Salvation is So Sweet.

But I will sing of Your power, Yes, I will sing aloud of Your mercy in the morning: For You have been my defense and refuge in the day of my trouble. - Psalm 59:16

I am so thankful for the cross. I'm so thankful that my salvation isn't earned or obtained by works but that it is obtained through the blood of Jesus shed on the cross. I am so thankful for the cross. There is nothing else that can save me. Being a good person, making good decisions, getting baptized, going to church twice a week, none of these things give me salvation or put my name in the book of life. Only Jesus. Only by His mercy, grace, and sacrifice is our salvation available. It's so glorious. What's even crazier is that when we accept Christ to be Lord over our hearts, and lives, he fills us with the Spirit and changes our values to His values so that those things I just listed above become apart of our lives; not apart of steps to salvation but a result of salvation. It's one of the craziest things in the world. And I am so thankful for it. Reading this bible verse this morning really encouraged me and refreshed my spirit. I have just been going and going this week. With non stop work, randomly getting sick, and feeling drained because I've allowed myself to worry and stress but not trust God, I've been discouraged. That's one of the reasons I love God's word. It is alive and active and literally takes a discouraged heart and brings power and truth. Today in convocation at school our campus pastor shared with us that a girl we had been prying for who got hit by a car a few weeks ago had a 25% chance of recovery. Now the doctors are saying she is going to fully recover. Praise the Lord for turning that 25 to an 100! God is our defense. He covers us in the shadow of his wings and makes Himself a refuge for the worried, broken, hurting, and sick . So I've made up in my mind by the life changing power of the Holy Spirit to worship God regardless of what I feel, to take time all throughout my day to just say "thank you Jesus." His mercy is new everyday, it sustains and makes me whole. I encourage you guys as I encourage myself to sing of God's greatness and power everyday. Even if you have no idea what your future holds, even if you're in the hurt, wondering, waiting. Continue in thanksgiving and constantly remind yourself of the cross. Praise is a weapon against the enemy and a fragrant sacrifice to God. Use it and rest in the fact that your sins are forgiven and your name is written in the book of life. - Sofia

Pumpkins, Waterfalls, and the Holy Ghost

Happy Saturday everyone! I hope you all have had a good week so far. My week has been crazy! God has really been moving in a extremely supernatural way over the past few weeks in my life and roommates. He has just been teaching us so much more about His Spirit and has been taking us so deep into the miraculous. Just this past week money supernaturally filled my roomies bank account and wallet. The power of the Holy Spirit has just broken out and I am seriously overwhelmed with amazement on how it is spreading like wildfire in the lives of people around me. Friday night me and my roomette Kat went to a revival glory outpouring service at a church here in Lynchburg. It was indescribable. The Holy Spirit cam, baptized our hearts in His spirit, filled us, renewed us. Then I began to pray for Kat and the Holy Spirit started prophesying through me to her and about her life and things to come. It was miraculous. I am just so in love with Jesus. It is only by Hi's blood and grace that these things are able to become a reality. Seeing the kingdom of God here and now is beautiful and seeing my roommate's who I have grown to love in such a short amount of time experience these things for the first time and be filled with His Spirit like never before is incredible and I wouldn't trade it for anything. That's what this life is all about, serving Jesus and seeing people changed by his love and glory. God has set my heart on fire for ministry and seeing it manifest right in front of my eyes is crazy and wonderful. Today I got to go on my first every Virgina hike and saw the most beautiful waterfalls it reminded me of this verse. "He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water." John 7:38 The living water is the Holy Spirit and the only way for it to overflow out of us and into others is to drink from Jesus. Drink him in, take in his free gift, and the miraculous will happen. Revivals has broken out and this is only the beginning. Jesus we only want more and more of you. Pour out Your Spirit like never before."I may be weak, but Your Spirit is strong in me. My flesh may fail but my God you never will."

Oh and by the way today I went to a real pumpkin patch. As in the pumpkins were actually growing out of the ground. It was amazing. (I've never been to one before)-

Love Sofia

Rich Adventures in Richmond

Happy Sunday everyone! I hope you all have had a good weekend so far. Mine has been very refreshing. The weekend actually started on Thursday for me . My college was on Fall break which is basically a four day weekend for students to just take a break. Since one of my roommates is from Arizona and I'm from Florida we couldn't go home so we all decided to take a trip to Richmond which is about two hours away from our school. It was beautiful! Richmond is full of beautiful historic sites and all of the leaves are changing color. It was so awesome. We went shopping, bonded a lot, and went to a really cool cultural music festival. The coolest part of the whole trip were the awesome Jesus experiences we had. First when we went to the mall we stumbled upon this beautiful Christian clothing store called Altar'd State. It had beautiful modest clothing and was filled with worship music, awesome employees, and a Holy Spirit filled atmosphere. Not to mention I wanted their dressing room to be my bedroom. Along with that we went into Urban Outfitters and my roomette Megan was checking out in line, she felt led by the Holy Spirit to ask the cashier if he needed prayer for anything. He said he was okay but Megan said she could see a look in his eye of surprise. Who knows, maybe he was questioning God or if anyone cared about Him and God used Megan to step in. One thing I know is that the Holy Spirit will never prompt you to do something that is without effect. It doesn't matter if we see the results or not,God sees them. The next day we headed to downtown Richmond for the folk festival. Katarina (my other roomette) prayed that God would just open doors that day for us to share our faith with people. so guess what happened, we got to share our faith with people. God is so cool guys. We took a bus to get to the festival and met a married elderly couple, they asked us what grade we were in and then that led to us telling them how Jesus led us to go to Liberty and how much we love him. It was awesome. Then these two girls at the festival came up to us saying they were doing a project for school where they went around and interviewed people asking them what the meaning of life was. So of course me and my roommate's shared how the meaning of life was Jesus and how He makes everything purposeful. I can't forget to mention that we randomly walked into this tent and a Native American guy in a traditional costume was rapping about Jesus and  sharing the gospel. Come to find out his stage name is SupaMan and he was MTV Artist of the week and we got to meet him after his performances. You could just feel the love of Jesus coming from him and he asked us to pray for him which was so awesome. So basically Richmond was not only beautiful to the eyes but beautiful to the soul. God is amazing and the Holy Spirit will lead you to the coolest places to meet the most random people who's lives could be forever changed because you share the love of Jesus with them. Revival is happening, the last place I thought I would find it was my dorm room. But Jesus does the unexpected and I am so ready for more. Love you guys and hope you have a great week! "I am the way and the truth and life. No one comes to the Father except through me."- Jesus (John 14:6)

