Faithful

God is just so faithful!! He met me very specifically last week, but lets set the stage first.

First off, this deep into CIRCLES, most of you probably know that I like to draw during church. At first it was fun, and a good excuse/method to get some of my spiritual life in front of the eyes of the audience of the PodCast I am on.

Secondly, this past year has been a long and powerful journey. The tail end of which being a time of spiritual awakening. I know that this sounds dramatic, but just stick with me. The first step of this "awakening" was realizing and seeing the Spirits existing work in and around my life. Through and in things like my personality, history, talents, and struggles. This realization helped me to look at my personality, history, talents, and struggles with the Lord in mind. Seeing these things in the Light that only He can shead helped me to see Him in them. Seeing Him in them helped me realize that they are His, making it easier to give them back to Him.

Thirdly was learning the Power of choosing to have an expectant and humble heart. That is fertile soil for the Lord to sew His seeds.

The stage is now set, so lets rewind to the Sunday before last, April 3, 2011. On my way to RockHarbor I was having a conversation with the Lord about what He has been doing in my heart and mind. Specifically with how He has used my spiritual gifts in and through my drawings. I wasn't doubting His hand in it, or even questioning it. Because I KNEW He had been in it. I realize now as I sit here in Starbucks that I was challenging, or asking Him rather, if He was going to continue to use me in this manner. I left it at that, went to the Hangar to help set up. Met my friends in our regular spot in the Sanctuary on the left hand side under the good lighting (for drawing). Worshiped. Prayed. Worshiped. Etc. Then the study started, I prayed that I would be inspired to draw something, or be given an image. I sat and waited for a little while. Darin then said something about justice and I got an image. An image of a man holding scales. As I drew it it became more clear. It turned out to be our very own Zach! In the scales that he was holding there was a heart of flesh that was being out weighted by fruit. After the study I was serving with Zach in the Hangar and had the opportunity to share the drawing and what the Lord put on my heart about it with him. I always get nervous about sharing that stuff with people because I don't want to come off as, "THUS SAITH THEE LORD!!" That knee-jerk response is out of fear, not decrement. And fear is never to be reacted out of, so I did my best to die to myself and be bold. And I know and trust Zach, even if I was way off he wouldn't kill me. Long story a little bit shorter we had a great conversation about the drawing. At the end of the night he came back up to me and handed me a letter. When I got home to read it I was so blessed. It was really awesome. The Lord answered the questions I had earlier that night through Zach's letter.

Zach

I write this not to brag or anything like that at all. But to encourage. If you were to tell me a year ago that I would be writing this Blog today I would have been extremely skeptical, and probably thrown in an eye roll. The week prior to this story I was drawing and it turned out to be my brother, and when I called him to tell him about it we had the most wonderful and AWESOME conversation about what God was doing in each of our lives.

Be bold guys, and trust deeper! And expect the Lord to move. That give Him room for Glory and Honor in our hearts, and the hearts of the others around you!

I love you all.

my Brother

Joseph

Once again God's wisdom and meets me in the form of Hindsight.

This week I was going to blog about my lunch hour on Monday. I am glad I am blogging about it now on Sunday after Circles. For those who were not there or have horrible memories we went over the story of Joseph. This fresh approach of the classic Biblical story is what I needed to tempter the truth I got on Monday.

The Monday Life Drawing Class is every other week with an emphasis on Gesture drawing. I had been avoiding that class because I am already quite strong in that type, style, process of drawing. The models ware costumes and I felt that I needed to work on the more technical side of life drawing. Basically I wanted to brush up on my anatomy. So over the last few months I had been going to the Wednesday Anatomy classes. But a few weeks ago when I spoke with the lady who was runs that Storyboard program at work she told me that I should go to the Monday classes because they are instructed by a storyboard artist. So I figured why not. Lets now go to last Monday, I had just eaten an early lunch and was the second person in the class room. I gather my supplies and pick a place to sit. I go to sign in and the guy who got there before me, who I am now sitting next to, is someone who I used to post on an art forum with, now he is a big storyboard artist there. The forum was really big for it's art and comics back in 2003-2006. My posting on that forum stopped shortly after they realized I was a "political conservative" and all started to ignore me. He wasn't mean about it from what I can remember. I didn't introduce myself because he was busy talking to other people by this point.

Other people start to fill the room and then we all start drawing. The class started with 1 minuet poses and eventually went to 2 minuet poses. During the class the instructor was walking around. He stopped at me and asked what department I was in, I told him I was a P.A. [Production Assistant] and he was surprised and said something along the lines of, "...oh. Well you seem to really know what you are doing, keep up the good work." Later in the class he took a drawing from the guy I was sitting next to and walked it around the class and was describing what he was doing right and such. When he got to me I went to look at it and he basically told me yours is just as good.

That was and is a HUGE encouragement! I was really encouraged. I even email the instructor after the class and "thanked" him for teaching the class. Since I am being honest here I just wanted to open a dialogue here and "encourage" him to remember me. And this is what stuck out to me when were were reading Joseph's story. When he told the cupbearer to remember him. Ha ha that is EXACTLY WHAT I WAS DOING!

I am royalty working in the kingdom as a page, watching others rule over the things that I am designed for. I don't mean to sound arrogant, but like Joseph I know what the Lord has something for me, and even more so like Joseph I need to stop promoting myself. The giftings and talents I "have" aren't even mine. I need to remember that they are not for me! They are for Him! When I keep that in the forefront of my mind and heart it protects me from the temptations of pride and vanity in the forms of grandeur, self sufficiency, and success.

Protect me lord from myself.

More of you less of me.

Church Notes | Blood Money

We are going thought a study that will take us up to Easter Sunday titled "Witness' of Christ". Each Sunday is focusing on a person that Christ encountered during the week leading to the crucifixion. So far we have met Mary Magdalene with her unexpected and extravagant manner of worshiping Christ. Encountered the Pharisees and saw how blind their hearts were when what they were looking for was right in front of them. And about 2 weeks ago met the man I am blogging about right now, the betrayer; Judas Iscariot.

For me Judas has been a source of mixed emotions. He was the man who betrayed Christ and then hung himself. I've always wondered why he betrayed Christ? And why he committed suicide and what did his suicide mean? For a long while I would wonder if he even had a choice.

But I realized that we can't really ask the question if he had a choice. We have to assume he did have choice, because we've all had choice, all of us from Eve to Adam to you and me. I truly believe that choice is a primary form that God's love takes in our lives. If we did have the ability to choose we would be incapable of love, and on a side note and slight tangent, that is why addiction is so evil, it mars our ability to choose, but thats a blog for another time so anywho...

I always thought as a child that Judas betrayed Jesus because be was greedy and was supposed to. What I realized in that study, and have been trying to blog about for the last 2 weeks, was that Jesus wasn't what Judas wanted him to be. Judas did not understand how this man was going to establish a new kingdom and he did not submit his understanding to the both the Scripture and the prophet standing in front of him. His pride and vanity stood in the way not allowing him to see Jesus as a true prophet, let alone the Christ and Son of God. Out of what we can assume to be immense frustration and bitterness he turned Jesus in to the authorities. Even after the crucifixion I don't think he recognized Jesus as the Christ. He said that he spilt the blood of an innocent man, not that the Blood of the son of God. I really think this line of thought is supported through the actions Judas took after his admission. He did not seek repentance and redemption, but wallowed in his own remorse incapable, himself, of solving the issue, and I really feel that that desperation and isolation is what opened his heart and mind to suicide.

Basically what I got from this study was that I need to be careful to not allow pride to blind me from seeing how Christ want to work in and through my life. And that there is a world of difference between remorse and repentance.