A New Heart

I wrote this a while ago, and I finally got around to posting it. It was sort of a journal entry/ what God was speaking to my heart. 

On my 16th birthday I received a very special gift from one of my very best friends. It was a beautiful necklace that he made himself. In the middle was a cross, and hanging off of it was a small heart-shaped charm, held by a small hoop. I wore it every day, never leaving the house without it. I got compliments about it all of the time. I smiled with pride, I felt special knowing that my friend had made it for me.

I was in art class recently when I realized that the heart had fallen off. I looked for it everywhere, and I couldn't find it. I looked through my backpack, hoping it had fallen in there somewhere. My disappointment grew with each notebook I flipped through and every moment I spent searching.

I told my friend about it, expecting him to be as upset as I was when I first found out. He had worked so hard on it. I felt like I had failed him, felt ashamed that I had let it break when I knew he had spent so much time making it perfect. His expression didn't change. He simply kept smiling and said "I'll just make you a new one." I told him he didn't have to, but he insisted that it wasn't a big deal. 

Today he made me a new charm, sending me pictures while he did so. I felt really thankful that he wasn't upset about it. That he was so generous and kind and instantly wanted to fix it for me. He actually told me he liked this one better than he liked the first, and I had to agree with him. 

He dropped off an envelope with the charm and handwritten directions on how to attach it to the necklace. He told me that I don't have to worry about if it breaks again, because he'd fix it. I showed the charm to my mom and said "Look, he made me a new heart. Isn't that sweet?" God spoke to me as the words escaped my mouth. 

You see, this situation is a great picture of how we might sometimes relate to Jesus. He gives us this wonderful gift of life, completing us with a heart made perfectly by him. While we can't misplace our heart, we can do things that make it gross and undesirable. Once we start searching for what we once were, He steps in. He tells us that we can stop searching and just surrender to Him. He begins to work in us. He doesn't get angry, He simply says "I love you, and I would do anything for you." His death on the cross allows us to be made new. We can be washed clean. Not only does he get rid of our nasty, filthy, dirty, sin-stained hearts, he creates a clean, pure, new heart. Just for us. Complete with His promise that when things get lost or broken, He will do whatever it takes to make things right again, better than they were before. ♥ 

Knowing the Difference: Satan's Lies vs God's Truth

But the giant's calling out my name and he laughs at me/Reminding me of all the times I've tried before and failed/The giant keeps on telling me/Time and time again "boy, you'll never win!/"You'll never win"/But the voice of truth tells me a different story/And the voice of truth says "Do not be afraid!"/And the voice of truth says "This is for My glory"/Out of all the voices calling out to me/I will choose to listen and believe the voice of truth
~From the song Voice of Truth by Casting Crowns

I'm sure you know what it's like to be lied to. Maybe you've told a few lies of your own. Maybe you've even believed some lies.
Actually, if you're like me, you've believed a LOT of lies in your lifetime. And I'm not talking about the "She's the one who took the last cookie" lies.
I'm talking about the lies of Satan. You know, the ones that aren't very in your face. But just because they aren't in your face doesn't mean they can't be very destructive and cause a lot of damage.

The Bible calls Satan the father of all lies, and the great deceiver. He will stop at nothing to try to make us believe things that aren't true. About ourselves, people around us, even about God!

...He was a murderer from the beginning, and has nothing to do with the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. ~John 8:44

And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. ~2 Corinthians 11:14

The first lie he ever told to a human happened back in Genesis. He lied to Eve, telling her that it wasn't wrong to eat the forbidden fruit. She believed him. Do you think he stopped there? No.

Think about some of the daily thoughts you have about yourself.
I'm ugly.
I'm unloved.
I'm unwanted.
I've fallen too far to be forgiven.
I should have never been born. 

These are some of the lies I notice a lot of people believing about themselves today. But sadly, a lot of them don't know that they're lies! There are also a lot of other lies people believe about sin, and God.

Disobeying and disrespecting my parents is okay. What do they know anyway?
Getting wasted with my friends isn't bad. I want to fit in.
Lust isn't a big deal.
I'm in love with him. It doesn't matter if we're not married. We've been together for a long time. 
This situation is just too small to ask God for help. God doesn't care about my life. 

So how can we know the difference between what is true about ourselves, and what the lies are? To know which are lies, we must first know the truth.
Jesus calls Himself the Way, the Truth, and the Life. The key word we're looking for here is Truth. And where can we find Jesus? In the Good Book.

