Jesus went Jackie Chan...

Guess what, guys? I'm a fraud. I seem to have it all together. I seem to be this super-Christian that has all of the answers and never does anything wrong. I seem to be the super-Christian that reads his bible every day and prays constantly.

I'm not.

I DON'T have it all together. I DON'T spend enough time, or any time, with God. I don't pray about all of my problems. I'm NOT a super-Christian. Nor will I ever be. But God wants me to try. So, this weekend at Watermarks, God decided to completely wreck me. He slapped me in the face multiple times. Really hard. The speaker, Matt, talked about love for God and how, through that love, we receive grace. Through grace, we desire God. Through that desire, we seek God. Through seeking God, He becomes magnified. Matt called it the "hamster wheel" because all of it is full-circle. Love to grace, grace to desire, desire to seeking, seeking back to love.

When you love someone, you put tons of time and effort into making that relationship absolutely perfect. Yet, when it comes to God, what do we do? Pray a little? Open up a bible every now and then? That's crap, guys. God sent His Son to DIE on a cross to make our relationship absolutely perfect and we return the favor by doing...nothing. I give NOTHING to God. Needless to say, He wasn't too happy about that. I was informed by God (very blatantly) that I need to get off my high horse, man up, jump out of my comfort zone, and start acting like the Christian that I claim to be. If I show love for my God, the desire to pursue Him becomes incredible. "Desire comes from longing, longing comes from love, love comes from God, God comes by Jesus, Jesus came with grace." If I have that longing, that desire, to pursue God, my world will be absolutely flipped on its head. God deserves every bit of love that anyone could ever possibly give. After all, if only ONE person in the world believed in God, Jesus would have still come down and died for that ONE person. He loves us that much. It's incredible.

So I say it's time I start loving God and giving Him all my time.

Wanna help each other?

love. grace. desire. seek. magnify.

You Ready??

In the midst of chaos and confusion that this world is in right now, I feel like God's trying to tell us something. To be honest, what He's trying to tell us is painfully obvious. The world is hurting. Our big, beautiful, magnificent world is...well....falling apart.

Now, as far as I know, the world isn't literally falling apart. But, in terms of faith, the sphere known as planet earth is dying...sorta. I recently participated in 30-Hour Famine; an event at my church where you basically starve for 30 hours and learn about hunger and poverty throughout the world. When put in a situation where hunger and poverty is all around you, a person could really start to wonder....why aren't we doing anything to help? Granted, people are in third-world countries CONSTANTLY doing something to try and help but, why am I, Carter Lotts, not doing...something? Why are you, reader, not doing SOMETHING?

With all of these earthquakes recently and the rush of relief efforts to Haiti, Chile, and Taiwan, I feel like God is possibly trying to tell us something. I'm not saying God is sending these earthquakes to wake us up but, I'm not ruling out anything. Guys, we need to wake up. Our world, even our COUNTRY, is hurting. They need us. We have SO much here but yet, we just waste what we have away on fast food and cheap thrills. Are we gonna buck up and do something? I'm pretty sure God wants us moving so, let's put on our big boy, and big girl, pants and do some work. They need us out there and, frankly, we need them, too.

-Carter L.

Dang, dude.

As we all know by now, I love being in relationships. God, on the other hand, does NOT like me being in relationships. This past summer, my youth pastor challenged me to NOT date for a year because he felt that God has some pretty sweet plans for my life this year. Turns out, I think my youth pastor was right. Granted, I have been in a relationship since then but, God wasn't too happy about that. Ever since then, no matter how hard I try, God will not allow me to be in a relationship. He puts roadblocks up and makes the scenario change so that it just....doesn't work out.

Over the past few weeks, I've attempted to stir up a relationship (in my stupidity, of course). God wasn't too happy about that. The potential relationships got to a point where things COULD have escalated but, God put His foot down, said that's not what He wanted, and shut it all down.

Earlier this evening, I was having a conversation with a friend about relationships. We got to a point in our conversation where I just literally got sick to my stomach and SO overwhelmed. God is kicking my tail around with this whole relationship thing. This dude is determined to make me His and it's...amazing. I have never felt so peaceful in my life. God is fighting me. God is fighting FOR me.

I'm not saying to go out and dump your girlfriend or boyfriend or forget all about relationships. Definitely not what i'm sayin'. All i'm saying is, make sure that our God, our Savior, and our Father is the one that's in the lead. After all, God is Love. So without Him, that relationship you're in is crap, anyways. Love your Father first. He loved you first.

-Carter L.

Is It THAT Important..?

You know, I don’t understand why, as humans, we put EVERYTHING before God. Some people get it. They get…it. They get what loving God is about because they love God with all that they are. I’m gonna be honest, I suck at putting everything before God. I put friends, relationships, school, and the idea of religion before God. I put all of that ahead of loving my Savior. WHY?? Why does that stuff matter? God gave me all of that stuff. We have to wake up, guys. It’s not about us. We’re idiots to think that everybody cares about us and we’re idiots to think that everything revolves around us. ‘Cause guess what?? IT DOESN’T REVOLVE AROUND US.

God should be ahead of all other things. After all, He did give us life. I feel like this current-day, it’s-all-about-me, follow-the-rules-and-traditions CRAP is taking over. Everything has become about religion and not loving GOD. God even rebukes the Pharisees in the book of Matthew because they don’t practice what they preach. They latched on to religion and lost sight of loving people in the name of God and, essentially, just…loving God.

