By Kristen Mudrack

We bought a house not too long ago. A very adult thing to do, I know. Mortgage and loans and all – we own (well, the bank owns) a house.

The first thing we did was pull up some disgusting green carpet outside and then all of the carpet inside.

Why?

Because the green carpet was disgusting, and the inside carpet wasn’t great for my allergies and coughing, and it honestly wasn’t that great either.

But really it was because we wanted to make the house our own. We wanted to change it and fix it because it was ours now.

This got me thinking the other day. About how when Jesus comes into our lives, He wants to make some changes. Out with the old, and in with the new, as 2 Corinthians says.

Jesus doesn’t come into our lives and expect things to stay the same. He expects things to change – priorities to shift, time and money to be given elsewhere, sin to be dealt with. These changes don’t usually happen overnight, but gradually. And these changes often aren’t easy. It’s hard to kick old habits that aren’t glorifying to God. Hard to realign our priorities, time, money, and so much more.

How silly it would be for us to move into our new house and change nothing, not make it our own. How difficult it is to make something your home if it isn’t really yours.

And yet, how often we expect God to come into our lives and change nothing.

But we didn’t demolish our entire home – there was no need. We didn’t raze the place to the ground and start completely over – that would have been a waste of money and time and space.

You see, God uses what you’ve got. He works where you are. He doesn’t come into your life and decide you’re not worth it and so demolishes the whole thing and starts over. He doesn’t work that way.

God uses your talents, your gifts, your passions and your personality to do His work – to build up His kingdom here on Earth. And yes, He changes things. Things that are for your good, and for His purposes.

It certainly wasn’t easy to pull out all of the carpet and replace it with a new floor. It took time, money, and friends to help. It took long hours and late nights and hammered fingers and cuts and bruises. But the change was worth it – because it is our home.

Change is worth it, when Jesus is involved. It’s not easy. Not always fun, and definitely causes a few bumps and bruises. Letting God make you new takes time, patience, and people. Iron sharpening iron.

And the work isn’t ever done.

Now that the carpet is out and the floor is in, the baseboard is (mostly) replaced, the small cracks filled in, and the green carpet is history, we get to start working on other projects – like the overgrown, weed-infested backyard. And front yard. And side yard. Pretty much the whole yard.

As I work to cultivate the land and house that God has blessed us with, I pray that I will allow Him to work and cultivate and change me into the person that He is calling me to be.

By Kristen Mudrack

I spent the last two weeks roaming around Colorado and Utah seeing God’s beautiful creation firsthand with a college trip. How amazing to drive through the San Juan mountains or how speechless to stand at the foot of a mountain of sand. How breathtaking the beauty of the view at Pikes Peak. How wonderful the sunsets and sunrises and the rain and – yes, even the snow.

Remember those sand dunes? And the mountains? They were formed by violent winds and plates shifting. Those things at we call beautiful were brought about by something devastating and powerful. If you will, think of those mountains and dunes and valleys and lakes as scars. They are the scars of what has happened in the past. And yet, they are beautiful.

We tend to look at scars differently. We see scars on our bodies and remember the awesome stories or the way that we injured ourselves. Scars on our hearts are a little bit less glamorous, though. When parents walk away, friends die, relationships end, someone hurts you – those stories aren’t usually the ones we tell. Those scars aren’t the ones we proudly show off. We tend to hide them. Bury them. Run away from them.

Just a few weeks ago, we celebrated Easter. You probably went to church and sang songs about Jesus’ resurrection and heard sermons that were really aimed towards all of the visitors that day. You probably responded to the pastor’s call of “He is risen!”, with “He is risen indeed.” But for all of that celebrating, how many of us remember the scars?

You’ve probably heard the story of Jesus appearing to doubting Thomas before. It’s nothing new. But look at what Jesus says. He says, “See my scars. Touch my wounds and believe.” The thing that Jesus presents to Thomas so that he will believe are his scars. The very same things that freed us from the bondage of sin, that we sing bout, that we call beautiful, are his scars. His scars were the proof. The thing that tore the veil and made a way for us to know him,the thing that makes him our savior,those were scars.

What if our scars should do the same thing? Help people believe?

What if, instead of hiding or pushing down our scars, we let God use them to ring people to him? To help them believe?

I used to hide behind my scars. The ones that only I could see. And then one day, God dragged me kicking and screaming out of my comfort zone and showed me why I had those scars – for his glory.

When I finally let God use my scars for his glory, I saw a glimpse of what God sees: beautiful scars. Scars that point to him, that tell of who he is. I still have a hard time seeing my scars, let alone myself, that way. But God is using other people’s scars to show me his heart. He’s even using the scars on the earth that I’ve seen these two weeks to remind me of his glory, his majesty, and his beautiful scars.

