God's Beauty...

I went to a friend of a friends blog (http://jeremyparish.blogspot.com/2013/02/picture-post.html) and saw these beautiful photos. They captivated me right away, so I combined my favorites to make my own picture/background for my computer screen. 

Winter Weekend Retreat

     This past weekend I was at a youth retreat. I had an amazing time with friends; new and old. We slept in dorm-like rooms (girls on one side of the building, boys on the other side), with 4 or 5 other people. Laughter could be heard down the long hall at any point during the day. We did all different activities such as; basketball, volleyball, card games, shuffleboard, and even sumo-wrestling (which was quite fun to watch also). When we weren't having fun, we were in God's presence.
     An evangelist named Glen Badonsky was the special speaker and had us laughing and crying. He had a special sense of humor, but when alter call came we all went up to worship with him. He broke through with the humor and we were built up with our tears. He has a ministry in India called Double Portion Ministries. I truly felt the holy spirit in the chapel this year.

   

     We had worship time, which is always my favorite time. We sang a lot of contemporary songs. Some were "Stand" by Hillsong, "10,000 reasons" by Matt Redman, and "Promises" by Parachute band. Raising our hands in worship always makes me thankful that I have a God I can reach out to and he'll hear me and answer me.

Frame it, Friday!

Today it felt like spring here in New York, it was only 45 degrees (but it felt like it was 55 degrees). Such beautiful flowers will soon be sticking their heads out of the cold ground.

Mercy..compassion for all..

     It's been a while since I have posted something, and I missed writing posts. It's been a busy last month, since I've started my second semester of my sophomore year of college. For our break, me and my sister spent a lot of time together..it was a great three weeks (those are stories for another day). 

     I was thinking about what I should post and then my aunt gave me an idea. Well, she doesn't actually know that she gave me the idea. She went into the hospital yesterday morning in labor and around 13 hours later gave birth to a baby girl. She wants the baby to have the name: Mercy. So..I decided to write about what Mercy is...

The dictionary states:

1. Compassion or forgiveness shown toward someone whom it is within one's power to punish or harm.
2. An event to be grateful for, esp. because its occurrence prevents something unpleasant or provides relief from suffering.

and those are pretty good definitions. 

     One word comes to mind when I think of mercy, and that word is Jesus. He died for all our sins on the cross, even though we should be punished for what we do wrong. Jesus has power to punish us and sometimes he does. But, we can always cry out to him for his mercy and he will freely give it to us. Mercy isn't the only thing that he freely gives to us at all times. Along with it there is peace, compassion, grace, forgiveness, hope, and love. 

     I hope that you have a wonderful year (yeah, never wished you that, my bad)!