To begin this post, I want to say that these truly are just a few... the list could go on and on but I am just going to write about some of them. Maybe someday I'll add to it and if I don't then at least this will give you a little taste of who I am! :)
I realized as I'm sitting here watching the Nativity Story with my sleeping parents that I cannot go through life without a nice hot cup of something in my hands. Hot tea. Coffee. Hot Chocolate. Steamer. Anything really, it is just a simple delight to drink something hot and in the literal sense, feel "warm fuzzies" on the inside. (Right now I am drinking a Chamomile tea with honey in it.)
A wood fireplace, a good book and sweatpants in the winter with a hot cup of something. Nothing beats this kind of relaxing.
I love dreaming... both when I am sleeping, and awake. I have so many dreams in my heart that I am just waiting to come about... but in the waiting, Jesus is soooo faithful and is teaching me so much about who I am. When Jesus is leading me and showing me things about who I am and what I was meant to be- hoping is such a joy! Outside of Christ, hoping is burdensome and lonely, but in Christ it is something to look forward to with a holy anticipation and longing.
Meaningful conversations. I do not love small talk.
Family. I enjoy being with my family. They are kind and loving and enjoy life. They love Jesus and teach me so much about life and happiness and folling Christ.
And finally Jesus. I am far from it, but my desire is that He would be my all in all! I want every breath, every thought to be consumed with Him. My heart is delighted when He calls my name... I am honored that He would love me with such an everlasting love. I want to give Him everything, holding nothing back for myself. He has tender eyes, yet they burn with a fire that cannot be quenched. His desire is towards me and I delight His heart. All I want is to be near Him. Everything else is fading, but only His love remains. And in His love, He enables me to love Him back. Nothing else can compare to my Beloved. Nothing.
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Reflections of the Heart
This morning, I am sitting here at my friend's house drinking tea and thinking about my life. I watched a movie last night called An Old Fashioned Christmas and the main guy character told his fiance to just follow her heart because she has a good heart and he trusted her. As I was watching this, I became so frustrated with our culture because everyone tells someone making a decision to simply "follow your heart" but that's not what Jesus told us to do at all! He gave us the Holy Spirit to be our Helper! Jesus says in John 14:16-17, "I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever; that is the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it does not see Him or know Him, but you know Him because He abides with you and will be in you." In the Old Testament, a helper is one who provides aid or relief, specifically the Lord (Ps. 30:10; 54:4). In Psalm 30:10, David is crying out for the Lord to be his helper. Jesus answers this cry of David, and many others after His ascension by sending the Holy Spirit.
Now finally, after Jesus came and established one sacrifice for all (Heb. 10:10), we have the availability of the Holy Spirit living INSIDE OF US (Acts 2)! If you didn't get that, it means GOD WANTS TO LIVE INSIDE OF US and be our HELPER! This means that we don't have to follow our hearts and trust in ourselves alone! Why would we want to do that anyways? "The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick ('wicked' in other translations); who can understand it? I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds."
I do not want to be one who declares that I trust in myself by the way I act and think and move and give my money. I want to declare my utter dependance is on Jesus! I am His, and He is mine (SS 7:10). That statement means that ALL that I am is His. I don't ever want to hold anything back from Him. I want everything that I am to be His. For everything that I hold onto as my own, no matter how big or small, I miss out on the pleasures of being completely abandoned to God.
No one is perfect and we are all fighting for holiness, but if we set our hearts to abide in Jesus (John 15:4) we have confidence that out of abiding in Him, our hearts will be transformed and we will bear good fruit (John 15:5). If we abide in God, we abide in Light because in God there is no darkness at all (1 John 1:5). This abiding in Light will expose all the darkness in our hearts and after we have been broken of all our fleshly lusts and evil desires, God can and will start to repare and rebuid the foundations of our heart so that in the end, we will come out looking more like Him. We will finally be able to love Him with all of our hearts, with no shame or guilt over the evil in us.
If we were living for ourselves, wickedness would be acceptable and even pleasureable, but we are not living for ourselves, we are living for Jesus "...and everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure." (1 John 3:3)
Now finally, after Jesus came and established one sacrifice for all (Heb. 10:10), we have the availability of the Holy Spirit living INSIDE OF US (Acts 2)! If you didn't get that, it means GOD WANTS TO LIVE INSIDE OF US and be our HELPER! This means that we don't have to follow our hearts and trust in ourselves alone! Why would we want to do that anyways? "The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately sick ('wicked' in other translations); who can understand it? I, the Lord, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give each man according to his ways, according to the results of his deeds."
I do not want to be one who declares that I trust in myself by the way I act and think and move and give my money. I want to declare my utter dependance is on Jesus! I am His, and He is mine (SS 7:10). That statement means that ALL that I am is His. I don't ever want to hold anything back from Him. I want everything that I am to be His. For everything that I hold onto as my own, no matter how big or small, I miss out on the pleasures of being completely abandoned to God.
No one is perfect and we are all fighting for holiness, but if we set our hearts to abide in Jesus (John 15:4) we have confidence that out of abiding in Him, our hearts will be transformed and we will bear good fruit (John 15:5). If we abide in God, we abide in Light because in God there is no darkness at all (1 John 1:5). This abiding in Light will expose all the darkness in our hearts and after we have been broken of all our fleshly lusts and evil desires, God can and will start to repare and rebuid the foundations of our heart so that in the end, we will come out looking more like Him. We will finally be able to love Him with all of our hearts, with no shame or guilt over the evil in us.
If we were living for ourselves, wickedness would be acceptable and even pleasureable, but we are not living for ourselves, we are living for Jesus "...and everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure." (1 John 3:3)
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