Heyyy, 2011!

With less than 3 hours left in 2010, I thought it would be appropriate to reflect a little bit on the past year. I can’t believe how much has changed and how much I’ve grown since this time last year. Although there have been a lot of ups & downs and I still have a long way to go, I’m choosing to celebrate what God has done in me so far. I’m happier, more confident, and more responsible. I have a better idea of what I want in a career, a husband, a family, and life in general. Most importantly, I’ve grown closer to God, and I have a better understanding of what being a Christian is all about: accepting God’s grace and living out of the overflow of His love, which He makes very apparent..

While driving back to Stillwater today, “Never Let Go” by David Crowder Band came on the radio. I started singing along, and out of nowhere, I started crying. The sunset was beautiful, and I felt like God made it just for me to enjoy on my drive. I felt totally in love with God, and it was one of those moments that I wish I could bottle up and experience every day. I hope to have more of those moments in 2011, and I pray that everyone will experience the type of joy that comes from being God’s child 🙂

On that note, here are my goals for 2011..

1. Grow in my relationship with God by making it a point to spend time with Him each day

2. Work on being honest with myself & God

3. Read through the whole Bible

4. Maintain a healthy lifestyle

5. Run a half-marathon

6. Smile & laugh more

7. Establish stronger friendships

8. Do a better job of prioritizing my time and activities     

9. Live on a budget

10. Complete 3 Bible studies

11. Write the first 3 chapters of my dissertation

12. Simplify; get rid of things that aren’t useful, beautiful, or cherished

13. Post a blog at least once/week 

14. Learn to crochet (Already did this over Christmas break.. soo I’m changing this goal to “Crochet a whole afghan” 🙂 )

God bless everyone, and happy 2011!!

Starry Night – Chris August

Conditional Love

Driving 9 hours home for Christmas break gives a person a lot of time to think. Probably too much. A couple days ago, I drove from Oklahoma back to Illinois. I spent some much-needed time with God, and I spent a lot of time just thinking about everything that has been going on in my life too. I left town feeling very overwhelmed with a lot of things (one of which was the apocolypse thanks to a show I watched on the History Channel.. can we say “anxiety issues”?) I had just graduated with my Masters degree, turned 24, and was going home to see my family for Christmas. Shouldn’t I have been in a great mood? Probably so, but I just wasn’t. My mind wandered to a blog by my friend Cari that I had been reading all week. She had written a series on love. I’ve also been reading Love is Now by Peter Gillquist and this past week’s theme for my Bible study was “God’s Unfailing Love.” Ironically, I’ve been surrounded by love but not really feeling it. While I was thinking about some of the things that Cari mentioned as well as different situations going on in my life right now, I came to a HUGE realization..

In my past, love has almost always been conditional.

I felt like I had found a missing puzzle piece. I’ve been taught by those around me that love is not unconditional. It has depended on what I did or didn’t do. With certain people in my family it depended on behaving the way they wanted me to, making sure I wasn’t an annoyance, whether or not I made them proud, or if I took part in activities they preferred. With my friends in high school and now college, love seems to have depended on if I was funny or in a good mood or if I did things to fit in like partying or going to the bars. With guys I’ve been in relationships with, love seemed to depend on what I looked like, whether or not we had sex, if I was happy & secure, if I didn’t ask questions, or if I didn’t talk to certain people. And still sometimes, there was no rhyme or reason or clear pattern of what love was contingent on; I just had to figure out how not to screw up or how to keep people happy so they wouldn’t stop loving me. Regardless of all the effort I put forth, all the begging and pleading with various people, and all the stress & heartache that was caused, people always ended up leaving. People always walked away. People always found someone or something better.  Experience has taught me that I’m disposable. I can be replaced. And the hardest part of all of this is that I’M the common denominator in all of it.. which means there must be something that I’m doing wrong. Obviously this is something I’m going to have to work through with God.

I am thankful though because I’m more aware of why I do some of the things I do–like push people away or refuse to get too close or let anyone in too much. I’m also thankful because I’m finally learning what true love really is.. God. God is love. God loved me before time & creation. God loved me when I didn’t believe in Him. He loved me when I was living my life according to the world. He loved me when I didn’t love Him. 

I’m also learning what true friendship is thanks to a few girls that I’m slowly forming bonds with. These are girls who have my best interests at heart. They love me because I’m me, not because I’m me + something else. Someone else said something to me earlier this week that has really stuck with me and made me realize that it is possible for someone (other than my mom) to love me unconditionally.. “I will love you & praise God for you at your worst, and I will love you & praise God for you at your best.” These words absolutely took my breath away, and I am so thankful for this person on a daily basis.

