New book!

  Starting 5/11/11, I began reading a new book, and it is very good.

Heaven is for Real. It's a true story about a little boy who became very sick, and he was taken to heaven. He sat with Jesus and talked to him, met John the Baptist, etc. And the kid was only 3 years old. It's a cute book, and I recommend it.

But one thing that I think is particularly interesting is that, since the little boy met Jesus and knew what he looked like, lots of artists were drawing pictures of ways that Jesus might look, and asking him if the picture looked like the real Jesus, and the kid kept saying, "no, that's not quite right." And then there was a little girl who drew a picture of what she thought Jesus might look like, and the little boy immediately said that it looked exactly like him. And the picture is in the book.
It looks similar to our interpretation of Jesus' looks, but yet it's different.

I found that to be interesting. So, if you read the book, you can see what Jesus looks like. Incentive, I know :P

When Jesus Isn't Enough

  I have been into stumbleupon lately...
http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/68jg18/storybleed.com/2011/01/when-jesus-isnt-enough/
And I found this just now, and I thought it was so true. And then I thought, "I can write a whole saga about that on my blog!" So that's what I'm doing.

  First off, every American, no matter how poor, is so spoiled. Americans always want more and more, and then aren't truly thankful for any of it. I think the main problem here is that we receive too much.  If we only received material blessings every so often, we would be thankful when we did receive them. I don't know how often you receive material things, but I am gifted them constantly. If we are at the store and I see something I really want, I ask my mom if I can get it, and she usually says yes. And then when I get it home, I feel almost like I deserve to have it, and I'm not thankful at all.

  People in poor countries have absolutely nothing, but it is so easy for them to love and follow the Lord. Why is that? Personally, I believe that material possessions are a huge barrier between God and us. Those who have absolutely nothing - no food, necessities, hope - live so simply. Their lives aren't cluttered with unnecessary junk. So when they hear about Jesus, and how He will always sustain those who are weak, give hope to the hopeless, and everything else that they need, they simply trust and have faith, and that's all there is to it. Isn't that amazing to you? It amazes me. They just accept it so easily, and completely rely on God. And relying on God is what you are supposed to do, but if you're like me, we don't always trust Him with the important things, or sometimes even the little things, for fear that he won't give us the answer we want, or that he won't come through for us. (Or maybe that's just me....) I wish I had simple faith, but I don't. Do you have simple, child-like faith? The Bible says that we must have this kind of faith. But what should you do if you don't?

 There are always a thousand things we could do instead of go read our Bible or spend time praying, and usually I do the thousand other things. Watch tv, watch movies, get on the internet, call a friend, clean, eat out of boredom, etc. But for those that don't have any of those things, they most likely spend a lot more time meditating on the Word, and wanting to go more in-depth with their relationship with God. If you have ever just meditated on God, then you know that it has that effect. The more you think about how awesome, loving, and forgiving He is, the more you want to become closer and closer with Him. But, as I said, we only meditate on Him every so often, because we are distracted by other things. But those who have nothing to distract them think of God so much more, and so much more often - thus putting them in a better place spiritually.

  This whole topic always gets me. How simple and childlike the faith is of people who have absolutely nothing. Not a single thing of value. Yet, I think of how wonderful it would be to live and think like that, but would I ever really renounce all of my possessions and go live somewhere dirty and sleep on the ground? Probably not of my own accord. I probably wouldn't do that unless God gave me a huge calling.

Link.

I just found the neatest website for daily devotions. I thought I would share.

http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/8dBUao/www.soulstrength.com/Devotions.html

Hmmm.

  Last night, I was speaking on the phone with one of my dear friends, and we spoke for quite a while and traveled through many subjects. And while we were talking, the thought suddenly came to me: What was Jesus' last name?
  My friend was raised in a very religious home, and she always seems to have an answer to my religious questions. So I asked her, and she didn't know. So we looked up the chronology lists in both Mathew and Luke, and of all the names listed, none of them included a last name.
  Does that mean that people in the bible days didn't have last names? That would be a logical reason as to why you never hear of Jesus having a last name. And for people to identify themselves, they always said "I am ____, son of _____" or, "I am ______ of _____" you know? So maybe they just didn't keep last names. But if that's true, who first decided to start last names? When did that tradition begin? Interesting stuff, right there.
  That's probably the dumbest thing I've blogged about yet :p

The cross.

