All you need is love.....

LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE

As humans we desire it, we want it, we crave it, we need it. We see love in our frindships. In our reltionships. In our marriages. Every where we are looking for it. Love is such a great thing and it is something that is given to us as a gift. It is crazy as humans how we want to be loved, and to love so much. It is something that i think every one runs on, and every one desires. 

God loves us so much and wants us to love him. He has showed us unconditional love and is always going to forgive us no matter how much we screw up. God is so great and love us so much. So all we need is love, and God is going to give it to us. 

An Update.

Well hello there friends out there in the in the blogger world. I have not written in a good while and i am in my philosophy class so i figured what better way to kill time than to write in my blog.

ECU is going good. School is hard, and boreing, and long, and  strenuous. But hey its going to help me in the long run so i cant complain. LOL. Im sure that you have seen the pirates with two huge victories on the football field this year. It just sucks that we then loose to teams like NC state, and Houston. So pretty much the season is a huge let down. Its ok though i am a pirate for life. So ECU pride all the way. BLEED PURPLE AND GOLD. 

Young life is going good. A couple of times things have been rough. But hey challanges are only going to make us better. It is hard getting out to the school, trying to get kids to sign up for camp, getting kids to come to club. There is just so much stuff that you have to do and it wears you down. But when you get those kids that come up and give you a hug and say it is so good to see you it is all worth it. 

Friends are awesome. I keep building stronger bonds with people i know that are going to be in my life forever. It is so awesome having deep relationships and being able to talk about things that matter. Being able to get together and talk about God, and talk about our troubles, and hardships. But to also get together and lift each other up. A group of my guy friends meet once a week and pray for each other, encourge each other, talk about our trials, our goals, and our motivs. It is so awesome. God is so great and having friends that want to lift his name up with you is so awesome. 

Things with Heather are great. We are always growing together, and growing closer to God. Having a girl in my life that loves the Lord more than she will ever love me is such a blessing. I see God in her life every day and it is so great. The more i am with her the more i realize that i am not attracted to her, but i am attracted to the presence of God in her. Having someone who can encourge you and pray for you and share in converstaions with you about the Lord is such a blessing and i thank God every day for Heather. 

God is great. Loving him is the best thing ever. He has blessed me so much and continues to bless me daily. I am not worthy to be his servent, i am not worthy to do his work but he allows me to do that. He allows me to call myself a christian and to call my self a follower of Jesus. By keeping him at the forefront of my life he has blessed me in so many way. I am not saying that my life has been a cake walk. Actually it has become alot harder the more and more i give to Jesus. The more i give to him the more he challanges me. He keeps telling me.... Michael you are doing great, but you can be better so here is another challange. I love that. I love that he is challenging me every day. It is hard, and sometimes i get frustrated. But i have to know that i am going to be better because of it. 

Enjoy your life, and live it in a way that is pleasing to your Lord. 

Love you guys. 

A Journey

It has been two months since heather and I started to date. Most people see two months as not a big deal. To me every day is a big deal. Every day i am learning more about heather on a deeper level. She is learning about me on a deeper level. The journy has been great so far and i have learned alot about relationships, life, and God. 

Since i have started dating heather i have had rely on God more and more. I love that. Our relationship challanges us to be better people, and to be better christians. It is so great that we are being challanged and that it is not necessarily something that does not call us to something higher. Being a christian is hard for sure. But the walk of being in a christian reltionship is even harder. Being a young life leader, a full time student, a good friend, a good boy friend, and a devote christian is hard. There is nothing easy about it. But i have leanred that the best things in life are stuff you have to be challanged about, and stuff that you have to fight for. If things come easy and you dotn have to work for them then what is the point. Where is the reward. The great thing about being a christian is that there is always something to work on. There is always some way you can better yourself. Sometimes its frustrating. But i am glad its like that. Because i will never get tired of feeling the reward for something i have worked so hard to achieve. 

God is great and has blessed me so much. I see him every day more and more. Friends, family, and even random people i meet. I see God in some way. I am so thankful for heather and I i have grown so much in Christ because of the way she has challanged me. I see Working through her all the time, and she has helped me in so many ways. My journey as a christian is never easy but it has never been more fullfilling and rewarding and i am excited to see where it is going to go in the future. 

Caught up in the flesh.

Being a Christian is an awesome journy, but no one said that it was easy. So many times people look at Christian and think say that "they have it easy" or "they dont understand anything". Statements like these are ridiculous. We for sure no what is going on, and we for sure dont have it easy. 

Walking the life that we are called to walk takes courage, strength, and most of all faith. We are called to stand up for what we belive in, and face challanges head on. We should not turn away from them like cowards. Confroting situations is hard. No one likes to do it. But that is what we are called to do sometimes. We are called to have strength and not back down from hard situations. We need to stand firm in what we believe in. We need to not bend on certain subjects and have the will power to withstand temptation. And above all we need to have faith. There are going to be times when we fall short.  When we fall. But we need to have faith in our Lord that he will bring us back out of that darkness. He will lead us, and guide us hand in hand with him. We are human it is going to happen. Is that to say that we should not strive for perfection..... NO. We are called to strive for that. But when we do fall we need to rely on him. We dont need to dwell on our sins because we are fogiven. It is hard. We get caught up in our fleshly desires. But that is not what we want. We are designed for much, much more. Struggles and temptaions are going to come our way, and we are going to fall. But it is how we deal with the sin that is going to define us as Christians. 

