The Jesus Collection

“To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek Him the greatest adventure; to find Him, the greatest human achievement.” — St Augustine of Hippo

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Our new collection is available in the shop and it is all about Jesus.

The Trinity is a circle of perfect love and submission. Each One is always pointing us to the other — Father to Son, Son to Holy Spirit, Holy Spirit to the Son, the Son to the Father… and the wheel keeps turning.

In different seasons of our lives, we get to know each aspect of the Trinity in a new and deeper way.

Sometimes it’s the grace + goodness of a loving Father. Sometimes it’s the holy demand for surrender by the Holy Spirit. And sometimes it’s the wonder of the cross of Jesus.

Every God-ordained season comes with its own mandate, having in itself the power to perform in us that which the Lord sent it out to do.

So right now, in this season? It’s all about Jesus.

Knowing Him in a deeper way in all His multifaceted mystery. Understanding His Kingly rights to my utter obedience. Learning the beautiful freedom of these words: “Remain in me”.

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We don’t believe that things can make us love God more, but we pray that they will inspire us to seek Him more deeply + hungrily.

This collection is applicable to any time of the year, and we pray that the 8 weeks you spend walking through the pages will awaken you to a deeper knowledge of Jesus, and hopefully fall in love with Him just a little bit more.

Shop the new collection here AND you’re invited to our launch movie event!

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Stop Following The Godly Woman

Sometimes I meet some sweet women who say, “I follow you so I know you’re an inspiration.” If you know me, you know I’d choke on my tea a little. I am probably the most flawed person I know; the least likely person I would follow.

I wish I could find the tallest place in the world + shout this at the top of my lungs: Stop following the godly man or woman.

I feel like this can’t ever be said enough. The godly man/woman of God? They’re man, not God. It may sound like a bit of an overstatement, but the truth is we are often distracted the most by those who inspire us.

We can be distracted by those who are the most like God, if we do not see through them to see God.

Can we have some straight talk today? Get close to a man or woman of God and we will almost certainly be disappointed + hurt.

He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

Isaiah 53

Jesus was unremarkable to those who met Him, and He was the King of Heaven. He could’ve come to earth as a super handsome, statuesque, eloquent alpha male — the Messiah all of Israel was waiting for. Instead He made himself into a humble, nondescript Jewish man.

In short, Jesus was a huge disappointment to those who had waited hundreds of years for their messiah. He resisted when the Jews wanted to make Him king. He said offensive things that turned people away. He chose to be a carpenter’s son + a questionable virgin birth, and that stumbled some people who would never accept someone with that heritage as their Messiah.

Jesus knew that a shiny surface would distract people from seeing the deeper treasure within. He stepped away from the limelight so that others could see the true Light.

And all servants of God are called to walk in His footsteps.

We are asked to be a friend of the Bridegroom, not a competitor. We are bid to remember that we are weak, broken, imperfect vessels. That the anointing doesn’t fall on the deserving, but on the humble servants that acknowledge their need of a Savior.

We are called to be real, vulnerable, open books in which the world can read about the grace + goodness of God. We must be honest about our weaknesses so that our lives boast about His grace. We are invited to be real about where we’re at + our mistakes so that His goodness in our mess shines through.

And because of that, sometimes? We hurt + disappoint others… and that’s good.

Human beings run toward whatever we’ve got our eyes fixed on, and sometimes God needs to trip us up to help us realize that we lost sight of the Person because we’d been so fixated on the reflection. And it’s a good day when we discern clearly that we’d been chasing after His likeness, not Himself. Because an image, however precise, will never be as dynamic as the real thing.

So if we want freedom, we mustn’t look to those who are closer to God than we are. When we look at anyone, it must be Him we see. We can learn whatever we can from others. Be inspired by them. But ultimately, we must receive the bread directly from Him.

If we want to run and not stumble, we must stop staring after the people who have gone before us. Start running our own race.

Because putting them on a pedestal limits us, God, and them. Our growth will only go as far as they’ve gone. We’ll only open up to the extent that God has been demonstrated in their lives. And they’re not allowed to fall because their failures cause us to stumble.

We’re all works in progress, and what we see on the surface cannot define us + we cannot let it define how we judge someone else. Because the things we see are just a really small fraction. Real lives are far more messy + far more beautiful, and we need to give ourselves, God, and others to space to fall and learn and soar.

So Holy Spirit, would You keep our eyes looking upward and less downward + sideways + inward.

Give us discernment + wisdom in the sources we learn from. To know when to stop reading How-to’s and Must-do’s that get us all stressed out because we’re trying so hard to fit into a mold of success that wasn’t scripted for us.