Looking in the book of Matthew chapter 4, we see that Jesus used the word of God to rebuke Satan.
Jesus was in the desert, fasting, and He became hungry. So Satan tried to tempt Him by telling him that if He was the Son of God, He should tell the rocks to turn to bread. Jesus responded with "It is written...'a person lives not on bread alone, but by everything God says.'" Then Satan takes Him to a high place of a temple, telling Him to jump down, because the Bible says that God would command His angels to catch Him. Again, Jesus responds by quoting scripture. "It also says in the Scriptures, 'Do not test the Lord your God'". Then Satan takes Him to the top of a mountain and tells Him that if Jesus would bow down to him, he would give Him all of the kingdoms of the world. But Jesus said "Go away from me Satan! It is written... 'You must worship the Lord your God and serve only Him.'" After this, Satan leaves.

The thing I've come to realize about Satan is that for every truth God has, he has a lie to counteract it. It is so important that we know the truth about ourselves, because what we believe about ourselves strongly affects so many things in our lives!
So remember those lies I told you to think about earlier? Are you thinking of them now? Lets look into the Bible and find the truth that goes with each lie.


I'm ugly. Psalm 139:14 says that I am fearfully and wonderfully made by God and His works are wonderful.
I'm unloved. John 3:16, 1 John 3:1, 1 John 4:9-11, and Romans 5:8 say that God loved me so much that He sent His son to die for me even while I was still a sinner so that I could be made alive and become His child. 
I'm unwanted. Jeremiah 29:11 and 31:3 say that God knows the plans he has for me, to give me a hope and a future. He wants a relationship with me more than He wants to rule over me.
I've fallen too far to be forgiven. 1 John 1:9 says that if I confess my sin, He will forgive me and cleanse me and purify me from all unrighteousness.
I should have never been born. Jeremiah 1:5 says that before He formed me in the womb, He knew me and set me apart.

Disobeying and disrespecting my parents is okay. What do they know anyway? Ephesians 1:1-3 and Colossians 3:20 say that I should obey my parents because it pleases God.
Getting wasted with my friends isn't bad. I want to fit in. Ephesians 5:18, 1 Corinthians 6:10 and 1 Peter 5:8 say that I should be sober-minded and filled with the Spirit because drunkards will not inherit God's Kingdom.
Lust isn't a big deal. Jesus said in Matthew 5:28 that even lust is considered adultery of the heart.
I'm in love with him. It doesn't matter if we aren't married.  We've been together for a long time. 1 Corinthians 3:16-17, 1 Corinthians 6:19-20, Hebrews 13:4, Genesis 2:24, Ephesians 5:5 and Romans 12:1 say that sex is for marriage only, and I am to honor God with my body because it belongs to Him. 
This situation is just too small to ask God for help. God doesn't care about my life. Psalm 139 says that God has examined me and knows everything about me, when I wake up, when I sleep. He knows my thoughts before I think them. He knows my words before I speak them.

I challenge you to make a list of all of the lies that Satan has you believing about yourself. Maybe the list I made can help you. Then, go back and look into the Bible to see what the truth is. Speak them over yourself. Even if you don't believe it at first. Eventually you will start to believe it. Ask God to help you.

One thing I struggled with in the past was severe anxiety. I had really bad panic attacks for a long time. And God totally healed me from it! Satan's lies just made my anxiety worse. He would try to make me believe things would happen so that I would be scared to go to school. It was really hard. But after praying really hard and speaking the truth over myself that I found in the bible (Perfect love casts out fear 1 John 4:18) I began to heal from it, to the point where I don't have panic attacks anymore! Sometimes Satan will try to come in and tell me that I am not healed, but I rebuke him and tell him that I have been healed in Jesus' name and recite what the Bible says about fear. 

I hope you have found this encouraging and helpful. And remember, if you are struggling with severe anxiety or depression or thoughts of wanting to hurt yourself, it is okay to get help! God gave us doctors and counselors, and there is no reason not to utilize them! Just don't put more faith in them than you do in your God! He has all the answers, but there are times when He also wants us to reach out for help. You could also tell an adult, or a trusted friend about what you're going through, and I'm sure they would be willing to pray with and for you! 

One more thing: No matter what you've done, there IS forgiveness! So if you've gone too far with your boyfriend, or you've completely wronged someone, you don't have to feel like you're beyond forgiveness. Jesus will always love you. Just repent and ask Him for forgiveness. He will receive you with open arms and heal you from any hurt you're carrying.

Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow ~ Isaiah 1:18

Jesus loves you guys! Whatever you're struggling with, talk to Jesus! He is always listening, so just pour out your heart to Him and He will comfort you! 

Everything in Love

It seems like I've had a lot of free time on my hands lately, school hasn't started back up for me yet. With all the craziness of Christmas and New Years gone, I decided it would be a good time to start a blog post. But let me start by saying that God put something on my heart this year for a New Years Resolution, and that is to spend more time with him each day. I want to read my bible daily and spend more time in worship and in prayer. So far, I'm actually doing pretty well. My goal is to do just as well when school resumes.

With all of this free time came some to spend on the computer. So tonight I logged in to Project Inspired. If you're a girl that hasn't heard of this website yet, go check it out! It's a wonderful place for teen girls to find advice of all kinds. There's also a lot of beauty and fashion related stuff on there too.

After logging in to the chat room, we began talking. About a lot of things at first. Nothing really in particular. Then the topic of cussing came up. So we all just began sharing our opinions.

If you know me, you know I usually have a lot to say, especially if its something spiritual or somehow faith related. So I just started sharing what was on my heart.

When it comes to cussing, to me, you have three categories.
1) Your "swear" words. Yup. I'm talking your F-bombs and all that stuff. Stuff people consider the "bad" words.
2) Your Euphemisms. You know, instead of saying the actual "bad" word, you're saying "Fricken" or "Freaking" "Gosh Dangit"  "Dang."
3) And lastly, your "Careless" words. When I brought this up, many of the girls were confused and asked what I meant. So, I shared this verse:

"But I tell you that every careless word that people speak, they shall give an accounting for it in the day of judgment. For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." (Matthew 12:36-37).

Basically, what this verse is talking about are idle words. Words spoken that have no purpose, or have little thought behind them as to whether or not they are helping anyone, or glorifying God.

Then, another Project Inspired user shared this verse and brought something to my attention:

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. 1 Corinthians 13:1-3

No matter what we do, or say, if it's not done or said in love, it's all in vain.

About a year ago, I was being asked by my mom to do something that I really didn't want to do. And yes, she did have to ask me twice. When she asked me the second time, she also warned me that I would be punished if I didn't do what she said. So I started to do what she told me to do, but only because I didn't want to be punished for not doing it. Then, God spoke to my heart and brought this verse to my attention. I decided to examine my heart and change my attitude and motives. So instead of doing it in fear of being punished, I did it because I loved my mom and I wanted to obey her.

So, friends, let this encourage you to examine your heart and be more careful about what you say and do. No matter what it is, if love is not our motivation, then we're doing it for the wrong reasons.

Let all that you do be done in love. 1 Corinthians 16:14

Love is a Promise

Lately, God has been speaking to me about Love. 

I feel like our society cheapens the word. We use the word love in place of other words that don't have as much meaning. We say "Oh I love that TV show!" or "I love that song" when we could say "I really like that TV show!" or "I really enjoy that song!" and then we try to say we "love" people and that we "Love" God. But do we really feel as strongly about that TV show and that song as we do about God and people?

And what happens if we tell someone we love them? What are we really saying when we utter the words "I love you" ?

Most of us have heard of 1 Corinthians 13, you know, the Love Chapter. There's a reason they call it that. It has a lot to say about love!

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres." 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 

God brought me to this verse, and then told me that when saying "I love you", we are promising to follow these verses. You've probably heard "Love isn't an emotion", or, "Love is a verb" many times. It's kind-of cliche. But it is so true! 

Telling someone you love them is really saying: "I will be patient with you. I will be kind to you. I won't get jealous, I won't brag, I won't be proud. I won't dishonor you. I will be selfless. I won't be easily angered at you. I won't remember your wrongdoings. I will always protect you, and trust you. I will always hope for you and persevere."

Saying "I love you" is promising all of these things. 

And truly loving someone is doing your very best to keep all of the promises you made when you spoke those three words. 

Kindness, No Matter What

by Alexis 

Today, God has been speaking to me about being nice to people no matter what.

You know that person who you don’t like because they’re always acting immature, or that girl you aren’t friends with just because she makes fun of you or your friends? Well, there is always going to be somebody like that. But that doesn’t mean you have the right to hate them. You never know what they could be going through in their lives, and hating them could make it worse. It certainly doesn’t help the way kindness and love can.

