Guilt

I have been going back and forth in my mind for ten minutes now on what to write about, and I realized that I feel the same about blogging as I do about God.

Let me explain before you start interpreting that yourself.

I go through phases, as I'm sure everyone does, with everything. My daily snack, my methods of distraction, the way I sort my time to do homework, and what nail polish I like the most. Obviously there are more but those are just a few examples. Unfortunately I also go through phases with God which is why I related it to blogging, but there is a deeper reason. Guilt. Every time I go for a long period without praying (or blogging) I feel guilty and not only do I feel guilty I feel unworthy. This normally causes a cycle of me not talking to God (or posting) because I feel as though its not worth it at this point because it has been too long and the damage is done. I never knew why I felt this and the other day as I was explaining it I figured it out.

Its because I hate when people do that to me.

When that friend who hasn't talked to you in 6 months, despite your efforts, just tries to start talking to you again like they haven't been ignoring you?! Yea thats annoying. And I guess it falls under that categorie of Do Unto Others...

So whenever I ignore God for a period of time, I think it is rude of me to just jump back in praying, asking for stuff, yada yada yada. So I don't do it. I'm not really sure of when this cycle actually stops but I know it does at some point.

Writing this got me thinking about how different we actually are from God, even though we are created in his image. By different I mean flawed. When my friend calls I should be beyond thankful to hear from them, no matter how long it had been. My selfish tendencies get in the way more than I notice I'm sure and hopefully I am become more aware of it.

I promise to try to start writing more, and thats more of a promise to myself than the few people who actually read this.

God is love
Christ is truth

Encompassing

Today I woke up to a thunder storm. I LOVE thunderstorms. I turned off my alarm and just laid in bed looking out all three of my windows at the large flashes of light. As I am writing this I am comparing lightning to God, which I'm sure has been done before but today it seems relevant. To me it seems there are two types of lightning, the kind that fills your room with a burst of light and the kind that you can see go to the ground and back to the sky. There is a more "pin point" type and an "all encompassing" type.

In comparison to God I believe he works in both ways. There are times when I can feel God in everything that I do, my life is filled with His love and grace. Other times I feel him pointing me to one aspect of my life. Recently I have FINALLY gotten myself into a routine of daily reading and prayer. Its taken me 4 years to get to this point but I can't tell you how happy I am to finally be here. It seems that the more I feel I am doing what I should the more attacks I come under, I have always told friends that attacks are a good sign because they mean you are a threat, but I still dislike them immensely. The more I read the more I see errors in my way of living. This summer I have been probably the happiest I have ever been and always have the mindset that nothing can take me down. That is an easy mindset to have when all is going right. Don't get me wrong hardly anything is going wrong in my life right now but it amazes me how one negative thought can't completely shatter my motivation to stay happy.

I spent this past Sunday and Monday with my family at Lake Cumberland and had a great time! On the drive back I began to think about negative things/thoughts/feelings in my life and for two hours those little things completely consumed me because I let them. I felt like a bad friend/girlfriend/daughter/sister etc. and as I fueled these thoughts the more depression came over me. I have been reading "Walking with God" by John Eldredge and he talks a lot about spiritual warfare and praying against things such as depression, defeat, fear etc. As much as I didn't want to pray in that moment I felt that I had to, so I did. After about 30 minutes I began to feel better and definitely less discouraged.

Sometimes God will pin point things in my life that I need to address and while that isn't the warm and fuzzy God feeling most people are looking for, that is when He is with you most.

Sometimes He consumes me as quick as a flash of lightning and I am reminded who I am living for.

God is Love

Christ is Truth

Sometimes you just have to suck it up.

This is not going to be nearly as long as my last post but I just wanted to get some thoughts out. N and I were talking tonight and it really got me thinking about how we look at life, and how many little things I have let stress me out lately, and how many of those things REALLY don't matter. Life is always going to throw things at you, and it is all about how you respond to them that makes you who you are. You have to think, is this really worth my energy? will getting upset about this help anything? and the answer is normally no. Sometimes you just have to suck it up and be happy! Only you are in control of the happiness in your life, if you want there to be happiness, then let it in! allow it to take over you! I don't understand why it is so strange for someone to just be generally happy anymore. If someone is in a good mood there always has to be a reason. But I think from now on I am going to force myself to only allow joyful things into my life, not saying I'm avoiding the bad but I have control over what affects me. BE HAPPY! =D

Forgiveness, define that for me... What does it mean to Forgive. Sure the Bible says to forgive, and to not only forgive once but to forgive 77 times. But what does forgiveness look like? I've been struggling with this question a lot the last couple days, mainly because I am feeling negative emotions toward someone I thought I had, in my heart, forgiven. Does it mean you can have a normal conversation with that person, without holding a grudge? or bringing up the situation in question? Does it mean you want the best for them? despite what they did? Does it mean you feel content about what they did to you? I'm not sure. I want to say I have forgiven this person and truly wish the best for them, but I want to feel it in my heart. N had a great quote "forgiveness is when you see the person that caused you harm, and instead of wishing evil upon them, you pray for them instead. It's an attitude change." I thought this was a great way of putting it. Another thing I thought of for my own situation is that forgiveness is no longer letting that situation affect how I view myself, or that person. This view relates directly back to the happiness I was talking about earlier, I can control what I think about myself, and what I let get to me. The Devil is incredibly crafty and I just have to rely on Christ to help me fight the bad thoughts and only entertain the good and hopeful. The amount of good that has come out of this situation is ASTOUNDING, I have met and grown closer to the friends I'm certain I will have for the rest of my life. I have regained my relationship with God, I have started to become the woman I want to be. And the man of my dreams seemed to fall right into my life. =D My only regret is that I let myself stray so far from God that this had to happen to get me back. But I am thankful everyday to serve a God who will fight for me, when I don't deserve it. And I am going to challenge myself to pour good into people who we may think don't deserve it. If God can show me this much love, I can make an effort to get out of my comfort zone and help build up others. Don't underestimate the power of happiness.

If anyone actually does read this, I'd love to know your thoughts, like I said I'm trying to figure it out.

Corrie Ten Boom, a Christian woman who survived a Nazi concentration camp during the Holocaust said "Forgiveness is to set a prisoner free, and to realize the prisoner was you."

God is Love
Christ is Truth