Grace

How’s your grief?

Posted on by Josh Boyd

We like to throw these pity parties for ourselves a lot of times. Maybe you don’t, maybe it’s just me…but I doubt it.

We like to think that our problems are so big, and so grand, and we have it so hard, and that life, simply put, just sucks. Trust me, I get it. I know. I’ve been there, you’ve been there, he and she and we’ve been there.

We focus on this one thing, or maybe the buildup of things that have happened to us and we dwell on it and we let it eat us alive and we start believing this lie that we’re not good enough or we won’t make it out alive or maybe that life just isn’t worth living anymore… See how far we go?

We go from something like “Nah man, I don’t think I can go out tonight I just paid my rent and my funds are running low” to “I HAVE NO MONEY!!! I”M LITERALLY GOING TO DIE. MOM AND DAD PLEASE HELP.”

We go from “Dang! 1/2 a tank-need to use that brake a little more” to “I guess I’ll have to WALK to work because I don’t have enough gas to go anywhere!!!!”

You get the picture. And have you realized yet when you face one of these problems it’s all over your social media or your texting your life=problems to your group message.. Like it’ll magically get fixed. (side note)

………Do you see how petty our generation is? I say “our” because I’m the chief of living like this. I’m so over-dramatic with my life-problems that it’s become ridiculous. I really hope you can relate and I hope and pray I’m not the only one like this.

How about REAL problems in life? (Sorry if that offends you, but money and gas should be the least of your worries.)

How about real problems like, “My cousin and her unborn child were murdered”, or “My mom died of cancer”, or “I was raped”.

Hitting home yet? – Now I promise with all of my heart I’m not trying to offend you, I’m not trying to anger you, and I’m not trying to make you feel like whatever you’re facing is no big deal- because it is. Please let me finish. Keep reading, I’m begging you.

Your problem IS a big deal, whatever it is, big or small. It really is.

Let me share with you part of Isaiah 53:

“…he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. 3 He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.”

Now whatever you believe in, whatever you put your faith in, if you don’t have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, I ask you with all of my heart that you read this next line at least 3 times.

Your problem is SUCH a big deal that Jesus willingly endured whatever it is. He became acquainted with grief. He knew grief. He was one with grief. He had relations with grief. He was fluent in grief. He endured all grief. Whatever you’re facing in life I guarantee you Jesus has experienced it ten-fold.

Before He was put on the cross we spat in His face but what we did not realize is that the punishment He so willingly took was OURS! It was mine, it was yours, it was ours! All of it!

Please know that whatever you face today, or tomorrow or ever again in your life, Jesus has already experienced it. He has felt that pain and don’t think for a SECOND that He doesn’t see or know that you are hurting. He felt it for you. I’ve never met anyone that so desires to have a relationship with me that they would die and endure all the pain the world can muster up JUST SO HE CAN KNOW YOU!

God is unchanging and I believe that with all my heart, but what you have to understand is that God RESPONDS. He responds to it all! However, His response may not be at all what you have in mind for your life, especially not for your “right now”.

I can’t encourage you enough to not give up. Don’t throw in the towel. We spend so much time sweating over the problems we faced yesterday and today and worrying that they’ll become tomorrow’s problems and we’ll carry it forever and ever. Today’s mercies are for today. Tomorrow will bring mercies of it’s own.

Now let me share this image with you and maybe it will pretty much sum up everything that i’ve probably butchered trying to explain:

 

You’re at the edge of the pit. The bottom of the pit is real bad. You look around, make sure no one is looking at what you’re about to do because you think “although the bottom of the pit is horrifying it HAS to be better than what I’m dealing with right now. I’m tired of this” While you’re looking around you see a friend who just got a new car, and you see a friend who just got engaged, and you see a friend that has announced they’re having a baby, and someone else just got a promotion at work. You see that everyone else is living it up. And you just simply…aren’t. You scream at God one last time like He’ll fix it all just because you’re mad and hurt and yelling at Him. No reply. (Yet) You jump. Now while you’re falling you’re realizing “Man, I really thought God would catch me or save me or something” and then you scream, because you’re falling into a pit. Duh. You hit bottom. You’re insanely beat up, barely surviving. Suddenly, when you’re in this vast pit you realize how far you’ve fallen.

