Enjoying life at it's fullest!

Something about me is that I love to be random! :-) I love to do anything random, weird, strange and peculiar.

I realized a couple years ago, that everyone lives life on earth only once. Putting eternity after you die aside, I figured out that if I only live life on earth once, why not live it to it's full potential!? So since then, I have tried to live life as "weird" and random as possible, do cool and fun things, and make people happy.

Those are just a couple examples of what I have been doing that I call "weird/random/fun/awesome" for a 16 year old...I plan to share more of my awkward and random moments with you all as time goes by! :D

Give-a-way!!!

Hello everyone!

Recently I went to a concert and got a free Mercy Me music CD!! :-) It's their latest released CD and it's called: "The Worship Sessions."

However, the give-a-way is not on this blog. You need to go to my other blog at: www.dedicatedchristians.blogspot.com to enter!!

Hope to see you there! Details about how to enter will be there as well!

God bless,
Josiah

The Lord...Full of Mercy

This is something I typed up the other day. One of my favorite chapters in the Bible is Psalm 51. It's the prayer of my life and it has meant to a lot to me over my faith.

"When I fall away from the Lord, He always seems to find me again. When I fail Him, He always finds a place in His abundant mercy to forgive me. When I cry, He lifts my head up. When I am ashamed, He comforts me. When I am happy, He laughs with me. And when I need someone to talk to, He is always there, to listen and to answer." -Josiah Blanchard

I thought I would just type out Psalm 51, not only so you could read it, but so that I could see this chapter on my blog as well.

Have mercy upon me, O God,

According to Your lovingkindess;

According to the multitude of Your tender mercies,

Blot out my transgressions.

Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,

And cleanse me from my sin.

For I acknowledge my transgressions,

And my sin is always before me.

Against You, You only, have I sinned,

And done this evil in Your sight --

That You may be found just when You speak

And blameless when You judge.

Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,

And in sin my mother conceived me.

Behold, You desire truth in the inward parts,

And in the hidden part You will make me to know wisdom.

Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;

Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

Make me hear joy and gladness,

That the bones You have broken may rejoice.

Hide Your face from my sins,

And blot out all my iniquities.

Create in me a clean heart, O God,

And renew a steadfast spirit within me.

Do not cast me away from Your presence,

And do not take You Holy Spirit from em.

Restore to me the joy of Your salvation,

And uphold me by Your generous Spirit.

Then I will teach transgressors Your ways,

And sinner shall be converted to You.

Deliver me from the guilt of bloodshed, O God,

The God of my salvation,

And my tongue shall sing aloud of Your righteousness.

O Lord, open my lips,

And my mouth shall show forth Your praise.

For You do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it;

You do not delight in burnt offering.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit,

A broken and contrite heart --

These, O God, You will not despise.

Do good in Your good pleasure to Zion;

Build the walls of Jerusalem.

Then You shall be please with the sacrifices of righteousness,

With burnt offering and whole burnt offering;

Then they shall offer bulls on Your altar.

Thanks for reading. Hopefully this chapter can also help you when you fell away from your Faith with Jesus, or are struggling to keep Him in your life.

God bless,

Josiah

Lecrae

Hello everyone!

If you notice on my play list on my blog, I added some new songs. The artist is Lecrae, and I really like him! :-)

I know what your thinking...what is a guy like me, a Christian, listening to Rap music for?? Well, the thing about Lecrae is that he is using his gift of rapping for Jesus by reaching out to teenagers all around the world. If you listen to the words closely, they are really great!

I recently bought his CD, Man Up, which is all about how men should act, what makes us a man, what defines us as men, what we shouldn't do, etc. It's really great, and it's a great encouragement for me while I struggle through the same things Lecrae is talking about.

Something Lecrae said before he started singing (this was at a concert I went to) he said, "don't give me the praise and glory for singing; I don't deserve it. Glorify Jesus, I sing to glorify Jesus."

Anyway, I thought I would share what I thought of this group, and why I am adding it onto my play list.

Before I came a dedicated Christian, I loved listening to rap...however it was full of sin and wasn't glorifying God at all. This is glorifying God and the words are fun to listen to because I enjoy this kind of music. 

Something Adrian Rogers wrote: "I care not how beautifully you sing; how eloquently you teach; how liverally you give; how cicumspectly you walk - if you are not endeavoring to bring souls to Jesus Christ, you're not right with God. You...are guilty of high treason against the King."

I believe that Lecrae is bringing souls to Christ with their message.

I also like to listen to Country music, but a lot of that is inappropriate. I mean, you got Randy Travis, which are great songs, but his voice gets tiring after awhile. :-)

Thanks for reading,

Josiah

I got tagged!!! Yippee!!

