It was just a car door. Or was it?

I don't think this will come out like I want it to but I have to give it a try sometime. I can always fix it later ...

I'm all about experiences. Experiencing Father, Son and Holy Spirit, other people, smells, tastes, sounds, sights, touch .... the 5 senses. Everything we do every day is an experience. Now, weather or not we are engaged with experiencing every moment of every day is a different story. Sometimes it can be hard to stay engaged. It seems the easiest times to stay engaged is when we have an experience with someone or people that raises the bar above the previous standard we had before that experience. This also potentially creates connection between those people as well as understanding. All because of a different, better, higher experience than before.

I may talk a lot about big things in life but I pay real close attention to small things. Like the movement of eyebrows when people are talking, the way peoples mouths move the same exact way every time when they say certain letters or certain phrases, how someone holds their pen, if someone walks with their toes pointed straight out or if a foot is turned out as they move along in this life, facial expressions when reacting to situations, ect ect ...

I also pay attention if people remember to lock my car doors after I've asked them many times and they already know they need to lock them. I have always had to remind everyone to lock my doors even if they have been in my car 50 times. That all changed with one different experience.

It actually took me a while to get used to a person always remembering to lock my car and me not having to remind her. I remember she would get slightly annoyed that I would remind her because I had told her about my slight twitch about me having to tell people about locking my car (I don't know why it's such a deal, but it is. Only with people who know my doors aren't automatic, not people who rid in my car the first time or only have like twice. I'm talkin bout the regulars ... dont get offended guys, you didn't know). Even after I stopped reminding her I would even look at the lock to make sure. She made it a point to lock my car all the time on purpose because she knew my feelings about it so that I wouldn't have to ask her. I havent asked her for prob a year to lock my car door and I have stopped looking at the lock to make sure it was pushed in. I just know she does it. She's the only one I don't have to ask. Different experience.

This is very small in comparison to what it takes in most cases in life to change your mind about someone, something and how him/her/they/it affects you. But this little baby experience solidified my conviction about needing to have positive experiences with people to change our perspectives and the way we relate to people in our lives. If I am hurt from an experience in the past, I have to experience a positive action that will heal that wound. It would be wonderful if it would happen in one encounter but most times we have to experience it more than once.

I bet this might be a reason why God doesn't make things happen instantly for us all the time. He is interested in healing his people by us having wondrous experiences with him and then us having radically different experiences with each other that creates another world for people who don't know Jesus to want to know him. We experience him and changed, we experience each other as a result of experiencing him and people who haven't experienced tangible Jesus yet experience him though us since we have been changed though each other though him.

John 13:34,35 "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

Life

I am horrible at blogging. Clearly, if it takes me 6 months in between blogs when I said I was ready. ha.

Here's the deal though, I'm pretty sure one person maybe two read this thing. The one person who reads it is also the only one who encourages me to write in it. She is also someone who gets to hear what is in my heart on a regular basis so my logical thinking is like this: "if she's the only one that reads this thing as well as the only one who encourages me to write in it so she can read it and she also gets to hear my heart on a regular basis, then what the heck am I writing on this thing for?" So there is my reasoning for extended lulls in my writing on this blog. Correct me anyone if you read this thing, making it more than one person who reads it. I used to blog a lot back in the day about the happenings in my life, which I'm not about doing that to the extent that I did before. I don't want just anyone to be able to get a glimpse that deep into my emotions and heart. A little sure, because we write out of who we are, so of course a glimpse in is going to happen but not like it used to. That is reserved for those who have earned trust and are mature enough to carry and protect what is in me.

Speaking of ...

To handle hearts with care is something that I want to be known for by all, not because I say it but only because I do it. I am an actions person. You can give me all the words you want but if your actions do not parallel, I question your words. I also do that with myself. I always work at making sure my words and actions align. No, I'm not perfect but I do work intentionally on it and care about it.

I think being full of care, especially as christians, of everyones hearts is a core value that all should adopt. The heart is the most important part of a person. Life comes out of it. Life. LIFE. [crap, i just got a flood of thoughts that all connect in with this ... do i go through those thoughts or not? ... we'll see]

Life. It's love, creative and creativity comes from this place, innovative, breath taking, mysterious, concious, thoughtful, intricate, broad, expandable, it doesn't end but can be quenched. This list is vastly limited because there is no way I could ever come close to describing it anyway, so there are a few discriptional words for Life for you off the top of my head. Psalm 4:23 "Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life."


