living

I apologize for the slight break, things are seeming more normal therefore I do not feel the need to tell you every detail of every event.  However a few things have happened lately that I would love to highlight.  So this weekend I listened to two sermons that were basically the Gospel.  The first one was one by Mark Driscoll, and to be completely honest, it was the second time I listened to it because it was so intense the first time I had to turn it off.  However, this time I was able to finish it and I almost started crying on the bus ride back from school because I realized just how much I need Grace every single day.  He really emphasized how innately sinful we are, and that without Jesus, we are subjects of God's wrath and we are forced to drink our own cup which we fill every day and live forever in torture apart from Jesus.  The second talk I listened to was the first talk of the LT kick off retreat by Steve Hayes.  This one again emphasized the Gospel and our daily reliance on Grace.  I know Grace is something we all have a really hard time accepting and I am just so in awe of how beautiful it is and how lucky I am that God saved me.  The title of this post is "living" because I have been writing so much about living in Spain and all the things I have experienced here, which are all great and wonderful experiences, but apart from God none of it is actually living.  It is a false trail of self fulfillment that ultimately ends is death.  I have been so insanely blessed by this opportunity to know more of God's people and see his creation so that I can work to further His kingdom until the glorious day when He calls me home.

Yesterday I had a moment of "What am I doing???" thinking that maybe I was suppose to stay home and do LT because I have been feeling like I am missing out on something huge all the while I am just passing time at the beach not doing anything.  However, as you may or may not have read in a previous post, I have been reading Joshua.  Over and over again the people are forced to make seemingly blind decisions, but God ALWAYS comes through and fulfills his promises.  They carried the Ark of the Covenant into the middle of the rushing Jordan trusting that God was going to part the water so they could pass freely, which he did, but not until they were standing in the middle of the river with the Arc above their heads; They marched around the city of Jericho every day for a week blowing horns probably looking like fools to all onlookers, but not shouting a word until finally, on the seventh day, God crushed the city and handed it over to them.  This is the faith that you and I have been called to: Blind.  I think it is one of the hardest things to do, but when I do I see God come through for me in ways I never imagined possible.  I heard a sermon a while ago about when Jesus and Peter walk on water.  There was a lot in it, but the two things I took away from it were that each step Peter took required equally as much faith as the last.  Even though you step out of the boat you are still trying to walk on water.  The other was that, like Peter, when we take our eyes off of Jesus and start to sink, we are still closer to Jesus than when we were still in the boat.  How can you take a blind step of faith today?

Standing in awe of his transcendance,

Sigourney