Jesus loves me, this I know

I'm learning so much.

God is so big, so good.




I hope to find words to explain just what He is showing me . . . not tonight (I can barely keep my eyes open), but soon.



I'm praying for you.
Liz

Send me

I've been writing a ridiculous amount lately. From reading the entries over a week's time, or even over a day's, one would think I suffer from schizophrenia . . .

And it's true, I do.


No I'm just kidding. It does seem like I tend to turn to writing at the highest highs and lowest lows of meditation and emotion, though. I'm not sure what that says about me. I think it might be one of the things God could be revealing to me in the next week or so.


I say the next week or so for two reasons:

1. I received Velvet Elvis for my birthday from Alan. That was two days ago and I've already read half of it. It's full of new perspectives . . . so full I know I'm going to have to read it at least once more, probably a good number of times more, and much more slowly, to evaluate and absorb them all. I hope this week will be full of those new perspectives and what they mean for my life.

2. This Friday morning the FBC Student Ministry leaves for our Winter Retreat, my very last one, at Shepherd of the Ozarks. I'm already smiling with anticipation of our group of students seeing God in that place . . . and of what He might reveal to me if I could be so blessed.

3. And finally, I'm beginning this week with a lot of change to adapt to . . . to take on . . . to grow from . . . to rejoice in. I feel so aware of the freedom of following Jesus today, and of the freedom of this time in my life. I am eighteen years old. I look before me and I see the world. I used to be afraid of what my life might bring, what God's place for me in it all might be. Now, today, this moment, my worries seem so small compared to how big His plan is.



Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, "Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?" And I said, "Here am I. Send me!"
-Isaiah 6:8

2/18

The world would tell me that rejoicing over the end of a relationship must mean that I had readily forseen that end.

The world would say that rejoicing over the end of a relationship that made me happy makes no sense at all.

And the world couldn't be more wrong.

I know that God has a fantastic plan instore for my life and for his, my best friend. The next few weeks will probably be a lot harder than I want to realize. I may not always understand and I may not always know why or how or when, but I cannot wait to see what God is going to do through his obedience and mine.

My Abba is so amazing . . . that I can rejoice when everything is telling me that I shouldn't. That I can trust in His faithfulness and His love and His perfect plan for me. That I can ask questions without losing hope and without growing weary, always with joy in who He is and what He has done for me.



Delight yourself first in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart.
-Psalm 37:4

Haunted

Today I've felt haunted by what I want so desperately to forget. Sin is more damaging than I could ever understand. If I am mourning so much the consiquences I can see, I can only imagine how God must be mourning all the consiquences I can't.

I know I am forgiven. I know I am daily being transformed by the renewing of my mind as I submit myself moment by moment to His hand.

That doesn't make my mistakes any less real or their results any less disappointing, any less devestating.

Yes, my Jesus has washed that sin away . . . But I can't take back what I've forfeited. I can't give back what I've stolen. I can't regain that part of myself, that part of God's amazing gift of a pure life that I've lost.

Today is my Birthday.

Today is my Birthday. I am turning eighteen . . .

I know, I know. It's hard to believe.

Nobody said it was easy

I don't think you have the slightest idea how many days you've left ruined

How many schedules I've rearranged
How much I've sacrificed
How much time I've invested

How many times you've let me down

I don't think you have the slightest idea how many nights I've cried myself to sleep
How many hours I've slept through to avoid facing circumstances you've created

I don't think you have the slightest idea how badly you have the ability to make me feel
How worthless
How stupid
How small

Not even the slightest idea how many moments I've wondered
How much better so many of my days might have been
If you'd never been a part of my life
How much pain I wish I could erase from my memory and you with it

How many times I've had to forget how much I think you're lying
How many excuses I've accepted at face value
Knowing how little weight they would hold if it was someone else that needed you

How many wounds I've forgiven without ever being asked

And I don't think you have the smallest idea of how much I still care for you
How much I want to believe how happy you always make me and how wonderful you always are
How much it hurts to admit anything less

I'm not angry with the situations
I'm torn by how you handle them
How you don't handle them




If I shut myself off from the world tomorrow
Know that it's because I'd rather spend the day alone
Than spend it miserable again

Wondering if you'll care enough to make five minutes to call me
And tell me happy birthday.

