Graduation Photo Shoot

Here are a couple of my graduation pictures! =)

Butterflies in the Rain

This is actually taken from a devotional book I am writing called "Iron Wings". This is something God has really been showing me lately! So if it sounds weird...its just cause its an excerpt from a book. I hope God blesses you today. I love you all soooo much!

Part 1:Admitting We’re Human

Natasha is a beautiful girl…or so everyone says. She has nut-brown hair and big blue eyes that melt anyone’s heart. She has a gorgeous voice, plays basketball well, and has the biggest smile this side of the Atlantic. At church she is always the one to reach out, and she has plenty of attention from both sexes. Everyone thinks that Natasha loves God with all her heart, and she does. But something isn’t right.

A few weeks into the beginning of her senior year, Natasha loses it. She begins starving herself, eating rarely more than an apple a day. She gets involved with the wrong kind of guy. She drinks and begins locking her door to get away from her parents. Her siblings start hating her. And half her friends leave. By Christmas, Natasha is a completely different girl than she had been just 8 months before. And she is sick inside. She never dreamed she would get to this point. Why did Natasha change so much? Or did she?

Perhaps Natasha was the same girl the whole time along, but she was hiding the true her (all her struggles and fears) until something happened to push her over the edge. We read that and feel so sorry for Natasha, but we fail to see the fact that we ARE Natasha! Every single one of us! Common, let’s face it, girlfriends. We can’t be the goodie girls that show up at church EVERY day. We are also lonely, hurting shells fighting things that God’s girls never should have to. Why are we living double lives? Because we are afraid to succumb to the darker side of us, and yet cannot maintain our bright side no matter how desperately we try.

Let’s ask ourselves a question. Which girl do you think we are deep down inside? The one who is scarred and frightened, or the one who never stops smiling and doing the right thing? I know which one I am…choice A! Without a doubt! I am the girl who is scarred, frightened, and alone. Therefore, being the other way is just a veil to disguise our true identity. And a veil will only last so long before it will blow away in the wind. The wind will snatch it from our faces, and the mangled cheeks with hollow eyes underneath will terrify the world.

Not a very pretty picture, is it? Sorry! I’m not trying to be hopeless, here. But seriously! That is the way it is. It scares me sometimes to know that! Yet, let’s not be afraid! Because there is hope! No, I take that back, there is Hope! It’s not in the form of a magic tincture, a ray of sunshine, or a leap of faith. It’s in the form of something more real: Jesus Christ. You see, God allowed us to be dark on the inside for a reason. It isn’t His plan, but He let it happen. And He loves us for it. Even when we veil our darkest side completely away, do you think we hide it from God? Honestly, can we? I would like to think so! I would like to hope we could hide it from the Lord, but we can’t. Psalm 139 states:

“Oh Lord, you have searched me and you know me.

You know when I sit and when I rise;

You perceive my thoughts from afar.

You discern my going out and my lying down;

You are familiar with all my ways.

Before a word is on my tongue,

You know it completely, O LORD.

You hem me in – behind and before;

You have laid your hand upon me.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,

Too lofty for me to attain.”

Wow, that is just a little intimidating, isn’t it? So why pretend? Honestly, why do it? It isn’t accomplishing anything! Oh, you might look good to your friends and your family, but you don’t look any better to God when you are smiling than when you are collapsing. Now, please don’t think it’s that you couldn’t ever look any worse to the Lord. That’s not how it is! It’s more like you could never be any more beautiful to Him! Ever! So be real…break out of your shell and be free!

I love watching butterflies. They are without a doubt one of my favorite animals! What is one of the first things that come to mind when you think of a butterfly? I think of sparkly wings, a flittering body, and heart-stopping colors. And yet, did you ever think what a butterfly really is? If you stripped away those wings, you would see a brownish-green, wormy creature that I would probably scream at if I found it on the bathroom floor. That is what a butterfly really is…a slithering, ugly caterpillar. Except for one thing: metamorphosis. Oh, it is not that a caterpillar changes into a butterfly because it is impossible to morph a living thing completely into something else. Rather, it is that the ugly caterpillar was altered a little, perhaps through pain, so that it could become something so much more free. It learned a lesson and had a life-changing experience making it into the butterfly that we love.

