today

Every St. Patty’s day my sister and I would take the day off and venture off into every bar that had four leaf clovers and green beer. We would spend all day bar hopping being entertained by all the non-sense happening around us. Not any more. Today starts a memory I don’t like to think about. You know those days when something tragic happens? Like for example, Sept. 11th? You remember exactly where you were. Today is that kind of day for me. 3 years ago today was the day I had my last conversation with my dad. It consisted of him telling me to be careful, have fun and if I was going to drink, stick to top shelf. He said he would talk to me later. “Ok I said! , I love you.” he replied “Love you too Kid”. This week starts when my dad was rushed into the emergency room and he never did come out. nine days later, he passed away.

Today I am reminded how quickly life can change. How fleeting and fragile life is. I am sad today. I miss my dad today. This event with my father is what started making me question life and what my purpose was and the whole time the Lord was drawing me in, placing people in my life that told me about Jesus and eventually, after about a year and a half, I gave myself to the Lord and my life has changed ever since.

Listen, we all messed up, we all sinned but God has given us a way out because He loves you. If you believe in what His son did for you then you have a way out. Think you are good enough to go to heaven? Who are you comparing yourself to? Compare yourself to your creator, who is Holy, perfect, who has given you the breath you just took. Its a gift. This isn’t some inspirational message, my heart is heavy for the people I love who aren’t following Jesus Christ that could be gone today and be tormented in hell forever….”confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. Romans 10:9.

jury duty with a sister

I received the jury summons in the mail and it got me a little stressed because of my current workload but thought about how God is the one that schedules my time so if this is where he wants me, so be it.

I went to a part of Brooklyn I wasn’t too familiar with, found the building, went through the scanning process…. cleared. Shuffled into the waiting room and sat down. Now before I go into this story I just have to mention I never really talked much when I was a kid, up until college or so I was pretty quiet. Kept to myself. My dad in fact purchased the “How to talk to anyone” audio CD set just to give you an idea of how quiet I really was (Oh if my dad could see me now!) So anyways…fast-forward…gave my life to the Lord, I have become quite the chatterbox (only God can do this!) So this woman sits down next to me and she mentions something about the Lord and immediately I interrupted her. Come to find out, she is a sister in Christ. For the next couple hours this 50+ women and we exchanged our testimonies, our trials, our struggles. She spoke about her Hebrews studies and I spoke about what I am learning in James. Come to find out…she is single. Loving the Lord. Strong and had this presence about her that you knew she was just happy with her life, serving Jesus. She gave me advice on being single, more specifically…never to settle, only the best for a child of God.

She goes onto tell me where she has traveled, the young women she ministers and how good the Lord has been to her and I did the same. It was such a great day. God knew I needed to hear encouraging words from an older sister in Christ who was single. I am amazed at who God puts in my path to teach me.

And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:19

What does God mean by love?

An excerpt in Crazy Love by Francis Chan (pg 94). It spoke to my heart, convicted me and wanted to share…..a little exercise. enjoy

“According to God we are here to love but the word love is so overused and word out. What does God mean by love? He tells us:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails…..faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

But even those words have grown tired and overly familiar, haven’t they? Take the phrase Love is patient and substitute your name for the word. (for me, Francis is patient….) Do it for every phrase in the passage.

By the end, don’t you feel like a liar? If I am meant to represent what love is, then I often fail to love people well. Following Christ isn’t something that can be done half-heartedly or on the side, It is not a label we can display when it is useful. It must be central to everything we do and are.”

________________________________________________________________________________

Father, thank you for first loving me. Thank you for showing me what love is. Its not a feeling like how our society portrays it, its an action. Father, sometimes I am so opposite of what your word says. I need help father to love like this. I want to love like you. I want to be patient, hopeful, always trusting, always believing the best in people, not keeping record of wrong doings. Help me to love the people that just get on my last nerve, the people that don’t look like me, act like me, smell like me, I can’t do it without you. Search my anxious heart Lord, show me my sin and lead me to everlasting life. In Jesus name, Amen.

the crying game

hysterical. enjoy.

drifting

A couple summers ago my sister and I went to Newport, Rhode Island. We don’t live too far from there and its absolutely beautiful. A place where everyone from out of state tries to come visit but for our family, it was a place where we visited on a nice weekend to walk around where every year my dad and mom would take us to the biggest buffet I had ever seen. My sister and I were there one year and down one of the old cobble stone streets were canoe rentals. If anyone knows me, I am not really into risking my life in anyway shape or form and canoe rides, even though seem pretty harmless, I am afraid of deep water, can’t swim well, doggy paddle at best. So my sister looked at me with excitement and said, “Let’s do this” and I for whatever the reason…agreed.

