❝We are here on this earth to know God intimately, fully, correctly, and contagiously; to house His holy person in our very bodies, allowing Him to showcase to the world around us His loving nature, His attitude, His thoughts, His emotions, and His actions through the way we live every moment of our lives.❞
– Eric Ludy
❝Don’t believe something just because you want to, and don’t embrace an idea just because you’ve always believed it. Believe what is Biblical. Test all your assumptions against the precious words God gave us in the Bible.❞
– Francis Chan
❝A fish would never be happy living on land, because it was made for water. An eagle could never feel satisfied if it wasn’t allowed to fly. You will never feel completely satisfied here on earth, because you were made for more. You will have happy moments here, but nothing compared with what God has planned for you.❞
– Rick Warren
❝The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become - because He made us. He invented us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be. It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own.❞
– C.S. Lewis (via untilonlyloveremains)
❝Will God ever ask you to do something you are not able to do? The answer is yes-all the time! It must be that way, for God’s glory and kingdom. If we function according to our ability alone, we get the glory; if we function according to the power of the Spirit within us, God gets the glory. He wants to reveal Himself to a watching world.❞
– Henry Blackaby
❝For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.❞
– Romans 8:38-39

I talked to my family (aunts/uncles/cousins/etc.) today. Most of them were complaining about the situation in North Carolina. I felt a little one-sided, given that I don’t give a damn about gay marriage, but I hope next time I can explain that I don’t believe it’s up to believers to hinder it’s legalization, especially considering divorce rates within the church at large. Too busy waving around their morals, they aren’t bothering with the message.

I wouldn’t want to live in a place where homosexuality was more prevalent than heterosexuality and I had a million and one jerks telling me my feelings aren’t right enough to be bound to another person.

There are starving kids, broken people, homeless families, abusive parents, sex slaves, etc. People are out there, hurting, needing love and compassion but instead, we all wanna think politics and forget all about showing the honest love we were ordered to display. Getting your panties in a bunch over gay marriage? Alright, fine, but at the end of the day, I think the church has bigger fish to fry.

❝I want people to leave with hope. Knowing that in a world that is getting darker and more violent; and a world that tells you that you don’t matter unless you are rich and popular, that you matter to God. He simply loves you just as you are.❞
– John Cooper, Skillet (via alovefromabove)
❝I feel [while] it is important to reach out to people who aren’t Christians, people don’t want to be preached at-they want to be loved on.❞
– Jon Micah Sumrall (via alovefromabove)
❝Everybody in the world struggles with feelings of defeat or hopelessness. Most people just do a really good job of hiding their feelings, so those of us who are not so good at hiding wind up looking like there is something wrong with us. God is not offended by your honesty. Most of your “Christian” friends might be offended by it, but God is not. Go to Him with it, and I believe with all of my heart that he will take what seems to be a terrible thing, and use it for the good. It might take a lot longer than you want it to, but the wait will be worth it.❞
– Warren Barfield
❝Jesus commanded us to love our neighbor, and our neighbor can be anybody. We are all created in the image of God, and we are all sacred, valuable creations of God. Everybody matters. To treat people differently based on who believes what is to fail to respect the image of God in everyone. As the book of James says, “God shows no favoritism.” So we don’t either.❞
– Rob Bell