With Regards To Your Homosexuality Conversation As A Gay Christian Man, I Don't Agree With This. For

I’ve always had trouble with this idea of “hearing from God.” I always side-eye those super A+ put-together Christians who were hearing from God every week, and somehow I was outside the door of some secret club where God was throwing around fortune cookies full of His life-changing secrets.Let’s consider that God does speak to us every week. Let’s consider photosynthesis, the spinning of atoms, the burning of stars, the breath we just breathed, your child’s messy drawing, the twitching of your neurons to fire off emotions, a hug from your best friend. Let’s consider the sustaining of our molecules, which is purely by His grace. Let’s see all we are missing when our eyes are locked on a screen when the world is unrolling around us, as God makes His glory known through nature and coincidence. Let’s consider Christ, who is God’s spoken word and His very own glorious radiance (Hebrews 1:2-3). Let’s consider that God is already within the silence, and that even when we do not “feel” Him, God is okay with this too.

J.S. from this post (via yesdarlingido)

Now that I have a Lightbox I can take updated photos of Archibald Asparagus Saint Sebastian

“God made us then whispered “think symphony, not solo.” Individually capable, collectively unbelievable.”

— Bob Goff (via littlethingsaboutgod)

The Names of God

You Are Beautiful - Mike Young

Katherine Brown - Fill a Stable - Fill a Stable

Hi friends! This is me SHAMELESSLY promoting my latest fundraising venture! I'm participating in World Vision's "Fill a Stable" event with my university society. It would mean the world to me if you would donate and help us reach our goal of $1200.00.  Thank you in advance :) With love,  -Katherine

any trans person reading this I love you

any woman reading this I love you

any poc minority reading this I love you

any queer person reading this I love you

edit:

no matter how many trolls or trumpies come in my comments and spew their nonsense I will keep saying it over and over and over again no matter how many times to show them I will not change. I will never choose violence or hate ever.

any disabled person reading this I love you

any person out of country that wished they could desperately help I love you

Any parents of a queer child who did everything they deemed “right” to protect their child and still feel as though they failed I love you

any person on the spectrum I love you

Any SA survivors I love you

Any person that needs life threatening healthcare and can’t afford it I love you

Any diabetic person I love you

I don’t know you. But I love you. I will always choose love that’s not a bad thing nor will I ever feel bad about choosing it

The greater good is exactly the size of a single human life. The greater good is no greater than the well-being of the lowest member of society. To sacrifice any human for the greater good is to sacrifice the greater good itself.

On the nature of love.

You know how people say that love is powerful? I'm not sure if this is gonna sound really hippy-ish but I wanna talk about love. Love is absolutely, beyond a shadow of a doubt, the most powerful force in existence. This is real love I'm talking about now. Love that *chooses* to be committed to someone despite circumstances, despite emotions, despite personal desires, and despite any mistakes that someone might have made, and any flaws that someone might have. Love that means putting someone else before yourself. I saw the movie Frozen, and *spoiler alert*, the central conflict was thawing Anna's frozen heart, a feat which only true love can accomplish. I greatly appreciated the fact that Anna's heart was thawed not by "true love's kiss" but by her own self sacrifice to save her sister's life. THAT, my friends, is an accurate portrayal of true love. Love is the force that conquers hate and conquers fear and conquers apathy. It is the force that connects and binds all of humankind to one another. It is the force that heals the broken and saves the lost. Love offers truth even when it's hard and grace even when it's harder. Love will never ever ever ever ever ever give up. Love is divine. Love is the closest that humans can get to Godliness. Because God Himself is Love. His essence is entirely love. All love is from Him and is of Him. Any person who has the ability to love someone else can only do so by the power of God and the spirit and soul that God has placed within us. Your love is a piece of God in your life. As long as you know love, you know God. God is great and mighty and all-powerful and vast and crazy amazing and the human mind cannot possible fathom Him, BUT the closest you will ever get to understanding Him is simply to love. Therefore, love is NOT simply warm fuzzy feelings and cute romcoms and sad country music. It's not even an emotion or a relationship. It is a supernatural force. It is the essence of God! Never underestimate the power of God's love for you. It is fierce and it is all-consuming and it is all-encompassing and it conquers every single other thing in all of existence. Never forget that. Never underestimate the power of your love for the people around you. The best thing you can do for this world is to love yourself and to love others, because when we each begin to do that, then this world will know true peace and true joy.

New Year's Reflections

At the beginning of 2015, I was broken. Broken like something that didn’t work right. Something had gone wrong in my brain and I was glitching. I had just come out of the worse year of my life, and January 2015 followed possibly the most serious emotional/psychological crisis of my young life. I wasn’t me. My self esteem was virtually nonexistent, replaced by omnipresent self loathing. All of my relationships were in shambles, corroded by incessant deceit and self sabotage. I honestly wasn’t sure how I was even still in school based on my grades. And I had strayed so far from the moral path I wanted to be on that I didn’t even recognize myself. I was broken. My life had become nothing but a toxic cycle of lies, guilt, tears, denial, avoidance, and self destructive habits*.

 And 2015 was the year that God fixed me. I am in awe of His care for me. He had orchestrated the perfect cure for the bugs in my system, because He knows what is good for His children. He reminded me of who I am. Summer 2015 was basically like a hard reset for me. Like when your laptop freezes so you hold the power button until it restarts. That’s what God did to me this summer. He sent me to Africa where I felt more alive and more myself than anywhere else ever before. He reminded me of the purpose He placed inside me and the plan He has for my life. Then He sent me to camp where I met girls who not only understood the regrets and struggles in my past, but could relate and sympathize, and they accepted and loved me unconditionally. I learned that I’m damaged, and I’m not perfect, and I glitch sometimes, but I’m still capable and usable and worthy of love. It’s amazing to feel God’s grace in the realest form I’ve ever felt it. The grace that makes me beautiful despite my flaws. The grace that makes me usable despite my weaknesses. The grace that justifies me. The grace that makes me worthy despite my wretched unworthiness. The grace that is so much greater than my perception of my imperfection. The grace that showed me that I can’t shrink myself into something that God cannot love because His irrevocable love transforms me into something greater than human measures. 

 2015 was a good year, by the grace of God. 

 *for the record, my self destructive habits weren't substance abuse or self harm. They were just skipping school and sucking dick. harmful but not quite as bad.