Back up and running.

Wow. It's been a really long time since I've posted anything on this site. Well, a lot has happened since August. Alex and I are back in PA and it's been an experience. We've only been here for two and a half weeks but in some senses it feels like we never left PA. I do miss Missouri, IHOP and my co-workers, though. What I've learned while living in the mid-west will stick with me for the rest of my life.

Before coming back to PA, I was nervous. I was not sure how I would fit in. I didn't know how people would react and how Alex and I would be treated. Happily I tell you that it's been a great two weeks! I feel very loved and welcomed. It's been awesome. We thank God very much for His perfect timing!

School is going to be starting soon. I am very excited!! At first I thought I was going to be a history teacher but felt the conviction from God that music was my calling. So now, I'm back at VFCC, where I started, trying to finish up my degree. It's crazy how everything works out. I do have to say, however, that it was good for me to stop school for two years because coming back to it I'm more focused and actually love what I'm doing.

Alex and I have a family blog that would address more information on what we do as a family. You can find that at thekranjecs.com. Alex also has his personal blog that is like this one at alexkranjec.com. Check it out. More posts to come here!

God is Great and Greatly to be Praised!!

Tired..

Hi everyone,

It's been awhile. Just a quick update. Alex and I are in school. I'm taking three classes and it's wonderful. It's been a long time since I was in school but it hasn't been too bad. I think that once you've been away from it for awhile you enjoy it more later on.

I'm tired. I'm tired of putting myself before God. I'm tired of my bad attitude. I'm tired of rejecting God's love for me. I'm tired of focusing on the sin and not the sin forgiver. I'm just tired. When am I gonna wake up out of this luke-warmness and realize where I am in God?? In notes from Mike's sermon he writes, "Are you sinner who struggles to be a lover of God or are you a lover of God who struggles with sin?" I'm not the latter part. Unfortunately. I just want genuine love. Genuine relationship. Genuine passion. Genuine sincerity. I want to encounter God's love where it changes me.

Jesus, I want to trust you! "Trust" Kristene Mueller

It's the sweetest thing

to trust you

just to know

You got everything under control

it's the sweetest thing

to trust you

just to know

You got everything

and You are making me a mountain

making me a mountain

that cannot be shaken

well You are making me a mountain

making me a mountain

that cannot be moved

high up on a rock

looking out at the horizon

watching as the storm rolls in

wondering if my heart will survive it

as the waves crash all around me

and can't remember what it feels like to be free

i know You're making me a mountain

making me a mountain

that cannot be shaken

oh You are making me a mountain

making me a mountain

that cannot be moved

You say, I've got you my baby

I've got you

it's quite the mess you're in

but it's nothing Love can't fix

so sit here upon my shoulders

and watch as it all unwinds

You are making me a mountain

making me a mountain

that cannot be shaken

i know You're making me a mountain

making me a mountain

that cannot be moved

Inward...

I was listening to the church sermon today. It was excellent and a challenge. It just confirms that focusing inward is what needs to happen for the next two years and beyond. Mark Anderson, YWAM, spoke today. He was talking about how we're coming to the point where all the nations and peoples of the earth are going to be reached. Thus the great commission will be fulfilled.

Anderson talked about how we're seeing Hinduism and Buddhism are diminishing. Islam is still there but taking on another route, Humanism. It's in America! He says this is the Babylon that is sneaking up behind us and we don't even know. It's taking over America. Humanism is defined as, "Philosophy. a variety of ethical theory and practice that emphasizes reason, scientific inquiry, and human fulfillment in the natural world and often rejects the importance of belief in God."

This is scary. I have fallen into this belief. I have fallen away from laying down my life and taking up my cross every day. It's all about me. I'm done with this, "All about me," stuff. Whatever happened to, "It's all about Christ?" Has it slipped through our fingers unnoticed? I mean, I thought that's what I was focusing on but it wasn't. I was focusing on how I can fit Jesus into my plans and my future not how do I fit into Jesus' plans and Jesus' future.

What ever happened to Matthew 16:25, "For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it."? I don't find this anywhere in my life. It's time for a change in perspective. It's time for me to stop working through the five senses and starting working through the inner man who is in touch with God. My inner man has become numb.

Inward is the new word for the next two years. It's gonna be hard but worth it.

Looking Back..

