The Day After

I hope you guys had a good Christmas! I hope it was filled with loving family and everything you thought it would be!

   Christmas is one of my favorite nostalgic events of the year. Every year I reflect on the past ones, the embarrassing moments, the ones that made me want to smile and the ones that weren't so great. I remember this one Christmas where I acted like I got what I really wanted, and then went upstairs and pouted. Mature, right? I pretty sure it was only a couple years ago.

  When it comes to gifts, which of these scenarios sounds better: To get exactly what you wanted, or to be completely surprised? Personally I love to be surprised by what my mom gets me. The feeling just isn't same if I expect to get what I want. It's boring. This year I got socks and I couldn't be happier! They are these argyle long socks in about every color you could imagine because, you know me I love color!

Do you think the Israelites got what they were expecting when Jesus came?

Lets be honest, when they were thinking of their Savior, they wanted a courageous warrior to overthrow the roman empire. I would personally think of a Dwayne-The-Rock-As-Hercules type deal; bashing heads and taking names. But they would truly not get what they were expecting.

So now, picture yourself on a late night, in a little town called Bethlehem. You see a young couple; Joseph and Mary, frantically trying to find a place to bear a child. This child would be known as the Son of God! Honestly if I was Mary I would be totally freaking out right now. She's about to birth the Savior of her people and she can't even find a place to do it. I mean there wasn't even room for them in the inn. I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty bummed if my baby couldn't be born in a Marriott.

But most of you know where this story goes, the very last place they found was a stable full of nasty animals and germs. Not the most sanitary place to give birth to the Son of God. However, this will truly become the most beautiful scene ever.

This leader that the Israelites were expecting;  the overthrower, the hero, their savior came as a vulnerable little baby. As He grew, He did not act in violence nor in angst, but in love. He was a teacher, a father to the fatherless, a friend, a Savior. Did the people who He came to save love him in that aspect? No, because He wasn't what they wanted they hated Him. Like a little kid rejecting socks for Christmas, they wanted what they expected. Instead of a royal throne, they gave Him a throne of a cross, a crown of thorns, hatred. This Savior that came to dwell with the people He came to save threw him away. He was gone.

How demoralizing do you think it was to see your way of hope, your Savior; dead on a cross? I would just curl up in a fetal position forever. All hope was gone.

For three days.....

Then He came back. The hope, the joy, Jesus came back. He met with His followers for one last time and then ascended into heaven. To one day return to take His world back, and to fulfill His promise.

Where is He now?

To His people, He lives inside us. THE CREATOR OF THE UNIVERSE LIVES INSIDE US. His spirit fills our hearts to serve the least of these, to love others, and to serve his purpose. As I sit in this coffee shop on this rainy morning, I smile to the point where I am pretty sure I scared a little kid. It also reminds me that every stupid think I've did He has seen. And I've done some pretty stupid things. But lets get back to the point, you have the person--who can do anything--living inside you. When you feel useless, depressed, broken; remember that. You can do anything through Christ Jesus.

Now it's the day after Christmas; what are you going to do with the power inside you?

Father God, thank You for remind us the gift of Your love. I pray that this love is spread through Me and through my friends who read this. Thank You for the ability to write this and the ability to celebrate the birth of Your Son. 

John 3:16New Living Translation (NLT) 

16 “For this is how God loved the world: He gave[a] his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.

God Bless and a Happy New Year!

Aidan

You've Got a Friend in Me.

"Who gives a S*** about a 'ship?"

That question seems trivial, but at this point in our society its a pretty big deal. Relationships now are either "hit-it-n-quit-it" or casual. Friendship isn't great either; its one person using another and calling each other "friends". 

My history with all of this crap with 'ship's isn't too "choir boy" or perfect. I had one and done relationships that went nowhere, and when I did develop feelings it fell through. This left me battered, bruised and untrusting. Up until a couple months ago I've just been focusing on the wrong aspects of a girl; "what can I get from her? and how can I use her to my advantage?". Not, "How can I serve God with this woman?" or "Will dating this person further my relationship with God or make me drift away and stumble?". Like I said, up until a few months ago I was stumbling, hard.

My friendships were also for the wrong reasons a while back. "Oh, this person has a nice house." or "Oh, You have money, what can I get from you?" I constantly let people down and built no friendships that could last. 

Up until now

I came to grips with what I was becoming, I prayed and prayed asking why I was like this. Why was nothing lasting? 

A couple days after this prayer I just felt the urge to buckle down and get a devotion book and a journal. Honestly, it has really helped me focus on the aspects of loving people despite their sin and learning to serve God as a man of God, not a man of this world. 

