Dead

Feel like I've been

battling

pushing

pulling

trying

slacking

sleeping

crying

failing

failing

failing...

for a while now... living the Christian life great for a while, then royally screwing it up. Trying hard to protect myself from messing up all the while making huge mistakes in other areas. Asking for Gods help but only sometimes taking it. All the time battling mean spirited untrue thoughts about people who are close to me... Then times when I'm so tired... ah.

O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

A dear, dear friend of mines grandmother recently called me out of no where and laid much grace and mercy from God on me in a phone conversation when I was feeling so heavy and weighed down. She recommended (and gave) this book to me called "The Green Letters" by Miles J. Stanford which is about Christian maturity. Man, God is so sovereign... something I say non stop but... I can't get over it. This book has been speaking volumes to me about...myself. And more importantly about Christ. I need to realize, accept, and (haha) live daily in the fact that because of CHRIST


I'm dead,

For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 

There was no hope for me, my flesh. So God came and I was crucified, 2,000 years ago. And me, my flesh needs to STAY in that tomb so that Jesus may live in this tent.

But I'm not going down easy I guess...

"Is it not time we allowed the Holy Spirit to get at the source, and cut off this stream of sins before they are committed? Is this not infinitely better than the wreckage caused by sin, even through confessed? When believers get sick and tired of spinning year after year in a spiritual squirrel cage- sinning, confessing, but then sinning again- they will be ready for God's answer to the source of sin, which is death to self, brought fourth from the completed work of the cross...I must recognize that the enemy within the camp- the flesh, the old nature, self, I, the old Adam- is a usurper. By faith I must reckon him to be in the place that God put him- crucified with Christ. I must realize that now my life is hid with Christ in God; that He is my life."   
The Green Letters

 All this to say I still haven't gotten it yet... but man... oh man do I believe... that God is a gracious God.

And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ.

It is ALL Him... all the time!


So while in the midst of this struggle of putting to death my self and allowing the Spirit free reign I find kindred spirits who seem to sing the same song :)

"You HAVE to do this..."

So I dont know how many of you I've told... ok let me back up a little more then that. So super senior year of college I was just LOVING art. I just enjoyed it SO much... thinking about it, experimenting with it, making it... especially with others. So when I graduated and it looked like I'd be substitute teaching for a while it looked like I wouldnt need to be making art at all. And not only because I LOVED art but also because I was required for almost 2 straight years to be creative almost 24/7, I knew this was going to be a difficult change. But God has graced me with a few big ideas for big projects that don't have to be completed anytime soon but that I can work on whenever I have the chance :) (Hes also given me various other little ones to work on as well... thank you God!) Ok... anyway one of them is a graphic novel based on the story of the Apostle Paul but in modern times... weird I know. SO to make a short story long... Im trying to come up with an idea of how the characters in this story will look, more realistic/less realistic, basically what will be the feel to all the characters. So periodically I sketch out the heads of my idears of Paul, Stephen and Peter. So I was doing that today while resting and the head of the first one I was drawing was coming out more realistc. Thats alright and also he wasnt looking very Jewish... (I want Peter and Paul to look VERY noticably Jewish) so I decided to make this one Stephen. And I want Stephen to be blonde at this point (dont really know why). Also for the look I was going for I was thinking of Jon Foreman when I was thinking of his hair. (Probably because I cant stop watching the Switchfoot podcast from the last blog entry :) So when I was done I realised.... I drew Jon Foreman.... not Stephen. It looked very much like him. So... I had 3 circles on the page... I decided I was going to draw 3 of my favorite singers right now: Josh Garrels, John Mark McMillan and as I said above Jon Foreman. So I got ALL EXCITED. Then I thought, "ILL DO THREE PAINTINGS OF THEM!!!" and was even more excited (you can tell by the "all caps") But then I slowed down, I've been trying to keep my mind off of myself these days. God has been showing that pretty much the root to every problem I have is my WICKED selfishness... and its showing itself to be more and more true. So I thought, this is a pretty selfish painting. I stoped. Later this evening I picked up the drawing and thought I would at least finish the graphite portraits. I was looking through a bunch of pictures online as refrence for the guys. When I came to John Mark, I found this recently added video to his blog,



Then I heard...