Last night, I reconnected with God. I had strayed away from Him for awhile and now I'm back again. Anyways, I believe that is why I am getting so much today. God is blessing me with wisdom again. With that said, I have yet another impactful quote from The Final Quest that I just read.

          "Those who really believe that My words are true, will also be true to their own words...If you are not faithful to your own words, it is because you do not really know Me."

          This was like a punch in the face from God. I am sooo guilty of not keeping my word all the time. SO guilty. I apologize to anyone I have ever not kept my word with. I am truly sorry. I have never before connected my inability to keep my word with doubt in God's word. But looking back now...I have had doubts in God's word. Many of them actually. I once doubted that He really does have a plan for me like He said in Jeremiah 29:11. I no longer doubt that, but the whole moving mountains thing? Idk. I have plenty of doubts but they dont make me any less of a Christian. It just means I need to connect more with God. And with other people. As I learn to keep my own word, I will come ever closer to ridding my doubts of God's word.

         I have yet another post today containing wisdom for any of you who care to actually read this. This one also comes from The Final Quest and it concerns faith and love.

          "So you must seek love first, and then faith. You cannot please Me without faith. But faith is not just the knowledge of My power, but the knowledge of My love and the power of  My love. Faith must first be for love. Seek faith to love more, and to do more with your love.  Only when you seek faith to love can I trust you with My power. Faith works by love."

          Love is such an important asset to us. Without love for God, Jesus would not have been sent to save us all. But so often we place more emphasis on faith than we do love. Jesus wants us to love first. The above quote says it all. Faith must first be for love. Faith works by love. If we have faith and no love, where does that leave us? Do we really have faith at all? Let's answer it this way: why do we have faith in God? Because He LOVED us so much that He sent His only Son to die for us. I argue that without love there is no faith. We must love. However, with that said, I do still believe discipline is needed in our lives. A loving discipline. If we can't accept discipline as love from those above us, we are in grave danger. My parents used to always say that they spanked me because they loved me. I never believed that when I was little, but now as a leader, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they were telling the truth. Discipline is love if done in the right way.

          I have read some more in The Final Quest and once again I didn't make it far until I found something that hit me hard. It was this quote:

          "Paul did walk with Me as close as any man ever has yet. Even so, he was also beset by fears and weaknesses that were not from Me. I could have delivered him from these, and he did request it several times, but I had a reason for not delivering him. Paul's great wisdom was to embrace his weaknesses, understanding that if I had delivered him from them I would not have been able to trust him with the level of revelation and power that I did...He knew that when he was beset with weaknesses, or fears, that he was not seeing from My perspective, but from his own. This caused him to seek Me, and to depend on Me, even more."

          Many times in life I have wished that certain ailments would leave me. Many things have arisen that just..well, they sucked to be blunt. However, looking back, these things brought me to God on a level that I had never come before. Never. I know that God did not send these things to me, but only allowed them so that I would seek Him. I will no longer question why things happen, but merely accept them as needed. I will know that these things are meant to bring me to God. Thank you God.

          I recently received a new book while in Indiana. It is called Integrated Lives by Dale Stoll. I'm currently two chapters in and I believe it is already an amazing read. The quote I want to blog on right now is this:

          "We do not break the laws of God; we break ourselves on them. If you leap from a tenth-story window, you will not break the law of gravitation, you will only illustrate it."

          What an amazing quote!  I am reminded of how often Biblical principles fall into line with Masters (crazy, I know. Its like we"re a Bible-based program). In Masters, we have all these rules set down. But they shouldn't be considered rules to harm you. They sshouldn't even be considered "rules". A student comes to the program knowing  exactly what is expected: no dating, no bad movies, etc. So technically, these rules are self-inflicted. They are voluntary. Like a fast. A student gives up these things to find God. Just like in this quote, the rules are in place so that the STUDENT doesnt get broken, not the rules. Who cares about the rules, the student is what matters. The rules are set to protect the student, not hinder them. When someone chooses to break the rules, they are hurting themselves, not the rules. The rules just written words, they cannot be harmed. This is why rules are made: to protect people. What an inspiring thought! If we could embrace that simple fact, how much easier it would be to not only stay within the rules but go beyond them! For example, instead refraining from R movies, we also choose to say "ya know, that  PG13 isnt so good either". What a REVOLUTION we would stir up in our generation!

