Refocusing...Needing some refocusing

I had the oppurtunity to take tommorow off, I decided to do so, I needed sometime to refocus. To refocus on who I am in Christ, who I am apart form Christ, and have a day at most with God and I alone, perhaps I will go hiking or go commune with God in HIs creation or I will choose the quiet of my room and my noise cancelling headphones. I am not skilled to understand what my God has willed what my God has planned for tommorow, we'll see.

I wanted to write to you all concerning this subject of refocusing. I say we do not do this enough. And I ask myself the question along with all of you why in a world where our focus can go so many other ways and we get distracted so easily, why do we not continually refocus our gaze, refocus who we are, refocus so we can be an even greater light than the one that we experience. I think of the illustration of a magnifign glass and how it focuses light. When we begin to focus the light that is eminating from all around us we can start a few fires...I know however when we focus the true light, by reading His word, and communing on Him, forcing our will to be aligned sacrificially giving of ourselves, practicing the disciplines Jesus gave for us to practice, we begin to focus and make a difference.

I was pondering today about what if Elise and I were to say no to God, don't freak out Elise, it will never happen. Say no to the area of being called to missions in SE Asia or whervever he may call us. Would He bless us? IDK The thing is it would bug our conscience until the day we died! We would always have a desperate longing for some change to be done, to be used in some big way so that God may be glorified!

Also in my devotion today I thing God gave some interesting direction from 2nd Thessalonians I feel these words were written for me " We have confidence in the Lord concerning you, that you are doing and will continue to do what we command. May the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God and into the steadfastness of Christ.

I am one of those people if someone believes in me I can do anything but when I feel a downward force pushing me back into discouragment I don't desire to be anything than a bum. I thank God every day for the wonderous thing that is inside of me known as the Holy Spirit who encourages me and since my salvation have not allowed me to fall into pure nothing. I am encouraged each day that within me is the capacity to do just as much as Jesus did and even more, and yes that is biblical "greater works"Most certainly I tell you, he who believes in me, the works that I do, he will do also; and he will do GREATER WORKS than these, because I am going to my Father.
John 14:12

We must refocus though, it is a necessity

(PAUSE)

I just sat and read the past 3 months of what God has done in this life and around me. We must make an account of what Jesus has done, and we must constantly look forward towards the wonderful things to come gaining an eternal mindset but always remembering where we have come from. I wear three things on my hands as markers of where I have been some bad some good. My purity ring is a reminder of all the failures I have made in that area but also the new purity found in Jesus and His blood! A blue climbing rope braclet, to remind me of Nate, a friend who died last summer, and the joy and peace I have in Christ when there should be none. My CREW black braclet, a reminder of high school and all that entails, honesty lack of honesty depth lack of depth etc...

NEways i am going to post this but it will be tweaked at a later date, I am going to bed!

JG

Refocusing...Before the world wakes

I have been waking up before most of the world does and taking time in the car to be still in the early morning hours you know 4:30 AM or so before first light dawns on the world. This morning when no one seemed to be awake and everything seemed so still I found a peace that I really haven't felt in a long time. I went to work well, with a huge smile on my face. I swear everyone was llike what happened to him.

But I think with the prospect that my time table is switched with the rest of the world God is preparing me in a sense to the fact that my timetable is not the world my timetable is His will. To get devotional time when the world is still then being able to go out prepared for the day when it gets chaotic!

I See a lot of whats going to happen next year and WOW WOW WOW!!! GOD IS SO AMAZING!!! And knowing how blind I am now to any pophecy just forcasts that it is going to be so much more amazing than God will ever allow me to comprehend. I am truly captivated. This is where I want to be, I desire to be a sheep guided along by my Shepard!!! I am looking forward to a few events happening this summer one in particular but you will know when that happens I will title it "the event" you will know!!! Beyond that um well lets see.Prayer is offically the most amazing thing ever you should invest sometime in that. The bible is so amazing, you should invest in that. Being guided by the spirit blindly that's pretty amazing too. Being humble that's good too. Beyond that Cali folk I miss you but I like God better, sorry you don't compare. Don't take it personal he's like been my best friend since like I was four we got history!!!

Ooh also with the whole Asia thing my thoughts have always been that it's not going to be China. I was sitting in the food court this afternoon and something dawned on me it was an epiphany of sorts. It was one of those what if God wants me to go to Japan and do what He wants me to do. Then I looked at the fact we have Japanese at school. It is in the area. But who knows my thoughts were just wondering and perhaps maybe not. I'm blind, sorry, God's going to take me wherever He wants me to go. I do not have the answers currently and as my mom says God's 411 is always in the last possible moment rather than early. I think it's a character building exercise, He would know.

Anyways sorry for rambling, ooh one more note. Israel is at war, and Israel is not as big as the orignal land that it was promised by God. What will happen idk all I know is God will never let go of His promises especially for his chosen people! Israel I believe is going to get bigger they are going to grow and become the great kingdom they were originally suppose to be this of course is after a few things happen. Ooh I'm so excited!!!
JG

Arrows

Arrows from skies of blackest fumes
heart broken by this present time
Darkness shifting like the dessert dunes

And I stand, a monolith
and unshakable thing

Do I let these things get in my way
the books I've accumulated
getting in the way of the new day

And I stand, a monolith
and unshakable thing

Tears from mighty heavens
Earthquakes, war, and destruction
all because on the peoples sins

I desire to surrender, falling in love with you
Make me surrender, make yourself surround

And I kneel, face down
This is my desire to do
all the wonderful things
you have for me to do

JG

Refocusing...Grace means Enpowerment

I want to first apologize for the last couple posts, it seems sometimes that us bloggers can get away from meaningful things, from letting God speak through His beautiful wonderful scripture and we can loose sight of the fact that this, all this blogging, it's all about one thing... speaking to God's people and to the unsaved when apart to proclaim Jesus and his work in each of our lives. The importance of it is to tie all the seemingly chaotic things in our lives together to show the creators handiwork in it...

I would like to begin this post by praising God for the wonderful salvation of a new sister in Christ, Elise's mother!!! May we never forget the power & importance of persistent prayer and the workings of a most Holy Spirit!!!

I will also begin honsetly by saying that as of late I have fallen into a problem. I can no longer sit in a sermon and get anything new, maybe it is because of the value I have in direct inspiration from the Holy Spirit but I value devotionals much more over church, this is right because it is about the personal rather than the public. But it disturbs me that my personal has to be so much better than the public I feel two faced oftentimes. Undoubtably before I pin blame on the American church I pin it on myself and search my heart, but I believe and with much searching know for certain the church without the spirit as most of the American church is can do nothing more than mere man can do. That is a huge shame!

Reading a chapter by Tozer the other day and on our focus in things in the church God gave me a brillant insight. A denomination is no much more than the shadow of a man. Think about that for a second. It resides along the same fact that no greater has come from a theology school than the maker of that. A man can only found something lesser than himself. But as it says over and over in scripture the church is to be guided by the spirit and America has some great men and that accounts for all the working and wonders in most of it, but how much greater would it be if it were founded upon the spirit.

It is as Tozer chooses to say the three foundaitonal columns upon which the church is built is three events, the birth, the death, and the resurrection of Christ! To focus on merely one or give more importance to one will create something unhealthy structurally. To focus on the birth will keep christians with a perception of God as a helpless babe, and granted we are sheep in a world of wolves and ferocious creatures but as long as we keep close to our shepard He will protect and guard us! To focus merely on the Cross and the death will keep us teary eyed. To focus on Christ's resurrection that is where our perception becomes perhaps the best, a God of miracles a God who conquers, a God who defies gravity!

And I write this blog to focus on the fact that Jesus Christ, the grace given us, enpowers us not to remain in sin but rather
through His Holy Spirit residing in us. He will keep us on the straight and the narrow as long as we choose to focus on the column of resurrection, the beauty much like a pheonix. Something rising out of ashes to create something even more beautiful. What is coming if we choose this refocusing...something wonderful!

enveloped

There is a place
where few choose to go
a wonderful place

A place of absolute enveloping darness,
yet contradictory to itself
A place of absolute enrapturing light
a reason to fear

A copy has been made
which is just an old copy
we are the new

Copying God's ways
he ceased to learn His ways

but thank God there is marvelous light
enveloped in this ever present darkness
handiwork of Him

Acts 10

read it...reply back with what you see mentioned there by the angel when he comes to Cornelius, and what you don't see mentioned when the angle speaks wink wink!I will reply when I have recieved three answers!
JG

A Church without Purpose & A God Ordaining Something

I am forever amazed, quite astonished at all God can do over the course of twenty-four hours. How He can pursue so passionately and fervently everyone whatever country whatever state, whatever city, no matter where or how they are! I like many others who stand amazed at God's plan, stand amazed because God is real, He is in every nook and every cranny, ordaining things like a madman, calling His people to choices that are for their betterment, and He is orchastrating circumstance to balance perfectly as a sure testamant in pure chaos, this world has seen! I stand amazed and in awe!

