What am I missing?

I'm going to give a disclaimer that this may be a very long post today folks.  I have been thinking about this blog for weeks and am finally getting around to finishing it. It may seem depressing, then upbeat, spastic, yet completely brilliant. haha I just heard the perfect word today and knew I needed to finish writing it! So here goes!

What am I missing about singleness? They say it's supposed to be the best time of your life. (I sure as heck don't know who this "they" is, but I don't think they were ever married) I mean Paul says in 1 Corinthians 7 that he wishes everyone could be single like him because we would all have more time to devote to the Lord than our spouses. I get that part, really I do. I only have to worry about me. I do what I want, I buy what I want, I go where I want. I also know that I probably have more time to spend serving the Lord than say a wife and mother of 4 kids. Do I use all of this free time for this purpose? No, but we'll get to that later. But then Paul goes on to say that "those who marry will face many troubles in this life, and I want to spare you of this." Paul, did you not have any troubles as a single? Seriously, I read that passage and think, wow so only married people have troubles Paul? I'm screwed then because Lord knows I've got some problems in my life! He says that a married woman's concerns are of pleasing her husband and an unmarried woman's concerns are of pleasing the Lord. This is the verse that really sticks out to me. I'm a nurturer. I like to take care of people and I can't wait one day to please my husband (in more ways than one ;) BUT for the time being I don't have a husband to take care of. So as Paul says my full attention should be on the Lord.

So I got to thinking. Is my full attention really on the Lord? Am I really concerned with pleasing the Lord? What should I be doing with my life right now that I can't do when I'm married? Why did Paul make such a big stink about being single and how great it was? What am I missing?!? Because being single has kind of sucked the past 25 years.

So while doing all this thinking, I heard 2 songs and 1 sermon that have just rocked my world and I think have answered my questions. The first song is Keep Making Me by Sidewalk Prophets. One part of this song says "Make me lonely so I can be yours, till I want no one more than you Lord. Cause in the darkness, I know you will hold me. Make me lonely." Wow oh wow. I've asked God for a lot of thing, but not once have I asked him to make me lonely. I have asked many times quiet the opposite. The Lord has a funny way of answering prayers sometimes. I realized all those lonely nights laying in bed or lonely nights watching TV, God has just been calling me. God wants me to want him. He wants to be all I need. He desires a deep, intimate relationship with him. He wants to pursue me. In him, there is no loneliness. In him we are complete and perfect and lacking nothing. In him we are satisfied. Which brings me to the 2nd song that in hearing I immediately googled the lyrics because they were so great! It's called Satisfied by About a Mile.

Through the struggles I face

When contentment starts to fade

Through the constant wondering

When my doubt is crippling

This will be my, this will be my prayer

I'm letting go of my fears

And believing that You're here

No matter what my future holds

You are God, You are in control

And this will be my, this will be my prayer

Let Your song be the song I sing

Through the blessings and burdens this life will bring

In You alone I'm satisfied

And all I need is Your sacrifice

I have more than I deserve

You gave me Your life

In You alone I'm satisfied

Another sucker punch to the heart. In HIM ALONE are we satisfied. No Job, money, power, husband, kids can satisfy us. It's an amazing concept really. We are all searching for something to make us whole and happy. We can look to everything else, but the one source of true and complete Joy. I wish we all could just get this through our heads! We don't need to look anywhere else! He is it! Abba father! 

So in hearing these songs I was thinking about how to be completely satisfied in the Lord and once again what am I missing about singleness? How can I be more concerned with the lord affairs? I kept thinking that I need to do more. I need to serve more. I need to evangelize more. I need to love more. Sure all of those things are great and I should be doing them, but I realized it's not so much what I'm physically doing but more the condition of my heart. Am I satisfied completely in him? Am I so lonely that I run to him instead of online dating? Am I so lonely that I run to him instead of texting the guy I know I shouldn't?  Do I want him more than I want a husband and kids? The answer to these questions is currently no. That needs to change. 

So I listen to sermons on my way to work every morning. Today I started Pastor Mike's I Am series and boy am I glad I did! This sermon was from months ago, but it was exactly what I needed to hear today. The whole point of the message was this: What we mediate on is what we magnify, and what we magnify is what will control us. So basically whatever we focus on all the time will consume us and will take us away from Jesus. We need to mediate on Jesus so we can magnify HIM and let him be who consumes us. I mediate on so many things other than the Lord its ridiculous. My job is a big thing for me now, but something that I always mediate on is my singleness. Its constantly on the forefront of my mind. At night I check online dating sites to see if there is anyone out there. I lay in bed and think about the guy I was "talking to" a few weeks ago and how badly I want to just text him to see how he is. I'm always on the look out. I am always thinking, talking, searching, praying for this one thing. I meditate on  how it will happen or when I'll get married. By meditating on this, I'm magnifying it and in turn letting it consume me. 

