Well…The time has come for us, as students, to be cramming a whole semesters worth of work into the next couple weeks. I don't know why, but it seems that the end of second semester is so much busier and and so much more stressful than the first. Maybe it's the pressure of finishing yet another crazy year of school, the stress of moving, scrambling to find another summer job or for some.. a career! Yikes!.. no ones want to think about that. More and more of my friends are becoming "professional" students.
I have been able to stay caffeine free my whole university career up until THIS MONTH! This past month has consisted of me cramming school, friends and fundraising. It absolutely BREAKS MY HEART that I have to leave my NCCF (Nipissing/Canadore Christian Fellowship) family here in North Bay and I am trying to cram in every old and new friendship in my short time left while trying to balance school and FUNDRAISING! ($15,500 feel free to donate!)
Needless to say… Many things have dropped on my list of priorities.
# 1 The cleanliness of my bedroom (I can barely see the floor and I'm pretty sure I've worn the same socks more than twice and other articles of clothing without them being washed)
# 2 My diet: I just don't have time to grocery shop. I eat at the cafe a lot and when I'm home I seem to live off pancakes and peanut butter.. or toast and peanut butter. Eventually it might just be peanut butter…
# 3 This is where it gets serious. My time with God…
… Oh how foolish we can be..
Someone once said: "Until you know that life is war, you cannot know what prayer is for."
Ephesians 6:12 "For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places."
Ephesians goes on to speak about the Armor of God. When you don't spend time in prayer that armor gets stripped away and the enemy is always on the prowl (1 Peter 5:8) The enemey searches, looking for opportunities to tear you down. And I gave him just that. I let my guard down.. and sin slowly but surely started seeping into my life.
And I am so happy that I can say IT BROKE ME. I am so happy that I was NOT okay with that sin seeping into my life. I felt ashamed and heart broken that I had let down MY Savior.. my father.. that I had once again.. hammered that nail deeper into his wrist.
But check this out..
1 Peter 2:24
"He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed."
See? Christ has conquered sin for you and me. I am no longer a slave to sin. I have been set free, washed clean, renewed, refined, made new. Through Christ, I am made strong and can stand up against the temptation of sin (1 Corinthians 10:13)
So not only have we been forgiven of our sins… but check this out (God is so good) 2 Corinthians 5:21 "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."
Wait…. What? Read that last part over. "So that in Him we (me and you) might become the righteousness of God." THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD. COME ON!
Christ washes away all impurities, makes us righteous in the eyes of God and has promised us more than we could ever imagine. Revelations 3:21 says "The one who conquers, I will grant him to sit with me on my throne, as I also conquered and sat down with my Father on his throne."
Try and wrap your mind around that.