          So today I was praying cuz I've really been struggling with dealing with people. It gets more difficult every single day. I feel shut out and I can't get back in. I've tried. So I was praying about it for like the hundredth time this week. And God showed me some stuff. So here goes.
          I walked by a picture that caught my attention for some reason. On it was written the verses from Ephesians 6 that describe the armor of God. And God showed me some stuff. First off, I was wearing the armor all along. I had worn it for quite a while. But I was taking pieces off when I fought against people and it was allowing them to harm my spirit. God told me that as long as I wear His armor, they cannot hurt my spirit. They may be able to put some dings in the armor, but they will never penetrate God's armor. They can only push me down, which brings me to the next point. When people in armor get pushed down, they need strong people to set them back upright. I needed to let those strong people set me back upright before I could do anything else. God is awesome and really spoke to me through that today. I feel so much better now! It's rejuvenating me!

          So the other day I was looking at Whitney's site and reading through her blog and I came across an interesting post. It spoke of a church in Jerusalem on the Mount of Olives. On the altar there was a picture of a hen with her wings spread and chicks were coming to her. It was referring to the verse in Matthew 23:37 when Jesus says of Jerusalem "oh how I long to gather you, like a hen gathers her chicks, but you were not willing." It really got me thinking cuz that is exactly how I am feeling right now.
          As a leader at MCGC, I can't force people to come to me to talk about the serious stuff in life. I long for them to want to talk to me about stuff, I truly do. I have never turned down the opportunity to speak with them, not once. But I get depressed when it comes to this becuz they choose instead to block me out. I have done nothing that would betray them or hurt them in any way. I spread my wings out as a hen, waiting for them to come to me. But the bitter truth is that the hen can't make the chicks come. The hen is left vulnerable in this state, but she does it anyway. Cuz she loves them. Just as I love my first years and want to see them succeed.
          The other point I am seeing happen is this: when a chicken is attacked, the first thing I see them do is throw up their wings, just as they do for the chicks. This is also how I feel the first year view me sometimes. Although I am spreading my wings to invite them in, they view it as an attack or as a defensive move. It is all in the judgment of the chick. As a chick last year, I saw the things my leaders did as attacks. Now that I look back, that order and discipline saved me from a world of trouble. They were spreading their wings for me to flock to them. I chose not to and I regret it. Now as a hen, I am suffering the same punishment I dished out last year. I have done nothing for them to fear me or hate me. But it happens anyway. They see me as an accuser. And I hate it.
          With that said, I don't know where to go from here. This was suppose to be words of wisdom, but honestly I'm the one in need of wisdom. In this situation there is nothing I can personally do to make it better. My wings are spread and I'm waiting for the chicks to come...if they ever do. I'm honestly losing hope that they will ever see me for what I really am. If any first years happen to read this, please take it to heart.

          When we read more about Saul, we all know that he was blinded by an intense light. This brings me to another point of life: sometimes we must be blinded in the physical to see in the spiritual. Jesus didn't just appear to everyone in Saul's group, He blinded Saul and appeared to him alone. When we wish to seek God, we must shut out our surroundings and truly seek Him.  We need to be immersed in His presense and not focusing on the people around us or even the preacher on stage. Our hearts desire must be to continually look for Him. We must ignore all distractions.
         There is another side to this however. I applied this blindness to the principle of fasting. Let me give an example. People I have known have fasted from secular music for a period of time. At the end of this time, they would realize just how awful secular music is. This, to me, is making yourself blind in the physical for a time so that you can see in the spiritual. A person shuts themselves off from, say secular music, only to realize from a spiritual standpoint just how much filth is in some songs. If you don't believe me, try it.

Sometimes we must be blind in the physical world to see in the spiritual world.

          The other night, I was reading the Final Quest and I came upon a quote that spoke of Saul's conversion. So I decided to read it in Acts. As I was doing so, God began to pour into me some of His infinite knowledge. I brought many different things away from this experience so I've decided to post about each one seperately, as each is sermon-worthy. So here goes with the first.
          Before I even get into any specific Scripture, I learned something from Saul. That is this: Life is not about each individual destination, it's about the journey. Saul was on his way to Damascus when he was blinded and commissioned by Jesus to spread the Word. He didn't get to Damascus first, he was on the way. He was on the journey. Saul's journey changed his life completely, not his destination. Too many times in life we are so focused on what comes next in our life. The next job, the next class, the next year of training. But what should always demand our attention is the current leg of the journey to get there. God uses the journey to a place to mold us to the people we need to be by the time we get there. Let's look at Saul again. His destination was the killing of Christians in Damascus. His journey changed his purpose, for when he got there, he was actually preaching and prophesying about God and Jesus. Saul had to be molded into how God wanted him before he could serve his true purpose in Damascus. Isn't it about time we take advantage of the journey and stop worrying so much about the destination? If we don't trust God to work on the journey, how will we ever trust Him when we arrive at our destination?