Missing It

It's so easy to look back with rose-colored glasses, especially after weeks like this.

On weeks like this, I struggle with an anxious, negative mindset. I'm stressed and overwhelmed with everything that I'm supposed to do, and learn, and be. I'm afraid that I'll never meet the standard. Perhaps I am too much of a perfectionist, an overachiever, but I can't simply switch that off.

Occasionally, when I am especially sleep-deprived, I grow resentful of a system that teaches me the importance of a balanced, healthy lifestyle, and then loads me with so much to accomplish that the balanced, healthy lifestyle just doesn't seem to be an option. I feel something inside of me dying, although I can't quite put my finger on what it is. I feel guilty because I know how much some people would give to put themselves in my position. Yet the "spark" in me gets fainter.

Then at Friday night vespers, a student shares about her mission experience: "That year as a student missionary was the hardest, but also the happiest, of my life."

Yes. I can relate. But even while acknowledging that I had plenty of hard times in my student missionary experience, all my memories are filtered through those rose-colored glasses.

I miss it.

"[E]very woman in her heart of hearts longs for three things: to be romanced, to play an irreplaceable role in a great adventure, and to unveil beauty. That's what makes a woman come alive." John and Stasi Eldredge

In my 18 months as a student missionary, I felt like I had those three things, and it did make me feel alive.

I miss the sense of purpose and day-to-day adventure. I miss feeling that I am really making a difference. I miss being truly close to people who saw me at my worst and my craziest, and loved me anyway. I miss how much more simple and people-focused life was. I admit that I miss being told every day that I am beautiful :P

As I pondered how much I miss, God spoke to my heart.

"He made from one blood all nations who live on the earth. He set the times and the places where they should live." Acts 17:26 NLV

Just as God called me to South East Asia back then, He has called me to Collegedale, TN now.
If He could get me through the hard times back then, He can get me through the hard times now. If He gave me a sense of purpose, beauty, adventure and love in my life in Asia, surely He can give me those same things here in America.

Because the same God who called me to student missions is the same God who called me back to student life.

It's OK to look back with joy on times gone by, but I cannot let rose-tinted memories of the past rob me of what God wants for me in the present.

So I go back to my books.

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If anyone has any comments and advice about how you survived/are surviving your college years, how you find balance in life, and how you set priorities -- anything that could help me overcome my tendency to stress out -- I'd love to hear from you!

Batter My Heart

While studying for my British Literature class, I encountered a poem that I thought was so striking I had to share it.

Batter my heart, three-personed God; for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend
Your force to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like a usurped town, to another due,
Labor to admit you, but O, to no end;
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captive, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betrothed unto your enemy.
Divorce me, untie or break that knot again;
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, shall never be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

John Donne (1572-1631)

 

 

Am I enough?

I can’t be her. Frankly, I’m tired of living in her shadow. I’m tired of being jealous of her. I wanted to make you care for me like you care for her, but I’m so done trying. I will be myself; I will not be a second-rate her. I will not try to make you love me. 

Am I enough? I’ve always been seeking to answer this question. From my earliest teenage years, I compared myself to other girls and consequently struggled with jealousy. While other girls warbled away sweetly to great acclaim, I just about managed to croak out the high notes of the hymns in church. While other girls were tanned and sleek and beautiful, I struggled with flyaway hair and no sense of style. While other girls played with and cooed over little children, I looked at the children with fear, loathing, and dread. Even after the worst of my awkward teenage years were over, I struggled with feeling that I wasn’t pretty enough, wasn’t good enough, wasn’t talkative enough, wasn’t deep and philosophical enough, simply wasn’t lovable enough as I was.

Painfully aware of my inadequacies, I put up a façade as close to perfection as I could manage. I didn’t like to do anything I wasn’t good at. I tried to earn love, whether it was from my parents, from a guy, or from God. Even if I wasn’t as beautiful, good, or talented as other girls I knew, I hoped that someone could be persuaded to say, “You are enough.” Somehow, I never felt like I succeeded.

Finally, I gave up.

I am slowly coming to the place where I accept that for some people, I will never be enough. Finally, I admit that I’m really not perfect. I will never be as musical, as gorgeous, as witty as some people I know.

