What I want to tell you

I'm sitting here in bed at 10:42PM listening to the rain, and trying to figure out how to kick off this blog post. And since I really want to say 'why hello there!' but I've already typed and erased that a few times cause it just doesn't sound right, I figured I may as well get on with it. 

I'm really glad I don't have an English teacher grading these blog posts. Pretty sure she would cringe at that introduction. 

There's just so much that I want to say right now. I want to tell you about the wonderful, fun, relaxing Bachelorette weekend I had in Palm Springs. 

I want to gush about the fact that I've known this girl since second grade, and it's crazy to see how the Lord has worked in each of our lives, and in our friendship. It's equally crazy that in exactly two months from yesterday, I'll be standing beside her as she gets married. Like, woah. 

And just for kicks:

I want to tell you that I'm reading this book: 

I want to tell you how reading Dave Lomas' vulnerable account of his own identity crisis has helped me identify my own. I want to tell you all about my Giant Papillary Conjunctivitis diagnosis, which is basically a super professional way of saying my eyes hate contacts. I would probably make a lot of jokes about it, and say a lot of positive things about how there is so much purpose in this & God is using it for His good and His glory. 

And, to be fair, both of those things are entirely true. God's using my broken eyeballs to do a lot of good in my heart, and it is pretty funny to say that I have broken eyeballs. 

But I also want to tell you that it's hard. I want to be authentic and say that it's shown me how much I was relying on feeling confident in my physical appearance. Sometimes you don't realize you're using something as a crutch until God so graciously takes away the crutch. 

Actually, it's not exactly when He takes it away that you realize it; it's what happens after. It's when you find yourself ugly crying, or grieving like you lost a limb, or feeling the crippling sensation of fear, hoplessness and doubt. All over whatever simple thing was removed in the first place, for me: contacts. 

 I also want to tell you that it's okay to do those things. It's okay to ugly cry; it's okay to grieve when you feel like you don't have a reason to; and it's okay to acknowledge that you feel crippled from fear, hopelessness, or doubt. God doesn't ask us to hide our emotions, and He certainly would never tell us they're invalid. They are valid to Him, because He understands them. He understands them more than we do. 

He doesn't want us to hide from our emotions, He wants us to walk through them with Him. Because guess what: there's a light at the end of the tunnel. A light that we might never have found had we not gone through the crutch-removal surgery in the first place. 

For me, I see that light. I see the fact that my heart and mind and vision are being restored to see beauty the way He sees it. I see that I'm learning to truly find confidence in the Lord above all other things. I see that I'm learning to throw up my hands, and surrender to Him what every part of my flesh wants to control via wikipedia/google/wedMD. I see that I'm learning to trust that He has good plans for me. 

And now that I've turned what I thought would be a tip-of-the-iceberg post into a full blown heres-my-life post, it's your turn. 

What's new with you?

31days // Humility {My Story Cont.}

Purity is a journey. For some, we were born into it. The road was paved for us by our parents, or by the church. And for some, we found the road later in life. We had to unlearn so many things that we had learned over the years to carefully put one food in front of the other along this road paved by God. 

Regardless of if you have been on this journey your entire life, or 7 days, I'm sure you have had moments of struggle. Whether it's battling your own temptations, or dealing with the confused looks of others who don't understand why you would choose to walk this path, there are difficulties. It's worth the struggle, but the struggle is there. 

Something that I have learned in my life is that purity and humility go hand in hand. I would venture to say Christianity and humility go hand in hand, but we'll focus on the main topic here ;). 

For the majority of my life, I never thought that I could pursue purity because I thought that sex was a vital part of a relationship. I'm fairly certain that I told myself this to ease the guilt of having sexual relationships before marriage, but regardless, I strongly believed it was true. And I had people around me who agreed, so who could argue with that? 

This view of mine didn't go away over night. Even after my surrender on this day, I still wasn't sure where I stood on the issue. I think this was mainly out of fear, I had been walking on one road for my entire 22 years of life, how could I change that now? 

I have seen that a major way to combat fear, is with pride. Instead of acknowledging that fear, it's easier to just shake it off by assuming "I'm right. Sex is a vital part of a relationship." And that is exactly how pride gets in the way of purity and Christianity, because we start believing that our views are better than God's. 

God is never going to run out of things in our life to heal. He's never going to run out of things in our heart to reveal to us. In order to be healed, and in order to have those things in your heart revealed, you have to have humility. You have to be willing to believe that maybe, just maybe, God has a point here. Maybe His way is better after all. 

I say this because this is exactly what my last {almost} two years have been like. God is constantly healing me, constantly digging deep into my heart to free me of things I didn't even realize were there. 

And this happened once, shortly after that January 1, 2012 day. It had been a few months, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that my Bible reading, and worship music lovin' hadn't faded yet, like it had before. I was driving home to visit my family in San Diego, and had made it to Irvine, which is anywhere from 2-3 hours from Santa Barbara, with traffic. I had switched the radio station to Country music, and suddenly wanted to switch back to the worship music I had on before. I didn't know the stations well, so I simply flipped through them until I heard a song that I recognized. 

Well, I didn't find one, but I did find a voice. I found a station that was streaming a sermon, and even though I never listened to sermons in the car, something tugged at my heart to hear this one. I quickly realized, and was surprised to find that I recognized the voice behind the radio. I wasn't certain, but thought I would listen anyway. 

It turned out to be a sermon about dating. It was a message to people like me, out on the hunt for marriage material. And in it, this man emphasized the importance of being equally yolked, and staying pure in your relationship. He was sharing stories of experiences he has witnessed, and I was hooked on every word. For the first time, it made perfect sense. And it didn't matter that I had made mistakes, 22 years worth. All that mattered was I suddenly had the desire to pursue purity, the way that God designed and intended it to be. 

The sermon ended, and they announced the speaker. I already knew, but hearing it confirmed gave me goosebumps. It had been my pastor, Britt Merrick. I was 3 hours from home, and God had so intricately put my own pastor on the radio to preach straight to my heart. My heart was changed in that moment. 

So get rid of all the sin in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls. 

// James 1:21 //

What does God have to teach you today? 

Happy Friday, loves!