Building Bridges

I wrote this over a year ago, the day that Josh was feeling very unsure about starting up a relationship with me. It was a hard day, a day of fear and worry. But that night, I wrote in my prayer journal, and I wrote this song. Originally, this was to be a song about me and him, but as I wrote, it turned into a song quite different, a song about me and God.

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Building Bridges:

(a song about relying on God to build your life)

I am given a brick and am unsure what to do with it

Are there more bricks to come? What am I to build?

I'm gonna trust you Lord, and start a bridge.

Building bridges can change my life

Building bridges can turn out right

Only if I trust in You, or it'll come a'crashin' down

I put this bridge into Your hands

Jesus, build me a bridge

Some of these bricks won't be so strong and will have to be replaced

There'll be times I'll need to cry and feel like giving in

It'll be hard, but I'll have to try and try again

Building bridges can change my life

Building bridges can turn out right

Only if I trust in You, or it'll come a'crashin' down

I put this bridge into Your hands

Jesus, build me a bridge

There'll be hard times

It'll be a struggle

It'll take a long time

But I put it into your hands

Building bridges can change my life

Building bridges can turn out right

Only if I trust in You, or it'll come a'crashin' down

I put this bridge into Your hands

Jesus, build me a bridge

One day, I will finally finish that bridge

After all that hard work, the job will be done

When I finally cross that bridge, I will start a new and perfect life with You

Building bridges can change my life

Building bridges can turn out right

Only if I trust in You, or it'll come a'crashin' down

I put this bridge into Your hands

Jesus, build me a bridge

Jesus, build me a bridge

Jesus, Thank You for building me my bridge

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After writing it, I had so much peace inside, because I realized I just needed to trust God to help me. I needed to trust that he was all-powerful. I realized that He loved me, and anything troubles on this earth are meant for His good purpose. Now that is comforting. :)

A Love Note.

Call it a love letter,
Call it what you will.
I caution, what proceeds
Is not pretty; it doesn’t fill
A desire or a dream,
More like a lust, or scheme.
My love has never been under such attack
If I could, I would turn back.
My love, my darling, how could it be?
That my care, my concern, I could no longer see.
My sin will be the death of me,
My father judges equally.

How could one sin,
One taste of lust,
Make me stray away,
And destroy our trust?
It’s easy, when you think,
(These words, let them sink),
My heart desires not the best,
But only what my God detest.
To deny all that I’ve ever loved,
To throw away my one beloved.
My sin will be the death of me,
My father judges equally.

How could my life,
Just turn around?
My God, please answer,
If only a sound…
Please help, please cure,
Please make me something pure.
May I not grow ugly in your sight,
A life of faith, that is my plight!
Please help, I do not understand.
Oh Lord, you are so grand.
To listen to this worthless boy,
To grant him peace, and give him joy.
My sin will be the death of me,
My father judges equally.

No longer will it be my cry,
As I now surely know,
My God has done such great things
From above, to here below.
He’s chased away my evil lusts.
He’s taken me, reduced to dust,
Plagued to a life of reckless sin,
He no longer cares just where I’ve been.
My life starts fresh, I am brand new!
I’m part of a family, a precious few.
My sin won’t be the death of me,
My father pardons, quite justly.

My friend, he's lost.

My friend,
my time,
my care,
my concern,
I can't see.

He still lives.
He still breathes.
He still thinks,
but not of me.
How could he?

How could this one path divulge?
Where did we stray away?
Where were our signs?
Relationship turns to friendship.
Friendship turns to apathy.

Apathy turns to destruction.
We were at the bottom,
unwilling to climb up.
Care must be reciprocated.
Who forgot?

I hold fast.
I stay strong.
Perhaps, my friend,
We'll know each other again.
Letting go is hard.

God,
my prayer,
is that,
I should never turn apathetic.
But you forgive.

Each day is a new one.
I am a new person.
Never the same,
but for the better.
Always cared for.

Always loved.

The Image of Perfection

Tonight was the first time in a while that I had the opportunity to teach the middle school Bible study. Since Mr. Richard is back in school, I'm back to doing the lesson on Wednesday nights. Mr. Richard prepares questions and Scripture for us to talk about each week. This week, we talked about Matthew 5:1-12~

1"When Jesus saw the crowds, He went up on the mountain; and after He sat down, His disciples came to Him. 2 He opened His mouth and began to teach them, saying,

3 'Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

4 Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

5 Blessed are the gentle, for they shall inherit the earth.

6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.

