Head Over Heals

 

Listening to:
Song: Head Over Heels(In This Life)
Artist: Switchfoot
Album: Oh Gravity

 

 

Tonight I’m just letting these word become me:

In this life You’re the one place I call home
In this life You’re the feeling I belong
In this life You’re the flower and the thorn
You’re everything that’s fair in love…and war

It hits me because in this life He’s all these things to me. When I have nowhere to belong or no one to belong to it is so sweet to know I am always his. Lately I’ve become good at crying or rather owning up to it, and I’ll be honest with you tonight I just want to bawl…ugly cry it out. I am totally broken in love…broken in His love for me and broken in His love I see played out in the “glory glimpses” throughout humanity (or dogality haha).

I watched Marley and Me tonight and thought…what love. It’s unconditional and unrelenting…hmm much like someone else know. Then my mom said this and I instantly thought of Jesus.

They(dogs) love you even when you treat them badly.

Oh how many times have I treated him badly (God that is). I have saught my own way, loved something more, become self-absorbed, or just outright abandoned him and left him in the dust. To count the times would take an eternity. And all along I hear him sing the same refrain:

If you find her tell her that I love her. If you find her tell her heart to come.

Oh His love is so deep. The ocean is only a puddle in comparison. I just want to love him back…truly.

Standing

 

I’ll stand with arms high and heart abandoned.
In awe of the one who gave it all.
I’ll stand my soul Lord to you surrendered.
All I am is yours.

~Standing~

You’re Beautiful: A Photo Documentary

So I have started a journey. Over the past couple of days I’ve been pondering, “Lord, what does your love look like today? What is our divine romance?” So often I feel like I have become so blinded by the world that I miss seeing the glimpses of his beauty in the world. So I have unofficially started a picture blogging series. Where I’ll show you what he has shown me. I’m hoping to see a spec of his glory and the beauty of his character in everything surrounding me. Who’s to say that God can’t be seen in the petal of a flower or heard in the passing bird’s song.

“For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made…” -Romans 1:20

 

Here’s today:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You’re Beautiful by Phil Wickham: “I see Your face in every sunrise. The color of the morning are inside your eyes. The world awakens with the break of the day. I look up to the sky and say…You’re beautiful.”

Call My Name

 

Listening to:
Song: Call My Name
Artist: Third Day
Album: Revelation

 

 

Call My Name
By Third Day

It’s been so long since
You felt like you were loved
So what went wrong
But do you know
There’s a place where you belong
Here in My Arms

Chorus:
When you feel like you’re alone in your sadness
It seems like no one else in this whole world cares
And you want to get away from the madness
You just call My name and I’ll be there
You just call My name and I’ll be there

The pain inside
Has erased your hope for love
Soon you will find
That I’ll give you all
That your heart could ever want
And so much more

Chorus:
When you feel like you’re alone in your sadness
It seems like no one else in this whole world cares
And you want to get away from the madness
You just call My name and I’ll be there
You just call My name and I’ll be there

You just call My name
You just call My name
Call My name say it now
I want you to never doubt
The love I have for you is so alive
CALL MY NAME SAY IT NOW
I WANT YOU TO NEVER DOUBT
THE LOVE I HAVE FOR YOU IS SO ALIVE

You just call My name
You just call My name
You just call My name

The love I have for you is so alive
The love I have for you is so alive
You just call My name
You just call My name
You just call My name

What a beautiful blessing it is to know that You never leave Father. Even when the world around me crumbles…when relationships fade. Even when I feel so alone in this world…You are here with me.

“what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?” -Psalm 8:4

Lord I did nothing to deserve this love…nothing. Why? Why do you love me? Why do you love any of us? We live lives loving and then leaving You…still You gently draw us near to You. What great love is this…that the King of the universe would call me…would call me friend.

You are deserving of everything I have to give. Oh God, that I would only call Your name…that I would only call Your name.