Everlasting Beauty

I wanted to write today because i feel the urge to share something that is always on my heart. Its something that takes my breath away daily. It has impacted my life in so many ways and will continue to do so for all eternity. I am talking about the Everlasting Beauty that is Jesus Christ. 

I have grown so much this summer in my reltionship with Christ. I look back and realize that this summer has been so different and blessed in so many different ways. I realize that this has been the best summer of my life. I have grown closer to friends, i have gotten to go to alaska and see beauty that some people only dream to see, i have become closer to family,  i have an amazing girl in my life. But above all i am closer to my Lord and Savior. I have grown my leaps and bounds this summer. Every year i feel like i have grown. But this summer i feel like i grew up and that my love for my Father in heaven is greater than ever. I have delt with plaguing sins and i now realize that my Father has cast them away. They will never return to me again. 

I am a weak coward. I dont deserve to be mentioned in the same sentence as Jesus Christ. I dont deserve to wash his feet. At the site of temptation, or hardships i run away and hide. But with my father guiding me, and me standing by his side i am transformed. I stand tall. I am brave and courageous. He makes me a man. He makes me what i am meant to be. If i live for him i feel amazing. I feel like darkness will never touch me. The strength that runs through my veins is so powerful. God is truly amazing. He has brought me out of dark places and has welcomed my back with open arms. I have betrayed him many times and he has cried because of it, but he will never forsake me. 

I am so underserving. It brings me to my knees sometimes and i feel so dirty, and disgusting. But God does not look at me in that light. He lifts me up. I need him, i want him, i lean on him. He is my rock and my salvation. He hass carried me to the table and put me where i dont belong. He is truly amazing. 

This is the everlasting beauty that i am talking about. It is what i am so passionate about. It takes my breath away, and brings me to my knees. He is so beautiful. He has stolen my heart. He holds my hand and comforts me. I see him every day. His grace is so amazing. My God is so beautiful and powerful and wonderful. I love my God, i will love him forever. 

"I lift my eyes to the hills- where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the Maker of heaven and earth. He will not let your foot slip- He who watches over you will not slumber; indeed he who watches over Israeli will neither slumber nor sleep. The Lord watches over you- the Lord is your shade at your right hand; the sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon by night. The Lord will keep you from all harm- he will watch over your life; the Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.----Psalm 121

Bryan Oakley is AMAZING!!

Today i was in Charlotte all day. Bryan has been staying at my house this week because he is working at a tennis camp. So he stays over due to gas. I came home from my day in Charlotte. I came up stairs and sat down in my usual seat and got on my laptop. Then bryan said hey i got something for you. I want you to read this. Then he gave me a sheet of paper and on it was the following....

Within my book of memoreis

Are special thoughts of you

And all the many nice things

You often say and do 

As i turn the pages

And recall each single thought,

I realize the happiness

That knowing you has brought 

This book is filled with magic

That only you can make

Our friendship is magic

Something that will never break

As this book is written

With many good times to come

Each page makes us stronger

And soon our friendship will bench 468 lbs

Even when somebody treats me like the Roman Emperor Nero

I know that i can always come to you, my guitar hero

The friendship that we have is a supernatural bond, and it is....

Go look under the guest bed. 

So i then proceded to go to the guest bedroom. I bet down and pulled up the bed skirt. I looked under and i saw something amazing. It was a freaking JOHNNY CUPCAKES BOX!! I was so excited. I grabed the box and went back down the hall and opened it up. It was s shirt that i mentioned i liked a long time ago. He remembered and purchased it for me. If you want to view it go to www.johnnycupcakes.com and look at the shirt with the blue monster behind the fence. I was so excited. 

Bryan is an awesome friend and im so thankful that he is in my life. I can always come to him for advice, and talk about issues with him. Every day i thank God that he is such a good friend to me. I have known him since Sophmore year of highschool and plan on knowing him the rest of my life. 

Thanks Bryan Oakley for all the good times, and memories. 

RECORDING!!!!!

What is up my dear friends, and readers of my blog. There has not been alot going on recently. I am kinda just chillin out and waiting to go back to the great university of ECU. That is partly why i have not been blogging recently. But i am actually doing something really awesome right now and that is why i have decided to blog. Becuase i have something that is worth blogging about. 

I am actually in Conover NC and i am in the studio recording a demo with some awesome friends. Phil, has been writing some music recently. We got together and practiced and came up to the studio with jason piland and tyler dunlap to lay down a couple of demos. Recording has gone great. I think who ever chooses to listen will enjoy the music. It is alot more listener friendly than our old stuff that we used to play. I think those who listen that used to hear phil and I play our older stuff will be quite suprised at the change.

The band is known as making history. It is a pretty cool little project. Lyrics are pretty insightful, and it is good music to just sit back and chill and listen. We will have a myspace up soon and there will be demos up, Pics, and a video that is documenting the recording. So be on the look out for it. 

Thanks for reading, and sorry that i have not posten in a while. LOVE AND HUGS!!