No Perfect People Allowed

Perfectionists.  That's the topic for the day, folks.

One of my best friends in the galaxy is a huge perfectionist.  I used to be one too, until I grew out of it....in a way.

Actually...I didn't grow out of being a perfectionist, I just realized that there is no such thing as perfect.  The thing that really got me to believe that was my church.  They have a slogan, and it says "No Perfect People Allowed" (hence the name for this post).  For a long time I strived to be as perfect as physically possible.  I wanted to be perfect for my mom and dad, for my teachers, for my friends and everyone, except myself and God.  I have to admit that when I was younger, I wasn't a strong Christian.  I knew that Jesus loved me, and what Easter Sunday meant, but that personal relationship that I have now was not there.  Now I know that I live for HIM and HIM alone, and that HE is perfect, so I don't have to be.  :)

So this post goes out to all of those who are battling with perfection.  Guess what?  It only exists in ONE person, and it's not you.  It's not me, it's not that girl at school who has perfect hair, perfect makeup, perfect body, it's not the guy at your co-op with the perfect smile, perfect laugh and perfect eyes....
It's Jesus.  Jesus and Jesus alone is the ONLY perfect person to EVER walk the planet.  No one but Him will be perfect, so STOP TRYING.

Now, I must clarify.  I said stop trying....but I mean only to stop trying PERFECT.  Because everyone needs to try their absolute BEST at EVERYTHING they do.  We are to Glorify the Lord through our work, and he deserves nothing but the best!!!  Again, though he wants the best, he wants OUR best, not a generic PERFECT or socially-suggested CORRECT.  God wants our hearts, which are perfect in his eyes.  <3

So to my perfectionist friends, stop focusing on being or writing or making the perfect thing.  Jesus doesn't care if you look perfect, or write perfect stories, or do perfect drawings.  He just wants you to use the gifts He gave you to your full potential.  As long as you do that, you are perfect in his eyes.

Do what you love, and love what you do, and just be yourself.  You don't have anything to prove, except to Jesus Christ, who already knows it all anyway.  ;)

Go out and do your best in EVERYTHING my friends!!!  And remember, no perfect people are allowed. ;)

I am Sick.

Here's another pointless post......but I have good reason.

I have an upper respiratory infection with a touch of bronchitis.  O.O

.......

.......

I keep on coughing.  It's driving me nuts.  

4am.  I was up, coughing my head off until 4am last night.  My mother gave me some cough syrup that (supposedly) would make me stop coughing and fall asleep.  

4am.  I repeat.  4 a m.  

I was so kriffin' hyper I was going to die.  XD  I was coughing, giggling, talking, jumping around and dancing until 4am, where I fell fast asleep halfway through A New Hope.  XD

Now I'm watching Church over the computer (yes, you read that right) and the sermon is about Following Jesus.

Noo....not just "Oh yeah, follow Christ," I mean FOLLOW Christ, as in they're using the metaphor of Facebook, Twitter and Blogger!!!!!  :DDDD  I was like "AMEN!!!"  XD  

It's an amazing sermon.  :)  It really is.  I'm still watching though, so I might write more about it later.  :)

I'm doing a post on Fanfiction.  It's coming.  I'm also doing a post on Star Wars, and on Writing.  ;)  But they're in the works.  

I hope I sleep tonight.  I'm exhausted....ish.....;)

Love you all!!!!!  I'll talk to you all later.  <333333

Happy Easter!!

I cannot believe that another Easter has come and gone!!!!  That was SO fast!  I feel like it was JUST Christmas!!!!  LOL!

My Easter was fabulous!  I feel so blessed right now!!!!!  My morning started very early because my sister had to be at church really early because she was in the service with her choir.  ;) 

OH MY WORD.  Church was insanely, incredibly and amazingly wonderful!  I could do a whole post JUST on church.  XD  But I'll just put it in with this post.  ;)  I'll go in order though.  No need to get ahead of myself....xD

As tradition states,  my sister's and I's Easter baskets outside the doors to our rooms, and we open them in the hallway.  ;) I was really excited with what I got.  XD  I /finally/ got my Rapunzel Barbie doll from Tangled, (yay!!!!) and I also got the Lemonade Mouth and Tangled soundtracks!!!!!!!!  I'm listening to Lemonade Mouth right now, and I LOVE THESE CDS!!!!!!!!!!  So addicting.  XDD  I also got LOTS OF CANDIES!!!!!!!  I <3 Candy.  Candy is the only reason I celebrate Halloween.  :P

My daddy made a delicious breakfast of french toast and pancakes, and then we (my sister and I) went out into our backyard to have our annual Easter egg hunt.  ;)  I got lots of Jelly Beans. 
Then my sister got dressed, and I checked Blogger and email a little bit.  ;)  I also downloaded my new CD's into my iTunes. 
I got dressed in my pretty yellow dress, my new high heel shoes, and I let my hair curl itself, and got ready for church!! 

