My Psalms

Disciples

2011-04-22T08:05:00.000-07:00

Matthew 10 - 12

I LOVE reading these chapters. It's like getting a front row seat to learn what it really means to be a disciple of Christ. He leads by example and shows and tells them what to do and how to follow Him.

In chapter 10, I feel like Jesus is mostly warning His disciples. He is telling them that they WILL encounter persecution, they WILL encounter suffering and division. I listened to a couple messages recently about suffering and both pastors were saying that if you don't encounter persecution in your life, then something may be wrong. That doesn't mean that we have to invite it in and seek after suffering, but that is something Jesus says will accompany a walk with Him. BUT, he also promises this:

"Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it"

I want to find my life....and Jesus says that the only way to do that is to lose my life for his sake, so that is what I will do.

In chapter 12, what really struck me was the Pharisees reaction to Jesus. He's walking around teaching and performing miracles, and they question him. They try to pick out things that he is doing wrong, things that are "unlawful". Jesus disagrees with what they say and he heals a man on the Sabbath. In response, the Pharisees went out and plot how to kill him.

As I read this, I was trying to figure out why they rejected him and why they were so shaken by him. Then, I thought about myself and why some of the things Jesus says and does shake me and make me so uncomfortable. For me, I think it's because I don't want to give up control. I have my own idea of what life should be like, how people should act, and what Jesus should be. We all do because we're human. But, I don't want to be like the Pharisees...I don't want to reject the things of Jesus because it offends me or makes me uncomfortable. Instead, I want to offer those parts of my heart and mind to Him and allow Him to break them down and renew them. I know that thinking and loving like Jesus is going to look and be different than what we see most of the time all around us.

Following Jesus is a risk. We are guaranteed to be persecuted and we have to die to ourselves. That doesn't sound all that great. So is this risk worth taking?? It seems like a gamble until you actually step out in faith and see that Jesus backs up everything He says. He DOES give abundant life, He DOES meet all our needs, He is who He says He is.

I would rather take the risk and gain life.

Your Love Never Fails

2011-04-21T18:36:00.000-07:00

You stay the same through the ages
Your love never changes
There may be pain in the night
But joy comes in the morning

And when the oceans rage
I don't have to be afraid
Because I know that You love me

Your love never fails

You make all things work together for my good.

Revolution

2011-04-20T07:32:00.000-07:00

Jesus is a revolution. He is doing a revolutionary movement in my heart and in my mind. These past few months have probably been some of the hardest months of my life. I have been in a mental struggle with myself and the Lord about who I am, who Jesus is, the security I have in God, and what life is all about. There have been times where I felt completely and totally lost and out of control. Now looking back on those times - I laugh knowing that its much better for God to be in control than for me to. The Lord has brought issues to the forefront of my mind that I need to deal with - the biggest of which is fear. I have lived many days of my life in fear - mostly fear of Satan because he is the driving force behind everything evil in this world. I see all of the destruction, depression, chaos, and confusion in the world and in myself and it scares me. It made me question the power of God and what the love of Christ would bring to a world controlled by darkness.

It has made me truly question to the depth what I believe about Christ, who He is and what He is capable of. I have questioned who I am and who I want to be and who the Lord made me to be. The conclusion that I have come to is that Jesus is Life. There is NOTHING that He can't handle. There is NOTHING that He can't save someone from. In the words of David Platt,

"...Satan not only acts within the sovereign permission of God but also ends up accomplishing the sovereign purposes of God....We have nothing to fear because God is sovereign" (Radical, pg. 173)

That will be the conclusion that I come to in every struggle of my life for the rest of my days. I am fully convinced that there is no other purpose in life than to be in love with Jesus Christ and live a life glorifying to Him. There is truly nothing else worth living for. I have wrestled and argued with God and been angry with Him and asked Him tons and tons of questions and what He proves to me every time is that He is the answer - He gives life abundantly. (Please note - that abundant life in Christ is very different than what the American definition of it would be) There is nothing in this world that compares to the love of Jesus. It breaks my heart to think of the tons and tons of people that have never felt complete and total love - and even better yet love from someone who knows EVERY detail about them - every failure, every sin, every victory, every thought.

He has given me the freedom to be the woman that He made me to be and to live in faith. In Jesus, there is freedom. There is not freedom apart from Christ. He IS the way, the truth, and the life. No matter how hard you try to find life apart from Him, you will never find it. There is only one way.

I have fallen in love with Jesus in a new way over the past few months. I feel closer to Him than ever before. I have exposed myself to Him and surrendered my heart and my mind and He is good enough to hold me securely in His hands. In exchange for my fears and sin, He gave me freedom.

My desire is to be completely consumed by Him and to live a reckless and radical life for Him. I know that a life lived for the purpose of His kingdom will bring more adventure, joy, and love than I could ever imagine. I also know that it will bring persecution and suffering......to this I say, bring it on because I trust in who God is. I mean, come on...He's GOD.

Things I am learning...

2010-12-09T13:35:00.001-08:00

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.

Our Hope

2010-04-28T15:32:00.000-07:00

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.

2 Thessalonians

2010-04-22T12:22:00.001-07:00

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.

1 John 3

2010-01-27T16:25:00.001-08:00

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.

1 John 1-2

2010-01-26T16:11:00.001-08:00

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.

Philippians

2010-01-25T15:02:00.000-08:00

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.

Psalm 139

2009-11-08T10:41:00.000-08:00

This psalm speaks to the intimacy of our relationship with God.

He KNOWS us....in the deepest and most intimate ways possible. There are no shields or walls or barriers that we can put up to hide things from Him or to try to protect ourselves from Him. It doesn't work. He sees right through us....our strengths, our weaknesses, our victories, our shortcomings, our desires, our sin, our passions, our joy, everything about us. He created us, He delights in us, He works in us, and He LOVES us....no matter what He sees in us.

I know that we can't fully grasp this concept and I think that we don't even try sometimes. We miss out on so much because we don't really know what that love is like. We don't experience love like that in most of our earthly relationships. The kind of love where someone can really SEE you for who you are and who Jesus created you to be and intimately loves every part of you.

It is really scary to feel that kind of love from Jesus but His is PERFECT. At least it's scary for me...it makes me want to run sometimes or just shut down. It's even scarier to feel that kind of love from someone else because our love is not perfect and is guaranteed to fall short of Christ's love for us. But if we don't take the risk, then we will miss out on so much.

