from chisel to wrecking ball

Wow its been a while... A lot has happen but nothing to big to note, except WAR EAGLE!! Thanksgiving with the fam was good as well. Now i'm just kind of gearing up for exams.

So I've been somewhat apathetic lately. I think it originated we me seeing Thanksgiving as just a do nothing time, because do nothing i did. Unfortunately, the "do nothing" carried over to me spending time with the Lord, which carries its effects. Praise the Lord His Grace is always there and His love is just as strong no matter how much time we spend with Him but it takes its toll on your focus and what is real in your life. So, as a result I've been refocusing on how amazing He is and how much more real His glory is than those trifle things we worry about.

The highlight of this refocusing occured in the shower this morning. I was having a conversation with the Lord, which is always amazing because He lets me spill my side of the story even though it's totally off the wall, then with the utmost patience He gently corrects me. So I was asking the Lord about this "blah" and the Holy Spirit just quickened me to praise. Of course being the somewhat stubborn person that i sometimes am I responded with a "but that can't be it it must be something deeper" type answer. So when I was done wasting my own time with my dumb solution I just began to praise. Hello blah. It was pretty much like trying to knock down a concrete wall with a tiny chisel. Then the Holy Spirit reminded me of Jericho and about Paul and Silas in jail. Suddenly the chisel became a wrecking ball as I just began to take my small mind and try to wrap it around how incredibly huge and amazing He is. And my walls fell down faster than Brodie Croyle in the iron bowl! Then on top of that the Lord completely confirmed His moving by a word from one of my amazing friends that He has blessed me with.

How in the world can we walk around and not be busting at the seams with the joy of the Lord?? There is such power in our praise! Oh how much do we limit God's power in our lives by our small view of Him? Look at who the Word says we are! We are the righteousness of God in Christ! Why do we identify ourselves with our struggles so many times? Why in our minds does our potential to sin so many times outway the potential for God's glory to overcome in our lives?

Thats all I got.... you stay classy

grace and peace

the praise of our lips...

Life is amazing. Well actually He is amazing, which makes life amazing. I've had to really bring myself back to that this week, due to some events that really tried to shake my focus and reliability on Him. I tend to overanalyse things and every second I spend doing it is a second not focusing and trusting on the Lord. But praise the Lord He is faithful and He reminded me that He knows what He's doing and doesn't need my advice! But this week has been good. Monday night Bible studies were rockin as usual. The Lord has been so faithful with those. Then we had Harvest Hoedown on Tuesday night which was a lot of fun.
(this is long but worth it)
I try not to post until the Lord places something in my spirit to get out, because I tend to just throw out a lot of idle words. He has been stirring something in me this morning and I'm going to attempt to get it out. I pray it comes out with the magnitude that is felt in my spirit.
Why are we supposed to praise the Lord at all times? To rejoice in the Lord always? I love worship music, playing worship music, leading worship, etc... anything to do with worship, but the Lord has been dealing with me about some aspects of worship lately. I think we need to reassess our worship. I know I've needed to. I don't think I sang but half of a song at encounter last week because it wasn't coming from my spirit ("they shall worship Me in Spirit and in Truth"). Instead I spent the time just in meditation and praying in the spirit. I have said before that I feel in my spirit a move of God about to take place. I believe it is going to be ushered in by a new level of worship.
"In Spirit and in Truth"- Prepositions are very interesting in the Bible. This "IN the Spirit" is a nugget in itself. The "in" is denoting a place, just like i am IN my house right now and later I will be IN class. There is a place from which we pray, a place from which we worship and that is IN the Spirit. The simplest definition that I've heard about being "in the Spirit" is "being more conscious of spiritual things than natural things." Oh and what a place it is. What a place of sweet saturation. There are answers there. There is direction there. It's as though your spirit is plugged directly into the Spirit of God and you are being charged. This is where prayer needs to come from (Ephesians 6:18). This is where worship needs to come from. I can't count how many times I have sung or have even led worship without doing anything more than reciting words from memory. But praise the Lord for Grace! Thank God He puts up with our weaknesses! But there is a point, if we want to move on to maturity as Paul talks about, that we have to grow in these things. We have to press on in our worship...
And why do we praise anyways? Well for one we praise because that's what we were made to do. We were made to bring glory to God. We praise to magnify God and to make much of Him. But there is also a bi-product of praise that we need. We praise God so that He becomes more exalted and more magnified in our minds than the problems and circumstances we face. So when we praise, especially in trials and tribulation (Romans 5:3), we are saying God You are bigger! So as we praise, He is magnified and we are encouraged as well because making much of Him is saying "God You are so big that there is nothing You can't do in my life!"
Praise is also an activation of our faith. According to Mark 11:23-24, "Whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them." Now assuming that we pray according to God's Word (which the "whatever things you ask" is contained in... and you have to be led by the Spirit in what you pray for), when we pray and believe we receive we will have. No if and or buts about it! So what is left to do after that? PRAISE! Praise God that you have the answer! You have what you've prayed for! "But I don't see it..."- We don't praise because we see it with our natural eyes; we praise because we see it with our spiritual eyes!!! It already exists even if we can't see it yet!!
Well thanks for reading this far. I didn't intend for it to be this long, but praise the Lord! It's all good!
Oh and p.s. I'm looking for a Georgia ticket if anybody has one! (334)398-1345... thanks!

