A quick thought...

Alex, Megan, Laura, Me, Meagan.

Picture taken by Mentor, Sister, and Friend,

Sarah Jayne

This is a picture of my amazing small group that I was in on our college-aged retreat that we just had this past Friday-Saturday through Crossroads Bible Church. Another 24 hours with God where no words would do the outcome of this retreat justice.

I don't have time to go into detail right now about it...

I will quickly say though, that I've definitely realized the importance of having some REALLY good, close, deep friendships with other girls my age. I never thought that was important until now.

It is very clear God's hand was involved in putting us together; our similarities to each other based on our lives could not be described as a "coincidence" but "God."

The rest of this adventure with God will be saved for a later posting sometime this week probably.

xo

Veggies, Rice, Chicken and Family

As I sit here at my computer at 10:46pm on Monday night, I can't help but wonder if all of this miraculous growth that I've experienced over the last week will last.

I know it's a day-by-day thing. I have to lay it down before my Father every single day. There will never come a time that I can give something up one time and one time only, and have that be that and my life will be perfect. NO way.

I struggle because I've lived a life of questioning and not trusting, and paranoia for so long, this seems almost too good to be true and I still have such a hard time trusting....anything or anyone...that I feel like there must be a catch.

Is God really that good? So good that He would take away my emptiness and fill me up completely without having strings attached? I'm not questioning His faithfulness in any way.
I am still just completely astounded at His goodness and I can't help but think about how much I don't deserve any of it. Surely there are better people out there than me; people who have been better Christians; people who have loved more fully than I ever have and probably ever will be able to.

I almost feel bad for feeling so happy and at peace.

Last night, after fasting for exactly 168 hours, I ate my first meal in 7 days. I was given the honor of eating it with some of the interns at the BR. Brooke made an exquisit mix of rice, sauteed vegetables and this AMAZING chicken that I could probably eat everyday for the rest of my life (i forgot what it was called but something with coconut, lemon flavor, and some other goodness in it).
Afterwards, I wanted to try to help in some way to repay all these amazing people at the BR for traveling along with me through this journey so I decided to clean. They were so appreciative of it, but all they wanted was for me to just come and sit and just be with them.

Is this the way life is really supposed to be? Is this the way people who live their life for Christ really are? People just loving each other and not doing things because they expect something out of it, but because they really want to?
I felt 100% loved...do you know how good that feels?

Along with getting to spend time with my 2nd "family" (so i call them), I also found out some awesome information that gave me even more possible opportunities for my future; opportunities where I can fully praise God with every breath I take for the rest of my life.
At this point, there's nothing I would rather do than to get down on my face and pray to Him and worship Him every second I have.

I was so afraid that with 24/7 being done, I would fall back into my old emotions and lose sight of the awesomeness of God's grace and power...but so far I havent, and don't really think I will.
Just like Cassandra wrote to me during prayer last night, I feel like God really has put a new song in me. And if I could, I would sing it at the top of my lungs for as long as I could.

I can feel it so strongly and looking in the mirror everday, I can even see it. I no longer look dead or stare into empty eyes and hate what I see. I can see this person who is so filled with the Holy Spirit, it almost pours out of her because of the Glow.
This would not describe me 8 days ago...or any days previous to that. I am so RENEWED.

So back to my first question:

Is God really that good? Yup.

It couldn't get any better than this...

Earlier this week I was talking to a few friends about how I am sick of doing things that I don't love and can't look forward to.
I didn't want to waste my life away and this included my current job situation.

I have been working at Malarky's on the east beltline as a server and have made NO money and have just been struggling so much.

Yesterday i asked my dear friend, Emma if her daycare was still hiring. They had called me a couple months ago for an interview but because of my schedule I couldn't go.

So yesterday afternoon I got a call from one of the head leaders of the daycare asking me to come in for an interview this morning at 10am.
I was able to have a couple hours of prayer last night and one of the things that I prayed for was for God to let me know where He wanted me to be. If this was the job I was supposed to have, then I would get it, if not, I wouldn't and I would keep waiting on Him to show me the path to go on.

I went to the first part of the interview this morning where I was asked about 20 questions (let me just tell you that I HATE interviews...i get SO nervous).
What was different about today though was that instead of trying to answer what I thought they would want to hear, I just was completely honest with them about everything and answered whole-heartedly.
After that, they asked me if I could stay a little bit because their second interview was to spend time in a couple of the classrooms and see how I interact with the children and other teachers/assistants.