(Me in front of the big building we had church at.  :)  oh my gosh, I just posted a picture of me.  :P  ACK!  I hope y'all like that pic.....LOL!) 


CHURCH WAS SO AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!  :D

I could practically FEEL the love for our God coming off in waves off the people there.  Everyone was so nice, and so supportive and just so.....AH!  It was awesome. 

You see, my church is a pretty big church.  It's out-of-the-box.  It's growing.  So, for this Easter, we went to the huge concert/arena place in town.  I'm going to call it the BAC (that's it's acronym anyway, but I don't want to give away too many details.  :P)

My sister was performing, so we had to leave early to go to the BAC, and my mom and I did How To Write A Story program while my dad took my sister back stage.  EVENTUALLY we went in, and met up with my dad's friend from work, who sat with us.  It was REALLY REALLY AWESOME!  :DD  Here's a picture of the BAC when it was filled up.  :)

Actually, this pic doesn't do it justice. :P  It was filled up even all the way in the top rows.  The WHOLE thing was filled with church goers.  :)

Then, the service started.  I had so much fun.  My mom and I were crying ten minutes into the service.  xD  The beginning music was AWESOME!  Lookie!  It's like a concert!!!

I love all the songs that they played.  I sang, raised my hands, and praised the Lord with my voice.  XD  Make a joyful noise.  LOL!

Then my sister ran out, jumped around with a flashlight, and ran off.  I screamed for her.  xD  She was awesome!!!!  They did a 'This Little Light Of Mine' remix.  It was so cool!  LOL!

My dad and sister came back, and the sermon started.  :)  It was really great.  I cried probably five or six times throughout the service.  :P  The ending is what really got to me. 

The pastor gave an old school Bible study this year, and he talked about a story in Luke 24.  :)
It was about this man: Cleopas.  Jesus (after he was Resurrected) came and walked and talked with Cleopas and his buddy Noname (no that's not REALLY his name, but it wasn't mentioned.  XD)  anyway, Cleopas and Noname were kinda  blind because they didn't recognize JESUS was walking with them.  They were chatting with Jesus about all the events that happened to the Son of God, and all this that and the other, and Cleopas schooled Jesus on Jesus!  Then our Paster gave a talk where he named where Jesus is mentioned in every single book of the Bible.  It was very impressive!  :)  The point of the story was that Cleopas had his chance to say yes to Jesus and live the rest of his life for him, but Cleopas missed his chance.  He lost his opportunity.  The pastor's message was all about not loosing out on this opportunity for an exchange.  A Beautiful Exchange. 

When you are saved, you die.  The old you dies.  A new Christ filled you is born.  You are given a beautiful exchange.  Your old sinful life is exchanged for a new, fresh and forgiven one.  :)
This song was played during a very moving video.  It showed very vividly just how the whole exchange thing works. 

There were people in the audience (who were staged) who were wearing grey t-shirts that said something on them.  Everything from "Divorced" to "Addict".  They were all sins.  There were videos about a bunch of the people, and it was so moving.  I cried.  There were TONS of them.  Even the pastor was wearing a shirt.  His said "Unworthy".  The song came to a crescendo and then these girls came and painted glow in the dark paint on the two lead singers.  It was EPIC.  Then, at the big belt-it-out-you-are-saved part of the song, everyone ripped off their shirts to reveal these white shirts with paint splatter looking designs on them, with a big heart in the middle that said "Beautiful Exchange" on it.  Then the lights went out and all the shirts glowed.  I got a shirt.  ;)

I cried so much during that service.  During that song, our pastor did an alter call.  ;)  SO many people were saved!!!!!!  It was amazing!  I cried then too.  So many lives were changed at that service, and you could tell!  I was amazed.  People from all over the auditorium came and were saved that morning.  :)  God is Good!!!!!!

Anyway, it was epic.  I was amazed to see how the Lord works thru our churches, and I realized how huge it is when your life is beautifully exchanged.  I feel blessed.  :)  I feel exchanged. 

After church, we went to grandma and grandpa's house for dinner.  It was very nice.  We ate steak, had fun, got candy (and a bracelet and itunes card!) and I played my viola for everyone!  :)  It was so much fun!!!!  Chibi, Nutmeg and I played outside for a while too.  Tradition.

That was my Easter.  :)  I hope you all had as great of an Easter as I did!!!!  :)

God Bless!

