It WAS Hard.

Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me." (Luke 9:23)  Why?  Because Jesus took up His cross and died for all of our sins.  That's why.

Tonight I realized the fact that I haven't been surrendering my life up to God each and every day like I should.  The verse above says we should pick up our cross DAILY.  Not when we feel like it or when it's convenient.  Daily.  It's a simple act. We give our lives to Him because He gave His life for us.  Allow me to put this into a perspective that the Lord showed me to help me understand.

Jesus gave ALL of His life for us.  He bore the cross and took our shame.  He was the perfect sacrifice.  No one else could take on all of mankind's sins.  He did it with complete love and without complaint.  Yet we complain how hard our own lives are?  No has ever made a complete mockery of us.  No one tells us we are not who we are on a daily basis.  People don't follow us around in hoards which prevents us from the alone time we all need.  One of our friends will never betray us to the point of our own death.  No one has whipped our backs 39 times leading us to almost bleed to death.  We've never had to carry a cross to our death nor hang there for six hours for all of mankind's sins.  We were never resurrected and we are not sitting at the right hand of God.  In short, Jesus gave it all away for us and IT WAS HARD.  Never once did He complain or grumble against the world.  He loved the world and understood the fact that it wasn't entirely their fault.  Their world had corrupted them.  Darkness had set in but He was the light.  He did not forced His way into hearts by weapons or an army but with LOVE.  Jesus can share in our sufferings because he himself went through the same sufferings.  Jesus knows temptation.  IT WAS HARD but Jesus never gave in.  Jesus kept moving forward knowing that if He stayed in step He would join His father in heaven one day.  Life is hard but I would beg to differ that His life was harder but through it He reached a glory that far exceeded it all.

"For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all."(2 Corinthians 4:17)

It WAS hard.  It doesn't have to be anymore.  Praise God.  He kept moving forward.  Will you?

Kelsey Johnson

Lift It Up!

The act of lifting something up means we have to hoist it upwards.  When we pray, essentially we are just hoisting our prayers upward to God the Father in His heavenly throne.  "Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and grace." (Hebrews 4:16)  No prayer is too small and no prayer is too big.  Why?  Because there is nothing to small for God and there is nothing to big for God.  He is God.  He spoke, and everything around us came into existence.  Whatever problem you are facing whether big or small, He is more than able and more than willing to help.

With that being said, do you ever find that when you lift something up to God in prayer you feel lighter somehow?  Pretty cool, eh?  God's son, Jesus, already took all of our sins, problems, guilt, shame, EVERYTHING upon Himself when He died on the cross for our sins.  However, because we live in a fallen world life isn't filled with rainbows and unicorns.  Life is hard.  Satan tries to diminish the power of the cross by bringing things into our lives that Jesus has already taken upon Himself.  If Jesus died on the cross for everything, then wouldn't it make sense to lift it back up to Him?  Reason with me here.  If you feel lighter after praying and getting something off of your chest, was it supposed to be there in the first place?  Not at all.  What we struggle with in our lives is meant to be lifted back up to the one who has already taken it away.  He wants to be active in our lives and guide us through the trials of life.  He wants us to "lift up holy hands in prayer" (1 Timothy 2:8).  Dispute with a friend?  Financial trouble?  Loss of a loved one?  God is ready to help you.  He already did a long time ago, you just have to lift it back up to heaven and put it back into His hands where it belongs (literally).  You'll find that when you start to implement more lifting into your spiritual life, moving forward in the physical becomes a little easier.

Kelsey J.

Circumstances

Circumstances.  Circumstances are incidents or occurrences, especially chance ones.  Chance. Chance is a force assumed to cause events that cannot be foreseen or controlled; luck.  Read that a few times, let it soak into your brain, and then take a journey with me...


When we wake up in the morning, we have a general sense of what we will do throughout the day.  What we do not know, however, is the unknown.  We may have a plan but we also have a God in heaven who trumps our plan.  So if you will reason with me, our days our filled with occurrences or incidents.  Even predictable ones are not so predictable because our circumstances are chances.  Everyday occurrences happen by chance.  We may have a general idea of how we think our day will go but the fact of the matter is we have limited control of our lives.  Think about it.  Can you control the other 6 billion people in this world?  No. Can you control God?  Negative.  If you lived in a bubble by yourself could you control yourself?  Yes, but remember that was only a movie...not real life.  Let's take this a step further.  Since you can only control yourself if you were the only one in existence, everything in your life happens by chance because you have no control.  You have free will, not control.  You can choose to do something but you can not know the outcome because you can simply not control the rest of God's creation or God Himself.


Okay so here's the application. This part is hard.  This part involves trust.  It involves trusting that there is  in fact a God in heaven who will NEVER lose control.  He doesn't turn His back on us.  He has COMPLETE control over every aspect of your life whether you believe it or not.  He does.  I promise, and so does He.  His promise trumps mine though.  So to apply all of these facts to our lives, we have to trust that whatever comes our way, God is in control.  Sometimes we all get frustrated in our daily lives by our circumstances, but we need to remember that behind those circumstances is a God who is crazy about us.  You want some real life application at the heart level?  As Jesus Christ was hanging on the cross HE NEVER ONCE COMPLAINED.  He hung there because He knew there was something bigger than His circumstance on the horizon.  He even forgave those around Him in the process.  So our application is to not question our circumstances but to trust that God is seeing us through.  Does it feel as if sometimes you standing still in life?  Always remember that you are not in control, God is.  Acknowledging that will help you move forward.


