Prayer V

God, what am I doin'? I'm so stuck in my ways. I so badly want all the desires of my heart. Why am I so selfish? Why is my heart so focused on everything but you? I'm so tired of this, I'm so tired of the pain and disappointment of this world. Yet I still seek it more than you. I hate it! Even now when I try to focus on you my heart is being given away to earthly thoughts, hopes, and desires. I hate it so freaking much! All I want is this world, but all I need is you. I cant want you on my own, I will always choose to not want you as much as I want sin. So please, please, give me strength though your love and grace to overcome my wicked heart.

“Cursed is the one who trusts in man,
    who draws strength from mere flesh    and whose heart turns away from the Lord.
That person will be like a bush in the wastelands;
    they will not see prosperity when it comes.
They will dwell in the parched places of the desert,
    in a salt land where no one lives.

 “But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord,
    whose confidence is in him.
 They will be like a tree planted by the water
    that sends out its roots by the stream.
It does not fear when heat comes;
    its leaves are always green.
It has no worries in a year of drought
    and never fails to bear fruit.”

The heart is deceitful above all things
    and beyond cure.
    Who can understand it?

 “I the Lord search the heart
    and examine the mind,
to reward each person according to their conduct,    according to what their deeds deserve.”

I don't know what the future holds for me. I don't know what Ill be doing, or who will be apart of it. I know what I want, I know what I desire, and its not wrong but putting it above what you might have planed, that's wrong. I'm scared out of my mind that it wont be what I want, it wont be what I think I need. But you are greater than my plans you will not disappoint me. you will bless me with the true desires of my heart the desires that will honer and bless you. It's so hard but I trust you. I know that you will is greater than my own. I will fallow you. Please heal my heart, give me strength in my darkness. I need my King more than ever.


My friends you are in my prayers please keep me in yours. You are so loved!! 

Joyful In My God

The Lord is testing me. He is testing my heart, my mind, my soul, my faith. I don't know why, I don't understand, I'm confused and hurting. I long for a time not to long ago when I had everything I wanted, everything I "needed". I long for love, I long for happiness, I long for peace and assurance, but I get none. I feel like this time in my life isn't getting better, its not going away. I feel like the Lord isn't answering my prayer, isn't hearing the deepest cry of my heart. I long for Him to hear me and answer me. I long for this time to be taken away. I will wait and I will pray, He will, in time give me peace. Suffering produces endurance and perseverance. 

I urge you all to read the book of Habakkuk. Like Lamentations its a great reminder that God no matter what we go through and experience is still God. He is love, peace, joy, and happiness. The King of ALL. We should take joy in that and know that His love is good and our suffering is nowhere near as painful as the suffering He did for us. I have hope in my God, He is and always will be the the only sure thing in my life on this earth. I will be joyful in my God. The Lord is my portions therefor I will hope in Him.

 I heard and my heart pounded,    my lips quivered at the sound;decay crept into my bones,
    and my legs trembled.Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity
    to come on the nation invading us. Though the fig tree does not bud
    and there are no grapes on the vines,though the olive crop fails
    and the fields produce no food,though there are no sheep in the pen
    and no cattle in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord,
    I will be joyful in God my Savior.The Sovereign Lord is my strength;
    he makes my feet like the feet of a deer,    he enables me to tread on the heights. (Habakkuk 3:16-19)

You are in my deepest prayers my friends, please keep me in yours. You are loved by a great God!!

What Summer Holds

Its been to long since I last posted. I will do a better job of keeping all of you who read this (which is probably no one) up to date with my life and what the Lord is teaching me every day. This post is more of a list of things that I want to accomplish this summer. Hopefully it will be fun to read and hopefully I can write a post at the end of the summer saying that I accomplished all of my goals for the summer. Will see what happens, and maybe some of you will even be apart of my summer bucket list, which would be awesome cause I love adventuring with friends. So hear we go, with no particular order.

• Read Two books (Working on Reasons for God right now)
• Read all of the New Testament 
• Work on building a stronger foundation as a Christian
• Seek being a man of Christ like never before, work at being the man of God He has called me to be
• Grow in my faith more than I ever have
• Spend at least and hour ever day with my creatore 
• Become a Christ like leader
• Ententualy reach out to unsaved friends and love them like Christ
• Love others/ mentor and encourage others in their walk with Christ
• Work on humility 
• Work on loving others as Christ loves me
• Run 300 miles 
• Walk from Gardner to Olathe
• spend on day and night in the wild with only Christ
• spend more time outside Hammocking, walking, running, instagraming..(etc)

So far that all I can think of, but I will update the list if anymore come up. Mostly I want this summer to be about growth and adventure. I wont learn how trust in the Lord and give my all to Him no matter what life brings my way. I know He will bless me this summer. It should be an awesome time. Hope I cant enjoy it with all you at some point.

Keep praying for me, I'm praying for you, you my friend are loved.

