Big Break '10 and more

Sorry it's been so long since I've written a blog. I just never really got around to writing one. I've been a little bit turned off to writing because I am supposed to be doing it every day as an assignment in my creative writing class. When I am not told to write, it is easier.

Anyways, so Big Break happened since my last post! This was my second year going and it was just as awesome as last year, but in different ways. On the way down, our 26 hour drive turned into a 30 hour drive because one of the vans we went down in broke down. We had two 12-passenger vans and one minivan. One of the 12-passenger's serpentine belt broke. It took a little over 3 hours to get it fixed. You know you're with a group of Christians when your van breaks down in Ozark Alabama, just a couple hours from our final destination, and people break out in praise songs in the parking lot. We were able to bond as a group before we got down there and I think it worked out really good. Plus, there was a Dollar Tree in that parking lot, so we got wiffle ball stuff and ate at the Arby's there right next to us.

Well, after many complications, we finally got down to Florida at night past registration, but it all worked out very well all things considered. This year at Big Break, we did Haiti Relief for those affected by the earthquakes. Over the 5 weeks of Big Break, their goal was to package up 1 million meals which feed 6 people each meal. Our week, we packaged up so many meals that they made us stop early so the other weeks would have some meals to package up too. We put together over 400,000 meals and the organizations we were partnered with said they had never seen so much work done in so little time. We shattered world records for most meals packaged per hour, but that's not the point. The point is that we were able to provide for those in Haiti and have fun while doing it. We also used it as an outreach opportunity, to go out on the beach and take some people onto the property that wanted to help and hopefully share the gospel with them.

I personally never found anybody to take in, but they said they would do it the next day with their friends. Later that evening, we talked as a group sharing about what God has been doing through us and our stories of sharing the gospel with people on the beach. I never had any amazing conversations at that point, and was a little frustrated, yet joyful that God was working. I just wanted to see some fruit for my labor. I told our group that for those in the same situation as me that it's not about how many people we see come to Christ, but about our obedience, and stepping out in faith. We leave the results to God because it is God who does the work. It simply wasn't their time yet, but perhaps they were moved closer to God and it got them thinking.

After our sharing time that night, I went out on "Commando Cru" which is what we call the optional evening outreach on the streets. Well a group of us from Michigan Tech went out to Sonic in the rain to see if anybody there would be willing to talk. We did talk to a couple of guys, but I wasn't as personally involved in those conversations. After we got back, it was like 1:30 in the morning and I wanted to go to sleep and it was cold and rainy, but then I noticed Alex Baril and Ryan Hess go up to someone and talk to them who was sitting by himself by a vending machine.

It turns out he was really open to talking with us. He had just broken up with his girlfriend a couple of weeks before then and she broke up with him and if it was up to him they still would have been together as they had been for multiple years. So, that was a rough time for him and his roommates were upstairs drunk getting in fist fights, so that's why he was down in the lobby at 1:30 in the morning. We began to share the gospel with him. He said he was Catholic, but hadn't gone to church in like 4 years because he was so busy with other things. He kept trying to convince us that he was a good person and he believed in works-based salvation. We shared with him that we weren't perfect at all and had messed up in many areas ourselves, and then he tried to tell us that by going out that late and talking to him, that we were good. We continued to tell him that we weren't good enough. We had all broken the 10 commandments and Romans 3:23 says that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and Romans 6:23a says the wages of sin is death. So we all deserve eternal separation from the favorable presence of God. At this point he was really wondering where we were going with it and said Ephesians 2:8-9 that says it's by Grace that we're saved through faith and it's not of our own doing or good works so that no one can boast. It's through faith in Jesus and he began to light up when we shared with him that Jesus' death on the cross paid the penalty for our sins: 100% of it and nobody can come to God without him. We told him that if we believe that that is true and confess it with our mouths, that we are saved. We are redeemed, and have hope through Jesus Christ alone and that living a life for Him, because He bought us at a price, would give the most fulfilling life ever imaginable. That gap he had in his life created from the breakup of his girlfriend could be filled with God who will last forever!

