The Restored Hope

While doing my homework tonight, I had an odd brief moment of nostalgia. Nostalgia about how things used to be better. I read an email from one of my friends that talked about church about a year ago. She gave me a recap from church and talked about how she had a conversation with Todd and Donna. Then I remembered. A year ago, Todd was walking and laughing. And even though he still had cancer, I don’t know how to explain it but things seemed brighter. He and Donna were able to go to church, and there seemed to be happiness everywhere. I remember going to bring dinner to their house last May. Todd said he helped mount a cloth onto an apparatus that made a small tent in their backyard for dinner. It’s only now that I think “He could do that back then?” He said he went to Marcs that day. And he helped get chairs out. He helped his wife, Donna who was still recovering from her surgery. I don’t know how to explain this, but the fact that a year ago he could do all of these things brings tears to my eyes. What happened? I don’t want to go to any hopeless conclusions here. I just feel upset that a year ago he could walk and now he’s paralyzed.

            But then again when I really thought about it, was a year ago really better? Todd still had cancer and he still does now. Last year, the cancer was coming back with a vengeance. Donna had surgery and had complications. So, I now wonder, how exactly was last year better? Yes, Todd was walking, but is that the only thing? It can’t be.

            In the Christian life, it’s hard…extremely hard, to have hope in the midst of great difficulty. Yes, you’re supposed to, but you see, Todd has been stuck in his bed for almost 5 months now. He’s lived longer than Hospice expected, but sometimes, I have a terribly sick thought. What if Jesus just took him now so he could walk again? Sick, yes. I don’t want anyone dead. I want him to be able to walk. Yes, God could heal Todd right now, it’s just that I’m having a hard time believing that at this point. Sometimes I feel like I don’t have enough faith. However, in the midst of deep sorrow and suffering, there is one thing that will always be true:

            All shall be well. Yes, that really sounds like a band-aid answer, but it’s working for me right now. Part of me is afraid to hope. I’m afraid of escapism, but I must agree right now with “all shall be well”. I have to hold onto that hope, or else I’ll end up in despair. I have to hope that the Word of God will never fail. I need to remember that in the End, Jesus will restore all things. That Jesus is our Light in the Darkness of sin, despair, pride, anger, sickness, disease, and stupid cancer. Freaking stupid cancer.

            “All shall be well” comes from an Andrew Peterson song that I hope you’d listen to at some point. It’s part of an album that Peterson wrote about death. Can you believe an artist wrote an entire album about dying? Well, I’m glad he did because I love it. It’s really helped me to process death and what that means in the Christian life. “Word of God will never fail. All manner of things shall be well.” What I like about this is that this does not imply a mamby pamby band-aid answer, but affirms the true Hope. Yes, suffering is terrible. Yes, storms in life are hard. They’re unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. But there’s still Hope. There’s still Jesus. And as Holy and Strong as He is, He is redeeming us everyday. He’s giving us strength every day to make it through. He’s providing us with joy every day. And He’s giving us unmatchable mercy and grace every day. This is why all shall be well. Because Jesus is transforming us and changing us. One day we won’t be seeing any suffering. We will be in the New Earth, building up God’s kingdom in our new bodies, free from sin, death, and disease. But until then, while we wait on this fallen, broken, dirty earth, let’s have hope, the hope that Jesus died for us is our Sustainer through this hard thing called life.

Yes, I realize that I haven't posted in a seriously long time, and I doubt anyone's reading anything. Here's a piece that a wrote, but did not publish from a few months ago. 

3/20/2013

In which I get spiritually slapped

            It was after church and as we were leaving, my mentor and I began a conversation with a man who had been going through cancer for a few years. At the end of the conversation, she said “We’ll be praying for your healing,” and he replied, “I’m expecting it.”

            I went home and became concerned. “He’s expecting it? Well, what if it doesn’t happen and he dies? What will happen then?” Will he lose faith then?” I continued to think about it for a little while, and then I went on with my life, praying for him to be healed. And praying. And praying. Then, on Monday, I wondered what exactly he had said. “What were those words he said?” I thought. “I’m hoping for it, I’m asking for it?” For some reason the words he mentioned plagued my thoughts, as I could not find the right words. Then on Wednesday afternoon, I finally remembered the word. Expecting. “I’m expecting it.” And that, my friends, is how you spiritually slap me.