Let me tell you a little story about a heart-to-heart I recently had with one of my friends:

     This friend of mine is almost always happy-go-lucky, this person can bring you from a bad day to dancing and singing in your car like no other. Lets call this person K. After K and I were done hanging out, I went to drop her off at her house. As we drove along the road, her happy-go-lucky shell started to melt and I started to see the pain she was going through. I told her there was no judgement in my car and she let it all out. My heart broke at the sound of her telling me about self-harm and attempted suicide. Those stories almost brought me to the point of tears but I knew that I had finally seen the real K. Not the shiny outer coating that everybody else sees. 

  I felt that this experience showed me how all relationships between friends in Christ should be. The ability to be vulnerable before another person and before God shows the real you, the RAW you. Bottling everything up and pretend it's okay isn't healthy, true community and caring is shown in the ability to break down in front of one another. That's what makes relationships so valuable; the ability to be yourselves, broken or unbroken. 

When it comes to the other type of relationship, nothing is more important than defining what you intend to do with this relationship; How long to you plan it to last? Is marriage an end game? Will this person build me up or drag me down? 

Red flags for a dude in high school like me are: "My life could totally change" or "I'm gonna meet new people in college" tell me to not invest so much into a girl that could leave in the blink of an eye or tear my heart out of my chest. My ultimate goal for a relationship is to serve Christ together with a woman and that she loves God more than she loves me. I want her to be able to be vulnerable and to be the raw wifey that I will love. 

A New Beginning

   Well, its been a minute since the last time I wrote on this, I pray the words I write have a positive impact on your day today! 

Since the last time I wrote this, I definitely feel like I have changed. Its been a whirlwind of things happening, people changing, and soul searching. Lets play a little catch-up.

I think the most recent time I wrote, I was a junior. Man, that feels like yesterday but decades ago. This past year, I thought I was in a good place. I had a job at McDonalds that was paying pretty well, I started to get involved in Younglife, and my grades were good. MY LIFE WAS "PERFECT". I had one thing that always continued to kind of hinder my happiness. I was 250 pounds. I felt like my whole high school career just revolved around my appearance. No one wants to hangout or been seen with the fat kid at school. So the self esteem dropped pretty heavily. I was also a people pleaser, like my whole reputation revolved around if I made the right people happy. I felt like God was only there if something bad happened, I thought of him as a judge and nothing more. It was starting to feel nothing like the first months after I accepted him as my Lord and Savior.  The end of the school year was becoming a struggle, and everything was starting to change. I felt like I was losing my grip on my situation. I felt like my life was slowly spinning out of control.

My health was also getting worse. My blood pressure was spiking into 140/80 and the weight was still going up. Honestly other than before I accepted Christ this was rock bottom. I put so much weight on all these worldly things: girls, money, acceptance, and material things. I learned my lesson when those bottomed out on me and left me exposed, or raw, unprotected.

Okay, maybe that wasn't the most happy-go-lucky thing you were looking for today, but trust me it gets better.

After all these health problems, my mom insisted that I get a personal trainer. So we went to Cook Performance to meet my new trainer. I felt ashamed going in there, I felt like he was pitying me, but that wasn't the case. I started to train with him and it really showed me how far off I was from the right track. I could barely do pushups, I mean come on that's sad. I started with my trainer in May, and it's been a long journey. After several weeks of hard work. I lost a total of 15 pounds before heading off to my latest adventure. Younglife camp at Rockbridge! It was an awesome week, its definitely one of the best things about being a high schooler. I met some really awesome people. God made His presence there too. These moments that I had with these people truly showed the work that was going on inside these guys and gals. I also turned 18 in a West Virginia McDonald's! That was a weird experience, but I wouldn't wanna have it any other way. I went back to the grind of working out afterwords for a couple weeks and got to the 20lb weight loss mark. These I headed to my favorite place on Earth, Mahoning Valley Christian Service Camp. If I didn't state in one of my previous blog posts, this is where I fully accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior as a freshman. The place itself is surreal, its a place away from the world with people who all have the same mission as you. My last year is this year so it makes me sad but I'm gonna make the most of it! It was a great week and I was headed home optimistic and refreshed. I then wanted to start taking my faith seriously, so I got a journal, a new bible, and a devotion book. Then I didn't even touch them for about a month. I've started to do my daily devotions though and it's making a huge difference in my life so far. I feel as if though I've matured in my faith and have become an example. Which I hope I don't screw up. Anyway, to end my the last parts of my story up to here, I have a job at Goody's and Amack's Well (come get a good cup of coffee will ya?). I have been becoming renewed in my faith and I'VE LOST 50 POUNDS. I doesn't even feel like it, but I'm happy its happened.