We spend so much time trying to protect ourselves, trying not to get hurt, trying not to look bad and expose our weaknesses. Meanwhile, we are putting up walls that block us from truly loving one another as brothers and sisters in Christ, as husbands and wives, as family, as friends. But that is all Jesus wants us to do.

That's the key to life. Love. Love crosses all boundaries, it breaks all the rules, it surpasses all knowledge and understanding. That is how you breakthrough into people's hearts...is with LOVE, the kind of love that you could only know because Christ loved you first.

139:1-3 - "Lord, You have searched me and known me. You know my sitting down and my rising up; You understand my thoughts afar off. You comprehend my path and my lying down"

139: 7 - "Where can I go from Your Spirit? Or where can I flee from Your presence?"

This morning during worship, I could actually feel Jesus pursuing me. I felt weak and broken but He made a point to let me know that He sees me and He loves me. I think that for so long I didn't want to be truly seen by anyone but now...I DESPERATELY want to be seen and known by Jesus because that is the only thing that satisfies. His love sustains me.

But allowing Jesus in isn't the end of it....then He wants us to allow others in. He wants us to bare our hearts to other people...to surrender ourselves and let down our defenses to let others into our lives and our hearts. It's RISKY...but its worth it and the fruit is so great! At the same time, He wants us to pursue others like He pursues us and show them that we LOVE them. The only way that we can truly and fully love people is if we do take down our guards and show them who we really are.

Lord, help me to see and know the people around me. Help me to look past myself and see their hearts as You see them so that I can love them as You do.

Love crushes any stronghold.

139:17 - "How precious are Your thoughts to me, O God! How great is the sum of them! If I should count them, they would be more in number than the sand!"

139:23-24 - "Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my anxieties; And see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting"

That is my prayer.

Exodus 5 - 13:22, Psalm 93

2009-10-20T15:45:00.000-07:00

Ok so here is the exodus. God leads his people out. He gives them the freedom that He had been promising them for hundreds of years. He always follows through with His promises.

Through all sorts of signs and wonders, God shows His sovereignty to the Israelites and the Egyptians. And eventually, He leads His people out.

Lately, God is such a mystery to me. I have absolutely no idea why He does some of the things He does. Sometimes we LOVE what He does and sometimes not so much. Either way, its history like this that makes me realize it doesn't really matter if we like it or not but He WILL do whatever He wants and eventually it'll make sense to us. Or at least I think it will.

I mean if you think about it....the Israelites probably had no hope. I mean they were slaves living miserable lives and then this crazy guy comes and tells them that God is going to keep His promise and lead them out. If it were me, I'd ask where God had been all these years. But then, like He always does, He would prove Himself to me, show how awesome He is and I would understand that not everything He does will make perfect sense to me. And it doesn't have to.

When you realize that God is a mystery, thats when you really start trusting and having faith. And thats when He meets you and your relationship with Him is set on fire.

So as I was reading Exodus, I thought of the Psalms and read a few of those. I read this commentary in my Bible about the royal psalms and how they are all about how God is KING. This concept of God being a mystery but also being king has revolutionized my life over the past year because it has taught me to let go and trust in the truth that He reigns.

Psalm 93 - "The Lord reigns, He is clothed with majesty; The Lord is clothed, He has girded Himself with strength. Surely the world is established, so that it cannot be moved. Your throne is established from of old; You are from everlasting. The floods have lifted up, O Lord, the floods have lifted up their voice; the floods lift up their waves.

The Lord on high is mightier than the noise of many waters, than the mighty waves of the sea.

Your testimonies are very sure, Holiness adores Your house, O Lord, forever. "

Gosh, I could read these verses over and over and over all day long, haha. It is hard sometimes to walk in the truth that God REIGNS!!!! But that is the most powerful and consuming truth that I could ever imagine. It makes my heart want to burst forth with praise.

I want Jesus to reign over everything that I am. And reign in me and through me. I know that He does and He will forever. That will never change. How awesome it is to know that.

Exodus 1:1 - 4:17

2009-10-04T11:37:00.000-07:00

I love Exodus. I think that people should read Exodus like once a month, haha. Just so that we can be reminded of the FREEDOM that we have!!!!

So first of all, we see what kind of irrational and drastic things people do out of fear. The new Pharoah in Egypt gets so scared of what the Israelites could do to his people that he decides to make them slaves and kill all their sons. Wow, way to go there buddy.

So we have Moses who is spared and through God's provision and unchallengable sovereignty, he is adopted by the Pharoah's wife. I mean come on, only God can do something like that.

But Moses starts to see the injustice that is happening and starts to take action against the Egyptians so he ends up having to flee the country.

So the very first thing that happens once he flees is that God gives him a wife....haha what??? That seems so random to me. But I guess God knew what he needed. Then we read this...

2:23 - "Then the children of Israel groaned because of the bondage, and they cried out; their cry came up to God because of the bondage. So God heard their groaning and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God looked upon the children of Israel, and God acknowledged them"

This is so KEY to remember ALL THE TIME...God ALWAYS hears our cry. He always hears us. Whenever we groan, He is there.

And not only that......but He ALWAYS does something about it! Sometimes He does things in totally different ways that we would hope or expect but He ALWAYS does something about it.

So in one day Moses life is drastically changed. I think reading about this is so hilarious because its written so casually like crap like this happens all the time.

Moses whole world was revolutionized in like 5 minutes.

So he sees this bush that is burning. The first good thing that Moses did here is that he did not ignore it. God gives us little nudgings and promptings all the time but we have to decide not to ignore them and to follow Him every step of the way. That is how doors are opened and change unfolds.

So here he is, encountering GOD....and this is what God says to him...

3:8 - "I have come down to deliver them (the Israelites) out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites."

3:10 - "Come now, therefore, and I will send YOU to Pharoah that you may bring My people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt"

Okay that is a HUGE calling. I bet Moses was flipping out. Randomly one day, God comes and tells him that HE is going to deliver His people.

God is unpredictable. Things like this just make it so clear to me that it is SO silly to try to figure out what God is going to do and try to control your own life. He is God. He does whatever He wants. We need to be open to whatever He has for us at whatever time He has it for us.

The message at church today was about how we shouldn't "chase the wind" meaning that we shouldn't depend on our fleshly dreams and passions and always be trying to figure out what we're going to do next for God. We should allow God to plant His own dreams and passions in our hearts and allow Him to develop those in His perfect timing because His timing is perfect. Just be content in where He has you and follow Him so closely that you won't miss any of His promptings.

I'm sure Moses was wondering what the heck he was supposed to do with his life. He had seen the injustice that was going on and he wanted to take action on it. He probably felt a little bit useless out there in the desert. But then look at how God shows up and reveals His plan so unexpectedly and so clearly.

