Stop Divorcing Yourself

I realized it as I was reading the first chapter in Ericka Morrison's book Bandersnatch: I used to try to divorce the artist in me because it didn't seem "Christian".

Let me explain.

I used to believe that I couldn't be both a poet and a preacher. The two seemed separate to me. Poet seemed worldly. Preacher seemed spiritual.

Teacher was the gift and the compromise and seemed to fit into both.

But I can't deny that I'm a poet. I realized last night that being a poet isn't wrong.

The mind of God is a poet.

Just like the mind of God is an engineer.

Just like the mind of God is a scientist.

Just like the mind of God is a mathematician.

Just like the mind of God is a psychologist.

We all hold fragments of the reflection of God. Genesis 1:26.

If we are only looking at the teachers and preachers we are only seeing part of Him.

If we only accept the more spiritual parts of ourselves we are leaving out soul and body.

My spirit is a prophetess but my soul is a writer. And He made me that way.

What's more than that: He likes me that way.

We are making God religious and boring.

God is mind-blowing and cool.

And we don't understand Him.

When we try to cut off parts of ourselves it is evidence that we are putting God in a box.

**

I'm not saying that God doesn't want to take us on a journey to make us look more like Him. There are things that we will have to get rid of along our journey. There are sins we will have to shed. 

But we also don't have to divorce parts of ourselves.

We need all of the pieces within us to be whole- to be tied together in matrimony to Christ. 

You get to take along your eye for design. 

God has an eye for design.

HE MADE EVERYTHING.

You get to take along your calculations.

HE ORDERED THE MOON AND THE STARS.

You get to take along your art.

HE PAINTS THE SKY.

You get to take along your philosophy.

HIS THOUGHTS ARE HIGHER THAN OURS. 

HE CREATED ALL KNOWLEDGE. 

HE PROVIDES WISDOM.

I'm not talking about "accepting culture". Please don't get me wrong. I am talking about God being much less religious than we make Him. I am talking about God being the creator of everything. I am talking about the fact that we are made in His image. His image is complex. His image contains an infinite amount of faucets and fragments are seen in each of us. 

He cannot be contained, yet we contain pieces of Him.

With something to think about,

-Ashley

Fear

I've been re-evaluating a lot of things recently. I have been thinking about what the next season of my life will look like and quite frankly it both excites and scares me. 

I have seen two pictures that are really speaking to what the Lord is doing right now in my life for what is next.

The first one I saw on my way to school. It was the image of a piece of paper with the word FEAR on it written in red. I saw the piece of paper being torn in two.

The second image happened during service on Sunday morning. I saw myself holding a piece of paper with the word FEAR on it. However, this time I saw myself underwater and a huge whale was coming my way. I thought that the whale was going to swallow me, but instead it snatched the paper out of my hand and ate it. 

So, it doesn't take a brain surgeon to realize that I've been dealing with some issues of fear in my life. The Lord is showing me these pictures to illustrate what He is doing. 

He is removing fear. He is swallowing fear. He is tearing fear in two. 

I think whatever it is that is threatening me the most in my life is going to be the thing that takes the fear out of my hand. 

Consider this for yourself was well. Whatever it is that is coming your way that looks like it will swallow you whole is really the thing in your life that is trying to destroy fear. 

Crazy Joy

The strangest thing has happened in my 3rd block class.

We have been destroyed by waves of joy.

These waves usually hit at the beginning of the class period and leave us in hunched-over laughter. 

Friday, it happened again. It was beautiful. There is a freedom to play and be real and laugh that I have never quite experienced before. Did I mention I get to experience this with my my high-achieving students?

Smart cookies. Real smart cookies.

The kind that believe in Jesus' philosophy of leaving the 99 to go after the 1...the 1 point they missed from making 100 ...

And what are we doing? 

Laughing until we are crying.

After this, they do more work for me than any of my other classes combined. 

The lesson: Basking in His Presence of Joy produces amazing things.

Instead of the following: Saying you are standing in His Joy and striving to do amazing things.

Much of our church culture is flipped completely upside down. We trick ourselves into believing that we are supposed to be working for joy when really God intended joy to work for us.

You want to know why you are tired? 

You want to know why you are miserable?

Because you are working for that joy instead of laying in it!!

Maybe you need to stop working so hard. Maybe you need to stop serving so much. Maybe you need to bask a little while at the feet of Jesus. 

There is always a greater choice-- and it is never serving Jesus's needs, it is receiving from Him what He longs to give us.

If you don't believe me-- go read the story about Martha and Mary. Jesus was just as serious then as He is right now.

How do you foster an atmosphere for crazy joy? Invite Holy Spirit in and let Him surprise you. It's not going to happen if you are working really hard for it. It's going to happen when you walk right into it.

Praying for God to wreck your classrooms, homes, and workplaces with crazy JOY!!!!

Let go of control and put Him in control. Walk in peace and joy will follow you.


