Modern-day Paul

Sometimes I like to think about what Paul would do if he lived in our generation and our century. How vast our communication circuit is! Just imagine if Paul would have been able to send an email to the Corinthians and that very same day they would have been able to receive the sweet Truth and to spread it like wildfire!
Would they have been so eager to receive it?
I think of my brothers and sister in Honduras and El Salvador. Very few times are they allowed on the internet to receive emails and communications, but it is still something they have access to. They are encouraged and grateful for correspondence from brothers and sisters.
Good news is good news, whether it comes from pen and paper or as a sweet email.
Or a podcast!
John Piper's website Desiring God is full of wisdom and knowledge coming from the Good Book and is used by millions for study of the Word.

We have the Bible everywhere!
On our phones, on our computers, on the television. How great it is for us, my generation!

But what are you doing with these gifts?

Dear Friends, I write to you in exhortation and in guilt. I, myself, am guilty of not using the gifts we have been given to their full extent. Even while I sit here on facebook, youtube, reading email, I fool myself into saying "I don't have time for devotions today", "I don't have time for a study". Really? Really? How much time do I have for facebook? For Tumblr? For watching a movie?

Would Paul be appalled with the ratio of time of uselessness to time well spent?

How would Paul use the internet?

Just a short thought.

Love Always,
Christina

Let me tell you bout my best friends (BONUS POST)

Haha like I'm popular enough to announce bonus posts.

But for real. I've been reflecting on how blessed I am and had to write about it!

See those ladies over there? Yeah I'm over there but ignore me. I really do like that shirt, though.

 But anyway those cool ladies.

So, let me tell you about how blessed I am and how much the Lord must love me for all He's given me.

Those two are my cousins and best friends. That's right, cousins AND best friends. I'm sure I've mentioned this before. But a short time ago the Lord was gracious enough to have chosen to begin changing and sanctifying their lives as they became apart of my heavenly family as well. How many times I had prayed to God for Godly sisters to fellowship with me, and how many times I prayed for these two's salvation. I never knew He would answer both at the same time.
After initial growth they both seemed to just EXPLODE with desire and passion for the Lord and it's been so amazing and so encouraging to watch them become such beautiful women inside and out.

Cousin 1 (Left) has always been such a star in my eyes. Haha, I thought she was seriously the coolest while growing up. She's a couple years older than me, so of course, a couple of years ahead of my game. I tried to be like her, she was sarcastic and funny and had older high school friends. She would let me hang out with her and I thought I must be pretty darn cool for her to like me. I picked on Cousin 2 because that's what she did, I mean she was a full year minus two weeks younger than me, so lame ;). I watched as she struggled through being a teenager and different trials and that's when I truly began to love her for her. Before I just thought she was cool and wanted her to think I was cool, but when I got closer I saw the real her, (not that she still wasn't cool, it was just a different cool), and loved her even more for it. The way she thinks often gets me to think about things, and I love when she writes. I wish she would write more so I could know her thoughts. I think no matter how old we get she'll still be the coolest in my mind.

Cousin 2 (Middle) was born two weeks before my first birthday. We really didn't get along until teenage years. Even then we weren't the closest, but at family gatherings we could hang out and get along. She would always force me to be Ken, Aladdin, The Evil One when we played Barbies. She never let me play with the princess Barbies!!!! (Still bitter). Haha just kidding. Kind of. But, we slowly became closer and as she grew closer to the Lord the Lord revealed to me just who He was crafting within her, not only a beautiful woman, but my best friend. She knows pretty much everything about me, and I believe I the same for her. She's the person I go to for advice, she sees things differently than I do, and it's beautiful to me. We don't always agree, but we don't need to, we love each other enough to respect each other. She's talked me through sin issues, heart break, and triumphs. We laugh every time we're together and I enjoy just listening about her day and telling her about mine. I don't know where I'd be without her.

They are such an important back of my support system, I would be a mess without them!

I'm so lucky

Filled with so much love,
Christina

The Importance of Being Honest

Okay so warning and disclaimer about this post, it may come off as a rant of sorts, and maybe it is. But My frustrated mind is trying to resolve it's ideas and the best way I do this is to write. Words and ideas enter into my mind and wont leave until I put them down onto paper or clumsily speak them. I'm not so good at the impromptu speaking part, the words bounce around in my mind so much that they come out in unintelligent phrases when expressed orally. It's just a mess, if you've ever had the misfortune of having a serious conversation with me, I'm sorry because I probably sounded like I had no idea what I was talking about. I am knowledgeable of things! I just don't know how to tell you that.

AH I've already started a rant that has nothing to do with the subject I wanted to rant about!
(There I admitted it, this is a rant)

Okay so, something that I have been encountering, (is that the correct phrasing of that? Whatever it's how I want it to be), is an overwhelming fakeness practically dripping from people. You know what I'm talking about, you've met one of those people that no matter how bright the smile, or loud the laugh, there's a sound that comes after it, subtle, but encroaching enough that something in the back of your mind goes.... hmmmm. It's more than that, it's a small almost inaudible sigh with a shifting of the eyes as if searching the room to find acceptance in some corner, but they're not going to find it, because they're not being themself, therefore not accepting the person they're portraying.

