P.S. He Loves You.

So there's this girl in California, who is pretty much one of the most amazing women I have ever met in my life. And believe me I know some amazing women. 

This girl shared recently how we met on her instagram. Its seriously one of the most amazing stories. 

I met her back in 2005/2006 I'm not exactly sure when. I think I was a freshman in college, totally feeling lost being transplanted back into the western world after being in desert for about 6-7 years. Things were hard, I had surrendered my love life to the Lord after fighting Him and a lot of wrestling over it. I totally surrendered it, I had no idea what He was going to do with it (read more here). So I signed up with a community called purity girls, all beautiful young girls who shared this passion of trusting the Lord with their love lives. It was exactly what I needed at that time in my life when I felt as though no-one understood my desire to really love Him by giving Him the pen to my story and seeing what He would do with it. The day I signed up, there was an option to pick an accountability partner, and I felt like such a fraud. I had only just started on this journey of learning how to trust my heavenly prince with this area, I certainly didn't think I had anything to offer anyone else on this issue. 

I was scrolling through these pictures of young girls all with beautiful hearts and incredible stories, and I didn't really know what I was even doing being among them. When I clicked and a precious young girl (the same age as me) appeared on my screen. I read her bio about surrendering her pen to her sweet savior and trusting Him on His timing for romance and I got a little nudge. I have never been more sure about the Holy Spirit nudging me to do something. I was sitting there going 'but I didn't even want an accountability partner, Lord. I'm still trying to figure out what this looks like to trust you in this area, I can't support anyone.' And I felt His sweet whispers, 'Pick her, just trust me.'

So I clicked request accountability partner. And I have tears flowing down my face at His faithfulness by that simple click. Because the years that followed were just precious, we emailed each other, prayed for each other, shared our struggles and dreams in this area of our lives. It has truly just been one of the most encouraging friendships in my life, being able to walk similar paths with this incredible girl who lived the other side of the world from me. 

He absolutely wanted us in each others lives, and I am so thankful He did. It has been a blessing watching Him answer our prayers for one another. And I look forward to maybe sharing more of this amazing story with you guys someday.....

Now that I've bragged on her and the way the Lord brought us together as sisters....
she did something amazing this past year already.
She has written the most amazing inspiring devotional (and I'm not just saying that, really!). 
It has brought me into a beautiful season of seeking my precious prince & I have enjoyed just sitting in His presence understanding how much He thinks of me, how huge is love is for me, while reading her precious thoughts and meditating on the scriptures she shared. It reads like letters from her directly to you friend, you will honestly believe they are personally written for you. 


And I really think you should check it out.
You really won't regret it.  


But just in case you need any more persuasion, here's some sneak previews:

//Buy The Devotional//

Happy Thanksgiving & Birthday.

Happy Thanksgiving Friends!!!! 

There's so many reasons to be thankful today. I can't even begin to explain them all.

So I wanted to start with this sweet friend of mine.

Because its her birthday today too!! And I am definitely crazy thankful she is in my life.

I'm sure a lot of you probably know her pretty face.
Cause well she's gorgeous right!!
Meet Erin. She blogs here.
She also just writes crazy awesome posts, so you really do want to meet her.


Words wouldn't do justice how thankful I am to have a friend like her.
Seriously she has walked with me through some crazy ups and downs in life.
We met about eight years ago now when we were accountability partners based on our hearts for purity. The Lord placed such similar things on our hearts its insane.
And it has been such a joy walking with someone who understands where I'm coming from, because they are so similar.
Totally one of those God-given friendships. Like a bosom friend who is such a gift.


Today she celebrates another year of walking with the Lord, another year of life on earth.
And I am just so amazingly thankful for her friendship, her witness online, her heart for purity and other unpopular views in today's culture.
She encourages me so much by just being herself.
Definitely beautiful inside & out.
I can't wait to see how the Lord continues to use her in her ministry and how He continues to write her life story.


