The 23rd Thing I Love.

#23 - I love football.

While this has not always been a true statement, it has been profoundly true the last 5 years or so. It all started when I began cheering for UT because of a classmate who played on the team. After being a part of Neyland Stadium at capacity (over 107,000 people), I was simply hooked.

I attended a football chapel as part of Love United Gospel Choir and was deeply impressed by the heart felt prayer of a man named Gibril Wilson. Then he went to play for the NY Giants, and my true obsession was born.

The hard hitting, the intricate rules, the players that stand out as examples to young men everywhere, and the Manning brother commercials are just a few of the things I LOVE about football. I don't remember what Sunday afternoons in the fall were like before football. Thankfully, I don't have to.

GO GIANTS!!! 3-0, baby!!!

The 24th Thing I Love.

#24 - I LOVE in depth Bible study.

If you've never participated in a Bible study where you watched meaning scream into your heart from a few verses (or even a few words), you are missing out. You read a verse that seems pretty straightforward, or maybe boring, or maybe over your head. Then you begin to break it down. Maybe you look up the Greek or Hebrew words to find out what the author was really trying to get out. Then you watch the Scripture literally come alive before you, tugging at your heart, waking up your mind, giving you a glimpse into a meaning and understanding you never could have imagined from a few tiny words.

It is incredible the way that no matter how deeply you delve into the rich treasures that lie within Scripture, you can always go deeper the next time. You can always see something new that you never saw before. And as God reveals his purpose and character in the Bible, we shift from seeing it as a rule book to seeing the most beautiful love story ever written, motivating us to live from the inside out. "We love because he has first loved us." 1 John 4:19

These pages, so full of life, beauty, and meaning, were written for me! They are to be kept close to my heart, treasured like a middle school girl treasures her first love note. But where human love will fail us, the One who wrote us this love letter is always faithful, and he loves us more than we could ever dare to hope. His love letter is full of truth as well as love, without trite promises and unrealistic vows. Every thing he said in the Bible... he can back it up. I hope you will take a few minutes to go deep into a scripture today and fall in love with the Bible and with God.

P.S. If you want to be part of a Bible study like this, drop me a line and I'll do what I can to help you find one in your area!

25 Things I Love

So, I'm stealing this idea from Tara-Leigh Cobble, a girl I've never met but feel like could be one of my best friends. She is doing a blog series on 25 things she loves, in no particular order. So I am going to do the same.

#25 - I LOVE my friends.

Again, let me reiterate that these are in no particular order, because my friends would be much higher than number 25 were they ranked!!

God has given me the most amazing, incredible friends anyone could ever ask for. If something bad happens in my life, there are dozens of people I know I can call and rely on to love me, listen to me, pray for me, and point me to Christ. Praise God. I couldn't live this life without them. Many of you live entirely too far away, by the way.

One of you (I don't know if you will read this or not) may be feeling like you let me down. But let me tell you that I cannot even begin to comprehend the love that God has given me for you. As long as God continues to forgive me, I pray that he will give me the grace to do the same. All I want in this world is for you simply to come home to rest in the arms of Christ. I'll be here when you do.

"If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up!" Ecclesiastes 4:10

"My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command." John 15:12-14

"Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another." 1 John 4:11

Little crosses.

"The offenses which come against us do not cause us to sin, they simply reveal what sin is already there and needs to be addressed. And so, may we praise the Lord for the little crosses in our lives which if handled by the Spirit can bring greater peace and deeper wisdom to us."

Wow. For the rest of that blog, click here.

I miss football.

This video is hilarious!!!



Me too, boys. Me too.

God’s presence in the godforsaken.

I've heard Haiti described in many ways. I've heard it called a "black hole" for donors and ministries because of its crippling generational poverty. I've heard that it is a "God-forsaken" place because of voodoo's grip there. Yet as I stood on a balcony in the Dominican Republic, looking out over the mountains and valleys of Haiti, I felt something different. God's presence with and unique passion for the downtrodden and oppressed are undeniable. Why, therefore, should we be surprised to find him there? As bolts of lightening sprinted rapidly across the sky and a gentle breeze whispered through my hair, I gazed at the power and beauty being displayed in front of my eyes, over the Haitian landscape. And in my spirit, I heard the Lord say, "See? I AM in Haiti."

"To the LORD your God belong the heavens, even the highest heavens, the earth and everything in it. For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the alien, giving him food and clothing. He is your praise; he is your God, who performed for you those great and awesome wonders you saw with your own eyes." - Deuteronomy 10:14, 17, 18, 21

Lessons in Love and Community.

We were not meant to live life alone. We are designed to be a part of a community. (Please take a moment to read this incredible blog talking about the importance of such things: To Write Love on Her Arms.) God created marriage, family, and the church to meet these needs in part. But most of all, he gives us the opportunity, through the death of his son, to have a constant, meaningful, fulfilling relationship with him. He promises to never leave us or forsake us. He puts people in our paths, if even for a short time, to encourage us and point us toward him. But even these beautiful things like family and friends and church will pass away. Nothing is constant except the love of our Creator. He is without time, and without limits. He not only loves us, but he IS love. We cannot even begin to love unless we first accept his love. He gives us relationships to teach us about our relationship with him.

I have learned so many deep lessons about God's love. I learned one when my heart was broken, realizing that the way a person turned from me is the way that I turn from God. The Rocket Summer has an incredible song that says, "I will say that I'm true to you. But I'm a cheat. I don't understand. So I'll run to you." That lyric resonates so deeply with me. We cheat on God all the time. We promise to love him and serve him out of gratitude (not obligation) for the love that he has lavished on us. Yet we turn to other relationships, material possessions, or the worldly pursuits of success or pride. We cheat on him the way a spouse or boyfriend cheats, saying from one side of our mouths that we love him while kissing the enticement of sin with the other.

Another lesson I've learned from the same relationship, now redeemed through God's forgiveness and mercy, is the way that God can love us despite our mistakes. I learned to love with grace and forgiveness when God allowed me to share a bit of the pain he feels at our cheating on him. Now I learn the other side, as I see my constant failures, selfish desires, and the perceived need for control that I so desperately fight, and I know that I am loved despite my shortcomings. I feel the love that flows over me no matter my current state, whether that be one of insecurity, selfishness, or any other offense. I can do nothing to earn the love of God. He can love me no more than he already does. He can love me no less than he already does. This is a lesson that I am continuing to learn from a man that loves me in a way I never imagined being loved.

No matter God's plan, I am thankful for the lessons that he continues to give me. I am thankful that he has designed us to live in community, constantly growing and helping others to grow "as iron sharpens iron." I am immensely thankful for each friend, love, acquaintance, or even sunset that brings me closer to God and mirrors a part of my relationship with him, helping me climb closer to the goal for which I am constantly striving - to be more like him, to love more like him, to learn to rest in the love that he has for me.

To read a truly wise woman's words on what God has revealed to her about his unchanging love, click here: Kerry Hasenbalg's Blog.