Therefore do not worry, for tomorrow has enough trouble of its own

worry. it consumes us. it can turn a completely wonderful day in to something awful. i’m writing this blog because it something im kind of on the outside of…not to say i don’t worry, i just don’t do it a whole lot. a few friends and i were talking about worry tonight and they were saying what they worry about, such as: school, work, family, themselves, others. i think a lot of our worry comes from trying to please other people and not God. for the most part we strive to please people…we care what they think about us. we care about what they say about our clothes, houses, cars, phones, tv’s…and not whatGod thinks about us. i guess what im trying to say is stop worrying…i know its not that simple…for me worry has never really been a big deal…i think mostly because im lazy, but sometimes i should probably worry more.or maybe not worry…just be concerned. which brings up another point. what is the difference between worry and concern. worry comes from our human nature…we worry about things that either we can’t change or end up ok in the end. when we are concerned, it comes from our God nature…we are concerned when somebody gets hurt..or is in pain. so i guess im gonna wrap this up by saying you will never understand what its like to not worry until you are put in a situation where all you have is God and God alone. a situations where all you can do is trust in the Lord and know that he is gonna take care of it…when we worry its like saying that God is not big enough to take care of it…and just in case you didn’t know, He is. So i pray for you i pray that you are put in a situation where all you can do is rely on God. i pray that you stop worrying…because God IS big enough to take care of any problem you may have. remember…if God brings you to it He WILL bring you through it.

distraction

so i will start this off by telling you a story. So friday night i go to my friends house for her birthday…lots of fun. so were watching this movie (eagle eye) which is amazing, and lauren goes downstairs so i ask her to bring me my hoodie because my phone was in it. So i get my hoodie and no phone. so im thinking ok, it fell out downstairs, so we look. still no phone.  we tear the house apart. still no phone. So we go to bed thinking ok, it will show up in the morning. morning comes, still no phone. So needless to say i never found my phone.

Though it sounds silly, something so simple as a phone getting lost can put us in a bad mood. and i realized the second i couldn’t find my phone that i lost it, because it was a distraction. i know it may sound silly but i have let something so silly as my phone get in the way of my relationship with God and I. Whether it be talking or texting, it was ridiculous how much time i spent with that thing. And God has spoke to me before you know saying shay just leave it alone and spend some time with me. But i ignored his voice so he took it away. So tonight in small group we were talking about distractions, and it was very evident that even while talking about distractions, we were distracted. So I guess what im trying to say is put away the distractions guys. make the effort to spend time with God. We get so caught up in our day to day life whether it be school, boyfriends, girlfriends, family, phones, tv’s, computer, facebook, circumstances, or whatever it is just put it away, put it away for thirty minutes to spend time with the Lord Jesus Christ who died so we could spend eternity with him. i mean it seems like and unfair exchange. i mean thirty minutes for eternity? how difficult can that be. I mean, I have a very very very difficult time putting away all the distractions or thinking about what i have to do next to spend just a little time with God.And if you let it get in the way too much believe me, He will take it away. so quit being distracted and put your focus on what really matters, not the things that will fade away.

Speechless

I don’t really know what to say…i’m speachless. I feel like im deeper than i ever have been in my relationship with God. I feel like i never wanna leave this place. i just wanna go deeper, because God is perfect, he is holy, he is almighty. I love seeing God work. its awesome.

n Christ alone my hope is found
He is my light, my strength, my song
This Cornerstone, this solid ground
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm
What heights of love, what depths of peace
When fears are stilled, when strivings cease
My Comforter, my All in All
Here in the love of Christ I stand

In Christ alone, who took on flesh
Fullness of God in helpless babe
This gift of love and righteousness
Scorned by the ones He came to save
'Till on that cross as Jesus died
The wrath of God was satisfied
For every sin on Him was laid
Here in the death of Christ I live

There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain
Then bursting forth in glorious Day
Up from the grave He rose again
And as He stands in victory
Sin's curse has lost it's grip on me
For I am His and He is mine
Bought with the precious blood of Christ

No guilt in life, no fear in death
This is the power of Christ in me
From life's first cry to final breath
Jesus commands my destiny
No power of hell, no scheme of man
Can ever pluck me from His hand
'Till He returns or calls me home
Here in the power of Christ I'll stand

Be Satisfied.

be satisfied. with what you have. on this earth. only, never be satisfied, with God. Long for more. Long to go deeper. Long for Him.

