PC Recap

So I am almost  Junior.  That is one of the weirdest statements I have head in a long time.  I feel like it was just yesterday I was exciting about moving out of the house and starting college.  I realized today when I was eating lunch with Fryml and Cameron that I am almost halfway done with my college career.  We were sharing funny stories and good memories from pledgeship and realized how long ago that was.  So now on a more serious note.  Looking back on the past year and a half I realize how many witness opportunities I have had that I let slip right through my fingers.  My desire and prayer is that over the next two and a half years here I run after each chance.  I pray that I not wait for the chance to come to me but that I actively seek those who want to know more about the love of Jesus.  Hopefully you will too whatever your case.

Accepting the call

Have you ever wondered why certain events happen in your life? I mean of course we have all heard “everything happens for a reason” but seriously.  How many times does something bad, or trying happen and we question it or question God because we don’t like the way it went down.  I have been realizing lately that all things happen for a purpose whether we like it or not.  The part that will really irk me is that probably 80% of the time I won’t ever know what the purpose was.  Very rarely will I actually know.

So here’s the thing.  Sometime we have to do things that suck.  Sometime we have to listen to God and accept his call for us. (Sorry I just really wanted to use the title in this).  Anyway I am also aware that sometime events happen to us completely out of our control and we have to accept them and grow through them.  This year I had to deal with the loss of my Grandmother.  It has been one of the toughest things I have ever had to deal with but through it I carry on her legacy.  She was one of the most amazing Christian women I have ever had the privilege of knowing.  Because of her passing I was forced to go closer to God and rely on Him more. So …yup

Sunday’s thoughts

ONE Newspring today was amazing. I am so blessed to be a part of the movement that is going on in this church.  Two this series at newspring that started today is going to be so good.  I can’t wait to see myself and other people firmly take hold of what God has in store for us and surrender to Him.  Three I got to see Wicked tonight and it was ridiculous.  One of the coolest thing I have ever seen.

Weekend Plans

So this weekend isn’t really going to be a break for me.  I have to start reading right about now for a paper I have do next week.  So two tests and two papers next week should be a fun one for me.  Other than that we are supposed to get snow tonight.  But as everyone from South Carolina knows if we get anything it will be the same nasty gray ice slush mixture.  Tonight my fraternity has a mixer with ∑∑∑.  It is a superhero and villains theme.  I think i am going as Frank Lampard soo fight on Blues! O and I have tickets to go see Wicked on Sunday night.  I am so excited about that.

As far as the blog goes, I will be closing out Romans probably tomorrow night, maybe Sunday morning.  Reading this book has been really good for me and has taught me a lot.  I really recommend you read it yourself if you enjoyed what I wrote about it.  The great thing about scripture is that we could both read it and come away with different things.  So I hope everybody has a great weekend!

Just a feeling

Ok so as weird as it sounds I have really been praying over this blog and what to write on it every day.  Well lately I have been feeling really convicted that somebody reading this is desperate for a Savior and for something more than what they have right now.  So I have decided that today I am going to lay out my story before I knew Jesus and what it is now.  So here we go from the start.  Growing up I had almost every advantage I could have asked for.  I was lucky enough to grow up in a home with both of my parents and I had both of them encouraging me to go to church every week.  Well I did like they asked and I went with them every week to church and sometime when I was somewhere between seven and ten I saw a lot of my friends accepting Christ and I thought it was the cool thing to do so I prayed a prayer and thought I had done it too.  Well I kinda just kept drifting from there for about five years.  After five years I found myself as a freshmen in high school that wanted to do anything to be accepted.  Well it didn’t take long for me to realize that the cool things were usually far from Godly.  So freshman year was the first time I ever had a drink and the first time I had sex.  Well I was having fun and I was living an “awesome” worldly life.  My excuse for it was that I thought I was a Christian and would always say that whatever I did would be forgiven by God, which is a completely separate issue I talked about last week in my Romans 6 post.  So between freshmen year and junior year I pretty much continued living the way I just described.  The thing about it was I thought I had everyone fooled.  I thought everybody saw me as a good boy that never did anything bad.  Well now I know that it wasn’t secret and everybody my age saw me for what I really was.  Nothing new really happened in my life until midway through junior year.  I realized that I was empty and I wanted so much more.  I saw the hunger my friends had for Jesus and the joy they got from going to church and I was jealous of it.  I was only finding my happiness on Friday and Saturday nights and coming up empty every other day.  Well on August 25th 2007 I was at an event called Pulse which absolutely blew my mind.  I made the toughest decision of my life that night.  I was surrounded by 1500 people that I was good friends with and all thought that I was a Christian already.  I had to choose in front of them, that night, that an eternal life with Jesus was more important than my pride.  Well I can say it was the best decision I have ever made and I wish I could have made it earlier in my life.  My life was completely changed and it was amazing.  The Bible says in Romans 10:13, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved”.  I don’t know if anybody is even reading this but if you are and you think you have done something too bad for God, you are wrong.  There is nothing you could have done that He won’t forgive you for.  The grace of God is more amazing than anything any human or any substance can offer.  If anybody reads this and has any questions or wants to know more about Jesus or the possibility of accepting Him as savior please call, facebook, comment on here anything. I would love to talk to you about it.

