Deeply Rooted

     While I was at work the other day, I was left to myself to think. I was thinking about forgiveness. Now, forgiveness is something that has been expected of people, especially Christians as the Bible tells us to forgive 77 times. Forgiveness I realize is a challenge for people, including myself. I sometimes struggle to forgive others, and there are so many times when I struggle to forgive myself.     In my life, so much of what I went through has brought up so much I have had to forgive people for. In high school, I was so angry, and it can be easy to fall back into the struggle of unforgiveness. Recently, it has been challenging, so as I was thinking through forgiveness, I realized some important things. 1. It is God who gives us the ability to forgive. God is love, and love keeps no records of wrong according to 1 Corinthians 13. I in my own strength and flesh can't forgive others the way it is expected of me. God gives us the complete ability to for...

    I hear so many Christians talking about their quiet time with God. I see on Instagram people who have their Bibles decorated in an assortment of notes and drawings. Personally, I have never been one to really like writing in my books, and that includes my Bible. I might do some underlining, but that is about it. I prefer my books to not have much writing in them because I prefer writing in journals and it seems less messy. Quiet time is something that can be so hard to fit in a college schedule where I often feel drained; however, I realize that in my lack of physical rest, the Lord provides strength when I take my mind off the stresses of college and focus on him.      I know that quiet time is important, but I am realizing that my quiet time with God does not have to look like everyone elses. I don't need to complicate it as it is simply spending time with God. I remember one day my alarm going off, and I just laid back down. I started praying to God as I ...

      "You need to come out of your shell", "You are always so quiet, you need to be louder", etc were things I heard so much growing up. I grew up thinking that my personality was a flaw because people were always telling me to be louder, and more confident. I thought that confidence was being the loud, outgoing person who is always ready to give a TED Talk, play a sport, or perform. I did not think that being quieter and more laid back was confidence.      My friends would know that I am not always quiet. I have a louder sillier side to myself, but I find myself sometimes needing space to step back into quietness. I love people, but I also love time alone. When I entered college, I had heard enough of people telling me that "you need to get out there". I ended up completely spending my days constantly trying to see people, going to everything I physically could, and staying busy until I physically couldn't stay awake anymore. I was taking the advice ...

      Last year, entered my sophomore year and I was in an interesting time in my faith. I am still in that time, and it is a time of learning what I actually believe. I started looking into worship and what I believe about worship. I started to really question things like "How do I actually worship in Spirit and in Truth?" "What should I look for in a church's worship service?", and "Why do I feel like I will never be good enough for God?". I was incredibly overwhelmed with these questions and confusion because my whole life I went along with the worship music I heard in church and I always felt like "I got this faith thing down". There came a lot of shame as well because I have been trying to read through the whole Bible. Reading the whole Bible is great, but I am realizing things could be missed if we are not doing it with the intent to learn more about Jesus and grow in relationship with him.     The first chapel of Junior year, I asked m...