Through the Storm

    First off- I'd like to dedicate my title to all the people undergoing hurricane Irene right now. It's passing through North Carolina and will soon head up all the way to New York. Streets are flooding, windows shattering and trees falling. When something like this happens, it's so easy for us to wonder what on earth God is doing. Is he just sitting up there chilling watching everyone affected by the disaster scramble around in fear? Maybe that's being too hard on him. I mean, he says he loves us right? So if he is with us, then why is he letting all these bad things happen. He promised good things to all who believe.
    We go through storms in our own lives all the time. Hurricanes that come tearing through, messing up our plans and destroying things we know and love. I had a plan going into college to rush a sorority. And I had my heart set on one. The I got asked back to the house for round two and was beyond excited- It felt right. I even got chills walking into the house. I convinced myself it's where God wanted me- until the next day when I got cut. I was crushed, and confused. I mean, I thought it was where God wanted me and it felt like some kind of joke that God had given in to me and then snatched it away as soon as I loved it.


"For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11


   I heard this verse from everyone I complained to about me not getting what I wanted. "God has a plan for this". Obviously, I would rather have heard "God's going to make your plans come true". I didn't know what was best for me though, no matter how much I assumed I did. I ended up falling in love with one of the other sororities, and now I'm rooting for that one even more than I was for my initial first choice. God of course knew that the one he allowed me to be cut from wouldn't have suited me as well as the other. He wanted me to work somewhere else.

   No matter what obstacles are thrown at you in life, there is a reason God is allowing them. Whether it be as small as a college organization or as huge as a hurricane, God is preparing something greater than we can imagine or understand to come from it. Everything God does is with purpose, and as soon as we trust that his plan is better than ours, our eyes can be opened to his goodness and glory.

Before the Morning

This week, I officially left for college. I admit, the goodbyes were soo much harder than I expected they would be. I hated the choices I had to make, but I knew what God was leading me to do. And I decided earlier this summer that I would go into college open-minded, blindly trusting God that he'd light the path for my footsteps as long as I'd follow his direction.


One of the hardest things about following God is that once you decide to do it, our natural response is to expect good things to come. I mean, God promises good things, right? Of course he does, but he doesn't promise that the path of them will be easy, just worth it. My pastor Mike Mentor (restonbible.org) explained it like this in a sermon that stuck to me. Daniel followed God, and he ended up in a lion's den. Paul followed God and he ended up in jail, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego followed God and ended up in a fiery furnace. But they all had happy endings, and all trusted that God would pull them through no matter what.


We have to have the mindset daily that following God will not always be easy, because as soon as we put our full trust in the Lord there Satan is trying to find ways to bring us down. We will be brought down, but not destroyed. If God is for us then no one can stand against. 

Going into this first year of college will be so different. It's my second day here and I've already been tested multiple times, but I choose to follow God now when it's hard. I can stand the pain in the night if joy comes in the morning! Our God is faithful and good<3

"Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go." Joshua 1:9 (my most useful verse going into college so far!)

When Life Gives You Lemons

There's no escaping the hard times life sometimes hands us. It's even harder when you know that the times ahead will be hard. For me right now, it's heading off to college. I have so many thoughts running through my head all the time! I leave in exactly 10 days and I'm not nervous at all, I'm actually really excited. I feel ready. But for some reason, my thoughts and emotions have just been all over the place. It made me wonder what on earth it's like for the people that are nervous?! When my dad suggested it was anxiety, I diagnosed myself- yes, in fact, I probably did have anxiety.


Though I'm not nervous, I'm very aware of what will happen before I start college- the goodbyes. Goodbyes are some of the hardest thing we are called to face. I know the goodbyes are necessary and that all things will work out okay. Yet, I'm still anxious about leaving the people I love and diving headfirst into a city of strangers 8 hours away. Not nervous, just anxious.




"Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed,"says the LORD, who has compassion on you. -Isaiah 54:10 (NIV)


I found this verse in Isaiah and was immediately drawn to it. In this verse, what the Lord speaks of is moved, changed, turned around. With every goodbye in our life we come to a turn in our path, heading in a new direction. God talks of how with these turns, or "lemons" life throws us, earthly things are moved around. But he follows that statement by saying that His unfailing love will not be shaken. As humans, it's hard for us to blindly believe in something we don't know for sure. According to worldly accounts, how can we know for sure if we will be okay? God answers it for us- those who trust in him will ALWAYS be okay. Therefore, today I'm trusting him with that.

Take my Life, Let it Be

Just to give some background, I've been a Christian for my whole life- raised in a Christian home, surrounded by people that were full of love and lived their lives for Christ. I went through high school however only living it halfway for a lot of the time because I didn't rely fully on God. I felt that my way was always better.

At summer camp last week, our pastor Bob Mcrae talked about the power of the Holy Spirit- and it changed my life. This entire blog is my example of that. The difference from being passive and active, the difference between holding on and letting go, the difference between living halfway and experiencing life to the fullest. That's what all my posts will be letting the world know- the power of the freedom we'll find in Christ.


Until last week, I knew of the Holy Spirit but I didn't understand it on the level I needed to. Once I understood it, everything changed. Bob talked about how we could be transformed by the Holy Spirit- that all we had to do was ask and it could give us everything we lacked. I lack alot of things- but the weaknesses most on my heart were lack of patience, jealousy and lack of courage. That week, I asked for discernment- that I'd be able to recognize the grasps Satan had on me so with God's help I could overcome them. That's when everything changed. I asked for patience, and when a moment came that I would usually get extremely upset over, I turned to God and told him I was trusting him. Bam. Just like that, Satan was knocked down and didn't bother me. And in that circumstance, I was patient.


This first week back, I've been tested a lot..and I mean a lot. However, refusing to believe the lies that Satan is trying to convince me of has made me more mature in one week than I could have been in years. The key to overcoming Satan's hold on you is to let go. Let go of yourself, your sinful nature, your human desires and say, "God, I choose you." Once you allow the Holy Spirit to control you there's a huge difference in your mannerisms, in the way you speak, in who you are all because you decided to take a stand and not be held any longer by sin.


I'll be updating a lot on specifically how the Holy Spirit's been working in my life, there are already lots of ways and stories I could tell of how I've been changed. But basically what I'm trying to say is this- I lived my whole life being saved and still wasn't experiencing what God had in mind- the more I rely on God, the more hope I have for my life because I know with his help, I can conquer anything.

When You Think About the Ocean..

This week, I had the great opportunity to attend a summer camp with my church (restonbible.org). During one of the evening services, one of our band members Jesse Trask shared an awesome example of how we can defeat sin in our lives while giving his testimony.

Jesse told all of us 200 or so kids in the audience, "Don't think of an elephant". Then proceeded to ask us what we had thought of. Of course, we had thought of an elephant. Then he said, "Now, think of an ocean". We thought about an ocean. Jesse explained that "not thinking" of the elephant is like "not thinking" of sin. Even if your intentions are good, and you try so hard NOT to focus on your sin, it still ends up consuming your mind because you're focusing so hard to defeat it.

When we set our hearts and minds towards Christ, our earthly thoughts about sin and trying to overcome it ourselves naturally die down. When we are told to think about an ocean, we forget completely about when we were previously told not to think about the elephant.

 "8 Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. 9 Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you." Philippians 4:8-9