Have you ever had that feeling in your chest where you can just feel your heart break because you love and feel for someone or something so much?
Well, I have. Just recently, I have seen my God-given gift become more evident then ever. Listening to the stories of broken people breaks my heart. I can feel it. Sometimes it's almost overwhelming. Sometimes it makes you want to burst out into tears because you feel for someone so bad.
What about the time where you invest so much time into a hurting, struggling person and you find yourself watching them travel further down that painful road? Does it drive you to your knees because of the heart full of compassion you were given for them?
Our world is in need of compassionate people. The kind of people who's compassion leads them to act- to do something for this broken world full of broken people.

Dealing with Stress

So, I am sure many of you have felt stressed at one point or another. Maybe you get really stressed all the time, or maybe you are the type to not easily get stressed out.

I personally am more of the first than the latter of the two. And lately, I have been very stressed and even unmotivated. I have been procrastinating and all that fun stuff. All those things combined spell disaster. Well, kinda.

So what do you do when you start to get stressed? I think the solution is easier than most would think. Give it to the Lord. It's one of those things that can be so hard for us, but really, it's really simple.

Jesus tells us His yoke is light. If we give Him our stress, etc., He will help us by taking that burden and walking along side us.

Think about how amazing and beautiful that truly is. :-) <3

Change

Hello everyone!
I hope you are having a fantastically, blessed week!!

I decided to post again and thought I would share a little about the last few years of my life. So, if I don't manage to bore you all, yay!

As I believe I mentioned in my testimony that I posted on here awhile ago, I seem to tend to suffer from something like depression. I was never diagnosed as having anything, but I knew what I was feeling wasn't normal, unless it was caused by depression or something like that. When I was younger, this was kind of seen a little bit also. But as I got older, I felt it more and more. I finally figured out that there seemed to be a cycle to it- about 3 months feeling awful and about another 3 months feeling better. I think that I was always feeling it, just during a certain period, it was a lot stronger than another period.
After going on like this for a few years, I had a really horrible week. Probably one of the worst I had had in a long while. So, I told my mom- we have to do something. I couldn't stand feeling that way any longer. I also told her that it wasn't happening because of things going on around me, but probably because of something in my body not working right, etc. My mom began looking into ways to help me. She finally found this test that I could take. I took the test. We wanted to try the natural approach first and see if it helped. So, I started taking some supplements that the test recommended. I honestly didn't think it was going to help, but I began to see a difference.
It helped me to be truly happy with little effort, when before it would've taken a lot. I believe it also gave me more energy. I have started exercising and eating a little healthier. I now have something that motivates me to do something and not just sit around all day feeling depressed. I believe that taking a couple supplements helped me take that first step.
I am very thankful that the Lord helped me with all that- guiding my mom as to what to do, etc. I am so blessed that He stepped in and helped me out.

Being Happy In Spite of the Circumstances

I recently had the opportunity to go to camp to assist the camp nurse who happened to be one of my friends' moms. There were some unforeseen conflicts that arose though causing my trip to turn out entirely different than I thought it would. I ended up leaving on Wednesday instead of staying till Saturday due to this.
Normally, this kind of situation would have left me upset and not happy without any work, but I found this struggle going on inside. Was I going to be happy in spite of it? Or was I going to let it upset me and ruin my week as I normally would let it? I will confess that I don't normally have a struggle like this one. I normally just let it ruin my week/day, but something about this time was different. I believe that it could've been a lot worse if I would have let it take me down as far as it normally would have. I am thankful that the Lord helped me have a decent week in spite of everything that happened. :-)

AWANA Camp

Last week, I had my first real experience of camp.

I have been to camp in the past. But one of my parents would always be there, and it would be more of a leadership conference for just a few nights. AWANA camp was totally different. It was a six night camp with a lot of people. Since the whole camp thing was pretty new to me, I did not know what to think of it for the first few days. At first, honestly, I did not really like it. It was hard for me to fit in since this was my first year and almost everyone else already knew everyone else. (I did have a close friend go with me which was really nice and helped the factor of not really knowing anyone easier to work with.)