Love,

Church and what I got out of it

Last night was church time for me.  I usually attend the Saturday 5 o'clock or Sunday 6 o'clock both at night.  Last night was the Sunday one.  Our church is doing a series called Soul Train, and it's all about Peace, Love and Soul.    Just like those old 70's shows with the crazy clothes, even crazier dancing and all those....funky?....People.  Anyway, last night was all about Peace, and finding Peace in your Soul.

Peace:
You need to find your inner peace, because NOTHING in life will ever be absolutely 100% perfect.  Things will always break down, relationships, people, jobs, school, things won't always work out perfect.  That's because we live in a broken world, or as my church pastor said, a problem planet.

John 16:33 says,  "I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace.  In this world you will have trouble.  But take heart, for I have overcome the world."

Peace is not found in the "externals" in life, such as jobs, school, friends, relationships, money or anything else.  The only way to actual peace is through Jesus Christ.

Like if someone gets into a fight or something, they hope that an adult or authority figure will come and solve the problem.  Someone will stop the fight.  Jesus is that figure, he is the one who will stop the fight.  You want proactive peace, as my pastor said, not passive peace.  That means get up and DO something. You won't find peace by doing nothing to help yourself.  'God helps those who help themselves' remember?

There are a few ways to find Peace in your life.  I took notes at Church and I'll write them here.

The first way, and probably the most important way, to Peace is Peace With God.

Romans 5:1 says, "Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ"

Accepting Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour gives you peace with God, and because of that he'll give you peace.

The second thing that will help you find Peace is to make sure you're life is free of sin.  Staying with the Soul Train theme at church, Have you jumped the God track?  God has a plan for your life, but the road is straight and narrow.  It is easy to get sidetracked and to move off road of God's track.  Check for sin, and remember that Sin does not make you lose your Salvation, but it does forfeit your Peace.

Another way to help you find Peace is to look back.  Look at all the blessings and miracles God has performed in your past.  It will give you strength when things aren't going so great.  Look for miracles and praise God for the good times.  Even when things are tough, God is still there with you, even in a stormy patch of your life.

Another way to help you find Spiritual Peace is to spend Daily Time with God.  I personally need to get better at this.  I pray all the time, but I need to get better at sitting down and reading my Bible.  I have been doing better lately, and I'm glad for that.
Spend 10-20 minutes a day with God, just talking, reading the Bible, and praying.  It's good for your Spiritual Soul, so to speak.  Your body decays, but your soul is what goes to Heaven.  God is a Dad.  He wants to spend time with his kids.  He likes it when you crawl on his lap and pray to him.  :D

Take care of YOU!
Your Body is a temple of God, keep it in good working order!

Get Organized!  (I need to do this!)
Whether it's with Finances, school, work, or your bedroom, get organized!

1 Corinthians 14:33 says, "For God is not a God of disorder, but of Peace"

Eliminate unnecessary stress and pressures in your life.  God loves order, and peace.

Another way to find Peace is when you have pressures or are struggling, help others.  Not only does it make you feel good, but it makes God feel good also.  Show God's love by meeting the needs of others, even when their needs are probably greater than yours.  Especially then.  Sacrifice your own needs to help someone else meet theirs.

Isaiah 58:10-11 says, "And if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry, and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the day.  The Lord with guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame.  You will be like a well-watered garden like a spring whose waters never fail."

Where God Guides, He Provides.  If you do all of those things, you will find that you are not stressed, you are blessed.  In the words of my P.E. coach, God is a Father who LOVES to bless his children.  He will bless you with a Peace so crazy that it makes no sense.

To get that, you as a Christian need to settle the fight with your old, unsaved self.  They want to suck you back into sin, but the Christian, born again you says no.  You get a soul change the second you become saved.  The Old You is dead and buried, and the brand new you was born to walk in the ways of Jesus Christ.

Stop trying to save the old you, the old you is what is stopping you from getting your Christian Peace.

James 4:1 says, "What causes fights and quarrels among you?  Don't they come from your desires that battle within you?"
In other words, You are at war with yourself.  I've read this sort of thing happen a lot in Fanfiction and SW books.  In a lot of books, the main villain is the Main Character's own self doubt.

To end the fight with yourself, commit FULLY to Jesus, say from the top of your head to the tips of your toes, you are 100% God's.  Jesus will end the fight, let him win.  Stop trying to fight, let Jesus settle the deal, and end the fight.

That was my first "serious" post.  Expect more of that.  I think that I will do a summary of the Church sermon every week, if anything for my own self to reinforce what I learned.  I hope that this post was Okay....remember I am still new at this!!  ;)

God Bless, and Please Comment, ;)
Jedi~Chick <3

I still just LOVE this picture!!!!  It went with this post so.....I'm re-posting it! :D