The G.O.S.P.E.L. Truth

David Platt.

If you don't recognize that name, open up a new tab, google it, and immediately watch videos and buy books because trust me, you're going to want to be familiar with that name.

David Platt is a young preacher right here in the southeast who is the most by-the-book, wash-me-in-biblical-truth pastors I've ever heard. I have never read a book or watched a video by him where I did not feel like I was constantly growing in my walk with Christ. Seriously y'all, he's that good. He makes sure that what he says can be backed up by the Bible and is God-breathed and you just don't get that anymore.

Whew, anyway, on to what this post is about.

So David Platt does this thing every year called "Secret Church", inspired by some of his past mission trips in Asia years ago. On these trips, church goers could be killed if the government saw that they were attending church so they literally would risk it all to walk to an underground, undisclosed location and for 12 hours straight they would go through the Bible with David. Yes, the whole Bible. David describes his experiences with them in his book "Radical" (seriously, you have to read it), and it's amazing. It will sure make you think twice about how you walk into your church on Sunday. Well, after these trips, David began to wonder how he could instill the same sense of passion and urgency for the word in his own church back home. So began Secret Church.

It started with just David's church. They would remove some of the comforts in the sanctuary, such as chairs, and hundreds of members would come and sit on the ground for 6 hours and go through a large portion of the Bible. It became so popular that soon thousands attended. It began to be podcasted until it grew into what it is today. Secret Church was one week ago and over 63,000 attended/watched from their own church homes. Dozens and dozens of countries are represented in that number. And it is AMAZING.  God speaks volumes through David every time and it is never a disappointment so I recommend that you check that out next year because it is worth all 6-7 hours.

Now, to what I actually wanted to write this post about...

David's message this year was all about how we can disciple to people of different religions. However, he made sure to start off the night reminding us why it is so vital to spread the good news to everyone that will listen. He did this through an acronym which just so happens to be G.O.S.P.E.L., which inspired me to do a little 6 week series on each of the letters.
Here's what each post will be on:

G: God's Character
O: Offense of Sin
S: Sufficiency of Christ
P: Personal Response
E: Eternal Urgency
L: Life Transformation

I am so looking forward to this new journey that I myself am getting to partake in and I so hope that you all will join me and get something out of it too.

The Blog if You Don't Know What You're Doing

Today I got the distinct honor of being able to speak to a group of girls in high school and middle school who are interested in possibly pursuing a career in the STEM field. When I was contacted about doing this, I was referred to as a "mentor" and immediately thought  "WOAH, I am not experienced enough for that word or this event". I decided to take it on because going out of your comfort zone is really important in my opinion and who wouldn't want to be called a mentor, am I right?  I went in expecting a group of girls who were all mini-me's, future engineers who had a passion for math and had a million questions about what it's really like to be a woman in engineering school. What I got was not that.

I walked into a group of girls who had no idea what they wanted to do. Some wanted to pursue accounting, athletics, education. Some thought they maybe sorta kinda wanted to go into something sciencey but they weren't sold on anything yet. At first I thought, why are you here? And then I realized that they are mini-me's. I was reminded that though I'm halfway through college and it feels like I've been fully committed to engineering for so long, there was a point in my life where I had no idea what I wanted to do. There was a point in my life where I wanted to be a teacher. There was even a point in my life where I wanted to be a mermaid-bus driver-lunch lady, but that combo was too complicated.

So I asked myself, do any of us really know what we are doing? I'm halfway through engineering school which implies that I should at least halfway know what the heck is going on. But the catch is, I honestly don't. I take my life day by day, never knowing what to expect or if I'm going to make it (I understand that is ridiculously irrational, I get it). I am trying to get an internship and soon a job and I honestly do not even know how to go about that. I don't know what my life will look like in 3 months. I don't know what my life will look like in 2 years. Or 5 years or 10 years or 20 years. And I don't think you do either.

But as I was driving home tonight my favorite Christian song circulating on the radio these days came on, and it was like water washing over me. It reminded me that no matter what I want, it doesn't matter. Its what God wants. His plan is best. If I fail a class, I will trust him. If I don't get an internship right away, I will trust him. If you have no idea what your day tomorrow looks like like me, let alone your next few years, trust Him. He's the only predictable, stable thing. The rock won't move. I think its super important to take a time out and reflect on this so I encourage you to listen to the video below because it truly is amazing. Im also a major believer in reading what inspires you, so I wrote out the best lyrics from the song below. If you listen to this song and read those words and your whole body isn't covered in goosebumps and you don't feel like you could do literally anything because God's got you, I don't know how to help you. God Bless, y'all.

