My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding—indeed, if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God. For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. He holds success in store for the upright, he is a shield to those whose walk is blameless, for He guards the course of the just and protects the way of his faithful ones. When I was growing up, church was a twice a year event, and I never really knew what the point was. In elementary school I thought kids said they believed in God because they were afraid if they said otherwise, they would be judged or go to hell. I always thought, if there is a God, He will understand why I question. When I was 12, I began working out with my stepdad, who had raised me as his own since I was 5 years old. He taught me proper form for lifting, and I loved it. This was our father-daughter bonding time. When I entered high school, I quit working out consistently because my best friend told me that guys don’t like girls with strong legs like mine. Around that time, I began dating and finding my identity in what guys thought about me. My pursuit for love led to two miscarriages and a broken heart, and that was only the beginning. I also began to wonder why people believed in God, and honestly I wanted to feel the same way that they did about God. So I began going to classes at a church to try to understand, but it never made sense to me. I got baptized although I didn’t understand why, and after that I just went my own way. After High School, I moved in with my boyfriend, but we broke up shortly after, and I began working two jobs to support myself. I was sad and lonely, and I began going out to clubs almost every night of the week. Again, I was finding my identity in what guys thought about me and as the party girl. I would drink until I blacked out. I would drive home drunk. I would spend all day hungover in bed. I had promiscuous relationships.I was selfish. I had lost all sensitivity. I was numb. And I still wasn’t happy (Romans 1:28-32). This type of behavior continued for at least 6 years. On one occasion, I was driving home drunk and fell asleep at a red light. I woke up to the flashing of police lights shining through my back window. However, I didn’t get in trouble. Honestly, there were several instances that should have been wake up calls for me; and even though at times I wanted to quit drinking all together, I couldn’t. Finally, I think God said, “enough is enough!” On February 16, 2012, I was arrested for DWI and Theft. Four months later I was convicted. In July, I began my 18 months of probation, which included having a breathalyzer installed to start my car, and 40 hours of Community Service. In September 2012, I began my community service at the animal shelter that I rescued my dog from years ago. Day in and day out I would hear a man who worked at the animal shelter and another volunteer talking about how great God is. “Why do you believe that?!” I asked the employee. He responded with a question, "Why don’t you?” After having my heart broken so many times, I had lost my faith in man, so I responded, “Because I refuse to worship a man!” Then what the man said next, shook me. He said, “Well, that’s a stupid reason to go to hell!” It makes me laugh now, but at the time I didn’t know what to say. Next thing I know is I am balling my eyes out, and he is telling me that the tug at my heart is God! He told me that God wanted a relationship with me. He told me not to take his word for it, but for me to seek the Truth myself,. He said if I look I will find the answers I am searching for (Proverbs 2: 3-6). The next day, he brought me a Bible, and I began my pursuit for a relationship with God. I can’t explain it, but immediately I felt like the void that I had been trying to fill with alcohol and relationships, was God missing from my life. I learned what the Gospel, or the good news, about Jesus was. I learned that because of my sin, I was separated from God. I learned that Jesus was the perfect sacrifice and that He paid the price and received God’s wrath for my sins, and that if I simply believed that was true, that I would have eternal life. If you declare with your mouth,” Jesus is Lord”, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved.” (Romans 10:9-10) Now I wish I could say all of my problems were gone, and I sinned no more, but that would be a fairy tale. I continued binge drinking occasionally, I just wouldn’t drive. But one day, I got caught violating my probation by drinking alcohol, and that almost landed me in jail. My probation officer, gave me another chance, but I had to start attending Alcoholics Anonymous and Substance Abuse Counseling. Throughout this process and with the spirit of God, I quit drinking and I began working out again in place of partying. I was so happy that I was able to stop drinking because I was able to wake up early to start training at a boxing gym! My biological father was a boxer, so my Mom always told me I was probably a natural. My love for fitness grew and my desire to help others and share my faith also grew. I decided to start studying to become a personal trainer, and leave my stable job at the pharmacy, to pursue a new path. Around this same time God brought me out of a toxic relationship. I moved out of my boyfriend’s apartment and moved back in with my family. I wanted to get involved at a church, and one of my clients told me about Watermark Community church. So I went, the first Sunday of January 2015. This church was different than any church I had been to before. The pastor was open about his struggles, and didn’t claim to be perfect, nor that the church was perfect, but that they served a perfect God. The pastor was calling the people to be fully devoted followers of Jesus and not just people who showed up on Sunday and pretended to be righteous. At that moment I knew this was the place for me. Immediately I began