So today I just wanted to share with you one of the things I am thankful for.
This sweet girl.
Hoping you have a wonderful birthday and happy thanksgiving sweet friend!

Wishing we could grab a coffee together and celebrate!

Much Love,
L

Thankful//True gems.

Today was my first day back into life after the conference.

As glad as I am to be back, really glad in so many ways.

I have really began to miss the beautiful women who have impacted my life in the last week.

So today....

Thankful//for sweet friendships encouraging me to pursue Jesus.

Photos taken from Erin's Instagram....follow @erin_SweetnessItself

A look at a brief time with Erin at my home this time.

Missing her and so many other precious ladies.

Much Love,

L

Girl Behind the Blog: Your Influence

Hey Ladies,

Its time for another Girl Behind the Blog Link-Up.

I'm so glad Ashley keeps hosting these because its so awesome to keep seeing all you beautiful ladies in real life and hear different things about you all.

I also am so excited that Erin is co-hosting this month since she is my kindred spirit and I'm so thankful for her friendship.

So to support them both. Here is my video and addition to the Girl Behind the Blog 

Community.

You guys should head over and check out the other videos.

These ladies are so beautiful inside & Out. 

I'm so thankful for the close friendships of several of these ladies.

The Prompt

Time limit: Vlogs should be 2-3 minutes long

Introduce yourself and your blog

Who or what has influenced the way you think and who you are or changed the way you think/are? 

How do you hope to influence people through your blog? 

Is there another area in your life where you have influence? How do you plan to use your influence in this area? 

I know I keep saying that I hope to be back to regular blogging soon and honestly ladies I am trying.

You will have to bare with me for another few days as I deal with some pressing things going on in life right now.

I do have several ideas for posts but have been stuck in a funk for a few days.

So know they are coming, but I am just using this time to spend time with the Lord and work on some heart issues.

Much Love,

L

A lot of Laughter In My Tuesday.

Hey lovely readers,

(Come hang with me and pour yourself a cup of tea....) Sorry couldn't resist.

Just to let you know that the sign-up for the Spring Fling Swap is now closed.

Everyone who signed up should have an email from us already letting you guys know who your partner is, if you don't then email us at:

springflingswap@gmail.com

I'm SO excited to see what you lovely people all come up with =)

My partner for the swap is my lovely cohost, Erin over at SweetnessItself.

I have blogged about her before...you can read it HERE.

She is lovely.....

She blogs about purity and sharing her heart for the Lord.

If you like my blog, you will LOVE hers! =) 

So yeah...check her out! 

I can't wait to start gathering things to start sending to her.....

Feel free to link-up if you post about your partner during the next few weeks....I have added a link-up tool below.



I also couldn't resist sharing a few finds I have found online & in life during the last few days.
I have been dying with laughing along with A at some of these....the kind where you laugh till it hurts.

1. Well I didn't win this but I entered a contest to win a Karen Kingsbury signed book....I captioned this picture 'Your books turn my world upside down'.......guess we were the only ones who found it funny. Maybe if we had videoed the process of taking this picture we would have won.  Note: Laughing while standing on your head actually really hurts and leads to you sometimes losing your balance and nearly taking out your poor husband trying to take the picture =)

 

2. This video from the Ellen show....I totally want to do this now. In fact I have been laughing SO hard at too many Ellen videos to share them all. Hilarious show!!! 

3. THIS website. The cutest animations EVER! So funny too......
Meet Ickle & Lardee.....
You will LOVE them.

Image property of My Milk Toof

4. This photo of me & a little cutie in my life. We both have a TON of talent. 

5. THIS video.

6. Taylor Lautner's dorky dancing with Ellen.

So awesome when life is full of moments where you can die laughing. 

Enjoy friends.
Link-Up below a post about your partner for the swap =)

Much Love & Happy Tuesday!

L 

{Spring Fling Swap}

Surprise!!!

Introducing.....

About the Swap:

Spring Fling Swap has been created to celebrate the arrival of Spring (finally!) by making a new friend in the blogging world & sending them some encouragement.