He began to get really excited and couldn't believe we'd be out there that late to share this with him and he wanted our Knowing God Personally booklets to share with his friends which is a basic outline of what we had gone through. He called his roommate down so we could talk to him, but after explaining what happened up in the room, they had to get going. Once his roommate got down there though, he first told him, "These guys saved me!" Now it wasn't us, but rather God working through us to change his heart, but to hear him say that and seeing that he had changed was absolutely amazing and by far my favorite story from Big Break among many many others.

Right before he left, we asked him his name. We had never exchanged names yet. He said, "You guys know me better than any of my other friends, and you don't even know my name!" Then he said he was Tyler and we said our names. The things he said were so encouraging! Oh, one thing I almost forgot about... Tyler had gone the previous day to do some of the Haiti relief stuff and he said it made him feel better about himself. When we introduced ourselves as from Campus Crusade for Christ, he immediately identified us with those relief efforts, so God used that in his life to prepare him to hear what we would be sharing with him.


Ok, so Big Break was awesome, and if you want any more stories, you just talk to me some time and I'll share more. Moving onto plans for this summer. At Big Break and IndyCC this year, I was really encouraged to go on a Summer Project. I told myself that I didn't have the financial means to go on this trip so I just looked at it as something that would be impossible to happen. Then, I kept hearing that I should pursue one and decided to look into it and think about it a little bit more.

I realized that the money part should not stop me from going. If God was calling me to a Summer Project, then He will provide me with the money. After looking through them and all over on the website http://gosummerproject.com I felt God calling me to apply and see what he does with that. Well, I applied for a few different places and I plan to write another blog post on what happens with that, but more has to occur before it's interesting. I am definitely praying about it a lot!

Well, that's a brief update on a few of the things going on in my life recently and I hope to blog a little bit more often for those of you who actually read this. God Bless!

Prayer is a powerful thing!

So at men's leadership a while back, Robbie showed us a video about the power of prayer and how to pray boldly. It was really encouraging to me, so I had to pass it on to you to watch at your convenience. It's like 25 minutes long, but very worth it if you have the time!

Pray Big and Pray Bold: Sunder Krishnan from Urbana 09 on Vimeo.

A poem for an Atheist

I am in a creative writing class this semester. My teacher is an atheist, but apparently has a decent amount of Biblical knowledge. I think he's been turned off by hypocrisy of the "Christians" he knew. He didn't see them emulating Christ as we should as Christians. We have to keep a writers journal of creative writing every day and he challenged us to write a limerick, a sonnet, among other poetry types.

Now poetry isn't really my preferred avenue of communication, at least not typical formal types, but I figured in all of these poems, I would try to put a Biblical focus on them so if he ever reads them, he'll at least be more exposed to God in some way. I was thinking back to a story of mine where God showed me the answer to one of my questions, and after about an hour, I was able to put the story a little bit into sonnet form.

By the way, the sonnet is referring to Luke chapter 12:22-34, so you should check that out. Here it is:

I wonder what it is that I should eat.
The cash I have is for gas on the road.
Should I pass on gas and walk on my feet,
or take a chance that my car might get towed?

I read my Bible and what should I find?
In the gospel of Luke, I saw the Light,
on the subject at hand, so intertwined,
my answer was stated, so clear and bright.

I then gave my worries to God above.
He will take care of me, Why should I fret?
My Lord who is Sovereign is Lord of Love.
In choosing to trust Him, there's no regret.

Lord, help me to serve you some way, I pray;
Make me your servant to someone today!


I don't know if he'll ever see this poem, but in doing the assignment, I got a chance to meditate on God and how we truly can trust Him. My friend Devin also just posted a blog about not worrying and trusting God, so it was really neat.

Lessons in Trusting God

On Monday, in both my cell group (small group Bible study type thing) and in men's leadership Bible Study, we talked about different goals we all had for the new year. In both I mentioned that I really wanted to trust God more with all aspects of my life. I know that God is in control, so essentially, I don't want to be worrying about things when they don't go the way I plan them.

