Be Present

Skip to 4:31 if you want to watch the "Be Present" spoken word

You know those moments when you watch something or read something and afterwards you are just like "well...I feel guilty now"....that is kind of what happened to me after watching this video. It definitely spoke to my heart. 

There are so many things that serve as distractions: Emails, Texts, Facebook, Instagram, Vine, Twitter, Snapchat, Fantasy Football Updates, Tumblr...the list goes on and on. It's exhausting and it is like "man, when was the last time I looked up?" This generation is so guilty of not being present. We participate so heavily in social media that we completely ignore what is going on right in front of us.

This message called me out.

Referring to his wife, the man basically says "her presence is God's present, so be present" 

The Lord calls us to love Him and love His people. But how can we truly be loving if we aren't present? We spend more time typing then we do talking. We can't truly love, know, and understand His people if we don't even take the time to look up at them.

I pray that we can view the people that surround us as God's presents. So I just encourage that we spend more time talking to the people in our living room than talking to the people on our phone. If we are going to be there, let's be there. Amen? 

51

I just want to give glory to God right now and all that He has done through InterVarsity this past semester. Yesterday we had our end of the semester celebration in which we look at how we have seen God work. 

This semester we saw a total of 51 people make decisions to follow Jesus

PRAISE THE LORD!!!

Basically, InterVarsity saw a person coming to faith every other day. How crazy is that? Sometimes, I take for granted how special this community is. I get to see somebody come to Jesus almost every single week. That is so incredibly beautiful and inspiring. 

I pray you can all rejoice knowing that we have 51 new brothers and sisters.

I can't wait to see what next semester has in store! 

Decisions With Discernment

My prayer for you all tonight is that you just meditate on these lyrics

Lately, the Lord is really telling me what and who in my life is leading me closer to Him and who is not. 

We make decisions daily. They could be life changing or they could be as small as picking out your outfit in the morning. But how many times do we make these decisions for the sake of our God? When was the last time we approached decision making with discernment? 

No request or decision is too big or too small for God to have an opinion on, so why don't we start asking Him? 

Talk to Him tonight. Ask him what He thinks about your life....your job, friends, school, family, girlfriend,  boyfriend, closet addiction, children and what you do with your spare time.

Don't be afraid of the answer. Chances are He has something so incredible planned for you. He loves you enough to care about all of it. 

Offer every pocket of your life up to Him and see how He works. 

A Little Like Lily

As I was praying about what I wanted to share this week at woman's study, I came across this video and immediately thought "this is perfect". 

Some of you are probably thinking "where in the world is the biblical connection?" 

I know, it is kind of a stretch. 

The passage we went over was in Matthew 7

We discussed the idea of persistent prayer, receiving God's blessings and how to use them when our prayers are answered. 

The two things I wanted them to take away from this video were: 

1.) God knows the desires of our heart. When Lily was opening up her presents she would ask "how did you know I wanted this?! how?". So often the Lord denies us of what we ask for and gives us something even GREATER. So great that we always end up asking "how did you know I needed this Lord. How?!" His gifts to us are perfect. 

2.) After Lily was done receiving all her gifts,  her mother asks "okay, so where do you want to go with all these things?". Of course, her answer was Disneyland. However, I think that after the Lord spoils us with His abundant blessings, the question is "okay so how are we going to use these gifts". We not only should be receiving His grace, but we should be using it for His glory as well. 

So often God looks upon us as we looked upon Lily. Besides, to Him, we are all children. He knows our heart so intimately and He knows EXACTLY what we need. 

Now all we have to do is ask. 

I Am Awesome

Grace Amazing

This Monday night at women's bible study rocked my world. It is incredible how much you learn about the Lord as you lead people into a deeper understanding of His Word. No matter how much I try to plan and take control, God is always reminding me that He is the true Shepherd.

I wrestled for a while with the passage (John 4:43-54) that I was suppose to teach that week. There were just so many other verses that I wanted to share with the girls and however terrible this sounds, I just didn't have a passion for the story of the royal official and the healing of his son. I know, I know, that is awful of me to say, but I really just wasn't connecting with it.

HOWEVER, I decided be faithful and go ahead with the teaching of that passage. I felt as if even though I couldn't picture it right now, the Lord was going to really speak through it...

That morning while I was in class, I listened to a voicemail from my dad saying my grandmother was taken to ICU.

She had broken three sections of her lower abdomen and her organs were beginning to shut down on her at a rapid rate. 

I rushed back to the hospital in Temecula after class and spent the whole day praying over my dad and praying over her. Never had I seen a person more fragile. 

I began planning the bible study while sitting by her bedside as she slept. 

I started rereading the passage about how the royal official literally begged Jesus to come and heal his son. I could not help but connect with the desperation that the father was feeling. It was the same posture that I had minutes earlier as I begged for the healing of my grandmother. 

In this moment, I knew that the Lord had spoken to my heart. 

I then drove back to San Marcos to give the lesson on healing. As we prayed together at the end of the night and as I continued to pray as I drove back again to Temecula, I knew that everything was going to be okay. 

The next day I found out that although she was still in a critical condition, she was to be moved out of ICU and will soon be on her way to recovery. At 92 years old, any type of progress after the state she was previously in can definitely be considered a miracle!

This week taught me that I should never doubt how transforming His Word can be. No matter what, God will find a way to speak to your heart. It is AMAZING that what has been written thousands of years ago is still very much ALIVE and APPLICABLE to ALL of us today. 

How beautiful is that? 

You Got Served

A while ago I started to find new ways to serve God's sons and daughters. One of the things I began to do was pay for the people that were behind me in the Starbucks drive-thru line. I am sure you have all heard about people doing this, it is such an easy thing to do and really is pretty rewarding. 

So yesterday I decided to do it for the first time in a while. I know this is not a good excuse, but money has been kind of tight and I have been trying to save as much as possible. 

But this time, I had a gift card. My wonderful mother puts money on this card every time it runs out, so I knew I would be totally safe to pay for the people behind me. 

After I had told the barista to put the couple's order behind me on my tab, it turned out that there wasn't any money left on the gift card. 

Therefore the three drinks and two lunches that were to be purchased came straight out of kendal's broke account. 

I think this was God's way of saying there is no such thing as superficially serving His people. Although it was such a small thing, the Lord humbled my heart in that moment. I think that trip to Starbucks did more for me then it did for the couple behind me. 

So often we think that we can do the bare minimum, but God calls us to do more. Serving is good, but it is GREATER when it involves sacrifice. 

Let's just say, lesson learned.