I don't think I've EVER felt this free in my life...EVER. And I'm just in awe of God for that!

2009 has just been...wow...a year of EXTREME growth and changes in my life...and I'm thankful.

2009, well you can say it's been two things.

2009=A Year of Grace
2009=Continued Learning and Growth.

But moreso the first one.

I've made ALOT of mistakes this year. Listened to people I shouldn't have listened to. Fell into some things that I should have avoided altogether. Relied on my own strength and talents.

But then a funny thing happened.

Instead of picking myself up? I stayed down.

When you feel distant from God, who moved? God didn't!

Christianity had [at times] become a list of dos and don'ts. A list of laws basically. And honestly? This year I kind of became sick of being a Christian. I became sick of even being associated with them at times. Why?
Because at times, Christians think too highly of themselves. Some are so "holier than thou" that it makes the rest of us nervous like we can never live up to that.

I was no longer serving the Lord with Gladness. Instead I was dreading it, because I felt like being a Christian was too hard, like it was a bunch of rules and standards I could never attain or live up to.

The seminary visit had a profound effect on my life. My life is changed, seriously. Not just because of it, but I don't look at things the same. Right before my visit, I was stressing out about alot of things. I didn't know where or what I wanted to do after graduation, and i was just a mess in alot of ways.

I totally trusted God in visiting the seminary. I wasn't going to visit, actually...but a gentle nudge from the Holy Spirit (after I REFUSED to go, claiming it didn't make sense to visit a seminary I'd never heard of in VA of all states lol) had me booking a flight to Richmond...and wow, I learned so much about myself, about God, about others...I came home with a different outlook. I absolutely fell in love with that place and will consider myself extremely blessed if I get to attend next year!

But enough of that...I've been learning about the concept of grace. It has radically changed my life in ways I cannot explain. Grace came and changed me, and in turn, I'm much more gracious towards other. When you are aware of God's grace towards you, it makes you that much more gracious towards others. Then people are often the most authentic around you when they know grace is involved.

God's grace towards me has also tied in with the realized FREEDOM in my life. Where the spirit of the Lord is, indeed, there is liberty. (2 Cor 3:17)

I'd grown up in a rather legalistic way of looking at Christianity, that God will bless you if you keep His commandments. So I spent so much time obsessing over every little thing, wondering if my sin was the reason why I didn't have a car or everything I needed. Suddenly, I didn't see any benefit to being a Christian. I was really almost in a faith crisis, questioning so many things and just becoming cynical about things! God's grace came and rescued me on that visit. Not a sermon or a prayer. But coming in contact with some people who loved Christ that weren't legalistic set me free.

(btw, my church was and is still awesome, they were not to blame AT ALL!)

I have found that the call to ministry that God placed on my life was not restricting, but rather liberating. I felt that I could be me and be called to ministry. I didn't feel as if I had to completely change myself to be a "good" Christian or to answer the call on my life.

Instead, santification is a process. It's not something that happens instantly. It's not the result of anything that WE do. If it was, we wouldn't need saving, now would we? I am determined to walk in confidence, with my head held high, and instead of DOING, I'm learning to just BE. Grace allows me room to do that. And in that, I am FREE.

God has been truly gracious and good to me. I will most definitely say that.

I'm most definitely being stretched in ways that I needed to. Even if it hurts...I can see some of what God is doing in my life and it's blessing me, for sure!

I took Tuesday off from everything to spend the day with my mom...I didnt get much sleep that night, I woke up around 3am from a bad dream, missing my grandmother like CRAZY! So I took a personal day...and I'm SO glad that I did!

Anyways...I registered for spring classes today...Lord willing that will be IT! Pray for me you guys, I need a 2.25 in my major to graduate and my gpa right now is a 2.15. On top of that, I have a D in one of my classes and a C in another. I can pull off Bs in my other two classes, but I need to bring up that C to a B and that D to a C. If I don't pull up my GPA, I'm at CSU until I do...I need to work harder and then leave the rest in God's hands!

I'm excited about Spring Semester, most definitely. Lord willing, I will start my application to seminary and leave that in God's hands as well.

I've had to adjust to a few things in my life again, but it's temporary. So being aware of that, I'm trying to make the best of some situations!