I love getting tagged in blog posts. Why? Well they give me something to write about when I don't have anything to write about. :-)

Okay, so here are the rules that I need to share.

1.) Post these rules.
2.) You MUST post 11 random things about yourself.
3.) Answer the questions the tagger set for you in their post.
4.) Create 11 new question for the people you ask to answer.
5.) Go to their blog and tell them they have been they have been Tagged.
So Here are 11 Random things about me!

Now for the Random things about me!

(1) I love chickens - I love eating them, raising them, reading about them, and anything else about them.
(2) I want to own my own property/house by the time I am 20 years old. Where? I have no idea yet...
(3) I want to own a restaurant and hobby farm when I grow up.
(4) I love working. For money or not, I love working. I especially love working outside.
(5) I am taking business and communication classes in college.
(6) I sleep at the bottom of a bunk bed. I share a room with my brother.
(7) I have 4 e-mail accounts, 2 bank accounts, 2 social networking accounts, and multiple other accounts on odd websites. This results in a lot of passwords!!
(8) I love the Lord, and I can't believe how amazing He is with His abundant mercy.
(9) I am on my computer a lot, almost all day. I would rather be doing something outside, like raising chickens, but not yet...
(10) I know how to drive, a stick-shift. Which is actually fun!
(11) I have an eating problem...I find myself eating when I am bored, depressed, sad, or angry.

Now these are the questions I need to answer that Gracie gave me.

1. What is your favorite book?
I love the Bible, which is probably one of my favorite books. However, if I had to pick something other than the Bible, I would have to pick the "Circle" series by Ted Dekker. (Black, Red, White, Green, etc.)
2. If you could go any place in the world, where would it be?
I would love to go to Australia, somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Possibly the Middle East too. Such as Israel and/or Egypt.
3. What is your favorite type of ice cream?
I'm boring...I love vanilla. It's plain and simple, but it's tasty and doesn't make my throat burn after I eat it.
4. If you could have any super power, what would it be?
I have thought long and hard about this my whole life. My brother and I used to play games where we would have multiple super powers and defend someone with them. I would probably have strength, however flying sounds really fun too!
5. What is your favorite joke?
My favorite joke is a blonde joke that I learned at Jet's Pizza (the place I worked at). It was a bad environment which is why I learned this joke there. (Please take note that I do not believe blondes are dumb or stupid at the slightest. Everyone has their "dumb" moments, especially me! My sister Tirzah is blonde and she is very smart.)

The joke goes something like this: "A blonde was swimming in a swimming pool. She dove straight down to touch the bottom of the pool, when she saw a little sticker on the bottom. She read what is said and immediately obeyed. The sticker said, 'Scratch and Sniff. '"

(6) If you could accomplish one thing in your life, what would it be?
I would like to own my own restaurant and be able to make enough profit from it to be able to purchase land/homes for all of my children.
(7) What is your favorite color?
I would have to say green. I used to love black, but it's so dark and is used a lot for evil, so I decided to start liking green more, which I have!
(8) What five adjectives would you use to describe yourself?
Big, Tall, Strong, Weird, Random.  (Hopefully those are accurate, let me know in a comment if you think different!)
(9) What is your pet peeve?
When plans change.
(10) What is your favorite song?
To tell you the truth, it use to be "I wanna be a Billionaire" but now it is probably "Giving you all control" by Jeremy Camp.
(11) Which of these questions did you like the most?
I liked number 6 the best because it's something I think about everyday.

Now I get to make up 11 questions for those I tag to answer! :D

(1) What is your favorite word?
(2) What is your favorite time in the day?
(3) If you could evangelize to someone, who would it be?
(4) If you were able to meet anyone in the world, who would it be?
(5) What is your favorite flavor of Gatorade?
(6) If you had 1 wish, anything, what would it be?
(7) What is your favorite Bible verse that relates to you personally?
(8) What do you want to be when you grow up?
(9) If a lion approached you on the road, and was about to attack, what would you do?
(10) What subject in school do you appreciate the most?
(11) What "active" activity that you like the best?

Now I get to tag people, and as Gracie said it; "MWAHAHAHAHA! (Malicious grin)" I feel the same way!

I tag 4 people,

My two cousins:
Tori  - at her blog
Zoe  - at her blog.

And two friends:
Dodi - at her blog.
Shamarah Sunshine - at her blog.

I really want to tag my sister, Tirzah and Gracie again, but I know they already did it. :D

Have a ton of fun writing the answers to the questions!!
God bless,
Josiah

The Search Committee

Well, I reviewed another book! This time is was a novel, written by Tim Owens. It's called: The Search Committee. Tim Owens sent this book into the Jerry B. Jenkins Christan Writers Guild and won! :D

I don't want to give to much of the story away, so I'll just basically give you the general idea of what the book is about, and what I thought of it.