So how does Moses react? He freaks out a little bit which is totally expected. The Lord just continues to affirm and reaffirm that He is there with him.

It is NOT about Moses and who he is. It is about GOD and who He is and what He can do through Moses.

4:15 - "I will be with your mouth and with his mouth, and I will teach you what you shall do"

This is one of my favorite verses ever I think. It always encourages me when I feel like I have nothing to offer. He is always strong through our weaknesses!!!

Job 32:1 - 39:30

2009-10-01T16:50:00.001-07:00

Here He comes!!! hahaha I can't even imagine being confronted by God like Job is. I mean thats CRAZY!! I have nothing really to say about these passages. I think that God's words stand alone. Nothing should be added to them. Out of allllllll the verses, my favorite is the very first question that God asks Job...

38:4 - "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?"

That is just breathtaking to me.

God is GOD. He reigns. And He loves us!!!!

He can do whatever He wants, whenever He wants. And whatever that is is promised to be PERFECT!!

He is so amazing. I am so in awe of Him.

Job 26:1 - 31:40

2009-09-28T14:20:00.000-07:00

Job's mind is still spinning around and around. There are times where it seems like he is content in knowing that God is God and He holds him in his palm. There are other times where he is questioning God and asking for the things he has done wrong and for reasons as to why God is torturing him.

Such is life.

That's what we all do in our lives in different ways. We (or at least I) go around in circles. We try to handle things on our own until we reach the end of our strength and we are desperate. In our desperation, we seek God because we have no other choice. We grow in the Lord but when we start getting too comfortable, we start depending on ourselves again and not submitting to the Lord. Then the cycle repeats.

But this can't be another reason for us to claim that we are human and that we can't do any better. Or for us to condemn ourselves and feel horrible about life. No, this IS life. It is a growing process. As the Lord teaches us, we learn and we must commit to following His ways and applying that teaching everyday.

I LOVE the verses in Chapter 26: 5 - 13. Basically, Job is talking about how majestic and powerful God is.

When we remember His greatness, it puts everything back into perspective.

Yesterday, my mind and my heart were worrying about something. Yesterday evening, I got to take a beaaaautiful road trip for a couple hours during the sunset. Even though this sounds cheesy, as I looked around and saw God's beauty, it kind of made me realize that I was being a moron and worrying over nothing.

And then it gets better....

26:14 - "Indeed these are the mere edges of His ways, and how small a whisper we hear of Him! But the thunder of His power who can understand?"

We can only see a glimpse of who God is.

Sometimes that is AMAZING to think about and other times it is frustrating because we want to see more.

But I am learning to embrace the mystery of God.

Job 19:1 - 25:6

2009-09-23T12:54:00.000-07:00

19:25 - "For I know that my Redeemer lives.."

I've heard that so verse so many times but I never knew that it came out of Job's mouth. That fact makes it even more meaningful! That a man going through as much strife as Job uttered those words.

That should be our attitude, our belief, and what we cling to no matter what we are going through.

Job and his friends are still going back and forth. However, Job's words are focusing more and more on the Lord. It's kinda like as he is talking this through with his friends, he is realizing how awesome God is.

His friends constantly acknowledge the sovereignty and power of the Lord but they miss key characteristics of Him. For example, Eliphaz's accusations of Job and his description of God make it seem that we have to earn our relationship with God and that it is all based on if we do good, offer sacrifices, and don't sin.

That is not who God is. And that is not the relationship that He wants with us.

Job talks a little bit about his relationship with God....I think that it illustrates well what we should strive for...

23:10 - "When He has tested me, I shall come forth as gold. My foot has held fast to His steps; I have kept His way and not turned aside. I have not departed from the commandments of His lips; I have treasured the words of His mouth more than my necessary food. "

Oh. my. goodness.

That is convicting but AWESOME!!! That is my prayer for my life....that it would look like that. That's all I want out of life.

Then about God he says...

23:13-15 - "But He is unique, and who can make Him change? And whatever His soul desires, that He does. For He performs what is appointed for me, and many such things are with Him. "

God is all powerful. He does whatver He wants. But we shoud be so thankful that whatever He does is out of love because He is love.

Isaiah 43:18-19 - "Do not remember the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing.

I am reading this book, "Jesus Wants to Save Christians" with a small group and the chapter we just read talks about this verse. When we discussed it the other night, this verse made me think of Job and his circumstances.

I realized that a lot of times I look at Job and how awful he had it and I admire him for his faith. But then I thought about this verse....and how THIS should be our focus all. the. time.

Rise above the circumstances.

If I would do that on a regular basis, my life would be so much easier, haha. I think that God wants us to love Him so much that even if we ARE in a situation like Job's, we simply trust that He will do a new thing.

Definitely easier said than done.

But it is true.

Job 15:1 - 18:21

2009-09-21T15:21:00.000-07:00

The discussion continues between Job and his friends...

Job's tone is still hopeless. However, I think that these passages show that it is good to talk things through. God reveals Himself to us in discussion and relationships with other people.

That's about all I have to say today!!

Job 8:1 - 14:22

2009-09-20T09:41:00.000-07:00

It's weird to read through someone's struggles. But it's also cool to see his intimate relationship with the Lord.

Job is as low as you can get. He speaks with very little hope. Which in my eyes is understandable considering all that he lost. He is pleading with God for verses and verses trying to get just a bit of understanding of what is going on in his life.

That's how I feel right now. I would not compare my life to Job's because I have not lost anything comparable to what he lost. But in my life right now, the enemy is doing everything he can to take away all hope in my heart in all areas of my life.

Job also has these friends....that although they seem to love the Lord, their advice to him is not the greatest. They are convinced that God is punishing him for some sort of sin he has commited. They are rebuking him for pleading with God and wrestling with God. They are telling him to repent immediately.

But Job doesn't really listen to him. I'm not sure what Job thinks. He seems angry. Job questions God and basically asks Him why He would create Him if He was going to put Him through all this anguish.

But in the midst of all his pleas, he says this:

13:15 - "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him."

It's kind of like Job is in this place in his life where he is completely miserable and he feels as if he has nothing to hold on to. But no matter how angry or sad or depressed that makes him, at the core of his being he KNOWS God and he cannot deny that. He knows that he has no other choice but to at least try to trust God.

That is the key. God wants us to be satisfied in Him. He wants us to be completely fulfilled by Him. Everything else is an extra bonus.

