Beautifully Broken

Ever have those days where everything seemed to be spinning out of control?  Everything from exciting, happy, joyous moments to the darkest of tragedies can cause us to need a second to breath and just put a pause on life for a second in order to take back control of our world.  Or, we think that's what we need at least. Tonight, I found myself asking God to just take over control of many different things.  As I was praying this, however, I realized that while this is one of my most common prayers, it may also be the most ironic. Why?  Well first of all, I tend to pray this most often when I am not feeling in control to begin with and simply not getting what I want.  I get scared and confused about a situation, so I ask God to take control of it.  Is this really what I am asking, or is this just a common phrase I say to pretend like I am giving God control of it? I pray the words, but the heart behind it is more along the lines of "okay God, you're in...

Before we look at any scripture, let's start off by getting three images in our heads. 1) Think of the God in the Old Testament. 2) Next, think of God in the New Testament. 3) Lastly, picture God how you picture Him in your own life. I would love to say that most of us have the same picture of God's power in these three images.  However, we probably don't. When I think of the God of the old testament, I think of a kind of power that can be clearly seen.  For example, I think of God allowing His people to win great battles and be mighty warriors; power in the physical sense. When I think of this same God in the New Testament, I also picture a great deal of power.  While there were not as many wars happening in the New Testament, God allowed His Son the power over DEATH itself!  Can anything get more powerful than that? Unfortunately, I feel like we don't see this kind of power in the God of our own lives. Why is that?  We KNOW He i...

Why do bad thing happen to good people? So many things can fall into the question, such as deaths, illnesses, and just bad situations. While it's a broad question, let's focus on why we can feel so lousy while in the midst of being used by God.  Wouldn't you think it would be the opposite?  It seems like when God is using us the most, Satan can attack the hardest. James 1:2-3 Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing if your faith produces perseverance. That's one of those verses that I unfortunately have conflicting feelings about.  Some days I read it and I'm like YEAH FAVORITE VERSE RIGHT THERE! Then other days I read it and I just kinda want to pretend it doesn't exist. (But thank goodness it does!) Joy and suffering? No, that doesn't go together.  But God has a different idea. This verse is clear about a few different things. 1) Trials of many kinds. Life can h...

I know that understanding our self-worth is sometimes a struggle for a 20 something year old girl, but I'm guessing this concept affects people of all walks of life.  Knowing we struggle with sin can sometimes make how we view ourselves a little messy and confusing. The Bible is pretty clear on how God feels about sin.  The consequences of sin are death, He spits out the lukewarm, we fall short of the glory of God... this list can go on and on. Because we sin, we are not worthy.    We don't deserve the grace that God shows us daily.  However, God thinks we are worth it. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Roman's 5:8) When evaluating our own self-worth, we have to stay focused on how God views us. Today's emphasis on social media makes it hard to see ourselves in the best light sometimes.  I love social media as much as the next person, but it becomes a problem when we forget to remember that we...

  As some of you may know, this week marks the 7th year anniversary of when my dad passed away.  It was the hardest thing I've ever been through by far, and I am still wondering how that fits into God's perfect plan.  While the pain of this never ends, God's love doesn't end either. It doesn't matter what life throws at us, we are never without our Father.  This can be a really difficult concept to grasp depending on our different life experiences.  If we have been hurt a lot, trusting God can seem impossible.  When people we love pass on, we wonder if God is really there and why he would do something that causes us so much pain. He says, "Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth." (Psalm 46:10) God does not call us to go crazy trying to figure life out.  He simply calls us to be still .  This time of the year typically calls for stress for so many different reasons. ...

If anyone would come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. (Luke 9:23) It's not fair. Why me? When will I find answers? Is God even listening? Some days I feel like simply sitting around and moping.  It sure is easy to come up with so many reasons why life isn't fair. For me personally, I can come up with a lot of reasons why my life "isn't fair".  I have lost way too many close family members, I get caught up in emotions of daily life struggles, people aren't always kind, and I guarantee I could keep going for awhile. I'll be honest. Life ISN'T fair. It's not fair that a perfect, loving man was beaten, had nails driven through his hands, was mocked, had knife-sharp thorns driven into his head, DIED.  It's not fair that our Jesus went through this and I didn't have to. It's not fair that I take advantage of the greatest act of love that has ever and will ever occur.  It's not fai...

This post is mainly me questioning myself. I'm currently reading Not A Fan by Kyle Idleman (so far I highly recommend it) and I'm thinking about how to actually apply it to my life.  The theme of the book is that while knowing facts about Jesus is great and all, that means I'm His fan. I know the verses, can tell you some bible stories, ect. But do I KNOW him? I am firm in my beliefs that Christ died for me and that He is God's son. I know who He is, but do I really grasp that information fully? Honestly, I'm guessing not many of us do. We don't get the reality of just how awesome He is.  If we did grasp it, why aren't we telling literally everyone we see about it? I'll proudly wear my Baylor Tshirt for everyone to see which team I support, but why can't I tell one person about Someone so so so much greater than any earthly thing? Why do we feel awkward bringing up the subject of God? I want to be the person that can tell the waitress at that restaur...

So this past week I turned 20.  That's terrifying.  A friend nicely reminded me that this is the decade where so many important life changes will probably happen, such as graduating college, grad school, job in the real world, possible marriage and starting a family...STAHP.  Why can't I go put on some footie pjs and watch cartoons? Life can get crazy, but how in the world can someone get through the craziness without Christ at the center?  Let's look at the life of Joash and decide if we want to make the same choices as him, or go down a better path. (found in 2 Chronicles 24) So if we think our lives are crazy, Joash became king when he was SEVEN.  What's weirder than that?  He actually did a pretty good job of keeping focused on God even under all that pressure!  The prophet Jehoiada seems to have been a pretty good role model for Joash, because the young king did "what was right in the eyes of the Lord" all through Jehoiada's life.  After ...

My biggest strength!? I'm so glad you asked!!! I'M SO HUMBLE ABOUT EVERYTHING. Ummm. Yeah. So humble. Have you ever heard those people that go on and on about how humble they are?  Most likely we have all said or at least thought it at some point.  It's kind of interesting how we take the most pride in the very fact we aren't prideful.  I mean, does that even make sense...? It's true, God does call us to live with a sense of humility in our lives.  However, this is one of His commands that we can't exactly practice... That probably won't work out very well.  If we spend all of our efforts making sure we aren't being too prideful, this is what our thoughts may become: *Whoa I hope everyone saw that cool thing I just did.  And now I hope they see how casual I'm playing it. I'm just so talented AND humble!* Yeah I don't think that's really the idea.  If we concentrate on our own humility, then we are doing the exact opposite...