Music Videos

So, I have two music video to share a little about.



BarlowGirl- Beautiful Ending (Click on name to see music video)

So, I’ve posted this music video before, but I watched it again today. BarlowGirl started a website called BeautifulEnding.me and it is for people to make videos and post their own thoughts about their beautiful ending. Nathan Lee, a friend of the Barlows, and also a fellow musician already has a video posted and it really inspired me.  BarlowGirl wrote this song according to the feelings that they have about this whole ministry that they are involved in. They mention when they talk about it that when they first stated the band, they were so scared because they were just worried to get sucked into the whole “job” part and the money and the numbers, instead of focusing on the one who called them to do this.  They talk a lot about how they have to get past the mind set where they just think about numbers and albums and fans and followers, but instead they keep their mind on their one true love, God, the one who they are doing this for. 

Nathan’s video was really inspiring because he talked a lot about loving people. And a lot of the things that all the videos mentioned was this idea that we don’t have to “do” anything. Not literally, but I think we always talk so much about “letting go” and letting God take control of our lives. But as much as we talk about it, I don’t think we always live that out.  We might try it… and say “Ok, Ill let God live my life and I’ll just sit back,” but then we have this feeling that we have to DO something. We have to change ourselves, we HAVE to control our own lives, we HAVE to plan our future, and all of these things that we feel like we have to DO. It’s just in our heads that we have to do something for God. But I think we can get to that place where we truly let God take control of our lives. It’s so hard, (especially for us control freaks) to just let go.  We want that feeling of control in our lives… and if we don’t feel it with our family or friends then we try to do it to ourselves, but honestly, we’re not completely in control of our own lives. Obviously, we are in control of our actions and words, but God is leading us.  He knows our future and he knows what our ending will be, and He will guide us and lead us, but we have to let go. We have to surrender all those things that keep us from letting God guide us through. 

This music video is so beautiful, because the little boy represents us.  And the fox he sees represents those distractions in life like money, numbers, or whatever else.  Once he saw that, he ran away from his parents to follow that temporary thing.  He ended up lost, but in the end God led him back to the whole reason he was alive, and his true love.  It’s like us. Sometimes life throws these distractions at us, and we get side track and follow them. We chase all of these worldly things and kind of push God to the side. We end up getting lost in our own lives, until we remember the reason we’re here. We live for God, and we live for the one who makes our heart beat and loves us unconditionally. He is our first one true love, and He will lead us along life.  Our beautiful ending doesn’t depend on the amount of success we have had on earth. The beauty of our ending us being with God and being able to say that we let Him walk us through our lives to get to the end. We live in this love, in this love of God. We don’t live for success… and it doesn’t need to be our main focus.  I think it’s such a sense of peace and rest to know that God has full control of where I go tomorrow and next year. I want him to lead me. Lead me to the end.

Nick Jonas- Who I Am (Click to watch video)

Nick Jonas, youngest of the band, Jonas Brothers, recently made a solo project, which I have written about before.  He came out with his first music video for his single, ‘Who I Am’ a week or so ago, and this is one of the first Disney music videos that really touched me. I have seen a lot and liked a lot, but this one was really inspiring for me and I actually wrote a lot of my English paper for school about this video. 

I love this song a lot, and I really love the concept of the video. I love how each of the people are so different. I love the “Gothic/emo” girl and her sign that says ‘Honor Student.’ I know from being in High School that most people would not expect a girl like this to be an honor student.  I love the athlete who has a prosthetic leg. I love the big sumo wrestler whose sign says “sensitive.” I love how most of our first impressions of all these people are so different than who they really are. I think this music video can open up our eyes a lot about how different people really are. This music video proves that there is no person that is exactly like another person.  It also shows that the way we think people are, may not be who they really are. I think this music video portrays such a sense of individuality and uniqueness that couldn’t come out in words.  My favorite, of course, is Nick holding up the last sign that says “just me.”  It’s so typical of me to be in love with this :) No matter what anyone else thinks, and no matter what anyone sees you as, there is always only one person that you are, and that is simply you.  And this is what makes us all so special. It’s the very fact that we are all different, but it’s not something to be ashamed of, but rather something to embrace. 

