9:38

I took a few pictures but I don’t feel like posting them up right now. I’m sleepy and sick and I just came from a leader’s meeting at church. To top it all off, I have to wake up at 6 tomorrow morning for my 7:30 class. Sometimes life feels like one gigantic sigh.

The upside is that tonight was humbling. Our senior pastor showed a video of Rick Warren, who talked about spiritual familiarity. Sometimes, when you get too comfortable with something, you forget how wonderful it is. Think of long-time friendships. Marriages. Even sibling or parent relationships. Think of work. School. Think of Tumblr. Haha!

But, really. When you get caught up in something, you forget what life was like without it. Similarly, when you get so used to the idea of God, you forget that you once had a hopelessness and desperation without Him. So you go on thinking that everything is okay everything is okay everything is okay until you wake up and realize that, in reality, everything is not. And for some strange reason, you’re not where you thought you were. In fact, you’ve drifted miles and miles from where you want to be. Miles and miles from where you should be. And in that moment, in that recognition of absolute helplessness, you’re faced with two choices: to stay and drift further away or to swim back.

Of course the problem with swimming back is that it requires effort. Reconnecting. Change. And, as our pastor said, there can be no change without loss and no loss without pain. When it comes to swimming back, in terms of faith, you need to let go of what’s keeping you afloat. You need to move. That’s the first step. That’s the hardest.

Anyway. There are a lot of things I learned tonight and even though I left the conference early, I know that tonight God was speaking to me. It’s been awhile since I felt God direct something at me but it happened tonight and I am just… *sigh* I concede, God. I will start moving again.

9:38

I took a few pictures but I don’t feel like posting them up right now. I’m sleepy and sick and I just came from a leader’s meeting at church. To top it all off, I have to wake up at 6 tomorrow morning for my 7:30 class. Sometimes life feels like one gigantic sigh.

The upside is that tonight was humbling. Our senior pastor showed a video of Rick Warren, who talked about spiritual familiarity. Sometimes, when you get too comfortable with something, you forget how wonderful it is. Think of long-time friendships. Marriages. Even sibling or parent relationships. Think of work. School. Think of Tumblr. Haha!

But, really. When you get caught up in something, you forget what life was like without it. Similarly, when you get so used to the idea of God, you forget that you once had a hopelessness and desperation without Him. So you go on thinking that everything is okay everything is okay everything is okay until you wake up and realize that, in reality, everything is not. And for some strange reason, you’re not where you thought you were. In fact, you’ve drifted miles and miles from where you want to be. Miles and miles from where you should be. And in that moment, in that recognition of absolute helplessness, you’re faced with two choices: to stay and drift further away or to swim back.

Of course the problem with swimming back is that it requires effort. Reconnecting. Change. And, as our pastor said, there can be no change without loss and no loss without pain. When it comes to swimming back, in terms of faith, you need to let go of what’s keeping you afloat. You need to move. That’s the first step. That’s the hardest.

Anyway. There are a lot of things I learned tonight and even though I left the conference early, I know that tonight God was speaking to me. It’s been awhile since I felt God direct something at me but it happened tonight and I am just… *sigh* I concede, God. I will start moving again.

Posted 2 years ago & Filed under God, learning, Notes

Notes:

About:

that's when i realized that words have wings;
they're kind of like birds but mostly like children,
whom you groom and raise.
you mold them and shape them well
and, like the sky that has no limits,
you hope that someday,
somebody will take them home,
call them their own;
that they will find a place to belong.
-amena brown

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