Looking back we were so excited to move to KC MO. We didn't know how our lives would look like or how everything would work out. The first six months were rough. We didn't have enough money. We made it through, together, with God. Sometimes I got really bitter towards God and others. Towards God because I saw it work for others around me doing IHOP full-time and towards others because they did not believe in what Alex and I were doing. I started to get bitter at IHOP because I wanted to go to the prayer room as I pleased so I stopped going.

After we got back from Philly Alex got a job and I got depressed. I couldn't find a job for two months. I finally got a job but it wasn't really good so I got another job at the bank. The whole time I was at the bank I was not happy. I wanted to be full-time IHOP. I realized being away from the prayer room that I was missing out on a lot. I was not content.

God finally opened a door for one of us to work at IHOP full-time. It was perfect for Alex. He wanted to go to school full-time. Working at IHOP allowed him to do that. I told him to go for it but I got bitter at him as well. Why does he get to work at IHOP full-time and go to school and I have to support my husband financially at a secular job. I thought I came out here to be a part of the prayer room. It wasn't in the cards for me. I tried to find every possible way to make full-time IHOP work for me. I even thought about support but I couldn't do it. Everyone who I thought would support us coming out here would not. I was heart-broken and scared to go down that road again and fail.

So I continued to complain in my situation. Then we went on vacation to Philly again in May of 2009. Alex and I were driving and just as we past the Valley Forge exit on the PA turn-pike we both got this sense of , "This is our home. We belong here." We turned to each other and realized what just happened. God just told us what to do and we knew what was going to happen. Mind you, we have traveled back home a few times before and never sense this before. It was truly awesome.

When we got home I realized what limited time we have. Something stirred within me to get close with God. I started to go to the gym so that my body is God's temple and I started to read more about God's presence from A. W. Tozer and Brother Lawrence. I started to pray the Sermon on the Mount so I can live like Christ would have me live. Even though I am still working at the bank, I have become content with it. I have never had such determination before to get closer with God. And though I'm not in full-time IHOP, maybe it's because God wanted me to learn different things.

I have two years left. It saddens and excites me. The last two years I felt that I have wasted and was drawn away from God and IHOP because of not being content. But looking towards the next two years I cannot dwell on the past because I knew it got me here. I will not let my attitude of the last two years be my attitude of the two years to come. The excitement is growing to see what I'm going to learn while I'm still here. I'm learning I have to be ok with not being at IHOP full- time because when I go home I will not have an IHOP. I will have to practice the presence of God for anywhere I go.

As I'm typing this I'm holding back tears. What needs to be understood is that my heart will truly be in KC MO. Alex and I started our marriage here. We built a life here. We have gone through thick and thin here. It truly was a seasoning for us. I will always remember the times and what I have learned. This time in my life will hold a special place and when I look at the scars I got while being here, I'll remember the grace, mercy and love of God for two people who wanted Him whole-heartedly.

Confidence...

Hello again! I haven't blogged in a while because of two things: 1) Nothing has really hit me to blog about 2)I've been really lazy. I'm up and at it again so I hope this goes well.

Confidence. It's one of the things that I lack. Actually I believe I lack it the most in my life besides energy at the end of the day. I don't know why I have this lack of confidence. All I know is that I want it bad.

I pretty much am not confident with anything. I'm not confident that I will pass the audition for school. I'm not confident in making friends. I'm not confident that my life will ever get to the point of trusting in God completely. I'm not confident in Jesus. That's the worst of it all. I know in my head that he came and died for me but it hasn't moved to my heart.

I need to trust in God and be more confident in Him. I don't even know where to begin. I think that I might try to look up 'confident' verses in the Bible and read them to start to believe in it. I'm guessing that to be confident in all the other little things of life, I have to learn and love to be confident in Jesus.

This is going to be so very hard and I know that I'm going to need encouragement and prayer and advice and support. I know this is one of Satan's ways of putting me down and he has a very strong hold over my confidence. Please pray with me to get through this. It will be a rough and hard and turbulent road. I know I will make it through.

Help me Jesus.

Ok..

Ok.. I know. I said that I would post every week but I didn't do one last week. Well.. Here is a post now. I hope this makes up for it. A little update for the few who read: I am going back to school. I will be starting in the fall and I hope to get a degree in Music Ed. I figured no matter what that music is my passion and to learn more would benefit me.

