James 4:6

So.. you know when you reach that point where you haven’t been spending enough time with God and you just break? When you have this nagging feeling that you just need to stop being so bull-headed, stop getting in God’s way, stop being so distracted, and just shut up & listen? Well, I got to that point today. I love when God nags me.. not really while He’s in the process of nagging me, but after I give in, it’s a good thing. I’ve been struggling a LOT with anxiety lately.. not so much the past week, but it was really bad the week before that. When I’m in that state, it’s SO hard to get myself back to a stable place where I’m not freaking out, worrying, being agitated about something (or everything), or feeling like the universe is caving in on me. During my little chit chat with God today, I decided to give up and give it all to Him. I mean, He knows what’s going to happen anyway, so why would I try to trust myself to figure something out when he already has all the info? He’s got this covered. Duh.

I’m currently reading C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity. While reading this book, God smacked me upside the head and made me realize something… I have a problem with pride. Really? I didn’t even know I struggled with pride until I read the chapter about it in this book, but it’s so clear now. I think part of my anxiety problem is from being so concerned about myself  and my future all the time. Here’s an excerpt from the chapter:

“I do not think I have ever heard anyone who was not a Christian accuse himself of this vice. And at the same time I have very seldom met anyone, who was not a Christian, who showed the slightest mercy to it in others. There is no fault which makes a man more unpopular, and no fault which we are more unconscious of in ourselves. And the more we have it ourselves, the more we dislike it in others… According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind.

Does this seem to you exaggerated? If so, think it over. I pointed out a moment ago that the more pride one had, the more one disliked pride in others. In fact, if you want to find out how proud you are the easiest  way is to ask yourself, ‘How much do I dislike it when other people snub me, or refuse to take any notice of me, or shove their oar in, or patronize me, or show off?’ The point is that each person’s pride is in competition with everyone else’s pride. It is because I wanted to be the big noise at the party that I am so annoyed at someone else being the big noise… Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man. We say that people are proud of being rich, or clever, or good-looking, but they are not. They are proud of being richer, or cleverer, or better-looking than others. If everyone else became equally rich, or clever, or good-looking there would be nothing to be proud about. It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest.”

Wow. That really got me thinking about how prideful I am about certain things and about what kinds of things people are usually prideful about. Are we responsible for how attractive, smart, talented, rich, athletic, etc. we are? Umm, NO. That would be GOD who made us that way, who gave us those talents, who blessed us in those ways, who bestowed upon us His GRACE PLUS SOME. So why do we feel all high & mighty when we see someone who isn’t at the same level we’re at in regards to one of these areas? What’s crazy is that some people reach this point in regards to their salvation and being a Christian! “Well, I’M saved.. but SHE really needs to change some things.” I doubt these words rarely come out of people’s mouths, but I’m certain they cross people’s minds in some variation or another. It doesn’t make any sense whatsoever; whatever we possess, whether it be tangible or not, comes from God. But people don’t think of it that way. For some reason, whatever it is about ourselves that we value, instead of thanking God for it and making it a non-issue or using for His glory, we get all snooty and act like we’re responsible for it. Some people may say things like, “But I am responsible for my wealth.. I worked hard to earn my money!” or “I have big muscles, and I can bench press 2,394 pounds because I put the work in!” or “I get good grades because I’m smarter than most people.” (usually said in a pretentious tone as if they made themselves smart) Seriously? Who gave you the ability to work? Who gave your body all the intricacies necessary for building muscle and strength? Who blessed you with above-average intelligence? And if you have this money or this physical strength or intellect (or whatever else), what are you using it for? Sponsoring a child or donating to a service organization? Building houses for the homeless or helping with projects? Teaching children or developing a treatment for an illness? Helping anyone at all for the glory of God? Or just using it to glorify yourself and follow your own agenda?

According to Lewis, “The real test of being in the presence of God is, that you either forget about yourself altogether or see yourself as a small, dirty object. It is better to forget about yourself altogether.” I would have to agree with him to some extent; however, self-loathing is still self-worship, so even if you are always thinking poorly of yourself, you are still focused on yourself rather than on loving God and loving other people. So basically, we’re all somewhere on our own continuums of how we feel about ourselves when we shouldn’t even being on our own continuum at all; we should be on someone else’s continuum building them up, making them feel worthy, and letting them see more of God than of ourselves. Don’t get me wrong.. I don’t think we should just neglect ourselves. We are, after all, products of God’s creation, and I’m pretty sure He doesn’t call us to stupidity. We still need to take care of ourselves and our families—physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually—but only to the point of necessity and by leaning on Him; for it is by our physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual strength that we are able to help and love others.

I think that’s enough for now. It just drives me crazy when people (myself included) take credit for something they had nothing to do with, especially when the One who actually deserves the credit rarely receives it in comparison to how often we pat ourselves on the back. So much to pray about..

