Answered prayers

I was thinking about some of the prayers I prayed in the past, back when I believed in a God I knew nothing about. I didn't know who Jesus was aside from the fact that he is God, or associated with God in some way. I didn't know of the things he's done or the sacrifices he's made. I prayed every night for 2 years I think to this God that I knew nothing about and he actually listened.

To be honest, I don't think I prayed thinking that he would hear me. I think I just prayed because I needed someone there and I believe that he was. It's amazing how these insincere prayers that this confused and lost little girl was praying was still worth His time. It took me a while before I realized God actually answered these prayers and that's because he decided to answer it in a way that was far more than what I had asked for.

I prayed for death and he allowed me to be reborn in him.

I prayed to be adopted into a loving family, and he adopted me into his own.

I prayed for a love that would last forever and he made me aware of his love.

For those of you who constantly think God is too busy to hear your prayers I want you to think again, God listens to every prayer and if you think hard enough I guarantee you will find his answer somewhere. It may or may not be what you asked for but it is definitely 100% for your own good and for the good of his kingdom.

Equally yoked

I was recently exposed to a tumblr post titled "What Kind of Guy Should I be Looking For?"

I have to admit, I agree with everything that was written. There's this one thing though and its been something that I've realized about my fellow females out there. I feel like us girls fall into what I would call "the princess syndrome". Everyone constantly tells us how we deserve nothing but the best, even disney movies got us thinking someday my prince will come. It's true, we are God's precious jewels and we do deserve godly men but at the same time God's men aren't any less loved than we are. They deserve godly woman. Just like how we're told that we don't have to settle for less, our brothers don't have to settle for less either.

Maybe I'm just speaking for myself when I say this but knowing to wait for my godly man to show up made a whole lotta sense to me but never did I once think about being the godly woman that the godly man deserves. There shouldn't be a double standard to this. If us girls go around throwing ourselves at anyone, giving our hearts away to anyone, not respecting ourselves and our bodies the way we would want others to, what makes us worthy of a godly man?

So before you complain about being forever alone and how God is taking forever to bring the guy to you, remember that it takes two people who are ready to serve God together to be in a relationship that glorifies God. Maybe its not that the right guy isn't man enough to be revealed to you, maybe you're the one thats not mature enough for him yet.

The guy said "none but the brave deserve the fair"
the saying works the other way around too...
"none but the fair deserve the brave"

Be deserving of one another.

What Faith Can Do

I’ve seen dreams that move the mountains
Hope that doesn’t ever end
Even when the sky is falling
And I’ve seen miracles just happen
Silent prayers get answered
Broken hearts become brand new
That’s what faith can do
That's what faith can do!
Even if you fall sometimes
You will have the strength to rise

Unworthiness

Have you ever sat in a corner and thought to yourself "I am so unworthy, how can God possibly love me? I am undeserving of Jesus' sacrifice"

This is something I have to say I was struggling with since the day I came to Christ, I never really thought much into my feelings of unworthiness, I just thought of it as a personal thing that doesn't influence my feelings towards God or even have anything to do with him because its my own feelings of lack of self-worth...(idk if that made any sense at all)

This year, actually very recently...this week, I finally see the problem. It's true that we are undeserving and unworthy of what Jesus has done don't get me wrong, (I mean thats what Grace is all about. He gave us what we didn't deserve.) But its the very love that he has for us that gives us tremendous worth. He made us worthy..more than worthy. How can we say that we are unworthy and not love ourselves when this man held us with tremendous worth that he was willing to die for us and to go through all the pain that he went through for our sake.

My pastor said something interesting "i believe the gospel has little to do with the worthiness of you or me"
That is very true, i mean if you think about it; the gospel has nothing to do with how worthy we are because God clearly loves us all unconditionally. No matter how messed up we are or what we have done, God sees us  the way our parents would but so many times more. We're his precious jewels, the very ones he love so much. Who are we to judge whether we were worth Jesus' death or not?

So believe me, you are more than worth it Because God said so :]

Good Friday

What exactly is Good Friday? Honestly speaking, I never gave it much thought growing up. No one ever told me what it was, for all I care it just meant Easter was coming and with Easter comes spring break. Easter was nothing but a holiday american people celebrated (which I now know otherwise) in which they hid eggs and candy around their house (probably attracting a bucket full of bugs which I'm much too smart to join in on knowing just how much i "love" those little creatures) and some giant easter bunny with a bowtie comes around (which is obviously as real as the tooth fairy...i guess you can tell i was never much of a fairy-tale believer) It meant absolutely nothing to me...up until I came to Christ that is.

The thing is Good Friday isn't just a Friday that leads up to the goodness of Easter sweets. Good Friday is the day we remember the price Jesus paid on the cross for our sins. At this point, many people wonder why anyone can call the death of a person "good" especially when the person died in such a painful and heartbreaking way.