  Easter is coming up! I'm excited to watch The Passion on Easter Sunday and really take in why we celebrate Easter. I've never really sat there and thought about what it means, and how it affected Jesus and all that. But the other night, I was praying and just trying to think over Easter, and I thought of some pretty amazing facts.

  1. The cross symbolizes my sin. 2. The cross was heavy, and Jesus carried it. 3. There was no better way for Jesus to be put to shame, than by carrying the cross down the streets of Jerusalem. 4. In Matthew 26, Jesus prays to God when he is very scared, and he asks God if there is any way that he could take away the cup of suffering, but then he ultimately says that he wants God's will to be done and not his own. 5. The incredible pain. 6. That should have been me.

  1: The cross symbolizes my sin. My sin is why Jesus was crucified in the first place. I couldn't be forgiven if Christ hadn't willingly given up his life for my own.
  2: The cross was heavy, and Jesus carried it down the streets. This one kind of ties into the first. I realized that the weight of the cross (my sin) is the weight that sin has on us. When I sin, I ask Jesus to forgive me and of course he always does. But depending on the seriousness of my sin, I sometimes can't forgive myself. When I ask Jesus to forgive me, he does immediately, and the Bible says he doesn't even remember  it anymore. But when it comes to letting the weight of your sin off of your heart, it is so much more difficult. But Christ carried that weight for me. He takes away the weight if we let him.
  3: There is no better way for Jesus to be put to shame, than by carrying the cross down the streets of Jerusalem. If you think back to the way things used to be, there would be huge crowds watching people being put to death. Huge groups of people stoned others in the streets depending on what sins they committed. Can you imagine the shame that Jesus endured? He walked through the streets, and was probably seen by everyone in the entire city. (he was a pretty well-known guy, after all). The Bible says people spat at him, and some people were punching and slapping him. He never did anything wrong!! That always gets me.
  4: In Matthew 26, Jesus prays to God when he is very scared, and he asks God if there is any way that he could take away the cup of suffering, but then he ultimately says that he wants God's will to be done and not his own. Jesus knows what is about to happen to him. He knows everything, even the caliber of pain he is about to be put through. If I knew all of that was about to happen to me, I would probably be begging God to take it away and rescue me. But instead, Jesus asks if it is possible for his cup to be taken, but then he basically says, 'but really, I just want what you want. So if it has to be this way, then let it be.' Could you imagine saying that if you knew exactly what horrific things were about to happen to you, knowing that you never did a single thing wrong?
  5: The incredible pain. Think about it. First, they whipped Jesus many times. They tore open his skin in many places and he was a bloody mess. Then they made a crown out of thorns, and shoved it onto his head. Thorns! I whine like a baby if I get just one in my foot. But he took several, and they were shoved into his scalp. And then, as if that wasn't enough, after he was weak and almost broken already, they forced him to take the enormous weight of the cross and carry it through the city. Past every single person that spat on him and hit him, up to the hill where they proceeded to take four nails, and shove two of them into his wrists, and two into his ankles. Just stop to think about that for a moment. The pain is incomprehensible. Surely none of us have ever taken on such pain, as he did. And he did it for me, and for you.
  6: That should have been me. All of it, from the beginning, he endured just to buy my pardon with God. What he, a completely innocent man, took for me, is what I deserve for the things I do every day. It should have been I who endured a kiss from a friend who betrayed me, who was judged guilty, who sat there while people whipped me and shoved thorns into my head, who carried the immense weight of the cross with a week and beaten body. The shame should have been mine. And most importantly, the pain of my body being hung on two pieces of wood by four nails should have been mine.

 Yet he takes all of it away completely. This is what I am going to remember on Easter Sunday. What are you going to remember? What are you going to think of? Are you going to be focused on getting a day off, being able to take a nap, or being lazy for a day?