Perception

I am the one full of doubt.
I am the one who is shy.
I am the one who would rather
Go hide in the corner than talk to people.

Or at least that is what I thought.

It is funny
How you can go through life,
With an opinion of yourself,
That is totally different from
The people around you.

Not only that,
You walk through life,
With a view of yourself,
That is way different
Then the way God sees you.

God calls us his children.
God laid down his life for us.
God has forgiven us of our sins.
God loves us.
But we often forget all of that.

We shouldn't let our views
Affect the way that we think God sees us.
For all these traits were written in the Bible,
Never changing with time.
But we often based our view
on how we are perceived,
based off our ever changing emotions.

I am loved.
I am forgiven.
I am his child.
I am not forgotten

Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank you for your constant love, and for the fact that you don't change. when i am changing constantly, it is good to know that I have a rock to lean on. Thanks for being my rock. Amen.

The Beauty in a Sunrise

I'm sorry that there was no post on Wednesday. This week has been busy with getting everything together for my last week of school.

For today, I want to talk about sunrises. Sunrises are beautiful, and they are the way that god shows his love is breaking through the darkness everyday. I found this verse in 2 Samuel 23:4,that fits perfectly with this topic. "He is like the light of morning at sunrise on a cloudless morning, like the brightness after rain that brings grass from the earth." If you have ever looked at a sunrise, you can understand just how beautiful they are, and how God made each one unique to each day. In our lives too, God is still a sunrise. When we feel like we are in our darkest place, God is that light that breaks through the darkness into our lives. That moment when he does is so beautiful and so unique to that moment in your life, that it deserved some time to just be watched. Just like how the sun breaks through the dark every morning, God breaks into our lives, and the light he gives shines in us, and even through we may leave the light to go back to the darkness, or the darkness over takes us, God will bring a new sunrise, and a new breath of light into your life. And when you let him just be a sunrise for you, there is so much peace and comfort found in there when you sit back and watch how God is working in your life. I pray you take time to enjoy the sunrise!

Dear Heavenly Father,

Thank you for being a sunrise in our lives, when it feels like we are in a dark place. I pray that I will let you break into my life, and I can enjoy all the marvelous things that you are doing. Thank you for loving me even when I am in such a dark place. Amen. 

Fight the Good Fight

So we are approaching the end of the school year. Some of us are already out of school, some end this week, and some end school at the end of the month. I know that most of us have slowly started to lose interest in school, and you just sit in class and day dream about summer. I want to encourage you to keep working hard all the way up to the last day of school, and keep fighting the temptation everyday to slack off. 2 Timothy 4:7 says, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith." Finish the school year with the ability to say that you fought the good fight all the way up to the last day of school, and that you still remained faithful through the hard times. 

Dear Heavenly Father,

Thank you for giving us the opportunity to learn. I pray that you will give us the strength to finish out the school year strong, and keep fighting the good fight. Thank you for always being with us through the trials of school. Amen.

Tests

For most of us, when we hear the word test, we freak and try to find any way to get out of them. Well for the next two weeks, I have a test almost every weekday because of IB. So the first two test I have were English, and like any other English test, you have to write essays. So the last English test had more of an open ended question, and I just went hard with it, and as I was writing my conclusion, I wrote somethings that even caught me off guard. The way I wrote, and the topic I wrote about exposed so much about me and why I do what I do, and this test is a test for my IB Diploma, not a test to discover who I am. But in actuality, God created test as a way for us to discover more about ourselves so we may grow. James 1:2-4 says, "Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." Tests were designed to show us were we are lacking so that we may grow in those areas so that one day we can be complete, not lacking in anything. The thing is that in today's society is that we have so much standardized tests that test have become a thing that we must do, and we don't take advantage of taking the facts that we don't know to grow from that. We then take this attitude and apply it to the tests that God gives us. We try to get through them as fast as we can to get onto other things in our life, but we don't stop and take time to learn from these tests. Then the test comes up again in another form and we get frustrated that God is just giving you the same test over and over again. Trust me, it is extremely annoying. The thing is that God wants you to be complete and not lacking in anything, so he gives us these test, sometimes four or five times over, so that we can learn from it. That is why the verse starts out with the fact that we are to be joyful for test, because it brings us closer to being complete, and that is something we all should be striving for. So no matter if it is a test from God, or a test from your teacher, go into it with an attitude for learning, because you may never know what you may just learn about yourself. 

Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank you for giving me tests so that I may not lack in anything. Help me to have an attitude that is excited for the chance to learn from each test, for all you do, you do out of love, and never to hurt me. Thank you for your love even when I run away or try to avoid everything you have given me. Amen.

My Everything

A couple years ago, someone showed me a video. It was a skit done to the song "Everything" by Lifehouse. I immediately fell in love with the song and the skit that was in the video. The reason why I fell in love with it, was because it shared the simple truth that God created us, then we turned from him, yet he still died on the cross for us. The skit is so well perform, and it fits beautifully with the music. The song "Everything" is so beautifully, and if you haven't heard it, the message is that God is our everything. If you haven't seen this video, I suggest you take the time to see it. The link is posted below.

Everything Skit

Dear Heavenly Father,
Than you for your love that you give us, and thank you for being all that I need. I know that I may forget from time to time, so please help me to remember this fact when I fell like I'm at my lowest point. Thank you for the love I don't deserve. Amen.

Be Still

The world that we live in today is fast paced with all the technology that we have, and how we have the ability to spread news faster than before with internet and social media. With the fast paced life that we are living, we tend to miss out on what God has for us. We are always on the go, that it is rare to find to to just sit still. There is a verse that I like, Job 6:24, that talks about how important silence is. "Teach me, and I will be silent; make me understand how I have gone astray." Now if you have been to school, you know that the teacher can not teach you if you are talking and making noise, because your focus is placed somewhere else besides on the teacher. The same concept applies to God. He wants to teach us and to help us grow, but if we are continuously distracted by the things of this world, and if we keep running around like chickens with our heads cut off, then we don't have the opportunities to learn from God. So I challenge you to slow down this week, and just find time to sit still and be quiet, and try to listen to what God has to teach you. For I know that you won't immediately get a response from God, but when you are silent, you are allowing God to work in your life, and maybe work in ways you never through of before. My life has been crazy busy the past month with everything I need to do to graduate, as well as finding a job, and still trying to keep up with my school work. But when I do find that time to be still, I can find strength to keep going, and sometimes, God teaches me where my mistakes have been, and what I can do to move forward. 

Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank you for wanting to teach us even if we are bad students from time to time. Help me to find time in my life where I can sit and listen to you, to learn more about who you are, and who you made me to be. Thank you for your love and patience. Amen. 

Through the Storm

We all have storms in our lives. That is just a fact of life. We all deal with storms differently, and we all reach our breaking point at different points. But know that God is with you, through the storm. But no matter what strom you are going through, take heart in this verse. Psalms 34:17-20 says, "When the righteous cry for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their troubles. The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all. He keeps all his bones; not one of them is broken."

Dear Heavenly Father,
Thank you for being with us through the storms. I pray that you will give me courage to keep fighting this fignt. Thanks. Amen.