Blogging.

I want to blog but I don't have anything exciting to say.

I love Jesus.

Girlfriend.

Last night Jonathon took me to Olive Garden and back to the place he first asked me to be his girlfriend two years and ten months ago. He played me a song and asked me to be his girlfriend again. I said yes :)

Confusion.

I am left in state of confusion of how people can know so much about the Bible.

Far more than me even.

And still reject Jesus as LORD.

My precious old man just walked out. The last thing I heard him say?

"The problem with all religions is that it ignores the honesty of the finality of death: Nothingness."

My heart hurts.

Real life physical pain.

It actually kind of hurts to breathe.

I am here using Bible Gateway to copy scripture into word documents to print out and put around the infant classroom.

(P.S. I am lead teacher in there starting Monday if I have not already exclaimed my joy and excitement!!!!)

Right after I typed this I copied the next verse so I could take a break and breathe.

2 Peter 3:9

"The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness,

but is patient toward you,

not wishing that any should perish,

but that all should reach repentance."

Thank you Lord.

I could cry right now.

I am drinking tea and typing scripture right now.

Next to me there are three tables pushed together bringing eight people together discussing a book.

There is one precious man to me. He just stuck out to me with his hearing aid, gray hair and purple sweater. His small figure and wrinkly face made me want to give him a hug and kiss his cheek.

They were just discussing the woman in the story who all the men wanted because she was too perfect to be real.

She was idolized.

The comment was made:

"Well isn't that what people do to God? They idolize and fear him."

"Oh, I don't!" my precious old man proclaimed.

I am pretty sure that is the first thing I have heard him interject in the last hour.

It is taking everything in me to not cry.

And I have not even spoken a word to him.

It hurts to smile at people walking by right now.

My mom's

Goldfish.

Zephaniah 3:14-20

Zephaniah 4:17 "The LORD your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
he will quiet you with his love,
he will rejoice over you with singing."

This verse has always hit me a special way.

It has left me speechless time and time again that this is how God views me.

Knowing that God is perfect and all knowing it always makes me question my insecure self.

Last night at lighthouse we sang a song from the perspective of God singing over us. Some people sang along. But I just fell into my chair and wept.

These past couple weeks I have been showered with blessings from God. Yet in the mix of it all I have lost intimacy with God.

I have been living Philippians 3:7-8, "But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain Christ."

The blessings I have been given have turned into curses because of the lack of intimacy with my Savior Jesus Christ.

Last night as this song was song over me I could not control myself. I was taken off my feet by the abundant mercy, grace and faithfulness of my God. I literally felt swept off my feet by his love :)

"You're My Beloved
You're My Bride
To sing over you is My delight
Come away with Me My love

You're Beautiful to Me
So beautiful to Me

Under My mercy
Come and wait
Till we are standing face to face
I see no stain on you
My child

You're Beautiful to Me
So Beautiful to Me

I sing over you My song of peace
Cast all your care down at My feet
Come and find your rest in Me

I'll breathe My life inside of you
I'll bear you up on eagle's wings
And hide you in the shadow of My strength
I'll take you to My quiet waters
I'll restore your soul
Come rest in Me and be made whole

You're My beloved
You're My Bride
To sing over you is my delight

Come away with me my love"

I am so excited to be so close to God again.

I am so excited to fall into his loving embrace and feel my heart beating with his.

Last night was overwhelming.

God is so faithful.

He has never let go of me.

Intimacy with him is so beautiful and so amazing God could take anything away and I could not be sad.

Take away my car.

Take away my apartment.

Take away my job.

Take away my friends.

Take away my family.

Take away my money.

Take it all.

And give me more of God.

And I will sing for joy.

I understand how Job felt.

I love my God.

I love him so dearly and so deeply.

Oh words cannot suffice.

Mrs. Kearney

This is a teacher from the high school I went to.

She never taught me in any structured classes.

But she taught me more than any words I type now could express.

She went home to be with her Father in Heaven yesterday.

Part of me is just rejoicing so much.

How glorious for her.

She is just dancing with Jesus right now.

