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Today had the opportunity to be ruined by many circumstances. But I have decided to pass up the opportunity to have a horrible day.

Here’s what happened…

Yesterday, after church, I left my headlights on. It drained my battery.
I got a ride to and from prayer. And jumper cables.

I got to see an old friend. Weird. Random. Neat.

I was late to work, trying to find someone to jump my car.

Whilst standing in the rain with jumper cables, I noticed that I was standing on the home of millions of fire ants.

The rain… If I didn’t love rain, I would be sad right now about my soggy shoes. (still soggy shoes)

BUT!

Starbucks, smiles, and a nice warm hoodie = just the beginning of a day that could have gone all wrong.

Today, I will take part in joy. I will maintain happy, pure thoughts. I will not give place to anger. I will rejoice instead of scream and sob. I will remember that I am an overcomer. (still)

Above only, and not beneath…

Don’t hate.

We are all very aware of the death of pop music legend, Michael Jackson. It’s allover the media… and twitter. I have seen shows that talk about how much of a traumatic childhood he lived, and recall seeing the life story of the Jackson family when I was younger. He truly has had to overcome a lot in his short life. But the other stuff… the questionable stuff… that is what makes me concerned.

His children will forever be known as “Pop Music Royalty.” Just like Lisa Marie Presley is the King of Rock ‘n Roll’s daughter.

It is strange to see the legacies live on. After the death of Princess Di, I suddenly saw her family in the media. I don’t recall seeing her boys on the cover of every gossip magazine on the rack while she was living, but they’re right up there next to Bradjelina.

We are on week 2 of a 9 week series at Living Word called “Building a Failure Proof Life.”
We all need this. I wish I knew some of this stuff YEARS ago! But, luckily, it’s not too life to leave a legacy worth remembering.

I was so lucky to get a second chance, I would have hated to leave that legacy.

So… Here is my question:

What will YOUR legacy be?

Today is day 2 of Dominion By The Word. If you didn’t plan on coming, you’re missing some amazing stuff. John Avanzini brought it, as usual, and Carl Lentz, a newcomer to the DBTW conference laid it on hardcore. Tonight’s session with Robb Thompson is sure to be amazing.

But that’s not what I am writing about.

I’m going to tell you a little story about an awkward moment I had today at Target.

I was walking toward the building and a man in his hover round said… “hey beautiful.” I replied with… “Awkward!” and continued walking into the store.

As I was walking out I saw him again. he was creepy.

That’s pretty much it. I don’t have anything else.

So, for those of you who know, I moved OUT on August 1. Tomorrow I will be moving IN!
If you would like to help, here are the details.
If you do not want to help, feel free to show up anyway.

I get off work at 5pm. I have everything in boxes ( ) in storage down the street from the church. The apartment I am moving in to is on the first floor and we can back straight up to the door. ( ) It should be really easy, I just need hands and feet and backs and trucks!!!

So call me, text me, email, tweet, facebook, etc. and I can give you more exact details.

See you there.

Wow!
I can’t even begin to tell you just how fast my head is spinning!

1. I’m going to Iowa in December.
2. I’m moving next week.
3. and something else.

So!
Whilst in Ioway I will be chilling (litchrilly) with the ‘fam’ and I will get to meet the cutest baby ever. Ayeleaddisonkangni. Yes, it is one word.

Um. Ok I’m done.
Thanks for not reading this.

Ok, so in my quest to get my ‘junk’ together, I have been doing some “maintenance.” And part of that is to figure out what the ‘junk’ I am supposed to be doing.
This year has been… less than amazing. To me, anyway. I’ve lost so much of what I thought was important that it has left me completely dumb-founded as to what I should be doing.

It has been pretty hard-core.

So I’m finally getting back to a place where I can stop struggling back up the same mountain I was once so gracefully ascending; and please take my word on this, the fall down sucked. So here I go…

I have managed to write a lot in the past few months, not in here of course… I didn’t want to be committed or something like that… so I am going to share some of the stuff with you. Because you want to read those things.