When Nick talks in interviews about this song, he always mentions that this song was really about learning to love yourself before you can really love anyone else.  And I really think that’s an important lesson.  We have to recognize that we are different, but we have to be proud of who we are and not push that away. We are never going to be like everyone else, no matter how hard we try. But, I’d rather be different and happy, then a plastic face in a crowd.  It’s hard to accept yourself the way you are, but I think we will all realize it one day, if we haven’t already.  We’re always going to dislike something about ourselves, but that just comes back to the fact that we can’t be perfect. Who I am is JUST ME.

His [Unfailing] Love Endures Forever...

This is sad. My poor blog is being neglected by me. I am so sorry. I didn't even planning on writing anything... but something just came to me... and well, I thought I would share. :)

I was just looking up some verses on the great Biblegateway.com and stumbled upon something pretty spectacular.  So, I like to look up the word love. I don't know why, it's just my favorite word and I wanted to find some verses. So, I just started scrolling through hundreds of verses in the bible with the word love and I found some really amazing ones, mostly in Psalms.

The LORD loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of his unfailing love. Psalm 33:5

How priceless is your unfailing love! Both high and low among men find refuge in the shadow of your wings. Psalm 36:7

The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love. Psalm 103:8

...may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ.  Ephesians 3:18


And these are just a few. I talk about the love of God all the time, and I always know that He loves me, but just now, I think my eyes are opened to how much He truly loves us, each and every one of us. We have all messed up so many times. I know for myself that I feel like I've failed so many times in God's eyes, but yet His love is SO great that He still loves me after I feel like I have failed Him.  These verses just made me realize how incredible and wonderful this love is.  Unfailing, unconditional, compassionate, abounding... these are some words that describe this love that God has for us, His children. I just sit here and wonder how God could love someone like me this much.  


I think that we don't always take the time to actually think about this and notice this love, this great, incredible love that God has for us.  And, it's even more amazing to know that we can't do anything to lose that love. Unfailing, and unconditional.  His love will never fail... "His love endures forever..." 

Helping through Loving

I am the absolute worst blogger ever.... I'm sorry about that.
So, I just recently thought of something I could write about. 

Just a little while ago I was talking to an old friend and something just kind of hit me. I've been seeing something in my life that God has really been changing in me, and it's something that I think is really important. A lot of times in life, especially as Christians, we kind of see the need to "fix people" or to teach people the difference between right and wrong. We take this responsibility upon ourselves to help people in life by teaching them and guiding them.  Of course, there's nothing wrong with that. But, sometimes I think we kind of do it in the wrong way.  I see a big difference between helping people, and helping people. Yes, they are the same words, but I think the meanings are very different.

One way we help people, is by telling them what's right and what's wrong.  When they do something that we know is not going to work out, we tell them that it's wrong. If we see something in another's life that we don't like or something that we know is wrong, then we tell them.  We take our position in life as a Christian in a way where we have to help direct people in life. We kind of make it our job to show people the path they should take in order to live a "good" life.   This is one way of helping people. Through my life, this plan hasn't always worked.  With this kind of "help" I may be pushing this person out of my life.  Sometimes, we may be farther ahead in life of the people around us. We may see things that they don't, and even if we do it out of care, I don't think that it's our place to tell them what they can't see yet.  We put ourselves above them, and maybe even above God.  Instead of letting God reveal things to them in His time, we push Him aside, by doing it ourselves.  This may not always work.

Another way of helping is the one that I am trying very hard to work on. This is help through love and care.  If I see something in someone's life that I think is wrong, or something that I think may not end up as they want it to, I don't tell them. I decide that it's not my place to correct them, but instead, I show love and support for their decisions. Obviously, in some cases, this may bot be the best decision, but for me, I think it's more important to show love for a person and support their decisions, rather than telling them they are wrong.  I think that may be one thing about Christians that others don't like.  We try to hard to fix everybody else. We try so hard to lead everyone in the right directions, instead of just loving people.  We push God to the side and try to do His job.  But this isn't our job.  We just need to love people and care for them, and let God lead their lives.