 Don’t you guys love meeting new people and sending them some love? Your package should include a pair of flip flops and other items you think they might like! We want encouragement to be the main goal here, so please make sure you are able to meet all the requirements before you sign up. We are closing this at 100 participants, so sign up now!

 

Swap Partners:

Erin & L will pair you up randomly with one partner who you will send and receive a package from. Hopefully you guys will become friends through this! 

Dates:

         Sign-up remains open until April 6th (sooner if all 100 spaces are filled).

       We will email you guys your partner info by April 9th.

     IMPORTANT: Your package should be mailed by April 30th.

·  May 11th We want you guys to link up on Erin’s Blog and show us what you guys got in your wonderful packages.

Overseas:

Erin & L made the tough decision to close this swap to US residents only. We are extremely sorry if you live overseas. We are both pretty busy at this season in life and felt it wouldn’t be fair to include this option as we feel unable to give the extra time commitment this would require.

Requirements:

1.       Active Blog in 2012 to participate

2.      Must be a US resident.

2. Please spend between $25-30 on the goodies in your package. You may include handmade items (i.e. from your own store) but keep the value within the guideline.

3. Please do not participate if you don’t feel you will be able to stick to the timeline. We want everyone who sends a package of love to receive one back.

4. We are limiting this swap to 100 people. So sign up now!

How to Sign-Up:

Please click HERE and fill out the form.

All the info will be emailed to us and we can start pairing you guys up!


{Sign-Up is now closed.....check back on May 11th to see the fun packages!!!}

Spread the Love:

If you decide to participate, grab our button & stick it on your blog letting people know you are taking part!

<a href="http://allglorious-within.blogspot.com/2012/03/spring-fling-swap.html" target="_blank"><img alt="AllGloriousWithin" src="http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a273/LisaBarker/SFSbutton.jpg"/></a>

Questions:

Anything we didn’t cover?

Email us at springflingswap@gmail. com

Be sure to stop by Erin’s blog today at SweetnessItself =)

We would love to meet you guys through all this fun =)

We are so excited! We have been giggling and squealing! =)

 Leave us a comment below and let us know if you are participating.

much  love,

Erin & L

Sponsor Spotlight: SweetnessItself

Given the wonderful surprise coming later in the week, yes keep an eye open this friday...

It only seems appropriate to introduce you to a wonderful sponsor of mine & a dear friend.

Meet Erin From Sweetness Itself.

Image Property of {SweetnessItself}

If you have yet to visit her blog. Well it is a must! 

No seriously!! I am not joking....go check it out right this instant and stop listening to me.

You back already? Well ok...I will continue =)

There are girls you meet in this life whom you may not see very often. She and I have never lived in the same place (It is one of my dreams to someday). She is a beauty living on the west coast. The very first time I ever saw the Pacific Ocean (or the West coast), it was with her and because of her. 

If I were Anne living in Green gables....it is quite possible I would want her to be my Diana. She is one of those girls. The ones you know you don't need to talk to everyday to know that if you call them, they will still understand you. Even if life passes for a few months, nothing changes between the 2 of you.

Sweet friends. She is one of them.

Image Property of {SweetnessItself}

 So I thought I would take this opportunity to introduce you not only to her AMAZING blog. 

Which you really should visit quite frequently, because her heart is just amazing and she shares it over there in her virtual living room (aka her blog). 

But also to share the sweet story of how we met.

Image Property of {SweetnessItself}

Picture 18 yr-old Erin & L. Both living on opposite sides of the globe. 

Both with hearts for purity, a love for the Lord & committed to allowing Him to show them the one they would someday marry.

A few months after I arrived at college, a friend introduced me to the puritygirls website. I can't link to this site anymore as it no longer exsists due to personal conflicts with the people running it. However, it was a site dedicated to encouraging young men & women choosing to wait on the Lord to bring His best into their life in a spouse. 

