the next step...

so, as the days go by, well, that's it. sometimes they just go by. they are gone forever. I've heard countless times "life is too short to be unhappy" or "its to short to waste away on meaningless things." and i agree life is too short to just sit around and let the day just go by, but if you think about it life on earth is the longest thing we are given, for now anyways. but i think about this often, almost daily. what in the world am i going to do with this life?? God has clearly blessed it in countless ways, but not only what am i going to do, but what does God want me to do. i think that's the real question.
i recently got back from the annual youth retreat i go on with my youth group. for the past three years we have gone to the same cabin and kinda fell, for me anyways, into the same routine once we got back home. you know the routine of not doing anything...just letting the days go by. but this year we had a guest speaker, Tim Owens, also commonly know as Big O, and he had a message that really spoke to me. it was based off the verse of John 10:10 A thief comes to steal,kill and destroy; i came so they can have real and eternal life, a better life than you've ever dreamed of. the whole weekend revolved around this verse and the idea of living an extraordinary life. i learned something very important, well a great deal of things actually, but mostly i learned that in order to fight the enemy (Satan), that i have to know the enemy. its not just important to learn about God, because Satan will always try to bring us down when we begin to grow spiritually. think about it, like the army, they are constantly doing background checks and finding out as much as they can about their enemy. this is something super important that i was basically oblivious to before.
when you are a sold out Christan, doing/living it up for your God and Savior, Satan wants to steal your joy. lately that has been happening to me so much. the past week or so, I've just been in a horrible mood and mad at myself and getting up set over trivial things, and i can literally feel Satan trying to pull me apart and feeling vulnerable and lost and confused. i know that their is a difference between being happy and being joyful, and i think the biggest difference is that just because you are a joyful person doesn't mean your gonna be happy 100% of the time. I'm hoping this makes sense to you because i don't really know how else to explain it.
the next thing is if you are a stumbler, you know, sitting on the fence, not one but not the other, lukewarm, Satan wants to kill your witness. if that's you, that's a scary thought.
and if you are the seeker, looking for God but not sure where He is, or what to believe, Satan wants to destroy your life. Satan tries to do all of this because he hates me, he hates my friends, he hates you. he hates every one. also i think its because he knows the power that is inside a godly person and Gods people. he knows the holy spirit is moving in me and he hates it, absolutely hates it. Satan tries to get at us everyday, and for some of us he does that by making it easier for us to compromise our faith and walk with God. check out Matthew 7:13-14 you can enter God's Kingdom only through the narrow gate. the highway to Hell is broad, and the gate is wide for the many who chose the easy way. but the gate way to life is small, and the road narrow, and only a few ever find it.
the whole purpose of Jesus coming was to save us from being ordinary. He wants something bigger than ordinary for His children. He wants to rescue us from this world and an ordinary life. and that begins when you realized your need for a Savior, Romans 10:9. then when you know and acknowledge Satan's temptation. it is all around us, its so bad that sometimes we get into a sinful habit and the temptation is to strong to quit. that's why we have Jesus, to help us through that. Hebrews 2:18 and finally you depend on gods strength, not your own. Psalms 118:13, Nehemiah 8:10

Jesus wants us to get past this rut of being ordinary and here is what i learned on how to do that
1 identify what Satan is doing in your life, where is he trying to pick you apart?
2 take it personally, Satan wants to kill you
3 fight with all you've got, fight with your life and everything that's within you
when your sold out for God, live it up. when your a stumbler, beat temptation. and when your a seeker, pursue God's way.

being extraordinary isn't gonna be easy and its not gonna just happen over night, in fact i think it is something i will work on until the day i go to heaven. trying everyday to pick up my cross and follow Jesus, losing my life for Him and finding it, losing my soul for God before i come to His kingdom. Matthew 16:24-28.

also one thing i absolutely love about reading Gods word everyday and listening to Christan music, i love it when i hear lyrics to a song and knowing exactly where in the bible that came from, like the song b y tobymac-lose your soul, it comes from Matthew 16:25-28, and i think its just awesome whenever i realize something like that :)

so for now thats what im going to try and do wiht this life, not let the days just go by, but doing someting and be extrodianry, im gonna pick up my cross and follow jesus, will you?
love always and forever
gracie :)