Well, yesterday was quite dangerous.  If you tried to leave your home in the morning you would know.  While on my way to church I (Shayna)  made good friends with a telephone pole.  Or, well my car did.  I hit a sheet of ice and my car skid left, right, left, right and BAM! telephone pole.  Well, I’m soooo lucky because only my mirror was taken off instead of my head.  In fact, after hitting the pole, my car decided to keep on going for a bit in the middle of the field by the prison.  It could have been soooo much worse and I’m so thankful God took care of me yesterday.  The Hollobinkos took me to church and then I saw another white honda on top of a hill (along with several others)…
This is where i come in (deanna)… that white honda, yeahhh, me. i tried getting up the steep hill by the church and while getting half way up, proceeded to slide back down. there were about ten other cars traveling 4 miles/hr with flashers on, apparently the cold is not our friend. but the telephone pole is definitely shayna’s. until it backstabbed her and stole her mirror. bahahha. but anyways, i tried going up the gravel road to the church, hoping i’d get more traction. which was also a FAIL. i got stuck and had to walk the rest of the way to church.

ohhh what troubles we go through just for attending church..

buttttt. God took care of both shayna and i and we are both alive and well.

that is our story. so here is a verse to let you know just how much God loves you and will take care of you next time you hit a sheet of ice on a cold december morn.

k thats it.. right shayna?

YAAA!

okay, so go read the bible…

If the Creator of the universe cares enough about the humble birds to care for them, why would He care any less about us? God provides for the birds’ needs; as He loves us even more, we can count on Him to provide for us as well.

Matthew 6:26

Proverbs 12:18 “Reckless words pierce like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.”

You cannot grasp God in this World… and this week in Sociology class I’ve realized it’s become an obsession with people, both Christians and non-Christians alike. There is always an argument and always a rebuttal to any statement someone may make about God or any topic. God is not an argument to be won… He is the one and only absolute. He is outside of time and space. No end and no beginning. And until you treat him as such, you will waste your life away trying to grasp Him and His ways.

You cant understand God in a “fallen world.” It is like trying to find light in a black hole. It can’t be done. The only truth of God that you can find on this Earth is by looking to the Word and realizing the only light in this World, now, are the true followers of Jesus Christ. We are a light. And if we truly know God, the truth we confess and the wisdom we profess to the World is of God and is the the only truth that proves the absolute Himself.

While pursuing God and trying to fill this void in my life, I knew I wanted to get involved in something that loved on people in the community. Even before I gave my life to him, he instilled in me how to serve and love….

So, I landed here, at CLA, as the admin assistant to the Youth Pastor b/c Pastor Tony Sebastian believed in me and wanted to see spiritual growth in my life. It has been life changing to say the least…

Have you ever had a passion to do something then a year or two passes and you realize that you are so far from it….Sure, I know we go through different seasons and sometimes passions and dreams can be put on hold…I remember saying to friends while taking care of Baba and managing a part-time business that I want to do more and help in the community….little did I know that I desired to do something in the name of Jesus not for myself.

I want to take advantage of this divine season and place….With the new vision of the church, Love God…Love People…Change the World…, it has brought back all the desires I have to impact our community…

Here are a few areas this month you can love people…and change the world. The first opportunity is working with Capital Area Pregnancy Center. They offer caring and professional medical services, abortion recovery counseling and support, clothing and furnishings for mothers and baby, among other programs. They are completely self funded. They hold six car washes a year to help fund these programs, this being the last one for the year. They need 6-8 volunteers. It will be held on Saturday, September 6th from 9:30am-2:00pm in Mechanicsburg off the Bowmansdale exit. Click here for more information about CAPC.

The second opportunity is helping the Center for Champions of PA. Center for Champions of PA is an outreach to inner-city, at-risk families using a holistic approach that addresses the mind, body and spiritual needs of the individuals we serve. They are committed to changing the city for Christ one family at a time….Once a month they have dinners for the parents. This month it will be held for the entire family at a Veteran’s Park Elmerton Avenue in Harrisburg. They are in need of 10-12 volunteers to serve and love on the kids. The date is Thursday, September 11 from 4:00-9:00pm. We are leaving from the Youth Center at 4:00p.  Click here to find out more information about CFC.

If you are interested in serving, please email frequenyouth@christian-life.com or call 717-635-7230.

any good Christian knows that God searches the heart, but the Christian that searches his heart is rare.

unfortunately

i have a friend who was praying that i’d step into parts of my heart that i didn’t know and was afraid to. that prayer has been, is being, and will continue to be answered in me.

my heart is a scary place. do you identify?

God commands so much of us, and yet settles for so little. why???????

why do we make God suffer with so little of the so much that he so kindly asks of us?

i search my heart. and i question. i question my motives. are they pure? why did i bless that person? was it to genuinely bless them, or was it to gain some sort of sick, selfish pleasure beacause I blessed them? sick. why do i pray what i pray to God? do i pray for the benefit of others, or for my own convenience? why do i what i do? why????????!!???!!?!?

i have been praying that God’s reality would eventually become more real to me than this perverted physical reality. the demands on our easily perceiving senses are so easy to yield to without realizing it. but the requests God makes of us, perceivable only in a Spirit, practiced only in obedient love to King Christ, are hard to hear and understand.

but it’s possible. i have taken this saturday as a sort of sabbath. i have been searching my heart. i have been doing my best to yield to God my whole heart and let him search it. for we truly cannot control our hearts. no matter our best efforts, they do things that we have no control over.

which is why often times we distance ourselves from our true selves, because we’re scared of the control over us our hearts have. and thus the product is the very thing we hate to become. a viscious cycle. not broken by being merely saved, but only by King Christ’s power in a truly transforming way, met with glorious Scripture, changed by unchangeable words of God.

you youth are so real, so genuine. you don’t hide because you’re young. you hate fakeness and you can smell it in harrisburg. but unless you let God search your heart, and change it, you will eventually fade into what you don’t want to ever encounter.

God searching and changing our hearts is PAINFUL!!!!! it hurts! it stinks! i hate it! i honestly do not like it! it’s hard! it’s hard to yield! it’s hard to be honest, real, genuine to God! we want to say “i believe you wholeheartedly God!!!” and we want to impress God with our undying love and faith. but he’d rather we come to his feet, with no faith, no belief, no trust, but a heart willing to learn, and a genuine teachable spirit.

search your heart. guaranteed you’ll scare yourself. but it is worth it. with God, you can do it. you are deep, because God made you that way. and your depth will be either a great blessing to you, your family, your friends, and every person you ever meet, or it will be a wretched curse to all life.

you choose.

God loves you. and he will help you choose rightly. simply ask him for help. he will. and it’s okay to take time. i’ve been saved for 5 years….it will take time. and that’s okay.

i guess i sound somewhat crazy. but then, free hearts usually do. not many people are used to free hearts, and i suppose few know how to handle them…but then that’s because they not handle-able.

beauty inspires me. as it does every man. it helps me to passionately chase after God. who can know his mysteries? and yet he longs to show us and reveal to us his mysteries. but we have to seek him.

and so i seek him. even from inside the rooms of nothing. i seek God.