The Dark

Genesis 1:3-5

³ And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. ⁴ God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. ⁵ God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.

God Separated the Dark and the Light. He claimed the Light was good. But what about the dark? Was it not good? It doesnt say. This bothered me when I realized it. Then I read on.

Genesis 1:16-18

¹⁶ God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars. ¹⁷ God set them in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth, ¹⁸ to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good.

Light is good, and Dark is bad. That is what we have been taught. The light side vs the dark side (for all you starwars lovers out there) is a classic fight between good and evil. When God separated the light and dark it perplexed me when he only called the light good. But later on once God placed a light to govern the night he saw that it was good. That got me to thinking (dangerous I know).

We as Christians tend to have a lot of dark in out lives. By that I mean sins we try to hide and attitudes and behaviors we tend not to control. Before God gave a light to govern the dark, the dark didnt serve much of a purpose. But once God's light was governing the dark he saw that it was good.

Lets bring this full circle shall we? If you have sin, unforgiveness, behavior issues you havent given up to the Lord. You're hiding in the dark and it is worthless. But if you let your Dark be governed by the light of the Lord then God can use your Dark for good. But still yet many people struggle to bring their dark to the light. Why is it so hard for us to do that?

Are you afraid of the Dark? If so you should be. Theres nothing in the Dark that can hurt you if you let it be illuminated and revealed by God's Light. Living in the Dark can hurt and hinder you by not letting your Dark be governed by the light of the Lord. By bringing your Dark to the light not only will you be liberating yourself but you will also be enabling yourself to be a walking testimony of God's faithfulness in healing and restoration of his people.

I truly believe it is the will of the Lord that you bring your Dark to the Light so that it may be Governed and used by him for his Glory.

Dont Sell Out

Many have heard the name Rob Bell. An established author. Fantastic pastor. Unreal motivator. Yesterday an article of his was published online by CNN. Here it is...

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/02/13/my-faith-suffering-my-way-to-a-new-tomorrow/

In his article he says:

"I assume you're like me - really good at making plans and plotting and scheming and devising just how to make your life go how it's "supposed" to go.

We are masters of this. We know exactly how things are supposed to turn out.

And then we suffer. There's a disruption - death, disease, job loss, heartbreak, betrayal or bankruptcy.

The tomorrow we were expecting disappears. And we have no other plan."

I'm a senior in college. The past 3 and a half years of my life have been solely aimed and dedicated (while not as dedicated as it should have been in the start) to progressing my education. Why? So I can get a job, start a family, and settle down. Now as Rob said I'm really good at making plans and plotting and scheming and devising just how to make my life go how it's "supposed" to go. Somewhere along the way I started to sell out from what I knew I was supposed to do. And not in a way that I completely dropped it but I slacked off and shrugged off a lot of the calling I so deeply felt for quite a few years.

I was once told "Dont sell out for the American Dream. You're better than that and you have a lot to live for." I have to think back a few years honestly and start remembering what my dreams are because somehow I let the fog of an American dream take over.

Another motivator I encountered this past weekend was that I was able to watch Elevation Church's documentary "This is How We Change the World" you can watch it here too for this week only. It's mighty inspiring:

http://www.elevationexperience.com/

If you see this blog and arent able to watch the whole documentary before they take it down then you can at least see a trailer of it here...:

http://www.elevationchurch.org/video/wechangetheworld

I went Friday night with Caroline and our friend Sam Kent to watch it and celebrate Elevations 5 year anniversary. It was a great time and I left truly inspired and reminded to follow my calling. I hope you will be encouraged as well. I spent the rest of Friday night talking with Caroline and Sam at Q'doba in Blakeney and then again in the car on the ride home. It was good to be reaffimed by people that are close in my life about my calling.

If you read this and you find yourself realizing that you've lost sight of your dreams or that they've been blanketed by some other vision you've been fooled into following it's time for a shift. Get back on track. Get out of the rat race and into the real race. It doesnt matter where you are in life (whether you take that on a timeline or geographically) You can get back to where you are supposed to be.

My closing words to you today are the ones that were told to me years ago though slightly modified. Gotta make it fit for everyone since everyone who reads my blog isn't from America (Shout out to my Iranian Brothers and Sisters, you guys rock stay Strong!)

Don't Sell Out for a Mediocre Dream that will rob you of a life worth living, you're better than that!

I Love you all, keep me in your thoughts and prayers and if you message me I will gladly return the favor. Have a great week.

Hello there... Its been what 8 months? No big deal.

Heres something I thought of Today....

There are around 300,000 Churches in America... wow. Heres some food for thought. What if every single church took on the task of building at least one home in Mexico much like this... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHcCBtIcxhQ&ob=av2n

Thats what I would call Impact, somebody take this and run with it.