Well today, today was quite a day. I really had to trust God and I was getting a little overwhelmed at times. I couldn't believe what was happening, yet God brought me though, I generally stayed calm and trust God with it anyways. I still have a long way to go. I was getting a little anxious at points.

So you're probably wondering what happened. Well it all started this morning when I was getting everything ready to go. I had to do all the usual morning routine things and then get all my snowboarding stuff in my car for my snowboarding class later in the day. Well, all that seemed to go pretty smoothly and I was driving down to Houghton to get to my 9 o'clock class wondering which parking lot I should attempt to get into. I was about a quarter of a mile away from the Quincy Mine area and all of a sudden my car started slowing down. The accelerator pedal wasn't doing anything. I wondered what was going on. Since I couldn't go any faster, I pulled off to the side of the road and turned off the car. As I was pulling off, my oil light went on. I didn't dare start the car again in fear that I would kill the engine if there was no oil in it.

I proceeded to make a couple of calls. On the second call, I decided to call Chris Morgan. He knows a thing or two about cars and his wife-to-be Erica lived really close to where I was. I called him and asked him what he was doing. He said he was just driving to class and then I told him why I asked. He was actually picking up Erica when I called. He was within like a minute of me. Then, he said he could come and pick me up, so he did. Oh, I forgot to mention that my cars hazard lights weren't working the last time I tried, so I fidgeted with the button and found out it actually could work, but then it shut off after a bit, so I had to pull it a certain direction. Anyways, so Chris comes and picks me up with Erica and then we dropped off Erica at her class. Christ didn't have anything he had to do for an hour, so we went to the gas station nearby and picked up 3 quarts of oil to bring back to my car and check it out. We thought maybe (since my car had just been worked on a few days before) that the oil filter fell off because they may have put on the wrong one. Well, we looked under the car after putting in the new oil and nothing was leaking, so I started the car. It seemed a little bit rough, but started getting back to normal.

So then right as a cop pulls up to find out what's going on, we pulled away and I was going to drive to the dealership that worked on my car recently. I got about half a mile down and my car started kicking a little bit, so I pulled off to the side of the road again and asked Chris was he thought. He was following me in his car. I then tried calling my dad again and this time he picked up. Now I thought that when my car was just fixed that they gave it an oil change too and my dad thought they were going to, but they did not. That explained why the oil might have been low. I thought there would have been nothing to worry about right after an oil change. I asked my dad what he thought and then he called the dealership and then called me and told me what he said. Then I called the dealership and he told me what my dad told me and we decided after running my car a bit more that it would probably be ok to drive it to the dealership in Hancock a few miles away. I told Chris he should go to his meeting at 10 he had, so he left. I knew if something went wrong I had other friends to call. Well, I made it to the dealership and explained things. They said they'd look at it and I called Nate Kroodsma and he picked me up.

I decided to put all my snowboarding stuff in his car in case my car wasn't done by the time the class rolled around. We drove to Tech and when I got there, I missed 2 of my classes. I knew God had a plan in it though, so I didn't bother worrying about it at this point. I emailed my instructors explaining what had happened and they were ok with it. Nate gave me his keys so I could get my snowboard out of the car later on.

Well, about 15 minutes before my class later on, my dad called and said the car was done. I asked him to go pay for it (I'll be paying them back), pick up the keys, and come back to Tech. Then after my class, I would go to him and pick up the keys and get a ride up to get my car from a friend.

Alright, I'm not even kidding. As I finally got some time to relax, just now, a fire alarm went off in Wads, so I had to stop writing, go and stand outside in the cold, and then walk back in. It's been a non-stopped day.

Alright, so to continue... I ended up getting a ride from my friend Jason King who was in my snowboarding class up to my car. I got up there and told him I would meet him at his apartment later on. I then realized I hadn't eaten yet and it was after 2 o'clock, so I went briefly to Taco Bell to grab a cheap bite to eat. Then I realized I needed to go to Walmart to buy a certain type of notebook for a class. I went up to Walmart and they were all out of what I needed. They had tons of the kind of notebook I was looking for the other day, but not what I needed this time. So, it was a wasted trip and time was running out to get ready for my snowboarding class. I then headed back to campus and when I was almost there, I realized I hadn't gotten my book I needed for an assignment in a class and if I didn't stop at the campus store right then, it would be closed after I was done with my class.

