Advice...

If you have graduated High School and you are living at home, save your money. Now I know that isn't a revolutionary thought at all, but I still see many single twenty somethings who have a really hard time with this. It's so tempting to go out with your friends or buy that new pair of jeans on pay day or take that road trip where you will take lots of pictures of memories to put on Facebook! I know, I know, trust me I was the worst. You're not under a huge financial strain, you aren't married and you don't have kids. You may feel that you are too young to buy a house and you aren't sure what you're gonna do for the rest of your life. Who does? That does not mean you should still live paycheck to paycheck and spend it faster than its coming in! Let me give you a couple of ideas:

Since you aren't paying rent, find out what it would cost you to get your own place and then set that amount of money aside every month. After all, you don't have to spend it since your parents are being so gracious. This will help you to save (even though it might be a little tighter than you are used to) and it will help you to start budgeting now for later on when you need to pay rent. Who knows, you may even be able to save enough for a down payment on a house when you get married, that would be an awesome wedding present.

Also, say NO to free money. What do I mean by that? Credit cards. Just because it allows you a little peek into adult hood and the card may come with a cool picture on it, does not mean it is free money! In fact, it is more expensive than money! Do yourself a favor and pay cash for everything. If you don't have the cash, don't buy it. That's called living within your means. If you don't have enough means, get another job. Don't have enough time for another job? Figure out priorities and either take time away from something else or live within some other means. It all comes down to "what do you REALLY need" at this time in your life? By the way, it may seem like a really simple thought, but you cannot make time, no one can. You can only take time away from something else, we are all allotted the same 24 hours a day. Hopefully you will get to the point where you live BELOW your means.

Psalm 121

Verse 3
"He will not let you stumble;
the one who watches over you will not slumber."
Verse 4
"Indeed, he who watches over Israel never slumbers or sleeps."

I read this last week and it really jumped out at me (obviously).

I'm a Jr. High pastor. There is a certain level of thinking like a Jr. Higher that I have to keep up with. This not only means that I have immature thoughts, but that I think about curious things. One of the things I have thought about before is "will we get bored in heaven?" I only think about that because it is hard for me to sit still now. Of course I know we won't get bored in heaven, but I have even wondered if God gets bored sometimes. In fact I wondered that last week, when I read this verse. If God never sleeps, then he must have some time on his hands. I wondered about why he never sleeps, I mean, surely he has set up such a system that things kind of run automatically, or that maybe he has delegated in such a way that people and angels all over the world can take care of the minor stuff.

Now theologically I get it and know that those previous thoughts aren't true, and I am the kind of christian that relies heavily on the fact that we each can have personal relationships with him. Each. Personal. Relationship. That takes up a lot of his time I'm sure. But even here in Psalm 121 it says that he always watches over you and we get from the context that he is protecting us constantly.

I felt impressed that one other possibility for him not sleeping or slumbering is because he is in constant pursuit of us. Granted it does not say that here, but one thing I know about God is that he is crazy in love with his bride; the church. Israel was created thousands of years ago as his chosen people, a nation that he picked out of all the nations of the world for himself. And yet, the people of Israel all through the Old Testament were drawn away by other gods and selfish temptations. He speaks of it in Judges 8, Isaiah 1, Jeremiah 2 and 3, Ezekiel 16, and throughout the whole book of Hosea. And yet, he has always honored his covenant with his people. A covenant that even extends to us today; not only for the Jews but for those of us that believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.

That means he is in constant pursuit of me because of his intense love for me, and yes for you. I felt the Lord ask me, "What if your bride's attention was continuously drawn away from you and the vows you have made to each other? What if you constantly had to fight for her attention and affection? That's what I do with you. That's why I never sleep. I love you dearly and will always long to be with you. I don't have time to sleep because I treasure every moment I get with you." How is it that he is so crazy in love with us? I realized in that moment that my attention and my affection is always being drawn away from my first love, and that I don't deserve his consuming love. But, I sure am glad that he loves me anyway, and there is nothing I can do to mess up this love. Oh, I have had times when I ignored his love, but that does not mean that it ever went away.

I feel that all throughout 2010 he has been wooing me. He has been romancing me and letting me experience more revelation of his love. It does not have anything to do with the stuff he can get for me, but that the creator of the universe, the one that holds everything together, never sleeps or slumbers because he is constantly watching over me and that he loves to be with me. I have a feeling that I will never be able to fathom the depths of this love, but I want to spend each day exploring it.

Strengths

So right now we are going over our individual Strengths Finder results at the office. Everyone is really into it and apparently they all had a 3 hour meeting with Allan Kelsey that blew their mind - in a good way. Of course I missed it because I was on a two week out of town outing to go and see family. So I had to hear everyone talk about their personal revelations about themselves. I have my results I just don't know about all the "...based on 40 years of research... only 200 other people in the whole world have the same results in the same order as you..." so I'm stuck guessing. It's cool though because you take the test on their website and it puts together a personalized profile just for you. Here are my top 5 in order:
Arranger
Communication
Connectedness
Includer
Individualization

What to do?

I have something deep inside me that is inspired to blog again, but I have been told different things about what kind of blog, or actually where to post my blog. I already have the one here at blogspot, but I have been told to go to tumblr and wordpress. Any suggestions?