Although it’s been hard to realize that I’ve been believing something so wrong for practically my whole life, I’m praising God for bringing me one step closer to complete healing. I still have a long way to go, but I have more hope now than I did earlier this week. I’m also still learning to trust Him with situations, however difficult that may be. (In fact, I was thinking & worrying about a particular situation and then received my weekly Bible verse text message.. Psalm 32:8 – I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go, I will counsel you and watch over you. Maybe God doesn’t really speak to us via text message, but I like to think He does 🙂 ) Thank God for living & learning!

“Dark days are stepping stones on the path of light.”

Held – Natalie Grant

Unfailing Love

I’m currently working through a really great Bible study.. Breaking Free by Beth Moore. This week’s them is “God’s Unfailing Love.” It’s weird because I wasn’t able to do the Bible study for a couple of weeks, and the timing for this week worked out perfectly. (Side note: Why is it that whenever something that seems to be a God thing happens, Christians tend to describe it as being “weird” as if it happened by chance? Hmm.. maybe it’s just me. Anyway..)  Today’s lesson started out with Beth talking about parenthood and how she didn’t realize she had such a capacity to love until her daughters were born. Then, she mentioned that a child psychologist once explained the tension or conflict that happens when children are teenagers as being necessary in order for parents to let their children go when it’s time; “If the bond we had with them as infants did not change, we would never be able to let them go.”  Then she moved on to the connection to God.. “All our lives God retains the strong feelings toward us that infants evoke in their parents.” Since I don’t have children, I can’t totally comprehend this, but I would imagine it’s a pretty amazing feeling–one that I hope to experience someday. However, I have experienced the love that my mom has for me and I have to say that I can’t imagine anyone else loving me more than she does. So to know that God loves all of us infinitely more than my mom can even comprehend loving me really blows my mind.

The study continued with some exercises that included the following verses:

“For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” – Romans 8:38-39

“What a man desires is unfailing love.” – Proverbs 19:22

After talking about Proverbs 19:22, we had to write down our view of “unfailing love.” Instantly, I thought of the love a husband should have for his wife.. unconditional, strong, real, true, persistent, giving, protective, understanding, supportive, passionate, eager.. forever..

Then came 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, which sounded very similar to the list I wrote out.. “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”

Then Beth wrote, “Paul described agape love as a supernatural love that only God fully possesses and only God can give…The only way we can love with agape love is to pour everything else from our hearts and ask God to make them pitchers of His agape. Before we can even begin to give God-love away, we’ve got to fully accept it. God loves you with perfect love.”

I instantly thought, “This is my problem.” I don’t know how to accept love, especially from men, because I’ve been hurt so much and so deeply. I’m scared to really let anyone in. Even God.

Then, we read 1 John 4:18.. “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.”

When I flipped to that verse, I already had it outlined so I had obviously read that verse in the past. But it has never hit me so hard as it did today. “There is no fear in perfect love.” I came to a huge realization.. if God has marriage in my future, I won’t be scared when I meet the right person. That is huge for me.

But before, I can be ready to love another person and let them in, I have to let God in. Lately, I’ve been praying, not intentionally and not in the same words, Psalm 51:6.. “Surely you desire truth in the inner parts; you teach me wisdom in the inmost place.”

I want to let God go to the deepest parts of my heart where I don’t let anyone go because I’m too scared. I really need to start asking God for more help with this because, as Beth described it, “if we don’t allow God’s truth to take up full residence in our hearts, we may learn just enough to move out of one prison into another.” I can really relate to this, and I’m guessing anyone who’s reading this has been through this at one time or another. Instead of really opening up and letting God take control, you keep moving from one thing to another, trying to find peace and contentment.

There was a question written on the page that I was not expecting.. “Have you ever feared that someone would cease loving you?” I felt something shift inside of me, and my heart & mind let out a resounding, “YES!” Then I read Beth’s reflection on it and could completely relate.. “Not only have I feared it, I’ve experienced it! God has carefully and graciously allowed some of my fears to come true so that I would discover that I would not disintegrate. I’ve experience a few things I was sure would destroy me. But guess what? They didn’t. Not because I’m so strong, but because God taught me to survive on His unfailing love. It wasn’t fun, but it was transforming.”

I think we all lose perspective sometimes, especially in the thick of a difficult circumstance. Everything that happens to us has to go through God’s hands first. He won’t give us any hurt, pain, or heartache that we can’t handle with His help. That’s an especially hard thing for me to understand & remember along with the fact that God loves us unconditionally. “God’s works change, but His love stays simple, steady, and strong.” I feel like I’m meant to love someone as I have in the past.. with my whole heart. But more than that, I feel like I’m meant to love someone with absolute, fearless abandon; I know that “Someone” is God, but whether there’s another “someone,” I don’t know. I just know I’m meant to love and love better & stronger than I ever have.