In 2005 I had just started reading the bible for real. In about month 6 of reading I came across Colossians 1:16 "For by him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by him and for him." Then the Father (I didn't know it was him at the time but I do know now it was his voice out of the trinity that was speaking) said to me, "Katrina, that includes people's hearts. They are not yours, they are all mine, treat them as such. I look at the hearts of man and I see their actions." I instantly died. Amen. 


So this encounter with Him has dictated how I approach, treat, see, look at and engage people. I haven't been perfect because I'm not perfect. He knows though. He knows he killed me. Killed me dead. So that He can live in there amongst imperfect actions but perfect and holy desire. It's the great thing about Him living in us. He makes our desires holy and loves us to change behaviors that will line up with those desires. What a journey. The journey of life. My heart and everyone else's heart are not mine or for me. They are his and for him. All the time, every second of every day of every year, for eternity. I am not my own and you are not mine. I am blessed to enjoy myself and those around me every day, paying attention to the life that flows from the hearts of the redeemed and those still to step into redemption through the Christ. 


Looks like that's all for now. 

I think I can start talking now

I think I'm finally ready to start talking. Well, maybe writing, but it's talking to me so I'll stick with talking.

Recently I had been wishing that I would have blogged once a week or every two weeks since I have been in Redding (Sept 2008). Then I thought maybe that wouldn't have been a good idea. Taking notes on my life yes, but blogging, probably not. Probably not because every day for 18 months I was changing.

18 months. That's 72 weeks and 504 days.

That is not even an exaggeration, nor a prideful annunciation. When I say I was changing I mean how I think, what I believe (about myself, others, life, Jesus, kingdom ect ... the list goes on), why I think and believe it, the freedom to think big or small as long as I was thinking. From one week to the next I had no idea who I was the week before and a lot of times even the day before. There's no way I could have even explained how I was changing to you because I couldn't even explain what was happening to me myself. It wasn't just happening to me either, it was happening to all of the amazing people I was in school with. I came out to Redding having no idea what I was doing, I just heard the drum beat per se and I knew there was more and I was supposed to be here. I was thinking that I was going to learn about Jesus and get some good teaching and call it accomplished. I was absolutely and completely wrong.

I did not just get teaching, I met Holy Spirit. I did not accomplish anything, I am the one who got accomplished. I do not only have a message, I am a message. I am transformed and still transforming ... by His power into His likeness.

When I say changed, I really mean it. Everyday I would come into our class time with my classmates, who became my family, not knowing what we were going to learn that day. We would worship Jesus with all we had before class started (that alone changed me everyday) and then get bombarded with a Kingdom that I knew I was a part of and that had to exist I just hadn't seen it walked out in real life. There were times when I was exhausted spiritually and mentally because I had never heard (just dreamt) of a life like this and it's beautiful allure and bombardment into my life took my inner world by storm and rearranged it. Actually in the summer of 2009 I'm pretty sure I only went to church 3 times because I couldn't even handle any more internal rearranging. My spirit and my mind were exhausted.

So here it goes. Now that I can look back and see what was really happening in me, around me and through me, I can now export it better than I could as it was happening.

Some of it might not make sense. A lot of it will sound crazy. But this ... this is some of what the Father has done in my life. He's more real than the air we breathe. He's not a religion or set of rules to be followed, He's a man who has captured my heart. He's greater than anything natural. His power is supernatural. His love is radically wrecking and transforming my life. Every day, because of Him I will never be the same. I've been encountered by Him and He by me. He has made me a brand new creation and I am His daughter.

My life and my transformation to wholeness is what He died for.

These will be the stories and experiences of Jesus told through my life.

I hope they rock you.

My Worship Will Never Stop

In the past 2 months I have changed into a completely different person. Again and again. I'm not even the same person I was a week ago. So different I'm having to get to know myself again.

