the weirdest thing just happened...

wow i have no idea what to make of this.

someone offered to make a job connection for me in st louis. i looked on his facebook page for the church website and found reliantchurch.org. clicked on it and have spend the last day and a half falling in love with it. its creative. its inner city. its diverse. its simple, young, active. and i have been praying about it for the last day and a half to not rush and just say yes. so i finally went tonight after talking it over with past/future roommates about it to send the friend who made the connection a facebook message to say yes i am most definitely interested. BUT first i thought for some reason, maybe i should check just to make sure that it was the only st louis church on his facebook page and that i would be writing to him about a church that he doesn't know about and he'd think i'm crazy. so i looked.

and i couldn't find it.

i searched through his groups ten times looking for it.

and its not there.

and i found a different church that wasn't there before.

how the heck...?

and the new church on there is a church with a HUGE staff and tons of programs and nothing that i would ever be interested in working for...minus the fact that it is an actual job possibility in an economy that doesn't provide much hope.

needless to say i have absolutely no explanation besides God.

and what does that mean i am supposed to do with it?

I did not google search for this reliant church.

I found it by clicking on a group link on this guy's facebook page and then found the website on its facebook page.

but its not there anymore.

this is clearly not where he works.

this is clearly not where the job offer is.

but the church is wonderful in all that it is doing.

it is real.

and beyond any rationalization that i could ever come up with, God took me to that website.

the reliant church is close to where my roommates were looking for an apartment in st louis.

i told God that if i were going to move to st louis...anywhere for that matter...i'd have to have a community/connections to live in. i was not going to move somewhere blindly with two roommates and expect to stumble into a community. i wanted a guarantee. there it is. 

how do i explain it?

God what do you require of me?

as i speak my mind...

i'm becoming a horrible person.

as i speak my mind,

i'm becoming a horrible person.

this entire thing is poisoning me, ruining me

eating away at my soul.

it is making me a horrible person.

and i can keep lying to myself

justifying what i say and do by the pain she's caused

but ultimately it makes me no better than her.

and that's why i don't speak my mind.

b.c i know my heart is not right and my words are poison.

i can't express myself well

b.c what i want to express only hurts people.

i want to express myself

i need to express myself

but i'm realizing more and more how entirely futile my efforts really are. the harder i try to express myself the worse it gets. i'm trying to talk things out, work through them, but words only get me so far. my heart has to change and i want my heart to change b.c i can see how the poison in me is hindering my other relationships. but i don't know how.

i've talked it out.

i've even i think pretty much figured out the reason for the pain.

i'm praying about how to confront it

but the pain keeps reoccurring; it hasn't stopped. so i am healing from past ones but new ones keep being inflicted. i am fighting a losing battle. one i have no strength no wisdom nothing by which to even fight. 

meanwhile i feel like i'm becoming this horrible person. i just need to stop talking about it. i have to. i figured it out. now i need to let it go. and talking about it does not help me to let it go. 

Lord help me to keep my mouth shut and my brain off.

Turn on your spirit in mine and shut up my infantile logic.

Amen.

i want to go to paris

So I need a break...desperately.
and not just a visit friend break but just where i go do my own thing.
and i want to go to paris. plane tickets from chicago are under $500 in the next couple of weeks. sigh. i am so tempted to just up and leave.
i want to sit by one of the huge fountains in one of the parks that you can just see the Eiffel tower peaking over the trees and sip espresso. that's really all i want. i can just feel it at the edge of my fingertips. i can taste the espresso. and i can feel the relaxation/absolute joy flooding my soul as i think about it. its practically tangible. i want it so bad, but have no time for it til august. but i want it now! i feel like a little kid with the cookie just out of my reach. BAH!
someday. its good to know that i can feel something like that again.
instead i'm looking at a lodge to stay at here in michigan for a day or two.
but i really want paris mind you. oh well life goes on.
but i will get there...i will. and that is final.
meanwhile i reach the point of breaking physically mentally emotionally but not spiritually.
For the first the time in a long time i am at peace spiritually.
the rest of me is now ready to collapse since that has been taken care of. and i need a break.

a mist...

peace and contentment whisper in my ear,
taunting elusively,
playing cat and mouse with my heart.

residing temporarily,
settling within me in small pieces,
and then fleeing at a moment's notice.

others attempt and praise,
but nothing fulfills the drive,
tearing and wearing at my heart.

i am left empty-handed
with no answers
and a God that seems to have turned a deaf ear.

Seeking and searching the unattainable,
the elusive tomorrow,
instead of dwelling in the God of now.

God has the control,
but the hold is invisible,
and incomprehensible.

grieving

grieving seems to be the absolute theme surrounding my life right now.
because of lent and because of life.

Life has given me many causes to grieve--
and not a lot of time.

God has asked me to grieve--
and I have ignored Him
for years.

Until I made the commitment to be at camp this year.
I cried more this summer in front of people than I have--EVER.
I had a complete and utter breakdown and nothing could make it better.
the walls had begun crumbling.

