Lessons

I love to journal and write down my prayers. It is a way of helping me organize my thoughts. I view this blog as another form of organizing my thoughts, but instead of all my detailed private thoughts, I like to write about the thoughts that seem to have a theme to them, on this blog. Lately the theme of  my thoughts has been, the faithfulness of God.

In the book, "One Thousand Gifts" (can you all tell, I just love this book?) Ann Voskamp writes about worries. She says, "Every time fear freezes and worry writhes, every time I surrender to stress, aren't I advertising the unreliability of God?" I read this a couple of weeks ago, and not until this morning, have I really stopped to think about that. Every time I let those fearful thoughts cycle through my mind, over and over again, I begin to believe them, and when I begin to believe those fears, I am confessing that I do not believe that God is the same good God he was yesterday.

Voskamp goes on to write, "Gratitude is the memory of the heart.... Remembering with thanks is what causes us to trust- to really believe." This is a challenge to remember the goodness of God in my past, and see how he was faithful then. If I remember how he delivered me, how he turned my darkness into beauty, how he filled me with joy and hope, then I can trust, that he will do the same today.

So this morning I spent a while writing out all of my fearful thoughts, and then for every thought, I was reminded of a similar experience where God proved to be good and faithful. As I remembered his hand in those past experiences, I know that he will not withhold his hand in my present experiences. Praise God for being faithful, and consistent. Praise him for knowing me better than I know myself. He is my strength, my strong tower. He is my hope and the only solid foundation that I can stand on in this life.

This is what I am learning, and I am thankful that God is teaching me these lessons- This is the gift of love God has been showering me with, freedom in trusting Him,

Hannah

Love > Anger

I was reading part of "One Thousand Gifts" last night and I read, "Nothing happens to you except by the will of God, and yet [God's] beloved children curse it because they do not know if for what it is." This, she calls, is blasphemy. I was challenged by this because I tend to complain to God about my circumstances, or about the way He made me. "God, I am not fun enough.", "Why did you make me so emotional?", "Why is this happening?", "Do you care about me at all?" But everything that happens, and everything that He creates is part of His will. If I question that, or if I curse those things, I am calling the God of the universe wrong and ignorant. But He is great, right, and all-knowing.

The author goes on to talk about the power of love. She asks, "Do I really smother my own joy because I believe that anger achieves more than love?" This is also blasphemy she says, because by saying anger is more effective we are saying that Satan's ways are more powerful than God's ways. This year I want to work on kindness. I have not thought much about kindness in my life. I always thought that I tend to be a nice person so it is not an issue really. But kindness is different than just being nice. I want to choose love when I am angry with someone. Choosing love over choosing frustration and fury. I want to be patient and wait because of the love I have for that person. I am sorry to all of you that I have acted out in anger toward. That is not right. Love is much more powerful than anger. Praise God that He chooses to love me, even in my sin. If He chose anger over love, I would not have been saved by the death and resurrection of His Son! Amen

Gift of Love today- I had to write a paper where I had to design an experiment with multiple variables and statistical research, and I had no idea what I was doing. I asked the Lord for help, and I just turned it in a few minutes ago. Thank you Lord for that gift!

Happy Sunday!

Hannah

The Valentine

I have not blogged since the days of Xanga. So, honestly, I am not completely sure how this works or even why I want to do it. Today I was sitting at my desk spending some time with the Lord, and all of a sudden I had an urge to start a blog. I love journaling. It is one of my favorite ways of communicating with God. I pray, write about things that are on my mind, worship, and draw in my journals. Lately I have been writing down things called "Gifts of Love" in my journal. These are things in my life that I am thankful for and that I am able to see God's love through. This past semester I started reading a book called "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voskamp. (I highly recommend this book to everyone) It is a book written by a menonite woman that struggled with having joy in her life and especially having it in her walk with God. So one of her friends challenged her one day to write down 1,000 things in her life that she is thankful for. Since I started reading that book, I have been realizing the power of being thankful. No matter what life circumstances someone is going through, God is sovereign and in control! He is worthy of praise. And by being thankful, we are able to praise him even in trial. So I thought it would be awesome to start a blog that is focused on those special gifts of love that I receive from my God every day.

Today I was overwhelmed with His love. It is Valentines' Day and honestly I was dreading it. Such an awkward day.... So I decided to begin my day praying and asking God to overwhelm me with His love. I was reading "One Thousand Gifts" and was struck by these sentences "We are head to head, I am bare; He is bare. All Eye sees me." It probably doesn't make much sense to you that have not actually read this book, but it overwhelmed me. To have the eyes of God staring at me- perfect, holy, pure, right, and unconditional love. This is the only love that will never ever fail. Praise God!

So the Gift of Love today was God's peace, joy, and overwhelming love.

Thank you Lord!

"For I am the Lord, your God, who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, 'Do not fear; I will help you'." Isaiah 41:13

Hannah