I find myself in a sea of people living from spiritual high to spiritual high. Some have a constant and growing faith, and some have a faith that hops from worship concert to Christian festival and is dead in between. I know it sounds like I'm judging them, and maybe I am, but it makes me angry to see people act like this, there is NO evidence that they are Christians except for when they raise there hands or say an "amen" during a worship song that really has no depth to it whatsoever. How can we think that God is actually pleased with this type of behavior? How can we all be so blind to what the bible says?

"When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. “But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you."

What good are healing crusades and mission trips if we are only trying to impress our family and friends? Why must we make a show out of our faith? They will know us by our FRUIT, not our Christianized tshirts and bumper stickers, nor by our numbers of how many people we "healed". On a further note, will God really bless me financially and materially if I give my money to the pastor's bank account, show me the bible verse that says that! At a recent concert...that was the message I got repeatedly over and over, and to tell the truth it completely ruined my experience of a band I used to love. These past few days since the concert...I've tried to listen to them on my ipod but all I can hear in the back of my head is the pastor telling me that I NEED some money in my hand so that God will bless me in my material ways, cause that will really do me a TON of good.

My prayer is not that I would be beyond the people that believe this lie, but that I could learn to pray for them in a non-judging way. And pray that they may find the REAL truth's of God

"look to me"

Never have I heard God's voice so clear



"look to me, I won't let you down"

I'm not who I was...

Sin is a constant battle, you don't really need a rocket scientist to tell you that. As scared as I am to admit this...lately..sin is winning this battle within me, and its tearing me apart. I havn't felt so apart from God since I became a Christian in 2005, and I'm left here wondering, where has all my faith gone? Has it dried up in the midst of all this change? Why is God allowing me to fall? Why can't I see Him when I'm surrounded by so much "Christian-ness"? How could I possibly forget the great things that God has done for me? I ponder these questions often and wonder how I got here. The only thing I can really come up with is sin, and the fact that I live in a broken place no matter how many times the name of Christ is thrown around.

So where do I go now? As I was listening to my ipod in the shower...Brandon Heath's: I'm not who I was , came on. I suddenly remembered why I was thankful for what God has done, because..I'm not who I was.
"I found us in a photograph
I saw me and I had to laugh
You know, I'm not who I was"

I think about the life I used to live...and wow, I'm not who I was. How many times can I say it? As many as it takes! Now my challenge is to grow from this standpoint. I'm not who I was, but I am a new person who needs to grow and be challenged in her faith. I need a constant reminder that I am not held down by chains any longer, that I can have the strength to walk away from it all if I just ask the Lord for it.

My biggest struggle is understanding that developing a right relationship with God is not instant..but a process. A constant process that takes time and nurturing like any relationship does.

Pray for me as the wounds within me are beginning to close.