I was attempting to get to sleep last night, I couldn't. Thoughts of things going on kept keeping me awake. I was crying, because once again I gathered a glimpse, a treasure amidst the darkness, and realizing that I am so undeserving.

An interesting thing has been happening as my perception of God has been growing! I find myself with an inifinite hole of sin seperating my savior and I. An ever increasing one. I am redeemed and thank God for Jesus, but have neglected the spirit on several occasions and I feared like a selfish child I had so much sin I was undeserving of God's promises. I am Worthy through Jesus and His Spirit! Nothing more nothing less!

God revealed something to me last night that I feel must be shared...we are a church without a purpose. Recently I have had issue praying again, mostly because of my aching body and the spiritual warfare going on there, I pray it is over, but as the spirit continues to gain strength inside of me pain is sure to grip this heart and therefore my body. I do not fear, I embrace what is to come. The power made perfect in weakness!

God told me this late last night" My church is a church without purpose, no direction, and no guidance, I am doing something, something wonderful, wake them up, begin to ask for that purpose to be restored, a direction to be given"
Guys, things are changing the Spirit is speaking listen! Give heed all nations His battle cry is raging, He is coming to our rescue, he is to silence a deadly foe for a 1000 years, that is something!

I ask you to do three things for God today and the rest of your life, pray, listen, and ask this question" what is God doing around me, where does my purpose lie, and to whom does it belong?

JG

What Ever happened

What Ever happened to Angels coming down
cascading down a glorious stairway

God writing on ancient walls
to say you have been weighed

What Ever happened to burning bushes
God saying this is hallowed ground

My heart is too sad to say
vanished are what the ancients thought
we forgot what they did to obey

And why does it seem to be so hard
to hear a God whose glory is renown

What happened to the days of old
when my God spoke so clear

My heart is too sad to say
vanished are what the ancients thought
we forgot what they did to obey

So let us change our ways
so that God may live in this new day
glorious unhindered
a beautiful sound

My God come, surround
be renown

It has been raining all day since last night,it is such a wonderful sound. Driving down to the Mill last night was one rain storm I will never forget, Thunder was pounding all around us and to see the lightening as bright as the sun truly a showcase. God is doing something with this bizarre weather, and with everything I see the dual nature of its purpose and how pathetic satan's atempts are to derail an unchanging God's final plan that he has worked and crafted since longer than he has been around, how foolish!

I am sitting at my computer listening to the wonderful drops falling from the heavens. It seems though that God is healing things and bringing new life as He so wonderfully does. Last night as the rain was pouring I had probably about 6 hours of conversations with people up until 4AM last night or this morning and God healed something that I had messed up because of a lack of honesty on my part. To not tell of what God is doing because of fear of hurting someone that is sin! That is what I learned last night!

God need not be defended because he is unshaking all the same, but we are to boast about out God, to tell to all the nations how good he is.

I heard a sermon once while I was in highschool about goodness, and not necesarily about witnessing to other nations but instead providing for their physical needs just as Jesus did: the necessity to share the goodness that God has blessed us with especially as Americans. But also know that that rediculous quote that if you teach a man to fish he can feed a family but if if you give a man a fish he can only feed himself, it applies! We must be willing to teach men to fish after we have fed them fish! We must lead them to water but not drown them by forcing them to drink to much that they forget to do other necessary things! We must give to each man what he needs from us. Beyond that we are to be providers! Knowing that there is a necessity in it all. We all play a part! We all play a vital role in what Jesus Christ is doing! Some more than others because we have accepted the responsibility that Jesus has given us to do. To do more we must live that radically different life, set apart for Christ! But we must accept the responsibility that God has given to us, this will take several years of prayerful consideration, and all sorts of sacrificial things, but that is what this life is about again. Our lives are about dying to ourselves and letting the Spirit take over, to do anyless we are not going to get what God wants us to get, which is a shame.

Anyways I have been up late two nights in a row so I am off to bed night!

JG

How beautiful it is to just sit here
to be still in my Savior's loving arms
to have the Holy spirit so near

How beautiful it is to be apart
to be unified together in Christ
to have aparant contridiction strike this heart

Jesus, you are my beautiful end
infitude that none comprehend

How beautiful it is to gaze upon Your eyes
to be and be still

Treasures of Darkness

I feel like it has been forever since I got the chance to just sit down and write and think, well kinda, but that knowledge is not for the present! I love the fact that I can do that, that I have enough direction from the last time God spoke to continue on till He speaks again. I like to boast about my God and how he has not given to us darkess but a light that illuminates everything!!!

I will give you the treasures of darkness, and hidden wealth of secret places, so you may know that it is I!- Isaiah 45

I was telling Elise I think last night that this time of silence is a test but it is also a time where God is speaking differently. Many of you have heard the analogy that God is always walking beside you but we don't always realize it because sometimes he is the one carrying us and there is only one set of footprints or something like that. I don't think that is necessarily the case but I think God is doing something different that I haven't interpretted correctly.

What I interpretted was silence was a lot like silence but it is more so like the treasures of darkness Isaiah speaks about. God gives us the oppurtunity in times of silence to find out who we are, I know full well I am a crummy person without Christ, that is a fact, don't try and change my mind! But I think it is also a time that God shows himself to us and moreso what transformations have really been made within us! It also switches things up in devo lives and worship lives to let us understand better who God is apart from the religous ritual we so often fall into! I think all of these things God is doing within me but one thing in particular I have realized as of late.

In regard to the treasures of darkness God is giving me something, far be it form me to know, but he is giving me something that should full well belong to the darkness. That's vague...sorry that's all I got as of yet. I know that this is the reason for all the spiritual attack as of late and why Satan wants me to get into a hole I often get myself into during the summer months. God is giving me something that he also gave the devil. That's sounds dark. Let me explain if I can. Satan although the adversary of our souls is a beautiful creation of Gods. Isaiah is the only book that accounts for the fall of Lucifer. It is my belief at this point that anything that Isaias talks about as darkness is just that belonging to the devil, but also as the Lord is shown throughout Isaiah and through the psalms the Lord makes darkness his covering. God is giving me something inside that darkness that I could not pocess if I were as clearly being spoken to in the same way. Things are changing and thank God they are changing for the better. Hopefully that made some since.

Anyways yah that's all I got it's odd to be so happy and content when everything seems to not be making sense. But that is the cool thing about it I wouldn't want it all to make sense cause then where would all the adventure go? Where would God acting outside of my knowledge be? I would never want my own knowledge to contain a God that is infinite!!! You know the whole fitting a big triangle through a tiny hole, that simply does not work.

Anyways chat with you all later, love you all.

JG

In Need of a Rock Band

So this one time...pretty much. Simplicity is just not working in my worship life as of late. I am in desperate need of a rock band!!! So as I am attempting to record the album that God wants without much direction from Him I find myself screaming how GOOD MY GOD IS!!! Screaming I LOVE YOU!!! Screaming to be heard yet knowing my desperate cry is heard!!! So I need to rock a little as of late, how to do that, um , have no idea but we'll see what unfolds! That's all I got.
Ooh I am debating on whether or not to go to camp for the third week, it would put me down about a hundred bucks in gas money but I think it is worth it we'll see what the job situation is looking like! But I couldn't help feeling today as I applyed at over probably forty stores trying to find a closer to my home job that might give me better hours. I found that all of this pursuit of money pursuit of providing is just refusing to let God be glorified. I mean for crying out loud I am probably going to live in Asia doing mission work, my mission work is in the workplace but WOW!!!! American society it needs a wakeup cry. We'll see what the next couple of weeks unfold to look like, and of course I will try and keep you posted!
JG

From ground level

I have recently been fascinating by taking pictures from the ground. And much like music seems to folow art and the expression there so my art reflects something about the music that is happening in my soul.

Currently and over the course of this summer God has been and will continue to teach me those few things I missed in the foundation of my christianity. Those in which I have had an improper view and an improper frame of mind on certain subjects. In order to do this I must focus on simple things He must start with the foundation work and fix that before anything else can begin to grow and be buillt. We must focus together on the ground and even what lies uderneath it! As I have said over and over again this is difficult because God is very much silent as he has never been before. He is an architect desiging this beautiful thing but he is not giving it to me the engineer the crafter of things to make it work easily etc because he wants it to be beautiful I must lay aside that part of me. I must surrender the planner and crafter I am. For this reason I know he has chose to let me walk in this silence, but if I know anything God is not done...praise be to the fact He will never be.