I had surrendered my relationship with A to the Lord at this point in my life. We were not corresponding and living in different countries (again, I apologize more on this story another time).

I decided to join this site and hopefully find encouragement from like-minded girls choosing to trust God with this area of their life.

Once I was a member of the purity girls website, I filled out my profile details and then it moved to the next step (which was optional) of choosing an accountability partner.

So I scanned through the pictures of countless young women all of whom looked awesome in trying to live their lives for the Lord. As I scanned through them I thought well I will choose someone later...then I came across the profile of a girl called Erin. 

I felt a huge nudge, like a voice said to me 'Pick her!'

It was not an audible voice, just to be clear.

As I read through her profile, the nudging happened again.

I was unsure if this was the Lord or just me thinking she looked sweet, so I clicked the button requesting accountability with this sweet californian girl. 

It.Was.The.Lord.

Who nudged me.

A friendship this sweet, was definitely a gift from the Lord.
As we began correspondance that year, I met this incredible girl with such a sweet heart for God.

She encouraged me in my pursuit of Christ, in my loneliness of being single, in so many different ways.

The more I got to know her, the more I found out how similar we were.

We were both the oldest of 2 girls in our families. Both love vintage things, both have blonde hair & blue eyes (in fact her mom mistook me for her when I later visited her), both in love with girly things (I blame her for this change in me haha). 

Image Property of {SweetnessItself}

The Lord has given me this precious friendship & taught me so much from her wonderful heart.

She has been my friend through so many exciting changes in my life.

From loneliness in my first year of college, through exciting courtship with A.

Through engagement to A right after I went to visit her and we actually got to spend a week together in sunny California.

She has been such a true friend to me. 

She was my long-distance bridesmaid as last minute she was unable to make it to our wedding.

I am so thankful the Lord nudged me that day in my dorm room, to pick an accountability partner from SoCal. Just another girl in a bunch on a website. 

She is not just another girl!

This girl has a heart of gold.

She is so precious.

I pray that someday I will be able to witness her earthly prince arriving to sweep her off her feet.

To share in her joy, like she did mine.

And I totally plan on naming a child after her (of course that decision will be made with A)...

because I love her name & because if I someday have a daughter who turns out anything like her....

Well that would be one of the biggest blessings in my life ever!

I was going to describe our trip to see each other.

But that might have to wait.

Praise the Lord for sweet friendships & for ordaining our meeting!!!

Go call or email those wonderful women in your life for no reason other than to say hi. 

You know who they are.
They are a gift from the Lord.

Much Love,

L

 Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another.

Proverbs 27:17 

The heartfelt counsel of a friend is as sweet as perfume and incense.

Proverbs 27:9
 

 Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble. Likewise, two people lying close together can keep each other warm. But how can one be warm alone? A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken.

Ecclesiastes 4:9–12

Letter to me.

My dear friend, Erin, blogs over at Sweetness Itself. 

The story of how I met her is such a cute & God-ordained story, 

perhaps I should share it sometime.

She wrote this past week a letter to herself, you can read her post here.

She inspired me to totally write a letter to seventeen-year old me about things I wish I would have known or done.

Dear 17 year old L,

I'm sure you feel that life can't get much better than it is right now. You feel as though all the friends you have are forever, that high school will never end and you don't want it to. You aren't sure what you want to study at college and the thought of leaving all the people you love here in this beautiful city scares you....

Let me tell you sweet girl, you will figure all these things out and so much more. Don't be afraid of where the Lord will take you. He has amazing plans for you in the next 7 years. You will enjoy life so much more than you think in the years to come. In between you will have difficult moments, but trust me you will learn so much wisdom from them and find a treasure in the Lord.

If I thought you would listen, I would tell you to stop worrying about trying to fit in at school. You won't. You come to realise this is just fine. 

I know you feel that you were insane for choosing biology, chemistry and Physics as your only classes your senior year. Don't worry you pass all of them. In fact you more than pass....yes even chemistry....

