He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end...Ecclesiastes 3:11

Heylos.

I have learned many things in the last year. some important, some not so much. I have learned many life-lessons, no matter how cheesy that might sound, most of them revolving around God.

one important thing that I have learned summed up in three words:

God. Is. Beautiful.

the things He makes are beautiful.

the things He does are beautiful.

His glory and grace is beautiful.

everything about Him is stunningly beautiful.

He can make an ugly, sinful, horrid human being like me into something beautiful.

He creates pure love. He IS true love.

you can see His beauty everday all around you. in people. in the heavens with their millions of stars. in the glorius landscape that He has made- mountains, lakes, forests, plants and animals. living in Maine you don't realize how beautiful it is here until your stuck in a city...and our trip to colorado and driving through the Rocky's, then going to Utah and Arches National Park.  just watch Planet Earth on the discovery channel...just. simply. B e a u t i f u l.

i have a beautiful christian boyfriend, a beautiful family, and a beautiful life no matter what happens because of Him.

He makes everything Beautiful in His time.

Newsboys.

I wanna start it over
I wanna start again
I want a new beginning
One without an end
I feel it inside
Calling out to me
It's a voice that whispers my name
It's a kiss without any shame
Something beautiful(Yeah Yeah)
Like a song that stirs in my head
Singing love will take us where
Somethings beautiful
I've heard it in the silence
Seen it on a face
I've felt it in a long hour
Like a sweet embrace
I know this is true
It's calling out to me
It's the child on her wedding day
It's the daddy that gives her away
Something beautiful
When we laugh so hard we cry
Oh the love between you and I
Something beautiful
Something beautiful.

Jars of Clay.

If you put your arms around me,
Could it change the way I feel?
I guess I let myself believe
That the outside might just bleed its way in
Maybe stir the sleeping past
Lying under glass
Waiting for the kiss
That breaks this awful spell
Pull me out... of this lonely cell

Close my eyes and hold my heart
Cover me and make me something
Change this something normal
Into something beautiful

What I get from my reflection
Isn't what I thought I'd see.
so, give me reason to believe
You'd never keep me incomplete
Will you untie this loss of mine?
It easily defines me,
Do you see it on my face?
And that all I can think about is how long
I've been waiting to feel you move me.

Close my eyes and hold my heart
Cover me and make me something
Change this something normal
Into something beautiful
Into something beautiful
Into something beautiful

And I'm still fighting for the word
To break these chains
And I still pray when I look in your eyes
You'd stare right back down
Into something beautiful

So close my eyes and hold my heart
Cover me and make me something
Change this something normal
Into something beautiful
Into something beautiful
Into something beautiful
Into something beautiful

Kels..

"We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin.  I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.  And if i do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good.  As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me.  I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.  For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.  For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do--this  I keep on doing.  Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.  So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me.  For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members.  What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God--through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin." Romans 7:14-8

Heylos.

hmm. this is one of the best devotionals I have ever read, so I figured I would share it.

taken from Heartlight Daily Devotionals- November 4, 2008

Under All These Masks, by Ann Voskamp


He never told us his name, that night. It's the way of the street.
Concrete and asphalt and dark don't require you come with a name, for
the streets christen with names of their own. And anyways, names may be
forgotten, but not a face like his, never his story, the one these
streets lent him.

I'm trailing the youth from our fellowship down Yonge Street, the last
of the light seeping out of the autumn gold of the trees. I dig my
hands deeper into pockets and warm. The grey chill's creeping in, up
the wet pavement. It's going to be a long, damp night out here.

A wild mane of graying hair, he's standing, back to me, in front of the
Yonge Street Mission front entrance. It's him, his tribe, we've come to
minister to, to be ministered to. Tonight's not about what too often
happens -- us getting to where we're going, walking wide of the
crumpled hurt, looking the other way. Tonight's about the street and
its people, their stories. About us each finding Christ in the other.
Before I reach the entrance, he steps out in front of me, walks towards
our cluster of kids. His buddy stays in the shadows, swigging long out
of a 1 liter pop bottle. I feel something inside tighten, twist.

