Well, I'm not Buddha.

I'm beginning a workout program. Shocking, I know. But, we are going to Destin this summer, and I would just once like to have a beach-worthy body. I mean, I've had a gut for as long as I can remember. Now I bought an app for my iPad, a personal fitness trainer to help with that. Basically, since I am still doing the couch to 5k thing, my schedule for a week will be to run one day, then work out the next, then run, then work out, then run. And I want to give myself the weekends free. That way I can stay on a course and see some results. But, this isn't going to be easy.

A main reason I want to do this is because I believe being healthy is Biblical. Paul wrote to the Corinthians that our bodies are temples of God. We are supposed to honor Him by what we do with our bodies. Granted, in that passage Paul was referring to sexual immorality, but I believe that being in physical shape is better for you than not being in it. Duh. Lol.

Anyways, I was so stinking excited. For those of you unaware, I have been on a hiatus from the youth group at my church, and that has been an interesting experience. However, James called me today and asked if I wanted to come back. I couldn't refuse. I am so glad to be back. Tomorrow we are eating lunch, so yay!

Also, the girl I was supposed to eat lunch with had to have a study group session for a Psychology test tomorrow. I told her that was waaay more important than eating with me. We have rescheduled for Friday, after I go to Scuba. Good luck on your test Shannen! She prolly doesn't read this. Oh well.


Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
(John 15:13 ESV)

Short verse, but a good one

Philos, Justin

P.S. You're beautiful. :D

Toppling a South American Government

Just another day in the life.

TOMORROW IS GOING TO BE SO AWESOME! Except for math. Math and I aren't friends. But, I'm making an A in there, I believe....

Anyways, I get to go eat lunch with an amazing girl. Have no idea where we are eating, just excited to get to catch up and spend time with her! And, tomorrow night I get to take my "valentine" Jessica out to go see a movie. We both were complaining about not having a valentine, and I jokingly asked her and she agreed. It's all in good fun though.

I can't think straight. Not like I'm trying to cop out of blogging, just can't seem to wrap my mind around what to talk about.

Double team of two awesome videos. Well, two awesome songs.






Philos, Justin

Valentines Day

This post kinda had to have a theme. So I'm gonna talk about my opinion on love, dating, relationships and all that jazz.

Where to begin? To truly love someone, I believe you need to be IN love with them. And to be IN love with them, you need to love Jesus more than them. And to love Jesus, you ...yeah, you get the picture. The point is, for a healthy relationship that is truly whole, there needs to be an agreement that your love for each other needs to come second to your overwhelming, head-over-heels love for Jesus.

As far as dating goes, I'm not sure where I stand. If you don't date, I believe it becomes a lot harder to find your future suitor. But the dating game for teenagers is a pretty sick game. We get into relationships (which is my next topic) and they consume our being. Most of us. Kudos to you if you know how to not let that happen. But we enter these relationships and I know that at least from a guy's perspective, we are pretty hard-wired to desire physical contact. I will let you determine how you read that. But we do. That's not what a relationship should be about. But I digress.

Relationships are confusing. My problem is I see the girl I want, with another guy. Odds are, she doesn't read this blog though. This girl is one of the most amazing people I know, goes to school with me and I believe I can say she loves Jesus more than I do. And that, my friends, is a good thing. But the hard part is to make her believe that I want her to be mine. We'll see how that goes. Just know this, ___ , if you're reading this, the T-Swift song "You Belong with Me" comes to mind. But, oh well.

I just need to realize that God may not want me to have a girlfriend right now, and to just throw all of my love to Him. He's worth it.

A passage fitting for Valentines Day. This is what Biblical love is.


If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.
(1 Corinthians 13:1-8 ESV)

Philos (Brotherly love,) Justin

Weesa goin' home!

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace is on Spike TV. That's pretty cool. We were just talking about Star Wars at work tonight! I remember going with my aunt and uncle, D and Todd to go see the opening of Menace. Afterwards, Andy and I got our hair cut to look like Anakin from the movie. It was nerdy, but it was cool!

I'm not sure what to blog about. There's a whole lot of ideas that I want to talk about. I just want to unload everything, but it's overwhelming. Ugh.

Tonight is just a video. A song we sang today at church. It's amazingly powerful and a total prayer to God.




This song captures the overwhelmed feeling we need to have with our God. Just to stand in His presence, with our arms spread wide, the universal symbol for I give up.

God, here I stand. You know my heart, know my thoughts, know my actions. And yet, through all my mistakes, You love me. You sent Your Son to die for me. You sent a perfect lamb to die a cruel death that I deserved. And I am so grateful for it. I don't deserve it, but through Your grace, You have given me the privilege of approaching Your throne and worshiping You.

God, forgive me for where I fail You, because I do a lot. Lead me and guide me in the life You desire for me. Thank You so much for blessing me. In Jesus name, Amen.

I just prayed through Blogger.


