My Give a Damn Is Busted

So I was thinking about my life today and this song by Jo Dee Messina popped into my head. I hate when people don't return my phone calls or when people walk all over me and want to use me to get something and this song kind of says how I am feeling about it. I just don't care anymore. Forget you. I mean I shouldn't care if you don't want to take the time out of your busy schedule to have a true friendship but the problem is I do care but I am tired of caring because all it gets me is hurt feelings. I am tired of waiting and wishing things would turn out differently. I am tired of acting like I don't care when people walk all over me! It is time for me to take a stand and I think I am going too. So My Give a Damn Is Busted! I don't care what other people want me to do or if they ignore me. It is time for me to move on and focus on what is best for me for once in my life!

Jo Dee Messina
My Give a Damn Is Busted

Well, you filled up my head with so many lies.
You twisted my heart till somethin' snapped inside.
I'd like to give it one more try,
But my give-a-damn's busted.

You can crawl back home, say you were wrong;
Stand out in the yard and cry all night long.
Well, go ahead and water the lawn:
My give-a-damn's busted.

I really wanna care.
I wanna feel somethin'.
Let me dig a little deeper:.
No, sorry: nothin'.

You can say you've got issues, you can say you're a victim.
It's all your parents fault,I mean after all you didn't pick 'em.
Maybe somebody else has got time to listen:
My give-a-damn's busted.

Well, your therapist says it was all a mistake:
A product of the Prozac and your co-dependent ways.
So who's your enabler these days?
My give-a-damn's busted.

I really wanna care.
I wanna feel somethin'.
Let me dig a little deeper:.
No, still nothin'.

It's a desperate situation, no tellin' what you'll do.
If I don't forgive you, you say your life is through.
C'mon, gimme somethin' I can use:
My give-a-damn's busted.

Well, I really wanna care.
I wanna feel somethin'.
Let me dig a little deeper:
No, Man sorry.
Just nothin', you know.
You've really done it this time, ha, ha.
My give-a-damn's busted.

What is a church?

So on Wed I went to this new church. It was pretty much amazing. I walked in and went to help out with the kids. After a few minuets of coloring/playing with stamps we went into the sanctuary to let the kids watch a baptism. We were sitting in there singing and I just thought that it was amazing. Then while they were getting ready for the baptism they were doing announcements and there was this little kid running around. My first thought was why is this little kid running around? I mean it is a little distracting. Shouldn't someone make him be quite? He was like running around and being kind of loud. Then as I was sitting there the guy doing the announcements mentioned that the church was a family. I am not really sure what exactly he was talking about but I caught that and I thought duh. This is not what this church is about. No one cares if a kid is running around. They are all here to praise God and to worship him together as a family.

Then while they were doing the announcements they announced the VBS coming up next weekend. They said they needed some volunteers and like two or three people raised their hands and said that they would help. I just sat there and was like WOW that would never happen in my church. This is pretty amazing. It also reminded me of an episode of desperate housewives. Lynette asks Bree if she can go to her church but thoroughly embarrasses her by raising her hand and asking the pastor a series of questions after his sermon, in front of the whole congregation during church. The pastor later says that he really likes that Lynette asked a question during church. Bree is shocked at this. Now seeing this and seeing what happened during the announcements made me think why can't we ask questions during church? Why can't the church be more like a family? I just don't understand that. I think that in todays church it is more about image and being proper and this is what you do and if you something out of the normal than everyone will stare at you. I don't think that a church should be like that. I feel that the church should be a place where you are comfortable and you can say or do anything without feeling like you are an idiot. Shouldn't the church be like a family where we all love each other no matter what we do or where we come from? I feel like todays churches have lost site of that. I wish we could just all get back to that.

So this is what I thought on Wed night while I was sitting there. Then we went back in to the classroom after the baptism and we had our lesson. It was pretty fun. I got to know one of the girls pretty well. I think that I am really going to enjoy doing ministry over there.


Last summer I worked at a summer camp and to get the kids quite we would say...
GOD IS GOOD! then they said... ALL THE TIME!!
Then we said....
ALL THE TIME! then they said... GOD IS GOOD!!

MAN IS HE AWESOME OR WHAT??

Getting back to what I LOVE!