Marisa and Hadassah and Erica are up ahead, huddled together, hands
drawn up into warmth of coat sleeves, waiting for staff from Center for
Student Missions to meet us, give us directions for the night. Tyler
and Dan and J.D. are closer to the street, checking out models of cars
blurring by in thickening twilight. I can hear Dan's voice above the
others, "Catch that little beemer? Sweet." Kids mingle, joke, laugh,
wait.

I'm a few steps behind this bulk of back and tangled hair, watching our
kids already gathered up there on the street. And I see him pull down a
mask. He's pulling down a mask, walking into the center of them.

I walk faster.

I can see his hands gesticulating, but from behind him, I can't make
out his words, words muffled under the plastic of the clown's mask. Yet
over his shoulder, I can see the uneasiness of Marisa's eyes and see
Hadassah's ashen face. Then I catch a phrase. "Why you think I'm
wearing this %*$#& mask? Hey? Why?"

Hadassah's stepping back. The raspy voice yells louder, leans into
these home schooled, mostly farm kids. "Why would I wear a *$%# mask
like this?"

Tyler's not watching vehicles. Lean and lanky, sunglasses hanging from
the neck of his jersey, he shifts from one foot to the other. Erica
scuffs her shoe at the crack in the sidewalk. None of us know what to
do with this. It's not on the itinerary.

Then this man rips the mask from his face and the blade of his howl
slashes at us all stiffened to this spot here. "I'm wearing the &%$#&
mask to mask my feelings."

He shakes the painted rubber face in his hand. "I'm masking the real
me! Know what I mean?"

I want to raise a hand to my own face, see if I can peel off mine.

There are more words, drifting ones, but I can't hear them. I can see
his wide shoulders seem to slump, shudder. Erica looks up. Tyler chews
his lip. And the night air on Yonge Street, with the traffic still
whistling by, fills with this guttural moan, this pitched wail. It's
the exposing of a naked soul. He's crying. Sobbing. I catch snatches
.. "I'm so *&$**# up ... Jesus ... Savior ... need ... know what I
mean? ... Just so ... Jesus ... Lord ... know what I mean?"

Bared, he writhes, storms past me, a flurry of tears, hair, hands. A
mother in the group calls softly after, "Jesus loves you ..."

He stops. Half turning, he tries to steady his voice between the
wracking of sadness, tries to find the face that went with that voice.
"Yeah, He does. And He loves you too, lady."

The wind whips at his hair and he blusters down the street.

If the story had ended there, we would have had questions, knots I'd
have worked long at loosening, and his face, that mask held up in
clenched fist, would have lurked in memory alleys of that night. But
God has more on the itinerary.

Later, we run into him again at the door of the mission. His mask's
still in hand.

His eyes dart, desperate, driven. He's not done. He stands in the
middle of the street, blocking the way of our Street Mission worker.
There's more to this story, lines he's got wrong, parts we haven't
understood. Do we have time to listen? "Hey, I'm sorry, okay, lady?
I've got issues, know what I mean? I'm like, bipolar."

His buddy spews his drink, mocking. "You're not bipolar." Like
graffiti, the label's smeared across the coming dark, a cuss word. But
the scoffing doesn't deter. It's us he's got to say something to,
whatever this is. "Hey, I'm *&%$#* messed up, man. Look at me!" He
steps into the company of young people. Some look away. "Look at me!"
His rage shakes us.

So I look. His nose is crooked, busted up somewhere, healed all wrong.
His mouth clings to a few brown teeth. His skin's pocked, ruddy, and
his eyes look like a childhood friend's. Maybe he's my age. "I'm a
**%$& retard. Fried my brain on crack, know what I mean? Gotta
pacemaker in here." He pounds his chest. "OD'ed just down there," he
waves his hand, "and it took them five hours to find me. Don't do
crack, know what I mean?" His eyes are fiery, searching the faces of
these country kids. "Don't get &*%*$# messed up like I did. Love your
mom and dad cuz they love you, know what I mean?" He's choking back
emotion.

I wonder where his mom and dad are -- if they know he's here, like
this, if they care that he's in all this strangling torture. "Gotta
Bible?"

He's in Erica's face.

But this, this is what we came for. But we didn't think it'd be like
this.

Erica manages a slight shake of the head. "Who's got a Bible?" he
hollers at us all.

I'd had one in my small backpack all weekend, but for tonight's street
walk, we'd been instructed to bring no money, and I'd left everything
back in a locked church basement.

