the inside of my twirling universe

These words can't accurately say what I mean, but it's the closest I can come. God is SO good. He is more than I deserve and blesses me in so many ways every single day. I am so thrilled by the fact I get to spend eternity with him forever. Let me tell you about him...

My God didn't make me perfect. He had a better plan. He loves me anyway, and decided to make a plan of redemption instead of a person of perfection... He hears me. He answers me even when I can't see the answers! Today I've recognized a couple more answers to prayer.

My day was incredibly busy (ihatethis) from school, to work, to church... and there's 13 hours of my life gone. With a life like that it's hard to find time to think about God, but he's made himself SO evident in my life. First... the sunrise was simply amazing and beautiful. He reminds me to work on my memory verses before my mind gets too overloaded. My God never gives up on me. I am blessed this semester to have a class (maybe I've talked about it), the psychology of caring for your soul. This class isn't just a class. It is providing me with the opportunity to read 2 books devoted to the idea of re-forming my character to be more like Christ. So even within my busy day, I have a class like this to help me slow down and think about my inner-self and not all that's spinning around me. I feel like it's just a bonus to get college credit for this "work."

After school I go work with my kiddos, who by the way are so impressive. I could brag about them for a while... They make me so proud and I smile constantly because of them. I got to play soccer with a couple boys today and that was the highlight of my day. ANOTHER blessing. I can't explain how I even got the job working with these little people, but God gave it to me.

After work I met with a friend and got to share a little of what's been happening with my life and some of my answers to prayer. She's an awesome listener... I feel like I talked the whole time, but she told me I was an encouragement to her and I thank God for that... I totally wasn't meeting up with her to think "I'm gunna ENCOURAGE her and be a blessing!" But God works things out beautifully.

After friend time, I went to the college service at church... blessing after blessing after blessing (I need a new word for blessing) has come to me through this church. Last summer that very friend I met with today prayed with me about finding a church I could get connected with where God wants me to be. 6 months later, I'm at Brainerd Baptist and am so much more engaged in my relationship with the Lord. Anyway, the Word preached was about building an authentic Biblical community. I prayed that God will help me to bear other people's burdens (not praying with any specific person in mind) and to reach out to others instead of thinking about myself all the time. I didn't realize it until I was driving home that within an hour God answered that.

I got to talk with a (new) friend and I was just saying hello but she opened up to me and let me share some of her burdens and also helped me bear some of mine. I am sooo moved by her heart for God and how brokenhearted she is when she knows something is not the way it should be with her Savior. We prayed together and the way she used Scripture and song lyrics throughout her prayer was beautiful. I love the fact that I can pray with a friend openly, not worrying about what people think but only focusing on possibly the only thing we have in common - our Lord.

God is working on me in many ways... so pray with me that I will be who he wants me to be as an individual but more as a part of a community, a family of believers. I want to find my place within this church (and by church I mean body of believers in Christ, not a building) to do the things God commands - to help people with their problems, to point out sin when it needs to be confronted, to encourage each other in the Word, to pray with people...and whatever else He has in mind.

I am blessed beyond what I can tell you in a blog... or in person. or anywhere.
I looked up "blessed" on thesaurus.com and the only synonym I like enough to mention is "redeemed" but even so, that's not what I mean.
Praise God with me... pray with me, tell me how I can pray for you.

what God said

Around Saturday afternoon I always start to wonder what I should blog about and think... ugh do I have to do it again? But, it's more exciting than the homework I'm procrastinating not to mention this is something I want to remember a year from now... It's my blog so I can write about pretty much anything. I'm not sure why I get anxious about the topic of my blog...

3 weeks ago I wrote my spiritual goals for the year down and marked on my calendar every other Sunday to review my goals. So last week I reviewed them and the one that didn't measure up or really show any progress was the goal to pray more intimately. I asked my discipleship group to pray for me in that area and ... touche... the sermon this week is on prayer. Not to be depressing, but I feel like everytime someone talks about prayer in church, they say the same thing. It always comes around to praying for every single person you know or have ever heard of which just seems impossible to me. The one thing I liked most from the sermon today though was this: You can't really learn to pray by reading books (I've tried), or talking about it in a classroom. You learn by doing it, by practicing.

With that, I'll share some recent answers to prayers. If I talk to you regularly, you probably have already heard this. :P
I mentioned my discipleship group is praying with me... The fact that I have a set of friends I refer to as my discipleship group is an answer to prayer. About 4 weeks before we met together for the first time, I started praying for a group. I didn't know where to find one or who I wanted to be with. My schedule with school and work and church from 8am Monday til 5pm Friday is way too crazy for my taste... but somehow among all that, the 4 of us have the same empty spaces in our schedules. We've only met twice so I don't really know them that well but I am so blessed to have a group for this purpose, to help me grow spiritually and stay accountable, and to have a new set of friends - people I probably wouldn't have chosen to hang out with if God hadn't brought us together.

Before the new year I was asked to be a nanny over the summer for one of my girls at school and her sister. I started praying about it and 2 weeks later met with the mom. I had my expectations coming into the "meeting" and she had hers for their family. So over coffee she told me what she was willing to offer and I wasn't really sure so I didn't give her a definite answer. The week before I was also asked to work at a summer camp. (It is against my nature to think about summer plans in JANUARY but... such is life.) When it came down to the details of which job I wanted (5 months ahead of time), summer camp is less work for about the same money. Being a nanny and investing in 2 little lives for 3 months to me sounds priceless. When I wrote out the pro's and con's of each... the only thing stopping me from saying yes to the mom of those girls was money.
As I've been reading through Proverbs this month, over and over again God has showed me how unimportant money is. Taking this job as a nanny will pay my bills plus some... that's more than I need regardless of how it compares to other jobs. Here's what God said... (The mom and I met on January 16th... and this is from Proverbs 16... not an accident)

Proverbs 16:3 - Commit your work to the LORD and your plans will be established.
Proverbs 16:16 - How much better to get wisdom than gold! To get understanding is to be chosen rather than silver.
Proverbs 16:20 - Whoever gives thought to the word (or to a matter) will discover good, and blessed is he who trusts in the LORD.























I felt peace in making this decision and after talking to a few people about what they think I should do, my
decision was made. These verses confirmed for me what I was specifically praying to God about.

What really gets under my skin are those people who will say "yeah pray about it. God will tell you what to do. You just listen to him." Then... when I make my decision based on God's guidance, if it's not the choice that falls in their favor they have a bad attitude towards me. They hold a grudge against me for doing the very thing they told me to do... Can't it be enough that I'm doing this because God told me to?

I was going to add more about what God's been speaking to me about but... I think this is long enough. :) Please share with me what God's been saying to you. It excites me to hear about what He's doing other places too. :)