More Reasons to be Thankful

         In the midst of this busy week I’m having trouble finding the words to describe how I’m feeling about this life-changing trip that I’m going on this summer. It’s going to be such an eye opening experience, one that will make me even more thankful for everything that I have and all of the opportunities that I’ve been given. Don’t get me wrong though, I’m VERY grateful already but I think that once I see these children I’ll never be the same again.

Thank you, Jesus

Home. For most people that word conjures up warm and fuzzy feelings, maybe even a sense of relief. Whether home is back in your hometown with your parents, an apartment with a beyond awesome roommate (I’m biased to this one) or maybe you’re a moneybags with your own house- regardless of where that place is the bottom line is that it’s somewhere that’s comfortable to you where you don’t feel the pressure of the outside world. You can be your true self and you’re surrounded by people that know you and don’t need explanations of why you do the things you do.

Today I’m thankful to have friends that really know and understand me and how I work. I’m thankful to know that my friends won’t let my desire to pursue my dreams get in the way of our friendship. A true friend is a rare find because they are willing to let you go, sacrificing a daily relationship with you, in order to let you chase your dreams and pursue God’s will on your life. John Maxwell said something that really spoke to me: “As you seek to enlist people into the fulfillment of your vision, don’t be discouraged when people you respect can’t see what you do. And don’t be despaired if people you respect won’t take the trip with you, even if you’re inviting them to do it for their own benefit. But instead simply celebrate when people choose to join you, and keep loving those that don’t”. It’s easy to get discouraged so today I’m simply just thankful for what and who I have around me.

Fears and Insecurities

Fear. It’s something that I’ve been dealing with a lot lately. I think that I’ve always been scared of one thing or another. Snakes are definitely my biggest physical fear, but even then I’m so intrigued by them that I can’t help but watch shows on Animal Planet about them. Crazy I know. But spiritually my fear has always been of failure. Recently though my fears have evolved from that into a fear of success.

Last night at church our pastor gave an awesome word that was so timely, considering it was leap day. As a church we were making all of these declarations about what we would be “leaping” into this year, they were all so incredible and I’m still bouncing around over 12 hours later. But one of them really stood out more to me then the rest:

I will join myself with other believers who are leaping forward.

Since moving to Boone I’ve definitely done better about this, but I think it used to be because of fear of being left behind. Thankfully I’ve grown so much since then. I’ve learned that success isn’t always contagious, but the desire for success is. Being around someone who is living out their dreams and passions has one of two effects on other people. It will either motivate them to pursue their dreams too, or it cause them to claim life is not fair since they don’t have the boldness to venture out and pursue their own dreams. As important as those relationships are we have to be really careful not to give them too much control in our lives. If you are too worried about what other people will think of your dreams, they are in complete control of them and essentially you. I know that I’ve definitely been guilty of doing this. I’ve mentioned before about how I’ve known for a while now that my passion is to work with kids, but because I let other peoples opinions weigh on me so much I wasn’t really hearing from the Lord on what to do. And that’s how I worked up this plan to open my own child development center. “It’s a good way to use that degree to make some money”, is what they said. Which is true and not entirely horrible. But the Lord didn’t call me to use my gifts to just make money. He called me to follow His purpose. Those people that were speaking into my life meant well and I know they have my best interest at heart, but because of their lifestyle and lack of a serious relationship with the Lord they no longer have the position of power to speak those things over me. That being said we, as believers, need to be careful about who were receiving from.

“Remember your leaders who taught you the word of God. Think of all the good that has come from their lives, and follow the example of their faith”

Hebrews 13:7 NLT

Life. Now.

This post is going to be short and sweet. Mainly because I’m at work, drinking coffee and reading this awesome new book that my pastor just gave me. Yes I’m getting paid to do this in between making the occasional latte and I work for my pastor. It’s really a great job and I’m so blessed to have it, be jealous if you must but just for two seconds please J.

As a believer it’s easy to adapt the mentality, “If it’s Gods will, then it will happen.” It’s a little more difficult then that though. Knowing God’s will for your life doesn’t eliminate the fact that we must obey to get the blessing. You have to work WITH God to get what He has planned. His sovereign will over our lives is not an excuse to be lazy. That’s how you miss out on His blessings. If God is moving, you’ve got to be moving with Him or you may never get from where you are to where you want to go. Since I started this blog I’ve realized how easy it is to just be lazy once you know God’s will. But I’m learning that I can’t just sit around waiting for opportunities to fall into place, sometimes that will happen, but more often then not I’m going to have to seek things out for myself. It wasn’t until about 15 minutes ago when I was reading in this book that I realized why I tend to be lazy about it though.

FEAR.

