"Believe In Me"

I swear JJ Heller stole my very thoughts
with her lyrics in this beautiful song...

A frantic search for my place
For my space
I’m drowning in confusion
Of what to be
Make something out of me

I’ll hasten to Your calling
Hang on Your every word
But I beg You to speak loudly
‘Cause I cannot afford
To miss it Lord

But in the meantime
May I have the grace to wait
You won’t hesitate
When the time is right
It’s in Your time

And when You see me face to face
I’m certain
That the plans You have
Will turn out good for me
I rest in the assurance
Of your boundless provision
It’s a mystery that You believe in me

When the world is caving in
I can hear You whispering
I will calm the sea
Believe in me

thankful thursdays {21}

{via the notebook doodles}

Sorry about skipping out on my little weekly list of thanks last Thursday. I just plum forgot to do it... Needless to say, it has been a crazy few weeks. But I am back today with an extra thought out list of things that I'm grateful for!

writing letters with recovering drug addicts
a sweet visit from the lil' sis (diet coke in hand)
fage greek yogurt with honey
slap happy moments brought on by sheer exhaustion
the countless people in my life who invest in me
a birthday celebration for my bestie
getting an invite to sigma theta tau
my amazing gym buddy, emily
getting geeked up about the things i'm learning in my seminary class
a professor who (unlike the rest) is not making me jump through hoops this term
and another one who bought me pizza just to be nice
finishing up my psych rotation (holla!)
cinnamon vanilla creme coffee mate
being mentored by one of the coolest ladies around (through a project at my church)
learning a whole lotta stuff about cancer
zumba and kickboxing
blessings from project 119
long chats on the phone with my momma
2 new tires (after having a bad flat)
God's provision
the creativity that comes with being broke
walking through life with the goonies
this song. oh, goodness... give it a listen!
somehow finding time to journal and hit up the gym

and last, but certainly not least...
this precious little bundle


Introducing Isaiah Benjamin!
This sweet little blessing came in to the lives of two dear friends, Zane and Jasa, this past week. We held a shower for them last night and it took a whole 5 minutes for him to steal my heart. You can read their amazing adoption story here! Praising God for this beautiful little life!

Be blessed.

at the sound of your voice...

{via}

My church recently introduced me to a new song by Aaron Strumpel that has really spoken to my heart. The song is called Resound (listen or buy it here). The lyrics are incredible...

Your word turned darkness into light
You spoke, and brought stars to life
And all our days began at the sound of your voice

Your word turned waters into seas
You spoke, and brought oceans to be
And all our days began at the sound of your voice

Your word turns sorrow into joy
You speak, and make my heart explode
And all our days begin at the sound of your voice

Your word turns death into dreams
You speak, and make my eyes to see
And all of our days begin at the sound of your voice

And everything is good
All you do is good
We resound
We testify
When you sound, we resound
When you sound, we resound your praise

Did you catch that line?
"All our days begin at the sound of your voice..."

Wow! This line has been playing through my mind for weeks now. I know in my head that my days are gifted by God and begin by his sovereignty alone, but I've been realizing that I don't really give God much of an opportunity to speak into my life, into my days. I generally just go about my days, living out my own agenda and maybe spend a few minutes reading and praying before I fall on my face in exhaustion.

This needs to change.

I'm not entirely sure what the "game plan" is, but one of my biggest goals for this year is to begin my days by allowing some time for God's voice. I am desiring more time to be in His word and to be before him in prayer. Like I said, not really sure what form this is going to take, but consider this resolution #1 (more to come when I'm back at home).

what are your goals/resolutions for 2011?

thankful thursdays {9}

{feel free to nab the picture and join in with this experiment in cultivating thankfulness}

sorry for the hiatus last week...
i was feeling a little beat up by the world,
and was sitting smack dab in the middle of a major pity party,
but it's a new week & I'm back with a new attitude and an extra long list.
Things I'm thankful for from the past TWO weeks...

free Jazz tickets to the season opener
mumford & sons+coffee+rain+journal = perfect saturday morning
a great win for the Utes! (lovin' that 7-0!)
some much needed family time
kirkin' of the tartan service on sunday morning
booked my flight for Passion 2011... SO excited!
+ finding out that I get to see my friend Amanda while I'm there
the autumn mountains here in Utah... truly breathtaking
this beautiful song (the lyrics have been running through my head all week)
getting to know my students better... they're so rad!
first snow! (trying to have a good attitude about the approaching season)
new perspectives toward difficult things in life
nana's apple pie and vegetable soup (yum!)
teaching burn ed. to 100's of high schoolers & NOT getting nervous
acing a test I totally thought I bombed (by the grace of god)
an incredibly interesting day working with burn victims
a super fun halloween party (thanks to michy)
finally taking time for a nap (i think it's my first of the semester)
conversations with intelligent people (challenges me to be more informed)
finally feeling better & shaking this nasty cold
a hilarious email sent by a classmate (the timing could not have been better)
my car was broken into & the only thing stolen was my lunch box
a lovely letter of encouragement from a sweet friend
coming home to sweet little post-it notes plastered all over my room
planning a visit from my best buddy living in Africa
an eventful wednesday night at an artshow