When we feel like we have nothing, when we feel lonely and afraid, that's when He wants us to at least try to trust Him. And the more we do, the more He will meet us and sooner or later, we will realize that He is the only thing that truly satisfies.

There are times in my life where I believe that God truly satisfies me and there are times when I do not. Sometimes it takes circumstances like Job's to get to that place of belief. I'm not saying that we will go through circumstances such as his. But remember, God uses everything for His good.

I get so angry with God sometimes and similar to human relationships, I just wish I could run away. But in the core of my being, I know God. And I cannot deny it. So in the depths of whatever Satan throws at me or the pits that I have created out of emotions and fears, I will try to trust Him and I know He will pull me out every time.

Job 1:1 - 7:21

2009-09-15T15:30:00.001-07:00

Oh Job. What a guy, what a guy. So Job is basically this guy that God loves. He calls him "righteous". One day, all the angels come before God and Satan comes as well. The Lord asks him, where do you come from...

1:7 - "So Satan answered the Lord and said, 'From going to and fro on the earth, and from walking back and forth on it'"

Satan is our enemy. He is constantly watching us and finding ways to destroy us.

God gives Satan permission to test Job.

This shows several things. First, it shows that God is sovereign and ultimately has all control. Secondly, it shows that God sometimes allows Satan to test us.

Why?

I would think that it is because God knows what good can come out of our faith being tested. He never intends evil for us and He never gives us more than we can handle. So by allowing us to be "sifted", He is allowing our faith and joy and hope to be strengthened.

Job loses everything: his family, his property, his posessions, and then ultimately his health.

It's not often that we lose as much as Job lost but I know that there are seasons when everyone feels like Job felt. Completely hopeless...like they've lost everything.

How would I react if I were Job? I would think that I would have no choice but to depend on the Lord if I wanted to save my life. There is no other way out.

I think about the seasons when I have felt hopeless (this season in my life being one of them), and I realize that these are the times when I am closest with the Lord, walking side by side with Him and learning from Him. Why? Because, in my eyes, I have no other choice.

Job's friends come to comfort him and try to give him advice. The first guy, Eliphaz, basically says that all of this trouble must be happening because Job must have sinned and he deserves it.

I think that this is often our attitude as Christians...We are inherently judgmental and when we see calamity in other's lives, sometimes we just assume that they deserve it and are filthy sinners.

Jesus doesn't look at us that way. He is gracious. He forgives.

This story proves that. Job didn't necessarily do anything to "deserve" what happened to him. God allowed it to happen but I don't think that it is punishment. And I am certain that the Lord worked it all out for good.

Although Eliphaz's theory isn't completely accurate, some of the ways He describes God and the benefit of being tested are awesome.

5:18 - "Therefore, do not despise the chastening of the Almighty, for He bruises but He binds up; He wounds, but His hands make whole. "

He. is. good.

In 7:17-21, Job is honest about his desperation and hopelessness. When we feel like this, it is so hard to have faith that God will intervene and bring us through. But we have stories like this to prove to us that He will.

Genesis 47:28 - 50:26

2009-09-13T09:40:00.001-07:00

The end of Genesis. What a beginning to the story of God's redemption and love.

The story between Jacob and Joseph is really emotional to me. Jacob LOVED Joseph more than anyone else and loses him tragically only to be reunited with him years later unexpectedly. I can't imagine the grief that he went through and then the inexplainable joy.

I think that its a small glimpse of Jesus' love for us. He cares for us so deeply and yearns unconditionally for us.

I love how Jacob describes God...

48:15 - "God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has fed me all my life long to this day, the Angel who has redeemed me from all evil..."

This is who God is. For all of us.

This is the beginning of a long long journey. The twelve tribes of Israel originate here with Jacob's sons. So much history comes after this. Each event leads to another and the sons live their lives. Some for the Lord and some not.

But the Lord makes all things work together for our good. For His people's good.

I have never found so much peace in that truth as I do now. And its not a peace with selfish intentions hoping that I get what I want. That's not what it means for God to work all things together for my good. His idea of good is much much different from mine. And I want His.

When we are at places in our lives where we truly want God's good for us, He can revolutionize our lives. And that's what I want....everyday for Him to completely revolutionalize my life and for me to be a revolutionary for His kingdom. Help me to be that Lord.

50:19 - "Joseph said to his brothers, 'Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God? But as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, in order to bring it about as it is this day, to save many people alive. Now do not be afraid"

Grace.

I think of all these guys in Genesis as like the big guys of faith. They are the frontrunners, the fathers of faith. I think if I were alive back then, I would have placed dependence in them as leaders. But then I realize that we are the frontrunners. We all are.....the poor, the weak, the broken, the sick, the useless. We are His hands and feet.

Genesis 42:1 - 45:15

2009-09-08T17:45:00.001-07:00

Gosh, what an emotional time for Joseph and his brothers. This a great story of reconciliation and the love of a family.

After years and years of anguish, Joseph is reunited with his brothers. He tries to be hard on them, he tests their character, but he cannot hold back his love for his brothers and his father no matter what they did to him.

This is how we love our family. I heard a message recently talking about how we should love our brothers and sisters in Christ the same way that we love our blood family. It is so much harder to do...but that is truth.

This is also a great example of God being glorified through everything. Joseph understands that the Lord is in control of his life. He trusts him with everything. I wonder how long it took him to get to that place...But he is there at this moment. I think that these verses sum everything up:

45:4 "...'I am Joseph your brother, whom you sold into Egypt. But now, do not therefore be grieved or angry with yourselves because you sold me here; for God sent me before you to preserve life. .....And God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth and to save your live by a great deliverance. So now it was not you who sent me here, but God."

I really like this. Now a good question is...does God put us through hardship to mold us into the people He wants us to be? Some might say that putting someone through hardship is not good and so God wouldn't do that. Others may say that He ALLOWS us to go through tough times (tough times that we have created ourselves)so that He can mold us. But the argument to that is that Joseph was thrown into his affliction by his brothers.

No matter what the analysis, we have to remember that He has a purpose in everything, He can redeem any situation, His plan is perfect, and He works all things together for our good. Praise Jesus.

Genesis 36:1 - 41:57, 1 Chronicles 1 - 2:8

2009-09-07T12:48:00.000-07:00

And the story of Joseph begins.

We don't know a whole lot about Joseph....all we know is that Jacob loved him more than all of his brothers and his brothers hated him for it. Honestly, if I were Jacob's brother, I probably would have been pretty jealous as well, haha.