That was something very hard for me to grasp at first, how his death can be good and how people can rejoice when he went through all that suffering. But then it hit me, the reason why good friday is good is because he gave us life, freedom and hope (just naming a few things) that very day. Good Friday isn't good because some random kid was nailed on the cross and just bled his way to death in the most painfullest way one can possibly imagine; its good because Jesus took on our sins and died so that we may have life.

I found this picture on tumblr randomly one day and something within me clicked. People think that Jesus lacked the ability to save himself because he allowed himself to die on the cross. What we fail to realize is, this Jesus who is dying on the cross, walked across water, saved a bajillion people and fed thousands with a few loaves of bread. That's just a few of the miracles he performed and yet we can believe that that very man was overpowered by a few nails through his body. That doesn't make sense. The very person who turned water into wine and gave a blind man sight...theres no way he can't save himself from this mess, I'm pretty sure more power is needed to let blind man see than to break free from the nails in his body. If he wanted to, I believe he had the full power to just vanish from the cross and he was given the choice to not even die on it. But this very man did die on the cross and nothing couldve held him there besides his love for us. I mean come on, he could easily break the nails, easily ran away, he knew exactly what was going to happen and when the day will come, God even gave him a choice to not go through with the plans and yet he faces this situation out of love. He's done all of this so that we can have life, so that we may not be bound to our sins, so that we will not go to hell and return to our Father's side. He died for the very people who hung him on the cross and He prayed for us despite our disbelief. He loved us til his dying breath and even when we turn away and dont believe this is true, he still continues to loves us.

Good Friday is more than just the friday before easter, it is the day Jesus' love for us saved us all from being bound to hell. The very day love was at its greatest. It is a day for rejoicing and to be fully thankful of his great and amazing unconditional love.

All of God's Plan

Last night, the servant team prayer was cancelled and instead we went to BASIC's one cry pep rally. There the speaker was talking about how people tend to fall short in seeing all of God's plans. When God's plans for us are being played out, there may be a time when things get tough and that is when we are called to persevere and to look towards God and keep pushing on. However, most of us just throw up our hands and give up. Some of us may grow angry with God for being cruel, and some of us may just be like "it is what it is, there's nothing we can do about it, this is what God wants" but thats not what God wants. He wants us to keep bothering him for an answer, he wants us to keep praying and persevere til the time comes when he reveals it all before you. He wants us to be close to him in that sense, to feel comfortable in coming to him with all things in our lives. God wants us to love him and to trust him. God isn't cruel at all, in fact he is quite loving. For every tear we cry, it hurts him a thousand times more. People are probably wondering "then why do we have suffering in our lives?" Well if you really think about it, what is happiness to you if you have never suffered before? When are you most willing to turn to God; in your happiest moments or when you really need help? This is the very reason why obstacles are placed in our lives, so that we can persevere and turn to God. God suffers so that we can live to the fullest. So before we give up and before we start hating him for being mean, lets really just trust him and ask him to show us what it is that he has in store for us. When we fail to see all of God's plans we will get stuck in all the pains of the obstacle and never learn the lesson that came with it. By doing so, we will only cause more pain to ourselves and that isn't God's fault at all. Persevere and have faith!

You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised. 

-Hebrews 10:36

Rejoice

I was sent this link by a good friend of mine through facebook and honestly when I first clicked on it, I just thought it was going to be a typical concert. But ofcourse I was wrong. After watching this video, I just thought to myself like "wow God...I see what you did that...such perfect timing...are you trying to tell me something?" lol I have a problem with making a big deal out of the bad things in life when there are so many blessings in my life to look upon. I have a blessings wall to remind me just how beautiful God has made my life to be and I constantly forget about it or neglect it. You know how people say its easy to come to God when things are good but once crap goes down its a lot harder? Yeahh I never thought I had a problem with that but upon hearing this testimony, I felt condemned...(is that the right way to put it?)

Their mom's dying words were to rejoice. It is easy to rejoice when things are good and everything is nice and bright. We can thank God through all of our blessings but true faith is to rejoice when times are rough and there is pain and suffering. And that really slapped me in the face. Why do I spend so much time complaining about the events going on in my life when I can just go to God with it and rejoice that he is with me through it all. He will never give me something I can't handle and He will always be there to guide me through it. The pains in life teach you valuable lessons, lessons that cannot be taught any other way. And I feel like this is the very reason why we should rejoice in our sufferings. We become greater people.

And that is exactly what I am actively pursuing right now. A heart that is joyful and full of God's love that I can overflow into the lives of those around me. I want to bear the fruits of the spirit and bring hope to this world. I want to bring the love of God into the lives of others and to show them that life isnt that bad afterall, God is still there. There is hope and there is joy. The joy that comes from God's love is something that nothing in life can compare to. And I want the world to see it. I want the world to feel it. So that suffering will no longer be suffering but simply just an obstacle to a greater lesson, a portion of God's awesome plans.