speaking of glory...

Well I just wanted to testify at how incredible Jesus is. Some of you might have heard me share a testimony about the drummer at our church but I'll recap. Hennan (the drummer) was diagnosed with cancer (i'm not sure which kind) about a year and a half ago and doctors didn't give him any chance of living. They basically did treatment just to go through the motions. Well praise the Lord Hennan didn't accept that report!!!! Just like Joshua and Caleb believed the report of the Lord despite the giants they saw Hennan stood on the Word and claimed his healing! Well because lies and sickness have to conform to the truth and healing power of God's Word Hennan was healed! He went back to the doctor and the doctor told him that he couldn't believe what had happened. He was stunned! Hennan wasn't though because God's Word "won't return unto Him void!" Well even with that great testimony they did a blood test and discovered that cancer cells were still growing, even though the tumor they found was gone. Again we as a church body hooked up with his faith and believed that that would change. And yes, you guessed it, it did! I talked to my cousin last night and he said that the blood count had reversed and the cancer cells were dying! Praise His name!!!! That is God being glorified in us and in our body!!! He is so good!!! I'm about to run around the computer lab! He is doing so many amazing things! His Word is alive and active!!! Well now i have to go take a stupid test! blah.... But I rejoice in You Lord, You are good and Your mercy endures forever!!

glory

Glory to God. What does it mean when we say this. What is glory? I would be ignorant if I assumed that there was a simple Webster's dictionary definition of this word. It's something that our English language really can't hold. I could go to the Greek and find that it means "doxa" and look at all of the definitions for that, but still there is something. The most fitting definition I can give to glory is that it is something indescribably perfect, something that reaches down to my spirit and satisfies a part of me that I don't even understand. There is something about that word "glory." I liken it to a prism, which seems so simple at first glance but when light it shed on it it is an array of splendor.
This all came up as I was reading John 17:22-23, which is Jesus' prayer to God right before His arrest: "And the glory which You gave me I have given them, that they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me."
At the point I read this my spirit immediately jumped. The phrase "the glory which You gave me I have given them" sparked something. All of a sudden my spirit took hold of my imagination as I meditated on the implications of this verse. "That they may be one just as We are one: I in them, and You in Me; that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me."
The very glory, the very substance that God gave to Jesus to make them one and to enable Jesus to walk the life He walked was given to us. So now we have a glory that will make us one with each other and one with Christ, a glory that will transform our lives, causing us to be conformed to His likeness. This is a glory that affects our lives so much that the world recognizes and acknowledges that we are loved by God.
This is a glory where we are totally transparent. The moment we try to take credit for anything, we are substituting our glory for Christ's glory. It is when we allow ourselves to be vessels that the riches of His glory and in turn He is glorified. That is why it matters what happens in our lives. It matters what we feed ourselves with. It matters what we let stay in our lives. May it be nothing that makes little of the glory of God in our lives.
I could keep going for hours, but read Romans 9:23, Philipians 3:21, and Philipians 4:19!

Feel free to comment!

grace and peace