Love and Grace

Grace….what is it??? for me Grace is something i can’t fathom. There is a grace thats unlike any other…i’m talking about God’s grace. how blessed are we to have God’s grace??? think about it. what have I ever done to deserve a grace like this..ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! Jesus died in my place on the cross and how do i repay him??? by turning my back on him? but yet everytime im back in his arms by the grace of God.  think about it i want you to think about somebody you may have hurt whether we know it or not…we’ve all hurt somebody. think about it did that person forgive you? if they did was it ever the same between you again? Have you ever had a friend that reguardless of how many times you turn your back on them they are there with open arms everytime? It amazes me how much grace God has for me and you everyday. look at this world (not to be debbie downer) but this world is not turning to God for all of its answers.ill be the first to say i don’t always look at God as my first choice. but yet no matter what we do, the hurt we cause God he forgives us. he gives us what you call unfailing unconditional love. no matter what you may think all love we can understand is conditional. we say “i love you” but we don’t add on that if you don’t lie to me or that,  if you don’t betray me or  if you don’t cheat me or if you don’t hurt me or if you don’t turn your back on me. that’s not God’s love, not his grace. when God says i love you theres no conditions. its more like no matter how many times you lie to me or no matter how many times you betray me or no matter how many times you cheat me or no matter how many times you turn to something else instead of me. when God says i love you that what he means. Its because God loves us so much that we are able to accept his mercy, his grace. its like they go together. and i stand in absolute awe to know that no matter what i do God will open up his arms for Him to embrace me in his grace and say “i love you” when i don’t deserve it and i never will.

So whatever youre going through know that its never too late to turn back to God. I hope you find the awesome forgiveness that is God’s grace and experience it for yourself i pray you do….its never too late. God loves you and God bless

To do list…

so i decided to make a to do list of things i want to do before i die. so this is it:

• go skydiving
• see the ball drop in time square
• get married
• have kids
• meet celine dion
• go on a mission trip to africa
• go to california
• take a bath in pudding
• go bungee jumping
• go to college at USC
• get a good job
• lead somebody to christ
• start something huge
• change the world
• go snorkling
• swim with dolphins
• own a motorcycle
• own a car
• own a house
• buy a drumset
• own my own business
• be a young life leader
• change somebody’s life forever
• love to see the gamecocks win the SEC
• go to las vegas again
• travel the world
• go on trip with compassion international
• get another tattoo
• be in a movie
• meet all of the gosselin’s (Jon and Kate plus 8)
• give to many charities
• help a lot of people                                                                                                                                                                                  there’s a lot more i just can’t think of …hope you enjoy

Change

So im sitting here thinking on this thursday night how wierd its gonna be to get up in the morning and go to prayer breakfast…you see for the last five years of my life i have gone to prayer breakfast on thursday morning and you know i was just kind of get in the routine of getting up thursday morning for some good grub and prayer before i head off to school. so i sit here and i think about the change that it will be…not a drastic change just something out of the norm. but why, why are we so scared of change? so this is my take on it…i feel like we as humans get very very content and comfortable with the way our lives are going and so this so called “change” scares the mess out of us….but think about it for a second don’t you think our God is big enough to know that the change we encounter will be for our benefit. we are so scared that we might have to step out of our comfort zone for a little while or we might have to actually do what God asks of us. guys our Lord Jesus Christ took on the sins of the world was nailed to a cross beaten nearly to death and all for what…for us to sit back and do nothing when he asks us to change a little…so i think we talk about change a lot and how we want things to change but we are never willing to take the steps to do something about it im sure you’ve heard the saying “be the change you want to see in the world” and i am making that my mission and personally i have a hard time with change i get very comfortable so ill be the first to say i don’t like change. but God didn’t call us to like change…he called us to trust Him and have faith that the change he brings will be better than what we could imagine. so quit being comfortable and be the change.

Purpose

So today I’m at my favorite time of the day —lunch! and im at the vending machines getting a rice crispy treat and a friend came up to me just with pure excitement in his voice. He said shay guess what just happened and so i was like what. he goes so my teacher was fussing at me and then all of a sudden in a kind of smart alec way she said “son whats your purpose in life” and all he said was “to serve God” and the teacher was speachless she had nothing to say. so im sitting here thinking what if we all that that kind of courage one that when somebody asks us who we are its not im shay i go to this school and i like to do this and that.  it im shay a child of christ the almighty God and thats the only thing that matters. what if we had the kind of courage that when people ask us what our purpose is in this life, all we would say is to serve God. why don’t we have the courage to take that step that “leap of faith” because God is there. i don’t know what your going through right now but i know that my God whatever it is, is SO BIG that no matter what it is it is in his hands and he is there just saying “trust me i’ve got you” and just embrace the struggle and follow God. i don’t really know if this makes a whole lot of sense but i know that all of this remains true. its like isaiah 43:2-3 says “But now, this is what the LORD says—
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
“Fear not, for I have redeemed you;
I have summoned you by name; you are mine.