            I’ll be honest. I have a dreadfully small amount of faith. Whenever I pray, I say, “If it is in your will Lord, heal this person,” This is not to say that I do not believe that God has a will because He certainly does. However, I believe that we must be careful always asking if it is in His will. Of course He has a will. Why would we ever think that He could change it according to all of our wishes? Therefore, the right thing to do would be to ask for healing in full faith that God will heal, whether he does or not. What I’ve learned for the past few months is that faith is not dependent on if something good or bad happens. Faith is the complete trust in someone or something. And once again, I have been spiritually slapped. I’ll be honest once again. I do not trust in God. I said it. Perhaps because of the disappointments or the setbacks that whittle all of our faith away, but I do not trust Him. Maybe it is time that I trust Him so that I can grow in Him. Because that is what a relationship is all about. A relationship is a dialogue between one another that evolves upon trust. And trust cannot be formed unless one trusts another. God, please help me trust You more.

            So with this, my friends, let us not only pray for each other’s healing, but let us expect it. Expect and hope for the power of God to heal the sick, poor, and tired. Expect God to heal you and have faith that He will. Because without faith, it is impossible to please God.

Obligation or Love? Part 1

Has there even been an event that you were "supposed" to go to but didn't want to. I mean like a church or club event and you were "supposed" to volunteer. And they gave you the guilt trip. "Please come anyways" makes it sound like you're the laziest person on earth and are always making excuses. I wanted to go to this event though (sort of). The problem was that someone pretty much forced me not to. I truly did want to go, but I believe that I was going out of obligation.

The consequences of doing activities out of obligation are huge. If we keep doing things out of obligation, we become apathetic. We lose relationships. We become cynical. The whole "go to church on Sunday" statement sounds like an obligation all on its own. (I'm NOT saying go to church whenever you want to. But when you go to church, you should have a sense of joy and gratefulness to fellowship instead of feeling like you have to be there). Most of all, obligation isn't love.

When someone does something out of love, it transforms the entire experience. It brings hope, joy, and celebration while doing the activity, making it worthwhile. And if you're trying to evangelize a community, this makes it even better and more effective because you're bringing people to Jesus out of love, not just because the Bible said to go and make disciples of all nations. I realize that I'm speaking in very vague terms here, but I want to try to express what it means to do something out of obligation, and to do something out of love.

All too often, I have done several things out of obligation. The requests for me to go and do something because I'm a "nice person" happen all too often. I remember this past week when I was hanging out with friends I felt like it was a crime and I haven't been out with my friends in months before then. I feel terrible when I can't go to youth group events, as if I don't have enough time for God and I seriously need to change my schedule. Why?-because somehow I've learned that we are all obligated to go to every single youth group event and if we don't, then something is wrong with our spiritual life. Now, yes, in some cases there are those teenagers who need to spend their time more wisely and perhaps youth group is a way to keep them grounded and out of trouble. But all too often I wonder if these events help to further the gospel. If they truly reach out to others. And if they are, is it out of the fact that your youth group pastor told you to go, or did you want to go? Were you just sitting down in the background when you heard of the event, or were you on the planning committee?

I remember back in the fall and spring when for a singing group, we performed at nursing homes and with adolescents with special needs. It was so much fun! And it wasn't out of obligation. I felt like I was helping to serve the Kingdom. Yes, while many people would think that it's just a performance, it was special. It was special because I believe that I was using love rather than obligation to bring people joy and to learn more about their lives. And that's what love truly is.

To Listen to God or to Listen to Man?

Sorry I've been gone awhile. If anyone's actually been reading this. Well, considering that it's the summer, I guess I'll post more-I promise :)

I'm in a conflict now that has started for everyone since they have been in preschool. It's called the "What do people think of me" complex. And it has caused everyone at least at one point to miss out on something that they were supposed to do. Less than a week ago, I was going to go to my sister's recognition ceremony, but didn't go out of fear that past teachers would think I'm weird because I'm older and the only older sibling there. See, where I live, there isn't a lot of 'family' gatherings for awards due to schoolwork, other sports, or just plain sibling apathy. So I didn't go because I was afraid of what man would think of me. Boy was I wrong and feel terrible. In fact, even one of my friends showed up. What a fool am I!

Fast forward to today. There's supposed to be swim practice today. But, the inside of my hips are sore from doing A TON of breaststroke and I am VERY out of shape. And a girl who isn't so nice is lifeguarding. Should I let her get in the way of my swimming? Or should I not care what she thinks and go? This is the most annoying dilemma. I can also make the excuse of how much pain I'm in. But that's just an excuse anyway. My mother told me to do whatever I want. I'm not even in the mood to go to practice. And I'm not letting her define me. I see her all the time. But aren't we supposed to not care what man thinks but care what God thinks? Well, it's surely much easier said than done. And there are times when it is right to avoid people not necessarily because of what man may think, but because man is mean. And isn't she mean? I really don't plan on having my self-image wiped out on her account. But she's seen me swim before several times. And before she became fast, she was really slow. And before she was mean, she was a loser at her school. So shall I go? Part of this has to do with "forcing." ("Forcing" will be for another blog post). "Forcing" is the crazy stuff I do when I force myself to do things that I don't want to do. For example, tomorrow I'm doing something that I don't want to do. I'm doing it because I heard it on Wednesday at youth group and thought it would be bad if I don't go. (Which brings us to yet another blog post on how we serve the world- are we doing it to serve God and better His Kingdom, or are we doing it because someone "said so"?) Well, I'll see if in the next hour and fifteen minutes I'll go. Nah-I'm helping my mom with dinner. And this isn't a cop-out. She told me to :)