The book is about a search committee, which goes from church to church, to find a pastor for their church that has none. In this book, the search committee is having several problems finding the right pastor, finding the Lord in their lives, and struggling with sins of this world as they do so.

It's a touching story, and I could actually relate to a lot of the characters that were struggling through their lives.

Another cool thing about this book, that at the beginning of every chapter is a Bible verse. After reading the Bible verse, you can understand what the next chapter is going to be about. It was pretty cool!

Overall it was an awesome book, and I highly recommend it.

Thanks for reading, and thank you Tim Owens for letting me review your book.

God bless,
Josiah

To comply with new regulations introduced by the Federal Trade Commission, please mention as part of every Web or Amazon review that Tyndale House Publishers has provided you with a complimentary copy of this book.

Jesus>Religion

Is religion and Jesus the same thing? This topic has been on my mind, as well for thousands of other people around the world. Below are two videos. The first is a Christian who is explaining why he hates religion and loves Jesus. He also explains why they are different and how they both affect  a person. The second movie is from a Catholic, who loves both religion and Jesus. I'll let you watch the videos before I further explain what I concluded with some of my personal Bible reading and with some of my beliefs as a Christian.

(Received 15,400,000 views in 20 days!)



(Received 122,000 views in 16 days)

So sure...the first one, that was originally made by the Christian, got the most views. However I threw that fact in there to show you how many people saw and might have been influenced by 1 movie on YouTube. Today's technology can be dangerous. However, used the right way, such as this movie, the Internet can be used for God's glory!

Now, back to the topic. Here is something I typed up while comparing the two videos together.

The major difference between the two videos is that Jefferson explained what Jesus and following Him has done to himself. He shared how great Jesus is by dying on the cross for our sins, and shared how he was affected by Him. Now, the catholic guy (not sure what his name is) shared what pleasures of the world would be unavailable to us if catholics weren’t around. He says that the Trinity was understood by them first. Did not the Lord provide a Bible for us to learn about the Trinity? It’s not too hard to figure that part out; all you need to do is read the Bible for what is says. (That’s another post for another time) Pleasures such as: hospitals, education, charities, science, literature, art, college, catholic church, etc. And if you notice, this guy brings all of his foundation to the “church,” his mother. He says that the reason for pretty much everything is the catholic church, and the religion that he believes in. Jefferson however, clearly defines that Jesus is the reason for everything, and it’s not some religion that is the purpose of it all.

If you listen and watch the two videos closely, you'll probably see where I got my conclusions from.

I would also like to share with you what Jefferson wrote for the description of the video.

A poem I wrote to highlight the difference between Jesus and false religion. In the scriptures Jesus received the most opposition from the most religious people of his day. At its core Jesus' gospel and the good news of the Cross is in pure opposition to self-righteousness/self-justification. Religion is man centered, Jesus is God-centered. This poem highlights my journey to discover this truth. Religion either ends in pride or despair. Pride because you make a list and can do it and act better than everyone, or despair because you can't do your own list of rules and feel "not good enough" for God. With Jesus though you have humble confident joy because He represents you, you don't represent yourself and His sacrifice is perfect putting us in perfect standing with God!

What did the catholic guy write? Here it is.

Jefferson Bethke's video 'Why I Love Jesus But Hate Religion' has stirred up a lot debate in the past couple days. And while he has many, many good points to make, many of his critiques apply directly to the Catholic Church. I have nothing but respect for Jefferson, he is an incredibly talented, sincere, and gracious guy. In the spirit of dialogue, I thought I'd make a Catholic response!

Nothing about Jesus what-so-ever in his description...however, he does explain that he wants to "defend his catholic church."
Some of the key points Jefferson shared are listed below.

Jesus is made by God, religion is made by men.

One is the Cure, and one is the infection.

Religion is man searching for God, where as being a Christian is God searching for man.

Some of the key points the catholic-guy shared are listed below.

Without the catholic church, today people wouldn't have the comforts of education, charities, hospitals, science, literature, etc.

The catholic church welcomes anyone in.

The catholic church understood the Trinity first.

Now, obviously you can see I believe in Jefferson's video more. However I do have one question about his video, and I want to ask your opinion on it as well.

Should we "hate" religion? The word hate is such a strong word, should we truly hate religion? Is it in our place, as Christians - followers of Jesus Christ, to hate religion?

This is a question that has been going through my mind for the past few weeks. What do you think?

Thanks for reading,
God bless,
Josiah