If anything I have learned this week is that God has lifted us up off the ground we often think, but oftentimes we must go back to the ground and realize that God is so vast we are still on the ground. We must relize that we are carrying eachothers burdens and helping others come into the deep beautifulness that is Jesus Christ! We are a body and everyone needs to play a part for thing to truly get done as God sees it. Salvation is coming and things are changing, what way should we approach this oncoming thing? Who knows? The only thing I know is that Jesus and His vast infitude will make sure things are in line. We must only gain the understanding that we are going to be called unto judgement and the name that is above everyname my blessed Jesus will save us if we have accepted him, but what must happen to us is one thing. We must decide, I want Jesus above all else, I want who He is to be shining forth in me! I want His Spirit to be flowing in a mighty precense around me! I want my God to look and say, I am a man of His own heart one that is beating in rythym with the wonderful chords that Heaven is playing! He must be all that we want He must be our one desire our one pursuit!!!

I was lost but I have found
My world revolves around You
I was far away and now
My world revolves around You

Jesus, my world without an end
No mind can comprehend
Though I keep trying
Jesus, my faith has found Your love
My hope has found its trust
My heart will beat the sound
My world revolves around

Though the sky should touch the ground
My revolves around You
I surrender, You surround
When my world revolves around You

Now my eyes are fixed on You
And I can’t look away
Cause all this heart was made to do
Is to offer highest praise
My praise, praise, my praise

-Revolve( Desperation Band)

Every time I walk away
You are here waiting
And even when I turn my back
You are still saying You love me
You love me

Every time I look at You
The world starts fading
When I hear You call my name
I can't help saying I love You
Yeah yeah I love You

I will never stop chasing
I will never stop running after
You are all I want forever

You are all I want
You are all I want
You are all I want

Chasing
Chasing
Chasing after You

-chasing(Desperation Band)

I am Yours, You are mine
I refuse to be denied
All of You, is my heart’s cry
I refuse to be denied

I’m coming after You
I’m coming after You
I’m coming after You

Though I’m weak, though I’m dry
I refuse to be denied
All my life, a sacrifice
I refuse to be denied

-Refuse to be denied(Desperation Band)

I was far away
But You found me and You made me want to stay
I was falling down
But You lifted me and turned my life around

Now I’ll follow recklessly
And I’ll love You with all that is in me

I am coming back ‘cause
You are coming after me
And I surrender now

When I lost myself
I came alive and You came into me
When I let it go
I realized that You are all I need

-Coming Back(desperation band)

JG

Glistening Wake

Let's just say camp was amazing, I can't get into all of the why but it was amazing!!!


Anyways though I found myself on the banks of the Colorado River this afternoon staring at the glistening water and silently praising my creator king, the author and perfecter of my faith and the wonderful prince (the bringer of peace and joy.) With knowledge of who my God is was and is to be and a heart welling up and tears about to break. I praised my God because behind Himself he has left and will leave a glistening wake, one of infinite beauty and incredible power. One that will shake the very foundations of the waters of this Earth. As Pastor Don always says" Oh Boy" what God has planned how beautiful, it is truly a glistening wake.

But because here I stand as a witness also to the present I will record what has happened this week.

I got the oppurtunity to go to camp something that I did not think I was going to be able to do because I had gotten back from school two weeks before camp started and if I got a job I would not be able to go because the prospect of getting time off, ya right! It came in a different form though, I had the time off from the begining making my own schedule but in order to go to camp I had to miss up an unsure oppurtunity for a promotion, I said in my last blog that I decided to go with the thing that was sure. I am reassured now that the sure thing was the salvation of a boy that I had the oppurtunity and joy of sharing God's love with for the first time.

On that note of leading people to Christ I must say that I am glad I have never had the oppurtunity to pray with someone and they accept Christ right there. Let me explain! It is a necessity to have people leading you but to pray a prayer...a prayer is a personal conversation with God and you alone. It has its place in community but there is a signifigant amount of prayer that needs to be done alone! A person accepting Christ at the least the ones I have seen been succesful are those decesions that are made by the persons themselves. There are definitley beautiful cases where God lets us know we are worth something by letting us share in the blessing that is salvation of others but I think we must ask ourselves what exactley is going to happen to these christians that have walked into a ground that they in part do not want to be in. If we fully want Jesus and all He has for us we must choose Christ and desire that above all else that is what will keep us pure our choices. The Spirit has an infinitley important part but we have not even begun to take hold of this Holy Spirit.

On another note I must record that sitting at a campfire last night sitting down with a man who is so intune with the Holy Spirit that he knows everything that is going on around him yet has enough common sense to know that all knoweldge is not profitable at every single moment for a fallen race. Having the oppurtunity to sit and chat and be so intune with one another that we were one in Jesus there is a place where one minute can change you more than three years of seminary. The words that were spoken last night and the knowledge that I knew he could not know apart from the Spirit of the Holy God( the prince of peace and joy) that is reasurance of things, that is the blessed communion that the saints of old talk about. "Oh Boy" this world is going to be changing !!!

For as I have learned this week and the continuance of a summer of learning those tenants and foundational keys of the christian faith I have learned this week that we will all be brought unto judgment we are cleansed through blessed Jesus but we are judged still as the non believer is to. We as christians must live in the light that sin will be brought unto judgement. All those lukewarm christians out there God I ask he change you cause the judgement you are coming to, I pray you will run with courage toward the plans that God has for you! Judgement is no pretty thing, we as christians know we are unworthy, but why do we act as if there is nothing coming to us in the hereafter there is no blessing that God wants to richly bestow upon us? Why must we act in accordance to what Satan has done and will use? I desire his head be chopped off, and he will be if sin is gone. We must run, and run with fervency...there is a glistening wake that Christ has left behind for us to follow to be on one side will mean that we are moved further away, may we always stay centered in Jesus, for he is the source of power, he is the source of all those wonderful things of which we have a desire. May God richly bless all of us and may we be a pure people, a passionate people, and a praying people.

I have seen that there is peace in the power of the Holy Spirit
I stand amazed from the ground I look up, and I see.
I am infinitley small but infinitley loved and blessed
and a glistening wake I have begun to see


JG

Looking up

Shall we? We shall...

Decision making and community

I'm trying to make a very important decision...the decision whether or not to go to camp this year. I have til tommorow. As it stands I worked a lot this week a total of 36 hours in four days, I have the oppurtunity to go to camp next week. But if I do so I may lose the oppurtuniy to move up and get a better job either with Foley's or a better job with American Eagle.

Here's what I know, God blesses us when we serve him. So therefore I have no worries in deciding to go...

The problem in my mind lies in the fact that God is often silent on issues like these a lot more these days...and me being a person who has always heard God I really haven't had to lie on past experience, I lived carefree hearing God, doing what God told me to do. Now since he hasn't been doing that I am forced to rely on past experiences to tell me what to do. I must look back on all that I have learned and decide, walking blind!

I have decided that I am gonna go unless something happens, no matter what may happen and if I have to work forever in the position as an XOC I will. I know God will bless it though.

(period)

New Subject:

I was sitting on my lunch break today sitting at the food court of Park Meadows, a very long table, as I normally do sitting with all these people who I don't know. I was listening to these two business men talking, getting to know each other simply caring about each other it was really awesome.

I have been learning a lot about community as of late especially in the fact that a real church is one where people have a conversation, and guess what disagree. I think we are so scared to start anything in our churches in our homes in our workplaces. But I say to you real community is when people from all different places, all different walks of life all different shapes, sizes, and colors cometogether as one. Oneness is so beautiful!

Anyways that is a snapshot of some things I've learned this week gonna be gone at camp next week! I will talk to you all later. For Dusty sorry I am cancelling on our date, hopefull we can do something tommorow, as in Sat.