Have you ever set back and looked at your life and thought is this really happening to me? Well that is kind of how I feel right now. About 6 months ago I decided that I needed to take a break from ministry. I felt that I was doing too much. I mean I was just going to school, working and working with the church on both Wed night and Sunday morning plus some weekend trips. It took up most of my time so I thought I would take out something. Little did I know that it was not what I needed. Those few months were not fun at all. I missed being so involved with church. So I started working on my relationship with God during this time. I felt like I was always trying to find out what I needed and what I should do. I wasn't taking the time to listen to God and find out what he wanted for my life. So I am still in the process of working on that and I started hearing him say "inner-city" work is where you need to be. Inner-city work to me is everyday people who live in the run down parts of town. They are the people that I feel that we tend to forget about a lot of the time. I want to work with these people. I don't want to preach to them. I just want to get to know them and show them what a Christian is supposed to look like. I know from experience that a lot of people have a warped view of Christianity because they have had a bad experience with someone who said they were a Christian. I just want them to see Christ through me and through my actions. I have started to learn how to do this through neighborhood walkers.

Well I have been thinking about this whole inner-city idea for about 2 months now. I drive past this apartment complex that is a little run down and my parents would not want me to live there because the neighborhood isn't all that great but the thought has crossed my mind "I wonder how much rent would be." I had almost stopped several times but I just kept thinking I am in a lease until December. Then about 3 weeks ago I was having lunch with a friend and she got a phone call about a city wide apartment ministry meeting. She didn't know what that was but when she told me I told her my story about driving past the apartments and about my vision for where I want to do my ministry. She then told another one of our mutual friends and she e-mailed me the details of the meeting. I knew that it had to be what I call a God thing for all of this to just fall into place. It was pretty amazing. After I got the e-mail from my friend I e-mailed the guy in charge and he told me about the next meeting. I was super excited. I also asked him about getting involved with a church that is in town that is primarily neighborhood people. He told me that they are always needed help so I started helping there this week. I also went to the apartment ministry meeting and I think I am going to fall in love with this ministry.

I am super excited about all of this but at the same time I am scared to death. I don't know what to think. I am glad that God is putting all of this in front of me. I think that it is a great opportunity. I am going proceed and see what happens. When I told one of my friends about how I was feeling she told me that it was a good thing to be nervous because that means that God will have to help me through this and I will have to rely on him. That makes so much since. God doesn't call the equipped he equips the called. So my prayer today is for God to equip me with the knowledge that I need to do the ministry he is calling me to do.

life

So I have been informed that I haven't bloged in a long time! SO here you go!

Life has been busy. I am working on taking some summer school and my brother graduated this last weekend. It was nice to see the family but it was a looooong weekend. I am tired and Summer 1 classes started today. I am taking 6 hours during summer 1. It should be interesting. Well I don't know much but there is a little up date on what is going on in my life. I hope you all have a great day and I will catch ya later!

A week of joy inspite of complications!

This week has been pretty AMAZING! I have had a few complications but I am loving almost every minute of this week. It started out with me going and getting prayed for which was amazing!
Then Tuesday Maymester started and I learned that for the next three weeks now two weeks I was not going to get much sleep. There is a ton of homework but I looked at the positive side and thought about how I am going to be able to get this class out of the way. Then Wed. rolled around and I was still having a pretty good week. I was tired and started to get sick from allergy stuff so that was no fun but I kept trucking on.
Then came Thursday. Thursday was interesting. I went to class and came home from my break checked my grades and I made 2 As 2 Bs and one C so not too bad. Oh and my cat started going into labor and had her kittens. It was interesting. She ended up having 4. Side note- all during the week I have been taking my car into the shop to get some minor things fixed and spent most of the week in a rental which I am still in. Thursday afternoon I did a ton of reading and spent some of that time in a tree house. I like this tree house because not many people know about it so it is like my own quiet spot. All I could hear were dogs barking and the ice cream truck off in the distance. I kind of feel like I am in my own little land that no one knows about. It is special and it is all mine for now.
Then came today, Friday. Wow today has been interesting. I only got about 6 hours of sleep last night and during that 6 hours I was up almost every hour. So that wasn't good. I went to class even thought I didn't feel the best. We were going to the movies for our afternoon session so that was good. I was excited about that and I had lunch plans with a friend of mine. So I went to lunch with her and we were done eating and I said lets go see this tree house. She didn't believe that it was there. So we were on our way and this guy pulled out in front of us and I hit him. It wasn't my fault and everyone was ok. I think about 10 people from church ended up stopping to see if we were both ok. It was interesting. These wreck things seem to just flock to me. It isn't the greatest thing in the world. The bad part was that I was still in the rental car. Then I went to the movies. We saw the new Narnia movie. It was good and for about 3 hours I got to just escape this world and enter a world with no worries. Then I went to work and dealt with insurance people and now I am babysitting. In spite of everything that has gone on today and this week I still see that it has been an amazing week.
The Lord has blessed me greatly. I am blessed and over joyed when I think about this week and what is to come. Don't take the little things for granted and when you take time to notice them thank God for them. They can be some of the worlds greatest treasures.

