Positivity, Positivity, Positivity!

So, my friend called me out today. I complained about something.... that a lot of people would just be grateful to have.

I told her that she was absolutely right. I can't call myself a Christian and be ungrateful about the wonderful things God has given me. I also believe that living in America is just another strike against me as far as complaining goes.

I'll be honest... I know I do it more then I even realize, but it's not something I'm proud of. It's a habit that I need and want to break.

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

and Philippians 2:14-15 says- Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation...

That verse in Philippians gets me- don't complain, because if you do, you can be called out in your faults. This verse just makes a lot of sense to me.

I don't want to be a negative nancy, I want to be a positive petunia!

Negative Nancy's, they find a fault in everything, they find something to gripe about in everything, they don't know how to be happy. Negative Nancy's are miserable people that push people away, purposely or not.

Positive Petunia's, they find the silver lining to every cloud, they will not let some rude comment destruct them, they will spin it into something positive, because they know anything negative is just a lie. Positive Petunia's are happy people, that people like to be around, because their positivity lifts their spirits.

So, basically me and my friend made a pact, to call each other out whenever the other is complaining. We will not become Negative Nancys. No way.

Positivity! Positivity! Positivity! That is our theme.

Perfect

God- Remind me, that I cannot be perfect. Remind me that it's alright for me not to be.

I can emulate you as best I can in this life... but I cannot become You.

Ephesians 4:22-24

You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; to be made new in the attitude of your minds; and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

Whenever I'm not perfect at something, and whenever I royally screw-up and royally need a kick in the butt. I rip myself up about it. Honestly... I can't let it go until it's fixed either.

And... honestly, I need to remind myself... that it's okay. It's okay to mess up, it's okay to disappoint people. Because it's going to happen, wether I want to or not. I can't make everyone happy- I can try- but I have to be happy myself. As much as I try to put others before myself... I know that in the long run, I can't serve God properly until my needs are met too.

Beautiful Mountains

Last summer I spent over a month in Honduras. Which is a beautiful country, along with the countries surrounding it. It's very mountainous and green, I remember during one of the van rides, we were driving right in between all of them, you could even see banana plantations on the hillsides of some. But, I was so taken away with the beauty of it, and I just thought why didn't God make those the focal of His creation. I was honored that God would choose me, us... because we all know how imperfect we all are. I just thought that those mountains would know better, and they were more worthy.

Until tonight, I think I understood a little bit more why God choose us versus the mountains. Of course... there's a ton of reasons, but humor me and let's just focus on this one thing.

I took this from a devotional e-mail I subscribe to:: "God also gains pleasure in watching you enjoy his creation. He gave you eyes to enjoy beauty, ears to enjoy sounds and music, your nose and taste buds to enjoy smells and tastes, and the nerves under your skin to enjoy touch. Every act of enjoyment becomes an act of worship when you thank God for it. In fact, the Bible says, "God generously gives us everything for our enjoyment" (1 Timothy 6:17 TEV)."

God enjoys watching us enjoy His creation! That's why God chose us. How enjoyable would it be for the mountains for people to walk all over them? To slap pavement on their backs? And... even though our faith can move mountains.... those mountains aren't going anywhere, those mountains will never be able to enjoy what the rest of God offers us.

So, maybe it's slightly foolish of me to be focusing so much on this. But, it makes me smile. I love those mountains, they are gorgeous... and even still it takes my breath away to think that God would rather choose us, with all our imperfections.

Unsent

So, I recently wrote a letter... that I’m not going to send. It was for me to write and for me to let go of a lot of things I had been holding on to this semester.

I’m usually not one to write unsent letters... but when I was writing this one, I really thought I was going to, but I’ve been doing just fine keeping it to myself. There are questions in it that I asked, but I don’t need the answers.

All I needed was peace.

That is all I needed, all along... peace; and I was so against it this whole time.

Why, oh why can’t I just learn to trust God.

I love how the end of a semester makes you re-evaluate... life.

I’m not proud of my semester... there was a lot I could have done better. But, I think considering the circumstances, I did well. My relationship with God suffered, but we’re getting back on track and that’s what is important.

Even through all the lows I had... God still used me, which amazes me- Never doubt what God can do with your life.

And even through my distance in my relationship with God, I still learned a lot about my beliefs, and faith and God in my classes, which I really enjoyed.

I think though that the lessons that sums it up is that God knows what He’s doing, even when we don’t. Which is cool, because I know that that’s what God taught my friends at Greenville too; which is awesome, because through our community even with distance... we can still learn from each other and grow together! Those are one good friends and two a good community.

-the picture is not a letter, but a Christmas card I just received this week, to be honest- I enjoy Christmas cards in May... especially from my best friend =] but I felt like it fit with being unsent letters, because we both assumed it was lost in the mail, forever... nope just in my house!

