Testing this out to see if it will sync with my new WordPress account.  By the way you can now follow me there at http://shadesofpinklife.wordpress.com/ 

Salt Shaker--wait, what's that?

So here it is the long awaited revival of my blog!! LOL  So yes, I am still alive…thanks for asking! =)  I have been pretty busy with school and life which leaves me with not a ton of time to keep up with a blog.  However I am going to try to change that—at least for the summer.  Speaking of summer, I am super excited for this summer in particular because it is going to be amazing!!  Let me explain to you why this is true.

This summer I am going to be involved with my church’s college group’s summer program called Salt Shaker.  That was awkward to type/say—I’ll explain more.  Basically we will be meeting consistently on Tuesday and Friday nights where we will have dinner together, and then on Tuesdays we will be going through the book Radical by David Platt.  On Fridays we will be meeting like we have been during the school year to share what God has been teaching us through the week, prayer, and fellowship.  Then on other times during the week and weekends we will be doing various outreach and fellowship events.  Along with all this once a month there will be a weekend trip where similar groups from sister churches with-in the Great Commission church network(Chicago, West Lafayette, and Iowa…I think that’s it) will come together for a weekend of learning, fellowship, and outreach.  I am hoping to be able to attend these and will definitely be involved when the groups come here in June! 

God has really put it on my heart that everything in this world and our life is His and is given to us by Him.  This means that we should really be living every moment every breath for Him.  We are human so this is hard to do but we should still strive for this.  Everything that we do should be to glorify Him and reach others for Christ!  I am realizing more and more that this world is at war—a war between our sin nature and the nature of the world and living for Jesus.  Every day we are in this battle whether we like it or not.  Just like a soldier who is in battle and wants to survive never takes a break from not being ready to fight we should not “check out” of being prepared to take every opportunity that we have to reach others for Christ.  I am a warrior in God’s army.  Oh, and by the way we know how this war ends and well, God’s side is the winning side so why wouldn’t you want to be on that side!  I need to remember that to be a good warrior it takes training and fighting every day.  We are not here to just have fun and enjoy life—God does want us to have joy and to enjoy the life that He has given us, but ultimately we are here to sever Him and to reach others with the good news of eternal life. (And for those of you who know me I love hanging out with people, laughing, and even acting a little silly sometimes! So don’t misunderstand what I’m saying here).  Any way, this is why I am so excited for this summer!  I am dedicating this summer to God (I should be doing this ever day any way but ya gotta start somewhere).  This will be like my spiritual boot camp in away—learning to serve others, challenge my faith to the next level, and grow as a warrior daughter of Christ!

I hope to keep up with posting things more regularly this summer and sharing exciting events as well as what I have been learning!  Hope y’all have a great summer and are able to take time to grow closer to the Creator of the universe who loves you enough to send His Son to die for you.  As always…got questions?  Send em my way! =) (answers are not guaranteed, but I will do my best or find someone to help)      

“The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life, and he who wins souls is wise.” ~Proverbs 11:30 

New poem!! =D

Hey everyone! I haven't posted anything in a while(been busy adjusting to college life at IUPUI). So I decided to post this poem. I've been working on for a few days now and might still change it here and there, but I thought that it was pretty good now!

As for everything else in my life... Well here's the short version. Everything is going really well! I'm loving IUPUI and I'm making a lot of friends and really enjoying getting plugged in w/CRU(Campus Crusade for Christ) there. I finally got an apartment and the move in day is October 15!!! Whoo Hooo!!! Also God has been working on my heart a lot and somethings have been coming into place for me to take a really big leap of faith. I can't go into all the details right now, but please be praying for me! If all this goes through, I will be really stepping out of my comfort zone!

Thanks guys! I'll write more later!

Jesus Did for Me!

9-12-10

Christ died on Calvary!

He died to save my soul and set me free!

His grace poured out on my sinful heart

And brought light to my darkest part.

I will sing and dance with glee;

Because of Jesus darkness flees!

He reached down into my broken soul

And is now surely making it whole.

It’s because of Jesus I’m alive;

Because of Him that I cannot die.

He took my secret scars within,

And He paid the debt that I was my sin.

