Being a Child

I stayed up all night November 26th (well actually, it was November 27th) and I, thankfully, stumbled upon the video that showed Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros recording "Home" on NPR:

I quickly became intrigued with this group of people. I started looking up interviews and music videos. Anything.

I was watching an interview and Alex Sharpe was answering questions. One of them was about how people can't help but to be moved by their performance and how does it effect the goals of their performance. She asked if it altered it at all.

His response was amazing. It was surely something I'll never forget.

He said 'to be like a child' is all he needs to remember and as soon as he remembers that everything is wonderful. He's completely free.

He said, "Its not about posturing or performing or posing or manicuring my performance... If its real, they'll feel the realness."

Its not hard to be real with your own music and your own expression of music and I believe its something completely beautiful when someone is real with their expressions. It makes me excited and happy to be making music.

I love the idea of freedom (especially freedom from sin). We age and grow up and get more responsibility thrown onto our shoulders, but we are able to almost walk blindly through this life and have complete faith and trust in our Lord. Once we indulge ourselves in this free way of thinking, people will feel the realness.

Here's what to take from this: I get to be free, like a child, every day and for all eternity and there is nothing else I'd rather be.

Psalms 1

I'm going to start posting a psalm almost every day starting with 1 and ending at 150.

The book of Psalms is a full book of hymns and prayers of all human emotion.

Wikipedia says that "The word psalms is derived from the Greek Ψαλμοί (Psalmoi), perhaps originally meaning "songs sung to a harp", from psallein "play on a stringed instrument".

So here's the first:

¹ Blessed is the man
who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked
or stand in the way of sinners
or sit in the seat of mockers.

² But his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.

³ He is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither.
Whatever he does prospers.

⁴ Not so the wicked!
They are like chaff (the husks of corn or other seed separated by winnowing or threshing) that the wind blows away.

⁵ Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.

⁶ For the LORD watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.

New idea. I'm just going to go through the whole chapter and "Git-R-Done". Let me know your thoughts!

Colossians 1

¹Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,

²To the holy and faithful brothers in Christ at Colosse:
Grace and peace to you from God our Father.

Thanksgiving and Prayer

³We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, ⁴because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love you have for all the saints— ⁵the faith and love that spring from the hope that is stored up for you in heaven and that you have already heard about in the word of truth, the gospel ⁶that has come to you. All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heard it and understood God's grace in all its truth. ⁷You learned it from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf, ⁸and who also told us of your love in the Spirit.

⁹For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding.¹⁰And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, ¹¹being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience, and joyfully ¹²giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in the kingdom of light. ¹³For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, ¹⁴in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

Paul wrote this letter as a opposition of paganism and what better way to remove those ideas than speak of the truth. I especially love verse 12-14. It never ever ever EVER gets old hearing that our Father in heaven sent His only Son to die for us and our sins. "He has rescued us from the dominion of darkness". MM!

Even though we KNOW this is true and we KNOW this is awesome, we still forget it and take advantage of it and put the idea in a box for when its convenient for us.

HELLO!!! We aren't worthy to have the comfort of convenience! We are sinners and God gives us constant and unfailing love. Why would we ever want to stray away from it?

The fact of the matter is that sin is fun. Drinking is fun. Doing drugs is fun. Lying is fun... But why waste the time when you have such an amazing God who loves you and who has an amazing life planned for you and an eternity of Him waiting for you?

The Supremacy of Christ

¹⁵He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. ¹⁶For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him. ¹⁷He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. ¹⁸And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. ¹⁹For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, ²⁰and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.

²¹Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. ²²But now he has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation— ²³if you continue in your faith, established and firm, not moved from the hope held out in the gospel. This is the gospel that you heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, and of which I, Paul, have become a servant.

He has removed every blemish. We are free from accusation, and because of that we serve Him entirely-living a life worthy of Him.

That is such a difficult task sometimes. The world is going on all around us and we are moving against it because of Him, but because we are moving against it I'm joyful. I'm ecstatic. Why be of the world when you could be of Christ?

