Deeply Rooted

    I love sharing my Christian life here on the blog. A big part of my life is scripture study. As a way to hold myself accountable for reading scripture, I recently started studying the Bible in chronological order. We should be reading scripture less as a guidebook to live our lives and more so as a way to realize the character of who God is. I want to know and study the story of God and come to understand the whole context of scripture. With that, I am embarking on a journey of reading the Bible in Chronological order. I will share here what I see about the heart of God as I do this. The meaning of heart when it pertains to scripture and the original audience is the center. The original audience thought of the heart being the very center of who we are. The center of who God is and why he does what he does is very important as we learn to live our lives to his glory. I am in no way a biblical scholar, but my reflections will be based on my reading and understanding of scrip...

      The world is broken, things aren't fair, sad things happen, struggling happens, and that is all the reality of this world. This can be recognized by anyone. We realize that in this world sickness and disease happen, people are harmed or sinned against, and things happen that we wish would not happen. Grief and sorrow happen in this world. This past year, I was no stranger to struggling to the point where I wanted to quit. I wanted to quit life for a bit and just lay in my bed all the time. I wanted to give up and stop doing everything that was required of my grieving weary soul. I was just trying to get through and survive. Now I am in a place of processing it all. While going through the difficult season, I remember thinking this to myself: "Lord I have been through so many hard things that I feel like tried to break me, but Lord I have been through nothing apart from you who restores me". God gave me the strength to do the next small thing each day when the big th...

Not a child of shame, a child of God Not a child of insecurity, a child of God Not a child that needs to prove something to the world, a child of the God who rules over the world.  Not a child that needs to succeed, a child of God who already loves us without doing a single thing.  Not a child of going through the motions, a child of God who has called us to greater things.  Not a child who is a burden, a child of God who delights in us.   Not a child who is worthless, a child of God who puts his image in you. Not a child who is under the throne of the devil, but a child of God who has overcome the schemes of the devil.  Not a child who is unwanted, a child so desired by God who sent Jesus Christ to die for us.  Not a child who needs to change themselves for the world, but a child of God who we influence the world for.  A Warrior for Christ who puts on the Armor of God through the power of prayer.  A beautiful child of God who is made in his image...

      In psychology, Identity vs Role Confusion occurs in adolescence according to the theorist Erik Erikson. Maybe this is partially true, but I think that college is more of an identity-forming time than my high school years. Maybe I was looking around at different clubs in high school and I started to go deeper in my faith. Where I feel like my faith was like dipping my foot in a pool in high school, I feel like college has been literally diving all the way in. This diving in first brought up this "being on fire" that I think so many Christians strive for. This season lasted a few months, but then I was truly faced with this questioning within myself: "I know that Jesus is Lord and Savior of my life, but how do I do this faith thing right?" This lead to many questions regarding the programs I was involved in and the beliefs I felt I had for so many years.       I was so confused about everything: How do I worship God in Spirit and in Truth? What sho...