So I don't really have anything to say and so I decided to write the letter I feel God is writing on my heart and maybe on yours too. I'm not claiming divine inspiration, just thinking about how he loves. 

Beloved, 

I know you are weary. Come and rest. Just rest. Remember, love, I AM. And that is enough. there is nothing for you to be and nothing for you to make me because I was and I am and I always will be. Darling, I know your heart so well. Do not hold tight to your heart because you cannot help but give it away. Thats just how I made you. I made you for me. We fit together. Every thirst you have is filled in me. Please, do not run from and deny your sin. No matter how far we go together, until we are reunited in eternity, it will be ever present, ever thorny and nasty and the more you know me, the more terrible it will become. Not that you will sin more but that sin will pain you deeper as you become increasingly part of reality with me. Be sorrowful in looking deeply and facing the parts of your soul that hate me. You must know sin to know the power of the cross. You are enough, I want you with me right now. If you tarry til you're better, you'll never come at all. I love you right now-abide in my love, abide in me. I do not love you because of who you are, I love you because of who I am that in creating you for relationship, I bound myself to humanity for al eternity. I just wanted to let you know I'm thinking about you. Literally every millisecond. Be daring for me. Love the people GOd has given you, who may be in the rest of your life and maybe are just for a fews seconds in a grocery store. Give it up for me. Lose your life. I promise i will catch you. IF you come to me, you can wrap yourself up in me. It will be such deep passion and love. 

Jesus

Thankful

I'll be honest I didn't really want to start writing a blog, even though I love to write. I thought no one would read it and I would have nothing to say. Which I don't. But God was like, "Love, I have stuff to say. And I'll use you." Which makes no sense. He wants to use us to spread his love. And he does-when we don't even know it. When we're still running after all these other things, He's quietly working in our lives to bring glory to his name and to write us into this love story that is underlying every aspect of existence. So anyways, I start it since I couldn't fail because it was His and its actually touching lives. Which literally takes my breath away. Today my dear friend Brandon called it gorgeous. My heart soared. And my lovely cousin Leia left me a message just to say don't stop. Nick, Ashley, Caroline, Mackenzie, Mom: your encouragement is nourishing to my soul. Not because I am good because I am not. But because He is so so good and his goodness is written all over it. My prayer for this blog is that as you read it you sense the Lord and know that it is a love letter from Him to you.

Today I was sitting up on the 8th floor of the library on a date date with God and the longer I sat, the more I was able to stop thinking about myself and my agenda and my worries and as began to turn my face to Him, He, who had been waiting patiently, began to soak me in His love. I have found that when saturated in the love of Christ, you have this deep desire to pour it out. You know that God works differently than things here because you don't want to hold onto this treasure. It is absolutely clear that in loving others our of the overflow of love with you will somehow lead to more love. And I could watch the campus, hundreds of kids walking by, and it hit me that this deep satisfaction, this savior I have been made whole by, is there's and they don't even know him. Most of them have never even been exposed to the gospel. Yes, most Americans know the "formulaic gospel" the facts of Christianity, but the gospel cannot be told without love. The gospel is love because God is love. So if they have not been loved THAT way they really have never even been exposed to the person of Christ. And I have. And I could expose them to it. Here is the really awful thing I don't want to share at all. I don't want to. Their eternity is at stake, and I'd rather just go to class and do homework and be busy until this very costly grace slowly ebbs from my heart and my thoughts. Because thats awkward and scary and against how things are to really love people. There is no glory in it like their is in feeding the poor and getting good grades and writing. Its the work of Christ. The path down. The path he took. If we accept grace, we have to know that it is costly because it cost us our lives and it cost God his Son. But it is grace because God did not reckon his Son to dear a price for our lives and because it ushers us into the only true life.


Maybe people's lives changed after one interaction with Jesus because Jesus was actually thinking about them and how to love them. Because we have all come to accept the fact that people usually aren't even listening. And we know because we're not. when people talk to me I can't stop about my response or my plans for the afternoon  or what they're thinking of me. But You and I are being made into Him-and we can love people. We can listen. We can care how they are doing. And we can reach the point, only by God's work in us, where our primary concern is the cross and loving people to the point we're their lives cannot be the same ever ever again. Lets do it.

I've been neglecting salvation.

