Today

Today was so many things. My daddy drove up from Hoover to spend time with me, we ate lunch and then we went for a long walk. God is doing crazy...CRAZY things in my family, sometimes I'm scared to believe it's even happening after all these years of praying. If you ever feel like your prayers aren't being heard, you're wrong. God doesn't run on your schedule, his has his own agenda and it's beautiful.

On a seperate note, a good friend said in conversation the other night said, "When you are sure of something, be sure. If you can't see how and why or when, that's okay, that's when you wait on God. That's when you just have to keep being patient."

I liked that. It was worth remembering.

"All I have seen, teaches me to trust Him for all I have not seen."

Gloom's Cure

I'm reading another Elisabeth Elliot book. Big surprise, I know. This one is called "Let Me Be a Woman." I just read a part where she discusses the cure to feeling lonely, depresseed, or just down on yourself. I have a hard time ever admitting feeling any of those things, but the truth is, sometimes when I've away from people for too long that is exactly how I feel. Elisabeth Elliot quotes Amy Carmichael when she says,

"If you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday. And the Lord will guide you continually, and satisfy your desire with good things, and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters fail not. And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of the streets, a path leading home."

Simply, I love that. I had to read it a few times but the more I did, the more it meant to me. To be someone's path leading "home" is far more rewarding than anything else I can think of doing for myself. The Lord is teaching me so much about what it means to serve and to truely love. Loving means not looking back but running forward and reaching out to those He places on your path along the way.

He holds it all together

A while ago I laid my shattered heart in God's hands. His were the only ones that could hold that many pieces together. He lovingly sent it through fire for purification and spent days, weeks, and months chiseling out all the rough edges, molding and remolding. The process was the most painful thing I've ever been through in my short 21 and a half years. Would I change a thing? No. The closest I've ever drawn to the Lord is when his arms were the only ones I had. He ever so tenderly held me the whole time.

"We please God most, not by frantically trying to make oursleves good, but by throwing ourselves into His arms." -A.W. Tozer

Trust more, question less

"God doesn't promise us understanding, He promises us peace beyond understanding. Trust more, question less."

Blank Graph Paper

The other night when I was sitting at dinner with my parents, I asked my dad what made him get the courage to quit his job that he's been doing ever since I can remember. He said,

"I like to make my yearly goals out on a piece of graph paper every year and this time I was staring at the paper but I couldn't seem to see anything I wrote, just all the different squares that make up the whole sheet. The more I looked at them, the more I realized if I were to color in a square for every day I actually lived since I've had this job, I'm not sure I could even fill up one sheet. That was the moment I got the courage."

I was not only enthralled with his boldness, it ignited something inside me. Not so much that I need to quit my job or anything else, but to question what I am doing with my time. How many days have I truly lived with the Lord's intentions in mind and not my own? How many days could I color for having done something for the kingdom and not myself? I'd be afraid to see the results.

My pastor spoke this past week and he said something to the extent of 'to awaken our holy spirit is to be alive, moving and doing for the cause of Christ.' If that is true than I have some work to do. I have some adjustments to make because a blank piece of graph paper says I'm merely existing. I was made for more than that. We all were.

Yes.

It's pretty obvious why I love this.

Quote of the week

"I want to be a woman who lives totally abandoned to the first commandment. To love my Lord, my God, with all my heart. I don't want the reputation that I love God, I don't want to write songs about loving God, I don't want to talk about loving God. I want to actually love God. When I close my eyes, I want my heart to move. When I close my eyes and look at Him, I want to feel alive on the inside. I want to look at Him with a fire in my heart that is real."

-Misty Edwards

New Beginning

I went to dinner with my parents a few days ago and the Lord really showed me what He is doing in them with a simple moment that night. Our family is at a very bitter sweet place in our journey and in the midst of what should be the worst, my parents smiled at me. From across our little booth at Applebee's, they showed me just how much faith this family is built on. My dad, what a sweet man, I couldn't love him more, his smile warmed me as he told me about quitting his job last week and taking the leap of faith. God wants him else where. He said, "Kendall, this is a new beginning for us." My mom smiled back at my dad and then at me and in that moment, I realized that God himself had sent fire to keep a flame glowing that I thought had every reason to burn out. What a beautiful thing it is when you realize that all the little pieces you thought could never be put back together somehow fit perfectly because His will is always perfect.

If you keep up with my blog, a while ago I wrote about God sending fire and lighting an alter of damp wood to prove that He Is in 1 Kings 18. For weeks I was so focused on whether my life was damp wood or not that I forgot the end of the story. It didn't matter the state of the wood. God was going to send fire, and even the most inflammable would be ignited.

Thank you Lord. You are faithful til the end.

I can't fancy what God has up His sleeve, but I know it's wonderful, because that is what He is. The church I was lead to start attending and later joined in Tuscaloosa is also called New Beginning, and I have no doubt I'm there because He wants me there. What that means and why I don't have the slightest clue but He does and that is enough.

'God said, "My presence will go with you, I will see the journey to the end."' -Exodus 33:14

Amen

One Hundred

This is my 100th post guys. Meaning I have stayed consistent. I am only consistent with things I love or feel obligated too. Examples, I love my friends therefore I'm extremely loyal. My job, while I don't always love it, I understand that I am obligated therefore I stick with it. This means, I either feel obligated to blog or I love it and survey says.... it's true love. I genuinely enjoy it. Even if no one saw it I think I'd still keep it up, but those who do read, thank you and I appreciate you. :)

:)

Oh, okay Jesus

I've wasted a whole lot of time trying on different versions of myself in hopes of becoming someone God would find worthy. I've tried to be so many that I have found I barely know myself. My true self, and more than that, my true intentions that make up myself. At the heart of it, I'm the most selfish person I know, but I slap the name Jesus on my motives and it gets me a "get out of jail free card" most times. I've wasted opportunities because I couldn't see one foot in front of the other so I refused to step. I have done everything but the one simple thing. Pray. I've been trying to be in the will of God, but I haven't even bothered to ask God what exactly that is. He's got blinders on me, not because He does not want me to see the glory ahead, but because I'm to stubborn to ask for guidence and have a little faith. So, I'm going to pray and I'm going to document it because I like to be able to look back and see the moves of God in my life and that, my friends, is something I believe is worth sharing.

Father, I pray for a peace beyond understanding, for joy that overflows my cup into the lives all around me. Even when I don't feel you and even when things aren't going as I had planned, help me remember that Your plan is still in motion. I will stand on that. I will stand on You and begin building a faith that cannot be shaken instead of these walls of fear I've lived behind. Place in me a hunger for righteousness and a distaste for all not of You. Give me new eyes to see people as you see them. Ignite a super natural fire. Make this not about me and what my life will become, but about You and how you can use me.
In your holy name.
Amen