...and i just started talking

I'm so thankful for the past couple of days.  It's hard digging deep inside myself to sort things out but always so rewarding once I have the light-bulb moment.  The past couple of days have been the result of all my digging (for a while now like.. a few months at least).

Prayer can be very beautiful.  Or it can be stale.  It finally dawned on me that my prayer-time had become very stale... With the repeat pattern from anytime I'm in community of using a 'sharable' prayer, I'd not been aware that this was the same I was doing with God.  Which essentially meant I wasn't being very open with God at all.

The past couple of weeks for sure, I'd noticed it and was struggling with it.  Why wasn't I being open with God? Why did I feel like I didn't know how? What was it going to take for me to break the wall back down?

Answer:  The fear of being WITHOUT God was all it took.  Because if there is a wall between me and God then that means I'm isolating myself and that N E V E R goes anything less than horrible!

So Saturday night I went back through the steps of how I spent my favorite time with God at the old house. Ooooh yeah! Laying in my bed on my back, hands stretched up high, eyes closed - no distractions. It took a moment still for me to get my mind right but man, oh man, I knew I needed to talk to my Lord more than I needed anything I could possibly think of doing.

And I just started talking. Out loud. I apologized for not talking to Him for so long.. and for sending up prayers like they were post cards rather than really acknowledging He was constantly here with me the entire time, and praised Him for His faithfulness. I apologized for worrying more what someone else thought of me rather than what HE thought of me, and praised Him for His love. And then I felt the freedom again like I used to - the freedom to spill my heart and brain out to my heavenly Father who delights in every single word.  I'm pretty sure I fell asleep talking to Him.

Today (Sunday) was amazing. I woke up feeling so alive and calm and felt so comfortable in my own skin again like I haven't in quite a while. Ahhhhhh. Jesus, You are awesome =)

huge reminder from God

This past Thursday, I met up with Mark at starbucks. It was the first time I'd seen him in person since the night I accepted Christ in the Crystal's parking lot.. which was the first time I met Mark. I also got to meet his friend Rick (who brought a friend named Jimmy). We talked about God, His Grace, Jesus, and what God is going in our lives, in us, through us, and around us for four hours.

All in all, it was a huge reminder from God that he is SO reigning in my life and those around me.. that He's got big plans, that he loves me, that I am His.. how perfect I'm not and how completely okay and normal that is... how I don't HAVE to devote my life to serving Him but how much happier I will be because I am anyway..

I felt His comfort so strong.. my fears just melted. He woke me up and called me to Himself and nothing can separate that.. His love is so great, I'm struggling to wrap my mind around it. At the same time, I love Him back even more when I realize each time how much I don't deserve His love and yet He gives His love to me anyway!

I want to live a life that He might, for a single moment somewhere along the line, be proud of. Like Chan said, I so want a 'well done, good and faithful servant' when I see Him, face to face. That's the treasure I want to have in heaven. That's what I want to lay at His feet. Nothing else matters. Nothing.

Rather than be afraid of what He might have planned for my life, I'm so thankful that He has that plan! Wow, have I got SO much to pray for and look forward to! I'm so honored.. humbled to even know or have a clue to a speck of that plan.. theCity.. that alone from Him sends my hope sky rocketing!