Injustices can rule no more.

Sometimes it's hard to believe that people consider me a "such a good person". Perhaps because I know my flaws and bad habits. But I want to change them. I want to change my attitude. I want to change my language and my thoughts and I want to stop trying to be like everyone else and I want to stop trying to be cool. And the only way to even do all of that is to put myself out of the matter and put God in it. I know that sounds extreme or crazy, but what is it going to take to change this world? It has to take us and our choices. I won't even lie. The other night at work, when it was just one other coworker and I cleaning and the store was empty, I asked her if she was ever mad- not necessarily at God, but at the injustices in this world, and I asked her if she just ever stopped and asked "Why, God?" Because this has been my thought for the past few weeks. Why. Why are people born into poverty or crappy family situations or without a father to stick around. Why does injustice rule, and why are people in the earth crying out, fearing that no one can hear them?

But I think God hears it. Not think- I know God hears the cry of his loved ones, and he repeats over and over again in the Bible that he WILL bring justice to the earth. 

But when? When will justice come fourth? When are those girls in the Philippines going to be taken away from Sex Trafficking? When is my church going to grow? When are we going to get more young people who care about God and prayer in my church body? I want to seek out those people who burn with a passion to reach out because partnering with them is what's going to impact a nation, a city, a person. 

Spirit Break Out

Our Father,
all of Heaven roars Your name
Sing louder,
 let this place erupt with praise
Can you hear it, 
the sound of Heaven touching Earth?
The sound of Heaven touching Earth

Spirit break out,
Break our walls down.
Spirit break out,
Heaven come down.

King Jesus
You're the name we're lifting high
Your glory
shaking up the earth and skies
Revival
we wanna see Your kingdom here
We wanna see Your kingdom here

Spirit break out
Break our walls down
Spirit break out
Heaven come down

 The spiritual resonance in this song is astounding. I have listened to this song 3 times tonight and each time it's as if I were hearing it for the first time again. I started praying the lyrics over my school and people of our town and nation tonight, and I felt like I received something to share with the world.

God is truly breathing on this nation and on the people around us. Whether or not it appears that way right now, through prayer and supplication, he is breathing on us and throughout our schools and throughout every nation, tribe and tongue. It might not look like someone is transforming, but our eyes can fool us easily. The fact that his breath of life is invading everywhere is truth. That person you have been praying for for five years has begun an inward transformation. Prayer won't return void. The fruit of prayer may not show up right away, but it's there.
God has not abandoned us in the darkness. His breath of life is in us, and he is constantly moving around us. He is our everything, and without him we are nothing. I am confident that we will see drastic increases in our walk with him the more we push through the "dry and weary lands." When I say this, I'm referring to the times where we don't feel like God's doing anything, or when we feel like our spiritual walk is boring, or when we're getting bored with the place God has put us and we want to move. On the other side of the desert is an oasis. We just need to sustain ourselves in Him and keep walking. I realize that I often write about pushing through the hard parts of our walk with God, but those challenges are very real, no matter how often people like to pretend they aren't there, and it isn't God that is making it hard, most of the time. It's us, because we tend to be self-centered instead of drawing our focus toward him. Often we do things to slow our own walk down, but we need focus on Him, forge on through to get to the other side.

That was a random spiritual epiphany, but there it is.


Spirit break out. Break our walls down. Break down everything that could hold us back from longing for more of God.

To Truly share and show Love.

My family has come a lot closer this past week. This past Sunday night my sister Carrie had a stroke. This wasn't expected, but it wasn't completely out of nowhere. She's in a rehabilitation center right now regaining movement of the left side of her body.
You don't realize how often you use the left side of your body until it stops working.
You don't realize how much time is given to you before you use it up.
Lately I have been back into a season where I feel that God is teaching me about love, sacrifice, and time again. I have often found it difficult to show love to people through my actions and words some days. I've felt bad because of teenage junk and I've thrown myself pity parties. I've been selfish. I've taken the things I have for granted and I feel that God is revealing to me what it truly means to have those things.

I was listening to a friend talk a Slab the other day. She said that a lot of times we take people for granted, and so often we're quick to judge and ignore people that God put in our pathway for a reason. Those people could be annoying; we could think "Why the heck did God put me here with these people?" and we can spend time getting so impatient with people and annoyed by them and snap on them for no reason.
 This sounds cliche, but really think about it for a minute.
Really ponder these thoughts:
Do you even know what that person could be going through?
Did you ever stop to think that God has you sitting next to them for a reason?
 Maybe it's to help them with something big or maybe it's just to smile at them. Afterall, every action you make bears a consequence. However, this thought isn't to cause pressure because Lord knows how often we screw up and say things we don't mean. But it's to inspire a change in how we live on a daily basis.

Consider the people that surround you, and consider what you do. Because the time we have here on this earth is so short and so quickly spent. I don't want to live a life constrained by things that don't matter and things that waste my time. But I want to make sure that these moments are well-spent. I want to say kind words to people. I want to compliment them, even if it annoys the crap out of other people and they call me a suck-up. That's just a negative term for kindness, in my opinion, and there isn't anything wrong with kindness.  I want people to know their beauty and their highlights and I want to be sweet to them.