From his abundance we have all received one gracious blessing after another...
- John 1:16

Thankful Thursdays {6}

I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder. ~G.K. Chesterton

first pumpkin spice latte of the season... yum!
surviving a heart-wrenching day in the PICU (definitely not my niche)
holding tiny babies with duck fuzz hair in the NBICU
(so stinkin cute... though, not my niche either)
my hippie little faith family here in salt lake

+ our retreat this weekend
(learning from this guy, singing songs, and enjoying the mountains)
+ a sweet time of worship, singing this song
+ being challenged to be still before God

Celebrating 78 beautiful years of life with my Nana
Psalm 61:2
my job... have I mentioned what a blessing it is?
5 Roses Tea (will forever be my favorite)
laughing harder than i have in a long time... it's good for the soul
an amazing clinical instructor who brought us pizza on tuesday
avoiding homework with tori
(i'm beginging to think that we're bad influences on each other... whatever!)

Hey all, hope you've had a lovely week.
Tomorrow is Friday... you can do it!
Feel free to jump on board with this little experiment in gratitude if you'd like!

week 2 with Mr. Lewis

Happy Sunday everybody! I thought I would start this week off with a favorite quote:

"If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probably explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably the earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing..."

{Brooke Fraser wrote this song based on the above quote. I love her music and I think she did an amazing job with the lyrics... if you have a minute, check it out}.

Alright, now off that rabbit trail and on to other highlights from the week...
(Mere Christianity... pages 90- 177).

"But, as I said before, 'the most dangerous thing you can do is to take any one impulse of our own nature and set it up as the thing you ought to follow at all costs.' Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing. There are many things below it, but there are also things above it. You cannot make it the whole basis of a whole life."

"In God you come up against something which is in every respect immeasurably superior to yourself. Unless you know God as that --and therefore, know yourself as nothing in comparison--you do not know God at all. As long as you are proud you cannot know God... For pride is spiritual cancer: it eats up the very possibility of love, or contentment, or even common sense."

"To love and admire anything outside yourself is to take one step away from utter spiritual ruin; though we shall not be well so long as we love and admire anything more than we love and admire God."

"The rule for all of us is perfectly simple. Do not waste time bothering whether you 'love' your neighbour; act as if you did... When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him."

"Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance. The smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may be able to go on to victories you never dreamed of."

"If you read history you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next."

"Thus if you have really handed yourself over to [God], it must follow that you are trying to obey Him. But trying in a new way, a less worried way. Not doing these things in order to be saved, but because He has begun to save you already. Not hoping to get to heaven as a reward for your actions, but inevitably wanting to act in a certain way because a first faint gleam of Heaven is already inside of you."

"... in Christianity God is not a static thing--not even a person--but a dynamic, pulsating activity, a life, almost a kind of drama. Almost a kind of dance... The whole dance, or drama, or pattern of this three-Personal life is to be played out in each one of us: or (putting it the other way round) each one of us has got to enter that pattern, take his place in that dance. There is not other way to the happiness for which we were made."

"We may be content to remain what we call 'ordinary people": but He is determined to carry out a quite different plan. To shrink back from that plan is not humility: it is laziness and cowardice. To submit to it is not conceit or megalomania, it is obedience."

"The only things we can keep are the things we freely give to God. What we try to keep for ourselves is just what we are sure to lose."

"The principle runs through all life from top to bottom. Give up yourself, and you will find your real self. Lose you life and you will save it. Submit to death, death of your ambitions and favorite wishes every day and death of your whole body in the end: submit with every fiber of your being, and you will find eternal life. Keep back nothing. Nothing that you have not given away will really be yours. Nothing in you that has not died will ever be raised from the dead. Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in."

Wow, sorry that ended up being SO long... there were many many other quotes I could have included. I finished Mere Christianity this week... such an incredible book. My head is still swimming with all of the different things presented in its pages. 6 more books to go... tune in next week for excerpts from The Screwtape Letters.

{xo. jarah}