A Year of Thankfulness

Richard Misrach: Loving his work.

(Source: ifloveisthedrug)

So my dear friend Ali has been on my heart a lot recently. I met her in my DTS, but didn’t know her that well. During my SOMD, I became a lot closer to her. Ali radiates coolness. Like if there was a job for trend-setting, I could totally see her doing it. She is so extremely real in everything that she does. 

We both did skate track during both DTS and SOMD, so we witnessed together. I have two favorite times-Venice Beach and the old man in Sunland. The main strip in Venice has tons of medical marijuana place. Ali decided that she wanted to talk to the people who were advertising the different shops, so went went up to everyone who held a sign or handed out cards. They would tell us that they had the cure for whatever was bothering us and Ali would say “No thanks, I already have my cure. I don’t need this.” And they would always ask her what she had, to which she would confidently respond “Jesus.” I really hate approaching people (but I don’t mind talking to them after) so getting to see her boldness really strengthened me.

Another thing that I’m really thankful for is being able to see how she comes alive when she talks about God. God gives her these crazy cool insights into people’s lives, and she just tells these truths with such authority. Ali is one of those people who I know will call me out on my crap, and I’m so thankful for that.

Bless the Lord from Godspell. so good.

One of the many amazing movies from my childhood is Godspell. I love musicals.  Godspell is from the 70’s and written by my Stephen Scwartz (the amazing composer/song writer of Wicked <3333). I loved Godspell when I was young because it was funny and the music was great. Now I love it for so many more reasons. For starters, Jesus and His disciples are hippy misfits. Also, Jesus has an amazing ‘fro (if only He had a beard as well) and wears a superman shirt. I love how Godspell brings the Gospel to life by making it fun and full of life. 

The reason why I am thankful for this is because I constantly learn from the songs from it. “On the Willows” showed me the longing that David had for his city, Jeruselem, which was the inheritance that God gave His people. “Bless the Lord” comes from Psalm 103, which is now one of my favorite Psalms because it talks about how completely amazing God is. It speaks of His love and forgiveness. “Save the People” shows how much Jesus loves the people and longs for the people of the world.

“Day by Day” used to be my favorite (but now it is tied with all the others.) I now love how it speaks about the longing of being with God, of falling more in love with Him, of learning more about Him. Robin, the woman who sings it, has always been my favorite character, so I just picture myself singing that to Him so longingly. I also love “By My Side” for the same reason of wanting to be with Jesus, of walking with Him through all of the trials and hardships because of how much love one has for Him.

i cant believe how blessed i am to have the people in my life that i have. i have so many friends who love Jesus so much and are fully in love with Him. it’s so amazing to see how He is working in their lives and to see the different fruits of the Spirit of them. i have learned so much from their knoweldge. i have people in my life would would call out my crap and be honest with me, even when it is tough. i’m lucky enough to have people who love me that much and want me to be the person who God created me to be, fully in love with Him. 

here’s a cool example of how awesome my friends are: today i was just being really down on how i look. (it’s weird how in the morning i can feel like i look great, and then a few hours later i feel nasty). it’s been something that i’ve been working on with God for a while cause i have a terrible view of my self-image, and i know that. but anyway, like 5 minutes after i thought that, one of my sweet friends texted me telling me that i was beautiful. how crazy is that? 

i am so stinkin’ blessed.