Amazed

I am amazed by God tonight. I have been seeking him and for some reason all day I felt like I needed to ask God to come into my life and take my life over. I have heard about 2 or 3 songs on the radio talking about letting go, which is something I have a hard time with, and giving your life to God. This is something that I have been working on over the past few weeks. So tonight I went to this thing called soaking with one of my friends. It was amazing. We were watching the Florida Healing Revival and they all asked if they could pray over us younger people. I have never been prayed over like that before. It was truly and experience. I loved it and soaked every minuet of it up. I am not sure what God has in store for my life but I can already tell he is going to do great things with me. I have no clue where or when but all I know is that I am following his voice and we shall see where it leads me.

My Grandpa

So if you haven't figured out by now my grandpa is someone very close to me. I just found out today that he is in the hospital. They think that he may have had a small stroke and they are doing testing tomorrow to find out what caused it. Please pray for the doctors to find out what is wrong with him and for my grandma to be able to get some much needed rest right now.

Thanks!

last weekend, grandpa, south TX

So last weekend I went to south TX. I absoultly love it down there. I think that I could park myself down there and just leave everything behind and not even care. It is so pretty. Here are a few pictures I took down there.
This was on the way down. It is a tree made out of deer antlers. It is kind of cool.

This one is just amazing!
Look at the clouds. They are almost perfect!

This picture is my favorite!! It is the road the my
Grandmas friend lives down and down the road
we stayed in. I absolutely love this picture!

This is the super cute house we stayed in!

This is just a random picture of the scenery.
I love it though! I could so live down there!
















So there are some pictures. We went down for my grandmothers 85th birthday. 6 out of 9 of her kids where there so that was a ton of fun. I got to hang out with my cousins from Houston that I never see so that was fun too.

Then on Sunday we went to a church where my grandpa used to preach. It is amazing and I love it. Anyway they used to video the service and send it to my grandpa but I noticed that they quit doing that. It is just hard to watch the church move on with out him when for so many years that is where he preached and ministered.

Now this weekend I am sitting here working on cleaning house and homework. A bit of a change from the last two weekends when I was down south just having fun. :))

If I won the Lotto

I have often thought about what I would spend the money if I was to win the lotto. I think that I would pay off all of my school. Then put enough in savings to live off of and then if I still had some left over I think it would be fun to buy an apartment complex for low income families. I think that I would just love that. It would be so much fun. I think I would want to live there with the families so I could get to know them. I think that would be fun too. I think that I would pay off my car and help my parents pay off some of their stuff too. Have you ever thought about what you would do if you won the lotto??

thurnder stoms

So I haven't blogged in a long time because I have been super busy. School is taking up most of my free time. It is raining outside like pouring. It has been lightening for several hours now but it just started raining. So I was at a friends house and I was hanging out watching a movie. The movie ended at around 12 midnight and I decided to go ahead and drive home. The weather man came on the TV and said that it was capable of producing golf ball size hail. I thought naaa I will beat it. Then I got scared out of my mind all the way home because the lightening was lighting up the sky and it wasn't looking too good. It didn't start raining until I was on my road. That was good. I made it home with only rain. It still hasn't hailed yet. I think I am crazy. Who decides to drive home in a crazy thunder storm like this??

Its not about me.

I have realized over the past few weeks that I tend to focus more on me and what I want but I need to focus on God and what he wants with me. Another thing that I have realized is that I focus a ton on the negative in things and I am really hard on myself. I am working on fixing that but it is just so hard.

HAPPY MONDAY

So I haven't blog in awhile. I have just been super busy. Last weekend my brother had his Eagle court of honor and this last weekend I helped out with a youth retreat. It was fun but it wore me out. Now I am catching up on homework and my bible study. I have realized that I have trouble wrapping my head around the concept of being saved by the cross. I know that we are loved but I don't think I have quite gotten that we are REALLY loved. No matter what we do. Anyway I am going to get back to my homework now but that is just something I was thinking about and thought I would share it.