Now, I'm learning more and more that this was one dysfunctional family....First, we have the brothers who killed all the men in Shechem, then Reuben slept with one of his father's women, now Jacob loves Joseph the best, and his brothers plot to kill him.

Instead of killing Joseph, they end up selling him to Ishmaelites who take him to Egypt. (This is mostly due to Reuben)

39:2 - "The Lord was with Joseph, and he was a successful man; and he was in the house of his master the Egyptian. And his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord made all he did to prosper in his hand."

This is pretty much the story of Joseph's life. He goes through a lot of tough times and affliction....but the Lord was with Him and He ALWAYS blessed Joseph.

TRUST. We have to have trust!

So after Joseph has been faithfully serving his Egyptian master, he ends up being falsely accused and sent to JAIL. So here is Joseph, probably praying everyday for his deliverance...having to go through all of this hardship and now he goes to jail. I would be ticked.

But then, two of the PHAROAH's workers end up in jail with him and Joseph interprets dreams for them.

TWO YEARS LATER....the Pharoah needs a dream interpreted, his worker remembers Joseph and Pharoah has Joseph interpret his dream. Joseph does, finds favor in Pharoah's sight so Pharoah appoints him over all of the land.

All that I could think of while reading this story was that He makes all things work together for our good. He makes all things work together for our good.

God is FAITHFUL!!! This story is rediculous. I am sure while Joseph was going through all this stuff that life sucked....I mean really!! It did! But he trusted in the Lord, followed Him, and the Lord guided him and made his life better than it was before.

The truth is that He does this for us too. He always will.

What really touched me when was Joseph was naming his children...

41:52 - "And the name of the second be called Ephraim: 'For God has caused me to be fruitful in the land of my affliction'"

How powerful. This is so true in our walks with Christ. Most of the time, the most fruitful, powerful, transformational times of our lives are when we are going through affliction.

When we are BROKEN, the Lord can mold us. And when we are broken, we learn to believe that the most important thing in life is falling in love with Jesus and walking with Him.

I went to a retreat this weekend and heard a man speak all weekend with so much passion for Jesus that basically every time He spoke about Christ, he was almost in tears. We came to learn that he has gone through, lived in, struggled through darkness. Real darkness. But through that, he came out with a deeper love and dependence on Jesus than he ever had before.

I want to be IN LOVE with Jesus. Really in love with Him. The deep down stuff. I want to be so dependent on Him that His love propels every step that I take.

That is life. That is truly living.

Genesis 32:1 - 35:27

2009-09-03T17:11:00.001-07:00

I really like Jacob, haha. I will keep saying that. I'm not exactly sure why but I LOVE his relationship with God. I love it.

Jacob wrestled with God.

In my last post, I talked about how much Jacob had struggled throughout his whole life. Ya know, you would think that someone who has struggled so much would be angry, confused, upset at God. And I think this shows that he was BUT the awesome part of it is...

That's not a bad thing.

I think this applies to us nowadays. I think that we often miss what it means to have a relationship with Christ. This is to be expected since we so often screw up human relationships....how much harder is it to be in a healthy relationship with someone you can't see. Anyhow, being in a relationship is about going through good times, hard times, joy, heartache, love, and conflict with each other. I truly believe and have learned so much recently, that it is okay to "wrestle" with God a little bit and be HONEST with Him. That is what He wants from us. The thing that we need to be careful of is not letting any anger or frustration with God turn into long term bitterness.

If you think about it...when you are angry with someone, it is more likely that you will resolve the conflict if you communicate with that person and try to work through it. If you keep all your anger to yourself, it grows and grows until it turns into a root of bitterness. I think its the same thing with our relationship with the Lord.

32:28 - "And He said, 'Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel; for you have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed"

This makes me really like God.

So in short, Jacob and Esau are reunited and Jacob is making his way with his whole crew to Esau's land. Meanwhile, he is staying in the city of Shechem. This guy, Shechem, violates one of Jacob's daughters, Dinah. In response to this all of Jacob's sons (Dinah's brothers) are FURIOUS. And long story short, some of the brothers end up killing ALL of the men in the city and taking all of their possessions, women, and children captive.

In response to this, Jacob rebuked his sons.

35:1 "Then God said to Jacob, 'Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there; and make an altar there to God, who appeared to you when you fled from the face of Esau your brother"

In the middle of all this turmoil, what does God do? He sends Jacob to the place where He first appeared to him. And what does he do there? He reminds Jacob of His blessings and His promises. (This is a small tangent but this also applies to us today....when we are in turmoil, hard times, struggling with something, feel trapped by sin, so often what we need to do is return to our first love. I think that God was showing Jacob this here)

This brought a lot of questions to my mind. It made me wonder why God blessed this group of people. Why didn't he bless everyone? Why just Abraham and his descendants?

And then...his "blessed" people do something horrible like killing a whole city of people, and it seems as if there are no ramifications. Instead, God reconfirms His promises to Jacob.

On the one hand, I see God's mercy in this. His forgiveness.

On the other hand, part of me really wonders....is this fair? It just doesn't seem right.

However, then I thought....I'm sure that there were consequences to Jacob's sons for what they did which I will find sooner or later. Also, JACOB did not partake in this and rebuked his sons for what they did. So why should God forsake Jacob because of what his sons did?

I think these are good things to think about. I am certain that I will never fully understand God. I am absolutely certain that nobody will fully understand God. However, I think that asking these questions is healthy and that when we do, God will reveal more of Himself and His purposes. We just have to be open to it.

I know that He is perfect. I know that whatever He does is good. Asking questions does not change that.

His mystery is a good thing.

Genesis 28:6 - 31:55

2009-09-02T14:21:00.000-07:00

Wow. Talk about some d-r-a-m-a. Some days I think that I have crap going on in my life...haha it is nothing compared to what these people went through.

So, because Isaac blessed Jacob....he is now on his way fulfilling the promises of the Lord. And as He always does, the Lord continually reminds Jacob of who He is and His perfect plan that He will see out to its completion.

I like Jacob. Jacob seems to have a different sense of awe than Isaac and maybe even Abraham. When I read about Jacob and the things he did, I can sense his fear of God. He really understood the majesty of the Lord and submitted to it.

Jacob marries Rachel (who he wanted to marry) and Leah (not so much). Basically Laban, Rachel and Leah's father tricked Jacob into marrying Leah and then forced him to put in 7 more years of time to get Rachel as well. So you see, the drama has already begun...

29:31 - "When the Lord saw that Leah was unloved, He opened her womb..."

God always hears our cry. There is a REALLY good book called "Jesus Wants to Save Christians" by Rob Bell. The whole first chapter talks about how God ALWAYS hears our cry. And not only that, but He ALWAYS does something about it.