 

You see, life is the pit. Sometimes in life, God has to allow us to fall all the way to the bottom so that we can realize how small and petty we are…And how absolutely HUGE He is. Bottom line- It’s really not about you. It’s not about me. We’ll never know pain as He does. We’ll never be one with grief.

Understand your size, so that you can get a glimpse of God’s.

An Open Letter To the Girl Who Broke My Heart- “It’s me”

Posted on by Josh Boyd

I think its inappropriate to call you by name, but I think you know very well who you are, you person who broke my heart.

I struggled for so long. I’d even said I had forgiven you. I tried. I thought I had forgiven you, but I was wrong. Very wrong. I stayed bitter for a whole lot longer than I let anyone know. I got really good at hiding what I felt about you, and how much I still cared.

I think it’s fair for you to know that I never should have dated you. I never should have put myself in that position, to sin like I did, to make myself vulnerable of doing whatever it took to make you happy. Because I did everything and more to do just that. I loved you. I loved you for a long time after you removed me from your life.

The funniest thing, however, is how much I actually DID love you. I spent every ounce of my effort loving you more, and it never seemed to be enough for you. I would’ve gladly taken a bullet for you any day, and depending on the day and how bad I hurt, I still would. You seemed to love me as well; you said that anyway. You showed it sometimes, but I was too blind to see all the times you didn’t see it. You embarrassed me in front of my friends at prom, you and your friends laughed at me on multiple occasions for caring “too much” about you, whatever that means.

I never saw it coming, though. Honest. I never would’ve guessed when you called me that Sunday afternoon that you would’ve said you wanted to end “us”.  For so long I had defined myself by your standards, and by who we were as a couple. But, in the end I was the one in my room picking the pieces of my broken self up off the floor.

You seemed fine. You still hung out with your friends. Everything seemed normal for you. When I’d pass you in the halls you would flash that deadly smile to everyone you passed, but you never once glanced my way. It’s like the thought that I existed never crossed your mind, and never would again. And while you enjoyed your next class after I saw you, I would go to the bathroom and cry. Trying to see myself in the bathroom mirror through blurred, teary-eyed vision I could almost make out the image of what was once me, but was no longer the man I knew.

I finally worked up the strength to call you after we broke up. When you answered, you told me you really didn’t want to talk to me again. I then proceeded to blame myself for every single problem in our relationship and every problem in your life, and in mine. There was a long silence-I remember because if you would have spoke one second later I would’ve thrown up. And after you did speak again, and hung up the phone…I did throw up. Your last words to me were: “Don’t ever talk to me again”

Do you know what it’s like to live with yourself thinking that you had hurt the person you loved with your whole heart so badly that they never wanted to speak to you again? Do you know how much blame you then shift onto yourself whether its regarding our relationship or not? You see the negative in everything, there are no more positives. You start to think what it would be like if you were gone from the earth. You think about if the people you cared about the most would be at your funeral. Then the worst of them all, would THE person I cared about the most be there? Would YOU be there? I knew you wouldn’t be.

But what really hurts the most, what drove me to insanity, and the darkest depression I’ve ever known was one simple thought.

“It was all a lie.”

4 days after we broke up, you went to the movies with your ex-boyfriend. The ex-boyfriend that after two weeks after you broke up with me, became your new boyfriend. And that you had been seeing him while we were dating. And that he was one of many you saw. One of many lies you told me, one of the hundreds of masks you wore. Whether it was making out with your friend in the school parking lot while I was attending Naval Academy Interviews, or the parties you invited boys to at your home, or the countless other times you flirted, texted, sent inappropriate pictures to, captivated, intrigued, entertained, or deceived other guys while we were dating. I knew that every thing you told me, every kiss, every “I love you”, every “you’re the only one for me”, every “can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with you” was a lie. It was all a show; some sort of act to prove that you can manipulate and do whatever you want with genuine guys who care about people and want to make others shine.

After a long time, I found out the real problem. It wasn’t you. Not even close.