JG

I'm gonna sit down

I've been feeling something different over the past couple days! I can't really explain it...well I probably can. I have a job doing all sorts of stuff for Foleys, which for all the CALI people it is a department store. They are switching over to Macy's so if that gives you a reference. Anyways they have me working all these odd jobs, repricing, straightening up, working the floor occasionaly selling stuff, organizing, pricechecking all sorts of weird stuff moving tables decorating...it's really cool cause it gives me something to do during my day. Things are undoubtably busy now I am working for 10 hrs with a one hour lunch break for the past week. You get home and you are exhausted...but after a while you get used to it. And the odd thing is I feel better each day. The thing is I think I am relying on God's strength more and more each day to get me up and moving by 5:15 every morning and do pretty much meaningless things with my life. Perhaps I'm not leaning on God more, but it is good because it forces me to spend my day being productive. Today though I was driving home listening to old hymns and wow it was amazing. God and I time singing full voice with the windows down in the stormy afternoon. It was awesome. I truly feel like there is another break happening. And I feel there is understanding where there hasn't been any before. I don't know what that means exactley but simplicity is speaking complexly if you know what I mean. I kinda missed a lot of points in the basic tenants of christinaity, we all have, and that either refusal or ignorance caused me to blind.

I started on my second album today, it's actually coming along quite nicely, I think instead of singing for most of it it is just going to be spoken voice...because I think music has power but it is words that speak more than the singing it adds iceing but I think it distracts we'll see what happens but I have the cover song done it's called fading symphony. It's all about that in order for a crescendo to come things must first be quiet. In there is a story of Jesus but also a prayer that all of us might come to change the world and realize a crescendo is coming, and everlasting crescendo!

Beyond that I really haven't had much time to just sit down, write, be still you know all that stuff. I have so much floating in my head that to actually make any sense of it would take far more time of alone that I don't really have the time for now, but it is coming!

To own a dragon is amazing you should pick up a copy and read it, cause it is just that good. Buy a hymnal while you are at it, they are pretty good too!

Once again, I am staying up really late when I need to go to bed. I want to say a few things before I go though here are the lessons I have learned this week!

1. Jesus was amazing, he is amazing , and will always be amazing!
2. Deal with your circumstances, knowing that God has placed you in them, never go for the temporary go for the eternal!
3. Malls are silly places, but it's good that God is in all the people in a crazyness around me!
4. Living in America takes a lot of money to live, even more reason to go to Asia!
5. 99c items and 1.99c items go to Ross etc and that is how they get good clothes they bid on them in boxes, werid!
6. traffic isn't bad at all, why do people think it is so bad. I guess it goes back to #2
7. donald Miller is an awesome peson and I am so glad that God gave him alot of crap and he rose up out of that!
8. Express is having a 60% off sale
9. You don't have much free time when you have a job
10. My parents are truly awesome people.
11. I've also learned a whole bunch of God things this week but those are for later blogs!
12. taxes take out a large chunck of your paycheck, but hey you get it when you least expect it!
13. Once again God is awesome, today, yesterday forever
14 And most important the Holy spirit that lives inside of me, is awesome
15 Devotionals are important
16 people don't want to cook when they are tired
17.yah I need to go to bed night!

When I was blind
I saw this line
Between bad and good
and this blurry kind

gathering pacing in my mind
a fading syphony
to softest music
kept coming yet not yet breaking

yet the crescendo was coming
this is that fading symphony

Eventually I will see
The very plans you have
And how I wait to see

Through him you will change the world
Through him you will show them peace
Through him you will

You will show the crescendo coming

The fading symphony
The softest notes of melody
Hope that is from thee

You will show the crescendo coming

Through him you will
You will change the world
You will show them peace

And he will be free

JG

Elephants & Work

It's odd the fact that I am working so much this week, that I really don't have a spare moment to sit and blog...sad but I'm sure purposeful. Anyways I had my first day of real work today, it was fun! I know that sounds weird but I get paid to do the things I love to do...

1. help people
2. be freakishly organized
3. Move around things

Anyways about the elephants, my most prized possesion is a rosewood elephant that my dad got me while he was in India. And if you know me you know that I am in love with Elephants, I should change my blog title. Anyways though, I am reading this book with my best friend and its so good we are going to probably read it straight through it's called to own a dragon by Donald Milller( so good) Anyways though he has this story in there about elephants and how if an elephant does not have someone to lead him along mentor him in elephant ways the elephant ends up stabbing rhinos and going crazy. But that stage only lasts for like a week in other elephants if they find a mentor etc...anyways back to the prized possesion I think it is cool that i have mentors now in my life that teach me wise ways and they lead me. There is a second elephant I bought and it's cool cause the stone elephant I bought is smaller than the rosewood elephant and they go together perfectly walking side by side. They younger elephant(the stone one) may be stronger but the stone one is more fragile it's a really sweet analogy I think I am going to write a poem about it sometime!

That's all the time I have time for hopefully tommorow will be better w, more me jabbing on about life but hey it's what I do!

JG

Windfall

How can I begin to describe
I am a mere scribe
to the workings of my God

How can I begin to comprehend
the people he has sent
to do all these things

How can I begin,how can I begin
to tell of all he has done
and all the things to come

winter had past, and spring is to come
In this quiet,this windfall
time had begun, a new fall

So I got this fortune cookie while I was at PF Changs the other day it said you are soon to experience an unexpected windfall. I was like hey what the heck is a windfall and I could probably right a poem about it oh wait I did how the wind often times gets rid of one stage of growth like in the fall and moves us to a place of winter away from new growth but it is a time of preparing etc blah blah blah...

But I have been realizing one thing about that word and all it's implications.

Elise and I always seem to manage to find our inspirtation for our blogs in the same book of the bible, I doin't believe this to be mere coincidence. She wrote in her last blog about there being a season for everything it is so true there is a season because God is not a God who chooses to breath in one place, he breathes on dry bones as Ezekial talks about, he is breathing everywhere we merely need to listen to this beautiful harmonium of the heavens. He is breathing in every season just like the wind, and although this is fall for me and i am going through a transition, the foresight of winter coming, it is beautiful. Oh and Spring!

1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
2 a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
3 a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up;
4 a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
5 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from
embracing;
6 a time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
7 a time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
8 a time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.
9 What profit hath he that worketh in that wherein he laboreth?
10 ¶ I have seen the travail, which God hath given to the sons of men to be exercised in it.
11 He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out
the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end.
12 I know that there is no good in them, but for a man to rejoice, and to do good in his life.
13 And also that every man should eat and drink, and enjoy the good of all his labor, it is the gift of God.
14 I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken from it: and God
doeth it, that men should fear before him.
15 That which hath been is now; and that which is to be hath already been; and God requireth that which is past.

I want to focus on verse 14 and 15 for a while trust me this might be a long one because one verse in this wonderful book known as the bible a man could spend his entire life on one verse and never know all that it contains it's simply beautiful ...I have been focusing on fear and my lack of it the last blog or so, and do I think it coincidence that tonight when God reminded me of that fortune that he eventually bring me to this passage,trust me there is way to much coincidence to be mere chance, it is divinity at work. From speaking through squirrels to the last leaf clinging to a tree to a fortune cookie God has his hand in it all.

I know this much that God if he is going to go something it is going to be eternal not in our timing, we have no say in changing the outcome but are mere vessels of facilitating it, and this is why we fear! God is a God of infitude, who has the ability to take away everything at a moments notice and yet has enough divine wisdom to keep his plan intact, we are not even worthy of being called pawns! God is good but he will take care that our hearts our being shaped properly if we truly desire that, he is o so powerful, and he is not tame. He is my God whom I serve, and whom I should serve alone. We worship Him because he is worthy to be worshipped not because he has done stuff for us, he is God free will aside and even free will in the picture we will all kneel and we should fear the fact that God is a God so vast and so hugely different than anything we could even possibly comprehend and when we sin we will have to know that the reason we are allowed to go is because the very man that sits at the right hand of God the Father deciding in his grace to set us free from our enemy.

We are free, we must act in accordance with that!

seasons change, and time flows by
A mighty river I have seen in my eye
Of saints in royal robe enthroned,
and grace in infinite number bestowed

I am a mere scribe
to these things I describe
to the workings of my God

This windfall that I see...it is pure beauty it is the beauty in the gray the thing that is not tangible yet is and can not be seen but the effects can! I see God working and am finally content I hope in the fact that this is where I need to be and will starting acting in accordance to the new! That is what I hope to behold in the view to which I persue.

JG

Vanity of Vanities

I have had a problem that has been developing for a while, I have everything! My life is one of pure blessing as I see it.Believe it or not that is a problem. I am called to fear God but all I see him as is a God who bestowes his richest blessing upon me. I pray he would get me to surrender wholly each day but is that the path of blessing I wonder? All I have known Him as is a God who loves, how can I get a God of wrath into my mind when I see God working in every facet of creation and his plan pretty fully most of the time. I understand that God is a God who has infinite character and each aspect of that but I see the next step in my walk as fear and because that is such a radically foreign concept for me it is going to take some reworking of this heart and mind.