And that’s OK. (How freeing it is to say it!)

I am slowly coming to the place where I accept myself for who I am. I am realizing that I cannot earn love. I am realizing that God doesn’t compare me with anyone else.

He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs. (Zeph 3:17)

And it’s a funny thing: as I become more accepting of myself, I notice that I’m becoming more accepting of others, too.

Instead of wasting time on comparisons and jealousies, I remind myself that I have an irreplaceable role to play, that I can touch somebody in a way that nobody else can. And I hold an irreplaceable place in God’s heart.

So do you.

Excruciating Pain and Incomprehensible Love

I had been going through a period of spiritual darkness for several months. Very few people – perhaps no one – knew how I actually felt, because I still did all the right things. But inside I was practically dead. I barely prayed, and rarely read my Bible outside of church on Sabbath. My mind was swamped with questions and thoughts of anger and bitterness over repressed issues from my past, as well as dealing with more recent events. In spite of everything I’ve experienced of God in the past, I was debating with myself whether or not I wanted to continue in my Christian life.

Now, here I was at GYC Europe, surrounded by 1200 other young people who were excited about their faith. For the first couple of days I swung between feeling uncomfortable and bitter as I wrestled with my negative thoughts, and excited as I met people I hadn’t seen for years and listened to the thought-provoking messages of the speakers. There was something about the atmosphere, and as I heard stories about and experienced directly the ways God worked for us that weekend, and considered the solid messages presented,  my heart began to soften again. I was finding answers for some of my questions, and being reminded that God actually was there…

On Monday I went to a seminar about prophecy. At the end of the session, I forget exactly how we got onto the topic, but the presenter began to share some things he’d recently learned about crucifixion. “Did you know that we get our English word ‘excruciating’ from the practice of crucifixion?” he said. “The word means,‘Out of the cross’…”

He started with a story about how his wife had broken her arm so badly near the wrist that she needed a metal plate inserted to help it heal. Although she was going to have general anaesthetic for the procedure, the anesthetist also injected local anaesthetic into her arm. “We’ve discovered,” he told the presenter and his wife, “that if we don’t do this, the patients wake up screaming.” Apparently there’s a certain nerve running through that part of the arm that is extremely sensitive.

The presenter continued his explanation of crucifixion. It was basically death by suffocation, due to the position of the victims on the cross, and designed to be as painful and shameful as possible. Victims were naked, and their backs – often torn to shreds by whips – rubbed against the rough wood of the cross. When they struggled to inhale, they would have to try to lift themselves up in order to take a breath, thus pulling down on the nails that had been driven into their wrists, right where that sensitive nerve was…. I cannot even begin to imagine the pain. And that is purely the physical aspect of the ordeal.

To be honest, it wasn’t the first time that I’d heard details about crucifixion, but this time something seemed to hit me. The presenter was still talking, in a voice getting choked with emotion: “Yet the Bible says that Jesus endured the cross, despising its shame, because of the joy that was set before him…”

And then I began to cry. I never cry in public, in fact I loathe crying in public, but now I couldn’t seem to stop. I simply could not – cannot – comprehend the kind of love that would consider me worthwhile to suffer for like that. I had been thinking so recently that it was such a hard thing to be a Christian and go through struggles because of my faith in Jesus; I had almost been ready to give it up. Suddenly I was slammed with an overwhelming sense of what Jesus had been ready to do for me. I was “the joy that was set before him”; I was the reason he endured the cross. How could anyone love me that much?! And how could I be ready to throw away that love?!

I went out of that room a different person.

You, too, were the “joy that was set before” Jesus. You, too, are the reason he chose to experience all that he did. How are you responding to him?

The Lady Bountiful

Sometimes I like to picture myself as The Lady Bountiful. Not particularly in the sense of personal wealth—a huge mansion, acres of garden, and a closet entirely full of hats and shoes (although that wouldn’t be a bad thing, would it?!)—but more in the sense of having money to give away.

I’d love to be able to give lots and lots of money to whoever needed it. Buy a big house for my parents. Sponsor a dozen orphaned or underprivileged children, and adopt a dozen more. Send the gospel to the ends of the earth via donations to ministries. Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, do every good deed I could possibly do.