"You are my strength and comfort,

You are my steady hand,

You are my firm foundation; the rock on which I stand,

Your ways are always higher,

Your plans are always good,

There's not a place where I'll go, You've not already stood

When you don't move the mountains I needed you to move,

When you don't part the waters I wish I could walk through,

When you don't give the answers as I cry out to you,

I will trust, I will trust, I will trust in you,"

God is an Onion.

Every night I read a chapter in my bible and try to learn from it as much as possible. Tonight, in one of the most short and unlikely of passages, God taught me an important lesson that I think we as Christians kind of adopted without necessarily backing it up with scripture. Tucked away in a segment of Mark 8 God taught me that he's actually an onion. 

I know what you're thinking: what lesson have we as Christians adopted that teaches us God is an onion? Well I'll obviously explain, but first thumb through your bible to Mark 8:22 and read to verse 26 (You all can do this, it's 5 verses). Basically Jesus spits in a blind dude's eyeballs (ew, Jesus) and asks him to describe what he sees. The blind man tells Jesus that he thinks he sees people, except they kinda look like giant trees to him. Now obviously the goal of Jesus' whole little miracle he's working on here is to get the blind man to not be blind. So Jesus rubs his hands around on this guy's eyes some more and all of the sudden the man can see "distinctly", as my bible reads. 

The first thing that came to my mind when I got through this section was times of season. In my own life this looks like my first semester of college last year. In others lives this could look like a loss of a job or financial trouble or any of the other thousands of seasons we can walk through in this life. God starts us on a journey and we get to a point where we think He should be done working his magic in our lives so we open up our eyes to look around and everything around us is all wrong.  How many people have given up on faith and God all together because of this premature peek at life and a hurried evaluation of God himself. We need only to have the faith of the blind man. To close our eyes yet again and allow the hand of God to touch us in our most vulnerable of places so that when God is ready for us to open our eyes we can see distinctly. 

So God is an onion. He's a process. There is no one-step acne treatment in God's eyes. You start at "Go" and you peel back layer after layer until God is done with his handiwork, not when we decide that we're done. Let's pray for the strength to be vulnerable to God and the faith to keep closing our eyes. 

2016 (Realistic) Resolutions for Dummies

My tips, tricks, and rules of thumb that anyone can easily follow for a better 2016:

- Read the Word every. single. day. Preferably when you wake up or before you go to bed. Do this in a calm, quiet, undisturbed and undistracted environment. 

- Eat desserts. 

- Breathe. In yoga you learn to breathe during exercise to lengthen muscles. In life you breathe to lengthen patience. 

- Smile. Again, often in yoga you smile through difficult poses to remind yourself that what you're doing might be tough, but it's worth it. A simple smile can be what you need to get through the end of a pose (which also usually is the hardest point of the pose when we think "I can't do this anymore!!"). This is a valuable lesson we can carry into our own lives. 

- To follow the yoga trend, do it. Often. It keeps you fit, it increases your flexibility and even your brain power, and could be the perfect way to wind down or even to wind up. It also helps aline your spine/pelvic floor and could be the perfect exercise for those who may not be able to conventionally exercise.

- Break rules. Wear white after Labor Day and before Easter.

-  Stay humble. You may be a 10 during the work week, but never forget your Walmart sweat pants/mud face mask/ 3-day-not-washed-hair weekend days either. 

- Life is hard enough. Buy a planner and use it. 

- Be organized. The older I get the more and more I realize how useful this skill is. The more organized I am, the better I sleep. 

- Speaking of sleep, spend money on good sheets and wash them every 2 weeks at least. Stay clean, sleep better. 

- Read books of all kinds. (If 50 Shades of Grey is on your "recently read" list, you're not doing it right and you're missing out on actual pieces of literature). 

- Pray. Frequently. 

-Wear what makes you happy, not what is trending. If they happen to coincide, awesome. 

- Keep coconut oil on hand at all times. Heals sores, softens skin, strengthens hair, and is a great healthy substitute for butter. Coconut oil and duct tape are musts in life. 

- Don't be a snob. Shop at Goodwill. 

- Drink lots of water. The benefits of water are literally unlimited. 

- When the going gets tough, the tough really do get going. 

- Do hard things. Often these are the only ones worth doing. 

- Dont hide behind a social media handle. Who you are is not who you are on a screen. Be authentic. Put down your phone in the presence of others. 

- Don't sleep in makeup, no matter how tired you are. Its icky, it ages you, and no one likes second day mascara. 

- People make mistakes. Your goal is godliness. Extend the characteristics of God towards people to the best of your abilities by exercising forgiveness, grace, and mercy. 

- Don't forget where you come from. Who raised you, where you are from, and who was there when you were at rock bottom. 