Incredible.

So after Jacob's father-in-law has basically made him slave for him for years and years and changed his pay 10 times, he still won't allow Jacob to leave.

But the Lord never leaves Jacob and continues to bless him. This is crucial. But it honestly makes me worry a bit. I wonder if my faith would be strong enough to go through affliction for years and years and still trust and serve the Lord.

Eventually, Jacob flees and Laban chases after him and finally, they come to some sort of truce but I mean COME ON....I can't believe Jacob had to live through that.

What I also like about Jacob is that he seems like an honest and straightforward guy. I don't know him personally (haha), but I would take a guess and say that he started to understand how to have a relationship with God.

Genesis 25:27 - 28:5

2009-08-31T13:31:00.000-07:00

Jacob. and. Esau.

So, the first thing that is talked about here between Jacob and Esau is how Jacob basically bribed Esau into selling him his birthright which Esau did.

Why would Jacob do that? Is it just because of greed? Does he want his father's blessing? Does he want to inherit a relationship with the Lord?

Who really knows?

The Lord continues to bless Isaac, keeping His promise. He reiterates His promise that He made to Abraham several times. He is constantly reminding Isaac who He is, what He has done, and what He will do.

So, Isaac is old and blind and he tells Esau to go hunt and prepare food for him so that he can bless him. Rebekah, overhearing this goes and tells Jacob to do the same thing but faster so that HE could receive the blessing. (Rebekah loved Jacob) So Jacob does these things with his mother's help, disguises himself as Esau and approaches his father.

27:19 - "Jacob said to his father, 'I am Esau your firstborn; I have done just as you told me; please arise, sit, and eat of my game so that your soul may bless me"

Wow. Not only this but Isaac QUESTIONS if it is really Esau and Jacob continues to lie multiple times about his identity. So...

27:28 - "Therefore may God give you of the dew of heaven, of the fatness of the earth, and plenty of grain and wine. Let peoples serve you, and nations bow down to you. Be master over your brethren, and let your mother's sons bow down to you. Cursed be everyone who curses you, and blessed be those who bless you!"

Isaac gives Jacob the blessing that Esau was supposed to get...

And of course, they eventually found out and Esau and Isaac were incredibly upset.

But when I read this, I thought to myself why did the Lord let these things happen? Then it hit me....we have a choice. We always have a choice. Jacob chose to deceive His father.

So shouldn't the Lord punish him? Or shouldn't He have prevented that from happening so that Esau could receive his rightful blessing?

I really don't know! I want to say that the Lord wanted Jacob to be the one who carrried out the promise all along....but He IS sovereign and He knew everything that would happen before it existed.

But then, I know that the Lord gives us choice. And on the other hand, I think this is a perfect example of the Lord's redemption.

No matter what, He is going to carry out His promises. He is going to make good out of bad. He can redeem anything. So if Jacob turned out to be the one with the blessing, the Lord could use him instead of Esau because He is capable of doing anything.

Again, these are the types of questions that make my head spin in circles. All I know is that God is good. He can do whatever He wants. His plan is perfect. Done and done.

The section ends with Isaac and Rebekah sending Jacob to Padan Aram to find himself a wife from among their people.

Genesis 25:1 - 25:26, 1 Chronicles 1:28 - 34

2009-08-30T17:52:00.000-07:00

Short blog today.

Abraham dies :(. And is buried with Sarah...

Isaac and Rebekah have twins: Jacob and Esau.

This is the beginning of a whole new story, a lot more drama, and a lot more of God's glory.

25:23 And the Lord said to her, 'Two nations are in your womb, two peoples shall be separated from your body; One people shall be stronger than the other, and the older shall serve the younger'"

So, basically Esau came out first and Jacob came out second and took hold of Esau's heel. This is a great foreshadow of Jacob and Esau's relationship throughout their lives.

On another note...GREAT message from Frontline service tonight on biblical community and Christian fellowship. He looked at Romans 12:9-10 and DOVE into the attributes of a Christian body and how to apply them to each of our lives. He gave 3 checkpoints for us to use to check ourselves:

1)Are you being transparent?
2)Are you striving to be holy and set apart?
3)Are you treating your brothers and sisters in Christ like family?

GOOD STUFF! Read it.

Genesis 18:1 - 24:67

2009-08-29T16:59:00.000-07:00

Double blog today on two sections.

Our history is some juicy stuff. Talk about people going through some crap.....they certainly did back in the day.

First of all, Abraham is chilling under a tree one day, and God walks up with two other men and come in to eat with him and Sarah. That is one of the reasons why I love God.

He is so real. He meets us at our level.

He knows us....so deeply and so intimately. He knows what we need and He knows everything that goes on in us and around us. He knows you.

18:16-33 - I think that these verses show two things. First, it shows the mercy and perfect judgement of the Lord. Secondly, it shows our DOUBT....

The Lord tells Abraham that He will spare the righteous and Abraham doubts. God gives us one good gift and promises to protect us and be our reward but we still doubt all the time. Doubt leads to fear and fear distorts our reality. Our reality should be the truth.

Chapter 19 - Okay....Sodom sounds like the grossest place on earth. Just thinking about it makes me want to puke...not because of the people but because of the hold that Satan had on them and the way that he had twisted, perverted, and corrupted them.

I like the part in this chapter when the Sodomites are trying to attack Lot...."But the men reached out their hands and pulled Lot into the house with them, and shut the door" (18:10).

Sometimes I feel like this....like I'm being pulled. I'm being pulled in one direction by temptations, by lies that the enemy is throwing at me, by sin, by impure desires. But on the other side, I am being pulled in to safety by the Lord.

He never lets go of my hand.

And we know that we have triumph in Jesus Christ so as long as we obey the Lord, there should be nothing to worry about.

I think that a central theme in these chapters is the lack of trust that we have in the Lord. Pretty much every problem that Abraham (or any of us) encounters is because he doesn't fully trust the Lord and he tries to work out things on his own.

Why is it so hard for us to trust the Lord? Is it because we cannot see him? Is it because we so desperately want to be in control of our lives. I wonder if this is why some people have such a hard time believing in the Lord...because by doing so, they would be giving up control.

The funny thing is, that when we DO give up control to the Lord...that is the only time that our lives are...in control.

The other thing that was kinda bugging me was the lack of emotion that some of these chapters are written with. I mean here is Lot....he lives in a city where evil has taken over and is surrounding him but he remains righteous so the Lord spares him when he destroys Sodom. So great!! That's awesome! But then, his wife looks back (which she was told not to do) and bam, she's dead.