So what story do your scars tell?

How do I make sense of it?  How do I accept that life can be cut off so abruptly – by a gun, by a car crash, by cancer, by any number of things?

Doctors likes to assure us that our life expectancies are high, that we’ve got time, that we’ll live to see our grandkids.  That we have time to decide what we really want to be when we grow up.  That we have time to grow up.

Do we?  Do we have time to put things off until tomorrow, or wait to say something until the next time we see that person?  Do we really have time?

Somehow, we’ve been conditioned to live like tomorrow is guaranteed.

But it’s not.  We are not promised tomorrow.

Living like tomorrow is promised means that we don’t always say “I love you.”  We don’t always resolve our disagreements quickly.  We procrastinate. We don’t visit family or friends when we can.  We don’t stop and smell the roses.  We don’t enjoy each moment we have.

Just because we aren’t guaranteed tomorrow doesn’t mean we don’t plan for the future, invest smartly, save for retirement, or try to do everything today.  We still have to have a long-term goal in place.  But it does mean that we live differently.

Living differently means taking every chance you get.  It means saying, “I love you” every morning before you leave for work.  It means taking the time to talk to those around you and offer your shoulder to cry on, even when there are tests that need to be graded.  It means giving your kids more time to crawl on top of you and tickle you.  It means living each day as if it was your last.

Tomorrow is not promised.  It’s a gift.  When you unwrap that gift every morning, give thanks.  And then go live it to the glory of God the Father.

It was a warm, summer evening many years ago when I first went to a live Casting Crowns concert.  I had been listening to their music for years, but had never seen them live.  I was so excited – but I had no idea what was in store for me, or what this concert would begin.

My family set up our lawn chairs at the outdoor venue and waited expectantly to hear my favorite Christian group perform.  And yet, from the first note they struck, it wasn’t a performance – it was worship.

They were leading worship.

Somehow, the stage wasn’t about them.  It was about pointing the crowd to God.  At one point near the end of their set, Mark Hall began singing the worship song We Fall Down.  He asked that we lay all of our burdens down at the feet of Jesus, and that we lift up someone up in prayer that they would do the same.  At that point, I felt moved to walk around a couple of chairs to my younger brother and to lay my hand on him and pray for him, that he would surrender all of his life to the Lord and His leading.

I didn’t think about that concert again until a few years ago, when my brother and I were at another Casting Crowns concert.  He leaned over to me and asked, “Do you remember our first Casting Crowns concert?”

“Vaguely,” I replied.  “It was at Alive, and our whole family was there.”

“And you prayed for me,” he added.

I hadn’t even remembered that until he brought it up again, but that prayer made an impact on him.  He remembers it.  He remembers that his big sister prayed specifically for him.  He remembers more of what I said than I do.  But my measly little prayer that day did more than I ever could have imagined.  We’ve been to many Casting Crowns concerts together since, but none sticks in his head so much as that one.

Pray for someone with them today.  Not just in private.  In person.  Out loud.  And ask the Spirit to lead you.  You never know what God might do with it.

By Kristen Mudrack

I’m not a huge fan of pictures of myself.  I tend to want to be the one holding the camera instead of on the other side of it.

You see, I tend to not like the way I look in pictures.  The picture was too posed, or the light wasn’t right, or I look fat, or I’m not smiling, or any other such excuse I can come up with.  But usually it’s because I don’t like the way I look.

I have this image in my head of what I should look like.  In short, perfect.  I should look put together, happy, and healthy, even if that’s not actually true at that moment.  I think I got this notion from looking at social media – where we all put the best of ourselves out there.  The perfect selfies and the happy status updates – they don’t always reflect real life.  When did we become so good at pretending?

Pretending that everything is okay, even when it’s falling apart.

Pretending that we’re always happy, even when we’re struggling.

Pretending that we’re always healthy and flourishing, even when that is the furthest thing from the truth.

In social media today, we put forward the best of ourselves.  We want people to see the best image of us, not the struggling, frazzled, often overextended person that we actually are.  Now, there are things you shouldn’t share on social media.  For example, that you’re angry with your significant other or a confidential matter that has been shared with you.  But neither should we always be the perfect version of ourselves.

Pictures show that more than anything.  I have pictures from college during times that I was on steroids and sicker than ever before.  I can tell, in those pictures, that I wasn’t feeling like myself.  I have pictures from trips with my family and friends that show beautiful landscapes but also dirty, muddy, sweaty, happy faces.  I have pictures from my wedding that show unbridled happiness as never before.

The more I stand on this side of the camera, the more I realize that I love these pictures.  Even the ones where I look terrible.  Because they show the real me.  The messy, dirty, imperfect, happy, sad, healthy, sick, real me.

What do your pictures show?  Do they show the real you?  Or the you that poses for the camera?