When you go on a weekend trip and you experience one of the most amazing experiences of your life, you just have to keep going on that trip. I 6th grade I went to youth retreat for the first time...it was the most amazing experience of my life. The Holy Spirit's precense was sooo amazing that it can't even be described in words. Every year since then, I have gone back to youth retreat and every year I experience the same feeling. It is overwhelming to the point that i find myself kneeling on the ground, tears streaming, my hands raised toward heaven all out praising God. Sometimes, you get caught up in the motions and your not really praising God...its really easy to get used to going through the motions, but God doesn't want the motions, he wants sincere worship from us. He wants more than a song, He searches much deeper within than what we do...He looks into our hearts. He doesn't hear what comes out of our mouths....he hears the words of our heart. The feeling you get when you truly worship God is the most wonderful feeling in the universe...what could be more wonderful that the warmth of the holy spirit all around you...taking the room over, completely blocking out all worries of the world...just you and God, the creator of everything, your father.
God really spoke to me this weekend. I think He really spoke to everyone that was at camp allegheny this weekend. Yeah, we all had a blast, ate junk food, got very little sleep, froze in the snow and played some really bizarre games, but there was a lot more than the fun we had this weekend. It was about fellowshipping with fellow christians. It was about advancing in our relationships with Jesus Christ. Through the messages that God had for us this weekend, I know that I have definetely grown in my spiritual life. We learned about the mask of comformity, the mask of control, the mask of self-reliance and the mask of religion. This weekend was all about taking off the masks...
The mask of conformity: God made us to be who he wanted us to be. He didn't create us to conform to the world. What does it mean to conform? To change who you are. There are people in the world that make you conform to what you're not. you can be conformed or you can be who you want to be.. what God created you to be. don't conform to the ways of the world, be a leader, not a follower. Why do we conform....to fit in...to gain popularity, fame, success, keep a reputation, because we don't want to be lonely. There are many reasons. GOD'S DESIRE FOR US IS TO BE THE PEOPLE HE CREATED. Not what the world wants to conform us into. we need to get rid of the fear of being ourselves. It takes one person to stand out for others to feel strong enough to be themselves. One person is all it takes...so be that person. Be yourself...don't conform to waht people want you to be
The mask of control: what is control? having complete power of something. When you wear the mask of control, you take charge of your own life. What does surrender mean? to give control to someone else. To relinquish control to another. We need to surrender to God. We need to give our lives to him. He wants to be in control and he needs to be in control. God knows what is best for you and with him in control, you are promised eternal life in heaven. Maybe you haven't surrendered your life to Jesus yet, and that would be a good start to getting rid of the mask of control. Maybe you have surrendered, but there are still areas of your life that you still have control over. You need to surrender those...give it all to God.
The mask of self-righteousness: People are not good by nature. You cannot earn your way into heaven. It does not matter how mant good deeds you do in your life. Our righteuous acts (good deeds) are worthless to God. True righteousness is to be in right standing with God. Righteousness is from God through faith in Jesus Christ, not good deeds. Jesus died on the cross for our sins; He became sin for us so that we could exchange our sin for His righteousness. Good deeds don't make you right with God.
The mask of religion: God is displeased with us when we worship him by routine and the expectations of men. We need to have a real relationship, not religion. We can look all nice and religious on the outside, but God sees our hearts, not what we do in church. God wants our hearts, not just us to go through the motions of everything.
This weekend was amazing and I will never ever forget it.
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