As Promised, Romans 12

Alright so here it goes. Sorry about the wait.  Ok Romans 12:4-6.  ”Just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not all have the same function, so in Christ we who are many form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.  We have different gifts, according to the grace given us. If a man’s gift is prophesying let him use it in proportion to his faith.”  I don’t have to tell ya’ll for you to know that everybody has a different calling.  Everybody has something different they are good at naturally.  As much as I like to pretend, I am decent at best at playing the field in soccer.  I like to pretend I have fifa skill but I don’t.  I have my gifts.  And in no way are my gifts any better than somebody else’s.  Looking at the big picture sometimes people start to feel insignificant.  Using the example of Newspring, the church doesn’t function without everybody.  The people  parking the cars in the lot are just as important as those working with kids and those that are on stage preaching.  It is just like the verse says.  God has instilled gifts in all of us that are for us to use.  It is like the verse says using the analogy of the body.  God has called us to step up and be the hands and feet of the church.  Get out and make an impact using the gifts we have been given.

Wednesday

Exhaustion.  That is the name of the game for me today.  I wish I had something heavy to lay down today but I don’t I read Romans 12 this morning and it was SO GOOD but I just could not process all of the information.  There will be a post later tonight about it because I am getting some much needed sleep and then hittin that up again.  So check back later tonight to find out what my thoughts are on it.

Be intentional

God has been laying so much on me lately it has been wild.  Some of these things I have known for a while and He is reemphasizing and some of them are new things that He has dropped on me this week.  First thing I really wanna say because this applies to everybody, especially if you are reading this.  I am so blessed.  It is crazy how much I have been blessed with.  Right now I am sitting on my own bed using my own computer to write down my thoughts and I have no fear of somebody coming to punish me for doing it.  If you are reading this you are most likely doing something really similar in your room or office maybe.  Did I mention my bed is in my room at my college.  The opportunities God has laid out before me are so abundant and so many times I catch myself being stressed out because I have a test coming up or because somebody started a rumor.  WHO CARES!  God really laid it on me last night that every second I spend stressing about those things is a second that I spend not pursuing Him.  It is a second I waste because I was more worried about my circumstance than His promise.  Second thing is this.  Every single conversation I have form now on will be intentional.  Everything I do will have a purpose.  While I was in Kenya there was no filter for it and whatever I wanted to say was said.  While I was over there I prayed that when I came back I would have the same reckless abandon for what people thought about me but when I came back I lost it.  While I was over there if I wanted to talk to somebody about Jesus the conversation was, “Hey my name is Matt, how are you, do you know Jesus?”  Why not here? Why do I care so much about what people might think about me? Why am i so worried that the person I ask could be offended by me asking them if they know about the greatest thing the world will ever know? The answer is both ridiculous and selfish. I don’t want to make somebody mad and lose a friend.  Why am I not more worried about that friend spending eternity in Hell. FOR REAL?  ”I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.” Galatians 2:20.  From now on this is it for me.  I am done worrying about losing a friend.  The glory of God is going to shine through me in all aspects. I will be intentional.

Romans 10

Ok so I have been stuck on Romans 10 for a while now just trying to digest this information.  My heart for the things in this chapter is just unbelievable and I can’t get past some verses in it so here we go. “For, EVERYONE who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved” 10:13.  EVERYONE.  This is something that really hits home for me because for a long time, namely junior year of high school, I kept telling myself that after waiting so long and messing up in so many areas of my life there was no way I could approach such a holy God and Him accept me. WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG! Everyone who calls, a phrase that could help so many people in need.  Another things that comes at me from this verse is Christians. So many Christians today need to read this verse as well.  I don’t care how long you have been attending your Sunday School class or how long your family has been a member of a church.  EVERYONE is welcome and there is NO place for you to EVER look down on somebody because of mistakes they have made because they are in the exact same place you were before Jesus and it is YOUR job to lead them to Him.

10th anniversary thoughts

First off, GOD is doing amazing things at Newspring Church.  It is unbelievable that 15,000 people gathered in one place today to worship God together.  Two I am so blessed to have been able to be a part of this for the past 5,6 years and cannot wait to continue to be a part.  Ok now for the fun part.  A long time ago I felt God calling me into the mission field and over the past two years I have felt God telling me that one day I will be a part of the Newspring ministry.  Over the summer I felt God calling me back to Kenya and I have fully come to terms with that and cannot wait until I get a chance to go back. BUT I also feel like He still intends for me to come home and work at a Newspring Church which leads me to the more exciting part.  During the service today (I know this sounds crazy and really stupid) God told me that one day I will be speaking to more people than were gathered today in the Bi-Lo center.  I know I know it sounds dumb but I am serious.  The second I got to my seat I felt myself becoming completely overwhelmed as I watched people start to file in.  About halfway through the service I had a sort of calm feeling.  All of my excitement from the activities left and I was just listening to God as He told me I needed to start preparing myself for when that day comes.  Here it goes!!