Alive to Live

HI-YAH!

So, I am feeling much more... what's the word? Not tired? Needless to say, I slept for 12 hours.

Anyway, last night was excellent at youth group. We talked a lot about Martyrs. People were really interested. The fact that was brought up was, there are so many people willing to die for Christ, and some of us aren't even willing to Live for him. BA BOOM! There is a splash of cold water on the face - wake up call. With that we led into Romans 12, fitting into our own culture without even thinking. You could tell everyone was hungry for God to pour down. So many prayer requests. I just can't help but feel a sense of family growing, especially with the girls, they have such a powerful desire to advance further in their maturity with Christ. And the guys are craving so much to break temptation and chains of sin. It's incredibly empowering to think of even after the fact.

Later in the evening I was talking to my pastor a lot about passion, and my day with my teachers, and just where my heart was. Actually, I am headed to work soon so I am going to count this next part as my blog for tonight.

My pastor and I were talking about Abraham, and how God made him give up his passion, which was his son, when Abraham willingly said, Yes God, I will give you my son, I love you that much, that is when God gave his passion back to him. He let Abraham have his son, but not until Abraham put him on the Altar. So I was kind of thinking about that, and how maybe God was showing me that? I think sometimes we get really set on the success that WE will see, for ourselves. Will people know our names? Will people remember us after we die? Will we make a massive impact? When we think these things our passions turn into plans for success for ourselves and not for God. Of course, God fixes that. So, take that thought for what You will. I am still working on it.

Another thing that we talked about was how this Western World has this outlook that if you are having an incredible walk with God, you are not allowed to be sad, or upset, or tempted. Not true. God says in His word that we will go through stuff like that, and Romans even says that if our friends are upset, be upset with them and comfort them. We talked about that for a while, and I don't know how, but I made the connection of being too serious with life. We have this one life, so have fun. god is not a completely serious guy, He invented comedy, He invented dancing and singing, and everything that makes us happy. It is Satan who has turned all these amazing gifts of joy into sin. So let's take those gifts back, they were here for us initially to have fun with, so let's have fun. Let's not be all stuffy and feel like we are glued down into a law of doing this and this and this in order to get into heaven. That is a load of *crap*, it is about a personal relationship -- directly from you, straight up, to your best friend. And your best friend wants you to live having the time of your life. We are alive to live, to have fun. WOO, feels good.

Another side note of what my pastor and I were talking about last night... when Satan reminds us of our past, we should remind him of our future.

Haha,

Colton