Talking with God

So yesterday I drove to Brownwood and for about 40 min I decided that I was not going to listen to the radio and I was just going to talk to God and just listen. Here are some of the things that I thought about.

noise- Everywhere we go there is noise. A train passing by, birds, tv, radio, passing by cars, and the list goes on and on. My question was can we ever be totally silence. So this thought is what lead me to turn off the radio and listen.

So I started talking to God and just telling him how I felt. I was talking out loud and then I thought that people who were passing by must think that I am crazy and talking to myself and then I was like next time someone asks me if I am talking to myself I am going to say that I am not talking to myself just talking to God. :))

Then while I was talking to God I heard him say shhhhhhh just listen so I did and he told me that he loves me and I am his which is something that I have been struggling with and something that I don't think I fully comprehend. Then I have been wondering what all I should be doing in ministry and when is too much. I think that he answered all of that for me. It was amazing.

seeking God

I am doing this bible study and it is kicking my butt. I have decided that the reason I questioned everything last semester was that I was too busy thinking and talking and not doing enough listening. I am working on listening better. I think that God wants me to realize how much he loves me and that he sees me differently than I see myself. He sees me as forgiven and as his child and I don't see myself that way. I am relearning all of this. I have also been longing for a friend who understands what I am going through and someone that I can talk to about anything and I just don't have that right now. I think that maybe God wants to fill that void in my life with his presence but I am just not letting him. So that is something that he is slowly letting me see. It is crazy. I am really starting to like this no cell phone thing. It gives me more time to listen and just be. Something else that I have realized is that being a college student and trying to be a Christian person in todays world is really really hard. Over half of the tv shows that I watch I probably shouldn't watch and over half the music on my ipod/computer I should probably delete. Most of my friends think I am crazy by now but I am not I am just trying to get my life back on track.

time and the cross

So I have decided that God is trying to tell me something and I know that he is trying to tell me something but evidently I still haven't quite gotten the message because he keeps telling me and to be quite honest I am starting to get a little annoyed with the same thing over and over again but I know that it is his way of saying hey you haven't gotten this yet. Listen you big dummy. He keeps telling me to slow down and enjoy the moment but I am finding that hard to do in todays world. We are so time consumed and everything has to start at this time and end at this time. I wonder what would happen if we showed up somewhere and just enjoyed each others company and never thought about what we needed to do next or I have all of this to do and I need to go do it now. Isn't life all about building relationships and growing with each other and watching Gods world go round? I am REALLY having a hard time this. My job is focused around a time frame and last Thursday I saw three different wrecks while I was on my route and I thought ok I need to slow down and just take my time. Things will get done when they get done. I also hate being late. I am one of those people that get ready at least 5 min before I need to be and I show up at least 5 min early. I just really hate being late. Anyway so I am trying to figure out what I can do for myself and just slow things down a little bit. I think I need to cut something out but I don't know what to cut. I don't feel over whelmed with anything that I am doing so for now I will just pray about it. The second thing that God keeps reminding me of is that he died on the cross just for me. This keeps coming up over and over again. I understand that he died on the cross to save me from sin but evidently I still haven't comprehended his love for me. I think I am going to pray about this too. Anyway I hope everyone has a great week and remember to live in the moment because time is so precious and you never know how much you have left.

Deer

Here are the pictures of me with deer. :)) My grandmother would take in deer that their mothers would reject because they couldn't take care of them.

Then here are some from not too long ago. Someone tamed a deer and he showed up in our front yard. He was really friendly and he gave our dogs a hard time. It was funny.

Pets

So I have always loved Animals!! I am at my parents house tonight becuase I am giving my dog a bath and taking her to my house for the week. I have really missed her. Right now she isn't too happy that she is in the bathroom still damp because I forgot my blow dryer but good things are to come. :)) I am not sure how she will get along with my cat but I guess we will find out. Here are a few pics to enjoy.

This one is the earliest one that I have with me and an animal. My mom thinks that I am three. I would sure hate to be that goat. :) This is at my grandmothers house.

This is the first goat that we got when we moved to the country.

More goats

These are some babies to the ones above.

Then came the donkey that we found and then it ran away but that is a story for another time.

Then during the goat and donkey times came the show pigs. I really do love pigs!! This was one of my sr pictures. I love this picture. There are two pigs here. These were my sr year pigs.