pursuing to become a member. Part of being a member meant that you had to be in a community group, that is a group of the same sex and same age group, that you meet with on a weekly basis to spur each other on to keep following Jesus (Hebrews 10: 24-25). These woman have been great encouragers to me; they know my past and current struggles, and they love me unconditionally, like God loves his children. When I hurt, they hurt; when they are happy I celebrate with them. When I am lost, they point me back to Jesus and remind me of what God says is true. The church also offered a course to help equip you to be a follower of Jesus, called Equipped Disciple. This class helped me grow tremendously. I learned how to read and mark my Bible and how to understand and apply what God is teaching me in His Word. It also taught me how I can better share my faith with others! I began to apply God’s Word in my life and my life was changing for the better. I began sharing my faith and inviting my clients, my friends, and family to church(Romans 1:16). I was able to witness God working in their lives as well. I am so passionate about sharing the good life that God has in store for everyone, that I even went on a mission trip to share God’s love in Haiti. God was filling my life with joy by giving me the desires of my heart that I didn’t even know I had. After finishing Equipped Disciple, I also began serving as a table leader so I could teach others the same things I learned. And now I have the opportunity to combine my passion for faith and fitness by serving with ChristFit Unashamed! It has been over a year since I have been going all in with Jesus, and I am so grateful to be able to experience God’s goodness in such a short amount of time. I still can’t fathom how much God has done in my life, but when I look back over the past few years, I am so amazed at how far God has brought me from who I used to be. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here” (2 Corinthians 5:17)
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Galatians 6:1-10 “Brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live by the Spirit should restore that person gently. But watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted. 2 Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. 3 If anyone thinks they are something when they are not, they deceive themselves. 4 Each one should test their own actions. Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else, 5 for each one should carry their own load.6 Nevertheless, the one who receives instruction in the word should share all good things with their instructor.7 Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. 8 Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. 9 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. 10 Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers Observations: There are both Corporate and Individual Responsibilities.
In the book “Boundaries” there are Ten Principles of Boundaries taken from this passage teaching a couple things. Specifically I will be focusing on is The Law of Responsibility – We are responsible TO each other, not FOR each other. To help understand more, the Greek words for burden and load give us insight into the meaning of these texts. The Greek word for burden means “excess burdens,” or burdens that are so heavy that they weigh us down. These burdens are like boulders. They can crush us. We shouldn’t be expected to carry a boulder by ourselves! It would break our backs. We need help with the boulders— those times of crisis and tragedy in our lives. In contrast, the Greek word for load means “cargo,” or “the burden of daily toil.” This word describes the everyday things we all need to do. These loads are like knapsacks. Knapsacks are possible to carry. We are expected to carry our own. We are expected to deal with our own feelings, attitudes, and behaviors, as well as the responsibilities God has given to each one of us, even though it takes effort. Problems arise when people act as if their “boulders” are daily loads, and refuse help, or as if their “daily loads” are boulders they shouldn’t have to carry. The results of these two instances are either perpetual pain or irresponsibility. One misconception we may have also is recognizing how boundaries work. Boundaries are not walls that block everything from getting in or out. Boundaries are more like gates, and as we mature in Christ we begin to mature in how we operate our gates. We need to open the gates to allow people to help us, learn to ask help when we are burdened, and recognize sometimes people’s gates are closed. Examples: We are Responsible: to Love people. Not responsible: Make them feel Loved. Responsible: Teach wisdom. Not responsible: For that individual to use that wisdom. Responsible: Ask for help. Not responsible: having expectations that a person can help, and recognize to seek other avenues. Etc….. This is definitely an area where I struggle and definitely need reminders from God and Others. In the book When Helping Hurts: It talks about having a “savior complex”. We are not to be people’s saviors but lead them to the Savior. Only God our savior can save someone, knows how to love them, and is in complete control. Our perspective should be less about how we are going to fix others and more about how we can walk together, asking God to fix both of us. The goal is to see people restored to being what God created them to be: people who understand that we are created in the image of God with the gifts, abilities, and capacity to make decisions and to effect change in the world around us. We should be people who steward our lives, communities, resources, and relationships in order to bring glory to God. These things tend to happen in highly relational ways. So let us continue to point others towards Christ and help where we see fit, fulfilling the law of Christ as it says in Galatians 6:2 References: Boundaries: When to Say YES, When to Say NO, To Take Control of Your Life by Henry Cloud and John Townsend. When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor . . . and Yourself by Steve Corbett
