I find it hard to believe that my freshman year has finally come to an end. At first it was very unfamiliar and different- I couldn't imagine that I'd ever get used to how big and new this place is until now. 1,500 students is certainly more than 300... but it's opened up a new door.
Now in this time, I feel closer to God than I've ever felt before in my life... While I was running after God before, there were so many difficulties I could have avoided if I'd done what I was suppose to in that time... but I'm sure we've all found ourselves in a place like that.
A few months ago I remember I was in my closet with the door shut crying so no one could hear me. With my phone in one hand I was talking with my youth leader. I never imagined such horror would come out of a situation smaller than the ever changing mind would make it.
"And you know what?" I rememebr her saying. "No matter what happens, God always has a plan, and he WILL send friends and people to you. Be yourself and be who you are."
Out of that I learned that in order to keep going in this race of Hebrews 12:1 I must get to a place where I give up literally every THING and every PERSON in order to maintain who God really and truly is within myself. By giving up everything it doesn't mean that you can't have things and friends and relationships, but it means that God is your first priority and your source above all no matter what happens. Not things or people or anything else... I knew in my mind that I had to put God before everything, and I did to the most part, but the meaning had become so much clearer to me.
I look at John the Baptist after listening to Misty Edward's Isaiah 40 sermon that I blogged about before, and he had nothing. There wasn't anything someone could take from him that would weaken him, yet his relationship with God was so intimate and he was striving for the eternal.
The undergrowth lifted itself and the branches cleared on the narrow path. Things had become difficult, but now they cleared. God was my main source and my mind was set higher on eternity than ever before. And it wasn't too long after this that I began recognizing that there were people in this time and age that are passionate for Jesus on our campus, and that there was something else stirring ready to burst. (as cliche as that sounds, you think every second that passes it's ready to burst even more... and the awe of God never dims. :) Visions and dreams were shaking and I recognized the passion God wanted to put in other students for me to reach again.
My friend Blake came with me to the Onething conference in Nashville and said he'd never encountered God like that before, and a deeper passion was set in him, and since then we've talked every day in school about things of God and we've become better friends. We've had one prayer meeting in the courtyard in which about 7 students gathered on the National Day of Prayer...
and most of all, the spiritual shift of the body has begun to show its effects. And the harvest has sprung.
This was a year of Shift and Movement.
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