Day 42: Addressing God?

When we address God, how should this look? What do we say? How do we introduce ourselves?

I wonder how Jesus addressed God. He often took time to just step away and be with God. He took time, amidst all the things He had to do to just be with His Father. He also found rest in it, and would go to the Father for peace!

Phillipians 2 said that Jesus, though He was made of the same stuff as God, His Father, still humbled Himself before God and would not look for equality or acknowledge His equality with God.

That's powerful for so many reasons.
One, because He WAS equal with God, but choose to put Himself below Him, so great was His love and devotion to His Father. The Message Bible says, "He had equal status with God but didn't think so much of Himself that He had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. "

Two, He knew He would eventually have to die if He continued on His humble path, and could have avoided it if He would have accepted and completely lived in His true power. In the Words of the Message Bible: "When the time came, He set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, He stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn't claim special privileges. Instead He lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death - the worst kind of death at that - a crucifixion." WOW.

Three, He was to become the model! His life would be the ultimate standard and the ultimate teaching plan of what God wanted from us! His experiences, His actions and the way He addressed God would set the bar... The Message again, "Think of yourselfs the way Christ Jesus thought of himself."

Wow... So, two things come to mind. I have a lllooonnnggg way to go, and one AWESOME SAVIOR! So, my journey into the mind of the Word continues. If I want to know How to address God I need only to look to Jesus!

I'm lookin'!

Day 41: So... about this mind thing!

A couple days ago I learned the importance of loving God with all my mind! To love Him with every part of my thought life and every part of my internal, hidden processes. My heart... that is a work in progress, but it's His! My mind... my mind is a slightly out of control, cluttery mess. My thoughts so often creep up on me. When life isn't happening in 4th gear, and there is an opportunity for scenery, my mind wanders off, lookin' for trouble. And its so natural and easy to just let it run. Kind of like auto pilot. But when I stop and focus on all of those "careless" thoughts... its amazing how many of them aren't careless. Its horrifying how many of them are judgements, or anxieties, maybe fears, doubts, complaints! And this is not intentional! Sometimes, I see it coming and I give it permission; maybe because I'm lazy or because I'm angry and I want to think about all the ways somebody is making me mad... many different reasons. But many times I snap out of bad thoughts. Kind of like bad dreams!

So what do I do about those?!

Hahaha... hopeless frustrated questions always have great answers! Check out Philippians 2! I found out today... there is more to this mind battle. We are not just called to love the Lord our God with all our mind... we are also called to have a mind LIKE Christ's! A mind like Christ's doesn't run off! A mind like Christ's has ONE thing at its center... one focus... GOD! What does this mean? This means that we are not only willing to love God with our minds and direct praise from within our thoughts OUT toward Him... but we are also to commit our minds to be as Jesus' mind is! To entertain the same thoughts as His. To think and reason and process as Jesus Himself does! A mind that allows Christ to infiltrate and penetrate INTO our thoughts and find perminant residence!

Whew... this is a WHOLE other level!! Well... I'll take one last breath... LETS GO JESUS! I'm ready! :D I just LOVE the way your mind works, Jesus!!! Can I have it?!

Day 40: Wonder

I am very tired tonight. It is late. Almost 1 am, haha. And tomorrow shall begin early. 7am. 6 hours of sleep. AND ITS GONNA BE GREAT!

6 whole hours! That's good! I could have gone to bed an hour ago... but this time I've spent with God and in the Word, and in thought and prayer... no sleep can top that! Wouldn't trade a second of it for any amount of sleep.

May I never lose my wonder for God. When I read the word, or pray with Him and think of how He makes Himself known in everything, I am filled with joy. I am so full of awe and gratefulness that God has let me in on the secret... given me eyes to see even a sliver His mystery!

I long for even more WONDER! I long to know Him more and more! To understand Him more and more. When I am lost in the depths of God, and He is revealing things to my heart, whether they are great or small, it is always all-consuming! Everything is profound and full of amazement... and I wonder, how I ever turn from that place. If I were always the "craziest" person in the room, so what?! If others didn't wanna come to "crazy" with me, who cares. We typically only see enthusiasm and awe and unshakable joy as traits of "crazy" when we don't want to look outside of our struggles or our darkness. When surface and coolness are all we want to share.

I don't really want to live there... ever... again.

There it is. Short and sweet tonight! I love you WONDERFUL God!

Day 39: ALL!

What will become of this heart? I lay and ponder tonight if I will ever overcome all that holds me back, all my "struggles". The mind is a beautiful place, but also very frightening. Such power exists in its fears and its misunderstandings. Such trepidation springs into my heart when I think of what is still to come. So as I pray and read with God... I am given this to ponder... In Luke 10 25-28 Jesus asks a man what the most important thing is? And the man responds, "LOVE the Lord you God with ALL your HEART (this is the most perceivable because love seems to spring from the heart), ALL your SOUL (all our emotion and will), ALL your STRENGTH (our ability to accept His grace) and ALL YOUR MIND (that means every thought and idea, every fear, every misunderstanding)!!"