It was me.

From the moment I met you, I should’ve protected my heart, for my future wife’s sake. Not mine. I can take anything you, or any other deceiving woman in the world, or Satan wants to throw at me, because I have God on my side. And you can never beat Him. I should have never began to fall for you. The more I pondered, the more I began to understand that while I did indeed love you. I did not fall in love with you. I fell in lust with you. I lusted over everything about you. I set my own self up for failure. You did not win.

I have prayed for you everyday since one month after you broke up with me. I want you to find the man of your dreams, and I want you to succeed in life. I want God to convict you of your sins, your deception, and your pride. The funny thing is, I don’t want what you did to me, to happen to you. I would never wish that upon anyone. I know now that without God’s help I would’ve never made it this far, in anything for that matter, but especially with getting over you and finding out who I am. But the one thing I pray for the most, is that you feel sorry. I pray that you feel sorry for not only me, but everyone that you’ve hurt, every guy you’ve deceived, every heart you’ve broken, every friendship you’ve destroyed, and every life you’ve ruined. I pray that God will use you to glorify Him, and to grow His Kingdom on earth and to make positive impacts on the lives of others.

 

Love,

Your ex-boyfriend.

 

 

 

Forgiveness…It sucks

Posted on by Josh Boyd

Its true, forgiveness really does suck. It’s one of the hardest thing for Christians, much less, humans to grasp. I apologize now, for the past two months. I’ve been a real loser. I haven’t blogged in a long time, and I’ve just been dealing with so much hurt and so much pain. But, I’m back. And I’m back to stay.

1.) Pain is suffering. Suffering leads to hurt. Hurt leads to sadness. Sadness leads to negativity. Negativity leads to depression. It’s an avalanching scale and there’s nothing “we” can do to stop it. Sometimes it’s someone else’s irrational behavior that causes a heart-break after being so close. Or dealing with stress in more ways than you think anyone else can imagine. Whatever pain or trail you’re going through in life; you’re more than likely suffering in some shape or form. If you think your life is great right now… get ready. The storm is likely coming. If you’re currently suffering or are in pain from anything, you must know that things WILL get better in time.

2.) You’re not alone. If you feel like your friends, parents, boyfriend, or girlfriend, or anyone else in your life has just given up on you; YOU. ARE. NOT. ALONE. The past two moths I have felt like I was being punished for wanting what was right for my life and for someone else’s. All I wanted was to make a difference, and they turned their back on me when I was showing them the most love I could.

Guess what… The same thing happened to a man named Jesus Christ about 2,015 years ago. He loved the world and the human race so much. The Son of God came to rescue us, to teach us how to love each other like He has loved and still loves us, and to make a difference in the world.

What did we do about it?…

We turned our backs on Him. We didn’t want someone to come into our lives and change the way of life we were so used to, we didn’t want someone telling us how to do things, we crucified Him, WE did it. ALL of us did. It’s because of us He willingly gave His life on a cross.

Re read 2.) and really let that sink in. Do YOU seriously grasp all of that? Because, honestly, at first, i didn’t at all.

3.) Forgive. Jesus died for us to forgive and completely erase all of our sin for all of eternity. This is the hardest step of all: whoever has wronged you, show them grace…Forgive. Let go and put your trust in Jesus because He loved us when our backs were turned. But wait, He forgave all of humanity throughout all of time, I think the least we can do is forgive the few people who will wrong us and cause harm in our lives.

One last thought… Whoever has wronged you, after all you’ve gone through together, no matter the pain…Look at their hands. Now look at yours. There is just as much of Jesus’ blood on your hands, as there is on theirs.

Well, its entertaining. So I like it.