I then went to try to park near the store, but all the parking lots were filled. I was about to park in a spot that wasn't a normal spot which would give me a ticket, but I was literally running in and out to get the book. However, a public safety officer was right next to me handing out tickets, so I couldn't even park there. I was running out of time and decided I would just have to do without the book.

So, then I started heading over to my friends house to carpool to the ski hill for the snowboarding class. OOPS... I forgot to go to my friends car and actually put the snowboard in my car, so I headed back the way I just came, really tight for time at this point. On the way there, everyone in front of me was stopping for all the college students to cross the road when the cars have the right of way. Oh well, I knew I shouldn't worry about it. If I was late I was late. It happened on the way back too. I got to Nate K.'s car, transferred my snowboarding stuff to my car, and then went to my friends apartment, went inside, put on my snowboarding stuff and we left right away for the hill. We got there on time, it was a good snowboarding class and then I got back. I decided to come into the Campus Cafe so I could check my email and do some homework. I then decided to start writing this blog... then the fire alarm went off and I had to come back to finish it.

So, what does one make of all this. It was a non-stopped busy day where nothing that I wanted to happen, happened the way I wanted it. I spent all but 3 dollars in my wallet on oil that was supposed to go towards gas in my gas tank. I drove around all over. I missed 2 classes, and I haven't been able to sit and think all day.

Let's look at the flip side. After all that could have gone wrong, my car could have been toast having run out of oil, I could have missed snowboarding. I could have not had a cell phone and been stranded on the side of the road for a long time. I could have not had a ride up to my car after it was fixed, I could have had to spend a lot more money than the relatively small amount at the auto place and the oil.

All in all, was it a horrible day? Absolutely not. It was quite the adventure, I got to see my awesome friends give up some conveniences to help me out and go out of their way for it. I got to see what great friends I have, the cost was fairly small, I now know to be checking my car's oil more. My teachers told me it was fine I missed class with the reason I gave them and I got the assignments. I have another friend who is going to email me the assignment out of the book for my class that's due tomorrow. Can we trust God with everything? You bet. He knows everything that's going on. His plan is the best. I don't know what all He has in store for everything that happened, but I know Romans 8:28 which says:

"And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose."
-Romans 8:28

We don't always know right away what God is doing, but knowing that He is in control and has my best interest in mind, I can rest in that assurance. Praise God!

IndyCC!!!

Well, now I have had a little bit of time after IndyCC to reflect on it. It truly was a fantastic week and God really moved in the hearts of people, especially mine. The main speaker talked about God's Holiness, our brokenness, repentance, and then God's grace and how we can live for Christ because of it. The worship band there was great as well! For those that don't know what IndyCC is, it stands for Indianapolis Christmas Conference and it's a Campus Crusade for Christ thing. It's a week of great seminars and Christian fellowship and so much more.

The best part of the conference was meeting new people and seeing some people who I hadn't seen in a while and really catching up with them and having deep conversations and better friendships that will carry on after the conference got over with. I also did my first freeway driving and city driving, both of which went great. It truly was an answer to prayer. The entire way down, the roads were dry and the driving was very fun. The fellowship on the way there and back was also great.

I guess I have to go into detail on at least one part of IndyCC more than I already have. One New Year's Eve, we had a big Dance Party and also there were inflatable games. Then after that, at about 11:20, we got together in the big conference room. We sangs some songs and praised God as a large group, and then we broke up into smaller groups and prayed with the people around us. I went and sat with some new Indiana University friends I made which was awesome and it was sweet to pray with them. First we prayed for our world globally, and then for our country nationally, and finally for our campuses locally. While we were wrapping up with the campus part, I heard a noise and looked up. It was the 30 second countdown to the new year. Then everyone around started counting down. Approximately two thousand other college aged people all joined together in prayer and then counting down to the new year. Once it hit, we were all hugging each other and it was completely indescribable. After everyone calmed down just a bit, we sand for about an hour praising God in the new year. What an awesome way to start a new year and let alone a new decade!!! After the singing, we were all invited back to the dance and party longer if we wanted to, but the IU people I was hanging out with went to the Steak and Shake. I had never been to one, so I joined them and talked to them even more. There were 2 or 3 cops inside the restaurant because so many drunk people were going there. When you left the restaurant, you had to pay for you food and get a ticket that said paid on it. Then you had to give it to a cop to actually leave the place. It was cool.

