These Last Moments

I apologize for not posting in a while, friends. Here is my senior kick-off.

We all come into high school with some idea of what it will be like and who we want to become in four years. But things happen that will shape you into a totally different person than you expect. You will meet people, things will happen, and by the end of it you'll be someone you never imagined upon first entering the doors of High school. It's completely up to you who you choose to become. That is a cliche statement, but so true. My freshman self would have never expected who I am today. And I'm sure that a year from now things will be completely different.
In this precious time- in these last moments, I want to do more than Live it up. I want to live every day as if Jesus would come back tomorrow. Because, friends, we're living in the last days. We have four years to be in the biggest ministry platform we could imagine, and it's a dark place. But Christ is drawing near. And everyday in school I pass people who are cutters, drug users, depressed, lost, and in need of a friend. I don't want to live senior year with my nose stuck in the air. I want to live senior year humbled. I want to live this year reaching into the lowest places, seeking people out who need Jesus to be their healer and comforter. You don't have to run through the courtyard speaking in tongues to get people saved. But you can choose to go into your prayer closet and pray for them. You can choose to sit by them at lunch. You can choose to say hello to them and ask how they are, and if they're struggling you can choose to reach out your hand.

You can choose to be a light this year.

So let it be the best. Let it be the hardest. Let the challenges come. Let the ocean try to overwhelm me. Because no matter what we face this year, with the Ultimate Best Friend at our side, we can overcome anything.

Let this be a year as if it were truly the end. 

Close your eyes.

Sometimes all I have to do is close my eyes and I'm there again. There in the hot van squished in the back seat between Connor and Bekah, bumping down the dirt road as we travel around the mountains. There sitting in the dining area with the new, sweet friends whom I wish I could see again. Sitting there laughing with them as if I'd known them my whole life when we only just met. I close my eyes and suddenly I'm There, shaking, heart racing in front of thousands and thousands of people who have lived lives much different from mine, all staring at the stage listening to me tell them about a little girl in their city who was healed of fractured legs that day. Sometimes I close my eyes and I'm standing in line for breakfast, and James hands me a piece of toast with Jelly and a cup of goat milk. And I thank him kindly and go sit with Tori, who puts on my ragman skit makeup that morning, and then I sit next to my long lost sister Caitlin.

Sometimes I close my eyes and I'm dancing to some electronic american music among a bunch of little kids who love to jump and dance. The teachers are giving us strange looks, but the kids love it. I close my eyes and see the little boy whose hand I shook in greeting, and I remember meeting his eyes in just that one moment, and I felt our hearts connect. From one heart to another. And he looked deep into my eyes, smiling. His belly was empty, and he had no shoes, and he was in a crowd of hundreds of little kids, in a city of thousands of people, in a continent full of millions of injustices, and he took my hand and looked deep into my eyes and smiled.

God, I want to go back.

I have to go back to them.

 I need to see them again and I want to love them and I want to sit in the dirt with them and listen to them and let them teach me. Not because America thinks it's nice to help poor people. Not because I want to be a cliche American girl who thinks that Africa Needs her. Those African children don't need her and her riches and healing and education. That girl needs THEM. She needs their eyes, their hearts, and their mentality and humility. Together, we need you, Lord. Because your heart for them has been rooted deep within me, and it has become a part of who I am, I must go back to the Nations. You've given me your heart for the fatherless, the brokenhearted, the captive, and those who need justice. And they need you. And together, we need You.

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. 

But the Nights can't hide the days

In these challenging days, the importance of remaining close to God cannot be stressed enough.

Life is an Adventure

Dear readers,

Have you ever thought that things could be better? Or correction- felt like things could be better? Have you ever felt like you weren't living life to the fullest when you could be, or felt like there's just so much more out there to achieve, and you want to change yourself to reach it? We live in a big, big world full of big things and sitting in Murfreesboro doesn't necessarily satisfy me, as much as I dearly love it and will have to do it for the next year. Going on a bike riding adventure doesn't satisfy it, either. 

In simpler terms, I want to live an adventure, with God. Life with God and sweet friends is an adventure, but I feel like it could be so much more, like living an adventure with God and awesome friends traveling around the world preaching the gospel, seeing people get saved and traveling around the world being in a worship band. THAT, my dear friends, would indeed be an adventure. And while most of us see a master's degree or a military family or a doctor's office ahead of us, I see a stage full of prophetic musicians and ministers, and the faces of many devastated people in the world ahead of me. People who are starving for hope and hungry for a God that greatly desires them- that is who I see ahead of me. And my greatest desire is to reach them, whatever sacrifices I have to make in this life to be with them.

I don't even know how this dream is possible to achieve, but it's in me for a reason, And I'd be honored to fulfill that, whatever it takes.

An adventure Is ahead of me. So here's to surviving the Here and Now.

Tonight at the Experience was simple, but very well needed. A night to finally connect with some uplifting friends from around town and to lift up the name of Jesus.
To be honest with you, readers, sometimes I grow weary of the way things are. Lately I've been finding myself getting tired of my youth group and how everyone seems bored and non-motivated. No filter. It's like everyone wants to go do their own thing and they may want God, but it seems that they're too wrapped up in trying to look cool to be concerned about growing in the word or even answering questions. It makes me want to get up and leave most of the time. But I will say that it's one of the most refreshing things being with God and connecting with young people who are hungry for more of Jesus and who have a great desire for him. I never thought I would see the day where I'd find more passionate God-seekers in my school than in my youth group, but it has happened. It's both a blessing and a sad thing.

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.