He rummages in his duffle bag. Kids look at each other. But we don't
move.

He shoves a dog-earred red Gideon's Bible at Erica. "Read Romans 7:14
to Romans 8."

"Who's got a Bible?"

I can hardly hear over the traffic, the rumble of the city. "Louder. So
they can all hear you!"

Then comes Erica's voice, calmed by these words she knows and the
Person in them. "... I do not understand what I do. For what I want to
do ..."

And a low bass throbs.

It's his voice. He's mumbling the words from memory, his eyes
penetrating, his hand keeping beat with each word Erica reads, "... but
I hate what I do."

I still inside, rapt. His cerebellum's scorched with fraudulent relief
and yet these words are branded deeper, right into his core. "... I
know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature." He
slurs some of the words, stumbles. Erica reads on and he marks each
word with a swaying hand, his voice echoing hers, "For I have the
desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out."

He's rocking his whole body to the cadence of ancient words, this cry
that his flesh weeps. He turns my way and I look into tearing eyes,
begging eyes ... "What a wretched man that I am!"

He's peeled it all off and here stands the cold, bare skin of a soul. I
can hardly look.

Then there's an exchange of words that I can't hear, our mission worker
saying something, nodding and he muttering something in return. Then
our group spills past, escapes. And when I, the last one, trickle past,
he makes eye contact, asks, "Did I get it right this time?"

Something right. Did I get something, anything, in this busted body
right? Do I do any of the good I long to do? The plea madly tugs.
Doesn't it echo off the walls of humanity?

I can't fix the consequences of his past, but I can nod, look in deep.
"Thank you." I say the words slowly, hoping they soak into his pores.
He'd wanted to share hope and Jesus with us. Had his second encounter
got it right? I don't know really, but this heart knew the howl of his,
and I nod again. "Thank you for sharing."

Into the Toronto night we walk, carrying glimpses of Christ we'd see in
the other. For isn't the worst kind of homelessness these masks we wear
-- homes outside of Christ?

Later that weekend, I'd come home, pull back clean sheets, tuck my own
boys into peace. And, with no warning, little Malakai's lip would waver
and tears brim, and when I pulled him close, he'd whimper words I
didn't know where they came from, or why then. "I just sin so much,
Mom. I can't even remember all the sins and bad things I've done." His
chest would heave and the words lurch out. "I ... just ... sin ... so
.. much."

And I'd hold him and gently say the last verses, ones a wild man
groaned, "Who will rescue ... from this body of death? Thanks be to God
-- through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Romans 7:25).

On a Sunday night while the rain fell, I'd hold my little Kai and let
him cry into me, and stroke his still-soft cheek. And I'd think how
names don't matter, about how we are all the same under all these
masks, and of a nameless man, somebody's boy too, and me too, with my
own messiness and brokenness.

We're all just wretched ones clutching, unmasked and naked, to the
Cross where He hung naked, our only hope.
....

yeah, that is a pretty amazing piece of writing right there.

Kels..

stranger than your sympathy, this is my apology, i'm killing myself from the inside out, and now my fears have pushed you out, i wished for things that i don't need, all i wanted, what i chase don't set me free, all i wanted, and i get scared but i'm not crawling on my knees, everythings all wrong, where the hell did i think i was?..its easy to forget, till you choke on your regrets, who the hell did i think i was? i'm now sure where I belong, nowheres home and i'm all wrong...

"Why is light given to those in misery, and life to the bitter of soul, to those who long for death that does not come, who search for it more than for hidden treasure, who are filled with gladness, and rejoice when they reach the grave?..For sighing comes to me instead of food; my groans pour out like water.  What I feared has come to me; what I dreaded has happened to me.  I have no peace, no quietness; I have no rest, but only turmoil..."

Job 3:20-36, read by Abby at the beginning of this week's episode of ER.

