Get some awe. It's awesome.

I will start off today by explaining the picture. This is Elizabeth (my roomie) and me, and an Ihop water bottle. Well. A couple of days ago we were talking about water bottles, and I mentioned that I secretly hoped they would just give Intro interns a fabulously cool Ihop water bottle. You know, to fit in, wink wink. :) I kid you not, almost everyone who has anything to do with Ihop has one of these water bottles. Because you are only allowed to take water bottles into the prayer room, they sell a lot of them. Anyway, Elizabeth and I get back from a Walmart run, and on the table is a birthday package from my mom, which I totally got the coolest electric toothbrush (Thanks mom! I am happy that I get to brush my teeth while I am here! Dr. Bell will appreciate that, too!) Elizabeth was all excited, she asked me when my birthday was. So, when I told her Sunday, she smiled real big and asked me how important it was for me to have something to open on my birthday. She smiled even bigger when I told her it wasn't a big deal. She starts telling me this story of how she was in Higher Grounds (the coffee shop here), and decided to bless me by buying one for me. And, not just any one...a pink one (they didn't have purple). HOORAY! My birthstone just happens to be pink. And check it out. She is wearing pink, I am wearing pink, and so is the water bottle! Kiss from God! And now, phew, I won't stand out like a sore thumb because I don't have an Ihop water bottle. Ha. Oh, and this really was the best of the series of pictures we took. So, as you see, a quarter of my face is blocked by the water bottle.

Yesterday was a pretty low-key day for me. I got spoiled, too. My mentor knows a girl out here, Tarah, and having connections, we wanted to meet. So Tarah took me to Town Center to window shop. We talked a lot about the Justice Orphanage, adoption, and the foster care system. That was really neat. It was truly a blessing. We also discovered that we are both going to be going through a program out here called Pure Heart.

Today was just an incredible day. I honestly cannot put into words a lot of what happened today. Worship started at 9am, by 9:15 I had mascara all over my face from crying. The Lord just showed up, and was working on everyone's hearts. Tissue boxes were being thrown out and replaced with new ones all over the room. God's fatherheart was sweet in the air, and the leadership ministered to every single person. It's all very personal, but it was oh so good. That launched my day for a day of just sensing His presence, and a lot of inner-healing took place.

Classes over the past 2 days have still been a lot of introduction to Intro stuff. We met in small groups yesterday and started Allen Hood's "Excellencies of Christ." I'm already floored with these teachings of the raw character of Jesus. He is good. The Father is good. And the Holy Spirit is good. Good is such a powerful word, once you encounter it, you know that it is more than a surface-level way of expressing how we perceive something. It's a very dynamic word. Good. My favorite line in The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, is when the kids are at the beavers house, talking about Aslan. Lucy said she would be scared to meet a lion, and asked if he was "quite safe?" Mr Beaver responds by saying, "Safe? Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.'" That blew up my ideas of what the word, good, meant.

Even just in 4 days of classes, I am sensing such a reality shift, or to use Ihopese, a paradigm shift, of who this Jesus is. This King. My King. Wow. I'm in awe of how much I didn't know His thoughts toward me. I'm in awe. And more awe is to come. Deeper awe. I'm barely scratching the surface. I have, in a sense, walked into a wardrobe as a child, to learn my place in the Kingdom and to fight battles.

Our small group had what we call Briefing, today. Basically, we sit in a side room in the prayer room, and brief about what's been going on. We talked about the power of praising God. The leaders (Jess and Alice...and just to clarify, Jess is a guy, and Alice is his wife), gave us this declaration that someone had written out a while back. When they pastored a church, they would instruct individuals in need, like a doctor would give a prescription, that they proclaim this over themselves X amount of times a day. And like they said to us, it's not that the words are a formula that is extra special...it's just the matter of taking the time to posture our hearts before the Lord, and proclaim who He is. They had testimony upon testimony of physical and emotional healings. So, here it is if you want to try it!

Hallelujah 3X
Hallelujah praise Jesus
Hallelujah praise the Lord
I love you, O Lord, my Strength 2X
Christ is my Life 2X

The words Strength and Life are in itallics, because those words can be substituted with whatever your need is. Health. Peace. Because Jesus is those things. It's basic Truth. Foundational Truth. And foundational Truth, when proclaimed, shakes things until what is left cannot be shaken.

I see that I have written a lot. So I will leave with some things from Allen Hood's notes that really struck me:

~The Cross was not drudgery for Him. The Cross was necessary for Him to receive the greatest yearning of His heart-YOU.

~Jesus did the unthinkable. He asked the Father to give the redeemed of the human race the highest possible pleasure-to behold the unparalleled splendor of God in Jesus and to feel the same love that the Father has for His Son. God's intentions are not to simply give us the right set of Gospel facts in order for us to pass the test to get into Heaven. He has something far more magnificent. He wants to share the most glorious thing he has-Himself in the person of his Son, in all of his glory and all of His love.