Hello everyone! Welcome back to my blog! If you're reading this for the first time, my name is Evie, and I am going on a 9 month gap year missions trip now traveling to Jamaica, Italy, Nepal, Thailand, Indonesia, and Australia! Go and check out my first blog if you haven't already to find out why I said yes to gap year!

This month has been a crazy one! I leave in just under a month now! I decided in June of 2025 to go on this trip and now almost 14 months of waiting, I am so close! I have learned and grown more in the last month than I have in the past 6 months all together. What God has been doing in my life has become one of the most amazing and ineffable parts of my testimony. I truly have no words for the way God has moved in my life, and I would love to tell you about it! If you would like to know more about me and my testimony, simply ask! I am always willing to share for those that are willing to listen! As of now, I am going to share some things the Lord has so graciously been teaching me.

I played volleyball for over 7 years, and if there is anything I learned, it is keep your eye on the ball, and where ever your shoulders are pointed and your eyes are fixed, the ball will go. It's funny how this can be turned right around to life. Where your eyes are fixed, and your body and mind are pointed, you will go. such a simple concept, yet so easy to forget. Constantly we expect to feel peace, and joy and not struggle anymore, but we go on to our lives of sin, trying our hardest to find comfort in that. its so strange how we try so hard to find comfort, and peace, and joy in numerous things, always ending up emptier and dryer than before. Meanwhile the literal source of those things are right in our faces. Now do I mean that following the Lord is comfortable? Not by any means, but he is our comforter. We place our trust in him that he will comfort us in our sorrows, and fear. Consider Isaiah 51:12 "I, I am he who comforts you; who are you that you are afraid of man who dies, who of son of man who is made like the grass,".

The best thing about our life on this earth is that it isn't about us. It's about him. It becomes about us when we turn our eyes from him. The hard truth is that when this life becomes about us, we begin to worship ourselves. In my opinion, the most natural thing for a human is worship. Whatever takes up our time, our focus, our minds, body, and whatever our eyes are fixed upon, is what we worship. Every human worships something! Even nonbelievers! How poetic of God, truly, that he made one of the most natural things to us is worship. But we cant serve two masters. Luke 16:13 "No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money." The word money in this verse comes from the Greek word mammonas or mammon. This word means riches, material wealth, or the personification of riches as a false deity or an idol worthy of our time and devotion (Theology and Religious Study). This is a hard truth, but if we are worshipping and serving ourselves, we cannot simultaneously worship and serve God. Our hearts, minds, body, and soul have to be fully turned and fixed on the one true King! Then and only then will we truly be fulfilling our purpose of serving the Lord and making disciples in obedience to him.

I came to this realization when I was, in full vulnerability, struggling with body image. My life changed when I stopped asking God to change my body, and started asking him to help me love his creation and be thankful for the body he gave me to serve him. Only hours later I heard this quote: "You only have one life, and it is our duty to live it to the fullest." Now while as followers of Christ we understand that we have eternal life with Jesus, and our "duty" is to follow him and serve him. But it still rang louder and louder in my head. We were given such little time on earth compared to eternity, and I refuse to let the enemy win by choosing to waste it on hating Gods beautiful creation. I Refuse to serve the same world that crucified my Father. God showed me that in my own hatred for myself, I was worshipping myself. I had become my own idol. From that moment I decided to take every thought captive and hand it to someone who is much better at handling them than me. I decided that the only one I want worship is the one who saved my soul from the penalty of death by sending his son to die instead, the one that radically healed me, the one that so intricately created me, and you by knitting us together in our mothers womb. He is the only master I want and yearn to serve. Anything else has, and will continue to leave me and you empty if we choose it.

But in all of that, the Father in his graciousness has new mercies every morning. He doesn't abandon us like so many people. He doesn't turn away from us. He doesn't mock us. My favorite quote is by Dane Ortlund in his book "Gentle and Lowly", which is: "The most natural position to God is not a pointed finger, but open arms." He wants you. He called you. He loves you. dwell on that for a moment. The Most High LOVES you. The one and only King PRAYS for you. One of my favorite passages is all of Ephesians 1-2. I encourage you to go through those chapters and highlight every single thing God has called you. Write it down, hang it on your wall. Remind yourself of it daily. Jesus thinks of you every moment of every day. He has compassion on you, and He truly is gentle.

So fix your eyes on him, stop running and starting pursuing. Choose today to serve the master that suffered for you.

thank you for reading<3 until next time ;)