But nevertheless, after the experience this past week, I will never care so much about what man thinks that I will not do something in fear of them. Because at the end of the day, unless you're being a sinner, being a jerkoff, being lazy, or being a bad example of character it doesn't matter what man thinks. It only matters what God thinks.

Thankfulness

After a stressful weekend of deciding whether I should celebrate Thanksgiving, or any other holidays, (I've recently found out that most holidays originated from Pagan traditions. However, searching throughout Google, I have come to the conclusion that if we aren't thinking about that aspect, then who cares? Our culture has changed so much that why should that even matter? It's like not getting treatment from a doctor because doctors did very little so long ago...anyway, that issue is for another day.) I have decided to celebrate Thanksgiving. But I have an issue.

I've recently discovered that I'm not truly thankful. Really, I'm not. I just go through every day with everything happening and it feels like I'm self-centered. Me me me me me. I want to do what I want and I'm thankful for what I have received. Yay!

It's almost like indirectly praying. I haven't felt that I've been actually praying to God lately. It feels like I've been praying indirectly to God. Like "Thank you God for helping ME on this test. Thank you for ME being able to do this" Me. Me. Me. And I'm tired of it.

It also seems that Thanksgiving has become a time of not so much being thankful, but a celebration of seeing who can shove the most food in your mouth. I guess I'm being cynical. But it just feels like this to me.

And, I want to be thankful and grateful all year around. Not just for three months out of the year. And I want to be truly thankful. I think that thankfulness involves being so grateful that joy just oozes out of you! And that has not been how I've been feeling. So I've decided to restart a gratitude journal (You can see how well I finish what I start ;-)) Every day, even if I don't feel it, I will write what I should be thankful for. And hopefully I can be grateful. Grateful that God loves me. Grateful for my wonderful home and community. Grateful for my health, my life, and friends.

Discipline

I've realized the consequences of staring at the glowing rectangle. Staying up late isn't my thing when I've been goofing off all day. However, I've realized the root of this problem. I don't have many activities after my day. I was forced to not do much because of an ever increasing course load, but still, I need something to do. Mostly, I need discipline. And by the way, I failed my plan. I have used the internet, but have been using it in small intervals and haven't been on it too long. Oh well, what's that stupid excuse of mine supposed to do? If I plan to stop using the internet during the week, it should mean to STOP using it once and for all.

 I. Need. Discipline. Now. I wonder why I'm still like this. Still the miserable failure, except that I can't pull off a pity party anymore. I've failed at attempting not to use the internet so many times that I can't feel bad for what I've done. And after reading several books in the Old Testament talking about God's people turning away from Him and God sending His wrath as a response. I guess I'll never learn. Only if I had something else; something other than nothing or a short activity would be a possible solution. But that cannot be the case. I still have to trust Him, no matter how many times I fail. (And I've failed SO MANY TMES!) But isn't that disrespectful to God? "Dear God, please forgive me for using the internet for the umpteenth time" and then the next day I go back on the internet for x amount of time because of a lack of self control. It's really because of my lack of faith, I believe. The lack of faith that I will be able to restrain myself. The lack of trust in God. The lack of my mind constantly thinking about the consequences. See, when I start to use the internet, my mind shuts off its talking to myself mechanism and I begin to listen to myself. My desires. My wants. My needs. These are all supposed to be God's needs. Not mine.

On Sunday, I read something about talking to myself rather than listening to myself. I forgot who it was, but he had written a book, and had talked about the main reason for unhappiness had been because so many times we listen to ourselves rather than talk to ourselves. We yell at ourselves for the terrible things we have done. We listen to ourselves in how entrenched we are in self pity. We listen to ourselves as our impulses and act upon them. Only if we could talk to ourselves, maybe we could stay away from sin. "How would Jesus feel if I did this?" "Wait, Jesus loves me. Why would I want to do something like that?" "Jesus died for me. He loved me so much that he surrendered Himself. He was God in the flesh who let Himself be killed for all mankind. Why am I doing this again?" "Jesus loves me. That means that if I trust Him and give my life to Him that I'm a new creation. I am dearly loved and a part of his Kingdom. I will not engage in self pity." At first, I didn't think very much of it, until the next day when I realized how many times I listen to myself rather than talk to myself. I will change now. I will talk to myself rather than listen. I will discipline myself about the internet. Any work needed to be done online or on the computer will be the only work done until all work is completed. I'm not standing for apathetic sinning and frequent forgiveness followed by no repentance. I do want to change.