I’m scared. It’s silly but I’m scared of all the good things that are on the verge of happening. In the past I’ve always seen my future and my purpose as being so far away so there’s no need to worry about it now, but why not now? All of the sudden I’m realizing that it’s here and now. I’ve got to act on what He’s calling me to do. Pursuing my dreams doesn’t mean that I’m no longer afraid though. I think that a part of me is always going to be a little bit scared of all of this but if I can just remember that my God is bigger then this little knot in my stomach then nothing can stop me. I’m actually conquering a fear right now by doing this. Growing up I always hated writing and on top of that I’m a very private person, so the idea of doing a blog this personal scares me more then a lot of things. But I know that if you’re reading this then you are on my support team. And if I want your support then I have to entrust you with what is going on with me. I’m human and I’m going to fail, but the Lord doesn’t fail and He’s leading me and opening up different opportunities. So if He’s opening these doors then I have to take the risk and bank on the fact that He can’t fail.

Patience Patience Patience

I was reading this morning and was lead to Micah 7:7 by a friend, and it couldn’t have come at a more appropriate time. It’s seriously SO good.

“But me, I’m not giving up. I’m sticking around to see what God will do. I’m waiting for God to make things right. I’m counting on God to listen to me.”

            You see I had just unburdened a lot on her and was starting to sound a little whiney, but she just let me talk my way into this little “pity party hole” I had dug and then simply handed me the right tools to get myself out. When she told me what verse I started to scoff at her because who seriously knows anything about the book of Micah? But, man was I wrong to doubt the Lord speaking through my sweet friend. So this got me thinking, what else am I missing by overlooking these small books by names that I can’t spell without looking them up? Oh hey Habakkuk.

“And then God answered: “Write this. Write what you see. Write it out in big block letters so that it can be read on the run. This vision-message is a witness pointing to what’s coming. It aches for the coming- it can hardly wait! And it doesn’t lie. If it seems slow in coming, wait. It’s on its way. It will come right on time.”

            So good, right?

            Confession time: I’ve been really frustrated since my last post and that’s why I haven’t posted for the past month. God had revealed so much to me in the span of just a couple of days and I was completely on fire and ready to get out there and help those sweet little orphans. And then all of the sudden I was getting nothing from him. Now that’s not entirely true, I was getting great stuff from Him, but it just wasn’t what I wanted to hear after getting flooded with awesomeness earlier.  “Wait.” That’s all I was letting myself hear and that is the most frustrating thing for someone to hear. My passion for these orphans that I WILL be helping to find homes is so great that the idea of waiting a couple of years seems like forever. Lucky for me there is India this summer.

            Have I mentioned how excited I am about this trip? I wish that it was this week, but I know that God will use the next 4 months to prepare my heart for what I know will be a life changing trip. There is so much to do in the mean time, like raising the money to go. It’s a lot of money but I’m also expecting a lot of support and I can’t wait to see how the Lord is going to work all of this out. I’m believing that the Lord has some great things in store for me so I’m really just trying to focus more on being patient with HIS timing because if it happens on my time I simply won’t be adequately prepared for any of this.

“We do not want you to become lazy, but to imitate those who through faith and patience inherit what has been promised”

Hebrews 6:12

Who am I really aiming to please through this?

So I’m sensing a mini theme here and I promise that it won't last forever but I'm just following my Father on this one, so stick with me.

I was reading in 1 Corinthians the other night with a couple friends and we found this verse that knocked the wind out us (or at least it did that for me). It's in chapter 10 and it says "I'm not going to walk around on eggshells worrying about what small minded people might say; I'm going to stride free and easy, knowing what our large minded Master has already said." Now I know what small-minded means but I looked it up anyways...have narrow interests (duh Britt), marked by pettiness and meanness (now we're getting somewhere). Right there is my opposition. It's as simple as that really, there are going to people in my life that are going to disagree with decisions that I'll be making from here on out but they're going to have to talk to my Father about that because He just said that I don't need to worry about what they're saying. Would I like for everybody to be behind me 100%? You bet! But lets be realistic, there are people in my own family that won't understand the calling that's been placed on me. It breaks my heart, but I'm believing that they'll have a change of heart and see me the way the Lord does...as His servant. But if you continue reading in verse 10 it says to not worry about what others are saying about you because your life's purpose isn't to please them.

Yesterday I sacrificed myself and my own wants and desires so that the Lord could do what He wants with them. Today I have to sacrifice my opposition, though right now they don't seem like that (and they may not even know it yet). It's not going to be easy, but it also wouldn't be much of a sacrifice if it didn't bring a little pain right?

On the other side of that the verse says that our Master and Father is large minded, and that He's ALREADY spoken. Part of the Greek translation of large-minded means proud. He's proud of me and He's proud of anybody that sits and listens to Him. That seems so simple and it is. But at the same time it's crazy to know that He thinks about me like that (and by crazy I mean crazy-awesome!) Also, before I was born He spoke all of this over me because He knew that I'd be sitting here in bed tonight struggling with wanting the support that I think I need. But in Him I have all the support I need. Anything else is overflow and so so so great!