Man, I cannot get across in words how amazing this Conference was. It's not fair that I'm limited to text, but that's the way it has to be. If you really know me well, or want to get to know me better than you do, I'd love to talk to you about this in person some time. There are some things I don't want to put on here that I will mention in person if you ask me.

After having gotten back at home, I have been much more passionately pursuing God. I read Romans 11 today and learned more about God's grace and how salvation came to the Gentiles because the Jews rejected it and more of God's full plan. If you're confused by any of this, read Romans 11.

I have also been journaling ever since my good friend Alex Helmboldt gave me a journal as a Christmas present. It was one of the best gifts I've ever received because thought has to be put into something like that. He put some really good Bible verses in the front and then a note to me and we had talked about journaling in person and how it has really helped him grow closer to God. Well I wanted to journal after hearing that but I hadn't gotten around to getting it. It's actually funny, because I was thinking about going to Walmart and buying a journal earlier in the day and then I got a package and it was a journal. I couldn't believe it. Small acts like this mean a lot to me and to most people.

Moving on, I've put many notes from IndyCC into this journal and then I reflect on it and put in prayer requests and it's great to sort of document my life story that hopefully I can share some day. That's also why I'm doing this blog. I'm going to look back on this and see what God's been doing in my life. It's just that in a journal, I can write personal things that I wouldn't write online and I can feel free to write ridiculous things in it, which I love. I'd recommend anyone reading this to start doing it.

One last thing I would like to touch on. I have felt God tugging hard on my heart to share my testimony with all of Campus Crusade as an illustration in a talk that I could give on God's grace. I'm actually very excited. I would like to do it this semester. I'll be a little nervous, sure, but I know God wants me to do it and for him that knows to do good and if he does not do it, to him it is sin.

I cannot wait to see what God does through the Christians on Michigan Tech's campus! IndyCC had a great impact on me and I can be sure that the lives of other Tech students were affected as well and we can all bring this passion back with us. It is a new year, a new decade, but the same awesome God we serve. Praise God for all He is doing for His children!

I am going to close with a list of songs that were sung at IndyCC that really impacted me and after my friend sent out the list of them, I bought them all with the itunes gift card I won while I was down there. Now I can bring a little IndyCC with me wherever I go. Here's the list:

From the Inside Out (Hillsong United)
Glory to God Forever (Steve Fee)
Happy Day (Tim Hughes)
Hosanna (Brooke Fraser)
How He Loves (John Mark McMillian)
Jesus Paid it All (Kristian Stanfill)
None But Jesus (Hillsong United)
The Stand (Hillson United)
You Alone Can Rescue (Matt Redman)
You Never Let Go (Matt Redman)
Your Grace is Enough (Chris Tomlin)
Your Love Never Fails (Jesus Culture)
O Bless the Lord (Lindsay McCaul)

If you get these songs, please hear out the lyrics in them. They're so uplifting!
Peace and Love,
Nate

Romans chapter 5

Wow, it's been quite a while since I've posted on this blog. For a little bit I've found myself stuck in a sort of rut that I couldn't seem to get out of. I was wondering why I wasn't feeling a closeness to God that I had felt before. For one, I was dwelling on my sin and feeling hopeless and for another, I wasn't reading God's Word as though it was food I needed greater than physical food. I had no hunger for the Word, no thirst for that endless fountain of living water.

Recently, I have finished reading through all of the gospels and the book of Acts. Now I am reading through Romans. Today in particular, in fact just a few minutes ago, I read Romans chapter 5. If you want encouragement, Romans chapter 5 is a great place for it.

