Hi Friends! Rachael here. I wanted to share a small piece of my story with Life Lived Beautifully as we prepare to release our Fall Give Me Jesus Journal in the LLB Shop on Wednesday.
My connection to LLB began back in 2014 around Christmastime when my childhood best friend called me one day and asked if she could come by my house. My friend and I have remained good friends over the years, but to be honest, we had not been spending much time together that year, so there was not much of an expectation for a Christmas gift. However, I’d like to thank the Holy Spirit and Kendall’s obedience for what happened next.
Kendall had discovered the Give Me Jesus journal back when LLB was selling through Etsy. She saw the journal, thought it looked like something I would enjoy, and said “she just felt like she was supposed to get one for me.” So she did, and it was beautiful! I was thrilled and eager to use this journal that I’d never heard of, but looked so exciting.
The Lord was at work in my life that year and I didn’t even know it yet. I received a journaling Bible for Christmas and my quiet time with Jesus would forever be changed. As I entered into 2015, I now felt that I had the tools to really help guide me in digging into Scripture in a new way. My excitement for creatively meeting with Jesus was contagious and I could not get enough! I know that the GMJ journal and that specific Bible were not magical – they were simply guides and helpful resources to help me understand what on earth a “quiet time” should really be, and the Lord was using them to shape my heart and soften my understanding of meeting with Him.
Meeting with God is not just something to check off our to-do list, take a nice photo of, or boast about to our friends so we sound more “holy”. It’s a sacred moment of connecting to the only lasting source of strength. It’s an invitation to draw near, to forget about the chaos of our day, and to commune with our Heavenly Father who has graciously extended this offer of relationship to His children.
The Give Me Jesus journal will not magically cure all of your hesitancies or your confusion about knowing Jesus. But it might help you like it did for me back in 2015. See the journal is intended to give you space and freedom to dig into any passage, but with a little guidance as you begin to seek the Lord. There are helpful tips at the beginning for how to actually study – where to begin, what to do, what to read. There is space to make goals and plans for how you will practically commit to this time. There are hard questions to answer that make you pause and evaluate your heart, both at the beginning and in the middle of the journal. All of these are just preparation for the real soul scrubbing that will take place when you begin to hold up the Word of God against your life and evaluate if those truths are taking root in your heart.
The new journal coming to the shop on Wednesday is lovely and makes me smile – but it is not meant to just sit on your nightstand or kitchen table as a pretty accessory. It is intended to push you to the throne of God and help you dig into the Word of life. It is meant to give you the space you need to cry out to Jesus, ask God for guidance, praise the Lord for His grace, and everything in between. It is meant to be a safe space to pray honestly, confess your sin, repent of your shortcomings, and rejoice in the love of our Father.
The journal is not anything special on it’s own – it’s a resource and a tool to equip us in our meeting with the God who is uniquely other, special and holy.
I have used the Give Me Jesus journal almost every day for the past two years and those pages are marked with honesty and questions and struggles and sadness and praises and hurt and joy and everything else that has marked the last two years of my life. I pray that it will be a space for you to grow in your love for Jesus, and I pray that it equips you to know Him more intimately.
If you’ve been looking for a resource to help you in your study, or if God keeps laying someone on your heart that you think might appreciate this journal, be sure to listen. It may just be the gift that stirs your own heart or your friend’s affections for Jesus in a whole new way – and when He’s at work, we never want to miss out on the opportunity to be a part of His plan!
PS – If you haven’t seen yet, we are having a giveaway of one of these journals and one of the beautiful hand-made Give Me Jesus bracelets by Dustmade Jewelry over on Instagram. You can enter here!
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