Sacrifice

Finally.

About two months ago to the date, I started reading a book that changed my life...   for the better. Instead of going into every detail of the book, I will say the most important most, biggest thing that I learned, was what it meant to give up what I have for Christ. Now why does one give up things for Christ? (I asked myself this many times at the age of 17) I give up these things because Jesus shed his innocent blood, for my sinful self, so that one day I might be able to spend eternity with Him. Because at the age of eleven I made a commitment to God that I would follow him, no matter what. Yes, no matter what. Regardless if I must give the things I desire, the things I love, the things I enjoy, I follow after Christ. I can tell you that at age eleven, no one sat me down and told me that, that being a Christian means you sacrifice things, no one ever told me that we are called to live the lives like those of the disciples in the bible. Yes, really be willing to give up what we cherish, our highest prized items to follow Jesus.

 Galatians 2:20 says, " I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me". 

We are called to die with Christ. That means the life I live, is no longer mine. My aspirations, my dreams, my visions in life are dead. I know that is not what we want to hear, but to truly follow after Christ, what are we willing to give up? Do we say to God, I will follow after you, whatever you want Lord.... only if it is what my heart desires. The Christian walk would be so easy, if all we had to do was say a prayer to God, to "commit" our lives to Him, but when something bad happens in our life or when we already had our own set plan for our lives, we just give up on God... or quite frankly, come to Him when its convenient for us. But the disciples never lived like that. Eleven out of the twelve disciples were martyred for Christ. They were willing to give up, literally everything for Christ. They didn't say to Jesus, I give you my time, my effort, my friends..... but I'm going to keep my family. No, they sacrificed everything for Jesus.

Jesus addresses the cost of discipleship in Matthew 10:37

-"Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it".

I can tell you that even at age eleven I don't know if my mind would have been fully able to understand what it meant to sacrifice everything, but I can tell you that it took me eleven years later, at age 21 to finally figure it out. I wish I could say that I have this down, but unfortunately I am not even close to being there. God is teaching me daily, though  that none of these earthly things matter. Heaven is the longest life we will live. The life we live on earth is short, very short. No cars, no clothes, no job, no marriage, no kids, will be taken with us. None of it matters in the end when we are facing the God of eternity at the gates of heaven. If heaven will be anything like Isaiah witnessed in Isaiah 6, we will stand in awe of God, humbled before a mighty King and in recognition of our own filthy sin. 

If God knows my every action, my every thought, my every motive, I want to live a life that is going to be worthwhile for the King of Kings. I don't want to be at my deathbed, and look at my life, that focused on what this world desires.What a wasted life I have lived then. If I am a Christian, I was not called to be of this world. This world is not my home.

       

My freshmen year of college when I was 19, I wrote a blog post or "note" on Facebook, saying that I wanted to be remembered of something when I died. In other words, I did not specifically have something I wanted to remembered for, but I wanted to be remembered for something in life. Being the naive 19 year old girl that I was, I did not think of the gospel as something to be remembered by. Now, almost three years later, approaching my senior year of college, I can tell you I do want to be remembered for something, and that;s the gospel. I don't think there is anything greater than that. And there is no greater legacy than that.

-"There will be liars and thieves who take from you

Not to undermine the consequence
But you are not what you do
And when you need it most
I have a hundred reasons why I love you"

"Heartache came to visit me, but I knew this feeling wouldn't be ever after...."

Restoring the ancient ruins

Where to begin? In other words, what do you want the world to know about your life....

To start off,  it scares me actually creating this blog, due to the fact that there are alot of people on this earth that can read your own personal thoughts, & I can't say I am usually into that.... but we'll give it shot.

Well, to start off my title of this blog, is not some song or random line, but something that I've been learning and going through this whole year. Literally. This year has taught me, more than I probably wanted to know, then again when the truth comes its pretty confrontational & who desires that anyways? God knew that I would have a hard time handling the truth and so when the walls came tumbling down, God remained to show me that he doesn't just tumble down too. In fact he never changes. He truly was the warrior through the night that pulled through for me lifting me up and telling me that he remains, when nothing else felt like it remained. At the present time I was doing a bible study, that changed my spiritural life, completely. The more I spent time every day doing the bible study, the more God showed how I had put all my satisfactions in all the wrong places. I put it in friendships, a relationship, and family. It was only a matter of time that it became fight after fight, cry after cry, and a whole lot of questions of asking God, "why"? God had been calling out my name the whole time, a very long time- I might add, but I continued to run after other idols.Of course God knew all this would happen as a he knew that a certain Godly woman would happen to give me the bible study at a certain time in my life, as  he knew that there was chains I needed to break, as well as he knew that for years I was putting my satisfaction in the flesh and not his word. As I give you this long (maybe exhausting story) the most beautiful thing about the whole thing is how God showed me through his word in Isaiah 61- which just so happened to be one of the last weeks of my bible study, was that he restores the ancient ruins, the places long devasted. That is something so overwhelming and calming at the same time to realize that he has the power to do that. The ironic thing is, I spent a summer in the Middle East a year and a half ago (where my picture is taken) and I was able to visit many ancinet ruins as I was there & now God has showed me he is restoring the ancient ruins in my own life.- wow. Thats powerful.
I wish I could say that I've completely fixed all the things that God has brought to my attention that need to be fixed, but I'm not fully there. It has been a very long journey and God has been with me and will be with me every step of the way. It is a very good feeling to know I am his, and nothing can ever break that.

"My wall, my mighty tower, be my shadow come cover me;
till all my enemies cower, jealous of my King.
Though the day be laced with trouble, be the stone o'er which I stumble,
Straight into the arms and stay where you remain, where you remain"

- "You Remain"- Jennifer Knapp