I have done this, I think to this extent, a few times since June 2, 2005. I can because I'm a new creation and I receive from a Man who is endless. Thus, I can become a completely different person with just another encounter with this man named Jesus.

I have learned and experienced what it's like to worship the King of glory with all abandonment. I've gone to the throne of grace with no adgena but to tell him how wonderful he is and to extravgently give myself to the praise of who he is.

In the past 2 months I have felt great pain; have had many tears caught in my Father's hand; felt the wonderful joy of the Lord; been with the poorest of the poor; held a child's hand who died 2 days later; rejoiced during the rehersal of the Adoria Fashion Show; have been more vulnerable than I have ever been before; confronted, challenged and persued by love; had a wonderful dream come true; been shown great mercy by God who is continually pouring out his goodness in my life and many many many more things that involve being ravished by his love.

Again, I don't even know who I am right now because I'm so lost in him. Every breath is worship. I'm breathing in heaven and exhaling it wonders. I'm amongst the most amazing worshipers I have ever been around as a group. Our pastors in school don't even know how to transition from worship to class time because they don't even want to have to stop us from worshipping the King. I am bold enough to say (ha, i dont even think it's all that bold because I know it would happen) that I think that someone who isn't saved would get saved just by coming into our worship sessions. When we worship him, he comes down and dwells among us. His presence is the thickest thing I have ever felt in my life. It's weighty. It's holy. It's .... amazing. How could we ever live without it? Every time I go deeper into him i think, "How have I been living without this??!!"

And the most wonderful thing is .... I get to give this to the world.

ramblings of life, glory and giving it away.

Life is out there, waiting to be taken by any brave soul that will capture it. Wanting to be grasped and transformed by the ideas you posess. Have you been told? And if not, why? Or have you, and you just deny it with a false humility that is running ramped through the body of Christ? The false humility that says we are nothing. That's not humility at all. It's acutally denying the greatness of God. We are created in His image. Each of us an expression of His unending character and glory. Each of us to subdue the earth and bring heaven here. His door is always open as He waits in anticipation of us opening ours. We are, whether you believe it or not, great. We are glorious. We are wonderful. And the earth is waiting for us to be revealed. The earth is crying out for us to be who we are. Loving Jesus. Posessing Him in all our our uniqueness and glory.

We each posess a glory. The radiant sons and daughters have a glory that is incomparable to anything in this world and it would be quite foolish to even attempt to do so. Christ in YOU the hope of glory. Christ in each and every one of us created differently expressing God through our own character and attributes. What if that fact alone was so deep in the hearts of the sons and daughters of Eden? How would our outlook on life be? What would we accomplish? If we knew we really couldn't fail, how would this shift our thinking?

But another question rises. How would we give this to others? Instead of displaying signs that fill the hearts of men with pain and even more hurt and rejection through our own religious judgements, what if we displayed the signs that made people wonder? The signs of love that make those who don't know grace or mercy hunger for it. That we, the ones who have received grace and mercy may give it to them. To rejoice with those who rejoice when our own world is crumbling around us. To mourn with those who mourn when our own world is filled with joy and prosperity. To be in and carry the presence of the Lord through worship so heavily that all we have to do is say to the lame man, "get up and walk. you are healed." To take time out of our own busy schedule and adgenda for "our ministry" and "our calling" to pour into those who are wondering in bewilderment needing someone to tell them they have been found and to run after what is in their heart because God put it there.

What would happen if we decided it in our very own hearts to invest in others. To invest our own hearts and selves into those, with the hope that they will do greater things than we have because we have added our own lives to theirs. Our celining is their floor. They begin where we left off. They won't have to start from scratch because they freely got what we had as an inheritance to them.

What would this do to our land? How much healing, restoration, and redemption would take place among a people like this? Those who understand that life is for those who will grasp and take hold of it, who unashamedably know who they are, and who give it away like a billionare could pass out $1 bills.

"For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea." I'm bringing this into present day. I think as we know the glory we have as well as the glory of the Lord the earth will be filled with this knowledge as well. We are carriers of the Spirit of the God of the universe. Life is waiting for us to take hold of it as we realize we carry a glory that transforms those and situations around us. How will we walk?

Just some of my thoughts on life, glory, and giving it away.