This is THE MOST IMPORTANT thing we have to do on this Earth. God wants it all! He gave His all for us... He gave us all the ability to choose what we wanted, do what we wanted, love Him if we wanted... He gave us all the opportunity to share eternal joy with Him in Heaven! In return, He wants our all. So that He can transform us! If we give Him ALL the burdens of our hearts, He can carry them and transform them to victories in His love for us... If we give Him ALL the questions and the doubts of our minds, He can transform them into faith... If we give Him ALL the transgressions of our souls, He can cover them with His mercy... If we give Him ALL our strength, He can administer His grace! He replaces fear with hope, sorrow with joy, the death of sin with eternal life!!!

Here I am, Lord... ALL OF ME! I LOVE YOU!

Day 38: Do you know or do you believe

I made a really cool realization today: there is a divine difference between knowing something is true, and believing it is true. You can know all about something, understand its concepts, grasp its potential and see its importance, but you can't walk in its truth until you believe in it. It is one of the ways that often separates Christians from the rest of the world.

"I would like to learn just one thing from you: Did you receive the Spirit by observing the law, or by believing what you heard? Are you so foolish? After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?" (Galatians 3: 2-3)

I was in the midst of a conversation today about God's love, going on between two wonderful people. One said to the other, "If you never overcame your struggle, God would still love you. You don't have to do anything, God won't care, He will still love you!"

And the other replied, "yeah that's true. I know, I know."

And the response was, "you know but you don't believe!"

And then the conversation went on to some unknown place that I didn't hear because it was such a profound and simple realization for me that my being couldn't let pass without chewing! The key to depth with God is faith. Faith in His love. Faith in His provision. Faith in Him! We can know stuff about Him, and read the Bible and know more stuff, and listen to a great song and know more, but until we have the faith to believe in all that we think we know it remains floating above the ocean waves, and we remain on the surface of His unending depths, treading water. It is the belief that allows us to dive into His presence and truth and... HIS LOVE!

As Galatians says, it is not by our knowledge of the law that God works and gives us His Spirit, but it is by believing in Him! We can know He is there. Our hearts and souls know it. We know it when we look in the face of creation and have no idea where to begin the questioning, or find the words for our awe... but until we believe, we don't experience the grace and depths of God. We cannot embrace His love. Rather we only witness His power.

Powerfully Lovely!

Also, today was my first confession. And it was absolutely amazing. The Holy Spirit was all over that room... and every ounce of fear and nervousness turned to complete humility and repentance as I stared into the depths of Jesus and He cleansed me of my sins. I am so grateful for the God lead tradition of confession in the Catholic church. And for Father Sebastian, who takes delight in allowing the Holy Spirit to live and move through the lives of God's children. Today was POWERFUL! All around!

And I got a slammin' fab dress from my sponsor, which we shopped for today and she got me for my confirmation... and the coolest part is that she got me to go and try on dresses, which was such a God thing, because I was so afraid I would see ugliness and undesirable things in the mirror today so I was struggling with going... but I didn't! Instead it was totally a blast to realize and walk in the healing and the blessing of my restored beauty! And FUN shopping experiences, are a wonderful new bonus to my life!!

Thanks for this day, my King. Thank you for Your unconditional love! I BELIEVE YOU AND IN YOU, PAPA! Good night!!! See You in my dreams!

Day 37: Ok 2 Things...

OK! I come tonight with 2 things on my blogging heart...

1.) I have confession tomorrow at 9am... my first confession. That will sound like this: forgive me Father, for I have sinned, it has been my life since my last confession! Hahaha. And I confess... I'm not really ready for it!

Some people struggle with the confession thing, but I really have come to respect it. Confession does a couple of things. Mostly it makes you accountable. I can say it is between me and God, but not really take it to God. And plus, when I know I'm gonna see that Priest around, I'm gonna have extra incentive to really stick to my attempt to not have to take the same problem to confession next time. :D And another really neat thing... lets say I do take my sin to God and skip the confess your sins to one another thing, and God forgives me... but I can't forgive myself. Confession is an opportunity for us to really let it go. To just release the sin and wash it away forever. We realize that sin doesn't have such a grip on us when we are able to share that sin with someone else. Because then the secret is out... and when nobody says, "you're the worst sinner that ever was," or, "you did what?!" then we really allow ourselves to believe that we are free of that sin.