I recently saw The Book of Eli in theaters. The movie is basically about a guy who has the only surviving bible in the world and he does everything possible to protect it. There’s a seen in the movie where Eli and a girl are riding down the road and he’s talking about the book and what it means to him and he says something along the lines of, “I’ve focused so much on trying to protect this book that I’ve forgotten what the words say.” Meaning, he’s spent so long worrying about keeping anybody from getting the book that…..he’s forgotten what the words tell him to do: go out and love.

Forget about staying safe guys. Put God first. Get down in the crap, the mud, the muck, and love God with all that you have. God is first. At least, He should be.

-Carter L.

Why do we GIVE?

In light of everything that is going on over in Haiti, I feel the need to say a little something about the “spirit of giving.”

What makes you WANT to give? Why do people give so much to people they have never met? I heard a conversation today between two of my classmates. One of the kids was saying that he had donated $30 to the Haiti donation going on at our school and, of course, the other kid had to say he had given $35 dollars. He HAD to give more than the other kid. He felt the need to one-up his friend. WHY?? Giving isn’t about being better than someone else. It’s not about giving more than the person next to you. It’s about doing something for someone IN GOD’S NAME because they may not be able to help themselves. In doing that, we’re showing God’s love. We aren’t glorifying ourselves because, well…that’s not what it’s about.

Our world is so bent on being better than the next person that comes along. We build up our lives with all of these material things that mean NOTHING. There are multiple stories in the bible where God calls people to give all of their possessions away and follow Him. So our possessions are obviously more important than God, right? No, not at all.

Now, I’m not telling you to go out, give all of your things away, and roam the countryside proclaiming God’s name. I definitely wouldn’t hold you back if that’s what you wanted but, I understand that could be a little drastic. What I am asking you to do is think about what your possessions mean to you. Then think about what God means to you. I assure you, God is more important than that car of yours. Also, don’t feel like you have to be better than someone else when you are giving. Know that what you are doing is for God’s glory and not your own. It’s not about you anymore. It’s about God. It’s about those people all over the world that are hurting. It’s about those people KNOWING God. Who cares if you gave more than your friend?

-Carter L.

Masquerade

Have y'all ever heard of a masquerade? According to Dictionary.com, a masquerade is a party, dance, or other festive gathering of persons wearing masks and other disguises, and often elegant, historical, or fantastic costumes. It's a gathering of people disguising themselves. A gathering of people trying to be something they are not. Ever feel like the church today is just a big masquerade? Do you ever feel like the church is a bunch of people dressing up, putting on their masks, and being this "perfect Christian" on Sunday mornings? I sure do. Now, I myself fall captive to masquerades a lot so, this is directly aimed at myself as well.

This "perfect Christian" persona has become very evident to me recently. Everyone comes to church and enjoys the social aspect but, when it comes time to worship their God, we just go through the motions. It becomes almost painful for us to worship God because, well, we think socializing is more important. Does this make any sense at all? To us, i suppose it does. We think that nobody will see through our mask. We think we can get away with this crap that we try to pass off as being a "good Christian." Well guess what? Not only does God see through our masquerade, but other people do as well. The people that we, as Christians, need to be chasing after see right through our masks. What kind of image do you think that gives them? That Christians are a bunch of fakes? Guys, we have to give up the charade. Nobody believes us anymore. More importantly, God is calling us to be the light unto the world. He is calling us to stand out. To stand out and be TRUE with what we're living out. This masquerade we're living? Yeah, it's total crap. It's time to drop the mask. Don't just drop it off when you're with your Christian friends. They're probably just as guilty as you are. Drop the mask off and LEAVE it off. I don't know about you guys but, I'm not a huge fan of Halloween parties anyways.

Are We Alone?

I've recently come to realize that my biggest fear is the fear of being alone. Not the fear of being alone in a room and not the fear of sitting by myself somewhere but, being alone in my life. I'm the kind of guy that, unfortunately, uses relationships as a means to happiness. I use dating to fill that void, that emptiness, that is created from my fear of being alone. I've let dating take the place of.....everything. I'm trying SO hard to fill that void that I've overlooked the obvious solution: bringing God deeper into my life. God has been tearing me apart recently. He wants to be back in my life so badly and what do I do? I push Him away. I push Him away because I would rather have that cute girl in my class or I would rather hang out with that funny girl on Friday night. Wow, how much more selfish can I be?? Did that girl die on the cross for me? Did that girl abolish sin for me? Well, God sent His son to do all of that but yet, I still turn my back on Him. In Matthew, God says "..and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of age." God will be with us to the very end of age. God loves us unconditionally. He loves us more than we can imagine. Heck, God IS love. So don't you think we could manage to give Him a little bit of our time?? God wants to be that person in your life that makes you happy. He wants to be that person that you run to for every problem you have. Remember back when you were little and you would fall off your bike? You would have a scratch and you would run to your mom to make it all better. Well God wants to be the person you run to when you fall. He wants to make everything better. He wants to make you feel loved. He wants to make you feel accepted. He wants to make you feel adored. He wants to make you feel cherished. He wants to make you feel all of these things because to Him, you're everything. With Him you're never alone. Never.

-Carter L.