Even before hearing this message, my dear roommate came to me with her own epiphany the other day that as much as we want to be pursued by a guy and we just want to to talk that guy, the Lord wants the same thing from us. As I lay in bed at night thinking about this guy and battling myself not to talk to him but so desperately wanting to, The Lord is battling for me and he so desperately wants to talk to me. So last night as I came SO close to texting that guy I just had this thought that I wish I was that desperate to talk to the Lord too. Then I heard this message today. I need to stop mediating on finding a man, I need to stop mediating on wanting to talk to this guy again, I need to stop letting this consume my thoughts. Because when we meditate on our storms, we magnify our storms. But when we mediate on Christ, we magnify Christ and those storms seem a lot less important because God is that much more real in my life. When I mediate on the "problem" of singleness in my life I only become drained and useless. If I would start meditating on things above, I would be uplifted and complete. So when I lay down at night I will stop meditating on this storm and set my eyes on Him. I know I WILL get married one day because The Lord will fulfill the desires of my heart. He gave me these desires to be a wife and a mother and I have no doubt he will give me those things. It will happen when The Lord wants it to happen. And until that time comes I am going to draw near to him. I am going to be satisfied in him first. If I can't be satisfied now, there is no way I can be satisfied when I'm married and more concerned about my husband and kids. So Lord, as difficult as this is to pray, keep making me lonely until you are all I need. Make me a woman after God's own heart. A woman who is so in love with you. A woman who is completely and utterly satisfied in her sweet and single life. 

LOVE

You know what was on my heart all day today??

LOVE

I spent the day with my niece at Sea world today and I thoroughly enjoy quality time loving on this little girl. We can be doing nothing but sitting and it's still just great to be with her. I adore her and would do just about anything for her. I just love loving her. 

Then on the way home when the little was sleeping my mom got all sappy and told me she really hopes she lives to see me get married and have babies. Now she's not sick or anything like that but you know how parents are...at least mine are and can get all emotional at any given time...So then I was thinking about how I can't wait for that either and I want to experience that kind of Love in life too (hopefully sooner rather than later, am I right God? :) 

Fast forward a few hours and I was talking to a friend about a tattoo I want to get (shocker! yes I want a tattoo!) and I had been going back and forth about what to get. I want something small and something that has importance to me. I thought about a cross or a bible verse but that just didn't seem right. I began sharing with this friend something I learned in Haiti and I just knew that it was perfect for my tattoo! He said that this tattoo would be a great way to share the gospel as well...And guess what it is?? LOVE  

While in Haiti one of the girls from a team in Alabama shared one night about Love. She read the verse John 13:34-35 which says “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.” Now I've been a Christian my whole life and I've heard this verse countless times. Of course we know as Christ followers that we are called to love others. But do we really follow this commandment? And do others know that we are Christ followers based on our love for others? My answer to both those questions would be no.

The girl who shared this said that love can look many different ways. It can be loving your spouse or your family members. It can  be loving your friends and walking with them through difficult times. It can just be hugging orphans, or painting old ladies nails. It can be being nice to the person no one is nice too. It can be building a house for the poor, or giving a good tip to the server who was lousy. It could be washing the feet of a dirty homeless man, or just smiling at a stranger. Love is shown in so many different ways. Love is not easy. It can be messy, hard, confusing, and not seem worth it. But trust me it is so worth it. If Christ called us to do it then it will be worth it one day when he looks at us and says "well done my good and faithful servant" I want him to say that I loved well and I loved deeply.  

I challenge all of you to look at your life and see where you could love more. Where could you give more grace to people and love them like Christ loves you? God doesn't just say to love, but to love like he loves us...now that's quite a bit of love! The Lord loves us with an everlasting love and there is nothing we can do to make Him stop loving us! 

I am calling myself out here and hopefully others will feel the same pull on their heart as I did when I was in Haiti hearing this word. I have not been doing an excellent job loving others. Sure we all have bad days and get frustrated with people but I bet if we go into every day with the mindset of John 13:34-35 then we will be more likely to show Christ's love and less likely to have those "bad days." 

