God Girl - enthralled with Love.

I haven't written in awhile, although I think about it quite a bit.  I just feel like I have to have something specific to say when I do write.  Well, today, I'm just merely in love with Christ.  Not merely - that doesn't sound right - I'M IN LOVE WITH CHRIST!  There, that's better.

One may scoff, decide not to read - but I write to those who will.  I write to all, for there might be one, just one that's curious enough to see, why?  I've got lots, oodles and oodles of whys.

Christ has changed my life, one hundred and eighty degrees.  If you've read previous blogs, you know where I came from - a life filled with stress, resentment, anger, distrust, and addiction.  I even at times despised my own mother.   However, God (Jesus and God are to me, one in the same, interchangeable) - has melted my heart.

I've always known that God was the answer, I was raised in church.  I've read my bible while so high I burned the pages, and the cover of my older bible -- because I passed out while trying to read.  I used to be very ashamed of this - but now I know that God has forgiven me for all my past mistakes.  Several of the pages are burned in my attempt to draw closer to God - and I was even in church at the time, while throwing back anywhere from 4-7 lorcetts at a time. I was just in the throws of my addiction.  I was so condemned that most Sundays, I went to the alter and asked for forgiveness, IF I hadn't passed out in church.  I hate to think how I must have looked to my Lord.  I hate to think of the shame I caused my Mom.  She was the adult sunday school teacher - and here was her daughter - high as a kite.  The problem with being high, you don't think other people notice it, that's how denial works in the brain...  It's a safety mechanism.

At any rate, if you want to know if I've been there... I've been there.  The whole town must have been laughing at me - or feeling sorry for me one.  My disease did not care.  I don't think God cared either - you see because much to many's belief -- God does not judge like we think, and He was not mad at me. He looked upon me with the compassion and mercy that He always does those who seek Him.  I was seeking.  Invariably I knew that I had a problem, I just didn't either want to stop, didn't know what to do about the physical pain - or the emotional pain - so the addiction won.  I had not grown to understand that God is the ultimate healer of it all.  It took me several years, hitting bottom a few times, to understand this fully.

We try as humans ( I guess we are just hardwired like this) to do things on our own.  It is the part of us that feels like we can do it alone.  I wrote to a friend just yesterday and told him that he wasn't the "universal solider" and that he needed help with his life.  He is at bottom and cannot seem to find  a way out.  Why we won't ask for help is beyond me.  Other than we seem to think that we have to have "all out ducks in a row" to call upon God.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  Despair, loneliness, depression and the like are all times when we need Jesus the most.  I guess because we can't see Him, He isn't a valuable option?  Faith.  We have it in other things, but not God.  Wonder why?  He is always our last resort.  In actuality He, should be our first - in all things.  I  suppose it is a matter of what one believes.  I know one thing, we give our minds inordinate tasks to do -- things that the mind was not designed for.  We ask the mind to handle our emotions, drive our cars, calculate our finances, move our bodies, replenish our cells every 24 hours - most of those things the mind can do - however the mind cannot handle your grief.  It's not hardwired to do that, this is why we have emotions.   Trust me, God knew what He was doing when  He gave us feelings.  So our stress elevates.  The expectation just too huge.  It's on overload - so you get mad at the kids, bark at your spouse, and miffed at your boss.  The list goes on and on -- until you have road rage, and the like.  This is what has happened in our society.  We've all given our minds the job of our souls.  Most of us, are wounded at best.

To love the Lord.  To believe in something greater than ourselves - not the sun, the moon, the stars - for God put them into existence.  Unless you believe we came from monkeys...........then this blog isn't going to sit well with you.

Mark 12:29-31 Jesus answered him (for a scribe had asked Him which of the commandments is first of all?), The first of all the commandments is: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.  And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.'  This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  There is no greater commandment than these.  

Love.  Isn't that amazing?  Jesus is all about love.  Something we all know and are actually hardwired to do - we love our families, our spouses, our pets --- our stuff!  Our homes, our cars -- the list can be endless -- but what about God?  Where are you with Him?

I challenge you today to look at these glorious trees.  Listen to these lovely song birds of spring - singing for a mate.  The awakening of our planet.  If these things are not evidence of a power greater than we are, then what is?

Love abounds.  If one will allow it.  Love of life, breath, spirit.  Be kind, be compassionate.  Find that small still voice inside of you that questions if a man came, lived a perfect life - yet died for all of us on a cross - so that we may have life, and have it more abundantly --- and most of all, never see death.  See if there isn't an inkling of belief --- and fan the flame.

Just another joint of the Journey

I've been through a bit since I've last written.  I didn't have time before, and now - again, all I have IS time.  I worked a mere three weeks, and one of the main funding sources ran out - thus, I got laid off.  