In reality, I am a poor student. Often I'm tempted not to give at all because I don't think my measly dollar (or pound) will make any difference. But it does. (And imagine what would happen if everybody who thought that way gave something!)

Perhaps I will never be really wealthy, cash-wise (there's so much more to riches than what's in the bank!), and that's OK. I'm trying to learn to give anyway-- and not just money. Time. Words. My talents and abilities. Even if I don't always think I have a lot to give, all the little things, when taken together, make such a difference. Besides, isn’t what I do with what I have now some indication of what I would do with something more? 

"We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can make which, over time, add up to big differences that we often cannot foresee." Marian Wright Edelman

"I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish small tasks as if they were great and noble." Helen Keller.

passion (or absence thereof)

I’ve been having some big issues with motivation lately – or rather, lack of motivation. I procrastinate on my papers, sweep over my Spanish, and tackle my other homework half-heartedly. I still get by well, although I am frankly uncomfortable giving less than my best. Except...I feel like I have little energy or inclination to give my best. 

I almost can’t see the forest for the trees. I seem to forget why I wanted a college education—and why I chose Southern—in the first place. It’s as if I’ve lost something of myself along the way; I’ve forgotten my dreams and what used to make me excited. I’m tempted to look at life with a tired and cynical eye.

And I hate that. I hate feeling like all the fire inside of me has died. I don’t know how to feel alive again, but I want to...

All is not lost yet, however. Over the last weekend, as I helped out with various aspects of Student Missions Emphasis week, and as I stumbled across some old writing I’d done for this blog (and never posted), something inside me stirred. Passion. It was far from consuming, but it was there, and that was all that mattered to me in the moment. I wasn’t completely dead inside after all!

There have been some rough spots again this week, for one reason or another, but on the whole I think things are slowly beginning to look up once more. I’m glad. Perhaps I’ll start dreaming again.

A Painful Realization

“What am I doing here?” The thought played on repeat as I stood in the prayer circle that August morning, listening to the young people around me. I was very uncomfortable. I hadn't been so uncomfortable in a long time, and I had certainly not expected to feel that way at prayer meeting.

God was close, so close. I hadn’t felt His presence that strongly for quite a while, and somehow I felt I couldn’t stand before Him – I was like Isaiah, crying out when He saw God’s glory, “It’s all over! I am doomed, for I am a sinful man.” (Isa 6:5)

All at once I was painfully aware of my utter lukewarm-ness as a Christian, my unwillingness to truly surrender, my pride and selfishness, and the mixed motives I had gone to the prayer group with. When I arrived back at my dorm I got out my journal, and began to weep in spite of my best efforts not to as I recorded what God was saying to my heart.

I wanted to impress other people. In fact, I cared much more about what certain people thought of me than what God knew about my heart. I wanted everything that came out of my mouth during prayer to be deep, eloquent and inspiring – honestly, I was addressing my prayers more to the other young people in the circle than to God, and the realization shocked me. 

I was reluctant to surrender fully to God (and this wasn’t the first time He’d been speaking to me about that). I knew that it had to be all or nothing, and that if I was serious about growing in my relationship with God, I was going to have to address some things in my life I’d rather ignore.

Would I pursue God for God? Would I follow Him when there was no one else around to see and think what an awesome, spiritual person I was?

I was completely crushed by the realization of the true state of my heart. Yet even as the sense of God’s nearness brought me to my knees in shame at my ugliness, I felt something else in God’s presence – overwhelming love. It sounds so cliché, I know, but I can’t describe it any other way. Somehow I knew that God was worth pursuing, that I could trust Him with my heart, fully surrendered. And I made the choice to yield. 

The decision to surrender is one I have to wrestle with every day. I still struggle with my pride and desire to impress people, caring too much about their opinion of me.  Some days I don’t want to ask God to take my whole self and give me an undivided heart. Yet each day God is showing me more and more that He is worth it. I am praying with ever-increasing honesty that I will love Him as He loves me – consistently and consumedly – regardless of who else is around and what they think of me.

(And for any SAU students reading this, if you haven’t been to the 7 am prayer group at the flagpole – check it out!)