Sa lahm!! (Hello) Passage: Romans 10:14-18 On July 22nd through August 1st, I recently had the opportunity to go on a discipleship trip with my church, Watermark Community Church along with E3 ministries, to Ethiopia, Africa. The purpose of our trip is evangelism and discipleship among new converts in villages targeted by the local church. Watermark single adults ministry and E3 Partners began this joint ministry in 2009. Every summer 4 trips go to Ethiopia to be the Hands and Feet to share the Good News of Jesus Christ making disciples of all nations. When our teams arrive, we meet the ministry staff led by husband and wife Demeke and Tarwikwa Atiso along with each small team’s translators and disciple makers. Our team stayed in the capital called Adis Ababa. An outline of the week from that Monday through Friday are working days which consisted of team breakfast in the morning, praise and worship at the church, team briefing/ prayer, and then out in the city or hill country depending where your team gets assigned. After the work day is completed, we’ll come back to our hotel, have a team dinner, debrief and share, and then finally cool down with team games such as Farkle or Mafia. You definitely don’t want to be on the losing end of a Farkle, lol! Now I’ll share some of my experiences during our time in Ethiopia along with our small team. Our small team consisted of 4 young adults along with 4-6 translators and 2-3 discplemakers. My hope when you hear my experience is to see the depth of God’s love for all people, to hear the Power of the Gospel moving across all nations, and the way He opens eyes, ears, and hearts, including mine. Below are some excerpts that I journaled during my time in Ethiopia. Excerpt from Field Day #1: Our small team heads out to a busy area within the city about 2 miles from the church. Our translators let us know the area we are headed are about 95% muslim. Generally the whole country is about 60% Christian Orthodox, 30-35% Muslim, and various religions and Christians among the rest. I had 2 conversations on our first stop. My first conversation was with a gentleman who was a farmer in that area. We got to know each other and we had some great conversations. I explained to him why we were visiting and asked if I could share my testimony of who God is in my life. The gentleman allowed and afterwards he told me that he was Christian Orthodox and was amazed at my story of God’s grace. I asked him about his story, and his story is similar to many other Christian Orthodox followers, where he explained is that’s what he grew up knowing passed down from generations in his family. Him and along with many other Christian Orthodox believers explained salvation is done through good works to get into Heaven and giving praise/homage to Jesus’ mother Mary, saints, and angels. After sharing the Gospel with the gentleman, we proceeded to ask if he would like to accept Christ into his life. The gentleman refused. My translator explained to me that the farmer is also into witch craft and at times people will combine their religion with witch craft to seek favor from God. Another conversation I had been with a Muslim Teenager. We got to know each other and then began talking about our backgrounds. I had the opportunity to share with him the Evangecube which is the size of a rubics cube. With it, it has pictures and is used to share the Gospel of Jesus. The young man seemed curious and then started asking me questions. The main question that he wanted to understand was if Jesus was God, why he would allow himself to get beaten and die on the cross. I attempted to help him understand the willingness Jesus took on the cross as a servant who came to serve us and not to be served. We dialogued and shared various stories from God’s Word which can be found in Jesus’ arrest and trial from John 18 & 19 in addition with Philippians 2:5-8. Our time ended as we left that particular village. Excerpt from Field Day #3: One of my favorite days came when we visited the country side. The country side is usually considered more of the mountainous farm area outside the city. On this particular day we came upon a predominately Orthodox village. We had the opportunity to start playing soccer with the kids in the area. The ages range from 5-18 yrs. On a quick note, regardless whether I do CrossFit or not, the hike to get where we were, in addition playing soccer with these kids wore me out. I forgot how much energy they have and how quickly I got schooled on their home field. A sweet moment came afterwards when we finished playing and all sat down in a circle to have story time. I had the opportunity to share the Gospel with the evangecube. Just to witness such innocence in these children and their attentiveness to listen was just a joyous moment for me. It continued to remind of why God calls us to have a child like faith. Seeing the way they just took in the stories with joy and excitement. Shortly after our group of kids wanted to accept Christ in which we prayed. Later that day I met a young man named Adin. He was a Christian Orthodox and a little bit of his background was that at a young age he was a Christian who accepted Christ. At the age of 7, his dad passed and no longer had that Christian leader in his household. His mom withered away from the faith and the rest of Adin’s family accepted the Orthodox religion. So Adin soon followed and was Orthodox because he did not have anyone help him understand the Word of God and who Jesus was. Adin and I talked for a bit and he just finished mechanic school and wanted to fix cars as he got older. We then had discussions about faith and what that looked like in our lives and a question that daunted Adin was “if