Being a person that has delayed reactions to things - it didn't seem to bad at first - I wasn't fired, nor let go -- I had just been temporarily laid off.  That is what my "rational" mind told me.  I hadn't had time to consider all that I'd been trying to cope with - all the dreams I'd had in my head.  Not only that, but the stress that I'd been under (good stress) trying to adjust to the new job.  Since it had been so many years since I had worked, the adjustment period had really just begun.  I'd had some difficult days, with pain control - and silly as it may sound to some -- missing my daily naps!  There were days when paperwork ruled, and I had a serious time staying awake.  This in itself was very disconcerting.  I knew that it would take sometime to adjust - and I was just beginning to get into the 'groove' of things.  Just getting a set routine, time off spent getting clothes ready - apartment cleaned, doing what every other working person does - in managing time.  It had been so long, that I had to relearn how to do it.  However, I had a lovely schedule, the longest stretch that I worked was two days in a row - and then off two - so it was really great.  I had all the time I needed to prepare to return mid week.  

I hadn't been feeling the greatest, there had been some stomach thing going around - and it seemed I had it.  My energy was very low - and come to find out, what ever this virus was, affected my blood pressure as well.  When your blood pressure is low, you feel lousy.  I knew, however, despite how rotten I felt, I was not missing work.  

I got a call about three weeks in - on a Thursday afternoon and I was actually napping - to come into work.  I told my supervisor that I wasn't feeling well, and he told me "no problem, we'll see you tomorrow."  Little did I know that when I got there I would be whisked off into a office, and told I was temporarily laid off until the funding returned.  They apologized, as I would expect, but what about my dreams?

I'd been looking at different apartments - and had bought clothes just the day before.  In all actuality - I'd spent too  much money - as I do from time to time.  Now here I am --- an unemployed person again.  My dog had surgery just earlier in the week, and I'd had extra testing done on her - because I knew I had extra money coming in.  Oh well........

So now I've a whole different set of circumstances to deal with in this juncture of my journey.  I won't tell you that by the third day I wasn't quite depressed about it all. I had big dreams.  Not only that, especially - on the days that I worked, I felt a sense of aliveness -- and great motivation to arise in the morning.  I love what I do.  I was on the verge of getting my certification back - and now that is stalled again.  One must be under clinical supervision in order to receive what I was going for.  

I've tossed it over and over in my mind - for what reason I do not know other than I'm human.  I guess that's what we do.  We try and figure things out.  I did not try and figure them out alone -- God is always in the picture with me, and I know that things happen according to His plan.  I know that there has to be reason for this, or it would not have taken place.  I groveled in my understanding of it -- but more out of the adjustment of my emotions.  I'd gone from the stress of the newness of everything that was, to now the newness of everything that isn't.  

It's funny how life can take turns so unexpectedly.  This makes me very grateful that I serve a constant God.  Oh I bewailed a bit - for I lost something temporarily that I really enjoyed -- but I trust that He knows why.  I, don't have to.  This will sound strange to some, and insane to others.  My faith keeps me going, in so many area's - in my life in general.  I don't get a lot of things - but I trust that God does and will reveal them to me as the time comes.  I know that someday I will look back and understand exactly why this happened, but I don't and refuse to drive myself crazy giving my mind a job that it can't handle.  

Faith for me, resides in the heart.  It is an assuredness and a safety.  I know my Savior has things in store for me, that I cannot even imagine.  I know this because of how far He has already brought my life.  It not just outward circumstances either - it's a knowing that all good things come from God.  I used to believe that God was angry, mad and vengeful.  I do not believe that any longer.   How are we supposed to love God, when we see Him this way?  If we really study Jesus's life, one can only see the humility, the compassion and the eagerness to spread gentleness commingled with love.  Jesus was God in the flesh, so how is it that God can always be so angry?  I just don't believe that any longer.  I've made mistakes, and plenty of them - but I refuse to believe that God remembers any of it.  To think anything less, would take away what Jesus did on the cross at Calvary.  I will not cheapen, no diminish what my Savior did.  I will trust, and wait.  I'll praise Him anyway - despite my circumstances.  I've everything I need - and then some.  And this comes from a girl that lives in a rent controlled apartment with a 13 year old car -- but I'm blessed.  I'm breathing, I've a roof over my head, food to eat - people that love me, etc.  Many, more that you or I even like to think about - don't have homes, or enough food to eat daily.  It's really simple for me.  When I'm in my "right" mind.  Some days I struggle just like everyone else.  However, it does not take me long -- to seek my comforter.  He and He alone knows my struggles.  I find solace in knowing He is sitting at the end of my life - saying, "rest my child!" What will be known will be made known.  Until then, I just have to do the next right thing in front of me.  Most of the time I find it in prayer.  

I just cannot imagine going through this thing called life, alone.  I've done it, and it was miserable.  Left to my own defenses, I always manage to really mess things up.  For this, and so many reasons on this journey -- at this as with every junction - I cling to Jesus.  Call me what you will, and judge me as you may -- but I'm never alone.  Not only that, but my help is supernatural.  It contains miracles.  I know because I've seen them.  Next time you're out and you catch a glance at that rainbow - think about it's maker.  Science may be able to explain it, but science didn't bring it into existence.  

So, job or no job - dreams aside for now - I'll hold on to my faith.  
"We walk by faith, not by sight." 2 Corinthians 5:7 
God's really my employer - and I'm still very much employed.  Happy Journey.