Crazy Times

I wish I could sit here and write about how God has dictated to me every step I should take. Obviously there's a lot going on here and yet, I haven't taken the time to listen intently and God isn't yelling loud enough yet. My friend is concerned that my decision making is based more on emotion than listening to God and to be honest, this is probably true. My actions are based on the following:

— My memory of past wounds
— Words I have received in the past
— My passions and my heart
— My judgements and assumptions, and
— My fears and lack of faith.

Other than Words that God has given me - sometimes through other people, there is a lot of "me" in this decision making process... and I need more of God in here. I rely on his people, his church, his presence, and to a small degree his Word - His love letter to me - but not enough with his still small voice.

In the midst of my troubles, I question whether I am to be in grad school at all or pursue ministry as I feel a call at some point in my life to plant and pastor churches. I worry about debt, about not getting a job and I think that I have to go back to school because there will not be provision for me. A lesson God is leading me toward now is that he will bring provision for those who are following his plan, his leading and this is hard in a society on the brink of recession or even depression.

As the church decision is resolved and in two weeks my aunt's situation will be resolved, I will be left to try to scramble as hard as possible to pull out what I can from this quarter. The class that I have skipped lectures from all quarter is of particular concern - will I pass the final with enough points to end well in the course? Something in the "B" territory would be great! In another course, a professor told us that the first quarter is always the hardest and as soon as the requirements are done, we get to take fun electives of our choice and life will be better.

Though I appear to have my life together, it is in fact a mess. I counsel people all the time to try to make sure their hearts are in the right place and I tell people that I am fine with what is going on in my life and for the most part, this is true. There are three areas of deviation though — where my heart is not focused on Jesus.


1) I struggle with fear and try to stay in control to mitigate the possible results of failure. This was evident as perfectionism, now visible as OCD hording tendancies and making decisions based on fear of bad consequences rather than the hope of good outcomes. I'm not saying we optimally should hope for the best and ignore the rest. I'm saying that with God, all things are possible and we won't learn this unless he leads us down a path that will test our faith. I try to not to get into those kinds of "teachable moments" because I usually fail and they're painful!

2) I struggle with fantasy and lust as I desire an emotional escape that robs my soul and Jesus of the very times I need to trust in him the most. Then I either doubt or don't desire God to take it away because it is my precious. Everything else is what I do for people and for God but this is what I do for myself. There is no room for people who live like this in the Kingdom of God and I know this.

3) I struggle with bitterness and anger. When people do something I don't like, I get angry and this turns to bitterness. It is usually never resolved properly and so judge people and lack compassion and grace toward those who cross me, for those who cross others who I care about, for those who don't know any better. You're either with me or you're against me and this is not really the way of Jesus.


In all of these, and surely more that I won't mention (pride probably being one of them), I miss the standard - I sin. Only God can change me, with a heart that desires his change, and so I must keep praying. I must also process more of this before God and not before my shrine of a computer or at the foot of my brothers. There's a place for both but none are as important as the Father and his council and I must get back to a place where we are best friends and inseparable. He has done so much to bring my heart into alignment with his but there is still so many strongholds, so many terror cells of the enemy - Satan - that hope to see me sacrifice everything for those secret wants.

I intimately know that Satan uses our divided hearts, offering to trade us our hearts desires (that are not Jesus) in order to get us to compromise on our values, to sin, etc. He uses this to kill us, creating an underground resistance in our souls that seeks to oust God from our hearts. We must identify those areas of the heart that are rebelling and we've got to sanctify those areas, reconciling them to Jesus. I want to live a life that completely dangerously and obsessively about one thing and that is Jesus. I pray that He would hold those powers at bay and work to destroy them in my soul.