- Just because someone's lifestyle doesn't line up with what we believe from the Bible doesn't mean we have a pass to keep our distance from them. Never once did Jesus do this. It is our duty to be Jesus to these people and that requires interaction and often times friendship. 

- Journal. 

- Keep a working budget and write down all of your expenditures. 

- Just because something says "organic" beside it doesn't necessarily make it healthy. Make good choices. Eat less processed food. Put some green on your plate. Be awesome. 

- If you own a black dress, you can own the world. 

Happy New Year! May 2016 be the year you actually keep your resolutions (I know, who am I kidding?)

I Believe.

These days it's common for elementary school kids to throw on some pjs, climb into a big yellow school bus, and head off to school for a day of cookies, hot chocolate, and one of the newest but most treasured Christmas movies, The Polar Express. Unfortunately for me, my grade was the last grade that didn't get to indulge in this magical day at school until my 5th grade Christmas party, however no pjs were worn that day so it seemed like every other year for me. On party day as I walked into the bus room and sat down in my class's line, I saw the grade below me all clad in their pjs and slippers and was filled with jealousy. From that moment on I decided I would hold my grudge against The Polar Express and not the people in charge at my school, naturally. It wasn't until the last few years that I decided to let bygones be bygones and allow myself to watch the movie. Needless to say, it's my favorite Christmas movie now and holds such a special place in my heart. 

If you've never watched that precious movie, you're truly missing out. It wasn't until I watched it this year that I had an "aha" moment and my eyes were opened to the vastly deep plot. These children are on the cusp of not believing in Santa anymore, get picked up by the most magical train since Hogwarts (but NEVER to surpass The Hogwarts Express), and are taken to the North Pole to meet Santa-with a lot of stuff in between. Once they've met Santa, the main character is gifted with a bell from Santa's sleigh. This is no ordinary bell, however. The bell can only be heard as long as you believe in Santa. The main character ends the movie by narrating as an adult with the quote:

"At one time most of my friends could hear the bell, but as years passed it fell silent for all of them. Even Sarah found one Christmas that she could no longer hear its sweet sound. Though I've grown old the bell still rings for me, as it does for all who truly believe."

I get chills every time I hear this quote and it's the subject of many future pinterest projects that I have pinned on my pinterest. However, last night I asked myself "does this movie possibly have an even deeper meaning?"

Just as many children stop believing in Santa at a certain age, unfortunately many people stop believing in God as well. I'm at a crucial part in life where a lot of people go to college and begin to have doubts. During this time of year especially, "the doubters", as the Polar Express would say, seem to come out of the wood works. A virgin birth, a northern star, and God made human all seem like fallacies in their minds. We see lawsuits to businesses for not being diverse enough. Christmas parties become holiday parties. Nativity scenes are labeled "offensive". Coming from a science major, yeah, it seems pretty out there to a human mind. In science you have to have facts, evidence, theories, and formulas before anything can be labeled as true. Jesus requires us to believe, trust, have faith in something that, in their minds, has little to no fact behind it. 

So what if we are the same as the kids in the Polar Express? What if we look at this Christmas as a journey? What is we allow ourselves to climb aboard the train of God and let it take us to the Father himself? 

There's one catch to this journey: we must be willing. The Polar Express doesn't force children to ride so that their eyes may be opened, they are asked if they want to ride. The main character at first says no, but when the train begins to leave he chases it down to eventually get on. I don't care how we arrive to this train, but we MUST get on. Unlike in The Polar Express, however, the train is always there for us. All we have to do is ask and Jesus says that if you ask you shall receive.

Asking God to open up our eyes to him doesn't just have to happen at Christmas, and it shouldn't just be for those who have their "yule tide doubts". We should all do this, and frequently at that. Every day we should wake up with one goal in mind: to grow closer to the Father's heart. That can come out in many ways and it looks different for everyone, but every day you should live to serve your God and come to know him more and more. 

Unfortunately, not all will believe. Just as in The Polar Express, some will not believe. Some, like Sarah, will allow events in their lives to shape how they see God or if they see him at all. But for those of us who ask God to take us on his own train ride, we will always believe no matter how old we grow or how seasoned our lives become. The bell will always ring for us. 

As the conductor of the magical Polar Express said "Seeing is believing, but sometimes the most real things in the world are the things we can't see." 

As for me, I believe. 

Relationship Goals

I live in a generation where all romance is dead. There's no anticipation during a first date because you two have already texted each other your complete bios. Goodnight texts are considered the highest level of love one can achieve in their relationship. "Netflix and chill" is the idea of a perfect date. And there's also this really annoying thing called #RelationshipGoals where we hashtag this next to anything we deem relationship worthy. Surprise, we're not really good at relationships.