Ok.. So I went to Barnes and Noble two weekends ago and was browsing through the Christian Inspiration section. I love this section because even though I don't read a whole book, the little snip-its on the back of each book bring encouragement. Anyways.. I came across one of my favorite authors, John Eldredge. He authored the book Wild at Heart and co-authored the book, with his wife, Stasi, Captivating. Those two books are great reads so I decided to buy another book of his Waking the Dead.

I was really excited to read it because it was about awakening my heart so that I can become fully alive. So far the book is excellent. With every page I read I can feel my heart beating again. It's so awesome. The chapter that sticks out to me the most, at this point, is chapter two, The Eyes of the Heart. It talks about how our heart eyes need to be open and how we need to start living like we're in a myth (story) than living fact by fact.

The part that stuck out most to me in this chapter was the part when Eldredge was talking about Daniel. Daniel needed some answers so he decides to fast for three weeks. He doesn't get an answer. Eldredge says that at this point most of us would be like, "I've messed up here somehow," or "God has forsaken me." Then what we would do next is just give up and continue with our normal lives, unsatisfied in ourselves and with God. This is totally me. I sit there and say, "I need to do something different because I'm not doing something right. I need to read my Bible more and pray more and sing louder and worship harder and jump higher." Then I get mad at God because I feel that he's left me hanging to dry.

But there is more to this Daniel STORY. Eldredge says, "And he (Daniel) would be dead wrong. On the twenty-first day of the fast an angel shows up, out of breath. In a sort apology, the angel explains to Daniel that God had actually dispatched him in answer to Daniel's prayers the very first day he prayed- three weeks ago. (There goes the whole unanswered prayer thesis, right out the window.) Three weeks ago? What is Daniel to do with that? 'The very first day? But...I've...I mean, thank you very much, and I don't want to seem ungrateful, but...where have you been?' You haven't blown it, Daniel, and God isn't holding out on you. The angel goes on to explain that he was locked in hand-to-hand combat with a mighty fallen angel, a demonic power of dreadful strength, who kept him out of the Persian kingdom for three weeks, and he finally had to get Michael (the great archangel, the captain of the Lord's hosts) to come help him break through enemy lines. 'Now I am here, in answer to you prayer. Sorry it's taken so long'" (Waking the Dead by John Eldredge, page 31-32).

I know it's long but Eldredge explains it so well. I mean there have been plenty of times where I have lost hope in getting answers but now I understand that there is more to it then what I thought. I just thought God was ignoring me or punishing me because I haven't been living the way that I should. This gives me so much hope and realization. We are at war all the time. God is fighting to give us the answers that we prayed but are we patient enough to wait for them. This is a total paradigm shift.

I'm too excited about this to type anymore.

Reflect and dwell on it. It will change the way you think.

My Everything..

I'm sitting here listening to Isa Couvertier's song, "My Passion". It talks about how God is her passion and her everything. I wish it were that way for me. I don't quite understand why I sing about how God is my passion and my everything and then when it comes to living with that understanding it's not reality.

Oh how I really want and desire for God to be my everything; consuming me with all of His being; taking over every part of my day and every part of my being. I do want that but at the same time I don't. This way of life means I give up everything. Do I really want to give up everything? Not really. My flesh, my body, my nature doesn't want to give up my sin. For some reason I want to revel in it. I want to play in the mud and I like to play in the dirty mud. I don't want to give it up, let it go.

My spirit, my heart connect with God wants to leave my flesh behind and go deeper. My heart wants God to take over but my flesh won't let my spirit go. This is a constant struggle. I repeatedly give my life to God completely and then the next minute I'm still doing the things that won't get me there. The worst part is that I know that I'm keeping myself from letting God take over. That's the scary and terrifying factor. I'm preventing myself from really having a relationship with Him. This needs to change.

I love what Nichole Nordeman sings in her song "Brave". She sings, "The way it always was is no longer good enough. It makes me wanna be Brave." I love this song. It's exactly what I'm feeling right now and how my life is going. I'm taking siege over my life and handing it back over to God. Hopefully this time it's for real.

Psalm 73:21-26, 28: "When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant; I was a brute beast before You. YET, I am always with You; You hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward You will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but You? And the earth has nothing I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. But as for me, it is good to be near God."