Bragging is Alright With God, Just Do it the Right Way

I was in church today and we sang a song during the Breaking of Bread meeting in the morning. It was "How Deep the Father's Love For Us". And as we were singing, the lyrics just touched me and made me think.

How deep the Father's love for us,
How vast beyond all measure
That He should give His only Son
To make a wretch His treasure

How great the pain of searing loss,
The Father turns His face away
As wounds which mar the chosen One,
Bring many sons to glory

Behold the Man upon a cross,
My sin upon His shoulders
Ashamed I hear my mocking voice,
Call out among the scoffers

It was my sin that left Him there
Until it was accomplished
His dying breath has brought me life
I know that it is finished

I will not boast in anything
No gifts, no power, no wisdom
But I will boast in Jesus Christ
His death and resurrection

Why should I gain from His reward?
I cannot give an answer
But this I know with all my heart
His wounds have paid my ransom

Verse 5 stood out the most to me. I had come across a verse that mentioned that as well as I was looking through my Bible.

So, as the Scripture says,

"If people want to brag,

they should brag only about the Lord." 1 Corinthians 1:31

The part of Scripture that was mentioned there came from Jeremiah 9:24, which states

But if people want to brag,

let them brag that they understand and know me.

Let them brag that I am the LORD, 

and that I am kind and fair,

and that I do things that are right on earth.

This kind of bragging pleases me," says the LORD.

Sometimes we find that we want to brag about what we've done to show others how good of a person we are. We always want to brag about earthly things. Things we've accomplished and things we're involved with. But have we ever taken a moment and tell others about how great our God is? Just like how easy it is to brag about ourselves, we need to be able to brag about the LORD that way. It is quite hard since many people reject the LORD. But what is keeping us from bragging about how awesome our creator is? And when we brag about ourselves, do we then take a moment and thank our God for giving us that opportunity or talent in front of everyone? Our God has done more than is comprehendible for us. We've failed him numerous times and dishonoured him. We cursed him and yet he accepted us and forgave us. So why can't we brag about the God who loves us so very extremely much that he rejected his own perfect son just for us to have a way to be with Him? 

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Friends

To me, I don't really care about popularity or if my friends aren't popular. I was thinking lately that the reason why I hang around my friends is because of the saying, "You are who you hang around" and I realized that every single person that I hang around has a personality or characteristic that I would like in myself. My best friend is very humble and she never says anything negative about anyone. She does not boast about anything, even if she is proud of what she had accomplished and she doesn't ask for favours from anyone. She agrees with everyone because she doesn't like to argue. I just find her personality overwhelming and I really need some of that myself. She may not realize this, but she is such an amazing example for me. I admit, I speak my mind often and if I don't agree with something someone says, I say my opinion up front and most of the time it results in arguments. Perhaps the reason why I want to be a lawyer is because I like to argue, but I also want to be humble and a peacemaker like my friend. I think that if I were to be friends with my best friend forever, I could end up to be the person I have always dreamed to be and who God wants me to be. Another good thing about hanging around the people that I do is that they are all Christians and encourage me in my daily walk of faith and we even discuss questions about who God wants us to be and what God wants us to do. They also come to me for answers and comfort when they're being troubled. Did you know that YOU have a HUGE impact on the people you hang around? Yeah, I know, scary stuff. So we must also be careful about how we act, because if we do not act the way God wants us to act or if we have made many wrong choices, your friends will soon make the same choices and do the wrong things that you have done. Therefore, the people on whom you rely on to create you, are actually not becoming the role models you have relied on before. When you make them something you did not want to be, you will be stuck in the position that you did not want to be in, unless you change yourself and be the huge impact on your friends. It is just this big circle. You must try to keep it consistent and not change the way it had been functioning before. (I mean when it functions the way God wants it to function).
What type of people do you hang around? Do they affect who you are, and how you act? How much impact do you have on your friends?

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Enjoying the little bits of your life

I was looking at another blog, and at the bottom of the post, I found this really cute little saying.

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I Find You When I Fall Apart

I was listening to a song called "Fall Apart" by Josh Wilson, my favourite christian singer/song writer, and it was saying in the song

 "Why in the world did I think I could only get to know you when my life was good? When everything just falls in place, the easiest thing is to give you praise. Now it all seems upside down. Cause my whole world is caving in, but I feel you now, more than I did then, I cannot come to the end of me, and somehow still have all I need. God, I want to know you more, maybe this is how it starts, I find you when I fall apart."

I just love the lyrics to this song because they're absolutely true words. I find myself praising the Lord more when I feel blessed and in my time of trouble, I don't praise Him, instead, I call out to Him. I find that I get to know more about how my Lord works, and I find Him better when my life is "falling apart" or when I don't understand why these little problems and troubles keep popping up in my life.