Before reading on any farther, I'd love it if you would read Romans chapter 5. It won't take too long. If you have no Bible near by, BibleGateway.com works great!

Now right off the bat, in verse one, you get some encouragement!

Romans 5:1 - "Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ,"

Now a verse that starts with Therefore means that there was important information to keep in mind written beforehand. Lets look at verses 4:23-25:

Romans 4:23-25 - "Now not for [Abraham's] sake only was it written that it (being his Faith) was credited to him (as Righteousness), but for our sake also, to whom it will be credited, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification.

I just love the added insight that that gives. The Bible wasn't originally written with the chapter breaks where they're at now, so sometimes people break into a chapter without realizing there is good info in surrounding text.

Now, I am not going to go verse by verse through the whole chapter, however, I would encourage you to look through it on your own and let the Holy Spirit speak to you in a way I never could. However, I do want to look at a few more. Verses 3-5 say:

Romans 5:3-5 - "And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

So now, even the trials we go through should be looked at in a positive way knowing that it brings hope and hope doesn't disappoint.

Now I'm going to skip ahead to what really impacted me in a new way, even though I've heard it plenty of times. When I was younger, I used to wish that I could take the place of Adam in the garden and choose not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. I like to think that I would be able to resist that temptation. It seems so easy to point at Adam and say how horrible he is. Then I looked at Romans 5. When it talks about God's love being demonstrated towards us in Christ's death on the cross, which also brings us salvation, it also goes on to say in verse 17:

Romans 5:17 - "For if by the transgression of the one, death reigned through the one, much more those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ.

and verse 19:

Romans 5:19 - "For as through the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the One the many will be made righteous."

As a born-again believer, I have been justified (God declared me righteous through the blood of Jesus) and am now free from sin. Whereas before being saved, all I could do was sin. I was totally depraved until the Holy Spirit of God began a work in me (which He will be faithful to complete!). This means I am no longer a slave to sin and can now live for God; so, going back to what I was talking about with Adam... I now have the righteousness he had before sin entered mankind. I am able to say no to temptation, yet do I? Sometimes. Not all the time. So essentially, I make the same mistakes. I sin just like Adam committed that first sin.

So why do I say all this. For one, I really want you to read through Romans chapter 5 and absorb the truth in it! It's rich! I also want to encourage you to evaluate where you stand with God right now. If you are not saved from the wrath of God by the blood of His son, Jesus, please talk to me about it sometime. Also pray to God that He will save you from your sins. For those reading who are saved, just look at your life and what you need to change to grow closer to God. Embrace the free gift of Grace and press on toward the prize!

I am certainly not perfect. I have my many flaws in many areas, but God's grace is greater still and I am free to live for Him, my Creator, Savior, and Lord of all. May God richly bless you as you pursue His Living Word!

Scriptural Application

This morning I was having a hard time keeping my mind on God and off of my sinful desires. Nobody ever said the Christian walk would be easy.

I have been having such a great past couple of weeks. The many many ways God has been working both through the lives of others and through my life have been indescribable and I'm going to try to stay away from mentioning them all to keep on task with the point I want to make.

With all the things God has been doing and how much I've been realizing it, I knew it was due to the time He has allowed me to spend in His Word. This morning in particular, I was struggling a lot keeping my mind pure, and I knew I had to dive into the Word, the Bible, and use it as intended in Ephesians 6. It talks about The Word of God being the sword of the spirit. A sword in battle is your weapon and also works defensively. It's the one piece in the armor of God that can be used as a weapon. I had to attack my feelings and longings of the flesh (my old sinful self), and I knew I could not do it on my own.

So I knew that the book of Second Peter had some relevant information in it for what I was going through in particular. I opened it up and started reading in chapter 1.

I CANNOT believe how completely relevant it was to my life. Almost every verse in that chapter stuck out to me in the current situation I was in. Let me start going through it a bit.