7 Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.

8 Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.

9 Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.

10 Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

11 Blessed are you when people insult you and persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of Me. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward in heaven is great; for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.' "

Now, this passage has a whole bunch of things in it. It's a list of characteristics that a person should strive to have. When reading this before, it had only occurred to me as that, as simply just a list of good personality traits. What I realized upon reading it and talking about it tonight was that it is the essence of Christ.

Think about it a moment, Christ mourned, Christ was gentle and meek, Christ hungered for and obtained righteousness. Christ was mercy. He had a pure heart, encouraged peace amongst his followers. And Christ was persecuted. The last two verses are really what stood out like never before. Christ was not only insulted, persecuted, and falsely accused, but He was killed, because He was righteous and truthfully claimed to be God. Yet, He rejoiced and was glad, because he saved us so that we could share His great reward in heaven.

We can all strive to be like Christ by looking at this list as a guideline. This list is the image of perfection because Christ is perfect. We will not be able to obtain all of these qualities until we reach heaven, of course, but they are something to strive for. Follow the Image of Perfection.

Follow Christ. :)

Pursue God :)

You know, its easy to stray from God.

It's easy to make excuses, to say that I'm to busy for Him. I could have said, I'm too busy or too tired to write this blog tonight. After all, I do have to wake up at 6 tomorrow morning.

Life is busy. Deal with it.

If I kept on making excuses like this, when would I ever set aside time for God? Time to just talk with Him and spend time with him? I don't think I would.

I'll give you the example of practicing voice. Last semester, I would always put practicing voice up to the last minute, saying, other things, other assignments are more important now so I need to finish them first. Even these past two days have been like this because of the research paper I had to write. If life is this busy, when will I ever run out of things to do?

I think what I need to do is put God higher on my priority list, and not just say, oh, well I'll talk to Him at the end of the day, when I'm not busy anymore. That's the last think I should do. I should be talking to Him in the midst of the business, and relying on Him when things get tough.

And it helps to set aside some time for just me and Him. Driving my car to and from school has become a joy for me! While I'm listening to the praise music on the radio, I'm talking to God and spilling my thoughts and concerns out to Him. And you know what? That always makes my day so much better!

I can even learn to set aside more time for God. Its worth it, because it changes my whole outlook on my day, and really my whole outlook on life.

Pursue God, and He will give you peace. :)

Father's grace.

"Today, if you hear his voice,do not harden your hearts."

That's part of verse 7, Hebrews ch. 4. I'm so grateful for God's mercy, as he destroyed my world nearly four years ago. That's sounds a little odd, doesn't it? It was the only way for Him to reach me. In order to start a new work, the old person had to disappear. Everything I loved, everything I wanted, everything I desired; everything came crashing down. What I loved, wanted, and desired all changed as God began His glorious work. That is to say, God's grace is marvelous, a changed soul is marvelous; I am not marvelous. For so many years, I hardened my heart and I was numb to the God's message. I was unwilling to compromise my lifestyle with His commandments.

Later on, I would come to realize that faith isn't merely a lifestyle change, it's a change in worship. Whereas I once worshiped my self, I began to worship God. God saved this time for me, He saw it right and fit to wait until college to turn my world around. Thankfully, it didn't start there. All along, as far as I can tell, God had been giving me little hints as to His character and His will. I'm thankful for the family I was raised in; they encouraged me to attend church throughout my youth. I'm thankful for the pastors at my church who took time to teach me the Gospel. I'm thankful for the Christian friends that I had. They were unashamed of the Gospel, and didn't hesitate to witness to me.

I needed to be turned around; as a freshman I began to experiment and flirt with immorality. I was compromising all of the teaching that i had ever received! The incredible sense of guilt that followed was no surprise. That is, I broke down on the night of my conversion. My life was a wreck, and I pleaded to God for help. The realization had come, I couldn't live like this. I praise God for turning around my hardened heart that night, and continually into the present (and likely the future). His grace is so great, that He would bother with a terrible sinner like myself.