There is nothing better than the encouragement of a good friend

So with in the past couple weeks encouragement has just been a huge thing that God has been showing me. We were assigned our chapel groups for school and my group decided we would have a chapel to encourage the student body. I am speaking in the chapel and I could not be more excited. In Hebrews chapter 3 verse 13 it says "But encourage one another daily as long as it is called today so that none of you may be hardened by sin's deceitfulness". Multiple things have shown up in my week that shows this is what God wants. The first sign I saw was some of my friends received anonymous encouragement letters. So I decided I would write encouragement letters to all my friends along with a little goodie bag, something sweet to make them smile :)  Another encouraging thing that happened was one of the administrators in the high school decided to put a basket in the high school filled with encouraging scriptures to encourage people who come into the office. Those are just a few of the mighty things God has done through out my life to encourage and be encouraged.

Recently we just came back from our spiritual retreat and over 40 people were baptized!!! How amazing is that!! One of the main things on my heart when I heard that was all those people need encouragement to continue living a life for God, because school is very different than being on the retreat. Everyone needs encouragement but especially people in new life, they need encouragement to continue with their faith and grow and support.

Today I was blessed with the opportunity to encourage a girl on my team. In my talk for our chapel I talk a lot about soccer and how coaches have encouraged me, how my pride gets in the way of encouraging others, and how the support from my parents give me encouragement. The girl, Rachael, on my team was gone for one of our big tournaments and so another girl on the team played in her position, and soon took over that starting spot. Rachael was disappointed, this was a huge change. She has played in the position since she was little and not being able to play there is hitting her hard. She opened up to me and just told me everything that was going on with soccer and positions and how disappointed she was and I was able to encourage her! Once I got home I sent her a text that said I know you are disappointed, but it will be okay. I have been in that position and I just had to work hard and become better and you can't let is consume you and mess with your head, you have to look at the other side of things and maybe see what good things can come out of it and just remember it is only one more year till we get to go to college and live out our dreams! She responded with that was the nicest thing someone has done for me in a while and she really appreciated it.

Through encouraging people I myself was encouraged. This week has been really stressful and by writing encouraging letters to my friends my stress has been relieved. Encouraging other can be hard, but when you encourage others it lifts you up.


WiSdOm fOr ThE DaY:

Inspire and bring joy to all those you touch

Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless

This is Good

This week is the week where I have to get all my college application stuff together because I send in my college application next week! Which is quite scary thinking I will be semi- on my own in less than a year, not quite sure how I feel about that yet. A couple weeks ago we got our chapel group assignments and my group decided to plan our chapel on encouragement. Since this week will be quite stressful for me and some of my friends I am determined to write a note of encouragement to my friends! Even though I may not get encouragement back that is not the point. Jesus called us to be a friend not to have friends, I am being called to encourage not to be encouraged and maybe through the process of encouragement I can be encouraged! Through every situation I need to be reminded that this is good! Even though it might not be good or it might be hard or something I do not want to be doing, if I constantly tell myself this is good I will begin to have to mentality of everything being good! And it will encourage me to achieve and do more than when I am discouraged and down on myself!

Romans 12:8
If your gift is to encourage others, do it! If you have money, share it generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take responsibility seriously. And if you have a gift for showering kindness to others, do it gladly.

Romans 12:4-5
Such things were written in the scriptures long ago to teach us. They give us hope and encouragement as we wait patiently for God's promises. May God, who gives this patience and encouragement, help you live in complete harmony with each other-- each with the attitude Christ Jesus toward the other.

Hebrews 3:13
But encourage one another daily as long as it is called today so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness

You are valuable because you exist. Not because of what you do or what you have done, but simply because you are

My PrAyEr:

Lord this week I hope your spirit just breathes peace into my life and that your words will be spoken out of my mouth. I also pray for my chapel class group. I pray you give us wisdom and guidance into what you want you to tell the student body. Let your will be done because it is not about us. I may know the I am but I am for sure the I am not!! Lord thank you for blessing me with the wonderful people I have in my life I do not think I could be alive right now if it was not for the encouragement from the people that surround me. Thank you so much. You are good!

Get Low #humility

I recently just came back from my last spiritual retreat with GAC. Although it was bitter sweet, I am so happy God has blessed me these past four years with an amazing experience at the FFA center and being able to be a small group leader.

The main theme for me this week was I am not, but I know I am, which is ironic because I am reading that book right now. I realized I have pride and I have secrets that consume my life and those secrets are baggage that ruins your life. The question what does God think of you was asked to me this week and I have yet to figure it out, but two of my answers were, you are worthy and you are his. God deeply loves us and wants us to jump into his plan with out knowing how to swim, we cant be afraid. We can't let the fear of striking keep us from playing the game because we know that he is always with us! The last session I learned that we need to ourself as God sees us. He created us and loves us and went through Hell to save us! I realized that through Jason's story that my mom truly does love me and even though we do not always get along, she is always there supporting me and loving me with all the love she has and I really ned to respect her more. Also, I need to receive God's love the only way I change myself is seeing myself the way God does, and the first step is receiving his grace and love.

