I think the quickest advice anyone ever gives when it comes to relationships- whether it be friendships, dating relationships, or business partnerships- is to "guard your heart". If I had a dollar for every time someone told me to "guard my heart" I would have enough money to hire Kylie Jenner's very attractive personal body guard. I get it..  Proverbs 4:23  "Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it." The problem with hearing "guard your heart" over and over again- no one told me what that meant so I began to interpret it as "build walls." I don't blame anyone for how I interpreted their advice but I feel as though many of us have begun to interpret protecting our heart as building walls up. So, what does it really mean to guard your heart- and how do we do it? Guard : (v) watch over in order to protect or control Okay- I think most of us know what "guard" means - but it's pretty ...

HeLloOoOoOooooo ... If you have ever answered a phone call from me you would read that in my exact voice- if you haven't- call me ;) jk. But yes, hello! I am back and I am promising myself that this post will not be - yet another - draft that never sees the light of day. I started this blog this month three years ago and I think this year I wrote a total of.. oh maybe three posts? Which for me- I find that unfortunate as I did the one thing I promised my dad I wouldn't do. I promised my dad I would "never stop writing" and yet here I was- not writing. But thanks to some encouragement from my old roommate/close friend, Katherine, I am determined to write out all the things I have stored up in my mind and heart. So Katherine, and anyone else who has always encouraged me to continue writing, this blog is dedicated to you. Not because the topic is related to you in any sort of way- but because part of my healing process is through writing and through all of the encou...

Hello my beautiful readers! Where in the world have I been? Well, I have been frolicking around drinking $7 almond milk lattes, dying my hair blue, eating far too many bagels from Noah's Bagels, and I have been doing all of this in Sacramento for exactly a year now! That's right, the beautiful city of Sacramento and I are celebrating our one-year anniversary.  We accept cash, coffee, or you can Venmo (@JessicaNicole-Lair)/Cashapp(@jessnicolelair) to congratulate our wonderful relationship. If you know me at all you know that I am super sentimental when it comes to memories or anniversaries. I am just one who loves to look back on what I was doing this time a year ago and see how far I have come. As I sit here at my favorite coffee shop and think back on what I was doing on this day last year I am hit with every emotion that is humanly possible. I could write about the hardships and each lesson I learned, or I could write about how every plan I ever had about my life vanis...

Let me start off this blog post with a background on who I am. First off, I am a millennial. I also am a pastor's kid who has been surrounded by the church her entire life. I have been to the small hometown church to the big, three-services-a-day church. I have been the PK running around, the staff member running behind the scenes, and the new comer in the corner awkwardly sipping the burnt coffee.  When I was 18 years old, I moved from the Bible-belt of California (Bakersfield) to Los Angeles. I began attending a church plant, only two-years old at the time, in the heart of Hollywood. For six months I got to church just in time for service to start and I was always the first one to leave. Through a twist of events I ended up serving as a staff member at this church. I love this church with my whole heart! This, being a new church in Hollywood, attracted almost 90% of millennials. After attending this church for two years, I moved up to Sacramento to a church that is alm...

When I dropped out of beauty school I made the promise to live a fully obedient life to Christ. When I decided to leave a beautiful life in LA and move to Sacramento, I made the promise to put down my plans and to always go when and where God tells me to go. Proverbs 16:9 "We can make our plans but the Lord determines our steps." People ask have asked me what I want to do with my life or what is my plan, and I never knew fully how to answer that question because my answer was never a generic "pastor" or "stay at home wife" or any one specific thing. But I have finally came to the realization of what I do want to do for the rest of my life and that is walk in full  obedience to Christ, whatever that may look like and wherever that may take me. If God directs me to be a marketing director in Sacramento, I will be a marketing director in Sacramento, if God calls me to preach to young girls all over the world, I will go preach to young girls all over the w...

Do you ever drive on the 80 East and literally start sobbing to God begging Him to move in a certain area of your life? Or while walking your dog, do you demand that He hardens your heart towards someone who hurt you? How about when you stare out your window at the big trees that provide privacy and whisper to God, "Why?" Just me? Oh. I think we all come to moments where we push cordialness in our prayers aside and we get real with God. We may scream, cry, or simply just ask God "why?" Why did you bring me here? Why did you let them hurt me? Why have you not allowed me to quit a job I hate? Why have you allowed to happen all that has happened? Why? Why? Why. I will be real, the majority of my prayer life lately has been singing praises to God of the redemptive stories that I have watched take place as of recently, but then I have my mornings, where I break, and I cry, and sometimes I even scream at God. (Let's all also remember I am just overly dramatic)...

Isaiah 28:23-26 "Listen to me; listen, and pay close attention. Does a farmer always plow and never sow? Is he forever cultivating the soil and never planting? Does he not finally plant his seeds- black cumin, cumin, wheat, barley, and emmer wheat- each in its proper way, and each in its proper place? The farmer knows just what to do, for God has given him understanding." I've been dwelling on these verses all day today. The question I asked myself after reading this during my morning devotions was: Am I being faithful with my field? Am I planting the right seeds in the right season? Am I over-watering to where I drown my crop or am I giving it just enough? Am I harvesting too early or reaping at just the right time? Have I neglected my field all together? What do I mean by all of this? I mean that in every aspect of our life; ministry, work, relationships, etc. we sow seeds. Each category of our life is a field that we must tend to. Are we actually progress...

I have been keeping up, not so consistently, with this blog for a little over two years now. I look back to the naive 18 year old that first began school at Paul Mitchell, living in her dream city, and I think about who she was and where she was at in her life and in her faith and I think, if only she knew then what I know now. Two years is really not a lot of time and I am barely turning 21 and still have my entire life ahead of me, but I sit here and think just how amazing this journey has been so far. Each and every blog post I write is inspired by a lesson I am learning in that exact moment. I have no fear when it comes to my writing, in fact, I can pour my entire heart out in little black letters on a screen with no hesitation. That being said, I was thinking back to previous posts and thinking back to specific moments or trials that inspired my words and I realized that through each lesson I was learning there was one big underlying message that was right in front of my face un...