One last verse for you to chew on that blows my mind every time I read it. 

1 John 4: 8 "Anyone who does not love does not know God. Because God is love." 

#BOOM 

My heart is in Haiti

I'm not even sure how to put into words all that I have learned in the past 10 days, but I am sure going to try! I had the most incredible opportunity to travel to Haiti with the Northwest Haiti Christian Mission last week. I would love to tell you all the amazing things we did while we were there but that would take me forever and you probably wouldn't want to read it! But lucky for you, my trip was well documented by photos that you can check out on my Facebook. :) The real reason for writing this blog post is to share my heart and how the Lord has changed it on this trip.

I went into this trip not exactly knowing what to expect. I had never been on a missions trip and none of us has been with this organization before either. The first day we got there, my whole team (at least us girls) were thinking "what the heck did we get ourselves into?" We had just rode a bus for 6 hours with no air conditioning on the bumpiest rockiest roads probably in all of Haiti. Meanwhile most all the other people on the bus had done this before and I just kept thinking why did any of them come back after this torture?? None of us asked each other how we were doing because we probably would have broken down at any point. For the first few days my team would joke with each other saying "oh next time we come we'll do this or do that" But we all knew there was no way we were coming back.

Well...that all started to change maybe 3 days into the trip. We started working with the orphanage girls and my heart obviously started melting. A lot of the kids can understand English but can't speak it and most of the older girls CAN speak English but choose not to...so annoying! lol But it's amazing how God is bigger than the language we speak. We somehow got to know these girls despite the language barrier and by the end of the trip I did not want to leave and could not wait to get back to Haiti to see my sweet girls again and tell them "Jezi remme ou!" The tent camping, the smelly bathrooms, the not so great food, the heat, and everything else I was not liking about Haiti seemed oh so insignificant compared to what the Lord was doing there with these kids and with me.

Every night we had devotions with everyone at the missions and one night we sang the song Oceans by Hillsong. I've sang this song many times, but this time it meant so much more than normal.

Sprit lead me where my trust is without borders

Let me walk upon the waters wherever you would call me

Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander

And my faith will be made stronger in he presence of my Savior

I will call upon your name

Keep my eyes above the waves 

My soul will rest in your embrace

 I am Yours and You are mine

I definitely feel like the Lord lead me to where my trust is without borders in Haiti. In America I feel like it is so easy to just put God in a little box on the shelf and pull Him out when I need him. It's easy to feel like we don't need God. Sure I trust God, but I feel like I put limits, or borders, on his trust. But in Haiti, my trust has grown by leaps and bounds. There were so many things that I had to put my trust in the Lord for. I couldn't keep him in my little box anymore, and coming back to America he is not going back in that box!! I love the last few lines of this song, My soul will rest in your embrace, I am yours and You are mine. I really felt this sense of peace, like I really am the Lords and he is mine. I didn't have to worry about anything else, but just feeling secure and at rest in his presence.

I also learned a new song on this trip called Slow me Down Lord. And the song is in fact slow and drags a little, but I loved the words! 

Slow me down oh Lord slow me down

Help my heart to hear Your sound

Speak into my life Lord speak now

Slow me down oh Lord slow me down

Clear my mind oh Lord clear my mind

Bring me peace that I cannot find

Take my worldly thoughts break my pride

Clear my mind oh Lord clear my mind

Wake my soul oh Lord wake my soul

With this mess I’ve made make me whole

Of this life called mine take control

Wake my soul oh Lord wake my soul

Slow me down oh Lord slow me down

Help my heart to hear Your sound

Speak into my life Lord speak now

Slow me down oh Lord, Slow me down

Oh lord, slow me down. I need this reminder every single stinkin day. It is SO easy to get caught up in life. In Haiti, I was forced to slow down. There was a lot of great ministry things we did each day but there was also a lot of down time in the evenings where I was able to slow down. I didn't have to think about work or bills. I didn't have to think about being lonely and wanting to find a husband. I was just surrounded by the Lord, doing his work with some other really great people. 

This has become way longer than I have intended! Props if you've read all this way! I could say so much more about my time in Haiti, but I think that is enough for one night! I am so incredibly thankful for this trip and I cannot wait to get back to Haiti and love on my babies! Thank you Jesus for loving me so I could love others and tell them about you. 

James 1:27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. 