I did a quick hashtag search on twitter and heres what "relationship goals" look like for our generation:

1) "___ and ___ are seen out in public together. #relationshipgoals"

2)"I wanna watch Elf and drink hot chocolate right now. #relationshipgoals" (not sure what that has to do with a relationship but okay)

3) a comment on a staged picture of a 3 week old couple on instagram that says "relationship goals" for no apparent reason.

4) "When he sends me a long text message telling me how much he likes me #relationshipgoals"

5) Some nonsense about how Chuck and Blaire are relationship goals. (Did you guys even watch Gossip Girl? Because I'm getting the feeling that you didn't.)

I don't know about you but literally none of those sound like "relationship goals" to me.

Relationship goals are loving a person when it's toughest.

Relationship goals are doing someone else's dishes or folding their laundry just because.

They're answering a phone call at 3 in the morning because your significant other is throwing up and they just want to talk to you.

Relationship goals are when he's really hungry but lets you eat as much off of his plate as you want.

Relationship goals are praying together, studying the word together, loving Jesus together.

They're foot rubs and hair brushings and random roses.

They're a goodnight phone call and a good morning text every single day.

They're offering your only jacket because she might be cold.

They're telling someone that you love everything about them in person 20 times a day so they don't forget.

They're trips to the grocery store for groceries that aren't even yours just to be with them.

They're carrying carloads of bags and not complaining once even though she's high maintenance

They're calling someone just because you know that they'll listen.

They're the times when you're driving down the road and you catch them looking at you for no reason.

Relationship goals are being called honestly beautiful when your hair is wet and you have no makeup on and your pajamas are 3 times too big.

For me, relationship goals aren't going to the gym together or being rich or watching a movie. Relationship goals are about living a normal life with an extraordinary person and putting their needs above your own every step of the way. So next time you go to comment "relationship goals!" on some instagram post of a new couple with a fake photo, rethink what you're actually saying. And don't you settle until your relationship goals look like absolute love.

**P.s. shoutout to my best friend and boyfriend for being the model of all of my relationship goals. Not a single person on this Earth could treat me like you do and I am so incredibly thankful that you choose to lovingly put up with my crazy self every day**

11 Habits You Have by the End of the Semester

Everybody sing it with me: It's the most horrible time of the year! That's correct, it's nearing the end of the semester which would seem like a blessing to anyone not in college, but to us seasoned scholars we know that the only thing worse than the end of a semester is actual death (Okay, I'm a LITTLE dramatic). Right now, I see a lot of posts from Odyssey going around about this very subject and I thought that a perfect way to procrastinate and put off all of my responsibilities would be to write one myself, so without further ado:

11 Habits You Have by the End of the Semester:

1) Your procrastination is at an all time high.

Yeah, you should probably be using all of your free time to study for your last tests or the upcoming finals you have, but suddenly everything around you seems more interesting. The floor MUST be vacuumed before you can even think about cracking a book. You've spent 30 minutes writing that 10 page paper, I think it's time to reward yourself with 2 hours of Netflix before bed, right? (This reason is also why this post was even written...oops!)

2) Thinking about end-of-term grades actually causes physical pain.

What do you MEAN I only have one test to redeem myself from the mistakes I made at the beginning of the semester? Ever heard of forgive and forget?

3) You're POSITIVE your professors assigned due dates while they were at lunch...together.

You have 2 tests, a paper, a quiz, 3 homework assignments, and a group project all due on the same day. Where. is. the. coffee. 

4) You're having to learn a semester's worth of material all over again.

At some point in academics, professors decided that the multiple tests given throughout the semester just weren't enough and we need a master test that covers all material we "learned" in the class. This means late nights in the library trying to learn everything you dumped out of your brain somewhere back in September. 

5) Your family thinks you're ignoring them.

We don't remember the last time we bathed ourselves. Calling home right now is low on our list. That is, until we have one of our famous nervous breakdowns, because then mommy is getting a call. 

6) What is sleep?

8 hours of sleep? Are you joking? Not only do you not have time for sleep right now, but your nights are filled with math equations or thesis statements. You can't even escape from responsibilities in your dreams. 

7) But when morning comes...

It's 7'oclock already? But you were just getting your best sleep all night!

8) You start breaking beginning of semester pacts. 

You PROMISED yourself you would make an asserted effort to look decent every day. This is a pact you laugh at as you pull on the same sweat pants you've worn for 3 days now. 

9) You remind yourself why you're here. 

Every 20 minutes. 

10) The only thing getting you through finals week is the thoughts of home.

11) And when you get home...

You try to show off your newly acquired smarts to your family without revealing that you thought about dropping out at least 20 times in the past 15 weeks. 

Now that you've procrastinated by spending  5 minutes reading this post, I think you deserve some Netflix. Where are your sweat pants?