July 17, 2009
Does He still find beauty in this creation?
What is beauty?
We are formed in God’s image, and He called us “good.”
A tree is designed to grow, and produce fruit; when it stops doing this, it dies.
So what about us? We were designed to grow and produce much fruit. And when we don’t, we die?
There is much to be said by the world of why we were created to do, but God made it easy and flat out told us why we were created… To know Him and make Him known. So why aren’t we?
If a tree that has stopped producing fruit it is cut off and thrown into the fire, why aren’t we? Why do we cause ourselves so much pain and agony only to suffer some more?
Why does our soverign God allow us to suffer? He knows what our limits are and will not allow us to be tempted beyond them.
If I am His precious one, I want to be treated like a precious one. I want nothing harmful to come my way. I want to see the fiery darts zoom clear past me.
I want to know those limits. Not so much to know how far I can push it, but to know how much longer I have to suffer before He steps in. When will the storm pass? How much further through this desert?
Does that sound selfish? Shouldn’t I just suck it up and continuouly praise God no matter what?
Easier said than done.

June 8, 2009
Finding Beauty In The Madness.
A song that a *once* good friend of mine wrote to commemorate the loss of an awesome friend of ours. The lyrics were about how this man had found beauty in the madness of life. In everything that was going on, he still took the time to find beauty in everyday things. We were all too busy destroying our lives with drugs, alcohol, sex… you name it, we were doing it.
This song… it was written by a man that didn’t see the beauty of life until one life was taken away. I’ve been singing that song for years now.

While on the prayer trip to Costa Rica this summer, it came back to me. Why is it that we have to go to a different country to find beauty when it is all around us? The people of Costa Rica are so used to the scenery that it doesn’t have the same effect on them that it does us tourists.

But while we’re in our own country, do we overlook the beauty that is right here? The majestic mountains right here in North Carolina, or the awesome roar of the ocean’s tide coming in just a two hours’ drive away? What about all of the trees? Have you noticed that no two trees standing there in a row look the same? Sure, they all have branches, leaves… But they’re different.

If you were to line everyone up everyone from coast to coast, all accross the earth, you wouldn’t find two people exactly the same. That is beautiful if you really think about it. Our creator wanted to know us all individually, so he individually created us. He formed each of us in our mother’s womb. He sent His Son to die for us so that we may be washed free of our sin and guilt.

A Beautiful Redemption.

The beauty of His majesty goes beyond just being washed clean. It isn’t a spot cleaner. It is something that washes us cleaner than snow.
Psalm 50
Beauty
It seems to be a reoccuring theme for me this year.
On Sunday we were praying in a park and God showed me the beauty in the madness. Even though the people there were smiling and having a good time with their friends and families, I could see the madness floating through their lives.
We all deal with things in our lives, we have crazy days, horrible weeks, but we have the Lord to help us get through it. We Sometimes go through things and feel completely alone. We struggle and feel hopeless. We feel Lost.
But when you have a relationship with Christ, you get a way out.
He shows you the beauty in the madness. He shows you the beauty in the blood.
It doesn’t just take the sin out, it washes you completely clean. Anything you have ever done is washed clean.

It doesn’t matter what I’ve been dealing with when I am in a mission trip. What matters is that I have the opportunity to sow a seed for someone to experience Christ. There are people that don’t even know that they can have a loving relationship with Christ and I’m worried about something stupid.
It seems really selfish to me.

The beauty of this trip is that I didn’t get to see first hand the fruit. I’m so used to going out and talking to people about Christ that I forget about all that was sown to make that possible.
It has shown me that this life isn’t all about me; that I play such a small part in the whole scheme of things.
What really matters is that the lives of many Costa Ricans will be changed, and the lives of the people on the following trips will never be the same.
How can I be so selfish to be worried about such small things?

As the song Burn Out Brighter says: I want to live inspired, I want to die for something higher than myself. The more I live I see that this life’s not about me.

Light shine on me, so that these blinded eyes might see.
Grace like rain, descend and make all these tainted ways come clean.
Let my eyes see you, forever stay fixated.
Let my eyes see you, and stay until redemption is found.
I know I’ve been redeemed.
For all my pain and my mistakes, Jesus has paid the price.
For all my sins, I’m born again, Jesus has paid for them.
And on this rock I’ll make my stand.

Beautiful

This song seems to end up being my theme song. If you’ve never heard it, you should. It really explains a lot about me. I think it’s because it just repeats the same thing over and over, but it ends with a reminder of how beautiful our redemption is.

I’m done now.

July 31 show has been cancelled.

