Now or later?

So the other night I was having the worst time praying. You know those times where you have to constantly stop yourself from thinking about everything else and tell yourself to pray. I finally became so frustrated with myself that I said outloud "AHH I am so sick of this! I cannot wait to just walk around in heaven and talk to You all day without being interrupted by some pathetic little human thought!" After the words came out of my mouth I kinda had a duh moment. All of my life I have heard pastors and Christians say that if you are truly a Christian you cannot wait to die and go to Heaven. I always feel awful when I hear that because even though I'm sure heaven is incredible and like nothing I've ever seen before, the truth is I don't want to die yet. I mean, I have alot of things I wanna do for God before my life is over. Here is the truth, nobody in the world wants to burn forever in Hell, and everyone would love to live an eternity in some crazy awesome place where the streets are made of gold and all of that I mean that is sort of a no brainer right? But our little brains cannot think past this life on earth most times, and when you take into account all of the people you love in this world and all the plans you have made you can't help but think that you would rather stay. I believe I have been thinking of Heaven wrong the whole time. When they say every christian should desire to go to Heaven, it isn't because up there they have the huge mansions and all you can eat buffets, it's because it will be like it was with Adam and Eve. We'll be able to talk to God without fighting our human selves every step of the way. We will be able to talk without any worldly interruptions. We will be able to praise Him all day long without catching ourselves making up grocery lists in our heads. In the past I believed that the Bible didn't say a whole lot about Heaven, but the truth is it doesn't have to say alot about Heaven. All I need to know is that we get to spend eternity with our maker, and savior.

Running...

I don't know about you but every time I sin I automatically want to run as far away from God as possible. (I know that this is not just me, it is a habit that started long ago with Adam and Eve in the garden. They sort of messed up everything didn't they?) When I screw up, I go through all sorts of phases, justifying sin, twisting facts until I convince myself that I actually didn't mess up, etc. Thing is I always run as fast as i can away from God. Ya see when I am in the presence of God there is NO way I can justify sin. There is absolutely no way I can twist the truth. God is truth and perfect. In the presence of God, I have to face everything that is human in me. The problem with running from God is that it gets me exactly that, farther and farther away from my Savior, from my reason for living, from my Father. If I am truly saved by Christ being away from God should make me miserable. So I come back with my tail in between my legs feeling lower than Satan himself, and then He strikes me dead...not exactly He ends up giving me a speech like this "Reagan why do you think I died for you? Do you think I didn't know you would mess up? I died because I love you! You will never ever be enough or measure up but I never asked that of you. I asked that you would lean on me and trust me to be enough to cover your unholiness with my holiness. I told you I would make the weak strong and I will. I asked that when you mess up, you run to me and let me heal you, and then use those scars to bring me glory. I asked that you stop looking at your faults and your uncleanliness and look at the cross and the love that is there for you." How many times have I heard this? Countless times, but every time I hear it I am dumbfounded and brought to tears. God's love is enough. He died for me so that when i make a mess of my life I can run to Him and His blood can redeem me. With a promise like that, I think we should keep on running... but this time into His arms instead of away.

Take it or Leave it

One of my favorite books of all time

Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers is a story based on the book of Hosea in the Bible. A beautiful love story of a lifelong prostitute who marries a Godly man that loves her in spite of it all. Many times she runs back to her life as a hooker, she has children with other men, the whole works, and every time he brings her back and gives her all the love and grace she doesn't deserve. When I read this book sometimes I get so upset at her. "Why can't you just stay and let him love you?", "Why would you run away from this amazing life he is offering you?". then I remember that this story is about me and God. That all my life I have sold my soul a thousand times to the devil for moments of pleasure and other things. All the while I have this God who has promised me a life out of all of this shame and filth and I am constantly running back to my old life. I am a person who thinks being dishonest and cheating on someone is the worst sin.(FYI there is no such thing as "the worst sin" to God sin is sin...But I'm not God I'm just me and me still has a hard time not rating them lol) So when I look at my life and realize that every time I choose sin over God, I am cheating on my love I start to see a different picture. When I think of all this I really start to feel humble. Our God is flawless yet he still wants me. He is offering this life of beauty, grace, and peace, When I am the grossest of the gross. So whats the problem? The problem is He is asking us to trust him and love Him with all of our heart, mind, and soul. (That probably wouldn't be such a problem if we didn't live in a world where you have to have a background check and psych evaluation before you can adopt a puppy!) The other problem is we start to understand how disgusting we are. I mean put me, on my best day, up next to God and I'm not even chopped liver. The shame and knowledge of how undeserving we are scares us off. It is pretty hard to comprehend that someone so awesome could want us. But he does! He knew what we were, are, and will be and God still offers this life to us...soooo I'm taking Him up on this offer...Are you?