"For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all.  So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."  2 Corinthians 4:17-18


Kelsey J.

Stairway to Heaven

"Trust in the Lord with all you heart and lean not on you own understanding; in will your ways acknowledge him, and he will make you paths straight." Proverbs 3:5-6

Let's face it, life is hard.  It begins to get even harder when you feel like people fail you or even worse, you feel as if you've failed yourself.  It doesn't have to be this way. Because others fail us and we even fail ourselves at times, we have trust issues.  We tend to forget that there is a God in heaven that will never fail us, never leave us, and no matter how badly we screw up He still loves us for eternity.

Think of it this way, your life is a series of steps.  A staircase if you will and if you like Led Zeppelin, think of it as your stairway to heaven.  Okay so if you are like the rest of the human race, you have an issue in your life right now that you can't seem to fix or get out of.  You want to change but you never seem to be able to.  It's as if you have one foot planted firmly on a step and the other foot in the air about to take the next step.  The step in which you have firmly planted your foot are the things you are holding on to in the here and now such as thoughts, feelings, behaviors, or actions towards someone or something.  The foot in the air is your desire, readiness, and willingness to change.  You want to change but change scares you, hence one foot on the step behind you.

So how do we change?  Stop looking down at the foot on the step.  We get so consumed with our circumstances that we forget to look up.  When we forget to look up we don't see that Jesus Christ is standing right in front of us with an outstretched hand waiting to help.  He is always willing and ready to help.  Always.  It's easier to change when your thoughts change from yourself to the One standing right in front of you.  In order to take the next step in your life, you must look up.  In order to change, you must look up.  "Set your mind on things above, not on earthly things." (Col 3:2)  Keep your head up towards your heavenly Father.  Keep your eyes focused on your Savior.  Keep reaching out to the outstretched hand in front of you because when you finally grab on to the One who will never fail you, HE WILL keep you moving forward...

Kelsey J.

Holy Cubed

"And they were calling to one another:'Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty; the whole earth is full of His glory." Isaiah 6:3


Holy - spiritually perfect or pure; untainted by evil or sin; sinless; saintly.


The one attribute of God that is repeated 3 times in succession in the Bible is holy.  We are also called holy.  Since we are now new creations in Christ we have been washed in the blood of Christ. Therefore, we are now untainted by sin, pure, and regarded as saints in the kingdom of God.  Even though we are holy and God calls us holy, we will NEVER reach the holiness that God possesses. We may be holy but we will forever be saying "holy, holy, holy" at the foot of His throne.  He will give us our treasures that we've been storing up here on earth in heaven, but we will throw them back at the foot of his throne and repeat "holy" forever and ever and ever!  Praise God that we are now holy and new creations because of His Son!  But praise Him even more that He alone is holy, holy, holy and we will never be able to say it enough to give His name justice!  Praise Him today.  Praise Him tomorrow.  Praise Him for eternity.  You'll find that when you do, it's easier to keep moving forward...


Kelsey J.

Brand Spankin' New

"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!" 2 Corinthians 5:17

As human beings, we like to dwell on things in the past.  We are professionals at reliving past failures.  When we relive our past, we start a downward spiral into our own manmade guilt trip.  It's not a fun ride.  If we have accepted Jesus Christ into our hearts, then we are a NEW creation.  The old has GONE.  It's done with.  It doesn't matter anymore.  We don't need to worry about it.  When Jesus died on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins, along with that He took away the guilt for our sins!  Jesus hung there on the cross and said, "It's finished."  He really meant it!  Since the old has gone and the new has COME, we no longer have to worry about the past.  Whenever we feel guilty about past failures, that is Satan's feeble attempt to bring us down and make us question whether or not Jesus really did take it all away.  He did, no worries.  Don't give Satan the pleasure of bringing you down through guilt from past regrets.  Always keep in the back of your mind that Satan has been defeated.  Your guilt should be no more. So, let's stop taking steps backward into the past.  One day we will stand face to face with the one who took all guilt and regret away.  So, keep moving forward...

Kelsey J.

Moving Forward

I created this blog because I love to write and I feel like I have a lot to say.  God has done so much in my life and taught me so much that I feel like it would be a shame not to tell others what He has taught me.  My intention for this blog is to shine a light on God.  He alone deserves all honor, glory, and praise.  There is NO ONE like our God.  Each and every day He gives us everything we need.  He gives us the strength to go about our days and He will NEVER give us more than we can handle.  Because of Him we are alive.  He doesn't need our help but for some odd reason out of His undying love for us, He uses us as His vessels to spread His love.  That's why He gives us strength.  It's not for us, it's for His name.  Our lives should be about making His name known instead of our own.  By no means am I perfect.  I struggle with this every day.  I forget how big our God is and how small and seemingly insignificant I am.  This life is a journey.  It's chalked full of highs and lows and many hard learned lessons along the way.  Thank God He is the one and only constant in our lives.  No matter what each day brings and no matter how hard life may seem, He keeps us moving forward.  The crazy thing is, it's not for our benefit but His.  I hope you join me on my journey.  I hope that you allow yourself to be moved from above.  Join me in making in His name know.

"So we tell others about Christ, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all the wisdom God has given us.  We want to present them to God, perfect in their relationship to Christ.  That's why I work and struggle so hard, depending on Christ's mighty power that works within me."  Colossians 1:28-29 NLT

Kelsey J.