I was in 2 classes with kids from ages 8 months-2 years and LOVED it.

When it was time for me to leave, they told me that Emma had spoken so highly of me before they were disappointed that I couldn't come in for the interview a couple months ago but they really liked me so they offered me the position and I start next week.

PRAISE GOD.

Last night I was saying how this week has been so amazing, that if I got this job, I don't think anything better could happen to me.

I am so thankful and blessed beyond belief.
I deserve none of this goodness coming to me.

I just wanted to share.

I am so filled with joy, all I want to do is jump around and dance and laugh the Holy Spirit laughter.

Tonight is the college retreat, and I think even MORE amazing things are going to happen.

God never ceases to amaze me.

xo


**THANK YOU EMMA FOR HELPING ME GET THIS AMAZING JOB!!!!!!**

My Testimony

Tony asked me to write a little bit of my testimony from this past week of 24/7 prayer...so I did, and I thought I would put it up on my blog as well since I am just SO EXCITED and filled with so much JOY. Some of it is a repeat from my post below but that's just because I copied and pasted.
Reading over what I had written, I realized that this was not me writing my testimony, but God, Himself, revealing His Awesomeness, Faithfulness, and Love through these words.

I am COMPLETELY transformed:

Coming into this week of 24/7 prayer, I was so lost. My emotions were running wild, my commitment to Christ was wavering back and forth, and I was completely on the verge of giving up on thinking that God had something amazing planned for my life.
I had no idea that He had something planned for this week of prayer and I had no way to prepare for it.

It started off this past Sunday at Crossroads; Rod’s first Sunday back after being in Israel. When he talked about drinking the Living water as opposed to the Stale water, something hit me so hard and I found myself on the floor at the front of the gym broken down and sobbing uncontrollably. The worst part is that I fit every characteristic of someone who drank from the stale water. This sickened me and at that point, I decided I needed to change things, but I didn’t know how.

Over the past few months, I had been dealing with so much loss and was so emotionally distraught, and had some hostile feelings toward certain people; people I didn’t even know. I had been so unhappy and discontent and felt dead and empty almost every single day that I woke up, it was getting unbearable.

That Sunday night, Chelsea invited me over for dinner at the boiler room, and unfortunately, something happened right before we ate and I got really upset and distracted. I almost lost it at the table so we went and talked it out for a while and I knew that it was time for me to make some big decisions in my life regarding how I treated others, thought of them, and just let go of things that were pulling me down. I just could not wake up one more morning feeling such despair over my whole life.

I went into community prayer that night feeling so unsettled and discontent. I had had enough, so I just cried out to God to make me clean and give me a taste of the living water because I was so sick of this horrible way of life that just got in between my relationship with Him. I wanted to make things right with certain people so at that moment I decided that I was going to go way out of my comfort zone and let God take over my life and heal what had been broken.

Not one minute later, God performed a miracle that only He could do. Someone I barely knew asked me to pray with them, and in that time, so much healing took place and I felt a huge weight lifted off of me, that I had been carrying around for months. It was amazing to be reminded that the discontentment and jealousy and negativity that I was feeling was all part of what Satan wanted for my life. He wants to destroy the love and relationship that is supposed to be between God’s children. God did not intend on any of His children treating each other with anything except love. This was so eye-opening for me.

After that happened, I was on this high and feeling a sort of joy that I’ve never experienced in my whole life. It was so encouraging and I knew I had prayer that night scheduled for 2 hours from 12am-2am so I could not wait to get back in there and rejoice and celebrate what He had just done for me. The room happened to be open at 10 so I went around 1030pm and stayed until 2am, and in that 3.5 hours, my heart was completely transformed.

A year ago when I signed up for prayer, I had no idea how I was going to make it one hour of that week just praying. That night was the fastest 3.5 hours I’ve ever had. I just laid there and cried to God, sang to Him, read His word out loud, and just praised Him over and over again for the loving kindness and mercy that He has given me, which I clearly have never and will never deserve.

Since that night, I have had extremely low moments, but overall, am walking around feeling the chains that have been holding onto me for so long, broken by God’s faithfulness. This week I have decided to give everything up and let God take hold of my life and do with it what He wants. Along with letting go of things that seemed so important to me, mainly people, I also have been fasting since this past Sunday. Between that and living in prayer almost every chance I’ve been given, I have never felt so full when it came to my life. I’ve already begun to feel God calling me to different places, and have been able to let go of so much of the pain that I had been holding onto for way too long.