Life in the real Word

 I can't believe I haven't written a new post since I have been working! It's been almost 7 months! Can you tell I'm a little busy? I have SOO much I could say, but I'm going to keep it short and sweet, at least try too! I'm not very good at not talking ;) I have a zillion things to do tonight, and this was definitely not on my plan of things to do tonight but I just felt the urge to blog! So here's a little list of some things going on in my life as of late! 

1. I got a job teaching 2nd grade. I may work 40 hours a week, but any teacher knows it's more like 60+ hours a week. It's never ending. You go to work and come home and do more work. You never stop thinking about the kids and ways to try and improve your teaching. You dream about the kids, you talk about school, you pinterest for school...your life if school! lol 

2.  I started baking a lot more and have been selling my goodies! This has been a great stress relief and good extra income! Check out Sweets by Jenn on facebook :) 

3. I lead the 2-3 yr old class at church and even though it's hard sometimes I love those kids and I love telling them about Jesus every week!   

4. My first year of teaching has been 1000 times harder than I ever thought it would be. I thought about blogging about this almost every week, but I don't want this blog to be a depressing place where I complain about my job. That's one big reason I haven't blogged in 7 months! 

5. I started attending a great community group and have made some amazing new friends! :) I always look forward to Tuesdays now! 

6. I miss my best friend like crazy, but we talk every single day!

7 It's been a major adjustment living at home, but I am 99.9% sure I'm moving in with a friend this summer. Yippie!! :) 

8. I have lost 26 pounds since August. Eating healthy and working out baby! Still have quite a few pounds to go, but it's a journey that I take day by day, pound by pound! 

9. I still want so badly to fall in love, get married, and have babies but I am actually content in that area of my life waiting on God's timing. I know that God will bring my husband into my life in His timing and not mine. Honestly, it's been good that I am so busy because I don't have much time to sit and think about how lonely I am and how nice it would be to have a man in my life. It WILL happen, but while I wait I'm just learning to trust God in the everyday things of life. 

10. The real world is hard! lol These past 7 months have been very trying! Learning how to make and actually follow a budget is hard. I love to shop, and it's been an adjustments realizing I can't just go shopping when I have bills to pay! Learning how to manage my time to be able to work out, plan healthy meals, spend time with Jesus, have some sort of social life, and be a great teacher is hard. It's nothing like college was. It's so much better and not quite as good at the same time. I don't miss school, but I miss Gainesville, friends, staying up until the wee hours just watching TV with my roomies or baking cookies, going to football games, Mexico Lindo, Barnies, and First Assembly. 

Well, I don't know if I succeeded in making that very short, but hey it's hard to sum up 7 months in a few paragraphs! I will definitely be back soon and it will not be 7 months before I post again! This teacher is tired and it is way past her bedtime! My prayer for you is that you are relentlessly pursing Jesus this week and laying down your life everyday. Make a conscious decision each morning that you will live your life for Him today and may your actions and words be used to glorify Him! Goodnight friends! Love ya'll! :)

God's laughing at me

You know that saying "If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans?" Well, God is sitting up in heaven right now peeing his pants from laughing at me. I have often told God what I want and how I want it! HA! yeah right. So in high school my "plan" was to go to college and get my MRS. er I mean education degree, (at least one of those happened). The big almighty plan was to get married the summer I graduated from school, aka this summer, and my husband and I find jobs and move somewhere. Well, alas I don't have a rock on my finger, nor am I anywhere close. So after I decided that plan wasn't working I decided the new plan was to move to Orlando with Lindy and we both get teaching jobs and live together like we did this year. We'd meet new people, do fun stuff in a new place, and hopefully find a husband since that didn't work out in college so well. Well, as I mentioned in my last blog I applied for 40 some jobs in Orlando and hadn't heard from ANY of them, and still haven't. So that plan was quickly going by the wayside.

Onto Plan C. I had been thinking about moving back to Melbourne for a few weeks so I thought why not, might as well go for it, BUT I didn't tell Lindy I was even thinking about this because we had both told each other repeatedly over the year "We are not moving back to Melbourne. We will not stay in Gainesville. We will not live with our parents again." See this is where God is not just chuckling a little, but bending over from his side hurting and peeing himself laughing. Because guess where I am currently writing this post from? My bedroom at my parents house in Melbourne. ha! AND guess where Lindy is? Living in Gainesville! (Sidenote: SO happy for her too and Gods plans for her life, BUT SOOO sad we won't be in the same town anymore and living together.) We are both doing all the things we swore to ourselves we weren't going to do. You would think I would be quite depressed by this turn of events, but miraculously I'm not. God may be laughing, but he is changing my heart in the process. I am excited to be back in Melbourne, a little nervous, but still excited. I'm excited to possibly have a job at a school I said I would never work at. Everything I thought I didn't want is exactly what I do want now. God changed my plans and my heart without me even realizing it.