He has wrapped me in His love

Now and forever more!

Whatch Ya Worrin About?

Hey Peoples!

Well this is quite annoying. You see I was driving home from church this morning and had the most amazing idea for a new post topic. Then I got home and busy with stuff, then took a nap, and now I've completely forgotten!!!! Uhg bug lug! This is really silly! Well if I remember it I'll post it so ya'll can then know. Until then, I just give you all a brief update on what's going on in my life.

It is now a week after the BreakDown Regional Conference 2010, and it was amazing!! I am still processing and trying to understand at a deeper level some of the stuff we learned. I'm also missing the people from Kentucky, STL, and Chicago!! I had such a great time getting to know everyone and growing in the Lord. I miss them all like crazy! I've always loved to hear people give their testimony, lessons they've learned, or how God has impacted their lives, but I have never been so moved by them like I was at the conference. They were all so powerful, and God used their stories to reach me in profound ways!

I'll be honest, things haven't been all wonderful and all "spiritual high" for me. I didn't feel like I was "on fire for God" or anything like that...I already have that a lot. This time it was more of a quiet calm. A peace and a loving warm embrace is the best way that I can describe it. Within this past week, I've had made stormy moments and I'm having to fight some battle even now, but every time I start to let myself run away with the depressed and overwhelmed feeling, I stop and run into the arms of Jesus, through prayer. It is amazing how after talking my head off to Him, crying some tears, and singing some of my fave Christian songs, how much peace and even joy I've felt!! I now just have this amazing peace that every time I start to stress out it's like, Jesus is right there saying, "calm down, keep your eyes on me, I won't let you sink!"

It is such a wonderful thing when you really come to understand this and put running to Him into practice! As some of you may know, I'm a worrier. I get stressed out easily. I am also used to having minor panic attacks often. Finally coming to understand this has been so freeing for me!

All this has also been put to the test this week especially, because I found out that I am now 26th on the waiting list for an apartment. My mom told me that when she asked if I'd have one by Christmas, the lady said that you can always hope. There is the reality that I might not even get it until next fall. This is very hard for me to handle... I'm a planner, big stuff like this needs to have a set-in-stone date, time, and place. Little things I can handle just "winging it." So this has been a huge challenge for me! We have talked about looking at other apartments in the area....along with a few other options. None of those other options are that great though. As much as I want things settled now, I keep feeling like God is telling me walk in faith and be patient. I keep asking Him what this walking in faith means because I can't pack up everything only to find out that I won't be moving until next fall. Then to complicate things more, I am in the process of looking for a job. My mom pointed out that it would be silly to get a job downtown if I am still living up north with my parents, yet it would also be silly to get a job here if I end up moving downtown. I still keep hearing God say, "walk in faith." So, I'm still trying to figure out what this really means... I guess one way I'll now if I'm "walking in the right direction" is where, when, or if I get a job.

Life is one big crazy adventure! I'm learning to not try to handle everything myself, but to run to God with it and let Him help me with it all! =)

Hope ya'll are enjoying your summer and growing in the Lord!

Have a great Sunday!

BreakDown Regional Conference 2010!!

Hey everyone!

These few weeks have been crazy for me! I have been working on my summer classes like crazy so that I wouldn't have much to do this week with the BreakDown conference. Here it the first day of the conference...I'm a little sleep deprived, but super excited! This week is going to be awesome! It had a great kick off on Monday when I got to hang out the whole day with Lindsay! We went swimming and I got a little sunburned. lol We couldn't go swimming at first because there was the biggest spider in Indiana in the pool and we had an army wasps attacking us. Finally after killing the spider that would not die and fighting off the wasps, we got to swim.

Today is Wednesday, the first day of the BreakDOwn conference. I'm sitting here waiting for people to come and check-in. The rest of this week will be amazing! I'm praying that God speaks clearly to all of this week and to me specifically. I've been so stressed with school and everything that I am so ready to have some fun with my BD family and grow closer to God! I am also excited because I am on the worship team for the conference. I haven't sung in front of people for a long time and I love that I can now use it to worship Jesus! I'm super excited! I could go on for quite a while, but I should really go.