Paul's Labor for the Church

²⁴Now I rejoice in what was suffered for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ's afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church. ²⁵I have become its servant by the commission God gave me to present to you the word of God in its fullness— ²⁶the mystery that has been kept hidden for ages and generations, but is now disclosed to the saints. ²⁷To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.

²⁸We proclaim him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. ²⁹To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me.

As followers of Christ, its our calling to call others to Christ. I love how Paul says it. "... that we may present everyone perfect in Christ".

That we will reflect Him in all good ways and be a light in complete darkness. That we will love our neighbor and show them the love of Christ. That we will not be of the world but still love it.

Take a big sigh because its going to be hard, but God will give you the strength and energy necessary to do these things if you 1. ask for it and 2. have faith that He will do it.

WHEW! That was a lot, but I'm excited to see how one chapter of God's word inspires and sets motion to the body of Christ.

Let me know what God is doing in your life and email me at kayceah@yahoo.com

Today I decided that I'm going to share with you my bible studies. Recently, I've been reading through the New Testament and I read through Colossians. I'll pick out a little each day and highlight it. I want to dig deeper into God's word and, to be honest, love the idea of posting my thoughts and I encourage you to share your own! If you'd like to read with me, let me know!

Here's todays verse:

"... All over the world this gospel is bearing fruit and growing, just as it has been doing among you since the day you heart it and understood God's grace in all its truth."

Colossians 1:6

That was such a refreshing verse to read. Within the christian religion there are so many different denominations and traditions connected to them. One thing is constant. The truth. Truth is not personal. Truth is not something different for different people. There is only one truth, and it is so comforting to know that and believe that.

What do you think? Email me at kayceah@yahoo.com

September 7, 2010

Personally, I fall into sin so easily. I'm easily influenced and was often tempted by the things I had once surrounded myself with.

I've been sick for the past two weeks which means I got to stay home from school and just sit around and do nothing for a few days. I always watch the Style channel and old Clean House re-runs kept playing when I was sick. Its a show where they get a group of people to come to your house, clean everything out, sell everything at a yard sale, and THEN they use the money to redecorate your newly cleaned house.

Everyone needs to clean house every once in a while. Not just their actual homes, but their lives too. I realized this in my lowest of lows. I had to do some clean house and remove the things that were tempting me. I had to stop socializing with the people that encouraged the sin in my life.

I cannot tell you how wonderful it feels to finally remove those things, and I guess this is my way of challenging everyone who is struggling with sin to do some cleaning in their lives. With prayer and a little effort, you can get rid of the temptation. With prayer and self discipline, you can keep it away.

(Its the perfect time, too. A new school year gives us a sense of a fresh start. Make it truly refreshing!!!)

Sorry for such a lame post. It was just something on my heart...

May 13, 2010

I bet most of you have heard this story before, but we all need to be reminded of the stories from when we were younger. The events in the bible that taught us our morals. So here goes nothing...

Some children smell awful. I'm talking about a stench so bad that it makes you want to cry. Being apart of the marketing team at Chick-Fil-A, I get to work with kids and most of them smell terrible. For instance; Today was spirit night at the store and I was face painting. When a kid came up and smelled awful, or told me they were sick, or just coughed and sneezed all over the place, I was hesitant to help them out. I didn't show them the love I was giving other good-smelling children. Ironically enough, the kids that were a little different were the ones with the best manners. They were the kids who wanted to chat and befriend me and my coworker. They were the ones that wanted to show us love.

These kids reminded me of the good samaritan. Samaritans are portrayed in the bible as the "do-gooders". The one's that are so different, yet the first in line to help someone in need. They are the people that "smell bad".

Well, there's a parable in the bible that talks about the good samaritan:

²⁵Just then a religion scholar stood up with a question to test Jesus. "Teacher, what do I need to do to get eternal life?"

²⁶He answered, "What's written in God's Law? How do you interpret it?"

²⁷He said, "That you love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and muscle and intelligence—and that you love your neighbor as well as you do yourself."