And I say all this in SUCH hope that I'm right! Haha and that I won't just go running out of that room! But be able to really let it all out and not hold back or get scared... I pray that! And that I God will cover up my bad planning and bring to mind all that He wants me to confess, and help me to have words and the confidence to use them!

Alright...

2.) I read 3 Chapters of a book I have really wanted to read for a while now but can't afford. I got to read part of it while chillin' out at Barnes and Nobles today for a couple hours. It is called "The Lambs Supper" by Scott Hahn, and Di always said it was a must read. Before Chapter 1 I knew she wasn't kidding. It may have been the most powerful 3 chapters of the beginning of ANY book I have yet read other than the Bible. I realized why I love Mass in the Catholic church so much, and why Church has been such an impacting place for me over the last two years! I realized that for me, Mass is Heaven! When I experience Mass, I am literally transported into the throne room of Heaven! And it reminded me of the moment that I decided I was going to become Catholic and I really had no other choice. I was kneeling in church during the Eucharistic procession, after I had been up for my blessing and while the remaining rows were going up for the Body and Blood... and something happened.

I call it the flash! And it has happened before. In the past what will happen is I will close my eyes and there will be this bright FLASH and this... vision I will call it... will manifest in my mind. It is always very white, but with dazzle too, and always SO REAL. Little glistening sparkles are everywhere and different wonders happen every time. One time an indescribably brilliant and sparkling vine appeared in midair, right in front of me, and started to grow around me, each new leaf lined and tinged with different brilliant colors. It was soooooooooo cool! But what happens is I get so excited that I open my eyes to see if I'm visibly there, and then it is just the same room I was in before I closed my eyes... and its kind of disappointing.

But this time, when I got the flash, I saw something I had never seen before. I saw row after row after row of people kneeling, facing toward something very bright and far off. It was walking toward us and I can only imagine that it was probably Jesus Himself. Everyone there was wearing white, and in the air and on people's clothes and in people's hair were little dazzling flecks of dust made from all different gemstones, glistening and sailing around the place. Everyone was worshiping, many people were crying, and there was this beautiful, indescribable humming that seemed to lift up from the entire congregation of people in perfect unison in melodious harmony. The entire seen absolutely stole my breath. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. And I started to hum with everyone else, and then, the excitement came and I couldn't help it... my eyes opened. But there was no disappointment. I was still there. I saw St. Rose but everyone was still there and we were still in Heaven, and Jesus was still a brilliant light walking toward us.

And I knew. I began crying and I knew there would be no more wondering if I was supposed to become Catholic. I knew I was home. And Mass seemed to me like... Heaven! And I thought, until today, that it might be a silly comparison and I never really shared this feeling. But as I read Scott Hahn description of Mass as Heaven on Earth, I cried again and realized that Mass is Heaven on Earth to me, and God whispered, "you see, you're not silly," and that what Hahn was talking about was exactly why I couldn't deny the pull of the Catholic Church on my heart and God's call for me to follow Him into something deeper than I'd ever yet known.

And now, I have a quick third thought... I just had such a wonderful night with my family and we shared so many good laughs and thoughts and joys and new horizons that I have to quickly just thank God, again, for this day...

and I just gotta say that I HAD SUCH A JOYFUL, GLORIOUS TIME, in really big CAPS LOCK LETTERS, before I EXPLODE with happiness...Night Papa! YOU are my FAVORITE! THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU...

Day 36: The life is in the pit!

This is not an original thought, I heard it from Di tonight, but it was something really wonderful that impacted my night that I wanted to write down and share. I learned a lot of incredibly profound things after a wonderful talk with my sponsor/mentor/mama... a lot! But one of the things that she shared with me that really grabbed me was the idea that the life of the fruit is in the pit!

Yeah... the seed is what carries the potential for new life and more good fruit! And yet... it is the part that we throw away! I had never thought of it. I just have to say real quick that I really think that God is so cool because He isn't as mysterious and ambiguous as we often think... really He has something to show us and grow us in just about everything!

So we have a peach market. We pick the ripest (but not too ripe!) specimen. We check it for bruises, worms, all the necessaries; we pluck off it leaves, and we munch! The fleshy part, the part we like to partake of, is sweet and yummy and pleasing and we eat it up vigorously, chomping it down to the pit, and then, while still licking the juice off our fingers, we chuck the life! The inner, harder, not as pleasing to the eye, inedible lump of brown part... is the life. If we plant that we can enjoy 100 more peaches much like it!

But it isn't pleasing. And it takes work. It takes planting, nurturing, growing, pruning, plucking, watering, down in the dirt work! And that is not something us humans are always so excited about or willing to do.

COOL!

What a WONDERFUL NIGHT... thank you so much Papa! SO MUCH! For everything... and for seeds to work on and grow! I am willing... and I love You!