Thursday, April 4, 2013

My hidden treasures in Christ


Hey friends!
Sorry I have been so M.I.A. lately, spring break was such a nice relaxing time at home with my family. I loved cuddling with my cat every night and staying up super late with no agenda or anything. Now that I am back at school, the busyness begins. I never forget how blessed I am to be living this life, despite all of the chaos. This week I’m realizing I desperately need Jesus in every aspect of my life. It’s not like I didn’t know this before, but Jesus is showing it play out in reality in my life. More God, less Jessica. I am super selfish guys. Thankfully God is so filled with mercy. Lord, help me to focus on serving you and not myself. Open my eyes to all your doing in my life and the abundance of blessings you have laid upon me. Anyway, How are all of you doing? I hope your doing amazing! Grab a cup of coffee and sit down with me. I’m suuuuuper glad you stopped by my page. :)

Jesus has been working tremendously on my heart lately, He’s been teaching me how to trust him more and He so badly wants me to know that wherever he leads me is the best path for me. Yet I fail miserably most of the time at believing this. I find myself asking God, “Okay, really? How could this be the right way? Whatever you say God…” Then all of a sudden his light shines the way and I feel like a complete fool for ever doubting Him. But, like I said, God is forgiving. Each day He is RENEWING me. Phew. Praise the Lord; He is so so so so good.


Today I wanted to talk to you all about the hidden treasures that each of us carry in our hearts from our relationships with Christ. Nope, I’m not talking about gold. I’m talking about the tangible things. Things like peace, love, hope, joy, and trust. It is these few things that have freed my soul from the power of sin. I want to tell you how each one of these hidden treasures I carry have impacted my life tremendously through my relationship with God.

     My first hidden treasure that lies in my heart is God’s JOY.
God has made known to me ever so clearly in my relationship with Him that He alone is the source of my strength. This strength isn’t muscle based, its joy based. Because I used to be so darn prideful, God had a lot of strongholds to conquer within my mind to help me understand that I can’t do anything without him. It took time. It was filled with a lot of failure. But where I am today is 100% better than where I used to be, and God is still working on me. God’s joy is my strength, I can’t get that kind of joy from any man, any type of delicious food (nope not even chocolate), no super hot celebrity (Justin Bieber? ;)). Nehemiah 8:10 says: “The joy of the LORD is your strength.” I LOVE that verse. Remember that friends, God’s joy radiates through you. The veil has been removed; sin no longer can defeat us. God wants people to question His love in you so they will be like: “Dang! That girl. She’s always so happy. There’s no absolute way she’s doing that on her own” Yep, I’m not. It’s just the God in me.


     My second hidden treasure that lies in my heart is God's PEACE.
 Life get’s crazy. I get stressed out with school, with thinking about the future, new relationships, many different kinds of things. But as time goes on and my relationship with Christ continues to grow, he has taught me so graciously that He is the only one who can give me peace, and that is a beautiful thing. It’s so reassuring that my savior died on the cross so my ugly sin could be taken away. I want nothing more than to live a life serving Him, as much as I fail Him daily. John 14:27 says: “I am leaving you with a gift—peace of mind and peace of heart. And the peace I give is a gift the world cannot give. So don’t be trouble or afraid.” Gosh, I love that verse so much. It speaks directly to my heart.  Without God’s peace, I wouldn’t know what to do. I wouldn’t know who to depend on. I would begin to depend on people again like I did in my past without Christ, which ultimately lead me to failure. Jesus is always with me, and His peace is abundant. He desires to give it to me every second of the day, and I am so thankful for that.

                          My third hidden treasure that lies in my heart is God's TRUSTWORTHINESS.
Before having a relationship with the Lord, I was kinda scared if I could trust Him or not. I didn’t entirely believe that the God of the universe wanted to have a relationship with me. I was raised in a church full of Sunday School sing-a-longs, which never told me anything about the relationship part of Christianity. Funny thing, that IS the only part! It’s not about going to church, it’s not about doing good things, its about having a real relationship with Christ and trusting Him. Over the past, God has proved Himself trustworthy to mean again and again. I’m not saying it’s ever easy, and most of the time I’m over-analyzing things and worrying way too much, but He always comes through for me. It may not be the way I wanted it to happen or how I expected it to happen, but it ends up being the best for myself, and I can see that. It leads me to my greater joy and benefit. God’s working for my GOOD, he so desperately wants me to just TRUST him. Nahum 1:7 says: “The LORD is good, a strong hold in the day of trouble, and he knows those that trust in him.” I love how that verse uses the two words stronghold and trouble. God is our victor against the enemy of this world, he is our rock when trouble comes in our lives. Proverbs 3:5  says: “Trust in the LORD with all of your heart, do not lean on your own understanding.” This verse reminds me of so many moments in my life where I wondered where God could possibly be leading me in my life, until later when His magnificent plan was revealed. TRUST Him even when things aren’t adding up. Wherever God leads you in the best way.

    My fourth hidden treasure that lies in my heart is God's HOPE.

Hope is a beautiful thing. When we hope, we imagine a beautiful future ahead for ourselves. We feel good inside. Happy hearts. Well, that’s what hoping in the Lord is like for me and its what He wants for everyone else. Jeremiah 29:11 says: “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” God loves it when all of our hope is in Him and Him alone. He responds to us hoping in Him by giving us His joy and loving us immensely. One of my FAAAVORITE songs right now is by Aaron Shust and its called “My hope is in you.” It’s an amazing song where he sings about how all of his hope for his future is in the Lord and how he hopes in God all day long. My hope is in you too Lord! Thank for being so gracious to me and forgiving me of all of my ugly sins that I show you daily.

               The fifth hidden treasure that lies in my heart is God's LOVE.

Most importantly, God LOVES us. He sent His son to die on the cross for us. I am so unworthy of this love, yet so won over by it. Thank you Jesus, for putting to death the worst part of me so you could love me forever in eternity. Remember that God love for you NEVER fails. It’s unconditional. I think that’s what I struggle with the most in believing. I’m going to start praying that God would show me how His love for me is unconditional for me. Lord, help me to fully grasp that more.


Anyways friends just wanted to share that with you all. I am going to start posting more on here, I promise! I have missed the blogging scene, and I feel like lately it’s been a little too me-me-me and not enough Jesus. So yep, these next couple weeks are going to be me working on being a little more selfless every day. Thankful for a God who is so forgiving of my sins, and so willing to make me better and better every day. Please give me some feedback, let me know what you think of my blog! I’d love to hear from you all!!!!!


XOXO

1 comment:

  1. Seriously. Good. Stuff!!!!!!! Mmmmm…JESUS!!! (0:

    Btw, I wanted to tell you that I nominated you for a Liebster award this morning and just posted about it (0: I can't wait to hear your responses
    Hope you're having a LOVELY DIA!
    Love and Blessings,
    Lacy

    ReplyDelete