²⁸"Good answer!" said Jesus. "Do it and you'll live."

²⁹Looking for a loophole, he asked, "And just how would you define 'neighbor'?"

^30-32Jesus answered by telling a story. "There was once a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. On the way he was attacked by robbers. They took his clothes, beat him up, and went off leaving him half-dead. Luckily, a priest was on his way down the same road, but when he saw him he angled across to the other side. Then a Levite religious man showed up; he also avoided the injured man.

^33-35"A Samaritan traveling the road came on him. When he saw the man's condition, his heart went out to him. He gave him first aid, disinfecting and bandaging his wounds. Then he lifted him onto his donkey, led him to an inn, and made him comfortable. In the morning he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, 'Take good care of him. If it costs any more, put it on my bill—I'll pay you on my way back.'

³⁶"What do you think? Which of the three became a neighbor to the man attacked by robbers?"

³⁷"The one who treated him kindly," the religion scholar responded.

Jesus said, "Go and do the same."

Luke 10:25-37 (The Message)

Jesus says to go and do the same. Go out and treat people with a kind heart and a willing

hand to help. It may be very hard at times to reach out to someone who might not be

in great condition and may repulse you, but those are the people who need your

love the most.

I challenge all to be a good samaritan in any situation. Whether it be at school, or at the DMV

(which is a very challenging place to be nice, I understand). "Go and do the same"

May 9, 2010

Do not fret because of evil men

or be envious of those who

do wrong;

for like the grass they will soon wither,

like the green plans they will soon die

away.

Trust in the LORD and do good;

dwell in the land and enjoy safe

pasture.

Delight yourself in the LORD

and he will give you the desires of

your heart.

Commit your way to the LORD;

trust in him and he will do this:

He will make your righteousness shine

like the dawn,

the justice of your cause like the

noonday sun.

Be still before the LORD and wait

patiently for him;

do not fret when men succeed in

their ways,

when they carry out their wicked

schemes.

Refrain from anger and turn from wrath;

do not fret--it leads only to evil

For evil men will be cut off,

but those who hope in the LORD will

inherit the land.

-Psalm 37

May 1, 2010

Yesterday, I planned and hosted a TOMS event called Style Your Sole. It's where you buy a pair of TOMS shoes and paint them, sharpie them, or splatter them any way you like. The only problem was I didn't bring any water for the brushes, so I told people to just use a new brush with a new color. Soon enough, there were dried up brushes with globs of paint all over them.

This visual reminds me of myself and where I am right now in my walk with Christ (or my walk away from Christ, rather). When I was in a wonderful disconnected relationship with Christ, I was painting a beautiful masterpiece through Him. I was showing everyone how wonderful and glorious He truly is. Eventually, I neglected Him and forgot to pray and forgot to dig in his word. I went against what He asked of me and did things that I regret now. I let myself sit and be swallowed by sin and now I am nothing but a paint brush with globs of paint dried up on it's surface just waiting to be washed clean.

So where do I begin? How to I get on the right path again?

Have you ever cleaned on e of those paint brushes? It takes a very long time, I can tell you that. So THAT is where I begin.

I pray for time to heal, and I pray that You come wash me clean. I pray the Holy Spirit takes me and consumes me in It's amazing presence.

After prayer, I dig into the word praying God will lead me somewhere.

"^13-14God rescued us from dead-end alleys and dark dungeons. He's set us up in the kingdom of the Son he loves so much, the Son who got us out of the pit we were in, got rid of the sins we were doomed to keep repeating."

-Colossians 1:14 (The Message)

Taken from darkness to the purest light. I pray for Your beautiful redemption.

April 28, 2010

I love the movie The Wizard of Oz. Its one of the greatest classic films out there, and has kept me entertained since I first popped in the VHS I had back in 1995. Out of all the characters, the lion is my favorite. At first, he lacks the courage to be the king of the forrest like he's supposed to be, but as him and the gang move forward in their journey, they have faith that the wizard will get them what they want. He has so much faith and courage throughout the movie that he didn't know he had.