“that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,” -Philippians 2:10

Fragile

Thank You

You don’t crush me with a heavy hand

You don’t leave me alone in this world

Yes I am fragile

My heart is easily broken

I am susceptible to tears

No stranger to fear

No alien to rejection or worthlessness

Still in You I find my worth

You make beauty from ashes

You make freedom from chains

Love me hard Father

Nights like this it feels like only You will

Love’s Divine Romance

 

Listening to:
Song: I Am Still Running
Artist: Jon Foreman
Album: Fall and Winter

 

 

Hmm…what a beautiful time. I lay here in my dimly lit dorm room all by my lonesome listening to Jon Foreman remind me that His love is strong. I admit so often I forget just how strong His love is. My heart becomes weary and my soul becomes restless and the enemy’s lies press in my inadequacies and lather on the doubts. Still, I must always remember His love is strong. Even where I fall short He is able to fill in the blanks and cover the empty spaces. When there is no where to run I always have somewhere to go…straight into His arms.

Still, I won’t build myself up to be stronger or more spiritual than I truly am because Lord knows He’s not always the first place I run to. Many times I’d love to steal a shoulder before I’d even think about delving into His Word, but He’s changing me. I’m beginning to understand what it truly means to run to Him, and seeing how those shoulders I once thought to be my only hope are just bi-products of a greater love and deeper romance. I cherish the shoulders, but I am more grateful for the one who flows through them. In every tender embrace Christ’s love pours out on me.

It is Him who makes Himself manifest in our loves. Doesn’t the Word say it best in 1 John 4:8, “…God is love.” It doesn’t say God knows how to love really well or God is a pretty cool example of love…it says God IS Love. He defines love. Love is Him and He is love. To love is to know God and to know God is to walk in that love. Therefore, I will look at love differently today and every day following. Each and every loving act done by a friend or friends I will count as just one more loving act from the Father. As said in James:

“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” -James 1:17

It is Him who infuses me to love and surrounds me with love. He loved me even in my most unloveliest of states.

By Faith

Hebrews 11 says:

“BY FAITH Abel offered to God a more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, through which he was commended as righteous…” (4)

“BY FAITH Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death…” (5)

“BY FAITH Noah, being warned by God concerning events as yet unseen, in reverent fear constructed an ark for the saving of his household…” (7)

“BY FAITH Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, NOT KNOWING WHERE HE WAS GOING…” (8)

“BY FAITH Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age…” (11)

“BY FAITH Abraham when he was tested offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises was in the act offering up his only son,” (17)

“BY FAITH Moses , when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.” (24-25)

BY FAITH these followers of God prospered. They were reckless and relentless. I love what is said about Sarah in Hebrews 11:11…”she considered him faithful who had promised.” God, the one who promised that she would conceive even in her old age in Genesis 18:10, she knew to be faithful and therefore had faith. Still what I find interesting is Sarah’s first reaction. She laughed to herself saying what would be somewhere close to, “Ha…good joke,” in our day and age.

For some reason, I find comfort in that, because oh how I’ve done the same in my life! God gives a glimpse of who he would have me become or shared the great and glorious things he is capable of doing, and I respond with an internal, “yeah right” only to be received with a “Yeah I AM right.”

But the key thing is to understand what makes Sarah faithful rather than faithless:
“She consider him faithful who had promised.” (Hebrews 11:11)

God’s not surprised by our human reaction to His awesome power, but what marks true faith is the discarding of the “sensible” and “logical” and taking hold of the promise. Faith is saying, “God said he would, so I believe he will.” This is regardless of what the world says, what my limited knowledge holds to, or what science or man-made logic claims to be true (science has failed too many times for me to place my faith in that). God has proven himself faithful from the beginning of time, and is therefore worthy not only of our belief but our trust. When push came to shove, Sarah trusted God. It was either trust God or miss out on the incredible things he had in store.

And this seems to be an underlying theme for all of these faith followers. Noah had never seen rain! EVER! Prior to the flood the vegetation of the Earth was watered by what could be classified as underwater hot springs (Genesis 2:6), but God hits Noah up and in my little paraphrasing says, “Yo I’m going to flood the Earth because of all the junk (sin) going down and I need you to build an ark and tell your fam to get in it and snag the clean animals too…male and female, 2 by 2, etc.” And guess what…Noah did it! He had no idea what God was talking about or how things would work, but he just believed and did what God told Him to do. Faith. And what happened next…one heck of a thunderstorm! (Genesis 7:10-12) But check it Noah and his family were rescued. Why? Because of Noah’s faith.

Faith seems to be the underlying theme here because it is imperative. It’s not just about believing in God. It’s about BELIEVING GOD.

Lord I pray I would have faith like these…trusting you always.