Riding Boots.

Happy Monday everyone! It's been so long since I've last posted an outfit and I've missed it! So today I got one of my lovely roommates to help me out and capture a new item to my closet. Boots. I am slowly turning into a Virginian and it feels so weird. I can't believe I'm actually wearing boots in September. I do terribly miss Florida right now and the nice sun and beach weather, but being able to have an actual Fall and wear cute riding boots is a plus. I actually just recently got these and they're from Walmart! I know it's hard to believe but the Walmart by my school is really nice. They were only $30 dollars!! I'm super excited about them and I can't wait to style them with more cute sweaters and coats. College has been great to me so far. I am learning so much about life, people, and Jesus. I couldn't possibly have imagined any of this and I am so thankful to our miracle working God who does exceedingly and abundantly more than we could ever ask or imagine. Hope you guys have a great rest of your week. - Love Sofia. 

The Beauty of Submitting.

"Wives submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church."- Ephesians 5:22-23

     Wednesday night at campus church (Liberty University college church service) I witnessed hundreds of college guys run to the altar, get on their faces, and cry out to God. All the girls in the room reached their hands out and covered these guys in prayer as we worshipped God together. The atmosphere was majestic. I could feel in my spirit the chains of addiction, lust, and pride being broke off of some of the young men's lives. It was breathtaking. The sermon was pointed toward the guys of Liberty calling them out and telling them to step up and be the men of God Jesus was leading them to be. The ladies were encouraged to not settle for a man of this world but to make sure the guy they are committing their lives to is committed to doing nothing else but loving and serving Christ. It was a beautiful night and it really got me thinking about this verse.

          

 "I'm an independent woman and I don't need any man in my life." "the bible is old fashioned and so are women that let their Husbands take the lead." To the world this might make sense, but to a woman of God we should run from these views. ( I am not saying in any way that women should put their worth in men and think they have to have a guy in their lives to be valuable!!!) You won't feel valuable with a guy if your worth is not yet found in Christ. The reason why wives submitting to husbands has become such a taboo in society is because society has warped what true marriage is supposed to look like. In the worlds view wives submitting to their husbands means being beaten and bossed around. It means being treated lowly. This is NOT what submitting means and this isn't what the husband being the head means. Another verse we have to check out is Ephesians 5:22. Right after wives are told to submit to their husbands as they submit to the Lord it says "Husbands love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her to make her holy cleansing her by the washing with water through the word." Do we understand what loving wives like Christ loved the church means? Jesus died for the church! He gave His life, humbled himself, shed his blood, and washed us clean. Hello! This is the most beautiful, selfless love that their ever could be. And God is telling Husbands to love their wives in this way! That is so beautiful. There is no selfishness in this. The man isn't being told to beat his wife and rule over her life. He isn't being told to call all of the shots and deny everything his wife says. He is being told to passionately and sacrificially love his other half. He is being told to protect her, support her, love on her, and lift her up. Jesus didn't have an affair with the church, he died for it. Just think about that. Ladies when we are being told to submit to our husbands we aren't being told to worship at his feet and let him run everything and never speak up. We are being told to honor him, lift him up in prayer, protect and support him. This is what marriage is supposed to look like. This is the beauty of submitting. The world has clogged it's brain with images of  what they think relationships are, friends with benefits, sex outside of marriage, same sex relationships. This has corrupted what the beauty of submitting in marriage means. When we submit our lives to Christ His love is lavished out on to us in such a glorious and beautiful way. Marriage is nothing more than a representation of God pursuing the church. Now I know I'm only 18 and not even in a relationship but this is something that God has just recently heavily laid on my heart. On Wednesday night I was encouraged to understand this biblical principle and God has so greatly opened my heart to it. One thing the preacher said on Wednesday is "Marriage is when a single man who has glorified God to the highest with his life and when a single woman who has glorified God to the highest with her life, come together to glorify God even more." I think this will remain in my heart for a long time. Ladies we are precious vessels and beautiful daughters of God. Christ lives in us and we deserve nothing more than a man who respects, love, honors, and prays for us all while worshipping at the feet of Jesus. I pray that God continues to keep my heart while I'm in college and that He leads me to a man that loves Him more than he will love me. This is my prayer for all of you guys as well. Whether you're in a relationship or not I pray that you realize the beauty of submitting in a Godly way. I pray that you only pursue someone who is pursuing Christ, purity, holiness, gentleness, humbleness, and reverence of the One true God. You're worth it.  Love you guys and Jesus loves you even more. - Sofia