Heylos.

complete utopia. my version of yoga, or meditation. no worries. no thoughts. no awareness of my surroundings, just vague knowledge of what my body happens to be touching. lost in the imagination of my brain.

joy. suspense. sadness. desire. awe.

peace. 

nothing makes me so at complete ease as when I am completely and fully absorbed in a book. I love what a good book does to me. It takes me away from my own world of confusion, pain, thoughts and emotions and submerges me in a whole other world. a world that fuels my already extreme imagination.

when i used to watch t.v. i always had a book in my hands. during commercials I would absorb myself in the book until the show came back. but more often then not, i would go to change the channel subconciously thinking that the story in the book had been a show. i wanted to get back to it. the book held so many more possibilities than the television did for my imagination. it became visual for me...i can see characters, places, objects, all in my brain. i see the characters, their features, their expressions. it completely takes me away...

of course that only happens with good books. i've always been the type of person that liked the random book found at the library. the one that had an author that nobody had ever heard off. i do still have authors that I've grown to love..

k.a. applegate (my first love, animorphs and everworld) scott westerfield (peeps, midnighters), Carol Plum-Ucci (what happened to lani garver), lurlene mcdaniel...and i suppose i have to add another to this list. the woman that got me to write this entry..

stephanie meyer.

why yes, i have turned into a Twilight freak. I have been waiting to read this book for hmm. let me see. at least three years. I was on one of my frequent visits to the high school library and my eyes happened to linger on a book that caught my eye. i picked it up and instantly liked it...mainly because it was a fairly large book with many pages ( i always like the big ones). i had to put it back down though as I told myself that I would get it later, as I had come to get another book and I had already reached my maximum load to take out.  I never got a chance to get it though and it has been haunting me ever since.  this was way before the book ever became popular...before the movie began to be filmed...before everybody in the book loving world was all about it.  which made me hate myself more and more because I had had it in my handddds.

well last year was too busy. i couldn't find time to do anything. so the first day of my sophomore year of college i went to the library and reserved it. i'm poor so i can't afford to buy anything but food at this moment in time...but that will change. SIX WEEKS LATER i got the book. i waited. paitently. and then i read it.

in five hours.

I HATE when i do that to myself.  I just get so absorbed that I can't put it down. I stayed in bed all day in my pjs and read. completely gave myself away to the imagination of mrs. meyers and let myself go. I was in another world. I couldn't stop. i cooked spaghetti for supper with the book still in my hand. i didn't even bother going to the bathroom. i was in a whole different world...and I LOVED IT.

now I can't get it out of my mind. I read it too fast, i know that. it was just so goooooood. i couldn't stop. and now i'm here. stuck without the next three books until i order them used off of amazon. until then my thoughts will be devoted to what might happen next and what has happened...to edward and bella. to how simply amazing that story truly is.  I've already reread some of it...and despite how I told myself that i would wait, i read the first chapter of New Moon that was supplied at the end of the book. bad bad move on my part. way to make it even more suspensful for myself.

ERG.

my name is kelsey smith and I am a book addict.

i suppose I'll start rereading Everworld to try and get my mind off of it..doubt it'll work. edward and bella are so in depth in my subconcious at the moment that I'm dreaming about it. <-- thats why you don't read books SO FAST. cause they won't get out of your head. and because they end way tooo soon. you want them to last.

--

before I end I must ask:

am I the only one completely distraught at the fact that ER is in its last season?  ahhh . its been on for fourteen years...I haven't been watching that long, cause I'm really not that old enough to...I was too busy watching Zoom when I was five.  I do believe I have been watching it for at least ten though..I know I was watching it for sure in third grade, maybe second.  It was easy for me to watch after my aunt died of cancer.  I had seen so much of the medical world so early in life, I needed to understand it better and ER did that for me. I've moved from Chicago Hope, to Strong Medicine on Lifetime, to presently House..but ER started it all.  Its what made me become fully aware about my passion of human anatomy and fueled my career choices.  i'll have to live for the reruns, like i do in the summer I guess.

Kels..

random high school pictures I found and felt like sharing..

one of my favorites. kelsey to a tee- laughing and thinking, my gosh we're idiots, but thats ok. its more fun when your weird. i like how jon's eye is in the picture, adds to the randomness.

one of the first times matt and I hung out...we were on our way with Riley, Logan, and Brandon to see Talledaga Nights for the second time (this was brandon's turn, previously was jons. they hated eachother at that moment in time, oooooh memories.) again, logan's eye is in the picture, adding more randomness.

human anatomy. not doing work. go figure. i like how we match..we're like a gigantic bruise- black and blue all over.

ahhh Matty and Ky..managering a game of basketball...getting visited by the ex manager, whose position of stats I took over (and kicked butt at thank you very much, despite the fact that i was yelled at about rebounds all year hah. they never argued when they liked what I said about them though. selfish little brats- "that was MY rebound, not ben's, ben NEVER rebounds")

priceless. Jon Burgandy. Gertrude the field reporter. dang I'm showing off some leg...more leg then I think I've ever shown haha. i loooooooove the shoulder pads. fashionable.