We stepped into our individual canoes and my sister has this ability to just know how to do things and canoeing was just added to the list. I don’t have this ability. She easily after a couple of paddles, paddled herself out of the choppy waters into the serene water where one could just bask in the sun and canoe her way down the lazy river. Me on the other…. almost lost my life.

You see, I didn’t know how to paddle. I kept going around in circles, drifting. I kept going left and then to the right, drifting. Drifting no-where fast! The waters were choppy. As I was yelling at my sister for directions I couldn’t hear her because the million-dollar yacht was heading my way blowing its horn warning me to move!!! I panicked and just continued to go around in little circles, but only faster (think pin wheel. fast like that.) I just had the water scene in Indiana Jones where the little boat is chopped up into little pieces by the yachts propeller, which is what I thought was going to happen to me (bit of an exaggeration but still, scary!), when the guy that was renting the canoes dragged my boat back to shore because to be honest, I was maybe 20 feet away from the shore!

Even though this story happened to me a couple years ago, I thought about it this weekend and how I drifted away in that canoe that day. Jesus says: Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. John 15:4

I accepted the Lord as my savior around this time last year and then baptized August 14th, 2010. As I take this journey I know it’s crucial to remain in Him, constant praying, fellowshipping, reading, confessing my sin, service to others. I need to remain in Him in order to have the love, joy, peace, self-control, etc, that Jesus talks about in the Bible. He is the vine and I am the branch.

I am sure if I kept persisting in that canoe, kept practicing, it would have gotten easier over time, I would have figured out how to paddle those rough waters, paddle straight but instead, I quit. It makes me think about my faith. I don’t want to drift away from Jesus…ever. He alone is keeping me afloat. This is a lifetime commitment and the waters will get choppy, the propellers will try to crush my sprit, storms will come and there might be times where I will want to jump ship but I know if I remain in the vine, I will be safe, anchored in Him. My hope is in Him. My joy…. in Him. I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ. Philippians 3:8.

Are you drifting? Keep persisting. Keep practicing the things of God, it has to get easier! If you are not as close to God as you used to be, who moved? ~Author Unknown

he loves me

 

I was reading out of Genesis the other day and read a verse that hit my heart.

 

 

Leah became pregnant and gave birth to a son. She named him Reuben, for she said, “It is because the LORD has seen my misery. Surely my husband will love me now.

She conceived again and named her second son Simeon because “the Lord heard that I am not loved.”

A third son was born whom she named Levi, meaning ‘companion.’ She was certain that her husband would become attached to her after giving him three sons. Genesis 29 31-35

 

How horrible of a feeling is that? Trying to win a man’s affection. I can’t even tell you how many times I have done this. Never succeeding. Left feeling used, thinking what’s wrong with me? I gave this guy everything? Why doesn’t he call?

Where do you get your self-worth? Is it from those around you or is it from One who truly knows you and loves you (psalm 139 says it best) The only One who truly loves us and gives us our worth is God.  He gives us our identity. 

Our identity needs to be in Christ and I can only tell you from personal experience (and many of you know how I was before I got saved), but once I excepted Christ into my life, God started to show me how special I am. Only God can do that. There is nothing that makes me more at peace; more joyful, more confident as a woman then my relationship with Jesus and no one could take that away from me. If you only knew, if you only knew how beautiful you are and are seen in the eyes of God, you wouldn’t let anyone make you feel different. You don’t need to earn the affections and attention of those around you because God loves you and Jesus earned that acceptance and affection for you. Our identity needs to be anchored in Him alone because in Him we have everything we need. I am realizing this more and more and it’s the most freeing, most beautiful gift I have ever been given. Thank you Jesus.

intimate sessions

intimate sessions

alone with Him

no-one around.

just me and Him

i hear my breath,

thankful

intimate sessions

exposed and raw

can’t hide, pretend.

He knows my heart.

a burning desire

to change.

to love more

above all

to love more

He has me close by

holding me tightly

never letting go

His grace

His mercy

His word

His love

my hope

my future

my trust

is in Him alone

forever

intimate sessions

alone with Him

just me and Him

thankful