No matter where you are in life today, show the people around you love. Everybody is looking for acceptance and encouragement, so give it to them! We all long to be known and loved. Living from the inside out means that whatever is on your heart, let people see it. Show them Jesus. Be transparent. Be real. Be you!

“…in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of others.” Philippians 2:3-4

so here I am…snowed in for what seems like the 1 millionth time this month here in the Nashville area…and I am discovering that God has created my brain to work in a very interesting manner. Maybe some of y’all can relate:

You see, my brain has what I’d like to call the “Workaholic syndrome” so it seems to never stop spinning with ideas and songs and plans and thoughts and questions and worries and the list goes on and on and on…

At what point, though, do I just sit back and let whatever happens happen?

That is what I am trying to do today…just relax. Maybe being snowed in is God’s way of saying “Carmen slow down!”… and even more importantly: PRAY. How many times do I try to fix problems myself instead of just giving it to God and say “Ok, God…I’m gonna trust that you know what you are doing here and only have plans for me to prosper and not plans to harm me.”? We are a society of “fixer-uppers” and are sometimes so much this way to the point where we don’t even rely on God to do any of the fixing. It is like we think we can get our whole lives to have purpose but leave God completely out of the equation. Here is the crazy thing we have to remember though:

God IS our purpose.

No matter what problems or goals you have that you are trying to do everything in your power to solve are, take a second to ask yourself, “Is the end goal I am wanting going to glorify God or myself?” “Am I trying so hard to open a door that God is actually trying to close?” or “What can I use wisdom and discernment for to do something and then what can I give over to God to handle?”

1 Peter 5:7
“Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.