Destiny or Choice?

I've been thinking a lot lately about some of my desires, my calling, my choices and my destiny. Lately, God has been teaching me so much about how to live life and it goes against so much of how people teach us to live. Some people think that our life is planned out for us, that we have a set destiny and that is true to an extent. It's true in the fact that if we know Jesus, our destiny is Heaven which should be our goal in life anyway.
But Heaven isn't something for when we die, God wants us to discover Heaven and bring it to earth! That is our destiny. How that comes about really isn't that big of a deal. I think that's where God puts talents and gifts in us and says "Ok, you know the agenda. Here are the things I've given you to make it happen. What ideas do you have? How do you want to do this?".
It's called co-creating with God. I'm not saying that God doesn't give us direction, but I also don't believe that he plans out our every move and our every step. When you simply seek first His Kingdom, everything else simply falls into place. We remove so much of the conflict and confusion in our lives when we just live with that simple goal. It's simple in the fact that the "how" isn't complicated. If you know the heart of God, and you know that He wants you to help Him complete our destiny, then you also know that He doesn't get all worked up when you decide to do something that He didn't straight up tell you to do.
 I know for a fact that God LOVES to give us the desires of our heart. He has given me what I want countless times, because He is good and He LOVES us! If you mentioned that there was something you wanted and your best friend found out and got it for you, you wouldn't say "Oh but you didn't tell me this is what I wanted so I can't receive this from you"....NO!!!!! You would feel loved that they listened to your heart, your desires and gave you what you wanted. It's just another aspect of God's love.
It's the enemy that makes you think that God is up there like a GPS saying, turn right at the stop sign....turn left at the light! It's the enemy that makes us think that if we don't do exactly what God says then we wont end up living the best life we possibly can. I think that co-creating with God, using our talents and gifts that He gave us to further His ultimate plan is living our life the best way we possibly can. It's how He loves us. And oh how He loves us!

Irene means "Peace"

    Well, as most of the world knows, the eastern shore of the United States was hit with a hurricane last week. Honestly, when people started talking about us getting hit by a hurricane, I didn't really take it too seriously. Then I made the mistake of running to Walmart! Dumbest idea ever! But despite everyone's fear and panic, I can honestly say I felt nothing but peace. I mean, it's not like I have an ocean's view from my bedroom window (though nothing would make me happier) but there's always the possibility of flooding, trees falling, power going out; which that stuff happened, but not to me. There was no worry in my mind what-so-ever. In fact, I had my window open all night and the breeze was so perfect! The whole time I had a Bill Johnson quote in my head "You have authority over any storm you can sleep through". That solid truth kept me in perfect peace, and yes I slept very well that night thank you!
    The morning after, I went to church. I had to go early because one of the youth girls had slept at my house and was on the worship team. During the 8am prayer time God shared so much with. I was actually in the middle of complaining to my journal about a crappy situation I was going through when He totally interrupted my thoughts with a picture (I think He more so was just sick of my complaining...ha!). So I figured I'd just copy my journal entry on the revelation:

   "I'm sitting in prayer and God showed me the radar tracking the hurricane and said to look at it in the spiritual sense. All the storms in our lives, government, whatever, they are happening all around us, BUT! there is always the eye of the storm. The place of peace where it seems as though nothing else is going on! The storms cannot touch what is in the eye.
    Jesus is the eye. He is the place of peace and rest and when you abide in Him, when you rest in Him, nothing can touch you. You have authority over any storm you can sleep in. If you find the eye of the storm, you will find perfect rest, because the storms cant touch you."

    We can choose to focus on the storms around us, or we can choose to run to the eye and sleep through them. Choosing to sleep through a storm is not ignoring that it's going on around you, it's simply saying that you recognize the storm but you will not let it steal your peace! That's the enemy's goal! To STEAL our peace! We have to see it and say "Satan I see what you are trying to do and I WILL NOT let you do it!"
     I don't believe that it was coincidence that even though a hurricane came through, it was given the name Irene. Irene means PEACE! Just a little reminder that we will have storms but His peace is always there waiting for us to choose to run into.

   I heard another Bill quote today that goes right along with this: "If we want peace that passes understanding, we have to give up our right to understand."
   And of course Jesus himself is the one who said "In this world you WILL have trouble, but take heart because I have overcome the world". That's a promise I can cling too.

My Quest for Love continues

 
       God has had me on this quest to learn how to love for quite some time now. Close to this time last year He was teaching me how to love unconditionally and it totally rocked my world. It wasn't an easy lesson to learn. He was teaching me to love people that have hurt me despite the hurt. My tendency, and I think it's most of our tendencies, is to withhold love from someone when they've hurt me. It's a protection thing. I don't want to just throw my love around when people are just gonna keep hurting me. But if you look at the life of Jesus, He loved. End of story. There was no, oh but in this case the hurt was just too great and He needed to "guard his heart" or protect himself from getting hurt again. No! Even when He was beaten passed recognition and hanging on a cross He still turned His face to Heaven and said "Father forgive them for they don't know what they are doing". That is the greatest example of love, and you know what He got in return? They continued to make fun of Him and hurt Him. There was no happy ending to that day. He died, and His killers were totally ok with it.