A Year from Now

Today is my last full day at my first year at Kansas State University. Its hard to really explain how I feel about this. See this year has been by far one of the best, most amazing years of my life. I have gained and grown in so many new friendships. I have grown In my walk with Christ. I have learn that my God is so good, no matter what.

This year began with so much hope and excitement. I couldn't wait to get here accomplish great things. I was so full of life, I was so passionate about my God and my faith. I saw the Lord working so evidently in my life, bringing new amazing people into it. I saw the Lord work more so in the first half of this year than I ever had before. Life was good, it was great. Everything I wanted I had.

But I got content, I lost track of who I was and what my goals where. I started to drift from God and His word. I put other things above him. So the blessings and gifts that He gave me earlier He took away. He wanted me to see that He is all I need. He is the only thing that will give me true joy. I did so well for a long time. But then I got selfish and, well, I hurt a lot of people. I disappointed not only myself but others that I loved.  I know the what kind of man I am, I know that I'm the guy that I was at the beginning of the year. But God had to show me the hard way, put me through hard times to get refocused on Him.

But God is so good! He has helped me grow in the last few months more than I thought I could. He has opened my heart His will not my own. Even thought this year was so good and feels like its ending bad. He is good and I see his perfect plan working in my life. I cant thank Him enough for his Love and grace that I don't deserve.

This year has been amazing! So many amazing memories with people that I love. I was blessed to gain a friends that changed my life forever. I was blessed to grow with so many good friends. Even though this year is ending rougher than I thought or wanted. I wouldn't change it for anything in the world.

I wouldn't give up trips to the library with my friends, "Doctors" visits with Ryan and Aaron (love advice),  late night talks at Seaton, movie nights with friends, late nights walking home to West, late night pranks with my roommate, adventures in KC, graming in Gardner, snow day adventures, and all those long fun drives from Manhattan to KC. there are so many smaller memories that I can think of but those are just some that I wanted to share.

All I can say is, Lord you have blessed me more than I deserve. You are a great God. Thank you so much for an amazing first year at K-State. I also want to say thanks to Morgan, Sarah, David, Aaron, Ryan, Josh for an amazing year. Your friendship means the world to me. I couldn't ask for a better group of friends. Thanks!

You are all in my prayers. I hope your summers go well and are honoring to the Lord. I hope they are filled with growth in Him. You are loved!

Idols of the Heart

I recently watched a sermon by Tim Keller called The Gospel and Idolatry. It goes over Acts 19: 21-41 and how Paul looks at and deals with the idols of his time. He also talks about how we can compare them to idols of our time and how we must see these idols and deal with them as Christ would deal with them. Here is what God word say in Act 19:21-41.

²¹ Now after these events Paul resolved in the Spirit to pass through Macedonia and Achaia and go to Jerusalem, saying, “After I have been there, I must also see Rome.” ²² And having sent into Macedonia two of his helpers, Timothy and Erastus, he himself stayed in Asia for a while.

²³ About that time there arose no little disturbance concerning the Way. ²⁴ For a man named Demetrius, a silversmith, who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the craftsmen. ²⁵ These he gathered together, with the workmen in similar trades, and said, “Men, you know that from this business we have our wealth. ²⁶ And you see and hear that not only in Ephesus but in almost all of Asia this Paul has persuaded and turned away a great many people, saying that gods made with hands are not gods. ²⁷ And there is danger not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis may be counted as nothing, and that she may even be deposed from her magnificence, she whom all Asia and the world worship.”

²⁸ When they heard this they were enraged and were crying out, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”²⁹ So the city was filled with the confusion, and they rushed together into the theater, dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians who were Paul's companions in travel. ³⁰ But when Paul wished to go in among the crowd, the disciples would not let him. ³¹ And even some of the Asiarchs,^[e] who were friends of his, sent to him and were urging him not to venture into the theater.³² Now some cried out one thing, some another, for the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together. ³³ Some of the crowd prompted Alexander, whom the Jews had put forward. And Alexander, motioning with his hand, wanted to make a defense to the crowd.³⁴ But when they recognized that he was a Jew, for about two hours they all cried out with one voice,“Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”

³⁵ And when the town clerk had quieted the crowd, he said, “Men of Ephesus, who is there who does not know that the city of the Ephesians is temple keeper of the great Artemis, and of the sacred stone that fell from the sky?^[f] 36 Seeing then that these things cannot be denied, you ought to be quiet and do nothing rash. ³⁷ For you have brought these men here who are neither sacrilegious nor blasphemers of our goddess. ³⁸ If therefore Demetrius and the craftsmen with him have a complaint against anyone, the courts are open, and there are proconsuls. Let them bring charges against one another. ³⁹ But if you seek anything further,^[g] it shall be settled in the regular assembly. ⁴⁰ For we really are in danger of being charged with rioting today, since there is no cause that we can give to justify this commotion.” ⁴¹ And when he had said these things, he dismissed the assembly.