August 4 – National Night Out
Super Target Parking Lot
12000 Retail Dr.
Wake Forest, NC 27587
5-9 pm
*We play at 8pm

August 28 – The Garner Historic Auditorium
742 W. Garner Rd.
Garner, NC 27592
$5 admission per person
7-10 pm

Don’t say “I didn’t know you were playing!!!”

Follow me on twitter for ‘last minute’ gigs.

If you look at your life as a giant scheme, a plan for which you don’t have, you’ll start to see the patterns.
In my life, the pattern is obvious, but it always comes disguised at the time I am going through it. One of the things that I have noticed is that whenever things start getting tough, I am quick to stay the same, rather than change and feel discomfort.
Rather than be stretched, I would prefer to just snap back to my comfort zone.

This trip changed that. I had to put myself in a place that would stretch me no matter how hard I tried backing out. I had to jump in feet first and keep swimming.

It was hard to do.

One of the things that really tore me to pieces was living what I had been saying.
A couple of years ago I read in a mission’s book that what the job of a missionary is, is to reveal a God that has been there all along. To show them the beauty of redemption in something that has been right there, all along.
But for some reason, I was unable to find the beauty in myself and the things around me, to see my Creator.
There are some things that many people do not know about me, only because I refuse to share something so close to my heart in fear of being hurt by it at a later time. But it seems like the closer I get to letting out my gifts and callings, the further I push myself away from the situation that most reveals it.

In August of 2007, I went on a beach retreat by myself. I stayed at a campsite and disconnected myself from the outside world. I was praying about what God wanted me to do, because I had become really great at messing up everything. I was sitting next to a blazing fire and one question came to my mind.

“What one thing would you want with you if you were stranded on a desert island?”

We’ve all heard that before, right?

But have you really ever thought about it? What is the ONE thing that you would want to have with you?

I know that I have blogged about this before, but rather than bore you with forcing you to read it, I’ll just cut to the chase.

The one thing that I decided that I wanted to have with me on this deserted island was my praise and worship.

I have known for years that I was created to create music and although I decided to create it in ways that did not glorify God at first, now I do. It seems odd to me that when I share this gift with people they are shocked. I am well aware that I am hilarious. I am amazingly funny. We all know this. But the serious side of me does exist, and it usually only comes out when I am in worship.

I momentarily decided to delete this whole post and start over, but then decided not to.

Why?

Because it’s putting a shiny glass window on one of the walls to my heart.

Part of the reason that I don’t share this gift with people is that:
1. They don’t know I can.
2. They can’t see me as anything other than just some strange, funny girl.
3. I’m scared of rejection so I choose to joke rather than be serious.

It’s usually #3.

So what am I so afraid of?

It’s you.

I could go really deep with this and say that it is because I used to use this talent and ability often, but never received acceptance or acknowledgment from the one group of people I truly desired it from, or I could go shallow and say… I’m shy.
But if we’ve met, you know I’m not that shy.

So what does this have to do with beauty?

It has to do with finding the beauty. Wherever you are. If you can’t see it, you have to create it.

While preparing to go on this mission trip I was trying to find some worship songs. I ended up finding a few that I had never played before, and learned them. When I was preparing to worship my first day there, I saw the theme in the songs. I don’t know how I missed it.

Beauty.

But it wasn’t until the last day that it really connected with me.

Laura was sharing something so deep and profound about what she learned about her brother’s passing that it struck me, once again, that I am not in charge. There is no way that we could have possibly planned this trip.
We were all there to add our little bits. We all had something to throw into the ring.
Cindy touched the bus. This may not be very profound to you, but when I saw her reach her hand out there and the bus just grazed by…
Sebrina… I’ve never seen someone grow so much in such a short amount of time – from last year to now.
Laura kept the rough edges smooth, bringing things together from the spiritual realm to the physical – not just words…
Keven – the task is part of the plan, don’t lose sight of why you’re here.
This is what tied it all in for me. From the first day’s devotions until now.

Why Am I Here?

To find the beauty in the madness.

I’ve been looking for it for years now. Reading, traveling, listening… But it wasn’t until this trip that I found it.

It has been on the inside of me this whole time.

The task is part of the plan and the task is why you’re here… don’t lose sight of why you’re here.

Finding beauty in the madness.