Even though you feel you aren't sure what you want to do at college. I wish I could tell you that you don't need to go straight from High School, no matter what pressures you feel from family. I wish I could tell you to work for a few years or do that YWAM dts....whatever you feel the Lord is leading you to. Figure out what you want to study before you head off to that foreign 'home' country to move to the next step in education....you figure out what you want to do...eventually....

You will feel pressure to apply to med school after graduating, you won't be accepted because that is not the Lord's plan for you. You will have the grades, but it won't be the right path for your life. So you will take a gap year even despite all the pressures around you to head to college immediately. This is a good thing, even though at first it feels like the hardest thing you have ever come across in your life....

I'm not sure I would want to tell you this....but you will fall in love this year L. And yes, he is the one. The Lord will answer your cry when you experience heartbreak from being pulled away from him when you are 19. But don't worry he comes back into your life. He is everything you think he is, girl!

You will make some wonderful friends this year, L. They are forever friends. You are right about some of them, you will still talk to them on occasion even 7 years later. Some of them will even be your bridesmaids. There are several friends who you won't see again after this year and its ok to be sad about this. But know that some amazing girls stick around....

You will have some difficult relationships in your life in the years to come girl. This grows you so much into a person who strives to love others well. They may not be resolved for a long time or ever. But know that the Lord still loves you, even when you make mistakes with them and encourages you to be accountable for your actions and not theirs....

You will have the shock of your life when you get to college. The culture shock of no longer living in the Middle East will kick-in. You will cry a lot in this new place. You will long for the days in the desert with those girls you love and that boy with the blue eyes. I assure you, you will be ok. It takes time but eventually you find amazing people in this new city too. They are wonderful people and encourage you so much....

This year I would encourage you to keep playing your flute. When you no longer having someone forcing you to play it is so much harder and requires a lot more diligence....

Don't pull any all-nighters in college girl. They aren't worth it. Make sure you start those assignments early and have them finished before the week they are due. This will be worth the sacrifice....

You will encounter what is called a dissertation while in college. You. Can. Do. It. 
And you will. Don't panic, even when half-way through the 6 months you have to write it, you completely redo everything. It will be a great accomplishment for you....I will be proud of you....

Spend time with those friends of yours in college. They are not around forever. Don't take advantage of having 2 incredible girls in your house that last year of college. They are amazing people! They will love you regardless and you will have the best year in this new city with them. They will both travel halfway around the world to see you marry that boy of yours. Someday life will get busy and they will have obligations to boys just like you. So spend more time with them....

Spend time with your sister. In a year, you will not live in the same city anymore...you will miss her. You will miss the wonderful sleepovers you have with her when her heart is breaking this year. You may not ever live in the same place as her again. You need each other more than you think....

Enjoy the small group of young girls you will teach next year. After that year, you will want to mentor young girls for years to come....

When things are going well, bad or just ok....run to Jesus L. He will sustain you and help you through so much more than you ever thought you could handle. 

Once high school finishes, you will move eight times in the next few years. This helps you figure out that your 'home' is heaven precious girl. You will adapt. Until then....enjoy your home in the desert.

When your friends want to get up and go to the beach early on saturday mornings....go with them every time. Hear me! You will treasure these memories for years. It is worth a little less sleep. 

You will see the Lord lead you to some amazing places and cross your paths with amazing people. This year you will head to Sri Lanka, next year it will Africa & India....then it will be to England. These places will stay with you forever. 

Learn from your mistakes L, Love people a lot, never lose hope, hold on to Jesus & don't lose your bubbly personality....

You will meet precious people and love them so much.
Even if some of them don't love you.
That's ok.
You have Jesus, sweet girl.
He loves you. 

Much Love,
Older You

P.S. Next year you will get the sweetest car ever!! =) 

Please vote on the poll on the left side bar about future Link-Ups on All Glorious Within.

Happy Birthday E!

On the occasion of a dear friend's birthday today....

You can find me over on:

http://sweetnessitself.blogspot.com/

Much Love,

L