Okay, caveat, (don't know what that means? Look it up, our generation has been blessed with modern technology and a virtually unlimited search engine, also known as Google. while you're there look up a vocabulary word you don't know. Don't be afraid to educate yourself. Education is attractive.) I want you to understand that the only reason I'm critical on this situation is because I used to be that person. And still today I struggle not to fall into that routine of hiding myself to try to please everyone, get attention, or be the cool person. And, this problem can typically be found within the high school aged assemblage (just looked that word up. Learning is fun!). This is where it hit me hardest and kept it's claws into me through the early college years, as well.

Back to original thought:

There are just those people that no matter how hard they try to fake it they come off as very insincere. And that is a turn off in general. And I don't mean boy-girl turn off, but a turn off in general.

The problem:

First off, what's so wrong with you?! Where does it say that you are such a horrible personality that no one will like it if they really get to know you?
God certainly doesn't think this way
Let's go back alllllll the way to the beginning.

1:26 Then God said, “Let us make ⁴⁷ 

humankind ⁴⁸  in our image, after our likeness, ⁴⁹  so they may rule ⁵⁰  over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the cattle, and over all the earth, ⁵¹  and over all the creatures that move ⁵²  on the earth.”

1:27 God created humankind ⁵³  in his own image,

in the image of God he created them, ⁵⁴ 

male and female he created them. ⁵⁵

(Gen 1:26-27)

 Okay let's start with the fact that God made you specifically. Every flaw, every strength, every strand of hair He made, and He made it in His likeness! Okay, how cool are you already?

Checklist, please!

God made you personally
He made you in His image
And it even says it, He made you to rule! You rule!

Haha okay that last one isn't a correct interpretation of the Scriptures ;P. But so far I'd say we're looking pretty darn good. 

So I feel like I have used this verse before but I don't feel like going and looking haha, so lazzzyyyy.

139:13 Certainly ¹⁹  you made my mind and heart; ²⁰ 

you wove me together ²¹  in my mother’s womb.

139:14 I will give you thanks because your deeds are awesome and amazing. ²² 

You knew me thoroughly; ²³ 

139:15 my bones were not hidden from you,

when ²⁴  I was made in secret

and sewed together in the depths of the earth. ²⁵ 

139:16 Your eyes saw me when I was inside the womb. ²⁶ 

All the days ordained for me

were recorded in your scroll

before one of them came into existence. ²⁷ 

139:17 How difficult it is for me to fathom your thoughts about me, O God! ²⁸ 

How vast is their sum total! ²⁹ 

139:18 If I tried to count them,

they would outnumber the grains of sand.

Even if I finished counting them,

I would still have to contend with you. ³⁰

The Lord made your heart and mind! He thinks of you. Your days are ordained by Him! He knows you thoroughly and He loves you. HE.LOVES.YOU. Done, checklist complete. Whom else do you need to love you? Sure people here on earth seem pretty great, and you may feel like you need them to love you, but really.... do you really?
Let's not get things mixed up.
God has given us earthly relationships to cherish and enjoy, and brothers and sister's in Christ to help and to be the Church, and this is very very important. I'm not saying become a hermit and forsake all others, all I'm saying is that truly, essentially, if it came down to it the only love your soul and heart desperately NEEDS is Christ's. You heart may try and tell you that you desperately need so and so's love and affection, but be not deceived, dear heart!

Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?

 We have sick hearts, loves. And it is only Christ who can heal, but so often will listen to heart above Christ. Be careful that you don't let your heart tell you that you need something. Unless that something is Christ.

So let's look at our checklist, hmm?

God made you personally
He made you in His image
YOU RULE (Christina likes to make corny jokes and insist they're funnnnyyyy)
He has made your heart and mind, but be careful listening to that tricky heart
He thinks of you. YOU. Think of you, He does. (Eh? Reference? Anyone?)
He ordains your days! Don't know what that means?... Guess what.... LOOK IT UP! Wooo!
He knows you inside and out and He loves you. He loves you. He loves you. He loves you.

I'd say this is a pretty good list so far.

So you, dear reader, if you do exist, with all your faults and quirks and not-so-funny jokes, (ahem), are a special person. Made beautifully in the image of a God who loves your quirks.

I've been learning that He even loves through sin. Now, He's not happy with sin, He hates sin, but if He has saved you with His unending grace, He no longer judges you based on that, and loves throughout. 


So, my challenge to you is that when you feel like you should act a certain way because it's what everyone wants to see, think "God loves ME, He likes who I am, and so do I!".

Because He does love you, and for you reader, so do I.

You rule.

Love, (really) Always,
Christina

P.S.
An awesome resource, which I use for this blog is net.bible.org. And Phil Wickham music is pretty good too.