Reflections

I hope that all of my readers had a wonderful Easter. I thought I would share some of the blessings that God has shown me in the past weeks. I will start with Easter afternoon yesterday. My family invited my brothers entire college over for dinner (clarification: this includes 11 students, 10 came) and some other friends from church. After lunch my brother took all of the students on a walk down to the Mississippi River. It was a beautiful, crisp, sunny, spring day. I enjoyed taking nature photographs which I haven't done for several months. It was amazing to see God's handiwork in new spring buds, sunlight, and some lingering ice.

This past semester in my Wednesday night youth group meetings we have been studying the book of Galatians. At our last meeting several works stuck out to me: righteous, faith, trust, rely. "Righteous" talks about the children of God and ties in with "faith" which is what we need to have in order to be saved. Many of us try to do things on own our, take our destiny into our own hands, or make our own decisions which is a matter of pride in our hearts. When this happens we must "trust" in Christ that he has a plan for our lives and that his plan is perfect. Secondly, we need to "rely" on his timing and way of doing things. So often in the past week I have felt like I have the weight of the world on my shoulders, at these times I need to trust and rely on Christ. I have relaxing into God's arms as he eases the weight off. I need the constant reminder that I will not figure life out on my own but need regular doses of prayer and trust.

Although this post is getting long, I would like to share one more event that shook my life this week. My best friend's father has been in Iraq with the Army on his second tour of duty for the past year and a half. The past Friday we had a joyous welcoming home for him at the airport. At the airport I hung back while he talked with the other adults but after saying hi to my dad he came over and almost immediately asked how school was for me and if I was keeping my grades up. I answered that I was staying busy but have been able to keep high grades so far. His response to my answer blew me away. He said that he had been praying for me! Here is a man who is across the world in a war zone worry about a million different things and he took time to pray for me and my school classes. A grade seems like such a little thing compared to the problems that he faced. I was humbled as I thought back to how often I had actually prayed for him which were very few and far between. If a soldier in Iraq can have such a strong dedication to pray for friends back home how strong can my prayer life be. How often do I point blank as my friends how their life is truly going and how I can pray for them. I hope this is an encouragement to give your worries to Christ so that you can slow down and take time to pray for those around you.