What ever happened to courage?

I'm talking about

DAVID and GOLIATH

MOSES and the RED SEA

JOSEPH and his STRONG FAITH

JESUS and his CRUCIFIXION

Real COURAGE

All these examples from the bible are of people having massive courage through our God.

Recently, some of the conversations in my household have been about doubt and uncertainty about the future. The things I hear are about money and college and things we, as followers, should put in God's hands but have a fear of doing so.

What happened to our COURAGE - our strong faith that GOD will pull us through?

I admit that I've struggled with the amount of courage I have. I've doubted God and have lost faith in many things many times, but why am I not courageous? After hearing and reading about the times that God's followers had faith in Him to bless them with courage and with the ability to part the sea or to survive a fierce battle, you'd think that I would've learned something...

There are many things we hear a lot.

We hear about God's love.

We hear about God's son.

We hear about God's plan.

But do we hear enough (or do we actually learn enough) about God's blessings and His way of never failing or pointing us in the wrong direction. We, obviously, haven't heard enough.

Jesus said

"Take courage! It is I. Don't be afraid."

He is always with us, and He has everything planned out for us. We know this so why are we hesitant to give up everything to God?

The bible says "Trust in the Lord" many times. In hebrew, when something is repeated over and over again, it is very important. The more it is repeated, the more important it is. According to the Revised Standard Version Bible the word "Trust" is mentioned 147 times, and that's a lot.

"O Lord Almighty, blessed is the man who trusts in you."

Psalms 84:12

Have courage that the Lord will lead you in the right direction. Pray for Him to give you the courage you need to move forward in the path to salvation. Pray for the strength to give everything in your life to Him. Pray for forgiveness for taking things into your own hands, and being cowardly towards the High Almighty God.

March 18, 2010

I am a human being. I was made in the image of God, but I am evil. I am wicked. I am a natural sinner. In fact, I am so far from perfect that the Son of God was sent to die for me so that I could be washed as white as snow.

From the scum of the earth to the forgiven scum of the earth.

I'd pick the second choice any day.

February 23, 2010

Honest is the best policy.

"An honest answer is like a kiss on the lips."

Proverbs 24:26

February 19, 2010

I'm terrified of rejection. When I am not included or when I get left behind, I feel awful. If I were to diagnose myself, I'd say I have a severe case of Kakorrhaphiophobia- Fear of failure or defeat.

This is my personal weakness. This is the thing that breaks me and creates a shaky foundation for me to stand on.

Weakness is a very hard thing to deal with, especially if you're going at it alone, but I'm constantly asking myself, "who will help me, and how will they help?" It gets hard to give weaknesses to God because you never know what He'll do with them or how He will work make them good.

"But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me."

2 Corinthians 12:9

This is my boasting of my personal weakness. I fear rejection, but I will always be accepted in the eyes of God.

"For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength."

1 Corinthians 1:25

"Lift it up, higher

Our God, He's stronger

Boast to our brothers

For He never fails"

Our God has no weakness. Our God lacks any foolishness. Our God never fails.

January 21, 2010

What is TRUE worship?

What does it look like?

What does it sound like?

What does it feel like?

I have always loved playing in the church band. Ever since I let Christ in my heart, I have had this desire to lead others in worship, but I constantly have to remind myself what worship really is.

From the people I have talked to and the many conversations I've had about this, I've found that many people think different thoughts of what worship is. Some say its a time when we sing to God. Others say its when the band gets up on stage and we all read the lyrics off of the screen.

Personally, for a while, I thought that I was supposed to benefit from worshiping God (sounds kind of silly now that I type it out). I loved the feeling I would get when I sang those songs and lifted my hands up at every chorus. But the crazy thing is that worship shouldn't be for yourself. Worship to God is FOR GOD.

" Thank God! Call out his Name!

Tell the whole world who he is and what he's done!
Sing to him! Play songs for him!
Broadcast all his wonders!"