Hebrews 2
I've began a Journey in the book of Hebrews and the first thing I came across that really jolted me was the beginning of chapter 2 which is about neglecting salvation. What killed me is that the ones he warns about neglecting salvation are the ones who have heard it before. aka me. I've been familiar with salvation, since I was old enough to be told Jesus died for me. And here is the huge danger-that statement "Jesus died for me" produces no response in my heart. It does not take my breath away, it does not draw me to tears or praise or meditation. Its become stale. And maybe you know this, maybe salvation has become cliche in our hearts because we hear it week after week. A dear friend of mine told me about how her mother was killed when she was 4 and she saw her mother after it happened. But she had told this story to person after person year after year, it had no emotional effect on her. It just became a fact. When she discovered Christ she wept when telling her story for the first time in years because she discovered how to feel pain and only in feeling pain was she able to be comforted by Christ. Thats how I can be about the cross. At that point where this HUGE thing has become ordinary and often repeated and just kind of a fact.
So last night as I read these ancient words, this God breathed text, a question crashed into my heart...

Do you think God sent his Beloved to be made the lowliest, to die on a human cross, so that you and the body of Christ can live like this?

And I plead with you, ask yourself that question. Your relationship with God, right now, this second-is it the sort of relationship that he desired? The sort of relationship that he put his wrath upon his own Son for? And this is not about self condemnation because God chose to send his Son knowing exactly how we would live, but it is a time of being real with ourselves and daring to wonder what He sort of relationship he desires enough to let his Son put on flesh. If Christ was willing to be that close to us-to strip himself of all godliness, to make himself lower than angels, to let go of all power and knowledge he held, subject himself to the earth he created, and perhaps most, leave God. Willingly live life away from God. It breaks our hearts and causes deep suffering in us to be apart from God and we are born apart from God. Jesus knew what it meant to live in community and relationship deeper than our humanity can take us. Can you imagine the agony of letting that go for a minute? For 33 years?

It undeniably leads us to the idea that God has more in mind for our lives and our relationships with Him.  I'll get really real. Jesus did not die to watch me find value or comfort in a flat stomach, to eat really good food, treasure cuddling with my boyfriend far more than being with him, enslave myself to perfect grades, save a bunch of people's lives, be a social worker, be a writer, be a world changer. He died for one reason and one alone: for me to be in relationship with God. To invite me into the relationship he and God had that we were all supposed to be a part of before we checked out and decided to find our own way. And whenever relationship with God isn't the desire of our heart, the craving of our soul, the 1. on the todo list, the source of life and worth and joy salvation is neglected. So with everything, EVERYTHING, did Jesus die for me to do this?

Rain

in my journal I usually write letters to God. I figured I'd write it here instead of there :)

Love,

     You have filled this day with rain and it is holy. How often, in your love letter to us, the Word, have you used water-the source of all life-to paint for us who you are in our lives. This stream of flowing water deep in our souls filling us, coursing through us, ever present, ever deep. How can you be in me God? How can you in your precious perfection, your brilliant glory come to reside in the brokenness of our humanity?
     God  rain is a nuance, it is dreary and inconvenient. I dawn my umbrella and hustle through to shelter. And God  I do the same with you. Every day. You wait eagerly, ready to drench me in your Spirit, pour yourself into me, hold my hand and show me and teach em great, unsearchable things I do not know-and my response is to hustle right by with the strange notion that I have important things to to do. But you are a God who sends rain again and again, that even when dawned my raincoat of schoolwork, my umbrella of social commitments, you still pour yourself out hoping to slip in past those things and reach our skin and just maybe reach a little deeper into our heart. Rain is lovely, Lord and you are lovely.
    Humble me God. Bring me to my knees in knowing that I have nothing to offer but that you will use me still to advance your kingdom. Thank you God for not giving us a roadmap of a life, steps to follow to make you happy, how to be a disciple. Because that is exactly what I want. And I know that I want it because then I could do it on my own. And when I'm doing it on my own, all is lost. You require us as your people to let you lead us  and that is far more intimate and then giving us a job and letting us do it on our own.
    Teach me God to explain to people that all that I am here to do is make much of Jesus. To love him and to love people because He does and He is who I want to be like. Thats it. I'm not here to change the world or to save it or to gain some glory that I am lifted up here because I wrote well or helped sick people or ended poverty. I am here to be brought low, to be forgotten, and made rubbish (as Paul would say) that all people see is You. None of us, all of You. Mold us as your Beloved into that.
     Thanks again for this holy downpour. Or sprinkling. But mostly just for choosing to be here. To be in the rain and in the sun and in our hearts and our lives. You love us so much. So much no matter how we respond, no matter what we do. Loved by the one that is Love.