Last but not least my dog!! :)) I couldn't find a good picture of her so I will have to take one. I have had her since I was in the 5th grade so almost 9 years. CRAZY!! She is the one on the right. Her name is Silver. The other dog in this picture is Cooper. He is more like my brothers dog.

Well I guess that is all for now. I will try to post one with the deer pictures. I totally forgot about he whole deer pictures. My parents actually have one of me butt naked playing with deer at my grandparets. Really what where they thinking?? I think it was this will be great black mail!!

A Call To Die.

I started this Bible Study with a friend of mine. The book is called A Call To Die. It challenges you to give something up for the 40 days that you are doing the Bible study. So I gave up my cell phone. Now in todays world it is hard for a college aged person to not have a cell phone. They are everywhere. Just stay in one spot and watch. I bet you at least every other person that passes you will be on the phone or doing something with their phone. To be quite honest they probably won't even realize that you are standing there.

I think in todays world we are becoming so technological that it is hard for us to have real relationships. I am one who loves spending time with people. I have fun just sitting and talking for hours. Are we missing something from not being personal with each other? I think that the answer is yes. You can't tell what someone is really thinking over the phone. You can't see the way they are acting like by their body language. If you were to go to a foreign country 80% of what you did to try to talk to people would be by your body language (a smile a hug a handshake).

Don't get me wrong I love talking on the phone. It is well was something that I did all the time. That is why I gave it up. Since I have done this I have realized how we are starting to do less listening and more talking. If we never listen then how are we to hear God? I think that this is something that I was having a problem with. Since I started this Bible Study I have listened more to God and he keeps telling me that I am never alone. It has been a constant theme over the past few days. God often speaks though me in songs. My favorite song at the moment is a song by Mainstay called Hang on. It is amazing. You should take the time to listen to it. I tried to find it on youtube but I didn't have much luck.

Another song I love by them is called Your Not Alone. I did find this one on youtube and I think it is an amazing way to do a song so take the time to watch this video.




Anyway I am going to try to keep things posted on here of what is happening with my life and how I am being changed. I hope you have a blessed day and I will be writing soon.

life

Well I haven't blogged in awhile. I have been really busy. I was leaving church this morning and I started thinking about how church is supposed to be the one place you can come and be yourself and still be accepted but it has turned into a place where everyone comes on Sunday mornings and Wed nights and they put on a smile and act as if everything is just find and dandy. Well most days it isn't. No one is perfect and everyone has problems. Even the people you think have it all together. I have been asked by several people this week if I am happy and I keep telling people that I am happy and that I am just stressed but I think that they truth in the situation is no I am not happy. I am feeling distanced from God and not really sure how to find him. I have been looking and still don't feel him. I know he is with me but I am in a low point and it is starting to get frustrating. I long to be close to him. I am starting a Bible study and working on surrounding myself with Christians and finding an accountability partner so my hope is that all of this will help me in the long run. I guess my challenge to you is to not be fake with people. Be real with them. Tell people what is really going on in life. I know that is hard but it is something that if we all did I think the world would be a much better place!

Thoughts on choosing our feelings

I was in philosophy today and I think it changed my thinking on a lot of things. We talked about free will and Jean-Paul Sartre. Sartre's view is that we never take responsibility for our actions like we should. We all have excuses and we don't just say that we choose to do something else instead. Like saying I choose to go to the movies instead of writhing that paper do doing that homework so that is why I don't have it but then isn't that an excuse in itself. I am not sure. I do think that we should take responsibility for our actions. I wonder how different would our world be if we all did this.
We also talked about how we choose out own emotions. We choose to be happy, sad, depressed. I am not sure what I think about this. I do think tit is right to some extent but I think that some emotions are brought on by circumstances. Like if something emotionally happens to you it makes you feel a certain way. Like if someone you are close to dies you are more than likely going to feel sad about that. This is where I am not sure if you choose that feeling. If you are sad because of something that happened to you then how can that be something that you choose.
I have thought quite a bit about this and I was thinking about feeling Gods absents. If we are feeling like Go d isn't with us then is that something that we are choosing. According to Sartre it would be something that we are feeling but I don't believe that. I do believe that we choose our feelings to some extent but we don't totally choose our feelings. When things happen to use it causes us to feel a certain way. I do think that we can choose to change how we feel when we are in those situations but for the most part that feeling is brought on by things out of our control.