1 Chronicles 16:8-9

I love how Kari Jobe puts it in her song "Joyfully". She says;

"I will sing from the mountain top

I will sing, I am overcome, I will sing making melodies

I will sing from the valley low

I will sing because of Your love I will sing

You're my king, I will sing"

Even in the worst times, we are called to worship the Lord.

"On your feet now—applaud God! Bring a gift of laughter,
sing yourselves into his presence.
Know this: God is God, and God, God.
He made us; we didn't make him.
We're his people, his well-tended sheep.
Enter with the password: "Thank you!"
Make yourselves at home, talking praise.
Thank him. Worship him.
For God is sheer beauty,
all-generous in love,
loyal always and ever."

Psalm 100

We are His sheep. I looked up sheep in the back of my bible and this is what it said;

sheep- the animal most mentioned in the Scripture, probably because it was the animal most often raised in Bible times; used for meat, for cloth, and for religious sacrifice.

We sacrifice ourselves and our lives to God, and our worship should be a big "Thank you" to Him. Its not just singing songs, or lifting up our hands. Its a daily activity that we should be doing 24/7. No matter where you are in life or on your spiritual walk. Believe that He is working in your heart and thank Him for His mighty works.

"Worship the LORD in the splendor of his holiness; tremble before him, all the earth."

Psalm 96:9

January 20, 2010

I love that God created love. He made it so that everyone is lovable and capable of loving others. I LOVE it!

Lately, I've been having a hard time with this concept. Unfortunately, I become annoyed by the smallest things, but the cool thing is, is that God can show love through your love to others.

Today I revisited the book Blue Like Jazz. The chapter I last left off on was chapter 13; Romance. Perhaps it was God being humorous, but as I read I was having mini epiphanies in my mind.

One of the quotes I wrote down was of Don talking to his recently married friend, Paul. They were talking and discussing marriage and what love is in a true relationship like Paul and his wife's relationship.

He says;

"...its much more than I ever thought it would be. One of the ways God shows me He loves me is through Danielle, and one of the ways God shows Danielle He loves her is through me. And because she loves me, and teaches me that I am lovable, I can better interact with God."

God loves to love, as we should love because He loves us!

It says in 1 Peter 4:8

"Above all, love each other deeply because love covers over a multitude of sins."

1 John 3:18-19 says

"My dear children, let's not just talk about love; let's practice real love. This is the only way we'll know we're living truly, living in God's reality."

... and my favorite is how God describes love in 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

"If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don't love, I've gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I'm bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn't want what it doesn't have.
Love doesn't strut,
Doesn't have a swelled head,
Doesn't force itself on others,
Isn't always "me first,"
Doesn't fly off the handle,
Doesn't keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn't revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end."

God created us to be lovable. He created us to be loving. Practice TRUE love for God TRULY loves us.

January 19, 2010

I just recently downloaded a bunch of podcasts to have while I'm on the go. One of the podcasts I found was an audio podcast from The Village Church (Matt Chandler's church). His podcast on Organic Faith really hit me, and this is the response I had...

I love kids. In fact, I'm looking forward to having a family and to watch my kids grow up and become who God created them to be, but there are some things little kids can get away with that adults can't.

If you have ever baby sat, or have been around an infant, you most likely have smelled one of the most foul smells on this earth: A poopy diaper. But the thing is, infants will grow and mature and, eventually, be potty trained. Soon, they'll be packing their bags for college! As much as we'd like this to be completely false, adults can't get away with walking around with a nasty diaper dripping off their behinds because we all grow. It is an entirely normal that infancy is temporary!

Just as a baby slowly grows into an adult, we grow spiritually. There is no such thing as faith that DOESN'T grow.

1 Peter 2:1-3 says;

"Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice and all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and slander of any kind. Like newborn babies, crave pure spiritual milk, so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord is good."

Peter compares us to newborn babies that should CRAVE pure spiritual milk. We should desire to grow.

I pray for miraculous change to happen in my heart, so that I can grow, but at the same time I need to pray for righteous discipline. We all need to have a balance of both so that we can be constantly spiritually growing.

Taste and see that the Lord is good.