Preciously Content

So, tomorrow is the day that I was born.
My day of birth.
Birthday.
Whatever you wanna call it, it's a happy day :)


You know, as I was thinking, today, of the myriad of events that have happened over my lifespan. I could not help but smile and then laugh...and then frown and pout. Much like anyone else would be after living for sixteen years, i have had many different events, things and people enter my life. I am grateful for
every.
single.
one.
each in its own special way.


Obviously, it would be impossible to sum these up in one blog post. And so that's why I tried to think of- out of all the things I could write to best sum up my life, thus far- what would it be? The one thing that stuck out from all the others was... my dad.


Now, I'm most definitely not a "suck up" for writing this and you have to understand why. You see, I have the most amazing mother. One I adore and look up to. One that I wish I could be just like one day...only a little different, of course. After all, one must maintain their individuality somehow... but, truly, she has done so much more for me than I will ever realize and touched my life in so many more ways than I will never know. But my father... he is a godsend above all else. A special gift.


Have you ever had the thought: "what if I didn't have a mom? -or- what if I didn't have a dad?" Well, I have had this thought an incredible amount of times and all I can say is I know beyond a shadow of a doubt I would be no where near the person I am that's writing this post unless my father was in my life.


My dad is an amazing man. Not only is he an amazing man but, he has shown me what it looks like to live for Christ. To dare and to go against the flow of people in order to stand strong for what the Holy Spirit has told me is right. He speaks truth in to my life and in return expects me to speak truth right back. He loves me more than anyone else I know and shows that. My daddy treats me like a princess and knows my favorite things.


He's the kind of dad who will dance with me in the middle of a restaurant. The kind who will run while pushing me up and down grocery store isles and who brings me sunflowers home when I need them most. 


It amazes me to see just how well he knows me, sometimes. How he knows just what's bothering me before I can even get over it enough to tell him. Many times I wonder why I'm the one to have such a remarkable father and today it dawned on me. Jesus knew just what I needed in my life to show me just how he feels about
me.


My God knew just who I needed in order to fall for him all the more. He knew just who I needed to keep me strong and safe. Just who I needed that would exemplify a passionate pursuit of my Lord, who would teach me to walk in the ways of my God and carry the cross of my Jesus.


It's a beautiful thing when I think about it. Not only did my Jesus die to save me but he gave me a dad to walk me through a response to His sacrifice. 


I am preciously content to remain in this thought. 

I am Resolved

Honestly, there are some weeks where I completely loose my mind and decide to spiral down into a dark abyss of selfishness and sorrow. Now, of course I'm selfish on a regular basis and i definitely don't want to fool you into thinking otherwise, but these kind of weeks I'm particularly closed off. I decide to shut down because I'm overwhelmed or because I feel worthless... or maybe it's because I can't handle not getting enough sleep or living up to other's standards... or better yet, because I allow Satan to speak lies into my soul. Sometimes I can't help that I'm rotting but most of the time I allow myself to become self focused and ridiculously saddened because it gives me some sense normalcy (oddly enough). But you see, any sense of normalcy takes away from the extravagance of Christ's suffering for me.

Today, as I was looking at some songs for the youth group band, I stumbled upon a sermon and ended up listening to it. The speaker was an extreme word smith and completely caught my attention... He mentioned a young man named Jonathan Edwards and at that moment I looked the guy up. I was stunned to find his list of Resolutions... here are a few that particularly got to me.

4. Resolved, never to do any manner of thing, whether in soul or body, less or more, but what tends to the glory of God; nor be, nor suffer it, if I can avoid it.

-As a Christ follower, I, Anna Foulkrod, am called to lift Jesus up in the highest way I possibly can and give him all the glory he is owed...but how many times do I take credit for the things that only Jesus enabled me to do? How many times do I forget that only HE deserves the glory and honor and praise?