Zach Taylor

“quit destroying the masterpiece I am trying to make you.” That is the line the lord just laid on my heart. And my heart has never been so heavy. I pray God show me that your shaping my life and he yells back I am! Why are you the one that always tells me to stop or does something so stupid that shows no one that you are a follower of me!? I stay silent after that is spoken to me. I’m not sure if this will even come together but who cares. Today pastor was preaching about are the people around better of because you are around. Pretty simple. There wasn’t some twist. Do you light up the room when you walk in. Are you consistent with your generosity? And I could in a second answer that question as soon as he asked it. No. No I’m not. I do not help anyone by being around. Does that make me useless and nothing? No. It makes an opportunity for God to work in me for him to get the glory. So secretly for the rest of today I shadowed people…almost stalked them. Took notes at how many countless people they said hi to. Gave a friendly smile to. Didn’t cut them off then yell at them on 51 with their elevation sticker stuck to the back of their car. All of these things I do daily….or things I do not do daily. I help no one on a normal day! How freaking sad! I claim to be a christ follower. Why? Because I intern at a church and honestly only know how to work in churches? The lord is doing so many weird things with me and I love it. His tone is always changing with me so I can see it in a different way. But his tone might change but his faithfulness and grace that I am so underserving of still remains. And he is good. And all the glory goes to him. Just like all the glory will go to him when people love for me to be around just because my smile or presences can make their day better. Trust me out of all the things I want to do right now…working on being more friendly and just a better person to be around is not on the top of my list. A perfect example of how good God is. Because now it is. Because to be the masterpiece that God is trying to form me into I must do everything that he calls me to do. Small and big. And I’m tired of screwing it up.

I have been doing a lot of thinking over the past few days. We are about to start our 10 day daniel fast along with reading the new testament in 30 days. But everyone kept on saying (myself included) there will be a lot of sacrifices made over the next 10 days. But I had to think…it’s not a sacrifice. I started to think of myself on the level of God. Me not eating meat and unhealthy crap for 10 days…that isn’t a sacrifice. It’s an offering…and a very small one at that. Not saying that it will be a piece of cake and it won’t phase me. But I am longing for the day that I have something that is so big to me and means so much that I will have to offer it as a sacrifice. Jesus was a sacrifice…meat for 10 days is not. I want to say I’m scared for these next 10 days…in fact I expected myself to be. But I am so shocked and how ready and willing I am. Maybe it because I have gotten myself aligned with God again. I can’t wait to see the troubles come so I can rely on my God. And he will deliver me. He has never failed. Even when I have been so unfaithful or my offering has been so small that it is meat. With my salary….my tithe even feels so small. But I know that my God is not a selfish God. And he will bless me with abundance with every offering I give. I realize daily when in walk into the lab to work and I see posters, stories, emails all with the same story of life change. I’m not looking for a new car or a hot wife. Seeing lives changed the in hundreds and thousands is enough for me now. Work in me so you can work through me.

I get often frustrated because there is always an update our for my iPad and software! Always! Growl updates every 3 mims! And I hate it. I put it off…and off…and off….until finally it stops working or it quits to much to function. The same goes for my daily life. God is always presenting ways for me to upgrade at no cost but I to often look at it and go nahhhh don’t see the point now. It will take to much time for something simple. Most of the time an update just fixes a line of code and is a back in deal. Something I will never actually see. But I will forever see the powers of the back end work. And God is doing that all the time here. Whether it is making 200 scripture slides in a day when I could be animating a fun project. Or playing with kids and getting moon sand thrown at me. Serving food at a graduation. Holding doors for girls and saying yes ma’m no ma’m. All these little things that honestly do nothing for my outside appearance or honestly anything for my motion design. But I’m realizing quickly that….none of that crap matters. What matters is I have the heart of a servant. That I am never to good to scrub a toilet. Because as I become to good he steps out. And those things that I deal with daily trying to not let them break will….well break me when I choose for me to step in forcing God to step out. Work in me so you can work through me.

Will I let this break me? It is so heavy on my heart. My heart has been doing nothing but aching. Even though my outward appearance is not flawed my insides do nothing but turn. But the decision that was made was the right one. Why? That is out of my reach. I cannot see the bigger picture like he does. I can barely see past the hurt. But I am confident that he is stronger. He is in control. I am trusting that what he is doing is good. Will this break me? No. No it won’t. I won’t let it. It is a perfect time for it to break me. But I won’t let it. It breaking me is not in the plan that he has planned for me. You never break while on his path.

1. I will act in audacious faith.

2. I am a generation of honor.

3. I will lead the way in generosity.

4. I am united under the visionary.

5. I need your seat.

6. I think inside the box.

7. I dress for the wedding.

8. I am Ruth’s Chris, not Golden Corral.

9. I am all about the numbers.

10. I eat the fish and leave the bones.

11. I am known for what I am for.

12. I will not take this for granted.

I will not take this granted. For a moment I did. Then I had to stop and apply the code to me. I will not take this for granted. Everything that is happening here. Everything that happened this weekend. I will not take it for granted. It was never mine to begin with. Everything that is happening here is the work of his hands. It is volunteers, staff, and interns putting down their own pride. The way we would like to see things or the way we would like to work. We put that aside and we unite under the visionary. Its more than seeing this city changed it is seeing this nation changed. This church is rising up leaders that will forever impact this world with the love of Christ. And I will not take this for granted. It kills me to think about what I took for granted back home. The results show that more than just myself took it for granted. Now it is up to the others to pick up the pieces that we left. I am in constant prayer that something beautiful will arise in that place. And he will be victorious. But I will not ever, ever, ever take any of this for granted. Whether I am here or anywhere else. Working in a church or being self employed. I wont take it for granted. Lives in Christ are nothing to take for granted. Work in me so you can work through me.