Friends, it is the same with us! We are the ugly, slithering caterpillars. We sit there looking dumb and moving around like little worms. We will never change who we are, because who we are is the person God loves! However, there is something so mind-blowing that it can completely transform our hearts’ condition! It can turn us into butterflies, free to fly away on the wings of the morning. You know what I am talking about: the cross of Jesus Christ! And that is what brings us to the second part of this chapter.

Part 2: The Metamorphosis

Where do we begin? When it comes to God, how do we start? I think we cannot come into the presence of talking about a holy Lord without first praying to Him, asking Him to fill us with wonder and awe. And so, let’s do it right now:

“Dear Jesus, we are your daughters. Your special little ones! God, we are coming before you and we are excited to be with You. We are looking forward to sitting at your feet and learning Your lessons. And we want to worship You, Father. We want to give you all we are. Thank You that You love us, thank You that You delight in us. In the same way, Savior, we delight in You! We honor You and praise You for all that You are…from the depths of our heart. May our lips be no closer to You than our hearts. May we truly be filled with You, and may Your wisdom pour out as we search the depths of Your riches together. God, give me wisdom as I write. May I only write what You would have me to! And may You fill each girl reading this with Your blessing…Your truth…Your love! Thank You, Jesus. Amen.”

:hugs: I’m so glad we could go before the Lord together. So, let’s pick up right where we left off. Caterpillars. More like ugly, crawling worms. In the depths of our heart, we are so despondent and isolated from anything good! We are longing for transformation and yet we cannot lift that veil separating us from Jesus Christ. Right now, if you can, I’d like you to go watch this youtube video. It will introduce what we are going to talk about in a great way. I cannot see this anymore without crying because it is just so beautiful!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nig4Rbeoqwk

I don’t think I’ll take the time right now to address all that can separate us from the Lord. There’ll be plenty of time for confession and talking later, and believe me, I’ll need it. Every day I have things I have to confess to Jesus. But right now, I want us to think about our metamorphosis. About what God is going to do for us through changing us into the image of His son! That is the only way we are going to break free. Our cocoon that enables us to pass into the future world is the cross. And we didn’t have to break out of the cocoon ourselves, because Jesus Christ did it for us. We can go right from the ugly caterpillar to the beautiful butterfly. On the cross, the Lord shouldered all that we have done so that we can be changed…not just changed by wearing our fake veil but really, truly altered in the core of our being! It can happen this moment…this day.

All my life, I have had a desire to walk with Jesus. For Him to change my heart and make me His! But that hasn’t been happening too well. The reason is that although I believed in His cross, I did not believe in His power to change my heart. I tried to do it on my own even though I was saved. I tried to look like I thought a Christian girl (especially the daughter of a pastor) should look without really letting God make me look that way. And you know the result? I almost ended up like Natasha at the beginning of the story…in fact, in many ways, Natasha was a substitute name for my story. My transformation only began last month, in the midst of a lot of pain. And yet that pain was my salvation, because I was able to break free since I no longer could hide my true self from God.

Girlfriend, just come to Him broken. Just come to Him in pieces! Let Him make you whole! 1 Corinthians 1:18 says, “For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who are being saved, it is the power of God.” Salvation is here! Salvation is now! Even if you have been saved from hell and satan, let Christ save you again from yourself. Worship leader and song write Jason Ingram put in one of his songs, “Lord, You know my flesh is so weak. In my own strength, I’m sure to fail. Let Your mercy cover me, that I might live for Thee. Save me from me, when my own hands pull me under. Save me, from me, your patience fills me with wonder. I am unable still You’re my Savior…save me! I believe what sometimes I can’t feel. You receive in spite of where I fail. What you see is what I’m gonna be someday…”

Why does it have to be someday? In the movie, Knight and Day, Tom Cruise says, “You know what someday is? Someday is just a synonym for never.” Please don’t let this transformation be something you put on the shelf. Surrender today and let yourself break free. Be the gorgeous butterfly Christ designed you to be!

In the following post we will be looking at the adventures of a butterfly and learning what we should believe as princesses in His heavenly Kingdom. But for today, for this moment, may our hearts simply pray that we may be freed! That we may be broken! That we may take flight and forever cast aside those useless veils!