I’ve never felt God’s presence in my life so much. Between my prayer slots and community prayer, I’ve been in that room praying to Him for about 10 hours, and having that intimate time with Him, just talking and being honest and honestly searching for Him and longing for Him in my life, has made me really feel what being a transformed follower of Jesus Christ is like.

Satan is always going to try to tear me down or get in my way or get me to question the Lord’s faithfulness. This will be a constant battle. But after this week of prayer, I am confident that I will forever be a whole-hearted, follower of Christ.

If someone asked me a few months ago where I would be today, I definitely would not have answered them with how I’m currently living my life. There is no way I could have fathomed feeling as loved and fulfilled as I am now. I feel almost lighter and can’t stop smiling. I didn’t even know how to pray before a couple months ago and didn’t have much faith in the power of it, but being given the chance to fill my life with prayer, is really how everything changed for me.

If what I’m feeling now is even a little droplet of what eternity with my Father is going to be like, I can’t wait for that day to come.

Psalm 30 is the exact description of my journey up to this point of my life.

Be Blessed, friends.

xo

One more thing I forgot to add.

The Boiler Room is doing 24/7 prayer this week and I got the chance to go in after community prayer for 3.5 hours last night.

It was probably the greatest time I've ever spent one-on-one with God, ever.

Transforming. That's all I can say about it.

Sweetly Broken

Just as I told Brooke last night, there are no words that are able to accurately describe the feelings that I have right now.

I am in awe and am so amazed. There will never be a single word or even numerous words to describe God's greatness.

Yesterday something in me changed. Hearing Rod talk about Living Water and Stale Water just hit me so hard. I felt so much like God was speaking directly to me saying, "Jenna!! Wake up! You are drinking from the wrong kind of water." And I was. What an upsetting yet humbling thing for me to see where I was lacking in my life of following Christ. I am so ashamed for fitting every single one of the characteristics of what life was like drinking stale water.

I had been holding these negative feelings; feelings of anger and jealousy and envy and just plain hostility towards someone I didn't even know and letting all of these emotions distract me and get in my way of what I was supposed to be focusing on.

It had been going on for months, and I could not wake up one more day feeling like I had been for so long. It was eating away at me and taking me over. I had prayed so hard for something to happen to make these feelings go away but nothing was.

At last I realized that I needed to be willing to give everything up to the Lord so that He would be able to do with me what He wanted. So that's what I did, and that's what He did. All in one incredible hour.

I won't go into detail, but what happened last night was not something that any earthly person can do. It is purely God working his miracles. He heard my desperate cry. As Sarah Jayne said to me, I had a huge mountain in the way of me and God. He heard my cry and smashed it down so I was finally able to see once again, His beauty and majesty.

Satan tries SO HARD to get in the way of friendships and relationships by putting chains of negative feelings and emotions on us, and often times, those take over and we really do lose sight of how we should be living and treating others.

The battle is not over, but I am so glad that God showed his power and authority last night. I feel so changed, and renewed. I am dedicating my life to following Him and loving others the way He meant for us to. Satan will not win this.

I know that there is an amazing plan out there for me. One that I can not fathom, and way better than anything I could come up with on my own.

If you asked me 6 months ago where I thought I would be right now as far as my Faith and everything in my life, it definitely would not be where I am presently.

Thank GOD for that. I am SOO blessed and He has just filled me up with this amazing understanding and love that I've never experienced before.

Something awesome is happening and is going to keep happening. I can feel it.

I Can't Wait.



To the cross I look, to the cross I cling
Of its suffering I do drink
Of its work I do sing

For on it my Savior both bruised and crushed
Showed that God is love
And God is just

At the cross You beckon me
You draw me gently to my knees, and I am
Lost for words, so lost in love,
I’m sweetly broken, wholly surrendered

What a priceless gift, undeserved life
Have I been given
Through Christ crucified

You’ve called me out of death
You’ve called me into life
And I was under Your wrath
Now through the cross I’m reconciled

In awe of the cross I must confess
How wondrous Your redeeming love and
How great is Your faithfulness

One More Thing...

I got a tattoo a few days ago.
I had been thinking about it for the past couple of years.
I woke up having an AWFUL day and my friend came to save me...
then she took me to get a tattoo.
So I got one.
And I LOVE it.
It was actually very empowering.

I'll post pics when I get some.

Discontent

Sometimes I just don't really understand.