The people who are in my life are AMAZING, PERIOD!

I want to write more but I'm sleepy. I'll end it by saying that i'm extremely blessed, even through the rough times, to be living the life that I live and headed for even greater! Goodnight all!

wow...what a week

So our church was on consecration for a week and I gave up a number of things...my church did it to get rid of distractions to seek God...I did it for that reason, but also to just get closer to God...

I think as Christians we can get so caught up on how close we were to God in a previous season...thats what happened to me.

About a few years ago I had slipped up in a major area, done something I said I'd NEVER do. That scared me...and this is around the same time I met this guy-I was goin through alot...so I clung to God real tough in this time. I got really close to God and for the first time ever I was single..my worship was off the chain, I'd spend like hours in the wee early hours of the morning worshipping God, reading my bible, all that...I was completely satisfied being single, it was just me and God and I knew I was UNSTOPPABLE as long as I had God!

Even when I met Keith I was still pretty close to God...but somewhere along the way, things changed. It had nothing to do with Keith actually, it was just me not having my priorities straight. My babe was growing closer to God and in some ways, I grew stagnant. Then, I thought I heard God say something and when things fell through, I was embarrassed, and grew distant from God. And it's been a fight to get back to "where I was."

Until I looked at things differently.
I realized yeah, I was close to God, but I had no depth to me. Last year, the very foundation of my faith was shaken, and things I thought I knew, I really didn't know at all. I found out I was walking around thinking I was better than some folks when really, I was just as ignorant, if not more, than they were.

Now? I'm far from perfect. I still have my issues, and I have stopped chasing after what was, and I'm chasing after what is to come. I realize that yes, I've made some mistakes, but I've matured a GREAT deal and have come a LONG way! This man can attest to this, along with a few other people who have known me for several years now...I cant believe I've known Mark for 4 years now, and he's about to celebrate his 3rd yr of marriage as well as welcome an addition to his family in January...SO proud of him!

Keith has surely been there for me and had some incredible foresight, has been my eyes when I couldn't quite see what God was doing in my life...this week I realized some things I had seen as failures were really just God gently guiding me to where I'm supposed to be. I will never look at a failure the same way again...because this week has just been FULL of surprises, tests, revelations, realizations. In some ways, I'm closer to God now than I've ever been and it's because I'm real with myself. I'm not the perfect Christian...I could always study the bible more, pray more (even though honestly, I pray all day, for real! me and God are always talking lol), do more...but then it would totally negate the fact that God's grace is totally sufficient.

I could try and be the best Christian ever...but in being so busy to DO, I would fail to just BE ME. I would not even be relying on the fact that God loves me, even if I do mess up, and that my salvation is not built upon how much I DO but rather how must I TRUST and RELY on the fact that God loves me. That is a rather difficult concept to wrap my brain around, especially when I have done somethings the bible has clearly spoken against...you mean to tell me that God has already forgiven me,before I even ask for forgiveness? It sometimes takes me a minute to forgive myself. I've been wrestling with that during the consecration week (of ALL WEEKS!)...I was trying to do EVERYTHING JUST RIGHT! I was trying to give up those things to show God how serious I was, I was trying to not do certain things...and things happened anyways, I got into situations that really made me realize how WEAK I really am. I'm not superwoman like I thought I was. (lol KIDDING!) Then God showed up in the form of encouragement, in the form of my friends, and music...that He's proud of me regardless. And I STILL got some MAJOR blessings on Thursday despite what happened on Wednesday. That just totally blew my mind (I'll blog about that soon!)...I was beating myself up when my friend said "Dei, I'm proud of you for not giving in..." and I was like "you've GOT to be kidding me! You realize the other areas I've given in right? You realize how CLOSE I've come, right?" because that's really how I felt! BUT! My friend said "you're missing the point." And he was absolutely right.

I saw a quote on FB on my friend's profile that said

I'm always watching over you. But I'm not looking for a "thank you." Just do what you're supposed to do.

I'm pretty sure that was for me. lol.

Sometimes God lets sin happen in our lives because He wants us to realize how absolutely DEPENDENT we are on His GRACE! We are SO weak without Him, and we'd all be lost with him...

Amazing Grace...Amazing aint even the word...I'll share more about the rest of my week later on...