During the freshman/sophomore retreat I was a group leader for a group of sophomore girls and it was amazing!! The first night we all opened up and told each other the hardships we had gone through and they stuff we were suffering through and it was truly amazing to God at work in their lives. We all have a secret and a story and we never know what people have gone through or are going through. One thing that God told me to tell my small group is "You are a beautiful daughter of the KING and he gave you WORTH and you have intrinsic VALUE and God believed you are WORHTY enough to send his son to DIE on the cross and SAVE us from our sins, because he WANTS YOU more than anything else on this planet!!!"

It was a great week full of God's spirit moving and changing lives in the student body. God lead me to be a leader through the summer and continuously told me I want you to lead the student body, but through this retreat he humbled me and told me leading isn't being in the center. I felt as though God was calling me to be a leader during worship and during the first night I worshipped in the front and then the rest of the times of worship I worshipped in the back and felt over joyed and felt more of God's presence in the back than in the front and I realized God didn't want me to lead front and center.

This retreat being my last retreat ever, I can not express how blessed I feel, being able to lead students and worship a fantastic God. I will probably never go on another retreat this powerful and just being able to grow in my spiritual walk is awesome!!


Wisdom:

Humility is not thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less
receive love. love god. love people.
we want to be gods, but we aren't
i am not but i know I AM
let go let GOD

to the training ground i go

Today we found out who the small group leaders are on the spiritual retreat at our school. I am super lucky to be one of them. We were asked to read Ephesians 4 and Philippians 2 along with praying for our small group that we will receive on the first day of the retreat. As I read Ephesians I came across the verses "Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ." My job is to train God's people to go out and be ready to fight for God's army! That we may be one unified army fighting against the enemy who wants to see us destroyed, but the Lord will give us strength as long as we put our trust in him.

My prayer:
Thank you Lord for giving me the opportunity to be able to minister to the kids that will be in my small group next week. I am overly blessed to be a small group leader, and be that leader you have called me to be. I pray that you will give me strength, courage, and peace and silence through out next week as I train your soldiers for battle against the enemy who will rejoice to see us defeated, but guess what we have a God on our side, and he is no small God because then he could only do small things, but he is a GREAT God far bigger and better than we can even imagine and you know what he will preform miraculous things for those who's faith lies in Him! For he hold us up by his right hand in victory, for he has conquered it all the debt is paid! Now he has given me the opportunity to rise up and serve him, because he served me, and one way I express my gratitude is to serve him!! Thank you Father! I am a beautiful loved daughter of the King and I could not have asked for anything better!

When clouds come floating, I go sailing

Today my friends and I decided to float the river in my backyard, and of course the weather was fabulous until the time that we were suppose to get in the water. We waited until the first of the rains passed before we decided to embark on our 4 hour journey. We get down to the ramp in my backyard and realize it is covered in mud, and of course we slip and fall; I mean what more is there to do when it is wet mud. We get in our tubes and start floating, about 30mins in we pass the first exit ramp and decide no let's continue going, the skies still look blue and the day is great. What we do not know is that a storm is brewing! As we float for another 20mins we hear thunder, and then it starts to sprinkle, then the sun comes out for 10 mins and now we are sitting in a down pour of rain and thunder. Not only is it pouring rain, but it is not warm outside either. So the 5 of us are shivering and wet, we decide to get out and call my parents to rescue us. They come and as they drive up the skies open up and it is sunny and does not rain the rest of the night.

As I review my day I realize, I run from rain, not just literal rain, but spiritual and life rain. Rain is all the problems I have that I do not want to deal with or things I am scared of that I want to escape. The calm before the storm, is the time between the two rains. We have big problems in our life and we have minimal problems in our life. Sometimes we create bigger problems by dealing with the little problems too much! Tubing today, we could have endured another 5 mins of rain to be able to float the rest of the 4 hours of a beautiful day.

God will calm the storm, or calm the person with in the storm. Today he calmed the storm, but through calming the storm calmed each one of us. He also will send a rescuer, our rescuer just happens to be a life saver that walks on water! Today my rescuer was my parents, they came and rescued us when we though we could not be saved.

God will bring storms into our lives we just have to learn to dance in the rain, to not be afraid to stand up to rain and not run from, for God is always with you. He will rescue you because he walks on water. When a storm comes, it is to change something in us or show us something we can learn from. Storms and troubles keep our faith genuine and strong.