I don't really know where to begin other than with the words that Solomon wrote when he was king. In Ecclesiastes he had everything anyone would desire and he had wisdom also but it caused him to look at the world and say" vanity of vanities" to everything he saw. I look around me and feel a lot the same way it only takes me about a week of being back home to be so depressed with the lack of movement here that I coup up in my room trying to pray to the end that there would be movement again, yet that often is to no avail because of the whole free will aspect, that kinda pisses me off. It won't stop me from praying but I am frustrated. Who knows maybe it is out of pride that I speak wanting a change so I can brag about my God and how he used me but the thing is I am only a vessel I am not the hand that moves the vessel. The spirit is that hand!

Back to the fear aspect, that is one of the roots of the problem. I see God working in everything and there is no place where I do not see His hand in and that causes me to beleive that we really don't have any power at all and really shouldn't take initative. I think it is probably more so than most people think but I am way on the otherside of things in that and I wonder is that wrong? When do we know we need to take intitative when the spirit prompts us and we get butterflies? I don't know I know when the spirit has prompted me and I act in accordance with that . I think we should probably do a little more of just listening for the spirit's prompting rather than rushing to do all these things. But like the one thing that my best friend in SLO has taught me don't do something to do it, do something because it actually does count and matter. What matters and counts are two things "the word of God" and "the" souls of men. One must ask themself the question did I spend my day today on both of those. As of late and in this place I am unable easily to do that, that troubles me and pisses me off. I am putting things in motion so I can, but it upsets me greatly that this is not and enviroment where that is easy to do.

I long so desperatly to just have a conversatioin that means something that helps someone and allows them to see the face of God shining whether through me or His word. This place is blessed don't get me wrong I just wish for it's sake it would be more!

JG

Silence

I have had a lot of time to be quiet over the past couple days, to sit in quiet reflection of the wonders in which God has showcased and to finally I think begin a process of preperation for the things that are coming next year!

It's so interesting in this place of my childhood, realizing how incredibly blessed I am in the place God has put me in. I have looked back on my journal entries and I want to say something that I realized God is good!!! He is so good! I look at the pictures look at the incredible wisdom God has graced me with this year and my heart can't help but be warmed.


Feather of dove
Feather of light
Lovely embrace pure delight
Falling from heaven above

Prism of every shade all of them grey
Walking blind in this new day

Feather of crow
Feather of the night
memories of dark fright
weed from the ground below

And grey the color of this song
Blurry line back and white to which we belong
like a babe,carried along

Feather of an Angel
feather of awe
The things you saw
Eyes that have seen it all

Prism of every shade all of them grey
Walking blind in this new day

Feather like a tear
trickling down
rippling to the ground
Spashing, releasing my fear

JG

Prophecy of the deaf

I walk forward, into this darkness
I find myself blind,
But I trust

And embracing this silence
The prophecy of the deaf
The difference in things

There lies a grey beauty

The sound of silence
Different yet so amazing
Peaceful, yet so unsettling

I find the light in unfamiliar things
In this turning of things
God rippling through this apathetic ink
Sound of thunder in midnight hour
Rain pattering on black window

A dedication, once again I come
To the alter I lay it all down again
Manifest and true

Embracing the Silence

What happened to what Christ and I had?

What happened to the childlike faith within me?

not not being silent but embracing it...

In accordance with that...I am not going to blog until my personal walk is healthy once again!

JG

Cleaning Closets of the past

I am sitting here watching probably the most bizarre clouds I have seen in my lifetime. I feel God calling me to blog on such things but how it is going to tie into the idea I had going earlier about cleaning out my closet I have no idea.

I came back from Cali noticing one thing, my room was not liveable. This was not beacuse my parents had moved things into it but rather that I didn't care about function I cared about looks so much during the high school years that I kept all these things that were unecessary. For me being an architect noticing that the room of the childhood of my past was not the one I would want now, that was not good. I think I realized probably one thing above all else living in a dorm this year, you don't need much to live with except clothes, a bed, a roof, food etc. and in essence starting over your life pretty much you don't have much clutter there. Everything there is planned for a highly functional place,most importantly the only reason something would be there is if you brought it with you. I have gained an eternal mindset this year, all excess should probably be burned... i don't mean all excess because God wants to bless us but I am merely asking the question what is all of its purpose if it is excess?

This refitting of new thoughts into old places is not going to be easy but it is best. I remind you that the newer is often times better than the old and should be incorporated at all costs because it is better.

Back to the clouds anyway, this is the first sunset I have seen in Colorado, things are much different here than california the wind howls and blows gustily sunsets are no longer on smooth oceans but riged peaks. Things go up quick construction wise it is not like the SLO life. It rains for 15 minutes than stops for and hour than rains again for twenty then is done not the three weeks of solid rain I experienced over there. It thunders here, a lot. However, most importantly though the difference is this is the place of my childhood I need to get rid of a lot of this clutter in my room and in my life , things about my past that I don't like, and although I have moved on it is time to face them to deal with things, change things for the better, for the uncluttered life, for one of only necessity!

I miss dearly every single person I know in Cali and beyond, but a lot like my closet and moving in general things need to be organized and certain things need to be packed and laid at the bottom first in order to make sure the top does not topple over. That is my closet, and I think for the first time I feel good about being here, as Phil told me I need not worry, God is in control! These emotions and these tears I have been having lately they are because things are so good, but I need be ready at any moment to give it all away and rely soley on God, I'm not there yet.

I was reading last night Passion and Purity and one thing that stuck out above all else is we are God's we are not entitled to anything, least of all the grace bestowed upon us and the blessing, God gives to the undeserving, crowns the sinner by His grace and by His love! That's reason enough for me to give it all away. Reason enough for me to stay here seeing things I have never seen before that are bizarre, like those clouds tonight, but I'll tell you something they are most certaintly of God. There is reason enough for me to clean out the closet of my past and make this heart a temple fitting for a Holy Spirit!
JG

Phoenix

Miles above the lightning
There is candlelight here
I commune with You

A remembrance of things

Amidst all these people
Lights in organized fashion
So faint, yet so beautiful

A reminder of things

In peaceful skies
From foggy place
To clear sunset

A remainder of things

1000 miles away
Here I shall stay
Until the phoenix rises

A renewal of things

Time Enough to be Still part 3

Written at LAX

It is an odd place to be crying, the Las Angeles Airport, that is. I don’t think I could, actually I know I could not put into words all that has happened this year and how truly awesome it has been. So I should probably stop titling the blog the same thing part 1 etc. cause I’m never going to be able to put in adequate words what God has done...I scarce can take it all in.

I sit here with a smile on my face yet crying…not knowing if I have died as I said in my last blog, oh how blissful heaven be if this only a reflection. I can’t wait to be in my bed tonight and praise, cause God is far more worthy than we make Him out to be. God is Good! God is Awesome!

It’s like Elise said it’s as if God is putting everything into place that no one can screw it up. That is bliss that is my God!

As I continue to say everything is cleverly orchestrated, and wonderfully crafted and we God’s people are soaked in God’s presence!

I hope we do realize that. Out creator is a master planner a conductor of the cosmos!!!

God has told me today I do not need to withhold information secret any longer, perhaps because I am not a part anymore physically of the revival that is consuming this state I’m a part of a different thing for the while. God is in control and as Elise also said God is making this thing so foolproof that God will not not be glorified through it all. It’s ridiculous! Yet amazing!

I have stopped being all emotional for the while and I will wipe my tears away so I will sit in God’s presence watching the sunset!

Strange how something we have crafted here on earth, God still can speak through it, and He can find us anywhere we go. He endlessly pursues us to the corners of the Earth. Where we may go He will follow, actually more He will lead! I like that! I don’t like being in control, we are not meant to be. I think that is why as I look around I see so many miserable people around be; they know they are not meant to be in control, they don’t know what is though. I do! Let me tell you it is so Good! Whoever said that the Christian life was not one of blessing, oh how far they had gone from God, from relying upon his presence as the guiding light. I think blessing is another thing I need to define but that is an entire paper in itself and I figure when I get to it God’s timing it will be such! I will say it in one sentence though you are a blessing and everything around you is a blessing because it is all crafted, and it is crafted so incredibly!

I will make one other note before I do close my laptop; I have so much caffeine in me right now. On top of that the Holy Spirit. It’s like Kalen says after I come back reeking in God’s presence after Celebration each Sunday night, “Elise don’t let him have coffee anymore.” This is of course after sometimes I do not have caffeine in my system. So funny! Yah I am going to close this thing now, have a great evening all of you or if you read this in the morning good morning and have a great day. Pretty much just enjoy the fact that God is so Good and get on your knees, it’s so good to do!

