November 11

This week was awesome. Seriously becoming family with everyone on base. In lectures, we studied the heart of worship. Some main things I learned this week! -Even when I have nothing, I should choose to praise God -In the hardest circumstances, DONT GIVE UP -Even when the circumstances change, God stays the same -True worship is out of the response of your love for God -I WILL worship, because God is worth it -Worship should never be about what I feel or what I’m going to get out of it, it is SOLELY to bring him praise

Another really cool thing that I learned this week is this: I don’t even have to go through intense pain, yet I always let the little things bring me down and take me away/distract me from my relationship with God. Do these issues give me an excuse to be discontent with God and my life? Absolutely not. no mater what I’m feeling, I must CHOOSE to be content and carry on praising God. It can be SO DIFFICULT, but HE IS SO WORTHY.

Also, we are so lead by our emotions, and it never turns out well. So many things we do are based on the “feelings” we get. We become enslaved to our emotions. Romans 6:16 says, “Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness?”

This is interesting because whatever we let influence us, is what we are enslaved to. We should be enslaved to God. Not necessarily servants to him, because that is not what Christianity is- Christianity is a relationship WITH God. So if we let God influence every part of us, we will become more righteous, and more like Him.

ANOTHER cool thing, is that yes...God will take us through trials and hardships, and that is fine. Without a crisis, there can be no breakthrough. God brings a breakthrough and you will grow, get so much stronger. It can be painful, but once you heal, you become even better than before. So no matter how much God puts you through, if you just persevere, it will be totally worth it!

The last thing that I really loved figuring out this week is this: We live in SO MUCH bondage of our past and what we’ve done. We are not sinners striving for holiness, we are saints who sometimes struggle with sin. Thanks to the gift of the cross, God forgave you as soon as you repent. It’s us and our worry-some minds that are the problem- not forgiving ourselves.

SO YEAH. This week was so cool. We also had a 24-hour worship session, which was AWESOME. I’ve been making some new friends here as well as becoming a little TOO COMFORTABLE around the ones I’ve had this whole time...(S/O to Dan Moreira). I’ve really started feeling like I’m at home here, and I’m just realizing how absolutely blessed I am to have the ability to take a portion of my life aside, live in AUSTRALIA, and have weeks like this... where I get to learn about my creator and build some extraordinary, life-long relationships.