Wisdom for the day:

sometimes the Lord calms the storm; sometimes He lets the storm rage and calms His child

clouds come floating into my life no longer to carry rain or usher storm but to add color to my sunset sky

God is more interested in your future and your relationships than you are

Louie Giglio: Boy Meets Girl

In the Beginning: trust is the beginning of relationships with God, if you are doing the pursuing you need to say good-bye

• God has given us the blueprint of what a relationship should look like by giving us Adam and Eve
• relationships succeed when an awareness to God and a connecting to God are foremost in our thinking <3
• we are created in the image of God, male and female he created us
• we have intrinsic value- we have value because God made us, our value is not our reputation, what we wear, our clothes, the people we hang out with, our body, our weight, our job, or whatever we do
• give the person you are thinking about intrinsic value- change approach, respect, honor, they way we look at someone, look at some with the highest value because God made them and they are a child of God (yes a little bit easier said then done, but how much greater would your life be if that is how you lived)
• God has a plan, God arranged our relationship so man would not be alone
• Man brings order to his life then is given a wife
• Man pursued the woman!! love this!! I want to be pursued I do not want to do the pursuing that is not how God created us to be! He created us for the guy to do the pursuing, if you are doing the pursuing it needs to end, and you need to TRUST God that he has a plan for you
• Everything was broken, but God clothed us and gave us hope he repaired and restored us

Pulling together or falling apart: fall in love with Jesus he will make you white as snow, he is the center of the story and in the center of you

• goal: fall in love with Jesus and awaken to someone who also has fallen in love with Jesus
• God has a plan
• man leaves his father to be united as one with his bride, it is a melding of hearts, unashamed
• Man was created to lead us, not rule over us
• Jesus is in the center of God's plan for us- he is the most important person at your wedding <3

Still dating dad: peace with our past begins with forgiveness, Jesus at the cross

• we all have a lot of baggage
• resolution comes at the cross with Jesus, he was broken so we could be made whole, he loves us unconditionally no matter what we do there is always love
• you can't go into a relationship with out your baggage already open, if it is closed it will pop open one day and it will be a disaster
• since God forgave you, you have to forgive others with that same forgiveness
• Christ takes all our messiness in our lives and takes it to calvary. all the wrong is paid. the curse broken. the domino affect is over

Waiting here for you: waiting does not mean sitting, it means action- so start now

• we have to wait on the Lord, we do not want to jump at the wrong time
• the cross is our anchor #Godisgood
• hope in a good and sovereign God and if waited on will give us the desires of our heart
• TRUST, DWELL- in the truth, DELIGHT, COMMIT, BE STILL, WAIT = all verbs in action
• waiting on God is an active thing, you have to work at it, it isn't a spray tan and everything is perfect, waiting means doing; what do you want to be like at the time you get married- start now
• camp out in the place of truth- I AM HIS, I AM LOVED, I AM FIRST LOVED

Waiting here for you part 2: pursue God, and God will lead you to the desire of your heart

• as we are waiting on God, we are waiting with him
• start working who and what you want when you walk down that aisle
• God tells us what he wants through the people around us, ask is this guy right for me?
• forget about what you want and realize God is the best of the best and delight and pursue the best of the best and you will be given the desires of your heart
• private time with Jesus becomes public display to the world
• I am BLAZING for the Lord

Marriage Myth: love her like Christ loved the church, sacrificial love

1. All you need is love
• Love her like Christ loved the church and gave himself for her- eph 5:22-32
• He will lead her like Christ leads the church, he will rule over as Christ ruled over the church
• true love is sacrificial love and it takes commitment, marriage is an example of the church!
• sacrificial journey powered by the spirit made possible through Christ all driven by the wind and grace and mercy in God
2. single problems go away when I get married
• single problems magnify- there are two of you not one
3. current relationships separate from marriage relationships
• your relationships affect your marriage, to find mr. right you got to get rid of mr. right now
4. first you don't succeed try again
5. living together helps you succeed
• most people who live together do not get married
• sex does not solidify commitment
6. marriage is the end goal in life
• at the resurrection there will not be marriage matt 22:23-30
7. marriage confines you
• marriage does not confine us but completes us
• God completes us
• you will be completed when you prepare your life for God to bring the perfect person into your life
8. I don't think I can do this
• more gospel centered- eph 5
• you can do it with the power of Christ- col 1

As I finished this series, I had my relationship talk with the guy I was dating. He decided that he did not want to be in a relationship going into our senior year but still wanted to date and hang out. After that talk I went home and cried. That was the first someone had said no to me, and also the first time I had a relationship talk with someone in person. I never realized how bad it had hurt to be told no, God taught me that night of how I had previously treated past guys I had talked to. The next morning I talked to my mom and told her about it and she said well isn't that what you wanted. No that was not what I wanted, but that was what needed to happen. I did not need to be in a relationship with him even tho I wanted to. I talked to my neighbor about it today and we were talking about boys and she made a great comment that I now realize is how God wants our relationship to be like. God wants the man to pursue the woman! The whole time we were dating I always was the one who texted him first and made the plans and what we were doing, and God does not want it that way. He wants the guy to pursue the girl and lead her, and be the sacrificial love God promises us!

Wisdom for the week:

• God empowers me to be so filled with love that I get to dump that love out on everyone I meet
• I will value people more than they value me, what a powerful beautiful way to live- Christa Black