Wow.

When a million things are going on
When a million things are going wrong

When I have no one else in the world to confide in
No other shoulder to cry on

How big is He?
How faithful. How good.


How blessed am I
To have nothing else
To need nothing else

To want nothing else


I have an Abba who loves me.





Who LOVES me




I can't comprehend it.

Today

This is a photograph of my dad teaching me how to fish. I couldn't have been more than a few years old. It's strange to think of how much life I've lived in a little under eighteen years, and stranger still to think of how much more life I may have yet to live.

Today I am learning that becoming a Godly woman means not only growing to be Christ-like, but also growing to fulfill the specific roles of a Christ-like woman.

As of Sunday, I will be legally able to vote, along with many other things I'm unconcerned with and even more things I'm unaware of, I'm sure. I will turn eighteen. I will be recognized under law as an adult.

There is a myriad of events and experiences our society uses to define the difference between a girl and a woman. For me, my eighteenth birthday has always seemed the most fitting occurrence to signify the change.

I hardly expect to wake up Sunday morning enlightened with the wisdom, gentleness, humility, and encouraging spirit that I have come to admire in the Christian women in my life. I don't expect to wake up suddenly transformed and prepared to walk into this next stage of my life. As the day approaches I can, however, feel God's hand on my heart, awakening me more fully to my call not just as an adolescent, but as a woman, with a specific role as one in love with Jesus Christ.

The next year of my life is going to bring the most change I have experienced in my life thus far. Looking that change full in the face is more than intimidating, but I'm so thankful tonight that every day and every night I can rest on the promise that God is faithful. Psalm 75:3 has has been of special assurance for me over the past few weeks . . .

When the earth and all its people quake, it is I who hold its pillars firm.

I sometimes feel that I'm writing only for myself to read, and while I'm perfectly okay with that, I also feel a little out of place addressing only myself in such an open forum. So, for anyone who may stumble into reading this, I hope your week is full of joy and full of purpose. I'm praying for you today.

Liz

Dreaming of you . . .

I often dream so intensely that I wake up overwhelmed by the emotions of sleep--because that's what my dreams are: pure emotions manifest, void of reason.

So angered that I don't want to speak to someone for days
So ecstatic that I can't relax my smile-muscles until they start to ache
So melancholy that I cry myself back to sleep

So convinced that no matter how I imaginary I know the dream to be, no matter how many times I repudiate the events, I still can't shake the feeling.

It's a scary thing. So much so that some nights I'm fearful to fall asleep, knowing what's been on my mind that day, however irrationally or even facetiously, and knowing that those are the things that I'm prone to wake up consumed with.

I never thought sharing these dreams to be a good idea, because they're almost always unfair to others' character and harmful to relationships if taken as true to my mindset.

I don't want to have to learn for certain from experience that truth.

Ten minutes from downtown is ten minutes too far

There are so many questions I want to ask you
So many things I want to learn about you
So many experiences I want to share with you

And never enough time

So we treasure what we've got
But what we've got is wearing thin
And though I'm willing to wait to build it strong again
It's an effort of will, a choice richly bought

With fear, it seems, all mine

There are so many words I'd like to swallow
So many intuitions I wish I'd followed
So many "seems" gilded or hollow

And this is how I know:
This isn't what I imagined
It still isn't
This is exactly what I expected
It still isn't

Upon a star

Some days, I wish I wasn't so meticulous.

I wish I could effortlessly brush off all of the small, meaningless gestures as small and meaningless.

I wish I could say what I mean in a sentence, rather than a monologue.

I wish I could smile at the blue sky, satisfied at its depth and color alone, and without the smallest impulse or need to know why or how or when it found such a brilliant blue hue.

Some days I wish I wasn't such a prisoner to reason.