As it also says in his other song, "Before the morning", "The pain that you've been feeling is just the hurt before the healing, just the dark before the morning." The problems that your faced with in your life, they will turn into something better than that, they will help you gain wisdom, confidence, a stronger character, peace, happiness, and many more marvellous things. When you think that your life's about to end, think again, it is just the beginning to greater things.

Here's the song if you want to hear it.

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Josh Wilson - I Refuse

I was just watching this music video. It touched my heart, I have been oblivious to many things and acted as if I hadn't noticed that that person had been hurting or that even my friends needed a hand sometimes, I would be too lazy to help and when my turn came, needing for help, I didn't take time and think that they were being kind and gracious to me.

http://youtu.be/6B1Lv8k5pEc

Sorry,  this video doesn't work if you try and play it on my blog, you'd have to click on the link above to view it.

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Loving others (Behind the Scenes)

I had just started my first year of high school a couple of months ago with excitement and anxiousness.
Not knowing what I was going to face, whether God was going to use me or use others to help me grow strong in character, what adventures he might bring upon me and what troubles and stresses I might go through. All these thoughts were running through my head as I took my first step into the building with my friends.

It looked normal, but what was behind the scenes at my high school? What were the students like?

High School is a major leap from Elementary school. More work, bigger facilities, more students, more studying, gym everyday (I'm not much of an athlete, I just like Thai kickboxing and Brazilian Jujitsu), more rotary, and harder teachers.

But what was so good about high school was that you can find more people who you enjoy to be around, whereas in elementary school, you were practically forced to be friends with the people in your grade since Kindergarten until grade 8 graduation. This was an advantage for me. I figured, the more people who would listen to me, the more I can share God's love, and in a Christian school! So they've already had some background knowledge from chapel.

I would like to share with you a heart changing experience that I've had in my first semester of high school.

My homeroom is science which I have with one of my close friends, I didn't really get to know much people then because we were just settling in and getting to know our teacher, but one person caught my eye right away, and I'm pretty sure he caught everyone's eyes too. You can't miss him. He was a boy about 6"5 and here I am 4"11 or maybe 5"0. About double my height. WOW. I know. All my life I've dreamed of being tall, but I never thought about being that tall. When you think about Goliath, he sounds pretty tall, but you don't actually see his height, you just get a written description. Now, I think that Goliath was massive because the boy is only 6"5 and Goliath was like 9 feet!

See, this boy, I got to know him as the days went by, he is actually the sweetest boy I have ever come across, but what I didn't know about him was all behind those eyes of his.

I was talking to him one day in one of the classes we had together and another girl as well and we were talking about our elementary school years, the girl was telling me about how she wasn't treated properly because she was born in U.S.A.! Isn't that crazy? People will try to find any reason to bring you down and to raise themselves up. The boy on the other hand wasn't treated well either because of how tall he was! That tore my heart away, all the stories I have heard, it was unbelievable! I started to pray for them, for them to find someone whom they can trust and someone who will treat them as a friend, a true friend. I also gave them my link to my blog.

Later I asked the boy if he looked at my blog, he told me that he didn't have time but he always had that piece of paper with him that had the link on it. That brightened up my spirit. It told me that I was doing the right thing.

That night I went on my blog and found that i had a new follower. I took a look at my comments and found one by a person named Tall but small. I laughed, surely this was the boy. I was so happy that he commented. I clicked on his name and on his profile it showed that he had a blog. I decide to read it and follow it because he didn't have anyone following it. What I read in the next 10 minutes broke my heart. It showed me what I was missing. People in the world look like they're having a great time and enjoying their lives, but once you look behind the scenes, its a whole other world that they're living in. But at the end of each post, he wrote about how he could always count on God to help him get through his pain and how He'll always be there for him. This showed me that I had really impacted someone. After he took a look at my blog it inspired him to make one of his own and I think that through this process he was strengthening his faith in God. Before it seemed as if he had given up on God but now he's a whole new person. I feel like God had used this boy in my life to show me that there are many others in the world who need this type of love and understanding, and a friend. He had also recently added a post called  Friends, it was about me and it showed me how much I impacted his life and how much he impacted mine.
If you want to visit his blog, and know more about him, here's the link:
http://goodformegoodforu.blogspot.com/

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Highlights in Ephesians

I was looking through the book of Ephesians and i found on pg. 1288-1289 of my Bible a lot of highlights and they were really interesting so I'll share them with you.