As a song I sang at lighouse last night would put it:

"On that day when I see

All that You have for me

When I see You face to face

There surrounded by Your grace

All my fears swept away

In the light of Your embrace

Where Your love is all I need

And forever I am free

Where the streets are made of gold

In Your presence healed and whole

Let the songs of heaven

Rise to You alone

No weeping no hurt or pain

No suffering You hold me now

You hold me now

No darkness no sick or lame

No hiding You hold me now

You hold me now

In this life I will stand

Through my joy and my pain

Knowing there's a greater day

There's a hope that never fails

Where Your Name is lifted high

And forever praises rise

For the glory of Your Name

I'm believing for the day

Where the wars and violence cease

All creation lives in peace

Let the songs of heaven

Rise to You alone

For eternity

All my heart will give

All the glory to Your Name"

Mrs. Kearney has been battling cancer.

When I say battling I mean battling.

That woman fought with everything she had.

I am so happy that she does not have to fight it anymore.

People often question God with the typical question:

"Why would you allow this person to suffer like this or like that?"

As much as I wish that in her lifetime on this earth she did not have to go through cancer.

What came from her fight was amazing.

Her joy.

Her smile.

Her laughter.

Her love.

If you had a conversation with her you would have no idea that pain that cancer was causing her physically.

Because her heart was amazing.

Her heart was joyful.

Her heart was vibrant.

Her heart was overflowing with the love of Christ.

This woman changed Lutheran High North.

Through her endurance through suffering and pain people saw what it meant to have a genuine relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

They saw that no matter what life throws at you a relationship with Jesus can keep a smile on your face.

Mrs. Kearney epitomized beauty.

Inside and Out.

Mrs. Kearney is so beautiful.

This world is not going to be the same without her.

There is one lonely flamingo sitting in a store somewhere that is always going to sit there

because Mrs. Kearney is not here to give it a home in her classroom.

Anyone who has had one conversation with her is going to have a special place in their heart for her always.

Sometimes if I was having a rough day at school I would pop my head in her classroom to say hi in passing.

Because I knew as soon as she flashed me her beautiful smile.

I would have a smile to give someone else.

I love her.

Jesus loves her.

I can only imagine the joy that Jesus must be feeling right now as he gets to dance with his beautiful bride.

Praise God for her life.

Praise God for her heart.

Praise God for her smile.

Praise God for her victory!

"Where o death is your victory, o where o death is your sting?"

By the power of the cross she has life eternal with the creator of the universe.

Zechariah...

I miss my nephew.

End of story.

People watching.

I love to people watching.

It intrigues me.

It breaks my heart.

Issues.

I have a lot of issues.

I am so blessed that God is so patient with me.

Deuteronomy 23:5

Last night at Watershed Beth Moore had an amazing talk. There were a couple scripture that penetrated my heart. Deuteronomy 23:5 was one of them. It says, "But the LORD your God would not listen to Balaam; instead the LORD your God turned the curse into a blessing for you because the LORD your God loved you." This really hit me for many reasons. First of all when I first read it I had to catch my breath reading the last line, "because the LORD your God loved you." I mean I know God loves me. But sometimes it just entirely takes me breath away, leaves me speechless, bewildered, humbled and joyful. My God loves me. Loves me. I also loved that God was referred to as "the LORD your God" three different times in just one sentence. I don't think that this repetition was just because God didn't have another way to refer to himself... Satan tried with everything he had to make Jon and my break up into a curse for me. But praise God for the blessing that has come from it. God is good. God is so good.

Last night God revealed a lot to me. He spoke to my heart so gently and lovingly, yet in some cases very sternly. For a solid five minutes I just spoke out apologies to God as I was driving home. There are ways in which I live sometimes I just wonder how in the world I am so blind to the detrimental nature of them. Thank the LORD your God for forgiveness, grace, mercy and a clean start.

Beth Moore said something last night. It struck me so deeply.

"We want God to give us strength from our vein imaginations."

That is me right now. That epitomizes me this past month and I pray that I cannot say that a week from now.

I am going to embark on a study called "Me, Myself and Lies" that my cousin is letting me borrow. I am making my heart as vulnerable as possible with God and am going to try to allow him to do so much work and shaping no matter how much it may hurt me. I just have to get myself out of the way and let God loose in my heart. The scariest prayer that I can pray but am forcing myself to pray numerous times a day is "LORD, have your way."

"Jesus my heart must know I'm pleasing to you"

I have probably blogged about this song time and time again.

But every time we sing it I never fail to be moved, to be drastically moved.