Lyrics for "Kings of Snow day"

"Kings Of Snow Day"

Verse 1

A Snowday is here
No School we're in the clear
Its time to go and play
On this Purple Backpack Day

Bridge 1

Half the People on their Sleds
The other half are still in bed
Drop your D's and go to Mi's
Theres Zero snow up on the trees

Black Ice all around the streets
People sliding in their Jeeps
We live in Charlotte its ok
We'll Have our snow just for Today

Chorus

Feb 1st Snow Day, Feb 1st Snow Day
Feb 1st Snow Day is Here!

Verse 2

Get your boots and your hat
Pick up your favorite baseball bat
It's time to plan our attacks
So we pack up our hacky sacks.

Bridge 2

Blowing up a big snow man
Punk'n on our neighbor Dan
Making lots of yellow snow
Mugging kids for all their dough

M-80's in the snowball fight
We'll cause Mischeif in the night
Pack each mail box full of snow
Hear the sirens? Time To Go!


Chorus

Feb. 1st Snow Day, Feb. 1st Snow Day,
Feb. 1st Snow Days Is Here!


Verse 3

The Day is almost gone
I hear a calling from my mom
Project these words from my mouth
Welcome to the Dirty South.

Bridge 3

We're the Kings of this snow day
And it's going down our way
Please try not to fear
This only happens once a year

Up and down the road we roam
Snow Day Kings we're here to own
The people here to us condone
The right to have our own ice throne

Chorus 2x

Feb. 1st Snow Day, Feb. 1st Snow Day,
Feb. 1st Snow Day Is Here!

Meltdown

To my 6 Followers....

Forgive me for the extreme lack of Blogging over the past like.... Lord knows how long its been. Wishful thinking: I wanna start getting some more stuff out for ya'll. Reality: I'm taking an 18 hour course load at UNC Charlotte this semester and I'm logging 90 hours of Community service (by my choosing of course I didn't do anything wrong I promise.)

Good and Bad

Good News: I intend to start blogging again.

Bad News: I don't know when.......

Thats all I got right now.....

Since I havent updated in forever.

I havent blogged in a long time... I get that...
Check this... odds are I wont be blogging for a while.....
Suck it up....... Till then glean what you can from this....

Matthew 28:19

Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,

NIV

If you can, listen to the song "Go" by Christian Stanfill. Its on his CD "Attention" track 4.

I'm going to quote my good friend Aaron Peters when I say...

"You cant make an Impact without Contact."

Go out. Make friends. Invest your life in them so that they might have Life for themselves.

I Love you All, check back (not often but enough to know that I'll still blog some.)

"Purple Backpacks, Yellow Hacky Sacks"

So this hit new band is taking Charlotte by storm everybody should check it out!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rawFmIkjYU

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Purple-Backpacks-Yellow-Hacky-Sacks/127073564371?v=wall

www.myspace.com/purplebackpacks

How Bad?

Last night I was sitting in the first InterVarsity meeting of the year. We hosted Kinetic Church's Worship team and Pastor. It was great. Pastor Dave had a great message but there was one part I wanted to share with you all in particular.

Dave showed a video blog done by Teller of Penn and Teller. Brief rundown on Penn and Teller, they are both avid Athiest who have toured the country doing a sort of comical magic act. They have a TV show on SHOWTIME called Bullshit! where their entire purpose is to expose fakes and frauds. (My personal favorite is when they shame PETA)

Well anyways back to my purpose in blogging. The point of Teller's video blog was to talk about an encounter he had. Long story short there was a man who went to their Vegas show and was apparently used on stage in one of the acts the night before. After the next nights show he was able to approach Teller and was very complimentary of the act. He gave him a Gideons Bible with a note written inside it.

Teller is a man who wants to disprove Christianity and show it as a fraud much as he does for many other things. He said that if Christianity is real and what Christians stand for is real then why arent they acting with a sense of urgency? How bad do you have to Hate somebody not to tell them something like that? "If you're about to get hit by a truck and dont know it, there comes a point where I tackle you, and this isnt even as severe as the consequences of not following Christianity." He said I'm not a fan of religious people but that guy that confronted me and showed that he cared. He was a good man, that guy was a good man.

So to end off this first short blog of my Junior year.....

Guy's we gotta start living it, we cant go on like we have been anymore, either we live it and tell people with urgency the Good News deserves or we just dont care.

The lack will continue much to the dismay of many

I havent Blogged in FOREVER, I know ok....... But I worked 44 Hours this week none of which were in the church office and havent been able to blog a lick. Next week I'm at the Beach all week Woot! So no blogging then at the internetless house. Sorry. Love you guys and hope to be blogging again soon when I get back home.