And as Jesus reclined at table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were reclining with Jesus and his disciples. And when the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” But when he heard it, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’ For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”
(Matthew 9:10-13 ESV)

Philos, Justin

Yellow

I want a girlfriend. I know I don't need one, but I want one. There are plenty of cute girls in the world, and I would love be with them. So, what's the problem? I don't know. I'm a firm believer that we as Christians have given in to what the world says dating should be. We now believe that you should shop around for a while, and maybe one day when you're older, find the "one", settle down with a house and white picket fence, have 2.5 kids and live the American dream. Well, that's kinda dumb. I mean, if you don't date, you don't meet your "one." I believe that. But I'm not sure how that ties into what we believe.

That's where I'm stumped. What does a healthy, God-centered relationship between a boyfriend and girlfriend look like? I've never been in one, so I don't know. I do know that to have one, God has to take the center of you two's love. You have to love Jesus more than you love the other person. And I don't love Jesus enough as it is. So maybe that's where I start. But at the same time, humans crave and long for companionship. We aren't meant to walk the human life without a mate.

Urgh. Lol.

Be strong in the Lord, and never give up hope. You're gonna do great things, I already know. God's got His hand on you, so don't live life in fear. Forgive and forget, but don't forget why you're here. Take your time and pray. These are the words I would say. - That is an awesome song. When you're down, look up The Words I Would Say by Sidewalk Prophets.

This post wasn't anything like what I thought I was gonna type tonight. I sincerely thought I would post something deep and profound, not rant about life. But, shows how much I'm really in control of everything.

Anyways, I know that I am loved. I know God loves me, no matter how much I mess up, which I do a lot, my family loves me, my friends love me, and that's all that matters. That, and God's grace is so sufficient for all of my sin. I just need to let Him do what He wants and quit trying to put my own agenda out there.


The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost. But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life.
(1 Timothy 1:15-16 ESV)

Philos, Justin

Engrish

I usually am a fan of English. It's pretty easy for me to write or type something for my classes, but tonight was brutal. Hang on, gotta go put my sheets in the dryer...Ok. I'm back. I realize as you read this, there hasn't really been a passing of time. But just imagine that took around 2 minutes. Anyways, tonight I had to type an annotated bibliography for a research paper that I am going to be doing later in the semester. I had to find 8 articles or essays, two of which had to come from our textbook, all about the issue of spanking as a method of discipline. It was like getting a tooth extracted. That was how painful and un-fun that was. But, it's due in 6 days, and I'm done. So that's good!

My brain is fried. Nothing deep tonight. Sorry guys! But, I will post a video to an awesome, awesome song by Matt Papa, a singer/songwriter that I enjoy.

Here's Open Hands.





Again I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to those with knowledge, but time and chance happen to them all. For man does not know his time. Like fish that are taken in an evil net, and like birds that are caught in a snare, so the children of man are snared at an evil time, when it suddenly falls upon them. I have also seen this example of wisdom under the sun, and it seemed great to me. There was a little city with few men in it, and a great king came against it and besieged it, building great siegeworks against it. But there was found in it a poor, wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city. Yet no one remembered that poor man. But I say that wisdom is better than might, though the poor man's wisdom is despised and his words are not heard.
(Ecclesiastes 9:11-16 ESV)

Philos, Justin

And I will try to fix you

That's the stinger lyric of a Coldplay song, entitled Fix You. Good, good song. I'm gonna learn it.

On the subject of songs, I posted a video yesterday to a song, Healing Begins by Tenth Avenue North. I downloaded it yesterday and only kinda listened to it before I posted it. A day later, having listened to it around 4 times, I love it. There is such a powerful message. Watch the video and listen to the words. Essentially, it is about the walls we put up, to make the world believe we are a good person. But in Christ, we can finally break the walls down because He knows we aren't good people, and wants to be the One to walk us through our junk. The pre-chorus and chorus sing: "So let them fall down. There's freedom waiting in the sound. When you let your walls fall to the ground, we're here now. This is where the healing begins, oh. This is where the healing starts. When you come to where you're broken within, the light meets the dark."

It's such a powerful song. When you come to where you are broken, the light of Jesus crashes head on to the dark sin in your life. And I promise, the light is more powerful. The bridge says: "Sparks will fly as grace collides with the dark inside of us. So please don't fight this coming light. Let this blood come over us. His blood can cover us." I mean, it's so awesome. Because when we finally do come to the point where grace meets our sin, it's never pretty. And then, the best thing to do is give in. Because it's so worth it.

Anyway, listen to that song. It's so stinking cool! In other news, it's supposed to be all wintry weather tomorrow. I don't like that. I actually want to go to school. When you pay for your education, school is more bearable. And I really like my history class. It's fun! Aaaaand, tomorrow Brent and I are supposed to get Fuzzy's tacos. Yum. Fuzzy's.

WOW! Google's homepage is so cool! Nerd alert...


Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed the heir of all things, through whom also he created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature, and he upholds the universe by the word of his power. After making purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
(Hebrews 1:1-3 ESV)

Philos, Justin