Please be praying for us! Have a good rest of the week!

God Bless!!

Hey Everyone!

Tomorrow it will be a month from when I started the music challenge. I am happy to say that it has been going really well! I even lost track of how long I had been listening to nothing but Christian music. I've even discovered some new groups that I have come to really like! It probably won't be hard for to me to continue listening to more Christian music than anything else. It seems hard to believe but it has helped put everything back into perspective for me!! It has been very refreshing!

So the other thing is that it is a WEEK before the BreakDown Regional Conference!!! I am so flip flopping excited!!!! It's not going to be as big as the first with only BreakDown St. Louis, some of Chicago, and some from the new team starting in Kentucky, but it will still be awesome!!! Words can't even begin to describe how excited I am!!!!!!

It is also exciting to see how God is moving with-in this group! Like this past Saturday we were working on the skit that we have been shaping for several weeks now and we just were really having a hard time. We came together and started discussing our concerns with the scene, and we ended up completely re-writing it that day! Then on Tuesday, we held an emergency meeting to work on the scene that we want to do for the conference. I was really nervous on how we were going to pull this off. I know that it was in God's hands because we nailed it on Tuesday! It was so amazingly good for literally just coming up with it. We only have 3 solid scenes and the scene with all the girls was the one that was the most complicated. It's all so exciting! This Saturday we will have practice for pretty much the whole day…as long as we need to have it to get everything down. Then come Wednesday, we will be heading to the conference!! That first night is our show case night where we will perform it for the first time. It is all so exciting! =)

If you could just keep us in your prayers as we go into this next week, it would be greatly appreciated!

Hope you all are keeping cool in this crazy heat!

Have a good day!

A Change in Music and a Whole Other Realization!

Hey everyone!

Well, here it is July 7 and I am happy to say that I am still going strong with my music challenge! I have found it easier as time went a long to listen to nothing but Christian music. I also came to realization that it was the hardest not to turn the tuner knob in my car to Radio Now, WZPL, or one of the other secular stations that I would often listen to, when I was upset, mad, or unhappy with something in my life. When I was like this I had to stop myself from turning that knob. I'd even begin to justify turning it with, "It's not that big of a deal...No one would know." Every time though I'd be like "No!" I'm can do this. Pretty soon I began to see that wanting to turn away from Christian "stuff" went much further than just music. It is a struggle in every part of my life. When I am angry at someone or a circumstance, or I'm upset it is so easy for me to throw a thousand "whys" and "I don't get its" God's way. Then I get frustrated because I can't see how this is all supposed to work out in the end and I start to run the other way, away from God. It's so easy for me in those moments to not read my Bible, not pray, and not go to church. My natural reaction is push everyone away even Jesus and mope all by myself. I have to laugh at how silly this all seems, but it's not some "no big deal" "silly" thing...it's something that hinders my growth closer to God.

I don't really know why I is easier for me to run away from God when things get shaky. I mean He is God. He is all powerful. It seems like it would make much more sense to run to Him than away. All I know is that I'm human and as a human I do stupid things. =) Part of it I know is the enemy whispering lies in my ears that "God doesn't really love me" "He's not really forgiving" or "What if He's not really real?" I know that I push people away because I feel vulnerable and I'm scared that they'll see the insecure me and not like that "me" and disappear or that I'll be a burden because they already have enough going on in their life. I guess that somehow I kind of believe that about Jesus too, even though that's crazy because he already see everything I do, He knows everything in my heart, and He hears every thought in my head. I'm glad that I saw all of this so clearly these past few weeks!

So, I am going to take this music challenge even further! Every time I get upset and frustrated with something in my life and I feel myself turning to run in the other direction, I'm not going to let myself. When I want to just turn on the tv and block out all my thoughts, I will let myself feel all those emotions and pour it all out to Jesus. I will pick up my Bible and read through my favorite Psalms. Whatever it takes to keep myself from run away and to keep myself running to God! I am not saying that I will not have a moment where I run the opposite direction, but I am going to learn to trust God completely and let Him wrap me in His amazing love when I feel down. =)

Have a fantastic day! =)