Blue Like Jazz

The last few weeks have been interesting, to say the least. I was having a really difficult time with my faith, or a “crisis of belief,” if you will. (Hence, the post on Feb. 10th). I felt very disconnected from God; I couldn’t “feel it” anymore. I felt guilty, somewhat lost, and extremely discontent. When I prayed, I felt like I was talking to myself, like God was maybe screening my prayers or something. I was still going to Sunday school, church, Bible study, and a theology class, so why didn’t I still feel it?! Isn’t that how it was supposed to work? I couldn’t bring myself to pray very often or read my Bible on my own. It was a very weird feeling, and I’m still not completely sure how to describe it. One night, I picked up Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller. I had never read it before, but I had heard really good things about it. Not wanting to work on anything for school, I began reading Miller’s book. While reading it over the last couple of weeks, I’ve come across numerous passages that seem to be speaking directly to me. Reading this book did amazing things for my sense of spiritual security and seemed to restore my faith and ease the anxieties that I had been experiencing. Here are some of the passages that really stood out:

“I don’t think you can explain how Christian faith works. It is a mystery. And I love this about Christian spirituality. It cannot be explained, and yet it is beautiful and true. It is something you feel, and it comes from the soul.”

“I am too prideful to accept the grace of God. It isn’t that I want to earn my own way to give something to God, it’s that I want to earn my own way so I won’t be charity… Who am I to think myself above God’s charity? And why would I forsake the riches of God’s righteousness for the dung of my own ego?”

“Every Christian knows they will deal with doubt. And they will. But when it comes it seems so very real and frightening, as if your entire universe is going to fall apart.”

“Don’t complain about the way God answers your prayers. You are still living on an earth that is run by the devil. God has promised us a new land, and we will get there. Your problem is not that God is not fulfilling, your problem is that you are spoiled.”

“God is not here to worship me, to mold Himself into something that will help me fulfill my level of comfort. I think part of my problem is that I want spirituality to be more close and more real.”

“I suppose what I wanted back then is what every Christian wants, whether they understand themselves or not. What I wanted was God. I wanted tangible interaction. But even more than that, to be honest, I wanted to know who I was.”

“God is up there somewhere. Of course, I had always know He was, but this time I felt it, I realized it, the way a person realizes they are hungry or thirsty. The knowledge of God seeped out of my brain and into my heart. I imagined Him looking down on this earth, half angry because His beloved mankind had cheated on Him, had committed adultery, and yet hopelessly in love with her, drunk with love for her.”

“I am a human because God made me. I experience suffering and temptation because mankind chose to follow Satan. God is reaching out to me to rescue me. I am learning to trust Him, learning to live by His precepts that I might be preserved.”

“Believing in God is as much like falling in love as it is like making a decision. Love is both something that happens to you and something you decide upon.”

“People hardly care what you believe, as long as you believe something. If you are passionate about something, people will follow you because they think you know something they don’t, some clue to the meaning of the universe.”

“What I believe is not what I say I believe; what I believe is what I do.”

“Marriage is amazing because it is the closest two people can get, but they can’t get all the way to that place of absolute knowing.”

“I no longer think being in love is the polar opposite of being alone, however. I say this because I used to want to be in love again as I assumed this was the opposite of loneliness. I think being in love is an opposite of loneliness, but not the opposite. There are other things I now crave when I am lonely, like community, like friendship, like family. I think our society puts too much pressure on romantic love, and that is why so many romances fail. Romance can’t possibly carry all that we want it to.”

“The most difficult lie I have ever contended with is this: Life is a story about me.”

“There is no addiction so powerful as self-addiction.”

“If we are not willing to wake up in the morning and die to ourselves, perhaps we should ask ourselves whether or not we are really following Jesus.”

“We don’t need as much money as we have. Hardly any of us need as much money as we have. It’s true what they say about the best things in life being free.”

“When we worship God we worship a Being our life experience does not give us the tools with which to understand. If we could, God would not inspire awe.”

“The little we do understand, that grain of sand our minds are capable of grasping, those ideas such as God is good, God feels, God loves, God knows all, are enough to keep our hearts dwelling on His majesty and otherness forever.”

“We are too proud to feel awe and too fearful to feel terror. We reduce Him to math so we don’t have to fear Him, and yet the Bible tells us fear is the appropriate response, that it is the beginning of wisdom.”

“Too much of our time is spent trying to chart God on a grid, and too little is spent allowing our hearts to feel awe. By reducing Christian spirituality to formula, we deprive our hearts of wonder.”

“I need something mysterious to happen after I die. I need to be somewhere else after I die, somewhere with God, somewhere that wouldn’t make any sense if it were explained to me right now.”

“It is always the simple things that change our lives. And these things never happen when you are looking for them to happen. Life will reveal answers at the pace life wishes to do so. You feel like running, but life is on a stroll. This is how God does things.”

“I used to love like money. The church used love like money. With love, we withheld affirmation from the people who did not agree with us, but we lavishly financed the ones who did.”

“I hoped that love would work like a magnet, pulling people from the mire and toward healing. I knew this was the way God loved me. God had never withheld love to teach me a lesson.”

“Nobody will listen to you unless they sense that you like them.”

“I loved the fact that it wasn’t my responsibility to change somebody, that it was God’s, that my part was just to communicate love and approval.”

“We have the power to bring a little of heaven into the lives of others every day.”

“Your value has come from God. And God wants you to receive His love and to love yourself too.”

“God’s love will never change us if we don’t accept it.”