2 When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze.”

Guys we serve the most high God do you realize nothing absolutely nothing can touch us so step up and step out no matter the circumstance God has you he is gonna be the only one who matters and the only one you will ever have to answer to for anything that could ever really matter… so please whats your purpose to serve the most high God or sit and watch?? you’ll have to answer that one yourself!

“

A New Day Has Come

ok…so i just got back from a little trip called winter retreat with my youth group. It was loads of fun literally…but thats besides the point. so the theme was “blizzard of oz” and so obviously we used the wizard of oz as an outline…so along this yellow brick road dorothy meets a scarecrow who has no brain…and we talked about getting our mind right and eliminating distractions….and then we meet the tin man who has no heart…and we talked about our heart and how its mostly associated with love and how God loves us and our heart is his…and then we meet the cowardly lion aka “the king of the forest” haha….but we talk about having courage and being strong and how courage isn’t doing something because youre not scared, its doing it despite the fact that you are scared….and then we talk about Dorothy aka miss “theres no place like home” and so we talked about being at home with God and how he wants to make our heart his home and no matter where we are we should be so comfortable it should feel like home because God is there with us….but i say all this to say this i feel like i’ve been running in the wrong direction for so long. its like God has been there all along jumping up and down and trying to do everything to get my attention and i just became so complacent with how my life was i just ignored him and if your not moving with him you might as well be running away from him because well…basically you are. i think the reason why we run from God is because we are so so so scared of what we don’t know…we as americans are conditioned to have imediate answers and solutions. but with God its very different. we are so scared that God might ask us to just trust him and let go and let God. we are scared of the change that we will have to make and the challenges we will have to face but he is there right beside you saying listen im here i got you  and i’m so at peace know that my God has my heart in His hand and nobody can touch that one of my friends said it the best its like we know in our hearts what we have to do but in our brain we rationalize it  and question it its like this world can try to put things into our mind through what we see and hear  but our hearts, our hearts…nobody can touch its in God’s hand…so quit running from what you don’t know and run into the unknown i’m so excited about this adventure. its gonna be the hardest thing at this point in my life that i’ve ever done but i know its ok because God has my heart in his hands and he is looking me in the eye and say “shay its gonna be ok i’ve got you and you are MINE. so please run with me to literally only God knows what…please quit being afraid and just embrace whats coming because its a new day.

Just Stand…

so i’m not one for chain letters or forwards or anything like that infact most of the time i delete them….but i don’t know why i decided to read this one today…it was a video…i don’t know if you have heard about this one before it was about a professor who was an athiest and for 20 years his mission in the class was to get his students to believe that there was no God. Dumb right? but so at the end of each semester he would say “if there is still anyone who belives stand up” and no one stood up for 20 years…and he proceeded to say “good because anyone who believes in God is a fool”  and he would say “if there is a God he will stop this piece of chalk from hitting the ground and every semester he dropped the chalk and it shattered to a million peices…until one semester a young man was taking his class and he had heard the stories and so he prayed every morning that semester for the courage to stand up when he asks his class “who still belives” and so the day comes and the professor says “if there is still anyone who belives stand up”  and so the young man stands up and the professor shouts “you fool!!” and so then he proceeds to say “if there truly is a God he will stop this peice of chalk from hitting the ground. and so on the way of getting the chalk the proffesors fingers slip and he drops it and hits his shirt pocket, hits his pants and stops on his shoe. the professor ran out of the class. So people can argue this all they want…but accident i think not…it just goes to show what can happen when we have faith and stand up for what is right and true and just. Because Jesus stood up for us and took on our sins on that cross where he was beaten til he was barely recognizable. he let himself become basically a piece of meat to be beaten…all for what…for us to just stay seated when we ask what we belive in…i think not. and i will be the first to say that i’m not perfect and that sometimes  i just stay seated when i should stand up. but guys i just can’t put into words what an awesome God we have. He is perfect and Holy.  And when something so awesome so pure and holy and true is questioned should we not stand up and say Yes there is a God! its not just about standing up for what you believe in its living it everyday…as a christian people will always always always hold you to a higher standard. somebody somewhere is always looking. its living it out everyday that is so difficult belive me i’ll be the first to say this is by far the hardest thing i’ve ever had to do in my life. So who cares what people think…I’m certainly learning not to because when i die and have to face the Lord God Almighty himself and i have to answer to why i sat when i should have stood up.Honestly  who cares anymore if you’re some “Jesus Freak” personally i take it as a compliment but please join me in standing up instead of just staying seated…we can move the world if we aren’t afraid of what we don’t know because guys God’s got it covered he knows a whole lot more than i do or anybody for that matter so basically i ask you to…just stand.