The Spirit

I was blessed to go to a seminary class all day yesterday so I figured I share what I discovered:

       As Christians, we're ofter so pressed to defend the deity of christ that we forget the humanity of Christ. Christ stripped Himself of all the power of His deity in coming to earth. Though he could have called upon his deity at any second to help him perform miracles, resist temptation, say the right thing, he did not do so once. For the entirety of his life he depended absolutely on the Spirit. Therefore though Christ was sinless, he is still the perfect new covenant person because the life he lived was entirely human.
       On a side note, the depth of Christ's humility is astounding. Just think, the God of the entire universe, becoming a baby. A baby who has to be fed, wear dipers, succumb to every bodily function, limit his infinite mind..Its ridiculous. We cannot possibly wrap our minds around the difficulty of the life lived by Christ, in how entirely he stripped himself to truly be one of us, to separate himself from the Father with whom he was in a relationship so deep and poignant and right that we cannot even picture it.
       So Christ, who has given up all godliness, lived his life dependent on the Spirit for everything. He studied the Scriptures endlessly because he came as we do, not knowing them. He prayed fervently to God because He had to learn the fathers will, just as we do. He learned obedience and was made perfect from the things He suffered. And from this we draw the uncomfortable conclusion that God does want us also to suffer that we may learn obedience and made perfect. That is far more important to God than our comfort in this life. And if you want a real life example of that visit Libby Ryder's blog is testifies to  how cancer is a gift not a curse.
 And the Spirit is below Christ in the sense that the mission of the Spirit is to exult Christ. The role of the Spirit in our lives is to exult Christ and make him known. The Spirit guides us in seeing Christ, and the more we see him, the more we come to fiercely love who he is, we are made like Him. It is a process of gradual sanctification that will continue from the day the Spirit enters us to the day we see Christ. Is is in the Spirit that we come to delight in our duty to obey Christ and the law is literally made perfect in us as it is written on our hearts.

Well, there's a lot more but thats probably good for now :)

Sit at His feet

Every once in a while, we reach these moments in the Word where its finally going beyond the surface and its meeting the needs, the urges of your soul and you want to devour it and get lost in it and soak in it. Do. Don't stop. There is nowhere more important you have to be. The messages that we have somewhere to be, something to do, some productivity to fall into are the battle cry of the enemy and of the ugliness in us as they start to see how serious the situation is becoming. Rest. Be patient. Soak in every ounce of holiness. Sit at His feet. Your email can wait. Your work out can wait. No one needs you at this moment. God whispers to your spirit:

I want you. I want to instill myself in you. All of myself. "I will plant you in this land of faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul" (the Word)

What do we want though? The offer is there. The question is whether we will take it. An impersonal, ambiguous God is so comfortable. Even a busy God who is dealing with all the world issues and needs us to deal with our own lives. The ball is in God's court. But its not. Our God is king, hunter, husband (C.S. Lewis). Putting ALL of his heart and ALL of his soul on the table. There can be no more wistful thinking on our part. no more self pity or need to take care of ourselves. Because his offer is there, in the deepest most sacrificial sense our choice is whether to accept or reject this deep love. Do we really want to be loved like that? A love that pales everything we've ever encountered. Or will we continue to pretend and make ourselves believe the offer hasn't been made, so we can avoid that question and the answer we already know...

I am so much more satisfied in a busy life of doing, running from one thing to the next then this life of being and being God's. Not being successful or smart or accomplished but being. Its so uncomfortable. Its uncomfortable just leaving class and and thinking "what should I do now?" Nowhere to be, no one who needs me, this panicky urge to study or schedule a meeting or go to the gym..But God's love would be no less if I did nothing for the rest of my life. Because He decided to clothe every person in Christ's glory and let us appear as the one person who did everything.

My name is Krystal. I am an 18 year old girl at college who misses her mom and her family in Christ back home and really wants love and has stumbled upon the great mystery, the glorious story of God and Man and realized I am a part of it. For the first time I feel satisfied and feel like life is resembling the craving deep in my soul. I'm just another Samaritan woman, pouring out my young heart into a lot of false lovers and then finding the one for me and its changing deep in me and I'm starting to find immeasurable depth in myself. And so I stumble around on how to live this life and I start to love strangers in ways that makes my throat tighten and I feel really far from humanity and really close to my Beloved. And I fall for Him, then I forget Him; I worship Him then I worship the world; and I belong to Him but have a whole lot of trouble letting go. And so I'm living this heart wrenching life and I'm finding what it means to breathe but most of all there is God. He's here and its me and Him and i don't have any words for Him but if I had to choose some I'd pick sunshine and mystery and dancer. Maybe I'd say trees and wind and rain. Or glory and rightness. Truth. Dangerous. Holy. Husband. Too much for me yet just right. I love Him. I really love him a lot.