I put my whole life into something and try SO HARD to only focus on that one thing.

Things get better and everything seems to be falling into place;
then I fall backwards.

I don't understand how two weeks ago I felt a joy that I've never experienced before; A freedom from feeling tied down by all of my negative and anxious emotions.
I knew that it was a good decision we had made; That my life is so much better and fulfilled because of it.

But then this past week happened.
I don't know what changed or why it did.
But I couldn't do it anymore.
Waking up everyday and feeling amazing and great and happy wasn't happening.

Dead. Empty. Lonely.
That's what I got.

Too much time has gone by to still feel like this.
I'm so exhausted of it and can't go on feeling like this forever.

I look at other people and think, "if they can be ok, then i can be too."
I don't really believe it though.

Moving down to be near the Boiler Room has changed my life.
The relationships that I've formed with people,
The need for prayer in my life has been TRANSFOMING.
But still, I thought that my feeling of hurt would be gone.

Would you pray for me?

I don't think I can get through this on my own.

24/7 Prayer Revisited

I just had a VERY long note typed out about my life and how it has changed since my first 24/7 Prayer experience.
Somehow I accidentally deleted it so I will do my best to remember everything I had written:

I was looking at my previous notes. I re-read the one I had written on 24/7 Prayer and how scared I was because I had no idea what I was doing.
I thought that it being exactly 6 months later, I should revisit that note and do somewhat of a response just to share what has happened and where my life is now.

After that week of prayer, and also after attending Crossroads and visiting the Boiler Room a little bit more frequently, I could feel my life changing. Something was about to just explode and it was a very exciting thing for me.

During that first week of prayer, i was so afraid because I didn't know how to pray. I thought that those three prayer slots would go on forever.
However, after my first hour was up, I realized that it only had felt like a few minutes. I learned that praying did not just have to be saying the right thing with your hands folded and eyes closed. It is any means of communication with God, whether it be singing, drawing, talking out loud, thinking, whatever connected you with Him. You could either give thanks, or cry out for His hand.

I could feel something different inside of me.
When i would go to Crossroads on Sunday mornings, instead of standing there, too shy, too afraid of what people would think of me, just reading the words on the screen to the songs with a blank look on my face, I felt this joy bursting inside of me. Joy knowing that I could close my eyes and raise my arms and sing praises to my God with everything I had. What a freeing thing that was for me.
It's unbelievable how much closer I felt to him.

I used to be so shy. Well, I still am pretty shy. I would never go up to anyone first. I didn't know how to start a real conversation. I always felt that people were judging me, thinking I wasn't a good enough Christian.
The more i attended this church, and the more time I spent at the B.R. I realized that my perception of others was the judgmental one.

I've gotten to know quite a few people on a very deep and personal level, and there are a few who I consider to be some of my closest friends...even after just a couple months.
I'm hoping to get to know everyone else at some point, just because I think it's amazing to have people in your life who can you share so much with, so that your relationship/friendship with them is that much stronger. I love hearing people's stories, and how they came to where they are at now.

It's so nice to have people in my life who I know are there to encourage me the whole way, even if I don't know them that well. They want me to succeed and are running alongside of me in my race to become the person I want and am supposed to be.

I think I've managed to find some of the greatest people imaginable. It's hard to believe that there are so many people who actually say things and every word that comes out of their mouth is sincere.

These are the people who work for God and have helped to start the transformation in my life. All they do is love, and I use all of their lives as examples as to where I want my life to be someday.

so THANK YOU to everyone who has played a part...

I asked for Faith and I got it. Just as Chelsea told me I would.

I would've been the last person to ever say that someone could be changed so dramatically in such a short amount of time. But I am living proof that it is not about our timing, but God's. 6 months ago, there's no way I would ever tell anyone that I would be where I'm at right now. I would've laughed if someone told me that my life would be the way that it is. Actually, I did laugh. People told me that God will do what HE wants with my life if I let him. I didn't believe it, because at that time, I was still trying to control everything.

Giving up control of my life is still one of the things I struggle with most. Especially when it comes to relationships in my life.
It's so hard to give everything up to God. When I get frustrated about things not happening when I want them to, i think of what Tammy tells me and others who struggle with this. "God is never late, but rarely early."
How true is this? When I think back the past 23 years, I don't remember much that has happened the way I planned it out to be.

According to my plan, I was supposed to be married, with a job, my own house, and a child in the next year. NONE of those have happened...but i can't be more thankful for that.