The Internet

I love the internet. I love how it gets us into an interconnected community able to share ideas. We can learn about each other on the internet. We can pray for people halfway across the globe. We can follow blogs and be introduced to many different types of families. We can keep in touch with our favorite artists...(well, that could also be a bad thing if someone's a stalker)

I also dislike the internet. It's highly addictive. We can intend to work for school or vocation, and find ourselves updating our Facebook status or watching YouTube videos, delaying our time until completion by minutes to hours. The internet is a source of procrastination. It is a tool that can take us away from normal conversation into isolated, nonverbal people. The internet can delay focus, stop our daily routines, and take over our lives. The internet can easily become our idol. We can be on the internet all day and night long, possibly. 

I'd like to present a challenge. I'm one of those "internet surfers" who end up trying to do work and ends up getting sidetracked at the push of the power button. I propose a plan to stop relying so much on these rectangles and say "yes" to more contact with friends and family. I propose a plan to decrease procrastination of the internet so all work can get done in a timely fashion. I propose a plan to only use the internet for leisure, and if this holds true, it will be for an hour a day. I propose a plan to not use the internet during the work week, only the weekend as a way to get rid of the addictive idol. I propose a plan not to do any internet surfing, and if surfing must be done, it will only be done in minimal amounts.

The point that I'm getting at here is that I'm tired of the internet controlling my life. I've tried plans before, but have always fallen. It takes 21 days to break a habit. Starting tomorrow until December 5, I will use all of these tactics to stop relying so much on the internet. I'll get rid of the rectangle controlling my mind everywhere I go. I will stop the search overload and telling everyone about what I've found. I will not use the internet until all of my work is done and it is a weekend. No exceptions. In all of the other times that I've failed, it has been because I've let something slide like "It's the weekend...I have all day to do this" and then I'm online for hours. Enough is enough. I've decided to let go of the rectangle controlling me. 

I'd like to reiterate that the internet can be used for good things. It has been used to tell of persecution in different countries as a way for people to help and has also been used in getting someone to stop committing suicide. However, the internet becomes our worst nightmare when we rely on it for everything we have and we let it control our minds. I want to change. I want to clear my mind of search overload syndrome and renew it with my relationship with God and all of the beautiful things that there is. I'm tired of staring at a glowing screen and typing on black keys. I will stop. I want to change. I'm done with using the internet too much and then shaming myself for it. I'm done with praying and asking forgiveness and doing the same. exact. sin. the next day. I won't have it. I want to have an actual relationship with God that is me obeying because I love Him and not out of fear. I want to feel free with joy abounding in me and to love one another with everything I have. I want to become more patient and more kind. I want to manage my time much better than I have been doing now. I want to be able to read and study; then come out of that reading saying "I understood the material". 

I'm guessing that stating how tired I am of all of my consequences of using the internet as my idol is what starts change. It's like how most people won't lose weight effectively until they choose to lose it. That's how God works. And I think that's amazing. He doesn't force us to do anything because He wants us to do things out of our love for him. And that's why we have a choice. Therefore, if anyone who wants to rid themselves of an internet addiction, I'd suggest that you'd check yourself to see how much you really want to do it. I don't mean to sound arrogant, and maybe it's good to let go of the internet and fail a few times until you have reached a final decision. I just don't want you to fail and then feel as if nothing else would work; that's how I've been feeling this past week. However, I've grown tired of all of this madness surrounding my ever present obsession with the glowing rectangle. 

Here's how it will work: 

-No using the internet during the week

-All homework must be done before using the internet on the weekends

-Internet usage is restricted to 1-2 hours

Or am I being too strict? Is this why I've failed before? Am I putting too many unrealistic restrictions for myself and this has been why I have failed? Maybe. Possibly. Maybe it shall be modified. 

-Internet usage may be only used 30min./day and can be only used when all homework is done

-Weekends permit 2 hours max. of the internet, only to be used when all homework is done

There. I think I have it. And I hope that if you're reading this and you would like to also have this journey of releasing yourself of the controlling internet on your life that you are successful too. 

I apologize that this is so long! I didn't mean for it to go on for this long!