whew.

so much to think about after home fellowship every week, for sure. a few highlights and things that we continued to talk about in the car on the way home...

• brad mentioned tonight how different it is to live in america, and i started thinking about how much that has effected the way i view God, Christianity, heaven, the purpose of life, etc. sadly, i realized in the car that i don't have a huge desire for heaven...i don't think about it very often b/c, to be honest, i really don't have it bad here. i started talking about it in the car and nick mentioned the fact that so many times, we think about heaven as more of a "materialistic" thing. as immature as this sounds, it was like a light when off in my head that i haven't really thought about often, if even at all. when i think of heaven, i try to imagine the "streets of gold" and all the "beauty" that we will find, but that doesn't really appeal to me because i'm quite satisfied with the things i see on this earth. when i do this, i am ignorantly forgetting that when i get to heaven, i will have a full and complete knowledge of God -- and this is what i crave each and every day in my life and in my prayers. i can't even fathom how wonderfully satisfying and awesome it will be to understand everything i've struggled with or blindly had faith in for so long. not to mention the fact that i will be completely physically healed; this in itself is absolutely enough for me to long for because i have no concept of that feeling. i have always believed that i am luckier having never felt "normal" when it comes to my physical state, but when i think about heaven, i definitely consider myself luckier to feel complete healing from this earthly, broken body. the thought actually makes me want to weep.
• brad also talked about how in other countries, people are "fatalistic," meaning that they wake up everyday with the expectation that things are going to be bad or even that they may die from the various things they deal with or encounter on a daily basis, whereas in america we are the opposite. we wake up everyday with the expectation that things BETTER go our way, or we are completely thrown off with nothing but pity for ourselves. this is exactly what i deal with on a daily basis, and the part of me that i am so trapped inside and loathe at the same time. what an interesting country we live in; a blessing a curse, as so many things are in life (the curse being our own fault, of course).
• justine also brought up how we are to figure out what to do with our lives, and we discussed that on the way home. we talked about something donnie said a few weeks ago, when he said that the job we use as a source of income on earth is really just a means to do what we are really here for on earth. this is really important to me where i am in life right now, b/c i have a hard time justifying doing anything outside "the ministry" b/c of how unimportant i tend to think everything else is...but at the same time, i don't feel a calling to be in "the ministry," or what people generally think of that as. interesting stuff.

actually, i think that's enough for tonight. my little human brain can't take much more at this point.

down to earth

Jesus was a human being just like me. i have to keep telling myself that.

actually, a LOT worse happened to Him than has or probably will ever happen to me. and most importantly, He knows how i feel. i tend to forget that and believe it impossible in my times of self pity and in bitter sadness and upset. but He certainly knows how i feel when i cry out to Him and that is so comforting. He will take care of me.

i was reminded during my trip to ohio that God has already promised us so many things in our lives. He also has a purpose for us and regardless of ourselves, as long as we genuinely desire it, He will do what He wants with us. i had a really remarkable talk/prayer with a student/friend of mine in ohio who God used to literally speak to me through. it was absolutely amazing, something i don't think i've ever quite experienced in my life and something that i hope to experience repeatedly.

it was so comforting...i have been praying for months saying "i feel like i never know what You want me to do...i can guess, i can try, i can pray all i want, but i know i'll never get an email or a phone call from You telling me what to do about all these things that i an anxious and unsure about. i can't see you or hear you or even sometimes feel You and i wish things were more clear b/c i'm more scared of ME screwing things up than You." so God used someone else to talk straight to me. prayer is good.

He told me to keep doing what i'm doing and spoke directly to me about specific things i had been praying about. even though some of these things weren't exactly what i would have liked to hear, i felt completely at peace b/c i knew it was God speaking to me.

i won't really detail anymore here, but if you're interested in hearing about it, i would love to share. it's just too much to write on here, too hard to explain. but i did want to share the point, and that is prayer. there is nothing else we can really do to save ourselves from ourselves.
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i have also realized that i would probably recognize and understand what God wants for my life more easily if i actually knew God better. it's just like your friends and family: i know exactly how my best friends and family members would react in any situation, how they would reason it out and what they would tell me to do. if i knew God half as well as i know my best friends, i would really probably do better at making decisions about my own life and reaching out to other people in their lives. how do we do that? pray, read the Bible...

[side tangent: why in the world do i have such a problem finding time to read the Bible when it's basically an instruction book for my life?!?! i
certainly have time to listen to music and go out to dinner and work out when i want to]

...meditate on the Word, and on God Himself and simply talk to Him and let Him speak to you.
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i also think i've finally realized how God speaks to me. i've always been jealous of people who said "God spoke to me...blah, blah" b/c i was always thinking "HOW does He speak to you?!?!" God speaks to me when i meditate...meaning, when i actually turn off the music in my car or lay in bed at night and talk to God and sit and let Him put thoughts in my head instead of filling them up with my own. God "speaks" to me when i get ideas...things that i know i didn't come up with on my own or things that i say to people that i never even thought of until they came out of my mouth. it's refreshing to say "i didn't think of that at all" b/c i know God has spoken to me and through me.

just like He did through my student, who i am so thankful for. :)