March 14

Three hours ago, I sat down on my bed with the intention of writing a post about how I had felt so lost and distant before this past weekend and how being at Passion had completely changed my point of view and that I am totally on the right track now, but as I was typing I started to realize that that was simply not true. After convincing myself all weekend that things would be better when I got home and that I would feel sure and secure once it was all over, "sure" is the least accurate word that I can think of to describe how I felt. Broken, lost, unsteady, trembling (literally), and silent crying on my knees on the floor is a much better description. And this is how I really felt all weekend:

I find myself, once again, arriving to my knees,
I ask, I knock, I seek, I search for Your sweet relief.
Lord, I come confessing now, I've trained some wandering feet.
I've tasted and seen, but with faded feeling, I long for something sweet.
I feel it all, I know it's real when outward I am shouting,
But all the while, I move along, and inward I am doubting.
Never of Your greatness Lord, or Your reality,
But always of my own fate in this sinful malady.
I reach, I long, I pine, I thirst for some tender clarity,
And yet still, I find myself wading in this vast disparity.

I texted a friend who agreed to meet with me, and scrambled to grab my phone and wallet and tissues before I ran out the door to talk things through. A few hours later I arrived back at home to find that in my scramble to find what I needed, I had pulled out a booklet from an event that I went to last March. The event had fallen on the day that I made my absolutely decision about where I was going to go to college. I began looking through the booklet and found something that I had written just a few hours after my decision. I had intended to post what I wrote that night, but in the excitement of becoming a Gamecock, I left the pages unshared, so here tonight as I falter with doubt and worry, I'm going to finally post what I wrote that joyful afternoon.

"March 14, 2015

It is so very strange to me just how much has changed during this time. The difference between this morning and that morning three months ago is unreal. Three months ago if you had asked me where I was going to college, I would have told you "The Georgia Institute of Technology" not, "I hope that's where I get in" but "that is where I am going". And then, at 12:00 pm on January 10, 2015, everything changed. The news of being deferred was far more devastating than it ever should have been. But then I got to spend three months waiting on God. Have you heard the song that says "strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord"? I never really understood just how true that was until this. Spending time waiting on God forces you to listen to Him constantly, you feel like you have to be constantly connected to Him so that you don't miss His answer. And He keeps you waiting so that He can teach you things while He has your attention. Some of the things I learned through this time:
1. Those pseudo sins that you think aren't a big deal because it's all just in your head are still sin. There is no difference to God if you are having hateful thoughts about someone or actually physically harming them.
2. Listen. Just listen. It is so easy to just talk and talk and talk and talk, but if you are really looking to hear from God, you won't be able to hear when He wants to say something. So listen to Him when you're alone, listen to church leaders when you're with them, and listen to your parents when you're with them. God is trying to speak to you, so stop talking and listen.
3. Read your Bible. Good grief. Stop making excuses about being too tired and having too much to do. You don't have too much to do, you are wasting your time on insignificant things if they are getting in the way of your time in the Word. The difference in my perception of my day if I begin it in the Word versus if I don't, is astounding. Because, when you begin your day in scripture, you see each day as a new way to glorify Him, rather than a way to help yourself.
4. Oh how He loves us. He is obsessed with us. He created us exactly how He wants us to be. But the thing is, He also feels that way about the person that you hate. That person is just as much His creation as you are, and when you hurt them, you are hurting Him. "


This was written by a me that had just come out of the dark days of worry, and was beginning to see the light of God's promises. She had moved from "Lord I am holding onto Your promises, because I know that that is the only way I am going to get through this" to "Lord I am holding onto Your promises because I KNOW that You are faithful, because I've seen it". That girl is not me right now. Me right now is back in the darkness and back to my knees, but I'm still getting truth from the Lord, He is just using this nearly year old booklet to do it. What I thought I wanted out of Passion this year was for God to say "alright, I am with you now, and everything is going to be ok" instead He waited until after Passion when I was finally willing to admit that my way may not be the best way to say "look I am with you always, and you know that because I've told you before".
None of this changes the way that I feel, but the way that I feel doesn't change God.



Post Script (May 13, 2016): just a note about #1 in the things that I had learned from God while waiting to hear from Him, I didn't deal with that pseudo sin the way that I should have and it has lead to real tangible sin in my life and I wish that I could go back to me a year ago and tell her that even though she thinks that she is a good person and doesn't have to deal with temptation the way that other people do, she does, cause she and I are broken and I wish that I had acknowledged the fact that I am broken earlier, because I would have lead to less pain and less tough conversations now.