Then we go on to the next chapter.

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?? Are you serious? Lot just lost everything he has.....but no emotion. He must have been devastated and questioning everything about his life and the Lord.

I think the point here (and I'm not certain) might be that it doesn't matter what we feel. What matters is that we are obedient to the Lord and that we love Him FIRST. That's all that matters. It's what mattered with Noah and it is what mattered here.

22:2 - "Then He said, 'Take now your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you'".

Hmm....okay, God. Sounds great! What?

So Abraham goes...but he goes in faith. I am convinced that Abraham believed the whole time that the Lord wouldn't actually take Isaac. I think he believed that the Lord would provide. I mean, he had to believe that. Otherwise, he probably would have lost his mind.

22:12 - "And He said, 'Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me."

Do I fear God? Do I withhold anything from Him....?

So Sarah dies and Abraham wants to make sure that Isaac gets a wife from his own family, the land that he came from. So, he sends his servant to go find someone and what do ya know?

The Lord provides. Surprise, surprise...

Another theme in these chapters is to obey. Obey. God prompts you. You go.

Sounds so easy...but I know so well that it is not. But that is my goal. To hear the Lord and follow Him so closely that I am covered by His dust. I mean what have we got to lose??? I know that doing things my way leads to nothing great....

Genesis 15:1 - 17:27

2009-08-27T16:53:00.000-07:00

15:1 - "...Do not be afraid Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward"

This is a verse that I need to memorize....lock it in my brain. I need to recite this any time I have fear over and over and over until I believe it and walk in it. This. is. amazing. It makes my heart melt.

He is this for all of us. Our shield and our exceedingly great reward. He protects us and is the best thing that we could ever have. He is there.

At this point, Abram is a little concerned that he is not going to have an offspring of his own. And when he expresses this concern, the first thing God does is this....

15:5 - "Then He brought him outside and said, 'Look now toward heaven and count the stars if you are able to number them'. And He said to him, 'So shall your descendants be'"

I heard a teaching once about this saying that this was not only significant because God is showing Abram that he will be the father of many nations but the way that God handles Abram's concern is even more important. He responds by showing Abram His incredible majesty kinda proving that HE CAN DO ANYTHING. Booyeah.

In these chapters, God pretty much tells Abram that he will be the father of many nations and He tells him exactly what will happen to his people. God is so clear when he speaks to Abram. Very straightforward. I think He talks to me like that all the time but I choose to overcomplicate it and second guess and on and on and on.

I need to simplify.

You - Are - the - God - Who - Sees (16:13)

The way that God comforts and treats Hagar shows his deep love and compassion for the broken and needy. He yearns for them. He seeks THEM out, finds them, and lifts them up.

So when Abram must think that God is crazy.....He goes one step further. He tells Abram that he and Sarah are going to have a son, Isaac.

They are both around a hundred years old. This is impossible.

But the impossible is possible with God. Sounds so cliche but its true.

These chapters are full of promises, blessings, comfort, majesty, glory, surprises, gifts. In just these few chapters we see so much of how INCREDIBLE the Lord is. He is amazing. Amazing.

And He is still amazing. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. (Hebrews 13:8)

Genesis 11:1 - 14:24, 1 Chronicles 1: 24 -27

2009-08-26T13:15:00.000-07:00

The Tower of Babel.

What is it about man that no matter what God has done for them or what they have been delivered from, we are still so inclined to follow our fleshly nature. I wish we weren't like this. And to make things even worse....we have a constant enemy lying to us trying to tell us that whatever it is is "not that bad".

Chapter 12: Enter Abraham.

I love Abraham. I love his faith.

12:1-3 "Get out of your country, from your family. And from your father's house, to a land that I will show you. I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; And you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed"

Gosh, how incredible!! God chose someone as insignificant as Abraham to carry out his purposes. He is strong through our weaknesses.

So what does Abraham do?.....Just like Noah, he does exactly what he is told.

Although, a little later we do see that Abraham is human like us. As they are entering Egypt, he gets worried that people will hate him because of the beauty of his wife so he asks her to pretend to be his sister. What he didn't realize was that by lying and taking "precautions" that weren't necessary, he was causing more damage.

This reminds me so much of myself. I get worried about things that are so rediculous, that haven't happened, that can't even be real....and I work myself into a frenzy about them. If I would just relax and let the Lord lead me and trust Him, then everything would be a whole lot easier.

12:17 - "The Lord plagued Pharoah and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram's wife"

I do not get this.....I do not understand why God plagues PHAROAH when Abraham is the one who lied and said that Sarai was his sister. It seems like Pharoah didn't know any better. This is one of those things that I just don't get...why would God do that?

So after this, Abraham inherits Canaan, a war breaks loose... Lot (Abraham's brother) is taken captive, Abraham and his servants go after him and retrieve him.

Then, Melchizedek king of Salem, meets Abraham and blesses him. And Mel is described as the priest of God Most High...

I thought to myself...why don't we hear more about him? Why didn't God use someone like Mel instead of Abraham in such a huge way? Why Abraham??

To me, it confirms that HE can use anyone and that when He uses the weak or "insignificant", you cannot mistake His glory that shines through.

Genesis 7:1 - 10:32, 1 Chronicles 1:5 - 23

2009-08-25T11:37:00.000-07:00

The grace that the Lord showed Noah and his family was/is incredible. He literally picked one man out of everyone on the earth and saved him because he was "righteous before the Lord in this generation".

How is Noah righteous in this generation? What did he do to get this kind of favor? I want to know!!

7:11 "In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened"

I love how much detail is given to describe the day of Noah's life that the flood arrived. Why?? Because this is HUGE in Noah's life.....this is a crazy/hard/traumatic/exciting/challenging/LIFE CHANGING day.

It makes me think of the days in my life that I remember the most...how most of the days that I remember in such detail are the ones that were incredibly awesome and the ones that were incredibly awful. Whichever, they are days where the Lord either did a work in me or was getting ready to do a work in me.

The same detail is given to the day that the flood ended and Noah was free from the ark.

I wonder how Noah remembered these two days in his life. I wonder what he went through in that ark over the YEAR that they were in there. Did he ever lose faith? Was he ever angry with God? Regardless of how he felt, the first thing that he did once they got off that ark was...

8:20 - "...Noah built an altar to the Lord"

I think this demonstrates so clearly and beautifully that no matter what our circumstances are, no matter what situation we are in, no matter what we are feeling, we still must love the Lord first.