Water

Tonight I went to a small group at school. Partly because it's a requirement for me to go in one of my classes and the semester is drawing near and I still have 3 more to attend.

The leaders of the group asked this question:

If you were to relate your relationship with God to a body of water, what would it be and why.

They also went a little more in depth; the one girl said that she was asked this same question a year ago, and it really put her relationship with God in perspective.

She said "Before you answer with an ocean- because your relationship is just soo deep, know that one person had said it was a tear, because of all the hurt in her life."

Other examples of tonight were a stream, a glacier, a waterfall, a lake, the splash mountain disney world ride.

I thought about it... and my first thought was a lake, but it really wasn't a lake.

As a little girl, I would always, always have a glass of water on my bedstand, just in case I got thirsty in the night. My relationship with God is that same glass of water- always there for me to take apart of- but I've been only taking apart of that water when either I want to or I need to.

Lately, I've been drinking that glass of water every night; and honestly, I'm afraid of slipping up again. But... let's face it- I will slip up again, and that glass of water is just gonna sit there and collect dust. But right now, I shouldn't worry about slipping up, I should being nurturing my body with that glass of water.

Well... I sure like to play with analogies!

I encourage anyone to answer that question for yourself, and I would love to hear your answers as well, if you're willing to share- I think you can leave comments, wether or not you have an account. Shalom.

Pray and Praise

Yikes.

Next semester is my third year of college. Not really a Junior just yet... Technically, I should be though. So, technically, I should know my major at this point in my life.

I don’t.

I don’t have one single clue. I went to Greenville for music. I thought about youth ministry, psychology and social work. I was going to major in social work. I was going to double major in social work and international/cross cultural studies.

Wow. I just feel like I’m all over the place, honestly.

But I’ve decided that I need to figure this out and declare it by the end of the month. I really need to have something set in stone in my life, because everything is not.

Knowing my major seems like a really good place to start too.

What I’m thinking about is cross cultural with a concentration and also a minor in business.

Social work seems like it would be better though as far as obtaining a job in America. And I also have a couple of those credits out of the way...

Oh, so complicated!

So, just pray for me that I make the wisest decision and just follow God’s plan for my life. It’s true, I’m a little behind but it will all be worth it in the end.

Praise!- One of the persons that I met over the summer from Honduras was kidnapped.

He was missing for several days, unfortunately I had just found out about it yesterday. Today, I heard that he was released by his captors and I’m assuming unharmed. I don’t know much else about it; but just thank God that he’s now with his family and friends!

He was a very nice guy, he set up a few concerts for us while we were down there, but we didn’t have much contact with him... else, I would write a lot more about him!

Clean Slates

Every time I mess up, I want a clean slate.

In fact, I expect a clean slate... but I only get that clean slate with God’s grace and I have no right to expect God’s grace, He gives that freely, but I don’t really think it’s something we should treat as "free for the taking."

I messed up, I believe everything happens for a reason. So, I know the mess-ups happened to bring me where I am: flat on my face, humiliated, and searching. Although, I don’t think the search will be quite complete unless I get up from being on my face... so I plan on standing up.

I misused this blog these past couple months. Not all of my posts have held the mission I wanted to inflect. My posts were suppose to be about bringing glory to God and giving Him the credit for what goes on in my life. I know that my life is not my own. It belongs to Him, and I want to honor Him in my thoughts, words and actions.

But I haven’t been doing that; yeah... it’s harder to do when you’re falling apart and when you’re angry with God. But we’re suppose to praise God even through our sufferings. This is my challenge and that is what God has been teaching me lately.

Now listen, I’m not an open book... I don’t share every detail with every person, regardless of what you may think. So, you can take what I have written here as the full story, but it’s not, it’s what I want you to hear. You as in the person that I don’t exactly know who is reading. It’s not that what I write isn’t true, it’s just deep enough to be honest but not deep enough that you can penetrate my heart to the level of people whom I sincerely trust.

So, as much as I desire to delete all the ugly posts I have written in the past couple months.. I won’t. I can’t erase the past, but I can learn from it. If you want to hold my past and mistakes against me, then that is your will. Thankfully, God will always forgive me and thankfully I know I have friends that will always forgive me as well. I’m a work in progress... and I need all the work and help I can get.

This is my mission statement that I am asking anyone who reads my blog to keep me accountable to: This blog is to share what God is doing in me, what He is teaching me and showing me. This is to exclaim the joys of the life I’m given and the blessings He has inflicted upon me. This blog is for others to learn and understand who and what God is and what He desires from all of us.

And this is my public apology: I’m sorry for taking this blog out of context; in fact I’m sorry for allowing my other blog to do the same. Words are a dangerous weapon and I’m sorry that I used them against anyone. I want to be encouraging and uplifting, and I wasn’t. I’m asking forgiveness, but I will respect anyone’s choice in refusal.