Thursday, September 29, 2011

My Life Verse

Hannah here :)

Okay, so, since this is a new blog and you all don't know much about me yet, I thought it'd be a good idea to talk about my life verse for this first post.

My life verse is Isaiah 43:1-2: "But now, thus says the Lord, your Creator, O Jacob, and He who formed you, O Israel, 'Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name; you are Mine! When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walked through the fire, you will not be scorched, nor will the flame burn you."

God showed me this verse during a time in my life when I was alone with Him. I didn't have a whole lot of friends, but I was focused on walking with God more than my brothers and sisters in Christ. He had me in a sort of tunnel-vision, and for those few months I was fully and completely dedicated to Him in what may be called my newborn faith. It was the beginning of my personal walk with God, when I was so on fire for Him that nothing else mattered. Often, it fades, unfortunately, but for me back then, this verse only affirmed what God had already shown me in my life- that I was His and no one else's.

As I grew up, I made more friendships in school, and became busier with homework and running. My quiet times have been few and far between lately, but that's not the point. The point is that, the things I do or don't do- whatever distractions cause me to sin by putting Christ on the back burner instead of allowing Him to sit on the throne of my life and be my Lord, as I promised when I accepted Him- don't change the fact that He loves me and that I am His. My performance doesn't determine His level of faithfulness; God is constant, even when we are inconsistent, when we commit adultery against him with the things of this world, and when we put him in second place, instead of purposing in our hearts to serve Him no matter what. God does not change; he is the rock in our lives, where everything else is "like shifting shadows." And it's this truth, along with His word that says He will NEVER break his promises, that enables us to trust Him with everything.

Once we become part of God's kingdom, we belong to Him. We receive His Spirit, Who gives us strength and wisdom, and allows us to understand the things of God. He gives his unbreakable word that whatever we face in life, He will give us the ability to get through. Trials by the fire, battles with the enemy may come, but he cannot destroy us; neither will we be drowned by the waters of this life- stress, circumstances, tragedies, hard times, that can take our focus off of God. His love isn't dependent on our feelings or how often we acknowledge His presence and work in our lives. No, He loves us all equally- the lifelong believer who accomplishes great things for Him, and the born again man on his deathbed who accepted Christ moments before his death. In fact, he loves those who will never accept Him, though He knew before time began that they would turn away from Him...He offers everyone the same promise: that if we accept His love, He will give us a NEW identity- we aren't defined by the world, because they don't have that authority. He defines us, because He CREATED us, and nothing can separate us from our Maker or take us out of his hand.

I discovered during that time in my life that when everyone else in life will eventually fail you, God will never leave. He will never leave you wanting, or provide love that has shortcomings. Instead, he gives us life, reminds us who we are and the sacrifice He made, the sin He carried, so that the new promise between Him and His people will never be broken. These verses are uplifting to read whenever I'm faced with struggles, hard runs, even situations with fellow believers, because they reassure me of who I REALLY am- the bride of Christ- which I discovered when God took me to a place where I was away from the crowd and alone with Him. Everyone needs those moments, when you realize that everything else pales in comparison to the importance of being in communion with Him, serving Him, and worshipping God with your life.

And what's incomprehensible about Him is that He is the husband who is perfectly faithful; He'll never, ever leave your side. Through everything, He will be right next to you as you carry your cross for Him, encouraging you, strengthening you, coaching you...

Loving you. Perfectly.

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

How We Escaped from a Well with only a goat and a slinky.

In relation to our profile question, this is how we answered :)

So here's how it all went down...

Okay, so, ya see, I'mma (Hannah) call my husband, Jesus, on his cell phone. He's never too busy for me... so He'll be like, "What's up, sweetheart?" And I'll be like, "Well, honey, me and mah bestie Alexis are trapped in this here well with a goat and a slinky." Then Alexis goes "Well looky here, You can kinda see that we are having some troubles. Could you help us out? It'd be like legit."
 Jesus starts to laugh and replies "I already knew you were trapped in a well. And that goat is actually a llama."
Then Hannah screamed, "OH MY GOSH, EMPEROR KUSCO!" The llama and her started doing an epic battle with lightsabers, while Alexis continued to talk to the Lord on the phone. Alexis was chattin it up good on the phone with Jesus and started to say "So Lord, the man you created to create this slinky was probably an absolute brilliant idea." She started to play with it in her hands when finally Hannah walked over without a big toe. "Ooo looks painful."
Hannah smiled. "Eh, I'll be aight."
"Ummm, if you two aren't too busy," came Jesus' voice from the other end of the line. "I kinda have a blog for you to write... sooooo I don't know about you, but I'm thinking we should get you outta that well..."
*dead llama (a.k.a CUSCO!) twitches on the ground...*
"...Sounds like a pretty good deal," Hannah said slowly.
"So are we gonna do something with this slinky?" Alexis asked.
"No. Something way more parkore." Jesus replied. A loud snap came from the other end of the line and the two of them appeared at the top of the well. Alexis cried out "I left the slinky down in the well with that dead llama!!! It must be so frightened."
"GET OVER THE SLINKY, ALEXIS!" Jesus shouted.
"...Sorry."
"By the way, that's how ya do PARKORE JESUS style!" Hannah shouted to the universe.

...and that's how we escaped from the well. And our blog was born...