Giftings

This past weekend was so awesome guys! Such a great time to spend with you all in one place for longer than 2 hours! :D One of the biggest blessings to me was how much talk, conversation, and intentional use of the Spiritual Gifts. This is something that the Lord has really been pouring to my heart and pounding into my head over this past year. Couple that with this past weekend and add what our Church Leadership and Family at RockHarbor is doing, I am really inspired!!

I just wanted to encourage you ALL to continue to walk towards the Lord and risk for Him! Use the spiritual gifts He has given you, develop them! If you are not sure what they are, I would encourage you to pray about them specifically. He will show you what they are, and 9 times out 10 you are using them without realizing it! As long as your concern is for His glory you are safe in the center of His will! During worship I looked across the circle of us slices and saw Kate praying and singing. I got an, for lack of a better term, "image". When I say "image" in this context it's more of a braiding of an image, inspiration, and insight. That sounds much move convoluted/complex than it needs to. Basically we all know how the Spirit speaks to us individually, He spoke to me in this. So during the study and I drew what I saw and felt, praying about it here and there and listened to Darin teach. I could have kept that to myself and that could have been the end of it, that would have been the comfortable thing to do. What if my silly drawing was way off, what if it wasn't any of my business to do that, what if? what if? what if? Instead i didn't mind risking and showing her. Thirty minutes and two smores later we had an awesome conversation! It was encouraging to her and me. When we willingly walk into what the Lord has for us Glory is generated.


So thank you again for all of your hearts and minds! The Lords is almighty and POWERFUL! WE WILL WALK IN THAT POWER!

Love

I am so blessed by this group. Such love.

I just want to thank each and everyone of you for your friendship, brotherhood, sisterhood, patience, encouragement, and leadership these past 4 months, especially the past month. These last 4 weeks have been a very difficult and dark month. I have withheld form blogging for many reasons; shame, frustration, apathy, guilt. Basically just death, but I am alive! And I must repent from death! So I ask you all to continue to forgive me, encourage me, rebuke me, and love me! If I want the Lord to be Glorified in and through me I need to leave room for him be glorified! I know I have in the past, but it's to march into the future He has for me!

There is such a powerful Spirit stirring up in CIRCLES, and I am so excited amd blessed to be amongst and a part of it! I love you all so so so so MUCH! And I long to be on the battlefields with you! MAY WE RUN OUT WITH CONFIDENCE AND POWER!

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.

Wisdom

These is from February 6th, Super Bowl Sunday. I colored it weeks ago but I didn't make the time to write about it, so here goes.



Every year for the last 4 years I make plans to watch the Super Bowl with six of my best friends. This year we went back up to Apple Valley, where our friends Matt and Amy live. I always look forward to the time I can spend with my friends up there, but I especially look forward to talking with Matt. He is such a wise man and it just spills into every conversation he has. With all that the Lord has taught me shown me this year I wanted to be able to bless him or speak some truth into his life. So I prayed about that specifically before I went up. All six of us were sitting around, drawing, knitting, putting kids to bed, playing video games etc when they realized they were out of dog food. Matt was going to go to PetsMart and asked if anyone wanted to join him, everyone else said no but I felt the Lord say go, so I did. It was a great time of fellowship over buying a bag dog food. I had just listened to that episode of the Orbiter where Darin shared how someone told him he should be a teacher and not a singer. And how that man told Darin that he was already teaching, he was just doing it through his songs and shows. I knew that truth would find a home in Matt. Matt works at High Desert Church as a Graphic Designer and he is a teacher by nature. It's just right now he teaches via his designs. Matt approaches design differently, its not about how good it looks its about how effective the message is. I know that is the point of a good designer, but for most designers it goes like this; great design that doesn't distract from the message. For Matt the design is there support the message, and since the message is beautiful, compelling, and challenging the design is then beautiful, compelling and challenging. He is selfless in it. Long story short I asked him about pastoring and teaching and shared that story about Darin. A couple of weeks later he shared with me that he spoke with the leadership at his church expressing a desire to go down that path and try his hand in teaching or administration or something like that. I don't know exactly what it looks like, but they were receptive of it, and he said thanks recognized Gods hand in our conversation. I thought that was pretty awesome. Kids the message of today's blog post is be intentional with what the Lord is doing in your life!

As for the drawing this is my friend Matt. I know he has the gift of wisdom, and that wisdom grips his heart and gives him vision. So that's what the drawing is of.

Vanity

I have been meaning to write this blog all week, excited about that the Lord is going to show me as I write it. It's so stupid that it took me to Saturday to make time for this. I am sorry Lord. I need to be more intentional, and I can not afford to forget that truth. I live, we live! in such an overly busy and many times falsely "hectic" culture. False because very seldom do we stress out over things that merit such investment of our time, and emotional stress. Now that I am aware of this battle on the plains of my heart I need to fight it, and fight it with intentionality. If I know I am going to be busy tomorrow, then I need to go to bed early tonight so I can intentionally have time to spend with the Lord.

Any who my intentions for this post is not about intention. But about something else that the Lord has been showing me about my heart. Ever since 3 weeks ago when Darin had us read that print out about repentance and confession. At first while reading through it I didn't really sink in. The Lord has done A LOT in my heart this past year. I heard whispers of the enemy saying, "you have already learnt all of this... this offers you nothing you don't already know. This is probably for the others now you" That last statement was what made me realize these are thoughts were not my own, and definitely not from God. So I prayed what the Lord would humble me and help me see through the lies to the truth of the situation.

After Circles I hung out with some friends from church. A bunch of us met up out in LA to see the Groundlings perform (if you are unaware they are a sketch comedy club, a lot of SNL guys come from there). After we went to dinner at this really cool place with the best name EVER! It was called Frankie's Place! haha it was cool. In fact Frankie was there to greet everyone, and he was quite pleased to meet another Frankie, as was I. I though I was having fun, but on the drive home my friend texted me and basically told me in that I was an ass to her all evening. Sorry for the language, but that word communicates best on how I was acting. "Jerk" or "mean" just doesn't cut it. At first my ego flared up, an instant later I felt the Lord place his hand on my heart to quiet it. He was then able to tell me that it was pride.

From that moment the Lord has been showing me some of the deeper parts of my heart. The lesson I am learning now is how Vain I am. He is showing me how widespread this issue is in my heart, my ego, my art work, my weight, my perception of myself, my view of the world, and I am sure the list can go on. How it so goes against what the Lord is growing and developing in me. Both in my talents, with my artwork, and with my spiritual gifting, with discernment. Basically what I am learning is that Vanity is just a prettier form of pride. Pride gets in the way and take the Glory from God. So the less vanity there is the less pride there is, and the less pride there is the less of me there is, and the less of me there is the more of Him there is, and the more of him there is the more He can do. And that is just super cool.

And I have to be careful not to be VAIN enough to think this is an issue I face alone! ha ha the devil is so crafty, good thing God is smarter. :)

Please keep this issue in prayer for me. Thanks guys.

P.S. -I love you all.