is that God would help me to apply the scriptures that I've read so many times before to my daily life....that they would become real to me. Sometimes, it's hard to walk out these truths in reality which is kind of sad because these truths should be our reality.
Are the scriptures something you just read? Or do you breathe scriptures and walk and live by them?
I know that most of the time lately, I have not been doing the latter but I desperately want to. Even if the world constantly tells me the opposite of what Jesus says, I want to strive to live out His love and change reality for other people. Help me to do that Lord.
This book is very convicting. Paul describes his walk with the Lord and his relationship with the Lord in many different ways. Plus, Paul is writing this while he is imprisoned for sharing his faith. I mean if you think about Paul's situation, it sucks. While I was reading this book, I tried to imagine a situation I've been in that was just really really crappy....and I tried to remember if I felt the same way about Christ that Paul did.
1:21 - "For to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain"
Is Christ everything to me? I say that He is and I know deep down in my heart that He is but I definitely don't live like that all the time. Yesterday, my pastor spoke about "clinging" to God and asked if that's how we lived our lives....clinging to God. I think the hardest part of that for me is letting go of all the other junk that I want to try to control that is necessary to let go of so that I CAN cling to God.
1:27 - "Only let your conduct be worthy of the gospel of Christ"
This is also convicting. I want everything I do to radiate Christ. I don't want to love Jesus or do things because I feel like I have to or in some sort of legalistic sense. I want to live out Jesus. I want to interact with people the way He did. I want to love people the way He did. I want to live out the freedom that He has given us and not be strapped down by rules and regulations.
His love is incredible. His love goes beyond anything I could ever imagine and I think I've learned that more this past several months than ever before. It's like the more you learn about Jesus and His love, the more of a mystery He becomes because its just so hard to fathom that He could be THAT good, that He could love you THAT much. But I think when we start to grasp that and walk in that daily, that is when we will walk out the gospel without even trying.
2:12 - "Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling"
Relationships take work. To be in a relationship with Jesus takes work but I believe it could be the greatest way to possibly live your life. It is the biggest adventure you could go on. Sometimes it's hard or scary or boring but that's how it is with any relationship.
3:13 - "...But one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus"
God is constantly renewing us which is so incredible because He knows that we need it. He knows that we are human and that we'll screw up....but He allows us to forget things from the past off and shake off those mistakes and failures so that we can press forward, getting closer and closer to Him each day. As we get closer and closer to Him, we become more and more like Him.
4:13 - "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me"
You hear this all the time from people who walk with Jesus and from people who don't. It's become so cliche and its something that just comes out of our mouths. But I guess the question I'm asking myself now is if I really believe it? If I do believe it, then why do I worry about foolish things and hold on to burdens?
I think that my prayer today is that God would help me to apply the scriptures that I've read so many times before to my daily life....that they would become real to me. Sometimes, it's hard to walk out these truths in reality which is kind of sad because these truths should be our reality.
Are the scriptures something you just read? Or do you breathe scriptures and walk and live by them?
I know that most of the time lately, I have not been doing the latter but I desperately want to. Even if the world constantly tells me the opposite of what Jesus says, I want to strive to live out His love and change reality for other people. Help me to do that Lord.
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