And friends, if my words cause you daily to look at me instead of pointing you to God? Hit unfollow. Then go and do the same to everything else in your life that has the same effect on you. You were made for freedom, so straight up go live free.

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Catching Fire

I was at a wedding last weekend when these words arrested my heart: How are we going to keep the flame alive in marriage? Not an uncommon question to be introduced at a wedding, but there was something different about this one. The Lord’s hand was on it, hovering, breathing, inviting. In the same way that couples often choose meaningful symbols of commitment—sometimes even something as thoughtfully chosen as natural spinel engagement rings in Brisbane—the moment carried a sense of intention and enduring beauty.

Maybe it was the season that Alex and I had gone through. Maybe I was finally ready to hear the answer to that question without being clouded by idealistic fancy or bitter cynicism. Or maybe it was just simply God’s time. It could’ve been all of the above, but simply put, it was uncomfortably impossible to ignore.

It brought me to a halt. I could not brush it out of the way.

So I asked Him: How do we keep the flame burning in marriage? And really, I meant that question for any relationship/mission we might be called to.

Holy Spirit, the wisest + wittiest person I know, swiftly came back with this rejoinder: By catching fire.

I’d like to say right off the bat that this is one of those messages where the messenger is probably learning right alongside the hearer as she delivers the communiqué.

I’m still learning what it means to set my soul on fire + kindle that flame. And seriously? It’s not just in marriage, but pretty much every other area of life. For some, it’s about relationships. For others, it could be about abiding in a season of singlehood, or sticking it out in a marathon, or hope for a hopeless situation. Wherever we are, I pray for the Teacher’s wisdom to show us how to apply this so we get to live fully alive in every area of life.

HEARTS THAT BURN. This is talked about too much + not enough all at once.

Revival. On fire. Awakening. These are some of the many words thrown around in our hipster generation, and these words reflect the nature of their era — they look good, sound cool, but are adopted by people who might not fully understand what it means.

In the deluge of words, my heart breaks when sometimes the truth of those words get lost in translation and people get shortchanged because they never knew there was a deeper richness available to all who would seek it.

So can we get one thing out in the open? Fire hurts.

Fire cleanses, purifies, sustains life.

It brings gold out of the rock.

But the process hurts sometimes.

You don’t play with fire because fire consumes, overtakes, dominates. You don’t take it lightly or use it flippantly because, while it is a handy servant, it is a demanding master.

We ask God for hearts on fire for Him, and then we tend to wonder why everything starts to go wrong in our lives. Good things come to those who seek Him, right?

We forget that in order for God to make our hearts wholly His, everything else that’s taken up residence in there has to go. He is the Consuming Fire that burns up all the dross.

And we don’t like that. We resist. We want the fire on our terms, at our whim + fancy.

We forget that He is not our lackey but our Lord.

And I feel like if we talked more about the Fire, we’d have more people living fully alive in the church.

“Then fire from the Lord came down and burned the sacrifice, the wood, the stones, and the ground around the altar. It also dried up the water in the ditch. When all the people saw this, they fell down to the ground, crying, “The Lord is God! The Lord is God!”

1 Kings 18: 38 & 39

Here’s what happens for those who do let His fire in.

They become burning effigies of Jesus Christ. Monuments, representatives, lighted beacons that show the world Jesus.

And that fire, His consuming fire, will overtake. It eats up the small fires or greed, selfishness, complacency, religiosity… and establishes His raging inferno in their place. That’s when we truly begin to live. Combustion happens. And it is no longer us endeavoring to keep the flame (in marriage, in our jobs, in ministry) alive, but His fire that eternally lights the blaze.

So we catch fire this way: We lay ourselves on the altar. And we let His fire set us ablaze.

We don’t need to holler + yell like to prophets of Baal did. God doesn’t need to be convinced, nor is He deaf.

A laid-down sacrifice will always attract His fire.

And that child of God that’s caught on fire? Well, watch out. She’s gonna change her world.

So maybe let this be the start of some conversations we need to have. What are some areas in your life that maybe need to come fully alive? Are we holding back any parts because we’re afraid of what His fire would do? Do we need to readjust the lenses through which we view + trust Him? Can we choose to surrender those areas of our hearts today?

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Idream of Eden. We were made for the Garden and the full pleasure of paradise. We got separated at Eden and we spend our whole lives searching for a way back into that secret paradise. All of life's pursuit + pain + questioning can be traced back to man's search for home. Our deepest instincts tell us that we are not home outside of this reality, and our souls will never stop searching until we return. Only there will we find rest and our true being. There, we begin to dream again the dreams that have laid asleep in our hearts all along.

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