I am shocked at how bad it hurts to actually walk right now. I did body by buck yesterday and it was hell. My body is still not used to being used that much! For me my job mostly requires me sitting down on my butt all day. The downside to that is once ive been sitting down for a while and then have to get up my legs are stiff and don’t want to even bend to walk. And that’s exactly what I do in my life. I get sore it truly gets hard to work. People are able to tell im limping but I cant show them im really in pain. So I sit down and sit….and sit….and sit….until it gets to the point when I get back up it wasn’t even worth sitting down in the first place. I was also shocked at the more I walked around and used my legs the easier it got to walk. My legs began to stretch more. And that’s what I will continue to do this summer. I will keep walking and stretching my legs. I will not have the mind set to sit down with it hurts. I will push and continue to push through body by buck. As stupid as it is to me and almost pointless im glad that some of my biggest struggles are body by buck and not that I don’t know when I will eat my next meal. Or what do we do when the water runs out. Thank you God for letting my body be healthy enough to work out and gain more muscle and not be fighting for my last breath. You have blessed me beyond words. I can’t wait to see what you are going to do with me and how to bring my vision to life. Nothing will be put in my back pocket so I will get it next week. It begins now.

Today I got to do my first bootcamp….I get the whole staying in shape thing…but holy. crap!! That was the most intense thing my body has ever encountered in my whole 18 years of living. My body was so not used to that much happening at once that I puked. And I puked good!! But once again (god I’m not sure why you keep doing this…but I like it. Thank you) i was brought back to the basics. I felt so much better after I puked and got all of it out of my system. Granted my whole body still hurts but I was able to get back with my team and finish the work out. Same thing with life. I am so glad I got last year out of my system. Not saying all of last year was just puke I had some of the best times of my life last year. But there was so much crap and useless stuff I did. And I’m so glad God brought me to the place where it had no where to go but out. And once I looked at it when it was out. I realized how gross and stupid it was. Because now I have a clean start. I am able to do things now that I was able to do before because I had all that crap inside me. It’s funny to me…I’m the person that always says I can make the best out of wherever I am. But it took me moving to a new state with new friends and mentors to begin to “make the best.” which as far as I’m concerned….you can’t do. Your the best when your with God plain and simple. Without him you are cold and in the dark but still have a lot of pride and want to show your awesome Christian friends how strong you are being when really. Your not. Your hiding. Your just waiting to puke.

I’m realizing that every hour I’m taken back to the basics. Mostly because I’ve been to busy trying to block God I’ve forgotten what he was doing with me when I told him to stop. I realized today, I do what I do because I love Jesus. The people that work and serve with do what they do…because they love Jesus. I did not decided to intern at elevation and work with churches because I love motion design. Let’s be real I could go to art school work in a studio and make an easy six figures a year. I work in churches because I know that the videos I create are helping people connect with God. I’m glad I went through last year. Because I got a glimpse of how shallow I can be. How big headed I can act. And how little I matter when I am not in the will of God. Work in me so you can work through me. And I am so thankful that in 4 days my God is faithful and my insides are turning for him.

I think out of all my journal entries… This one might be in the running for one of the weirdest. Not because it will be so deep. But because it is something that I just realized that I almost in a way forgot about…and it’s somewhat a big deal in our walk with Christ. I was setting up at the uptown campus at elevation. What a throwback that was! As much as I hated those early mornings at celebrate I’m glad I did it. Because the same thing happened here. It was early, there was a lot to do and with little time. But I began setting up one of 4,000 kids ares with a new guy I met. Danny? I think…. It’s my first day…and its my journal…I know who I’m talking about. Anyway! Me and Danny talked a lot about what I was doing at the church. What he does at the church. And so on. But then there is this awesome place at all elevation campuses call vhq. And all it is a room with snacks, drinks, and food later in the day. While in this room with some of my fellow internees I thought to myself…holy crap…I have forgotten about heaven.

I say the word eternity and I talk about setting next to my creator daily…yet somehow my mind blacked out that we will spend eternity in a place that is perfect. Where he is perfect and we are made clean forever! A place where I will sit with my old intern friends (hopefully.) I will get to sit with the disciples. There will be chipotles that I can eat at! I will eat with Garret, slack, Landon and all the other people I will meet on this journey. Im believing there will be chipotles in heaven….

Something so simple and to sum might even say this is dumb. But I know that I can’t wait to get to heaven and not have any guilt, hurting, heartache, loneliness, bitterness, starvation, poverty, death, broken bones, def ears, and blind eyes. When the world is no longer taunting me to fill my voids with something temporary. Infect we wont even have voids we will be made whole with christ. These are the things i need to remember. The basics cannot be forgotten. More importantly less of me, more of him.

Tonight was my first worship experience at elevation church. And yes it was awesome! But it was when they played you have won the victory that my mind started to race around all these things that I have been through. For me this internship is a.) the biggest honor I have ever had in my life and will continue to give God the praise for allowing me to be here. No matter what the outcome is. B.) its also a landmark in my life. I’m done with high school now I’m into the “real world.” and I couldn’t help but smile and give thanks to God at that moment in the song. Not just because I was standing as an intern at elevation but because my God has won the victory! He has won! And used me! He had his hand on me the whole time and this is a clear result of the victory. Pastor is very serious on making sure that we as a church continue to give God praise for what he has done. And as soon as we quit giving God the praise and sacrifices he deserves he will remove the blessing he has put on this church and put it on a church that is asking for it. The same is in my life. One thing I am learning is how to always tell God how thankful I am. Not just because of the church I’m at but because of where I am in life. I am healthy, loved, safe, a child of God. For yours is the victory. Work in me so you can work though me.