You would think that I would understand now that I shouldn't make plans, because my plans seem to be the wrong ones, but even today I caught myself saying "maybe I won't have to move out of my parents house because I'll start dating someone and we'll get married soon and then I'll just move in with him" (See how my mind works, always goes to the marriage point) Lindy quickly told me "don't count on that, because chances are that may not be God's plan right now." Don't you hate when you're best friend is right? I am not counting on this as a"plan" but it would be nice if it happened :) And as quickly as I am typing this I am forming new plans in my head. hahaha What can I say, I am a planner! lol I guess it's not bad to have plans, but we can't set ourselves up to be disappointed when they don't work out exactly how we want them to. So far not many of the plans I have ever planned have come to pass. And you know what? IT'S OK! One of my all time favorite verses is Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future." Jesus promises us that he has good plans for us. I don't know them, but he does. I wouldn't have ever chosen to be almost 23, single, and living at home. No way Jose. But that's God's plan for my life right now and I want his plans for my life way more than I want my plans. I am making it my daily prayer for my heart to become more like Christ's and for his will to become my will. I want what he wants for me, not what I want for myself. So I think my next "plan" is just to enjoy life and wait on God's plans and his perfect timing :) Sounds perfect to me!

Life is moving toooo fast.

      Has it really been like 5 months since I have written on here? Life is CRAZY town right now! Most anybody who is reading this follows me on twitter or is a friend on Facebook so you know that last month(wow a month alreadyy??) I graduated with my Masters degree from UF. I was SO ready to be done! I cannot wait to get out of Gainesville and finally start my life! Most people are scared to leave college and be on there own, but heccck no! Get me out of here! I have felt for a few years now that college was just this limbo time where I didn't really know what I was doing with myself and now I'm out of college and guess what? Still don't know what I'm doing! Go figure! 

     Getting a degree in education is different than most other degrees because I can't look for a job directly after graduation. I won't be able to start working until August, and even then I have to find a job first! I am hoping to move to the Orlando area, so I have been looking for jobs in orange, lake, and seminole counties. These counties have just started posting their job openings online and I have applied for about 17 jobs so far. And now I'm playing the waiting game. This is the most anxious I have been in my entire life. I am a fairly patient and relaxed person. I don't freak out about a lot of things, but I am beginning to freak out a little. I am constantly quoting Philippians 4:6 "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God" as well as reminding myself of my favorite verse in Jeremiah that reassures me God has great plans for my life, plans to prosper me, and to give me a hope and a future. Thank you Jesus for being in control of my life and having great, amazing plans for my life! I know that God is going to take care of me so I don't need to worry, but it just horrible having to wait. And I just said I was patient..oops. lol

    The worst part is that I have to be out of my apartment by July 31st, but there is a very good possibility that I won't have a job by then. If that's the case I have to move everything home to Melbourne and then possibly move it all back to Orlando or wherever I end up. Of those 17 jobs I have applied for, I could not even hear back about any of them. I honestly don't know. The education department is a little, or a lot, silly sometimes and they have to post jobs online even if they already know who they are going to hire. So I could have applied for these jobs when they already have someone for the position. But I'm checking the websites daily and applying to any jobs that come up for K-2. I just have to have faith that I will find a job. I may not find a job until August, or until after school has started, but I know that I will find a job. Obviously I have incredible parents who won't let me be homeless if I don't find a job, but I just want it so badly!

     I have this whole summer off and I would LOVE to be planning for my classroom, but it's hard when I don't know the grade! I need to pick a theme and I want to make stuff on my cricut for my classroom. I am so excited to have my own classroom and it actually be my class, my kids, my rules. Not just me in someone else's room. Eeek! That will be staring my life. Moving to a new city, making new friends, finding a new church, making a difference every day in these kid's lives, falling in love, having babies.....and more babies :) I want it all and I just want it to start now! :) Done with limbo land! There with the patience again! I think I've been patient enough for almost 23 years. lol ;)