The fact is this, as sinful people we love to make things our idols. We put things above God because we like to put whatever gives us satisfaction on earth about Him. To be completely honest with you, and I, are idol worshipers. We may not be on a knees praying to some statue, but we do give our lives over to "worshiping" the idols of our hearts, minds, and flesh.

The question that pastor Keller bring up is this. You know something is an idol in your life if you cant live without it. So what I what cant you live without? could you live without your parents or children? could you live without your husband or wife, boyfriend or girlfriend? Could you live without social media, internet, cell phone, TV? could you live without money, a car, a house?

You may seem easy to say that you could live without those people or things. But really think about it, would it "ruin" your life? would it hurt who you are as a person? would it dramatically change you to for the worse or  to mediocrity? Would you be upset with God if he took the "non idols" out of your life? would you be able to look at Him and say "you are holy, you are good"?

I will come up with a list of my idols and post them on this post later. But I want you to also to pray and think and to come up with a list of idols that you "cant" live without. Now obviously you can live without anything but its the how you react to the idol being gone that Im talking about. So come up with a list of things that you "cant" live without.

Know this, God is good. He is the only thing that give you and me true satisfaction in life. Not your wife, not your kids, not a car, or house, or even money. All of that is fleeting with time. All of that will hurt and will end disappointing you. Only Christ will fulfill you, love you, and satisfy you. God is the only God. He deserves all of us and no one and no thing should ever take our hearts and our love more than Christ.

You are in my prayers. Keep me in yours. You are loved!

Valley Maker: Abraham & Isaac

I was introduced to the awesome band Valley Maker earlier this year and have loved them since the first song. The album created by Austin Crane, was made for his senior thesis project. The album is basically the book of Genesis sung. Its really great I suggest checking them out at Valley Maker.com.

Today I was thinking about Abraham. I was thinking about how long he waited for Isaac. How much faith he put into the Lord to provide him with a son. Then after years of being patient God delivers on his promise and give Abraham a son. But then after all of that, after God gives Abraham everything he ever wanted He asked Abraham to give it back. And what does Abraham do? He takes his son up to the mountain and prepares to sacrifice the greatest thing that had ever happened to him. He was faithful to God. 

How awesome and encouraging that is to me. To know that God has a plan, he has a promise but it all goes through Him. He promises to give us the desires of our hearts but only if we are willing to give them up for him. We all have "Isaac's" in our lives. Things that we wait for, things that we love, things that we give us hope, peace, identity. But the main question is this, can we be like Abraham, can we put all of are trust in God even if we have no idea why He is doing what He is doing? I hope so. I know its hard to think about, I know its a hard thing to deal with. But I hope we can look at Abraham's faithfulness and see that God is good. I hope we can be like Abraham and be willing to give up what we love most in this world for God. It wont be easy, it will be really hard to do, but be faithful because you serve a faithful God.

Here are the lyrics to the song hope they encourage you. You are loved by a faithful God.

Oh great teacher 
Are you a promise keeper? 
It’s time to go son 
The work must be done 

Oh great father 
Would you call for slaughter? 
We waited so long 
I waited so long 

Oh great provider 
Have we made you tired? 
Am I to blame now? 
Am I to blame somehow? 

Burning torches 
Is this how I worship? 
It’s on the way now 
The lamb is on the way now 

Am I to say how? 

All that you hope 
All that you know 
All that you thought was yours to hold 
Burn it alive 
Learn to set fire 
Learn to fear what you sacrifice 


Oh great servant 
You have served your purpose 
Put your hand down 
Put your hand down 

Oh great promise 
To finish what I started 
Is not too much now 
To spread our son out 

You will not see how 

But I swear by myself 
I swear to your health 
Just as I saw you lay him down 
Ram you come out 
Ram you come out 
Ram would you lay your body down 


Oh my father 
I see the wood and fire 
But where’s your lamb now? 
Where’s our lamb now?

Pron to Wander He finds my Heart

This will be a short post. I saw some of the song Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing on a friends Facebook status today. I couldn't help but thank the Lord. I looked up the song and listened to it. Again all I could do was prays the Lord for his love. 

I wanted to share this with you because, well, today like many days this past month has been hard. I have felt like my wondering heart will never find a place to stay. But its always had a home, Christ has always held it in his hand. How great is our God. How great is his Love. Before we were in the womb he new us. He has always had our hearts. He is love.  

Jesus sought me when a stranger

Wandering from the fold of God

He, to rescue me from danger

Interposed His precious blood

O to grace how great a debtor

Daily I'm constrained to be

Let that grace now, like a fetter

Bind my wandering heart to Thee

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it

Prone to leave the God I love

Here's my heart, O take and seal it

Seal it for Thy courts above

Come, Thou Fount of every blessing

Tune my heart to sing Thy grace

Streams of mercy, never ceasing

Call for songs of loudest praise

Teach me some melodious sonnet

Sung by flaming tongues above

Praise the mount, I'm fixed upon it

Mount of Thy unchanging love