VERSE 1
Sanctify me
Clean out my closet
Take away anything
That is not pleasing to You

Purify me
Destroy all my anger
Wash away everything
That is not pleasing to You

CHORUS
I will be white as snow
I will be pure as gold
Jesus my heart must know
I'm pleasing to You

I give my life my all
Taking the cross I will follow
Jesus my heart must know
I'm pleasing to You

VERSE 2
Sanctify me
You are the light to guide me
To the place where I am
Only pleasing to You

Oh come and Purify me Lord
I need your light inside me
So the darkness flees
And I can be pleasing to You

I always am thrown into a time of deep mediation and self-assessment as we sing that song.

And I am always brought so humbly to me knees.

Nothing about me should be pleasing to Jesus.

There's always one prevalent area of my heart that God is working on because it is disgusting and not in line with who he is. And then there are all of the other parts that God is not working on yet because he knows I cannot handle it all at one time. There will never be a time I can seriously test my heart and claim that it is pleasing to Jesus. Time and time again I have to face the daunting reality that I am a poor miserable sinner dying without the blood of Jesus. But praise God, I have been covered by his blood and I do have life. In times where we are testing our own hearts Satan definitely tries to jump in and from the truths we find about how short we fall of the glory of God, he tries to manipulate them into lies that God's love is in some way conditional on how we act. It is the victory of Jesus Christ that we have to claim, and when we do we can walk restored and beaming with the light of Christ.

They are on the plane now.

http://denisebickel.theworldrace.org/

http://michaelmurphy.theworldrace.org/

And they are officially world racers...

My parent's house.

I am at my parent's house now...

not my house, my parents.

Weird.

I have internet.

I want to blog.

I have nothing to say.

Denise and Mike leave tomorrow and I promised Denise I would not be sappy when I say goodbye.

So if I blog about them my heart will get sappy and I'll cry therefore I will not be able to just goof around with her when we say goodbye like she wants me too.

So I am lame.

This is the worst blog ever.

But I would feel like a horrible person not blogging in five days.

This is the end.

If you made it to the end reading this I apologize that nothing good came from it.

Magnetic Poetry.

Goldfish has a magnetic poetry board filled with random words.

A couple months ago Jaime and I began our endeavor of proclaiming the Gospel on this board every time we come in. The other day we came in just so Jaime could pee and I put together, "He will always be light in the storm." When we have more time we put together more. I have decided to keep track of everything we do so I am going to put them up on here too.

This is the one I just spent the last half hour doing.

by the blood

true love is near

say yes to him

he will never lie or leave you

he sees your delicate beauty and sings over you

sky and sun show he is power

light wind whispers worship

sour beneath the shadow of his arm

live in moments when time is a gift

to tell of his death and our life together

Royal Oak Residents.

So Jaime and I are officially moved into our 300 sq. ft apartment in Royal Oak. I could not be more excited for what this entails. I know that through our living together and what he is doing in each of our lives he has huge things in store for us here. I could not be more excited for the future than I am at this point in my life. We don't have internet at our place which after this weekend I have found to be a huge blessing from God. There are plenty of places that have free wireless internet, the best being Goldfish Tea (as I am interrupted by the owner and given a card asked to vote for them on clickondetroit.com/4thebest, I obviously did since I had just typed that they were the best). If I am going to choose to walk somewhere to use internet it always makes me think twice if it's truly worth the walk to just check my facebook real quick. I have found most times it is not and instead I stay and spend more time in the word or singing to Jesus. Such a better way to spend my time.

We have also officially begun our P90X workout. Today I did an hour of plyometrics which is a mostly squat and jumping exercises (which let me tell you is fun to do in an apartment where the ceiling is only a few inches above your head c: ) and a sixteen minute Ab Ripper workout. By the end my shirt did not have a single dry spot. Such joy.

Working a four hour shift in the middle of the afternoon usually bugs me. What with a half an hour drive both ways and missing the entire morning which is when all of the meat happens makes it just kind of dreary. But today, I am all about it for some reason. I slept in until 8:25, talked with Jaime for a bit before she headed off to school, worked out, showered, cleaned, organized, and here I sit enjoying a mixed berry with black tea powder smoothie. After work I have Watershed Bible study which I missed last week and am so eager to go to tonight. I could not imagine together a more relaxing and exciting day. It is so great how God knows exactly what we need. If I had to pick the perfect day this would not be it, but right now, in this moment, it's perfect. God is so good.

I need to be responsible and do my whole change of address deal.

How long can I procrastinate on that?