Know you who read this are in your prayers, I do not know all who read it but I do keep you all in my prayers.

Night,
JGG

Time Enough to be Still part 2

It's really nice to sit for a while, everything is ready to go!

I had to say goodbye to my two best buds in SLO this morning and it was hard, but as always things don't work out the way I often think they do, which is one of the things I have finally been able to grasp these last couple days and perhaps is the last great lession I was supposed to learn. The best laid plans of man apart from God fail! God is so concerned with our heart condition that he is not going to let things go our way til he knows our hearts are aligned with his will. That takes a little shaping! That is what summer is going to be about... a little shaping in my heart!

I know though and will definatly cry on the plane ride home not because this time is sad , but becasuse I am so happy, I am so blessed, and am so grateful and my heart wells up in praise for all God has done this year. When the Moravians talked about not knowing if they had died and gone to heaven, it is something like that!

I am reminded that God keeps His promises... that is truly awesome!

God is good!

JGG

Time Enough to be Still part 1

Who is like our God? And who can compare to his endless love? The angels sing! The morning in its splendor speaks a lesser word than He! He is the great I am! Who was and is to come!

I have long sat in wonder at this Mighty King. And to say that I fully know of his matchlessness would be a lie!

I have long stood in awe of this King. Lifted my hands and praised him with all I can give at that present time!

I have long heard his unbearable but soft voice . I have answered and have seen because of it his matchlessness.

I have taken time to be still. And have found comfort in the unsettling thought!

And the words still echo, who is like our God? Who can compare?

I sit at the end of this year, and I want to throw a big party, not because of the end of school, but because there is a path that He has laid out that is the most amazing path! It is so amazing!

I can't seem to gather any signifigant thoughts because the simple is so profound in the deepest way!

And as I sit in my barren room there is life in a much deeper depth here...although there is a necessity for the difficult times ahead, God is faithful. God is strong! God is amazing! God is love! God is beauty! God is joy, peace and understanding! And I feel like crying because God is so good. And although I may have to say goodbye to this place I love, I am filled because of this place, God's chosen place!

And I find that I am so satisfied but it is not the time to remain complacent cause there is a deeper life past the deep. If only we could be pure enough to remain in the filled place.

And as I take time enough to be still tonight I am amazed, I am speechless, yet filled with so many thoughts so many words, that I want to speak because of God being God! but for now I will refrain I will enjoy the evening I will enjoy the transition time praising God for being matchless, endless, and more than the less!

Bravery

Wise men who sit and see
All life's mysteries, the grandiose mystery
Scattered thoughts put together
perhaps forming a greater mystery

Reasonings, and empty things
Thoughts and lies, prayers and honesty
a monumental bravery

And we seem so often scattered
but we are tied together as one
Like the mighty ocean's waves
moving us together in unity

Things we see and things we don't
The better do we understand
Blessings, could we ask for more

The Spirit moving, deeper ways understood
The sound resonating, a mystery
The lesser thing, scattered
lesser perception of the undertaking

And we seem so often scattered
but we are tied together as one
Like the mighty ocean's waves
moving us together in unity

Beauty, mystery, oh the unseen!

JGG

Meant to be read slowly...on words

I have tried several times to sit down and blog, all failed. I don't know what it is about the chaos about the end of the year that seems to make me like this. As of late though I can not seem to gather my thoughts. It must have to do something with the fact that we are all anticipating, moving on to a different thing, with the summer approaching. I have heard it said many times that while in college one is in a constant transition. We each long for what we use to have and inside each one of us is nervous about what is to come...but being packed up and ready for transition it begs the question does God have some great last lesson to teach me?

Anyways I think I should be able to offer some grand advice, but I find myself lacking a great deal at the end of this year. I find myself knowing that there is so much more to go. I understand fully that I am under a strong and mighty power. I understand also that there is great power that lies within me. I find myself exhausted though, and wondering how I am going to continue on with the plans God has for me.

Elise told me tonight that the night they presented what was going on in Asia she was crippled in the anticipation and the restlesness and couldn't move. Sitting there she couldn't figure out what that uncertainty was and why it lied within her. The uncertainty she felt was the one that was to come within me the one that cripples me and confuses me. As I am writing on a day that is not going to be a good one when history is played out God is asking me one question, as he has always asked "will you accept what I have for you?" and I think it would be so easy to just live a life of simplicity and one that doesn't require the sacrifice, but God says there is need to be neglecting mankind completly so that I might pursue one thing. And it sounds so clishe oftentimes but please know the sincerity with which my questioning mind is wrestling. God has shown me glimpses, they are imbedded deep within me, he has made my paths to lead to a point that is coming very soon. All this lack of clairty is the most clarity I've seen in a while. It is so confusing.

I know the wonders that God is going to do, but he asks us will we accept what he has for us, will we share in "blessing?"

(keep that in mind)

(new thought)

In the begining was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God, He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him and apart from him nothing came into being that has come into being.

I am going to say that the gospel is the Word. The story of salvation is written in the Word. Our response is what we do with the Word spoken to us. When the bible says walk in Him as Colossians 2 says we are to walk in Him, not walking in him. We are so prone to lean on ourselves that we forget we need not lean on ourselves

I ask the question how will I carry on.There was a Greek philosopher named Heraclitus who first used the term Logos( word in the greek) around 600 B.C. designating the divine reason or plan which coordinates a changing universe. This word was well suited to John's purpose in John 1. I will not carry on that is the whole point, He will carry on within me. He is the constant amidst chaos He is The Word it doesn't matter about our changing words and their meanings he is the Meaning. The only stregth I have for the difficult journey ahead is in Him, I know full well exhausted old me is nothing apart from Christ, and I like it that way. I like leaning not on my understanding. I have done that far too much, its time to let go a little more til all of me is gone and christ is completly formed in me.

(one other thought)

Why do we not realize we are in a war?

And there will be casulties on both sides.

Not everyone is going to accept christ, I believe it is within God's power, but it is not within each man's power to accept. I expect everything from God, but I have no expectations of man.

That is a shame, but we must not let the fact we lost one consume us.

JG

Living Fire

Oh, for the flame of living fire
Which shone so bright in saints of old.
Which bade their souls to heaven aspire,
Calm in distress, in danger bold.

Where is that Spirit, Lord which dwelt
In Abram's breast and sealed him Thine
Which made Paul's heart with sorrow melt
And glow with energy divine?

That Spirit which from age to age
Proclaimed Thy love and taught Thy ways,
Brightened Isaiah's vivid page
And breathed in David's hallowed lays.

Oh, for the flame of living fire
Which shone so bright in saints of old.
Which bade their souls to heaven aspire,
Calm in distress, in danger bold.

JG

Hope of Glory

I sit here tonight at my desk, finally understanding a little more clearly the questions that have plagued my soul over the past couple days. Architecture done and put aside I can focus finally upon to answering these questions.

But enough about me I have a question for you?

What happened to those people that were willing to give their all, like Paul for instance? I was reading my journal tonight and I came across a funny verse in colossians" Now I rejoice in my suffering for your sake, and in my flesh I do my share on behalf of His body, which is the church, in filling up what is lacking in Christ's afflictions.( 1:24) I was struck and kinda awe struck at the fact that I had never really picked up this characteristic within Paul before that he was carrying out what was lacking in Christ's afflictions. I forgot somehow that Christ's job was to set us free, not to carry out the "great commision." That is our job!

I've been realizing as of late that as verse 29 says" for this purpose I labor striving according to His power, which mightily works within me" that we have greater works than Jesus because Jesus was not even trying because that was not his purpose. He did amazingly for not even trying. I think we try to gain perspective on our lives and understand purpose so much that we forget the simple fact that we have one purpose as christians just as Christ did. Christ came to die, so that we might live, and we might live abundantly, and spread the gospel!

We have His Spirit a mystery and a wonderful thing! He is the hope of glory as Paul says. We never call God that but I think that it is funny because Paul does, we can't be selective, we must present the whole gospel. I believe it to be because we don't like to think that we have a part to play. We do! We are called to live it out with joy and peace because it is the Spirit that guides us, the hope that lies within us. God will be glorified in the end but we have the hope of glory within us. We must realize we have a responsibility to carry the hope that lies within us to every person on this Earth. What happened to those people that did that? I think this past 70 years or so has done a far better job than all the other centuries by far except the first but we are still so far from the man who exemplified missionary work. Paul suffered and he wrote to the church in Colossae saying to be colaborers of christ what happened to those people that were willing to become uncomfortable for what lacked in Christ's affliction?