** In fact, please excuse any grammatical errors in this post... I'm so drunk on Joy right now that it's a little hard for me to write this for laughing.

Here is some inspiration: Tip of My Toes

100 before January 01

When it comes to exercise, it is important to turn off your brain.

I am sitting under the covers, on my bed, thinking about how I need to go run this morning to reach my goal of 100 miles.

The more I think about it, the longer it takes me to get out of bed and go.

In fact, writing this blog post is postponing my trip another three minutes. But I wanted to get this lesson down.

Another lesson I'm learning is that you don't have to use your brainpower in overdrive all the time. The brain needs a break. Stop thinking so much. 

Goal: 100 miles (biking, running, walking) by January 1, 2016.

25Cents: Lesson 1- Wide Open Life

My best friend informed me that I am 25 years of a century old.

That makes me sound really old. I actually feel younger now than I did when I was 18. But that is another lesson for another day.

There have been so many lessons that I have learned before I turned 25. Some of them have helped me much more than I would have ever guessed. They are definitely worth sharing.

Over the next two or three weeks, I am going to post the most important lessons I learned before turning 25. I hope you enjoy!

Lesson 1: Your destiny is not an enclosed space.

When I first entered into the school of education for my masters degree at the University of South Carolina, I felt trapped. All I could hear the enemy say was, "Well, you've settled for an average life. I hope you're happy".

I don't think I am alone in hearing something like this. I knew in my spirit that I was entering into the teaching profession for a purpose. I knew it was not the 50 year plan. But the voice of the enemy kept repeating a sense of smallness.

As God's children, we are not confined to a smallness of thinking. We are confined only by the smallness that we agree to. God wants us to live a wide open life. He wants to coax us out of the room we have been sitting in and out into the open of the destiny He provides.

This lesson is based on the understanding that our destiny is not in what we do as a profession. This can be categorized as part of His will for us, but it is not, in total, our destiny.

Our profession is what we do, but it is not who we are. In fact, our profession is really like a vehicle to drive through different parts of our destiny. Sometimes our profession might look like one thing because that kind of vehicle fits our current terrain. The Lord has the right occupation for our season at the right time. However, we have to be willing to part with our old vehicle for our new one. And it is not our destiny. Our profession can be a part of our destiny, but it is not our destiny within itself. Our destiny is what we were designed for. Our destiny is what He has put delight in us to complete. Our destiny is linked with destroying plans of the enemy. Our destiny is to directly impact the lives of others.

Do not settle for living in an enclosed space. The enclosed space does not come from circumstances, although it often appears that way. The enclosed space comes from the way we see our lives. We must see our lives from God's perspective. He will take us in His lap and remind us that when we look from a higher perspective, we see more.

You must change your mind in order to live a wide open life. This is a lesson that I learned around the age of 23, but is something that will continue to impact me for the rest of my life.

Mindset Shift

I used to walk around being very aware of the work of the enemy.

Now, I walk around being very aware of the work of God.

There are probably several things that can explain this shift; one of them is a shift of my own sight.

My car has become a very anointed place. Maybe it was all of those hours infiltrating the space with the songs of Jesus Culture, Bethel, and the like.

Maybe God decided to meet me there. Or maybe it's a combination of all three and I just happen to spend a lot of time in the car!

On my way home from work yesterday, I was washed with a wave of His presence. Like getting a goosebump wave from behind and from head on. Then this thought hit me: "Every single place I go, the enemy is going to know I was there."

I feel a sense of power and authority that I have been longing for my whole life. Many of us have a heart to help those who need it, but for a long time have felt helpless. 

We have been more aware of the enemy than of the presence of God. 

The Spirit of the Lord is an insurgent force. He in surges in us and then through us. Plug into His power and release it. 

Shift your eyes to see that the Kingdom of God is building an army with soldiers being equipped with skill, love, truth, power, and justice. 

Many soldiers are shaking awake to the prescence of God and learning to walk in His power. I desperately want to learn more so that I can better equip my children for the times to come. 

Expecting.

I live in a small town outside of historic Charleston, SC.

I have been waiting for this morning for about 3 months. I walked outside and I know something has changed.

The breeze is blowing and I run inside to grab a blanket. It's 55-- (depending on where you are this might be considered beach weather...) and to me it is perfect.

I fix my breakfast and a pot of tea with an overly large portion of local wildflower honey and bask in the glory of 6:15am.

Then, just as I settle in, the Lord says, "You will be pregnant most of your life."

?!?!?!?!?

"Umm, excuse me Lord, what was that?"

And I hear it for the second time. I also hear a chuckle.

"I am going to birth things through you your whole life. You are going to give new life."

The Lord is doing something new, and it's in YOU.

Feed yourself to nourish the creation God is going to birth in you. Stop in-taking what is poisonous to growth. Take in what is pure. Our lives are bigger than ourselves.