   Here I am again, reliving what God taught me last year but this time on another level. This time He showed me another aspect of Love. Love associates with EVERYONE! Even if you don't agree with the way a person lives, how they act, how they talk....Love still loves even them! Those people that go to church and say all the right things and then turn around and act totally different, those people who live a lifestyle that doesn't glorify God, the sinners, you know the person you really dislike that is the last person you ever want to love. Our tendency is to say we shouldn't associate with people who could potentially corrupt us. BUT!!!! Let's once again look at what Jesus did, oh that's right! He hung out with the liers, cheaters, adulterers, murderers, and poor people. He didn't care about His reputation. They deserve love just as much as the "perfect" people, if not they need it more! Jesus laid down his reputation to love the unloved.
  
     I have no doubt in my mind that there were times when Jesus didn't feel like loving His enemies, I mean He was human, but the difference was, He knew how to live by the Spirit. He didn't allow His flesh to react the way it wanted to. He always followed what the Spirit said to do. If we are living by the Spirit, He will not only lead us to love those we don't want to love, but He will give us the strength to walk it out. The Holy Spirit never tells you to do something you are not able to do. It may not be easy, but you can do it!
  
Unconditional love is hard. It's a huge process that I dont know if you can ever even get completely right. Especially when there are people in your life that are just so challenging that they try your ability to love to no end! And we all have someone like that in our lives. But God says were still supposed to love them and Jesus showed us that it's totally possible! And not only Jesus, but the Bible is full of examples of people that learned to love even the most challenging individuals. It is not impossible!
 
     There are so many aspects to love and I'm seeing that the more and more God opens my eyes to them. He's even showed me that my love for Him can be conditional. I mean, how often on a sunday morning your tired or don't like the music or the teaching and you decide God isn't gonna get your worship and praise then? That's conditional love. I'm not happy so I'm not gonna make you happy. Love isn't easy, but it's what we are called to.

When it's all said and done, God isn't gonna ask us how much we did with our life, how much money we made, or how pure and sinless we were....He's gonna ask us, "Did you learn to love?"

"Except the Lord that build the house......"

   There is nothing I find more interesting then reading about the history of the Untied States of America. We are such a privileged, God ordained nation and how we came about and have continued to keep going has been nothing short of a miracle. I'm currently reading "From Sea to Shining Sea" by Peter Marshall & David Manuel. It is the second of a series of three about God's plan for America. It is the most inspiring piece of literature I think I've ever read. So as I'm reading you can expect me to post things things that jump off the page at me. Here is today's tidbit. It takes place in Philadelphia in 1787, a year after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. After much bickering and fighting about what direction to take our new nation, Benjamin Franklin took leave to say what was on his mind.

"How has it happened, sir, that we have not hitherto once thought of humbly applying to the Father of lights to illuminate our understanding? In the beginning of the contest with Britain when we were sensible of danger, we had daily prayers in this room for Divine protection. Our prayers, sir," he looked at Washington, "were heard, and they were graciously answered. All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of superintending Providence in our favor...And have we now forgotten this powerful friend? Or do we imagine we no longer need His assistance?

I have lived, sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth: "that God governs in the affairs of man.' And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid?

We have been assured, sir, in the sacred writings that except the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it, I firmly believe this. I also believe that, without His concurring aid, we shall succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel; we shall be divided by our little, partial, local interest; our projects will be confounded; and we ourselves shall become a reproach and a byword down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter, from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing government by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war, or conquest.

I therefore beg leave to move that, henceforth, prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven and its blessing on our deliberations, be held in this assembly every morning before we proceed to business."
-Benjamin Franklin

   Mind you, Benjamin Franklin was not a christian. He was known for his Rationalist views and he was the last person anyone would have expected to make such a statement.
   God, I pray that you raise up a Benjamin Franklin in our government today. A man that see's the importance of you in governing our nation and will stand up and boldly speak about the future of our country without the hand and wisdom of God guiding our every decision, even if he may not be fully convinced himself.

Album Update!

The Oil to Fire band! Only the most awesome band ever!

   Hey Everyone! I know it's been quite some time since I've posted an update. As most of you can sympathize, life gets away from you. Learning how to balance everything is something that you have to re-learn each time you enter a new season of your life. Well, blogging just did not take priority.

   I am happy to announce that we have successfully completed our six weeks of prayer and worship! We got all of the recordings and after 16 hours of working, Corey and I narrowed it down to what is now the line up for the "fire" portion of the album. It's exciting to start seeing this project come together and I'm so excited to see it finished completely! I know God is doing something through it and it's so exciting to be a part of it!

  Well I know this is short but I will try to do better at posting updates! Things are moving! Keep your eyes peeled for exciting pics, video and updates on the album! We hope to have a release date soon!