I don't think April could say it any better than when she said that instead of thinking that I can just jump in and help save people's lives, I need to just come and allow myself to be healed. I'm going to be broken. There are times I will not want to keep my life this way because I'll be so frustrated.
But so far, I've let myself become broken, and it's so nice to know that God is with me the entire way and he is forever faithful. I have been able to get back up again because of Him. I am being healed. And it's such a terrifying, excruciating, yet wonderful and cleansing experience.

There is so much un-Godly baggage and just things that have scarred me that I want to be rid of. A life of sin and negativity. I want to be cleansed and renewed into the Woman of God that I'm meant to be. I'm being transformed. It's so awesome. Can you feel the excitement?

In the past couple of months, I've lost a few things that were VERY important to me. Although, like everyone else, I have those days where I just breakdown and cry in the middle of a beautiful day, and just want to hide away in my bed, I am determined to spend the other time praising God for my suffering and weakness. Tammy offered me a verse when I was on the verge of giving up, and it has become my favorite to look at when I'm struggling:

2 Corinthians 12:9-10

"9But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 10That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."

I LOVE the Lord. I love knowing that even if i lost EVERYTHING, as long as I had my Faith, Christ Himself would fulfill me in every aspect. I Love living my life for God. I Love knowing that even when I fall and make mistakes, and am so undeserving, God will always forgive me and give me unlimited chances because He knows my heart is there.

I can't wait until I'm able to move down to where the B.R. is and engulf myself in doing work for the Lord, while at the same time being healed and renewed.
I'm ready to get rid of the worldly things in my life, and start giving more, and loving more, and learning about everything God.
This is what the Lord asked of us. To make disciples of all of the nations.
I want to give my life to Him and follow Him, spreading His word to everyone I know.

The Lord my God is my one true Love, my Father in Heaven, and my Light, leading me down the path to His Glory.

I am becoming a transformed follower of Jesus Christ.
I can almost hear the Angels cheering from the Heavens.

There is no amount of money, and absolutely NOTHING anyone could say to make me sway.

I am living my life for the One and Only.

This is my new life.

xo

-Jenna

Lose Control

A lot has changed.

I went from being ok with everything, to confused and not ok, back to ok, and now I seem to be not ok once again.

It's so hard giving up control, isn't it?

I find myself staying up way too late at night trying to figure out how to fix the things broken in my life when in reality, it is God who is breaking me.
I know He is trying to tell me to stop trying to figure everything out and to trust in Him. But it's so hard. Especially when I feel like I have absolutely nothing and want to cry all day.

I've been spending more time at the boiler room. Spending more time trying to get to know others, and spending more time getting to know myself.
I learned last night that it's ok if i don't have it all together. I can cry. I can yell if I need to.
Throughout the past couple of months, I've learned what it means to have true friends. Even if I don't know them very well, I have people in my life who want nothing but happiness for me and will be there alongside of me to cheer me on every step of the way.

Talking to a couple other girls tonight, I realized that when it comes to Love and relationships, that is the hardest time to give up trying to make things work on my own. I think I know what's best for me, and no one, even God can tell me different.
I'll bet that when I think like that, God looks at me and thinks, "My child, you have SO much to learn."

I feel my heart ache everyday, convinced that I know what/who is supposed to be in my life. But I need to realize that even if I am right, it's ultimately up to God, and He will make me ready for it when He thinks I am. Not when I think I am. That is a hard pill to swallow! Sometimes I think things are getting better and I'm letting go...but then I get scared and go backwards, ultimately just making myself more unsure and stressed out.

How great would all of our lives be if we just let go and let God?
He will never fail us.

My other problem right now is my job situation. I feel like God took so much away from me for a reason, and new opportunities keep coming, but then I feel like doors are closing on them.
God just has something better in store for me that I just don't know about right now, right?
It's so hard, especially when I don't have any kind of financial means to pay bills to believe that and hold strong to that.

I've felt so depressed the past couple of weeks, sitting at my house, feeling sorry for myself.
I need things to change. I know He is just waiting for me to come to Him saying "ok..you have all of me...do what you will."
But it's SO HARD. Does anyone else feel that way?
I've always been good at telling other people to follow the Lord and to listen to Him...but I can't seem to do it myself.

I can't wait for September. September is going to be the month that my life changes drastically.

That's all I have to say for now. Nothing insightful really. Just needed to get some things out on the table.

Pray for me. That's all I ask.

xo