The first day, I got there early since I rode up with some of the counselors. I was able to help one of them set up their cabins. The ride up was okay. I got to sit next to a friend. A silly friend who keeps everything pretty fun and interesting.
After setting up, I went up to sign in. There were no signs that gave me any direction. And the lady I talked to thought I was Rebecca W. the junior higher.... I do not even think I look like a junior higher... but okay. After finally figuring all that out, I set up my cabin.
They ran a tight and sort of strict schedule there. You also always had to wear this bead necklace and your name button. I was on the blue team. Out of the four colors- blue, green, yellow, and red- blue would be my favorite color, so, that was kind of cool. We kept in the lead with the points almost all week and only lost to the yellow team by a whole 15 points. I am very competitive, so, it was a real bummer not winning. Haha.
Throughout the week, I got to memorize lots of verses, play lots of game, etc. They also had a lot of freetime. That was kind of nice.

Enough with the details..

This was a Christian camp, and maybe I should share what I learned there.
Let's just say- When I got to camp, my heart was pretty hard. I have been going through some stuff lately that has caused me to ask God "why?!?" a lot. And my heart was hardened toward Him. And I did not want to soften it. But even through my unwillingness, God was able to soften my heart through being daily in the Word, and the daily worship and Bible study.
So, I came away with a softer, more open heart.

Camp was a different kind of experience for me. But after spending a whole week there, I grew to like and enjoy it. I am definetly going to consider going back next year even though I was not so sure if I wanted to go back the first part of the week. The people there are pretty amazing and my friendships with the people I already did know grew quite a bit that week. :-)

Below is a video with pictures from camp:

Click here to view this video

Free books!

The last few months, I have started going out on Saturday mornings whenever I am free. 

There is a man that goes to my church that runs a table full of free Christian literature. He goes almost every Saturday morning and sits out by an old restaurant. This really drew me in. I decided to go one day and liked it enough to go back again and again. Sometimes there are hardly any people that come, but other times, we get lots of people that stop by.

For the most part, the man I go with does most of the talking, but I had a really cool experience a few weeks ago. I do talk to people some, but this time, I was really the only one doing the talking. A young man came up and was sharing some struggles he was having. It meant a lot to me for him to share and let me talk to him. I gave him a few pamphlets and stuffs, and he went on his way. This would have made my whole day, but later, we found the pamphlets in a restroom next door. Even though he left these which seemed really discouraging, I hope that God was able to somehow use me in this man's life as an encouragement.

So there you have it. That is what I do almost every Saturday morning unless I have something else going on. It has been a cool thing to do, and I hope that I will be able to use what I am learning through this opportunity in my life more and more. :-)

Beauty

Beauty. What do you think of when you think of that word? I guess the first thing that comes to my mind would have to be... Looks. 

In our culture today, people are put under pressure. Pressure to look good. But we've taken it too far. We spend way too much time and energy trying to make sure we look "good enough". But is that what really matters?

When I think of this issue in our culture, I am reminded of this passage:

1 Samuel 16: 6-7 (ESV)

6 When they came, he looked on Eliab and thought, “Surely the Lord's anointed is before him.” 7 But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”

Samuel was told to go anoint the future king of Israel. And look what he does- He looks and sees the outward appearance of Eliab and is quick to think that he is the one just because of his outward appearance. God saw Eliab's heart and knew he wasn't the right one. Samuel couldn't see his heart- what was inside.

I believe our culture does just this. They see a person and judge them by their outward appearance. Although we can not obviously see what God sees, we shouldn't be quick to judge a person by their looks or put pressure on them to look good. We should look at who they really are in the inside and encourage them to be more and more like Jesus Christ.

Don't worry about what people think about your outward appearance. Yes, it is nice to look nice on the outside. But we should spend much more of our time and energy trying to have a heart like Jesus and letting Him work in our lives. That is all that really matters.