So guys, here's to a week of getting stronger and a time of loving more. Here's to a week of learning to dance in the rain.

You Satisfy my Soul with your Love

Hallelujah, you make all things beautiful.
Hallelujah, trials and testing prove there's gold.
Hallelujah,
you turn mourning into joy.




We can be having an awful day, a terrible week, the worst time of our lives; But at the end of the day, when everything is said and done, as long as we having the confidence that our God loves us unconditionally, and that he is eternally ours and that we are eternally his, that is the point when we realize that nothing can truly harm us. And we experience the most genuine liberation and freedom that can exist in the human state.

The Command to Go, not the inquiry.

There was something that happened in the earth when God commanded us in his word to Go. To preach the gospel to every living creature. He didn't set any limits. There isn't a phrase at the end of that scripture that says "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every living creature... only if you feel called to."


As living witnesses of The love of Christ, to go is our calling, wherever we may go, wherever he sends us, because he commanded it. He could tell us to Go into the school and that be our place, and from there we can reach further. The desire to go was formed in us from the beginning...

I can't say that before this year I had a burning, passionate desire to go on a missions trip, specifically. I knew that I would eventually, and I even thought to myself years ago "maybe 17 will be the year." I had a desire to see souls saved and people encounter Jesus, and that passion is still burning there and always will. But something sparked me. Something about looking at the way my friends were transformed when coming back home from these trips. How tears would fill their eyes when they would talk about what happened and the people they encountered and saw healed and saved. Watching them sell things that they owned to go on these trips and not miss a single thing. Watch them trust God with faith that moves mountains. Watching financial miracles happen. Most of all, it was watching them grow and listening to their stories and testimonies. Seeing something happen inside of them... It was a challenge, almost. A challenge that asked "How far are you willing to go? To what extreme are you going to take this whole Gospel thing to?" Even God asking me "What will you leave behind in order to follow my lead?"
So I sat down and asked myself. "How far am I willing to go?"
I prayed about it, and I felt that the answer was clear.
It's time for me to Go.



It's still time for me to go, No matter who decides to walk away from me for push me down for it. No matter who disapproves. No matter who makes fun of me for carrying a coffee can and a Toms box around school. There are so many people that are all for my trip, so many people that God has set in my path for me to cross paths with this year for important reasons, and they matter to me. They outnumber the people who disapprove. Even if everyone had turned their back against me, the fact that God approves outnumbers the opinion of man.

And he's faithful to send me if I just give myself to him, and to go for souls. It's not about me. It's about them... And it's All about Him, for his glory.

They are worthy because Jesus died for them.
He is worthy because he died for me, and my life is all I can give in return.

You're the Reason why I'm on the Up & Up...

Yesterday
Is not quite what it could've been
As were most of all the days before
But I swear today
With every breath I'm breathing in
I'll be trying to make it so much more

Cause it seems I get so hung up on
The history of what's gone wrong
And the hope of a new day
Is sometimes hard to see
And though I'm finally catching onto it
And now the past is just a conduit
And the light there at the end is
Where I'll be

Cause I'm on the up and up,
I'm on the up and up...
And I haven't given up
Given up on what
I know I'm capable of

And I'm on the up and up
I'm on the up and up
Yeah, there's nothing left to prove.
Cause I'm just trying to be
A better version of me for you,
A better version of me
For you

To be prosperous
Would not require much of me
You see contentment is the one thing
It entails
To be content with where I am
And getting where I need to be
I'm moving past the past
Where I have failed

But I'm finally catching onto it
And now the past is just a conduit
Right there at the end
Is where I'll be...

You never cease
To supply me with
What I need
For a good life
So when I'm down
I'll hold my head up high
Cause you're the reason why

I'm on the Up & Up...

I don't believe I've faced these feelings before up until now, but at the same time, they feel so familiar. I feel like things are starting all over again, from ground zero. But it isn't exactly the exhilarating change I had expected. I expected change and glory in this new school year, and so far I've seen that. And It's absolutely  amazing what is going on right now in school. I also expected persecution, but not like this. Not in the fashion. Not quite this extreme. I didn't expect things to become this difficult. If I could only put it into better terms, it would make sense. But for now I say that I pray this is only a phase. That things become lighter in the long run and that while I may be in a valley of some sort, searching through the woods, waiting for his voice to tell me what the next step is. I'm not going to give up on this journey. I can't. I choose to overcome my emotions and circumstances and I choose to reach out and seek others instead of waiting to be sought by them. I choose to look under the rocks and in the crevices for those who need a friend, and to be a friend to them. I want to extend my hand to those in need, not hold back and wait. I'm not going to hold back anymore. I'm speaking the word of God over these insecure feelings because I know who I am, and the devil wants to do anything he can to confuse us and make us forget who we are so that we won't reach out. I'm breaking free.


Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony.

Colossians 3:12-14