Then I went to China...and came back...and shut down and out.
It was part of the process...but not a part I had anticipated.
I was clearly misunderstood in my grief.
I misunderstood myself.
I fear grief because I fear being misunderstood and I fear expressing it.
I know its there.
I acknowledge it.
I feel it.
I dwell in it.
But I do not always know how to express it.
People like to provide answers--but I don't need Job's friends. I have enough of them in my own head. I am learning how to silence them...inside and out.
I am learning how to ignore how other people handle their grief and focus on my own expression.
I am learning how to grieve in the deepest way possible--deep beyond despair into healing.
I am learning how to dwell in the pain--love the pain into healing.
I am learning how to silence the voices--silence the noise into peace.
I am learning....
but it ain't pretty.

another thought

being forced to sit here for days on end in the same place has forced many things to the surface, but in my walk the one that haunts me the most...
given the stillness/slowness of this year i have chosen,
tis completely unavoidable.
i try. real hard. trust me.
but it's not fun.
when God says to be still, we don't often get beyond the point of the initial peace of the silence b.c the noise of our every day lives is so overwhelming and so addicting.
i like being busy. i like knowing i'm getting things done in a day.
i don't like silence. i don't like stillness. b.c its painful. it makes me question the purpose of my very existence.
i wanted peace from the silence/stillness of this year.
do you know what peace means? wholeness.
and how does one acquire such wholeness?
well it's definitely not on the happy road, let me tell you.
i'm pretty sick of it by now to be quite honest. downright sick of it. can you tell God to stop?
be careful what you pray for...
b.c you will actually get it...
but its never easy nor the way you want it to come.

hypocrite

whenever my stomach is bothering me (usually between the hours of 2 am and 6 am) i walk down to the dining hall and get some sprite. it has become a routine that i try to break b.c it frustrates me so much that my stomach bothers me all the time. i did it tonight at 10.30 pm figuring i would save myself the effort of having to go later when i'm awaken by my stomach plus i had this absolute frustration/suffocation/need to get out of the 'house'. it was ridiculously suffocating. i wanted to go to sleep. i've already taken my valerien and am quite ready to go to sleep except i am not at peace at all. and as i'm walking there God and i are having a conversation b.c that's the real reason i do this. i mean like the last couple of nights my stomach has really been upset/i've been sick but on many occasions its not because i'm sick...it's because my spirit is so uneasy in this place. that is so unbelievably hard for me to say. b.c if my spirit is uneasy that means that there is something wrong going on here and i've been thinking that it means i've picked the wrong thing to do with my life this year. to me it means that i'm in the wrong place and this entire year is a waste. to me it means that there is something wrong with me. and yes, there has been something wrong with me...lots of things wrong with me. but it's more than that. b.c no matter how much God and I battle back and forth about my personal walk and my own attitude and heart about life and the hand that has been dealt me, there is something else going on here. but its camp. it's Miracle Camp. It's the place where God lives. then why does it feel so empty? no that's wrong it's not empty b.c that implies that nothing is happening. no, it's negative energy that is at work...there's not just nothing going on...there's something working against us. but nobody else feels it. nobody else senses the absolute oppression that suffocates us day in and day out. nobody sees the emptiness that fills our daily lives in this mediocre existence. nobody sees the ridiculous things to which we run to hide our pain. nobody else sees the circles we run in day in and day out. these manufactured routines that make no sense. there's no purpose and its driving me crazy. everything i did in college had a purpose...it had to. i didn't have time for anything less and i loved it. now i waste half my day running in circles.
we do the same things over and over again
not b.c we love them.
not b.c we need them.
but b.c we are too afraid to do anything else.
we are too afraid to feel.
too afraid to love.
so we do the same things over and over again
so we tread in place, just keeping our heads afloat
not changing not moving forward
and we criticize. (constructively of course. b.c we're christian. i'm so tired of hearing the same old criticisms over and over again when we can't change a DAMN thing. correction: not can't, won't)
b.c we're bored.
b.c we think we can do better.
ultimately b.c we don't like ourselves so we point the finger elsewhere
instead we hide behind the smoke screens of our routines, our circles.
they hide how unhappy we really are.
and they don't change anything.
i just dont' get it.
i feel like i'm the only one that sees it and i can't sleep at night b.c of it. i'm trying to establish things here that change things but i'm drowning. i'm in over my head. i'm fighting a tide that isn't likely to turn any time soon. people are stuck in their ways. and its always personal.
damn those people who take everything personal.
i can't do it.
now that i can see it more clearly, i can say even more confidently...i can't do this.
i'm tired of working with people who can't see two inches past their own noses. and they are good people and they care about each other. but they have no interest in becoming a team. they have no interest in cooperation and especially not creativity.
why?
b.c their routines are a smokescreen for how unhappy they are, how much they don't like themselves.
and i should replace that they with we and their with our. i've become one of them.
God, that is so frustrating to say.
i don't like myself. i've been giving lectures on liking yourself for years and i realize my routines are a smokescreen for me not liking myself. why don't i like myself?
b.c i can't be myself. who's fault is that? well that's still up for grabs.
the demons have been let out of their cages.

I DON'T LIKE MYSELF
what a hypocrite.

God I see the way these people live their lives. They're Christians, but your saving grace is not a reality to them. and b.c of that, grace is not extended to others. I'm in a desert and I'm running dry. i want to give out of fullness, not emptiness, and only a fullness that can come from You, not some silly routine that makes me feel better for a bit. Flood this place with Your grace.