One Year

Anniversaries are always weird no matter what they are. It always seems that time flies and yet in some respects goes by so slowly. I can look back over a period of time and see how it went so quickly and yet at the same time feel that the start of it was years ago. Ya know? Time is just a weird deal. It is nearly impossible for me to believe that a year ago today my Dad's life ended. It is even weirder to know that I was in this exact same place when it happened, Nashville Tennessee, Belmont M-fuge. It feels like yesterday. It feels like a moment ago. In some ways it feels like right now. And yet SO MUCH has changed since then. That moment was a Catalyst for so many changes both good and bad. Life looked drastically different a year ago. Family looked drasitically different a year ago. I looked drastically different a year ago.

Time doesn't stop moving. It doesn't wait for you to be okay with the change it brings it just rolls over you as if you weren't even there. I know that God is doing things in me, but I still feel so many times as if I am carrying so many of my own burdens. I wish I was a person who could say, "Blessed be His name no matter what." This is just hard for me. I know that God is good and He is working all things for my good and His glory.

Back to Nashville

Back in Nashville friends for one more go around. I never would have imagined I would be here, Directing the thing I did as a student. I remember going to Centrifuge and idolizing the staffers, seeing their energy and thinking about how cool they were. I wanted to be them one day. Well, I have been them for several years now and now I am the person who is in charge of them. What a crazy and amazing ride. Fuge is just that thing for me that I stepped into and I just knew it was my place. I was made to do this and it has been an integral part of my spiritual growth for the last 5 years. I am now in one of those places where I just realize that it is impossible for me to do this job. I cannot do this job. I cannot Direct M-fuge Nashville. It is much bigger than me. 29 people between the ages of 20-30; 500-600 students and adults a week.
I am humbled and honored to have this opportunity. I dearly miss parts of my life in Fort Worth, namely my roommate. But I know that God has brought me here and I know that He has many things to teach me from this experience. So far it is going well. I am surrounded by an amazing team of servants and lovers of Jesus. We have one more week and then the kiddies come. Pray for me, for strength, for the leading of the Spirit, for my family. It is hard to believe that almost a year ago now my dad died. May 31st may be a very hard day. But God is good.

Gratitude

Its my last night at Southwestern for awhile and the one word that keeps coming to mind is...GRATITUDE! I can't get over how grateful I am for life, no matter how hard it is at times. I am utterly grateful for everything that I have been given because I came into this world with nothing. I have never deserved anything. And yet I feel like I have everything. I am perfectly loved by my family, by my roommate, by my Jesus!
Thank you Lord!

Heaven

I had my first massage today. It was quite possibly the most amazing experience ever. My roommate had talked a lot about how great they were and how she wanted another one and I had never been before, so I decided I would suprise her and we would go. It was money well spent. We did the hour long sweedish (just guessing the sweeds were an intrical part of its development) massage. I will admit it was akward and slightly uncomfortable at first. You know this random stranger rubbing on your unclothed back, but I got over that in the first 30 seconds of those 60 minutes. I then began to drool. I would reccommend this experience to anyone and everyone.

Urgency

It is only by the grace of God that I am what I am. All that I am not is afforded to His grace as well. This place, this year, this life, these experiences, God is using to show me just how close I am to self-destruction if not for His grace.
"For if every transgression and disobedience received its just punishment how wil we escape if we neglect such a great salvation?" Heb. 2:2-3.
I read this today and thought....what if only one of my transgressions received its just punishment?....I would be destroyed. If that is not a humbling thought I do not know what is. If that does not make a person urgent to take hold of their salvation I do not know what will.

Thoughts

At the Village Church last night Ben Stewart was preaching and if you can you should download the podcasts of him speaking the last 3 Sundays because it was AWESOME. It was about Jesus. It seems like that would be the obvious topic of discussion, but it isn't always. This was all about Jesus and it rocked! Last night he read from Colossians 3 and when it got the part about, "set your mind on things above" He said that spirituality begins in the mind. "What we think about we'll care about and what we care about, we'll chase." This is so very true. I know in my life it is.

The Church

Recently I was having a conversation with the college pastor I work for. He has a very northern, out-of-the-box mindset when it comes to church and Jesus, something I find refreshing at times. I was expressing my love for The Village Church and how it is a place I want to look into going. They have a rapid growing congregation and an excellent pastor, Matt Chandler. He, Vince, expressed some hesitation in my desire to go there. When I pressed him as to why he said, "I just think we really need to rethink church. He began to talk to me about the New Testament church, and the period of time between 100-200 AD and how it was the fastest growing time period for the church in all of history. They had no full bibles, no buildings, no lead pastors, no worship leaders, no programs and no heirarchy and when the church began to become insitutionalized, buildings were built (first around 250 AD) that rapdi growth was quenched. He asked, how much of the Village is unintentionally centered around Matt's ability to speak? How many of those members of the rapid growth are just people transfering from other local churches? What would happen if he were to leave? I was defensive at first and then he pointed me to this article and and a book he had read. I have not been able to stop thinking about this idea of church, what did Jesus establish it to be, what did that look like in the early church and how have we gotten it so far off track. I decided to do my systematic paper on the topic and I have been amazed at what I found. Here are some links and books if you are interested this is something very worth our time to research!
Leadership (Winter 2007)- We aren't about Weekends-http://www.ctlibrary.com/41509 (this is about a church 20 minutes from Forth Worth, I hope to visit it soon.
The Forgotten Ways- Alan Hirsch
From the Ground Up- Scott Horrell
The Problem with Wineskins of Today- Howard Snyder