The first thing this morning, I woke up after a bad dream. In it, my four year old brother, Nick,  and my dad were in a different room than I was. The room that I was in was dark. My dad came in, reached out to grab my hand and my sister’s hand, and he told us all, “Nick is having a heart attack.” It didn’t occur to me until after I woke up that nobody was actually freaking out. My dad was doing nothing but standing there.

Later in the dream, it somehow turned into “Nick has a tumor.” He was lying in a bed that we rolled around. He was dying of cancer. We brought him around to do a bunch of stuff before he died. He was acting like my one year old brother, Zack, and saying “bad guy” over and over the same way Zack does (I have no idea why). I forget what happened in the rest of the dream, and before I knew it, I was awake. One of the first things I heard from my mom was that Nick had an appointment at the doctor’s office for a cough that my mom and sister had already had. We knew he needed medicine. After hearing about this appointment, I thought, “Well, at least he isn’t dead.”

Then, I babysat almost all day, and when I got home, I got on the computer. I went on an awesome Facebook page, Christian memes. They always post about new videos from one of my favorite YouTube channels, BlimeyCow. A new one had come out today, so I watched it. It’s called “Seven Things Everybody Needs to Be Told”. The main idea is that you should be nice to people – and maybe tell them one of the seven things (i.e. I love you) -- no matter how they act, because their behavior could be a product of bad experiences at home or with friends. You don’t know what somebody is going through. So, you should always remember to treat everybody with kindness, not hatefulness.

A short time later, I was scrolling through my newsfeed when I found a funny picture of the SkitGuys. They had put their faces on Monster’s Inc’s Mike Wizowski and Sulley’s bodies. That reminded me that I hadn’t watched a SkitGuys video in a pretty long time, so I got on YouTube and looked them up. I figured that, in all that time that I hadn’t watched their videos, they had to have a new one up. Sure enough, I found a title that I didn’t recognize, and watched “Skit Guys - Little Billy: My God is So Big”. It’s about a little boy, Billy, at Sunday School whose teacher, Miss Linda, had been absent for a while. There had been many substitutes before, and the new one was the teacher’s husband. Billy was being his typical self, and tried to reject the new substitute. When the sub tried to sing My God Is So Big, Billy complained that that was “Miss Linda’s song” and that the new teacher couldn’t sing it. He tried to sing Jesus Loves Me instead. The two characters go through a funny skit about Billy and the new teacher.

Towards the end, Billy finally ends up asking, “Why do we have to sing Miss Linda’s song?” And at this, the sub got quiet. “Because my wife has cancer,” he started to say. With a tear in his eye, he explains to Billy, “My wife is very sick. She asked me if I could come today, and I just thought we could sing her favorite song…” As the teacher goes on about Miss Linda, Billy starts to feel bad. Once the sub fell quiet, Billy started to sing, “My God Is So Big.” And that was the end of the video.

After I watched this funny and beautiful video, I realized the main idea of today: that you don’t know what people might be going through, so you should be nice to them. I put everything together in my mind: in the dream, I experienced what it might feel like to have one of my little brothers die. Many people go through this in real life, and others go through other problems, such as abuse. It could greatly affect them, causing them to act up, bully others, or get stuck in bad moods all the time. The BlimeyCow video demonstrated what might happen if people like this were encouraged more, and ignored less. Lastly, the SkitGuys video was related to this. The substitute and Billy didn’t get along, partly because of Billy’s stubbornness, but also greatly because of what the teacher was going through.

My point is, be nice. That bully at school? Show kindness to him or her. That kid who is always in a bad mood, and who just “doesn’t want to talk about it?” Don’t push it, but make sure they understand that you’re there to listen if they need you. Sure, sometimes you can’t do much. But even those small things can make a huge difference. So, let somebody know that they have a friend. And I don’t mean you. You should be a friend to them, of course, but be sure to remind them that Jesus is their everlasting friend.

The Bad Things...

God, this world needs You.
What is the point in a comfortable life if it doesn't include a close walk with You?
What's the point in the internet and facebook and texting if all it does is distance us from You?
Lord, what's he point in anything that doesn't draw my heart into Yours?
Maybe there is a point to pain.
Because pain can cause us to run to You.
and You lead us to freedom.
Maybe, just maybe, pain leads to greater freedom than comfort.
Maybe, al of the bad things in my life cause me to be closer to You.
Romans 8:28 is no lie.
You make all things work together for my good because You love me.
The cross was something bad, but it lead to eternal life for me when placed in your hands.
Maybe the bad things...aren't so bad after all.

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