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satintiger
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Name: sarah
Birthday: 2/5/1988
Gender: Female
Interests: loving God, having fun with my friends, playing ultimate frisbee, singing, doing active things, listening to people's stories, thinking, organizing, asking thoughtful questions
Occupation: Student
Message: message me
Member Since:
4/21/2004
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| What is your understanding of the Spirit-filled life?
When we decide to follow Christ and accept his sacrifice on our behalf, then God fills us with his Holy Spirit. This means that his Holy Spirit lives in us in some way. It is hard to understand, but the Bible says that the Holy Spirit will guide us into the truth, teach us, pray for us, and convict us. The Spirit-filled life is when we tune in to what the Holy Spirit is telling us, opening our lives to God's will for us and to his perspective of the world, which is truth. I don't think that all Christians live the Spirit-filled life, because they become distracted by other things in the world or give in to various temptations. And in my own life, there are times when I am more receptive to the Spirit's leading, and other times when I am less so. May there be more of the former and less of the latter! But living the Spirit-filled life is obeying God and letting him change your heart and view of the things in the world.
Describe your relationship with God. What has God been teaching you recently?
He is my father who loves me more than I can understand, and who is always with me and will never leave me. He wants what is good for me, and he is all-powerful, so he chooses or allows things to happen in my life that he wants to use to teach me and mature me. He wants me to trust him with all my heart and not worry about anything because I believe that he is good and that he loves me. We both want me to know him more, and he reveals more and more of himself to me. He already knows me completely. God is holy, and the only reason I'm able to be in relationship with him (for I am sinful), is because he counts me as holy because of Jesus' sacrifice. See how much he loves me! He sent his son to die for me so that I could be in relationship with him!
Lately he's been teaching me to love and forgive, not letting bitterness take hold of me even though I've been hurt. He's been reminding me that he puts hard things in my life so that I will trust him with those hard things and allow them to develop perseverance and patience in me. God is a father who disciplines his children for our good, that we may share in his holiness. Also, in our suffering we can take comfort that Jesus has experienced the same and even more. He understands our hurt.
Also, he's been making me wonder about what it means to really struggle for others in prayer, like Paul talks about in Colossians.
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| I could sing that song right now..."I feel good! du nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh like I knew that I would....I feel good...like I knew that I would now...."
Breaking up with someone is hard. But I feel like I have learned so much since then and through the aftermath, and that God has really blessed me. Here are some of the things I think are changing about me:
1. I love God more. I now have an image of myself in mind that is confident in my Father's love for me, standing firm with lifted hands that praise God for making me strong in him. I feel more sure of his love for me than I have ever felt in my life. I know he is my Father and he loves me and he will never leave me, though other people will come and go. And not only does my Father love me, but he gives me his Holy Spirit to live in me and guide me into the truth and teach me how to live abundantly.
2. I'm learning to dream. To dream about what I could do as an individual with the gifts and talents and interests that God has given me. To feel excited and passionate about possibilities, big and small, soon and distant, that God might call me to. I feel empowered to live as God wants, no longer trying to pin my future life to fit around someone else's plans, but able to solely focus on what God would have me do.
3. I want to pray more, and I do. As I remember that my Father's Holy Spirit lives in me to guide me, I find myself wanting to tune in to what he is guiding me into and teaching me. So I pray much more, seeking his will and committing the things in my life to him, and asking him for the people around me to love him more too.
4. I am realizing that being a Christian is so much about being relational. It's about pouring into other people with the love God is pouring into me (both Christian and non-Christian), loving them in every way possible--spending time with them as friends and helping them when they need something, and sharing the truth with them as we share lives together. Bringing Christ to the places and communities and clubs where the people are already, instead of trying to get them to come to a Christian club with me. And encouraging my Christian brothers and sisters as together we love each other and others together. "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."
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| a broken heart
makes the soul waste away
makes the mind flit back and forth
and around
it steals your dreams
obscures the found-now-lost a way
confuses your emotions
and life
will it ever go away?
or forever make me pay
for attaching to someone and loving deeply
I cannot yet tell
I can only wait
and hope that better will come
that I will love again
that this love will disappear
fade away
be gone
die
find rest o my soul in God alone
for him my help comes from
and I will yet praise him
my savior and God
the maker of my plans
and keeper of my days
who holds all in his very large palms
my soul is downcast
but look up from within
he would not have you discouraged
no, certainly not
he said
blessed
are those who mourn
for comfort shall come
and morning from night
and darkness to dawn
there is one who is maker of all things
who brings light into darkness
and transforms completely
all who are his
one day
I will be his forever
and that cannot change
never no never no never
therefore do not be afraid
and do not be discouraged
take heart
for he has overcome | | |
| I have enjoyed my white Thanksgiving by:
leaving on Wednesday morning and not missing any classes since all 4 of them were canceled.
having an adventure in Chicago--we left the airport during our 8 hour layover and went to Millenium park with my cousin Erica, and her boyfriend, we saw the bean, ate at Giordano's and saw Jonie Yates too.
making it back to our flight with plenty of time to spare.
seeing my parents again.
talking to my parents about all kinds of stuff.
sleeping in every day.
yummy Thanksgiving food.
going running outside on the streets lined with snow, with my cousin Allie.
doing 85 pushups in 4 sets instead of 5.
having random dance parties in the living room with my brothers.
getting a new pair of shoes.
playing outside in the snow, building a snowman and having a snowball fight.
sitting in a hot tub at midnight outside in the snow with my brothers and cousin Allie.
But I also have some heavy thoughts to mull over, and a lot of homework...I'd better get to work on that. | | |
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