The Devil tried, but God tried harder

Last year I had a very scary but most amazing experience happen to me. I want to blog about it because it was such a scary moment in my life to which God first hand intervened.  I still remember to this day every moment of how I felt and what the Bible said at that moment to give me the exact comfort I needed!

So one night last year, I was doing a little bible study at home. I can't remember the bible study but I remember somehow Demon's popping up. This was around the time Paranormal Activity came out so perhaps it had to do with that. Point being, demons was on my mind that night. Now demons freak me out badly, I think they probably freak almost everyone out if you believe in them so I tried not to think about it and moved on from that section of study.

That night I had a horrible dream. It had to do like creepy monsters doing horrible things to people. I woke up in a huge panic and felt incredibly scared. I felt the strongest feeling of evil than I have in my entire life. Something was not right with me and the atmosphere was very scary. Perhaps it was all in my mind because I had demons on the brain after hearing about it, but nonetheless, I didn't feel safe or like I was me at all. I began to freak out not feeling right and grabbed my Bible and ran to the kitchen. I was in complete terror and didn't know where to look so I just opened my bible praying that God would show me comfort and stability. Now I'm not saying I was possessed or anything like that, just that I felt some sort of evil, something not natural happening at that moment. So I prayed.

God answered right away.

I opened my Extreme Teen Bible, which has little boxes called "Promises" in it where it disects the verse and talks about the promise God made in it. This is what it said:

Title: He promises to help you by his Spirit.

      Have you ever needed help? Of course you have. You may need help right now. All of us need help at some time or another. None of us are immune from the storms of life, but the good news is God sent the Holy Spirit to go with us through these storms. Not only did he come to fill us with power, but he was also sent to help us with every trial, every temptation, and every circumstance. You may be going through something at this very moment, but you know what? The Holy Spirit is here right now ready and willing to help, even as your read this. In fact, if we will become aware of God's presence in us, there isn't anything that the devil can throw at us that we can't handle. Jesus, the greater One, lives on the inside! Nothing can stop us now! We have the victory! He'll help you!

Pretty amazing right!? God was right there and knew exactly what I needed to hear. Praise be to God for he knows all things and is with us always.

"I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper to be with you forever." John 14:16

Favorite quotes and bible verses

When you can't handle things God can.

Be Strong...Stand for truth....Live for Eternity...Thanks Sarah :)

 "Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not Condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. Give and it will be given to you." -Luke 6: 37-38

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes." -Luke 12: 22-23

"If your brother sins rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. If he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times he comes back to you and says, "I repent" forgive him. Luke: 17: 3-4

Offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God-this is your spiritual act of worship. Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is-his good, pleasing and perfect will. -Romans 12: 1-2

And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance, character and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out is love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. Romans 4: 2-5

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-not by works, so that no one can boast. -Ephesians 2: 8-9

Sometimes the answer is yes

Today for practice we were supposed to run six miles at 60%. A 60% run entails running each of the six miles around 6:50-7:10 mile pace. The run was on our own today so I grabbed my ipod and took off up the road. After my warm up mile, I knew it was gonna be a bit of a struggle hitting the pace on my own. I said a quick prayer asking God if he would help me to have a great run today. About 5 minutes later I saw a shadow of someone running behind me. It was my teammate Whitney.

My run got much better after I had Whitney running beside me. It was a much more fun run having someone by me and my music was turned off which was actually quite nice. Sometimes running with music distracts me more than it does encourage me.

Last night I read in a magazine called "Revolve" a Christ centered magazine, that only God in Heaven knows how many times he has rescued us from harm. It continued saying that sometimes we are able to look back and know that God had his hand on us but that most of the time we walk around totally unaware of his divine intervention. I thought about how Whitney came up from behind me on my run today and realized that God could of easily had his hand on me in this situation. I may not have realized that if I had not read that passage last night. Prayer does change things! Prayer is power.

Sometimes God answers no, but sometimes the answer is yes.

You honor God He will honor you.

My mom constantly tells me that if I honor God he will honor me. I didn't quite understand what that meant until a couple days ago.

It's funny how much relationships affect my life. I don't really realize how much they affect me until something goes wrong. Then I get all in a panic trying to make things better. As my brother puts it, "I'm a person pleaser." This can be good and bad. It's hard to try to make everyone happy but it's good to think of people's feelings.

Recently, I have been struggling with a relationship of mine. It's more struggling with what I want and what God wants really. I know what it is I'm supposed to do but half the time (if not more) I don't listen and do what I want anyway. From what I have experienced so far-I lose. Heart ache follows quickly and things start to descend. I loose sleep for various reasons, loose concentration in school, loose focus on my goals. Most regretfully, I loose my relationship with God. 

I've never felt closer to God than right now. Sure I have felt the Spirit move in great ways before, but right now, I feel CLOSE. Like God is right by me helping me make decisions and giving me confidence in myself, track, school work, and personal relationships. It didn't just happen on it's own however, it happened because one day in church I decided that Jesus is and should be the most important thing in my life. The problem with this is I've said this before and have gone back into my old ways...living for myself. One thing I didn't have before that I do now is a schedule. That sounds weird, but I've now scheduled times when it's just me and God. After practice in the morning I sit down and pray just one and one. No distractions, no other thoughts, just prayer. Of course I have prayed before. Many many many countless prayers..one and one just me and him. The thing is lately, they haven't felt genuine. I feel like when I pray I am thinking a hundred things at once that keep popping into my prayer. "What time is it?" "I need to do this...and this..and this.." Distractions that take me away from my one and one time. I was sick of it. So I decided it was time to get focused and get serious.

It's amazing how God answers prayers...if you genuinely give all of yourself and your time to Him.

He's working in my life and it feels amazing. I feel like when I live for him, pressures of everyday life are not so bad. "Pray without ceasing." God is so great people. One thing I always say in my prayers is that I live for God today and do what he wants me to do. I pray that people see God through me and that I can be a light for him.

Every since I started doing this, track has been better. I pray every morning before my run that it goes well. I should pray that I run for him too. I need to do that more. God gave me this talent. I feel that I have more confidence and mental strength when I rely on God to take my strides with me. My outlook on my relationships has been positive too even in the roughest times. I feel like when I don't get my way I should praise God. Thank you Lord that I'm not getting what I want because I know that what I want right now is not what you want. Sometimes you don't always know, but right now I do. Right now I'm not getting my way with something and it hurts badly. In the past I would, but I know that God has a plan, there's a reason why this isn't working out, and I need to be patient. Relationships are tricky...especially when things get serious. That's a whole other topic though.

Honor God and he will honor you.

It's true what they say

Everyone has a voice and opinion.

Many people's opinions have been shared with me throughout my life. Some, I have seen as true, others not so much. Parents will tell you many things and friends will give you advice to heal a broken heart, but some times you never truly understand until you try to give the advice yourself. Perhaps it's from a different perspective you couldn't see before and in most cases, you wouldn't understand until you experienced it yourself.

I decided to write a blog about my experiences, struggles, songs, miracles, thoughts, and life in general. Most of the things people write about in blogs, only mine will be about all these things and how they all intertwine with My Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.