My Smile

I ran into one of the first testings of my faith since last semester--hard. :) It's a test of courage and faith. I didn't too so well at first. It's been on my mind since last night, but I'm trying hard to analyze and make sense of something I'm feeling inside, and I'm not refering to what my good friend Micah said, "you're better off than you think." He's right, but there's something else. Something like a chord that was struck and I mysteriously found it on key and the one I've been missing all along. But it's having a strange effect.

I just glanced at my wall. On it is a quote I heard a couple years ago that's served as a benchmark in my life. "Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are."

And then a quote from Braveheart, "Men don't follow titles, they follow courage."

We sang a song in chapel today that set my heart at ease, and held my hand in comfort. It reminded me of my lot in life, my total abandonment to all measure of worth this world, friends, or any person can offer--and in its place a desperate call to true discipleship in view of the grace of God, that costly grace of God. Being real and fully alive.

"Your pardon is a gift of love,
Your grace alone must save us,
Our works will not remove our guilt,
The strictest life would fail us.
Let none in deeds or merits boast,
But let us own the Holy Ghost
for He alone can change us:
Only by grace, by grace alone."
Written by Martin Luther

"He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all--how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen. It is God who justifies. Who is he that condems?" Romans 8:31-34