1. Ephesians 4:1&2                                                                           Therefore I urge you who have been chosen by God to live up the life to which God called you. Always be humble, gentle, and patient, accepting each other in love.
2. Ephesians 4:17                                                                                     Do not continue living like those who do not believe. Their thoughts are worth nothing.
3. Ephesians 4:22a & 23-24                                                                   You were taught to leave your old self-to stop living the evil way you lived before... But you were taught to be made new in your hearts, to become a new person. That new person is made to be like God - made to be truly good and holy.
4. Ephesians 4:25-28                                                                             So you must stop telling lies. Tell each other the truth, because we all belong to each other in the same body. When you are angry, do not sin, and be sure to stop being angry before the end of the day. Do not give the devil a way to defeat you.
5. Ephesians 4: 29&30                                                                         When you talk, do not say harmful things, but say what people need - words that will help others become stronger. Then what you say will do good to those who listen to you.
6. Ephesians 5:2-4                                                                                Live a life of love just as Christ loved us and gave himself for us as a sweet-smelling offering and sacrifice to God. But there must be no sexual sin among you, or any kind of evil greed. Those things are not right for God's holy people.
7. Ephesians 5:8-12                                                                              In the past you were full of darkness, but now you are full of light in the Lord. So live like children who belong to the light. Light brings every kind of goodness, right living, and truth. Try to learn what pleases the Lord. Have nothing to do with the things done in the darkness, which are not worth anything. But show that they are wrong.
8. Ephesians 5:15                                                                                 So be very careful how you live. Do not live like those who are not wise, but live wisely.

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Troubles on the Road of Life

The road of life for a Christian will definitely be a challenge but those challenges will have outcome solutions and even the fulfillment of God's plan for us but the hardest thing to get through on the road of life aren't the potholes or the mammoth bumps, the hardest thing on the road of life is the way you react to those potholes or mammoth bumps. So if you have a positive reaction towards the problems and challenges you're being faced with each day in your life, then the road won't be that hard to get through. It will actually give you peace in your heart and joy always and people will be able to see that in you. It may not be easy to always react positively towards every situation you come across but if you try there will still be a difference.

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Amazing Love

I'm forgiven, because you were forsaken
I'm accepted, you were condemned
I'm alive and well, your spirit lives within me
Because you died and rose again


CHORUS
Amazing love, how can it be
That you my king, would die for me
Amazing love, I know it's true
It's my joy to honour you, in all I do, I honour you


BRIDGE
You are my King
You are my King
Jesus, You are my King


God's love is greater than any love that you will experience and it is the only love that will give you Joy, when you are sad, Peace, in troubling times, Confidence, in things you never knew you can do, and Courage, when you face the giants of the World.

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Have Faith and Watch Your Actions

Philippians 4:13
I can do all things in him that strengthen me.

This past year has been a test to my Faith and courage. I have been faced with many obstacles that questioned me and my Faith. It has been very hard but I had faith that the Lord could give me the confidence and courage to go through them. The Lord has blessed me with a christian family and christian friends of who I am very close to, he has also blessed me with the encouragement of my church as well, and the faith that they have in me. Those who do not know the Lord need someone like all the comforters I have and they need someone to show them the way. If they do not know the way then they will scatter like lost sheep and be like the seeds that had fallen on the thorns, they might hear the word but they will not take it in for they need someone who cares for them to bring it to them. They need the Holy Spirit surrounding them and making sure that they don't wander away, they need our love. They need to see what the Lord has done in our lives, they need to see that they will change their ways and that accepting the Lord will have an impact on how the act, speak, and think. That they will make wiser choices and that they have peace. But if we, as 'born again believers' don't even contain peace and do not  make wise choices then they will not be interested and will think that this God will not change my life. We impact others by our actions, if we show that we make bad choices and do very bad things then we will have a negative impact on others. If we show God's love to others by the way we act then we will have a positive impact on others. People are looking for peace, they are looking for a love like no other and we have to give them what they are looking for. But this is very hard to do when we have people against us, that is why we need to pray together to the Lord in order for him to strengthen us and to give us confidence and faith that we can change many lives. I, myself am not perfect, sometimes the way I act  gives a negative impact on others, I have to watch what I say and how I act and how I think.

So please pray that we, as Christians act the way that God wants us to act and show the world his love through us.

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WWJD? (What Would Jesus Do?)

A good tree does not produce bad fruit, nor does a bad tree produce good fruit. Each tree is known by its own fruit. People don't gather figs from thornbushes, and they don't get grapes from bushes. Good people bring good things out of the good they stored in their hearts. But evil people bring evil things out of the evil they stored in their hearts. People speak the things that are in their hearts.
Luke 6:43-45

We are like those trees, there are bad people and there are good people. The Christians in the world should produce good fruit for all to collect. We, as Christians should be like the good tree and only do things that are good, we want to tell and show everyone who see us that we are followers of Christ without telling them so. They should be able to walk by and identify that we are born again Christians. Sometimes though we tend to do the wrong things and end up in the wrong crowd that causes us to do the things that God would not like us to do. It all depends on what we are living around and what type of world is surrounding us. The movies we watch for instance, affect the way we think. If our friends use alot of inappropriate language then we might start using the same language as them which will eventually lead us away and farther from God. What we need to do in order to stop us from making the wrong decisions is use the famous saying WWJD. What Would Jesus Do? That way we would know for sure whether or not we are making the right choices. Praying to the God would also help in making the right decision. In conclusion, just imagine Jesus doing what you think you should do and if the picture doesn't fit then know it's the wrong thing to do.

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