Kels..

"Blessed are ye that weep now; for ye shall laugh.  Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reporach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake.  Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy; for, behold, your reward is great in heaven...Luke 6:21-23

But i say unto you which hear, Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you.  Bless them that curse you, and pray for them which despitefully use you. And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other...Luke 6:27-29

But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping for nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest...Luke 6:35

that hits the nail on the head, now doesn't it?  I like the first part..rejoice in that day and leap for joy when men hate you and separate you from their company.  boy, I should have been leaping years ago haha..

I'm leaping now, Lord.

college is interesting. I hate it, God knows that for sure. I hate it with every cell in my body. But in the words of Vinny "God is putting you there right now, so go and follow Him." He has plans for me, though I may not understand them.  I think sometimes I have the opposite problem that most people have...I tend to see the 'big picture' in the future, but not the small picture right now.  I'm learning.

so on Friday nights and weekends I sit in my apartment. I do not go out partying. I do not hang out with friends, because I really don't have any that feel how I feel, or believe what I believe (and if they do they are too far away or busy). So Matt and I are pretty much completely over it...we really don't need to try and find company, because we know what they say about us when we are not around.  Sometimes it confuses me..(am I really that annoying? hahaha). Sometimes I ask myself what I do wrong to make people not want to hang around with us...but then I read God's Word and I understand. 

its ok...I prefer it this way. I'd rather just stay home and watch a movie with Matt. hes my best friend anyways.  I've been over what people thought about me for a long time now, so it doesn't bug me if they think I'm a loser.  I'm entertained by it most of the time actually.   However, if you do want to come join us, give me a holler.  We have netflix now, which is pretty darn cool. 

Most of my friends from high school don't talk to me anymore.  Thats ok, its not like I wasn't expecting it.  They've all let the college life take hold of them.  They let the need to fit in take them over, so they drink and party, have sex.  Makes me sad that they've let themselves go like that.  I find it weird that people allow their friends (classmates, people who surround them, whatever) to control how they think and behave.  We talked about that in my education class this week...how usually it takes to well after college until people start to think for themselves. peer pressure, hah. I find that weird, but I'm sure that most people, especially those my age, see me as the weird one cause I haven't given a crap what people thought or wanted of me since I was in middle school. I guess that happens when you find God..definately thankful for that.

I have questions for God as to what I should do.  Should I try to talk to them about it? Should I try to explain that they are just trying to fill a hole that cannot be filled without Him? The alcohol, the sex, the constant need to fit in is all an attempt to feel l o v e d and wanted, to fill that hole in their heart.  Why work so hard when its so easy? When its a free gift from God? I have this need in my heart to talk to my old friends, especially one in particular that I've already given so much time to. No matter what I do I cannot separate myself from this need to reach out, to get them to m o v e. I have faith in them that they can do it, but I don't think they have faith in themselves.  I know that most of them, especially one of them, don't really want to move. They don't care about how they are living, and they enjoy their life.  They don't see the big picture...and I fear they won't until its too late. 

so how do I get through to them? exactly how do I talk to them? what do I say to make them listen?  I know I can't do it on my own, and thats where God comes in.  I can't do it for them, they need to do it for themselves and they can only do that with help from God.  Still, I have that need. and I need to satisfy it...but how?

'Father hear my prayer, I need the perfect words, words that he will hear and know they're straight from You.  I don't know what to say, I only know it hurts, to see my only friend slowly fade away.  So maybe this time, I'll speak the Words of Life, with Your fire in my eyes, but that old familiar fear is tearing at my words, what am I so afraid of, cause here I go again...

                                       if he would just believe, he would never die. 

Kels..

i want nothing more than to sit outside heavens door and listen to you breathing..its where I want to be.