Astounding FaithFULLness

Do you ever feel like you’ll never forgive yourself or be able to move on from this or that sin? You know that God forgives you wholly when you repent and know that He has grace and mercy beyond your wildest imagination, but you still can’t shake feeling bad and guilty? You live in the doubt that you’ll never be able to remove this from your “permanent record” with God? If you can’t forget about it, then how will He ever forget about it? When something reminds you of your mess up (a song, TV show, social media, etc.), you let the lie creep in that God’s grace doesn’t reach that thing you’ve done and that it’s a little too much for Him to forgive? Or you believe you’re forgiven by God but you just can’t shake feeling shameful around your friends and others thinking “if they only knew...”? I’ve been struggling with these feelings, so I wanted to share some truth and encouragement from Psalm 51 that really excites my heart and gives me hope. I came upon the task of reading this psal...

We have a God that tells us to surrender control to Him. But we also live in a world that tells us surrender is a sign of weakness. We feel like a failure for waiving the white flag. We are told to hold onto control and rely only on ourselves. We have a white knuckled grip on the things we have and our plans. God's message is so simple- surrender. No trying to convince us, no smoke and mirrors. Simply the promise of a better day and a brighter future. How do we focus on such a simple message when life and the world around us are so loud and distracting. And if the world tells us all these things, how does it make sense that surrendering and listening to God's simple message will actually lead to freedom. These messages are contradicting, right? For a while I was living with white knuckles on my life, but as I have learned to live a surrendered life, I have gained an immense joy and a wonderful freedom. So how has surrendering played a role in my life? Rewind about t...

I have had a calling on my heart to share Jesus in some way for a little while now. I’ve spent a lot of my time over the last few months really digging into my faith and growing in my heart and getting to know Jesus. As I’ve been in this growing (and waiting) season, I have developed more and more of a desire to reach beyond myself. I’m a chemist and not a writer so the idea of writing a blog has been one that I tried to tuck away and convince myself wasn’t where I was being led. However, I remember reading a friends blog in which she said that we all have a story that is worth sharing and that has really stuck in my head for a while. On a particularly faith forming and life changing night, I was participating in praise and worship in the chapel of the catholic center on my campus. It was young adult night and there was a group from Net Ministries there that was staying at the center. As I was praising my Lord in adoration and sobbing, full of emotions, one of the missionaries n...