Devotions

Hello everybody, Cru is over for the year so I just wanted to post some of the things that have been on my mind. Right now, that's quiet time with God. I feel like, at least for me, this is one of the most vital parts of my faith but I always seem to "forget" about it. I do not spend nearly enough time in the Word and I don't know why. It's not that I don't love God or want to get to know him, I just never have the motivation to get into the Word. I wish I knew why, it really frustrates me because it makes me feel like I don't really believe in God and that Jesus died for my sins. I mean, I've never been a fan of reading anything so that may play into it but that's no excuse. I've tried accountability partners but that doesn't seem to work and I don't know what to do to get that motivation. I need it too because, especially with Cru being done, my relationship with God is not as strong as it should be or where it should be. I struggle more temptations and just am not as happy when I am not working on my relationship with God. So yeah, that's it, I need to get back on track and I encourage you to do the same if your relationship is struggling too. Contact me if you would like to try accountability and I will do my best to give that a try again.

God Bless,

Tedd Sheets Jr.

Fellowship

This past week during our All Campus Gathering, we talked about reloading the mission into church. Most of us Christians go to some sort of church or some gathering for Christ to have fellowship with other believers. And this is what we are called to do, have fellowship with other believers. Fellowship is a great thing as I have come to learn this past year. I grew in my faith so much through fellowship with other believers and I am very thankful for that. This past year also showed me how much I missed out on fellowship growing up. It's not that I didn't go to church or didn't go to youth group events, I just didn't understand my faith entirely I believe. I treated church just as something you were supposed to do and not as something to be enjoyed and take pride in. I feel like this is a common affliction for many Christians, not just at my church but at churches across the nation.

As Americans, we have the freedom to go to church without fear of prosecution from the government or other groups. This may be our problem. We take church for granted and don't realize how good we have it. We don't value this time of fellowship as much as we should Now, this isn't all of us, but I feel like there's quite a few people that this applies to. People tend to go to church and just go through the motions. Church needs to be treated as something where you grow in your faith and have meaningful fellowship with other believers. That sentence seems obvious to me but many people, myself included, do not treat church that way. I challenge you to actively engage in church the next time you go and see how refreshed you feel afterwards. Faith tends to be left on the church's door step and that's where we will find it when we come back next Sunday. I also challenge you to change this too, engage in a deep spiritual conversation with someone this week or next. If you have quiet times, discuss something that you found interesting with someone. If you don't have quiet times, I challenge you to start then start some spiritual conversations with some people. If you take one thing from this, let it be that fellowship is infinitely valuable in the Christian walk and it needs to be a part of your life. Keep Christ center in all aspects of your life.

God Bless,
Tedd Sheets Jr.

Worship

I apologize for the lack in posting last week. I had an exam and was quite busy preparing for that but it went well so that is good!

So the topic I'm going to be discussing today is worship. Last Thursday at our all campus gathering, the speaker spoke on the topic of worship. I don't know about you but worship is one of my favorite things. I love getting lost in a great worship song whether that be an old hymnal or a new up-beat song. When I heard that this was the topic, to be honest I almost zoned out, I mean, I've got this worship thing down. I just finished my exam and was ready to just call it a day but God had a different thing in mind for me. The speaker had us get involved with the people around us and so I was prevented from just zoning out, which, it is a good thing that I didn't. We were told how worship is not something that you just go to church or Cru or whatever it may be to do. Worship is an all day everyday thing. You see, worship is not just singing to God, it's what we spend our time doing. For example, if we spend all of our day just lazing around playing video games or watching TV, we are worshiping those things. I'm not condemning video games or TV by any means. What I am saying, however, is that we are worshiping something at every moment in our lives. When we do something for ourselves and don't have a mind at all for God, we are worshiping something other than God. We need to be aware of what we are doing and why we are doing it. We can't let our worship of other things besides God take over our lives. Our God is a jealous god and we need to keep that in mind, when we put our time and energy into something that doesn't glorify Him, he becomes jealous. So just keep that in mind the next time you want to watch TV for a couple of hours when you haven't spent some time with God that day.
Thanks for your time and I hope that this blog can be an encouragement for you! Until next time, God bless!