      Even though I am worried about all of this job stuff, God is still good all the time and all the time God is good! If I don't find a job, God is good. If I don't marry till I'm 30, God is good. If I can't have kids, God is good. My hope is not in these things and my life does not depend on them. I will never find fulfillment in my job, husband, or kids. I find fulfillment, satisfaction, and joy in Jesus and him alone. I am so thankful I can see this before I begin any of these journeys in life! I know it will be hard, but I will continue to humble myself before the Lord and put him first above all else in life. I am praying for each of you reading this right now, that you too would realize where your hope comes from and place everything in his hands. Let him carry your load, cast your anxieties on him, and find protection and peace in his embrace. Let him love you and enjoy being loved by him. He is the greatest abba father a person could ask for :) He wants a marriage from us, not a 30 minute date with him every Saturday. I am the first one to admit that I have been guilty of this. But it is time to be married to Jesus again. I must want him more than I wanted to graduate, more than I want to find a job, or get married, or have babies. I have said that to myself a thousand times, and you've probably read it on here a few times too ;) But I repeat it because it's so true and I forget it! Everyone needs a little reminding :) So with that being said, I am going to go spend some time with him and I urge you to do the same! Love ya'll!  

Convicted...again

So I woke up this morning and thought it was going to be a great day, but then I heard some news and BAM my jealous heart was at it again. I really wish I could control this thing, because I don't WANT to be jealous of people but it happens. It creeps into your mind and eats away at your mind and heart. I texted a friend and told her the news and I was sure she was going to respond with "oh yeah that sucks" and give me some pep talk to make me feel wonderful again. And at this point I wasn't even thinking about my heart. I just wanted someone to be on my side and basically to tell me it was okay to be jealous. Well, you know what she said..."Oh man. How is your heart?" Ouch. Thank Jesus for friends who are willing to be honest with me. I adore this girl and her precious heart and just a side note want to tell her thank you for spurring me in my relationship with the Lord today.

So, anyways I checked my heart and responded to her that yes my heart was jealous and I needed to spend some time with the Lord. She responded "that's a good idea. Jesus knows your heart. go talk to him." (she always knows what to say :) So this lead to my hour long quite time with the lord this morning. WHICH another incredible side not: at church on Sunday Pastor Robbie preached about prayer and how it can change your life. He encouraged everyone to start praying for an hour a day and literally cry out to God. At church, I thought "oh that's a nice idea, but I don't know if I can pray for an hour, maybe I'll try 30 minutes." Oh ye of little faith. Jesus knew what he was doing today when I got this news. He wants me to pray for an hour a day. I prayed for an hour today and could have kept going. It was so refreshing and just what I needed.. If I can watch t.v. or be on facebook for more than an hour, I can spend some time talking to my best friend for an hour, AT LEAST!

As I was praying Psalms 51:10 came into my mind. It says " Create in me a pure heart, O Lord and renew a steadfast spirit within me." How incredible is that verse. I have probably read it a hundred times it never really sunk in until today. Lord, give me a PURE heart. I want my heart to be wiped clean of this jealousy that consumes me. I want the lord to transform my heart and make it like his. I want him to take away the jealousy and in place of it fill me with compassion, forgiveness, acceptability, love, joy, kindness, faithfulness, peace, contentment, and generosity. I want to live, move, and breath for Christ. The second part of this verse also spoke to me today: renew a steadfast spirit within me. I have been in a valley for a while, not spending time with the Lord and feeling just drained. After my time with the lord today I saw what I have been missing out on. The Lord poured into me today and I know that if I keep doing this steadfastly I will feel that passion again. The same friend I spoke about earlier once told me "I want to desire Christ more than I desire marriage, more than I desire anything else in life and I am just not there yet." Well friend neither am I. I desire a lot of things more than I desire God right now. And this morning I got a little taste of how good it feels to desire God and it is WAY better than any other desire. I want to desire his word and his truth over anything else. I think I will get there, if I keep having more days like today.

The rough start of my morning turned my day into a GREAT day!! Not that this was a real trial or tribulation, but it was my own little hurdle and I think that God gives us these hurdles to jump over so we can draw closer to him on the other side. If your life is going perfect, you find that you need God less and less. And I don't ever want to need God less. So for now, I will rejoice in my sufferings because "my comfort in my suffering is this: your promise preserves my life." Not only did I spend time with my abba father, I got to lay by the pool, went to a ZUMBA class, which kicked my butt, and I went to my weight watchers meeting and guess what?? I love 2.4 pounds this week! woot woot! Even after eating a cupcake on Sunday and 4 oatmeal chocolate chip cookies yesterday. oops.

So friends, I am going to be continually praying for God to create in me a pure heart by steadfastly living my life with and for Him every day. May we all desire Christ more than anything else. :)