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The title of this post is not messed up. I wanted to share with you my thought process behind naming and starting this blog. I want to travel back about one year and tell you why I did this and why I am still doing this. So grab yourself a nice warm cup of coffee, and maybe a cookie, and enjoy.

It’s almost a year since I started this blog. I was reading back on different posts, thinking about how much has changed in my life over the past year, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. I’ve never really explained why I named my blog what I did. “Standing Firm in One Spirit” seems like an odd title for a blog. I didn’t want to do some cutesy title like “Meghan’s Musings” or anything like that. I wanted something of substance, something I could write an entire blog post on (which I failed to do so until now).

I also didn’t want it to be corny. I didn’t want it to make you laugh, not take this seriously, or think I was a complete and total idiot (which I may be at some point). I wanted to make sure that it didn’t highlight me, but it highlighted my love and passion for Christ. I wanted to make sure I didn’t show me in your first introduction to the blog, but rather everything pointed to Christ.

The name of my blog comes from my favorite passage of scripture. It became my favorite passage as my friends and I were ready to head off to college and I was going to be very, very far away from them. It was an encouragement to me, more than to them I think. It was what I wanted, above all, to be known about myself.

“Just one thing: live your life in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ. Then, whether I come and see you or am absent, I will hear about you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind, working side by side for the faith of the gospel.”-Philippians 1:27

This has been my constant reminder, especially through freshman year. It has been an encouragement, a reminder, and even a slap on the back of my head. I want people to know that I am working for the faith of the gospel. If they see me in person or hear about me, I want this to be what they see/hear.

So, the name of my blog came out of that passage. This blog is to uplift, encourage, slap on the back of the head, remind, and taunt you with false hopes of cookies (I really do that too much, don’t I?). This blog is to let you know what God is doing in my life, the journey He is taking me on, and to let you know I’m still working for the cause of the gospel.

Onto why I started this blog. I guess you could say that it all started 5ish years ago. I said something in a Bible Study once and compared something to a puzzle piece and God worked His magic after that. I was blessed with the quite unusual gift of creating really corny, but applicable analogies. Somehow, I still don’t exactly know how, it blessed people. It helped them understand. When I graduated and was leaving to go to Carson-Newman, I realized that I wouldn’t be able to share these things with the people I knew from home all the time. I started thinking about it, and realized that I’ve always been better at writing than I ever have been at speaking. So, I started writing. And I wrote for about a year, and hopefully will continue.

That’s why I started. I started to share the wisdom God has blessed me with. I kept writing for an entirely different reason, though. I kept writing because it gave me a vent. Writing gave me a way to share what I was thinking, get my frustrations out, and encourage others. I kept writing because it made people smile. I may seem really silly and quirky, but if it encourages ONE person or makes even ONE person smile, I’ve done my job. I’m content. Seeing people upset breaks my heart. I may be scatterbrained, odd, and just plain crazy, but I’m ok with that. I kept writing because God told me to. God has helped me to want to see people smile. God has helped me to want to encourage. God has helped me learn how to express my emotions in a civil manner. This is why I write.

                Now, go get yourself a cookie, because you deserve it.