he were to do die today, how certain would he be he would go to Heaven?” He wasn’t sure, but allowed our guides and myself to walk through the Gospel with him. At the end of our conversation we asked Adin if he wanted to re commit his life back to Christ. He initially hesitated and stated if he does, he could potentially face persecution from his family and be disowned. After that, I understood where he was coming from and tug I can have with how to Love and Follow Jesus but also love my family well. I thought that was the end of the conversation, then a few min later he said “I know where my dad is, and he is in Heaven.” I want to recommit my life back to Jesus Christ. My emotions were excited and giving God the Glory. One of His sons was ready to come back home. We prayed over him and Adin will be connected with one of the disciple makers in that area to help him build a relationship with Jesus and learn God’s Word. Some other highlights to note from our trip is how God showed me the reality of Gospel and those they may either come to accept or reject. A little bit of my perception going into the trip was that we would get to go around, build relationships, share Christ, and people would come to accept and it would all be just a “beautiful day”. However the reality and the Power of the Gospel of Christ showed me the depth of it across the world. We had several days where we faced potential dangerous situations that kept us on our toes. See when sharing Jesus, it can either go 1 of 2 ways, it will either go well and be received or be perceived as highly offensive. There were several times people turned away from us, several times people yelled at us, times of when people saw a picture of Jesus and they ran away thinking a picture of him was a curse of some sort, times of when people threaten physical confrontation in many ways. God showed me the reality of the Gospel and it wasn’t to serve me and give me comfort in sharing as if I was his chosen hero to help the save the day, but to remind me of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and like His disciples back 2000 years who faced persecution for sharing. For Jesus’ disciples back then is no different today in relation to our brothers and sisters today who are sharing the faith in areas where the Gospel can be considered offensive or illegal. In closing, as I still process what God has shown me, here are few things already identified. God taught me how I can struggle with the idol of control/comfort. There were times I wanted things to go according my way whether that be the schedule of the day, when are we going to have lunch or when would the work day end. Another idol exposed is affirmation. Sometimes I could get carried away in wanting those I engaged with to come and accept Christ or if they didn’t, not to turn away in a sense of disapproval of me sharing. God also showed me how content many people were despite living conditions and limited resources where as I and our community can be discontent in spite of the many resources we do have. They were many Christian men and women I met whose living situation doesn’t allow them to get as much time to spend with God daily because they may have to walk miles for work or to get groceries with also the responsibilities of taking care of their families. They expressed how they would do almost anything to have the abundant resources and time we have to spend with God and learn His Word. And yet how many times have I passed up the opportunities to spend time with God because I wanted to sleep in, or get distracted by Facebook and other social media outlets where I could use that time spend with God, or our culture gets so busy we get burnt out and don’t have that spiritual desire. God in a short statement has challenged my heart by asking me “How do I surrender in trusting God?” If anyone gets an opportunity to go on a discipleship trip, I highly encourage you to pursue it and don’t let it pass by. God will show you more about yourself and who He is in you then you thinking what it is that you’ll be doing for God. A quote that I meditated leading up to this journey and still meditate frequently was quoted to me from my time in Equip Disciple. The quote is “If not now, then when. If not you, then who.” I hope everyone would ponder that when put in a position to share the Gospel and the love Jesus in whatever platform that may look like for you. Amma say ga nah lo! (Thank you)
After I professed to accept Christ at 25, looking back I didn’t really understand what I was professing and didn’t know what I believed in my head and heart. I then thought being a “Good Christian” meant attending church on Sundays, serving, and getting plugged in, while Monday – Friday I still had a foothold in the world. After a failed and toxic relationship 5 yrs ago, that’s when I really wanted to seek Jesus with heart and want to know what it meant to follow Him. Since then he has blessed me in so many ways and the Christfit Ministry has played a huge role shaping me as one of His many children.
How did you hear about Christfit and what was your first experience?
What motivates you/ keeps you coming back to Christfit?
Best place you’ve traveled to and why?
Do you have a song on repeat for you this week?
Any verse or reoccurring theme on your heart?
How did you hear about Christfit and what was your first experience?
What motivates you/ keeps you coming back to Christfit?
What accomplishments are you most proud of (outside and inside the gym)?
After a good workout, what is your favorite meal?
What are some of your interests outside of Christfit?
What is one of your favorite things to do in Dallas?
Best place you’ve traveled to and why?
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Favorite quote or words to live by?
Do you have a song on repeat for you this week?
Greatest victory that has come from this week?
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