I'm In Love

He puts a sparkle in my eye and when I look upon Him my heart is set ablaze! And His heart also is set ablaze when He looks into my eyes- when He sees me gazing back at Him. I love you, Lord. You are my everything.

I just don't know sometimes...

I read the Bible and realize that I'm nothing like the Christians in there. Even the new Christians in the Bible are more faithful than me and operate in more power than I do. If I had to compare myself to a Christian in the Bible I guess I would be most like the Corinthians. But even they operated in the gifts of the Spirit. I don't understand. And I'm too far into this to go back to where I was. There's nothing left there anyway. My only choice is to continue toward Christ. But I just find that I'm so very very bad at it. My mind races so quickly and thinks of so many selfish scenarios in every situation. It races so quickly that I can begin doing something out of the goodness of my heart and in two seconds I've finished a train of thought that has brought me to thinking about all of the things that I can get out of that action and all sorts of selfish possibilities. It's really hard to explain. Thoughts go through my head that surprise me. I can't believe some of the things that I think.
And now I'm about to go to Chicago to spread the message of Christ. I'm just afraid that somehow it will end up being about me. I don't know how but somehow I can make it about me. That's my greatest talent. Even when I try to help a brother I mess it up somehow and completely miss the will of God and fail to reflect the character of Christ. I don't know what I'll say to people in Chicago. I don't even know how to witness to people. I have faith that God will at least use me to make Himself known to people. I have faith that He will give me the words to say when the time is right. I know that He can if He used a donkey. But that's about the only reason I know that He WOULD. Truly I am like a pile of refuse in the eyes of God. I lament over who I am and what I am. I just hope Jesus isn't ashamed of me when I see Him. I don't know what in the world He could possibly see in me. I don't see how He can love me. Jesus teach me to love myself- to truly love myself and not to simply have false pride in myself. God knows I have that to spare.

Violence

Temptation is relentless,
As are You, Lord,
And so shall I be.

No Satan, I will not run.
I will hunt and...
I will find you.

Praise the Lord with violence!

The Kingdom of Heaven is waiting!
The Kingdom of Heaven is waiting!
AND THE VIOLENT TAKE IT BY FORCE.

My God of War!
(WARRIOR!)
Wage war for me!

No Compromise Conference

So today the No Compromise Youth Conference ended. The message was AWESOME. The message hit on a whole lot of points, but what really stuck out to me were the points on lonliness. It's definitely no coincidence. What I wrote about last night was confirmed to me today. I also realized that I need to be more bold for God than I am. There is so much that rises up inside of me that I don't let out. Very intense spiritual things. I realize that sometimes it's not the time or place to let it out and that to do so would be insubordination. But at other times I simply chicken out. I seek to change this through the help of Christ, through whom all things are possible. I feel like I also need to learn to embrace social situations rather than shrinking away from them. Really it's not me that needs to do anything. Rather, I must allow Christ to make these changes within me.

On Happiness and Lonliness

I think everybody for the most part wants somebody to share life with- somebody who gets it. I know I do anyway. But I'm broken. I'm not yet whole. So much of me needs to be repaired that all I can possibly yield of anyone or offer to anyone of the opposite sex is something that's defective- something that's not what it could be and what it should be. I pray (and anyone who happens to read this, I ask you to pray) that I could have the wisdom and the true desire to run away from distractions. It's good for me to want someone that smells and looks better than me and is soft with a smaller, cuter, less threatening voice- someone who doesn't feel the faint urge to fight random strangers passing by for no apparent reason at all other than pure testosterone-induced aggression. That's good. The Lord said that it is not good for man to be alone. But I've begun to realize lately that first I need to be wholly and completely focused on God and to allow Him to change me from the inside out. I have to be completely abandoned and even at times appear to be perhaps completely insane for Christ the King. He is the ruler of all us refugees on this earth. I'm trying (and I will succeed by the grace of God) to sacrifice the notion that I'm even entitled to have someone to share this adventure of life other than Christ Himself. Someday perhaps the time will be right. Perhaps that time will never come. Either way is fine as long as God's will is accomplished. Not that it wouldn't be a challenge to live single, assuming I live for any number of years. But I'm up to the challenge. What other choice do I have? We aren't living for this world. Somehow I've kept forgetting that in moments of monotony and the mundane hum-drum of every day. Truly this world is just a strange and powerful illusion. I pray the Lord would open our eyes.

A Revolution approaches...

Back to You

Well, I really would like to say that everything I do
I do for You.
But we all know that's not true.
And I really would like to say I've given my whole life
But how can I lie...
When you see behind my eyes?

Every day I fail you it would seem.
So what can I do for You if I can't succeed?

I give it all back to You.
Every gift you gave me-
I give it back to You.
This one thing I can do.
I give it back to You.

Well, I really would like to say
I'm always on fire.
But some days I feel it
And some days I don't.
Some days I want to quit,
But by your grace I won't.

When life brings me down
I fight the frown.
And eventually the smile is real.

I give it all back to You...

Lately I've been able to write songs again. This is one I just wrote tonight. It loses something in written form.

No Double Agents

We, all of us that exist, are forced to live this life. We are forced to endure the ups and downs, accomplishments and disappointments, joys and sorrows. In this life there are but two paths: one that leads towards God and one that leads away from Him. Simply being a good and moral person does not qualify us as walking (struggling/trudging/fighting) towards God. We are born as sinful creatures. But if at some point we hear the call of God we are faced with the choice of going towards that Voice or running away from it. Going toward that voice means to turn away from the things that we naturally want the most- those things that are the easiest to desire- that require no thought but merely FEELING. This is the case not just once, but every single day. It is foolish to flirt with the enemy. And our enemies are not those friends that choose the life that we now choose against, but rather the activities and the desire to participate in the activities that constitute that old life. As much as we love those people we can't go where they go or do the things that they do anymore. Not without some specific call and the grace required to carry out such a call can we go back to those familiar places without becoming familiar to those places. For if we return we will be devoured. You cannot flirt with the enemy. You cannot merely dabble in your old life any more than you can be partially on fire. You're either on fire or you're not. It's actually very simple.