I think that helping people through love and support is much more effective than just telling them they are wrong.  Because honestly, people don't need to hear that they are wrong, and they may not take it as advice, but an attack.  It's easy to lose friends by trying to direct their lives.  Even in families, we have to be careful.  We all have differnet feelings and we're all at different places in life.  What we see in someone else, they may not see themselves.  It's easier to just love them and support them, then to try and "help" them in another way.

By caring, loving and supporting, you are letting God shine through your life, instead of pushing God to the side and trying to do His job. He will change people in His timing. We can just love them.

Faith As Small As A Mustard Seed

Each and every one of you that's reading this should shake your head in diappointment. I've really been bad on writing this new post. I am so sorry. Every time I sat down to write it, I started and then stopped.
So, I've been thinking about this since before Christmas and hopefully I will finally sit here and finish writing it.

So, a lot of you might know that on May 21st of 2008, Steven Curtis Chapman, Christian artist and musician, lost his five year old daughter when she got accidentally hit by a car and passed away.  I remember my mom and I crying when we heard that news back a few years ago. Both Steven and his wife were on Larry King a little while after the incident and I remember the extreme hurt they showed.  The pain that was coming through their words.  But, I also remember their extreme faith.  Steven is still writing songs, he just recently released a new album.  His two sons are also successfully making music.  The oldest daughter is in Ireland with her husband working.  And the other 2 little girls are being homeschooled by their mom.

I cannot even begin to imagine what this family had to be going through at this time. I follow all the members on twitter, and on a lot of days, they still express their pain. Like Christmas without their little girl.... they talk a lot about how she's happy in Heaven with her Heavenly Father right now.  Sometimes it's so hard to watch them go through this.  I don't know them personally, but through the music and through their blogs, you can hear their pain.... but this family has been such a huge encouragment to me.  Their never ending faith is just so incredible.  After having 3 children, Steven Chapman and his wife adopted 3 little girls from China.  One of these little girls, Maria was the one that passed away. She got hit accidentally by a car that one of her older brothers was driving.

I can't even imagine how each of them must have felt.  As a brother, as a sister, and a mom, and as a Dad.  I am sure that they must have been angry with God... or even questioned God, like "Why us God?" "Why Maria?"  But, even though they may have had this anger in the beginning, they now have a stronger faith than ever before. They know that God took Maria to be home with Him, and they know that she is safe with Him in Heaven.  Steven wrote a new song on his new album called "Heaven is The Face." (Click name to watch video) that talks all about his little girl and how he misses so many things about her, but also how he's trusting in God until he sees his little girl's face again.

I think that so many of us would have given up on God in this situation. We would have just thrown it all away and given up. We would have blamed God and been angry at Him for taking away someone we love.  What amazes me the most about the Chapman family is their faith and their trust.   Their faith in Heaven and their faith that God will carry them through the hard times, and their faith that their little girl is safe in His arms.  I can't even begin to think of the sorrow that they were and are going through, especially during the holidays and everything.... but it's that extrmeme faith that I think has brought them through these hard times. 

Just the fact that this family didn't give up on God and didn't give up on each other is incredible to me.  Sometimes, when something hard or bad happens in our lives, I feel like we get angry and blame God. We question God and we lose our faith, because something went wrong. But from this situation, I see that it's at those hard times in our life that our faith grows stronger.  We gain more trust in God, because it's only Him that can take us through those times. 

The Chapmans built a huge orphanage in China and named it 'Maria's Big House of Hope' after their little girl.  That young 5 year old girl lived a short life, but I'm sure that her experience and her family have changed the hearts of many in the world, including me. 

Just like the verse in Matthew, "If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to the mountain 'Move from here to there' and it will move.  Nothing will be impossible for you." 

This story makes this verse just speak to me.  Just that small amount of faith can really take you through hard times.  We can't give up on God. He will lead us through our lives, we just have to trust in Him.

Steven's website: http://stevencurtischapman.com/
Mary Beth Chapman's Blog: http://chapmanchannel.typepad.com/marybeth/  

*Amy :)