And the awesome thing is that we are promised that when we do put Him first, everything else will fall into place (Matthew 6:33). Amen.

Now, thankfully, God promises never to destroy the earth again. Good news for us.

Then, we start hearing about Noah, his sons, and all of their descendants. They are in essence repopulating the earth now. We go through a bunch of names (most of whom, I will forget, haha) and listings of where they are located. I think the most important parts of this section are:

a) Ham and his descendants (Canaan) were cursed by Noah.
b) It is clear that ALL people (no matter what language, nation, etc.) are descendants of Noah.

This is my history. This is your history.

Genesis 4:1 - 6:22, 1 Chronicles 1:1-4

2009-08-24T09:47:00.000-07:00

These chapters are loaded with so much information....lots of names of descendants, etc. but there are many interesting things in these chapters as well.

First of all, there is the situation between Cain and Abel. These brothers (sons of Adam and Eve) both bring a sacrifice to the Lord. The Lord is pleased with Abel's sacrifice but NOT Cain's because Abel's sacrifice is the BEST that he could offer. Cain is upset about this and this is the Lord's response to him:

4:6-7 "Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it"

Already...we see the grace of God and the simplicity of obeying Him.

When Cain chooses to give into his sinful nature and kills his brother, the Lord banishes him from his family and land where Cain starts his own family.

In chapter 5, we go through the descendants of Adam and Eve starting with Seth.

5:22, 5:24 - "...Enoch walked with God three hundred years..." and "Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him"

This is incredible.....out of all the descendants listed here, the writer goes out of his way to describe Enoch as one who WALKED WITH GOD. Gosh, can you imagine the favor, grace, love, relationship that he must have had with the Lord for the Lord to find him worthy of that description. This is what I want to do......walk with God every single day.

5:29 - "And he called his name Noah, saying 'This one will comfort us concerning our work and the toil of our hands, because of the ground which the Lord has cursed"

Noah is the only other descendant who had a description attached to his name. The name Noah also means "to rest" implying that he would be a part of the end of the curse.

In chapter 6...God shows his DEEP disappointment in the people that He created and says that He is going to destroy everything on earth EXCEPT for....NOAH!!

Noah, described as a "just man, perfect in his generation" found favor in God's eyes and was chosen to serve Him in this way. I want to know what that means....how was Noah just and perfect in his generation? How was he so different and set apart from everyone else? What did that look like....walking with God in that time?

So God tells Noah to build an ark and makes a COVENANT with him. He gives him extremely specific directions on how to build this ark.

6:22 - "Thus Noah did; according to all that God commanded him, so he did"

Thats it.

It's that simple.

Noah did.

I want my faith to be like Noah's.....I want to believe enough so that if God told me to do something that seems so incredibly OUTRAGEOUS (keep in mind..it had never rained before, Noah probably didn't know what a flood is) that I would ask no questions but instead do it excellently.

Lord, mold me and make me more like You.

2009-08-23T15:00:00.000-07:00

I have been trying to figure out what to do with this blog and I finally decided what to do today!! Dun dun dun....this is the challenge:

Read through the Bible in chronological order in 1 year. 365 days. From start to finish.

I will use a plan that I found online that goes through the scriptures in chronological order and blog about what I read, what the Lord teaches me, my experiences, etc. etc..... This is the plan: http://www.oneyearbibleonline.com/readingplan/oneyearchronologicalbiblereadingplan.pdf

Woohooo! I am excited!!

Good word from church today: Get up everyday ready to obey Jesus, be covered with His dust, and be excellent at what He has for you that day. HE will unveil His destiny for us in His perfect timing.

Genesis 1:1 - 3:24

2009-08-23T12:17:00.000-07:00

It is amazing how many times I have read this scripture and how many times I have gone through it so quickly without taking time to revere God and be in awe of Him....

HE CREATED THE WORLD...He created everything in it...EVERYTHING.

To me, this is just a known fact but I so often forget how AWESOME that is and how AWESOME God is.

1:3 - The first thing God created was light. Right away, He reveals His character and His desire to drown out ALL darkness and all evil. He always brings light, He IS light...He is life.

1:27 - "So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created them..." In my Bible's commentary, it talks about how the language in these verses where its talking about how God created man, the language used is elevated prose or pure poetry. It's like the language shows how much God loves us and is in love with us....and it started from the very second he created us proving that there is nothing we can do to earn His love....its just there.

2:18 - The Lord says that it is not good for man to be alone so He creates a wife for Adam. The Lord LOVES fellowship and its through fellowship with other people that we see more fully God's heart, purposes, and desires for us.

3:1-24 - This last chapter is about how the serpent deceived Eve and convinced her to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Of course, Eve and Adam eat from it and immediately, they are aware of sin..

The first question that comes up is why would God even create the serpent? He knew ahead of time that this was going to happen because He knows all things. So why would He even allow the fall to occur?....

It's these kind of questions that can make your mind spin around and around getting to no conclusion at all...and it brings up all of the debates about predestination and God's sovereignty...but this is what is clear to me from this:

1) God gave us choice. (If we didn't have this, then we would be forced to love Him which then wouldn't be LOVE at all)
2) God is FULL of MYSTERY. (Who the heck knows why all of this happened? We do know that despite of the fall God showed the greatest act of love ever recorded in the history of time and redeemed our lives and allowed us to KNOW Him through Christ)

Things like this are things that cause people not to believe in God. People want answers to questions and facts...which I completely understand. I think that this is something the Lord is teaching me frequently about at this point in my life because of certain things that have happened....that I simply have to trust Him. I'm NEVER going to know the answers to everything....but He does and that is what faith is.....believing in someone or something even if you can't put all the pieces of the puzzle together. If you could...then you wouldn't need faith and you wouldn't need a Savior.

One more thing about this scripture...

We have a constant and persistent enemy. Just realize this....Almost immediately after the Lord created Adam and Eve and told them not to do something....the serpent arrives. He asks Eve what he already knows....and then blatantly lies to her telling her that she will not die and that its a good thing to eat from the tree.

Satan is STILL DOING THIS TODAY. He is constantly trying to change our minds and put thoughts into our heads and most importantly LIE to us. He is the king of lies (John 8:44).

We have to understand that any thought, idea, theology, doctrine, whatever that does not align with the Word of God is a lie from the enemy and we DO NOT have to listen to it.

We must choose (and we CAN choose because we are FREE in Christ) to listen to, live by, and obey what we hear and learn from the Lord.

God is so good. He is our creator. And from the very beginning He revealed Himself as a lover.