Posted on by Josh Boyd

It’s recently been brought to my attention how popular horror movies are to our society! I honestly had no idea they were such a big deal! So, the first thing I decided to do was look up the top 5 box-office horror movies of the last two years:

5) Mama

4) Insidious Chapter 2

3) Dracula Untold

2) Annabelle

1) The Conjuring

Personally, I’ve never seen any of these movies. I don’t have any interest in horror movies whatsoever. I’m not gonna lie I do get pretty scared after watching things that are demonic or twisted in any way. It sticks with me for a long time and I just can’t shake it! So it’s just easier for me not to watch things like that. Plus, I don’t find the idea of people getting tortured entertaining. (yes, I’m well aware it’s JUST a movie)

So lets take away the “horror” part of the movie and just look at movies in general. Movies are one of the most powerful entertainment items we have now days and they make such a lasting, profound impact on society. Also, Movies, again in general, mostly now days are almost completely against Christian values or include some sort of ideal or moral that is strongly against what God teaches and what we’re supposed to believe as Christians.

Now, with horror movies, the main goal is to scare people completely out of their minds, and most of the time, they succeed! Hollywood has gotten extremely good these days at bringing carnage and gruesome images to the silver screen! The only problem is that it’s getting to the point now where it takes SO much more to genuinely just disturb people, which, in turn, completely desensitizes the public more and more with each movie.

What concerns me most is when religion comes into question in horror movies. Is it okay for Christians to be entertained about producers making blockbuster films about satanic, and demonic things that are extremely opposite of what we believe? Should we be okay with movies promoting the fact that senseless torture and bloodshed are okay? Again, I know that it’s ONLY a movie, but really think about what this is promoting to society. After really dwelling on what’s been stated previously, Should true Christians REALLY watch ANY movies with anything thats contradictory to what God teaches? Well… No. We really shouldn’t… But, do we anyway? Yes. Of course we do, we do what we want, we’re humans. I’m not singling any one genre of entertainment out, the horror genre was just pointed out to me today so I decided to research it. There are non-uplifting subjects in literally every genre.

Something to think about… If we as believers are going to stress heavily to people not to watch sex-filled movies, shouldn’t we also stress heavily not to watch demonic or satanic themed movies? If we point out to people that watching movies with bad language is wrong, shouldn’t we also point out that drug abuse and trafficking in movies is wrong, as well? The way I see it; Principle vs. Principle…Sin vs. Sin. It all sounds pretty equal to me.

1 John 2:15-17

“Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.”

He did what?!

Posted on by Josh Boyd

Today is Sunday, obviously. So on Sundays every week I want to have a deeper, and more spiritual blog to really get you growing, and thinking throughout the week to come.

This morning, during the 2nd service at my church, my youth pastor, Justin preached to the congregation. First, let me just congratulate him on a great message, however, that sermon was not Justin’s. It was God-inspired and God-breathed. Anyways, Justin spoke of Jesus bearing our sins. Now, “bear” (the verb, not the big furry animal), according to Webster’s Dictionary, means: “to accept or endure (something)”. That being said…Jesus accepted our sins. He endured our sin. But not just that. Justin also mentioned the wrath of God, and how if Jesus endured our sin, then he must also endure the wrath of God for our sin. This is HUGE. What I’m saying is that Jesus, the only perfect being ever to walk the earth, the Son of God, The Lord Almighty, accepted and endured all of your “past, present, and future sins. Forever.” -Justin Grack                                               That’s just what I got out of the message this morning. Other’s may have got way more or way less out of it, but either way, Thank you, Justin, for being submissive to The Lord and following in His will.

“For Christ suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring you to God, after being put to death in the fleshly realm but made alive in the spiritual realm.” -1 Peter 3:18

It’s pretty amazing to think about God’s forgiveness and how wholesome it is. It blows my mind and I literally cannot fathom His infinite grace that he pours forth onto His children. You see, God views all sin the same. There is no “level” of sin. It’s just sin. For we have all sinned and fallen short of the Glory of God. Yet while we were still sinner’s Christ died for us to save us from the death that we earned because of our sin.

Something to think about…Think of how huge God really is. He created the heavens, the skies, the earth, the entire universe, and EVERYTHING in it. Yet he cared enough about YOU and I to send his one and only Son to save US. To cover our backs and rescue us from an eternity in Hell.

Have a fantastic week and I pray that God uses this blog to continuously bless others and that The Holy Spirit will move and work in lives who need The Lord, and that each person that reads this post will be given hope and promise through God.

I love you,

Josh.