I can hardly believe another year is coming to a close.

It never ceases to amaze me the things that God does. The way He loves us is just so awe-inspiring. 

I've learned more about love and the simplicity of the gospel this year than I have in a very long time. 

I've been to more church services, youth meetings, mission trips, service projects, etc. than some people could imagine possible in an entire lifetime, and while all of that is important and all, I went through a time where I felt like that got me somewhere. Like all that adding up was going to do something for me in my life, take away one more trial than the ones I'll go through. How wrong that is, yet how many churches "preach" that. Faith without works is dead, yes. But that has been taken to an extreme that means something so much different than what that passage talks about. 

I guess at the end of this year, my perspective being 100% different, I've learned to love. To love Jesus, to love people and to let every single other aspect of life follow behind that. 

I've learned about prayer and it's truly life-changing the bond prayer brings to a group. To a family. To a single relationship.

I'm changed.

I'm better because of the people in my life.

I've felt pain, but more than any of that I've seen the hand of God in the people I pass by walking to class. And I see Him in the newborn babies I've rocked to sleep this year. And I hear Him in the voices of those I love. I feel Him in that livingroom on Johnson Ave. in Cleveland, TN. I just see Him everywhere & in everything.

I am simply amazed....

2008, you've been ridiculously kind to me.