2 Peter 1:1-2 is more of an introduction, which has value and I encourage you to read it on your own to think about that. I read on to the next paragraph which is verses 3 and 4 which say:

3His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.
- 2 Peter 1:3-4

So in verse 3, where it says "His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness...", that really emphasizes that it is not in my own power that I can overcome sin, it's through God's power. That is an encouraging start. Then in verse 4 it says we can escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. I like to read it backwards and say how do we do that? It is by His own glory and goodness through which He has given us his very great and precious promises which we have to stand on! This was awesome to me!

Now I want to look at verses 5-7:

5For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love.
- 2 Peter 1:5-7

This never stuck out to me so much as this time. For the reason of escaping the corruption in the world caused by evil desires, which I was having, it says make every effort to add to your faith goodness. Well, I have been trying to add to my faith goodness, and then from goodness, knowledge. I've been in the Word a LOT this week because God has really been working on me and may all the glory to go Him for it! The Bible is knowledge, so I've been adding to my faith knowledge and to my knowledge self-control. Now this past week, as a result of being in the Word and building up knowledge, I have become more self-controlled thanks to God. Now the hard part comes in. It says and to self-control, perseverance. Wow. Now I had just been talking to someone online about how perseverance is not something you learn overnight... in fact it's impossible to really learn it because you have to persevere to learn it and that takes time. It was at this point I realized I really needed to persevere. I needed to say no to the sinful desires I had and turn to God and count on Him to deliver me.

What comes after perseverance? It says "and to perseverance, godliness". I want my life to be characterized by godliness. I want the glory of God to shine through me and if I want that, I do not want to give into my sinful desires which takes away from perseverance which takes away from godliness. These all build on each other. After godliness, then brotherly kindness. I need to learn to persevere and grow closer to God so I can share Him with others and show my brothers kindness that comes from God that I could not have on my own. Finally, after brotherly kindness, comes love. God is love.

In my cell group tonight, we talked about how the world defines love and how the Bible defines love and they are very different. Everyone usually thinks of love as doing nice things for others or romantic love based on feelings. True love comes from God and God alone through Christ. God demonstrated His love toward us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Christ died for us. God's one and only Son, Jesus Christ died for us. He became the sin for us who knew no sin that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. It's all through Jesus that we have any hope. So this is how God shows us His love. We are called to love others as God loves us. Wow. Let that soak in for a second. True love is selfless, kind, does not envy, does not boast. True love is shown in a willingness to lay down your life for a friend.

So, to give into my sinful desires that might bring me brief fleeting temporary happiness but ultimately lead to destruction and emptiness, would bring me away from God who is love. Love never fails. It's in the Bible in I Corinthians 13 which I would highly encourage you to read on your own.

Let's go on to 2 Peter 1:8-9

8For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.

A possession of the increased measure of the qualities talked about earlier will keep us from being ineffective and unproductive in our knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. I want to be effectual and productive for Christ, so I need to be putting off the old sinful desires and putting on the New self created to be like Jesus in true Righteousness and Holiness. Then it goes on to say in verse 9 that if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind. This is truth! If you want immediate pleasure now, then that shows nearsightedness. Sometimes I forget that I have been cleansed from my past sins. I need to look towards who God wants me to be and focus on the true joy I find in Him!

Now to move onto verses 10 and 11.

10Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall, 11and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
- 2 Peter 1:10-11

Therefore, in other words, because of what was previously said, we should be all the more eager to make sure of our calling and election. It is fully up to God to draw us to Him and I am so incredibly grateful He has called me. Then it says "for if you do these things, you will never fall." Well. I think that's pretty straight forward. If I focus on God, stay in the Word, learn to Love others through self-control and perseverance, then I will never fall. It's when I lack these things when I stumble.

Then comes verse 11. "and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." Wow! Look at what we have to look forward to. We can have an eternity of life in Christ praising God in Heaven and it will be a rich welcome. Now in light of this, do the sinful desires still seem worth it? I would say 100% not.

Please keep me in your prayers. Pray that I may continue to strive towards the prize, that being Christ Jesus, putting aside all my sinful desires and fully seek after God so I can be an effective witness of His return to call his children home!