All that matters is Christ's glory, I want the hope that lies within me to become a reality!!! I know I am here at school for arch to build some character. Here I will stay till God tells me otherwise. Until then I remain giving my all towards not the hope but the reality that God will use the things in my past and present to influence what is to come. I am pretty excited about all that! I am also excited to see the continuance of blessing that God continues to shower on me it is so good now I don't know how I can handle the joy that is to continue on to maturity.

I love the fact that the revival that broke out in the moravian church in England was characterized by a joy that they said" they did not know if they had died and gone to heaven." I think I have a glimpse of that right now and let me tell you it is good. May the spirit fall and the hope of glory become a reality. It is our choice, and that is a scary thing, may we choose what is contrary to what is flesh!

JG

Sitting here

I am sitting here in the CAED lab waiting for my prints to come out and two and a half hours later they should take another thirty minutes or so which translates into another hour or so.

Anyways I will record my events of the day because I am bored out of my mind...

Chase, Josiah, and I in disciplship today were having a discussion about time and all that that entails and about making every moment matter. I don't think we let every moment matter quite too often. We spend thousands upon thousands of hours on arch homework but do we let people matter when we are doing that? sometimes we do, but all that matters is the souls of men the glory of God and the word of God, beyond that there are few things that do "matter." I think though as I think over my life and what I want to get out of it there are two things.

One I want to have helped change this generation

Two I want to be better than everyone else before me, in the terms of my faith, and my knowledge of who Christ is. I recognize I have some great competition and all you know Moses, Abraham, Enoch, all those people but that is what I want for my life.

Beyond that worship will spring naturally from that the fact that God chooses to use sinners.

It is interesting to see however that this life is a life that is a delicate balance, it cannot be progressed very quickly and things do take time especially character. Beyond that I am going to go now cause I think my prints are ready hopefully. Maybe I'll get to get to some things that need to get done tonight we'll see.

Post 81 Things are changing...

I've been experimenting a lot in photoshop as of late into selection of specific colors and enhancing those things. I think in a lot of ways that is what I need to be doing beyond my photoshop life. I spend so much time making this blog pretty. Those things are enjoyable but as of late I have been thinking about so many things that seem to tie into so many aspects of my life and I can't seem to get a grip on it all. I think it is as Elise talked to me a while ago about that we are not called to have it all understood as christians and with how much God is moving we are not going to unless we are so intune with God that we hear every move. But I think as most see through all this lack of understanding we need to be focusing more upon one thing, the divine light, which brings such a selection of color as those pictures I photoshopped. We need to gaze toward the one light. And once we do that we can start looking upon divine light and hopefully begining to seperate the colors and perhaps gain some understanding.

There is a life of divine understanding
A grasping, of much deeper things

There is a life of divine light
a beauty, a knowledge of things unseen

We often see tainted
yet pointed toward light
we see the reflections
things yet to come, oh so bright

There is a life divine
A depth, where few go

There is a life of divine journey
a calling, an adventure for those who believe and will go

One Question

What do you believe beyond a shadow of a doubt?

There is something deeper than apathy

I have been trying to figure out one of my friends for a long time, what exactley is wrong with him and with the gift of prophecy trying to understand what exactley I need to do to help him. This is come to no avail as of yet, and it quite honestly is begining to frustrate me that one of my best friends here because he can't understand himself is not making the moves into which he should be making to accomplish what he wants to accomplish. I think he understands it more than he knows and doesn't care he is falling in to something deepr than apathy.

I was in his room for about 15 minutes or so and I penned these words: I am going to try to understand them through the following minutes or so. I am going to duke this one out with God tonight. You are more than welcome to follow along through my duking or you can skip to the bottom I'll put something like begin to read here in all caps this is mainly just for me...

Here are my words:

Maybe it was silence
Maybe it was truth
the words you call me to say

upside down this world is
no longer true...its truth

I hate to be silent...but it was to be
That is hard...I feel the beckon

I see purpose
joyous in those things I do

but this one is harder
It forces me to think

It forces me to tune my thoughts
letting the blood come

upside down
you are upside down

This world is upside down

I can't say I have ever written a song upside down before...let alone something that doesn't make sense to me right side up. Normally my words can be interpretted as deeper than my own understanding at the present time but this is deeper and more different than I have wrote. I sit here reading it over and over and I can't understand it at all.

I find that either I am at fault or everyone else is. I think it would be easy to say everyone else is but much harder indeed to say that I am at fault. I believe I probably am somewhere but I can't see it.

Maybe I am selfish. Guillty. Maybe I am prideful. Guilty. Maybe I don't act in accordance with the higest will. Guilty. I don't know I am a sinner, I understand that fully. I have this desire to go to Asia, to do what, there are two different things I could be a great designer or I could be helping people. Should I switch over to construction managment. Then why have I had this desire to be an architect for so long. Why do my major and my desire to help not align as perfectly as I though they would at one point. Maybe its because everything isn't suppose to align as I deem it to be aligned. Maybe the architect upstairs wants a curve here or there to make it more beautiful. He doesn't want to be completely functionable as we see it. God wants to make things beautiful.

Perhaps I am all imagining this God thing, I mean everyone seems to be backsliding, not developing a passion for christ except me. Why do I seem to find such deepness where others don't. There is something much deeper than apathy going on here. What could it be? I have no idea. Why do people like him exist, and what if his purpose is just what I am doing here to strengthen the foundations? Wouldn't God be using people. But God never uses is a bad way. I have all these foundational truths within my head and I see what the principles of christ are and following them how they can help you but I see that if you do not have the holy spirit it doesn't seem to help and even when you do it doesn't completely.

That in lies my frustration I am not frustrated with the non-christians but the christians who no longer want anything deeper or if they do are unwilling to grab hold of it because of the deeper thing than apathy which I haven't quite put a name too. I am so frustrated with all of it. And all these questions plague my mind, and I understand what is coming but perhaps need to understand more before I take certain actions that would never jepordize but may make a dent in the whole beautiful picture but it's still so big the dent doesn't mattter.

Ug! ? ! ? I have no idea. Emo kids, they are very interesting people. They seem to not care. Why? I don't know they don't care enough to give or think about a proper answer. They avoid it with things that come from their emotions. So they let there emotions control them worse than girls often times. I would say I am a healty match of emo and intelectual. But the thing is I still have some balancing to do. The world appears upside down, it need to be either flipped in my direction or I need to do a flip, a 180.

I got to meet this kids friend this weekend it reminded me a lot of my best friend. Perhaps when two people that are pretty much the same...screw this...this isn't working.

Alright I'll go again. I prayer a very odd prayer the other day for him. I prayed that all his stuff would be put on me. I thought if we were supposed to carry our brothers burdens we should pray for that so I did. I have been a little downcast but it has been used for me. Maybe I am being selfish with all this blessing.

Yah that word has changed meanings so much this year. Especially with blessing being crappy circumstances. I am doing something wrong with all my crazy prayer life. I am taking away the blessings of others. I am going to look up that story.

Rocky territory I enter

To the Two

God has seen all the broken pieces
He has healed the broken
God has seen all the wrong motives
He has made our way
God has seen all the past mistakes
He has laid blessing
God has seen and made perfect
He has healed the broken

Now we accept that blessing
Now we accept it is not our own
Now we accept it is God alone not I
Now we accept that blessing

God has heard the cries in the early morning
He has answered
God has heard the faint whispers uttered
He has paved the way
God has heard desires lying in broken hearts
He has made beauty
God has heard
He has given us perfection

Now we accept that blessing
Now we accept it is not our own
Now we accept it is God alone not I
Now we accept that blessing

God has spoke in the silent place
to two He has whispered
God has spoke clear
to deaf ears
God has spoke through circumstance
to a life about to end
God has spoke to the two
and it was beautiful

Now we accept that blessing
we recognize, & we praise

JG

What is your deepest fear?

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."
-Marianne Williamson

A new testament man looking upon an old testament king

I have often sat in wonder of so many men that have come before me, those people who have laid a foundation for Christ in their times. The Hymns they wrote and sang, the psalms, and the lives they lived make me sit back and stare into silent wonder and reverent awe.

One man in particular has made me think about the beautiful passing of time and the signifance of man. David was a simple shepard become king. It is interesting to think that probably no man had inspired more than he has. Think of any church service in our day, think upon the psalms. The only part of the old testament we normally choose to focus upon. The worship we sing inspired by the words of that man. I think David had something we don't have in our generation he was a man after God's own heart. He was someone who laid a foundation for Christ to come before Christ had come. He was intune with the spirit, and within his character was the seed that brought Jesus.

