Happiness exists mostly in the absence of struggles, pain, and sorrow. Joy persists in the midst of them.
Do we mostly run on happiness, or do we mostly run on joy? Deep joy? Persisting through rough situations, problematic people, and crap with a steadiness of heart, a clarity of perspective,…
Great reminder of how we live our lives.
Sometimes the hardest conversations to have are the ones you need most. Speaking the truth in love often hurts, but it is in that pain that I am led tonight to take a hard look at myself and acknowledge my desperate, desperate need for God’s grace and guidance. It will take time to process and adjust, but I know that this conversation was one that needed to happen.
“We must all pass through the garden of Gethsemane. If Christ played with doubt, so must we. If Christ spent an anguished night in prayer, if He burst out from the Cross, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” then surely we are also permitted doubt. But we must move on. To choose doubt as a philosophy of life is akin to choosing immobility as a means of transportation.” —
Life of Pi
This passage said so much to me that I cried.. I have been so immobilized… but how to move on? How to resurrect my faith again?
(via jwhoaaa)(via swordofthespirit)
I feel God calling me into a season of stretching and reevaluation. To that end, I have decided to start a blog to log my experiences in working out and exploring my identity in new ways. Feel free to check it out! http://thetransformativejourney.tumblr.com/
Or ask me a question, drop a comment, share some wisdom at http://brassman42.tumblr.com/ask
What I felt Jesus saying while reflecting on my life tonight:
Jesus: What are your goals for this year?
*Growing increasingly daunted, I formulate a list of life goals for the year*
Jesus: You’re going to try at these. You’re going to fail at many of these many times. But remember: your victory is in Me. As long as you believe that, never once in all of your failures will you ever have truly failed.
[video]
Going to bed, but felt a need to write down a quick thought.
Thankfulness opens the way for God to move and bless us in increasing amounts in our lives, but our response can’t end at thankfulness. If someone gave you $10,000 every week without expecting a return, you could be thankful to them your entire life and never know who they are if you don’t ask them. True thankfulness born of love eventually manifests in an action step - the pursuit and emulation of the loving heart of God. Unlike money, food, or other resources, love truly does multiply when it is shared.
Anyway, good night!
I’m so used to reading Christian books for Christian wisdom, listening to Christian radio for Christian inspiration, and hanging with my Christian friends for some good-old Christian encouragement and fellowship. Day in and day out, week in and week out, I feel like everything melts into a reliable pattern no matter what I do to change it.
Imagine my irritation, then, when my pattern is interrupted my something as small as the common cold.
Laid out for the day, I decided to watch a show my friend had recommended to me 3 years ago - an anime called Gurren Lagann, in which a young, timid driller and his rambunctious friend dream of a world beyond their underground village. One day, their fate literally drops through the sky as a giant robot crushes the ceiling of their village, revealing the surface world for the first time in generations.
The rest of the series is driven by the same fierce, unrelenting power of these character’s will. Punctuated by such strange phrases as “My drill is the drill that pierces the heavens!” and “Who the heck do you think I am?!”, Gurren Lagann was, more than anything, a story of the unbelievable things that can happen when one simply refuses to accept the world as it exists. It is a true call to the inner spirit of adventure we all possess - that steady, instinctual urge that says “Isn’t there more? My life is meant for so much more than this!”
In true Sick Day fashion, I watched the whole series. Devoured it, even. And as I watched, my misgivings at wasting a day watching cartoons gave way to that persistent, small voice in my spirit: God speaking to me, saying “Yes, James. Your life IS meant for so much more.” This anime was not a Christian anime, did not come bearing a Christian message, and wasn’t intended to carry a religious message at all, but it spoke to me all the same, and had I not been sick and watched it, I would have missed out on a great message. In this story of deserts, drills, and indomitable will, I am reminded in many ways of our Savior Jesus Christ, who looked into the face of sin and death, taking humankind in its entirety and holding it on his shoulders as he conquered the impossible with the unquenchable, indomitable Spirit by which we now bear witness to his love.
It was said in the series that fighting spirit and love can change the universe.
How right they are.
(Source: elizabethgeorgina, via hammereddrunkwithfaith)