A girl named Amy once said I was a modern day David, I did not know the signifigance of that phrase back then when she uttered those words. That is probably the biggest compliment, besides being called a modern day Jesus. But as I study david's character more, who am I to be compared to a man as great as he.

The one thing I think David has that we don't is that he didn't care, he danced when the ark came back. When the Spirit of God returned he could not contain his joy. Are we delighted to enter into the presence of the most Holy? I fear too often we are not delighted, we forget that God desires us to be joyful to dance in his presence.

Psalm 16:8 says I have set the Lord always before me

Psalm 42:2 says My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God: when shall I come and appear before God?

David had no idols before him, he was consumed only by Christ. That is why I believe Christ came from his lineage. I am going to take this thought further and say that when we lay ourselves at the feet of God and demand to be conquered, being taken over in our personality and having it being shaped as the potter shapes clay God will bless our seed, he will bless the fruit of our labor and will make us as signifigant as David, giving our lives more meaning than we could possibly know just as David . For The circling of the earth around the sun three thousand times, the time it has taken for every empire on earth to collapse, rulers principalities and authorities to die. David has had more power over men for good than a thousand religious doctors and bishops have had. Even in death he has more power than the living, that is something!

That makes me want to run toward Christ forsaking all those things in which I have clinged too. I hope it makes you want to too!!!

JG

Final Project Preliminary Work

JG

You are Love

This is the story of my life
Alone and always disappointed

I find myself needing
More than I could ever receive
If only I could, find the love I so desperately need

What would it take for me to smile again?
What would it take for joy to have a presence?

It is you who I need,
You are the one I have longed for for so long
You are the frustration, you are love

The one we put in a box
The one we have not experienced

I find myself needing
More that I could ever receive
If only I could, receive the love you so desperately showed

The one we put in a box
The one we have not experienced

What other need is there but you
For You are love
JG

The Lifting

Things are now in motion which cannot be undone...I love that phrase.Everything is coming into perfect harmonium. Everything is beautifully orchastrated, skillfully crafted and iminates the creator of everything. The most beautiful of all is the fact that this is only a reflection of things to come.

As good old Habbakuk says watch the nations and be amazed for God is going to do something in our day and age that is more wonderful than anything we have seen yet. I wait with a huge grin on my face...

Like the pheonix out of ashes gray
of new baby,of clean rebirth
of sin of the casket opened exposed to day

Like the inconvienent, unwanted thrown away
of the cross, nature so graphic
of sin and selfishness that gets in the way

May we spend the time to listen and give and answer
with gentleness and respect, for yes they too are of God
May we rest in peace, amazed by those answers
with knowledge of the bad, but exclaiming the good

Like the lifting of some dead thing
of forgetting the losing of ourGod,
of lightning and poring rain

Tis the time to exclaim
harmonium
the lifting of the dead things...

JG

A Declaration & Promise

Almighty Lord,
Now if I do those things I know I should do, and if I say what I know in my heart I should say, I will be in trouble with people and with groups- but there is no other way!
Not only will I be in trouble for taking my stand in faith and honesty, but I will certainly be in a situation where I will be seriously tempted by the devil!
I accept this with my eyes open! I know the facts and I know what may happen, but I accept it. I will not run. I will not hide. I will not crawl under a rug. I will dare to stand and fight because I am on your side-and I know that when I am weak , then I am strong.
JG

Love

1 Corinthians 13

If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.
And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant,
does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered,
does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth;
bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away.
For we know in part and we prophesy in part;
but when the perfect comes, the partial will be done away.
When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.
For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then I will know fully just as I also have been fully known.
But now faith, hope, love, abide these three; but the greatest of these is love.


I have been pondering this subject for quite a while now as has probably everybody who has lived.I have been wanting to blog on it in hopes I had a greater understanding of it then I currently do at the present moment. You see the problem is I have never really defined love in my life, I have never sat down and seen where exactley love has intruded and been non-present. I think it is probably time I do that...

There has long been within my mind a thought that my life would be one like pauls where I would have to rely soley on my savior not the love of another human being getting involved in a relationship and all that. This has to do greatly with my testimony and what God has brought me out of. I saw that Jesus was single along with most of the disciples and I thought if I ever wanted to love God I would do that, I mean of all the people that loved Jesus most it had to be the disciple right? The thing is though when I get down to it and look at my motivations in doing things like living a holy life, it's not for treasures in heaven cause I feel so unworthy of any of that. The only motivation I have in being holy and doing what is right is the love I have for my Savior! I know precisly why now I am this horrible funk why I am hating, ancy and dishonoring God. I want a good strong healthy relationship but my fears cripple me. My sister told me a while ago God wants to bless us and we don't always have to do all the work. I think my perception of christianity has been more work oriented then blessing oriented. Thinking over this and the relationships I have here there is so much love. I think we accept gladly those friends that love us. But those that may be more, I think we let certain things pass us by...

With a certain girl I think I have let my past hinder me from pursuing a relationship, although it is not the right time for a relationship as both of us have talked about...I am still letting things hinder my future and the blessings God has for she and I. I would say I would be walking into uncharted territory, pursuing the relationship further. I fear perhaps I might screw it up and we would have all those conversations I had with my other "girlfriend" and we end up not speaking, then speaking and falling in love again and then a deadly cycle. The thing is though who are we to fear those plans that God has made for us. It says in Genesis 33 "My Lord knows that the children are frail and that the flocks and herds which are nursing are a care to me. And if they are driven hard one day, all the flocks will die. Please let my lord pass on before his servant, and I will proceed at my leisure, according to the pace of the cattle that are before me and according to the pace of the children, until I come to my lord" See the thing is ,there is nowhere we can go from God's presence in which he hasn't predestined something great to come from it. God has passed on before his servants. As I said in a couple blogs ago. We must learn to conquer our fears, and run with courage towards that which Christ has for us.

God is good and will keep all that is truly good, all that is not he will burn away that is part of the refining process. That is part of true oneness with God.

I hate how all these thoughts have been so jumbled and I fear so much. My one fear should be God and God alone. As God taught me when my friend died this past summer in phil 1:21 to live is christ to die is gain. We must be willing to crucify all pride and get rid of ourselves in the equation letting the master work. God has everything under control, only when we surrender. I know that I need to surrender a little more before I take the relationship further but for once in my life I look ahead and see something beautiful...and I have nothing to do with it...and that is altogether wonderful.

Self it's been so long since I told the truth to you
Deep down I'm lying to myself, because I know what is to come
She is the girl of my dreams
of elegance and beauty uncommonly seen

I love her
If I could only say what I feel now
These words upon my heart
it would not compare to her

O just for one day to be with her
would be the greatest gift
Just one more gaze from those fair blue eyes
Would be all I need

Past aside, we pursue what is to come
something altogether wonderful

JG

A bird flew into the window

A funny thing happened during physics this afternoon, a bird flew into the window...fell down and then flew away. I would say that that is a prety accurate analogy for the state of Satan's army right now here in SLO, as people begin to step out in faith Satan doesn't exactly know what to do. He is a lot like that bird right now doing things that a lot of people would call stupid. Although his attacks are pretty well placed, and granted he's been figuring out our weaknesses for quite a while the thing is that he doesn't expect men to act out of their box. I fear just like a lot of times we put God in a box satan puts us in a box too. Shall we burst out of that? I think that it is time...

Another funny thing happened this weekend I got to have one of those serious talks with a friend on a pier like in the movies, it was awesome, I guess if anything the last couple days have been in preperation of the honesty that is coming, the truth, the light and the stepping out of faith that is coming. If I can encourage any of you in anything I would say that as James talks about you have not encountered a sin that is uncommen. I think if most of you saw what I see, and you see moreso what God is doing you would sit in silent prraise and adoration quite a little bit more, stare at the ground and surrender all to a king who is more worthy than anything else in the entirity of existence.

Oh how I love all of you so much, and how it pains me to be silent sometimes and to say the words that need to be said, listening to God, but I am a servant not to act according to my own will. I am part of a much higer will than my own, and I thank God for that. I look forward when in heaven we will see, finally free, all the plans God had laid for everyone of thee and me. To see all teh intricate threads that make up this beautiful tapestry known as life. To God alone be the praise, and the glory, forever and ever, amen.



THE SUN

The sun is shining
On the depths of our souls
Reaching the innermost being
And making it come alive

The sun shines everyday
For this is why we sing
The analogy of love, and warmth
Of a fathers embrace

We come with open arms
Lifted toward the son
We come in power
Lifted toward the spirit
We come with tears
Lifted toward our father

The sun shines in the darkest reaches
With a light, a wonderful light
O soverign lord, we sing
We come alive
JG