Ups

So I was recently thinking about a talk that I had heard at a retreat I went on with my church. It was about David and Goliath. The speaker brought something new into perspective that I had never thought about before: David would not have been able to defeat Goliath if he had not first defeated loins and bears in private. (1 Samuel 17:34-37) One of the things the speaker talked/joked about a lot was how David had to carry cheese to his brothers who were soldiers. (1 Samuel 17:18) Needless to say, they did not have coolers back then, and when cheese is in the heat too long it starts to smell BAD. So, in the words of the speaker, "David smelled like some funky cheese!" This little part of David smelling like funky cheese is what I want to focus on right now. Fightig the lions and bears prepared David to fight Goliath, but the funky cheese was a big part of David's journy to his brothers and to the plan God had for David. I think the funky cheese in many ways represents the discomfort of the journy David had to take to get to God's plan. God never said that the path that we have to travel to follow Him was going to be easy, infact He basically said the exact opposite: very few find it and you will be prosecuted for taking it. But God did tell us that He will never give us anything that we can not overcome through Him. God prepared David for the battle with Goliath when David had to fight the lions and bears in private. Then David had to carry this smelly, nasty, funky cheese all day to get it to his brothers. After David successfully did both these things, he was presented with Goliath and because David had obeyed God when he fought the lions and bears and when he carried the cheese, David had the faith that he could defeat Goliath with God on his side that none of his brothers or any of the other soldiers had. David had to obey God first in the private and maybe even seemingly small things first before he could obey God in the big things. My question to you now is what are your lions and bears? Maybe no one else knows about them, or maybe only a few people know about them. And finally, never give up God's plan for you just becuase you are sick and tired of carrying smelly, gross, funky cheese, or in other words: just because its hard and difficult do not right something small off as unimportant. Praying over someone else, having a one on one time with Jesus even though you are ready for bed, going to your local church one day even though you have a sports game that you are supposed to play in may be part of the grooming that will give you the diligence that you need to be fully involved in God's plan for you. No matter what is going on in your life, God will ALWAYS give you the strength to get through it.

Downs

So the past few days have been really hard for me. School has already gotten rediculously stressful, its not even the end of the second week and I'm already behind. I was having horrible urges to cut the other night. I texted two of my friends though. One told me to rely on God, I was like, "I want to, I always want to when this stuff comes up, but I never have the strength to stay facing Him, I always turn around.." But another friend told me to read Psalm 91 which says:


1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High


will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. [a]



2 I will say [b] of the LORD, "He is my refuge and my fortress,

my God, in whom I trust."



3 Surely he will save you from the fowler's snare

and from the deadly pestilence.



4 He will cover you with his feathers,

and under his wings you will find refuge;

his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.



5 You will not fear the terror of night,

nor the arrow that flies by day,



6 nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness,

nor the plague that destroys at midday.



7 A thousand may fall at your side,

ten thousand at your right hand,

but it will not come near you.



8 You will only observe with your eyes

and see the punishment of the wicked.



9 If you make the Most High your dwelling—

even the LORD, who is my refuge-



10 then no harm will befall you,

no disaster will come near your tent.



11 For he will command his angels concerning you

to guard you in all your ways;



12 they will lift you up in their hands,

so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.



13 You will tread upon the lion and the cobra;

you will trample the great lion and the serpent.



14 "Because he loves me," says the LORD, "I will rescue him;

I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.



15 He will call upon me, and I will answer him;

I will be with him in trouble,

I will deliver him and honor him.



16 With long life will I satisfy him

and show him my salvation."



By the time that I had reached the fifth verse I knew I could make it through the night without caving to the devil. I know that cutting is straight from the pit of hell and I know it is extremely addictive. I do not want to take that path again. It is hard to resist now but the more times I cave to the will of the devil the more difficult it will become to stop. In the past I let my stubborness work against me, determined to prove to the world that I could be as self destructive as I wanted and that noone would be able to stop me; I was determined to prove that I decided how much pain I could handle, not the world. But now I am learning there is another way to be stubborn: to be too stubborn to cut, to be too stubborn to skip a meal. I am tired of letting the devil tell me what I will do each time I am upset or stressed, it is not his decision to make. It is not my decision either; my life is not mine: my life belongs to Jesus Christ. And in that I no longer have the choice to cut or starve. My only choice is to "rest in the shadow of the Almighty."

All Arounds

If you know my story already, great, if you don't but I know you, you will learn it over the course of this blog, and if you don't know my story and don't know me, why are you reading this blog in the first place?

Anyway, it has been an interesting time lately. I've started hanging out with a friend of a friend, we will call her McKenzie as she says she loves that name ;) I am praying that this continues to be an awesome friendship. The only thing that makes me even remotely weary is that I am VERY comfortable talking to her about anything and everything, not that that is necessarily a bad thing. The issue comes in that when I am ok with talking about stuff too much I start to "re-live" them. For example, I have not givin in to almost any of my impulses even remotely since last Christmas. But after hanging out with McKenzie I was desperately wanting to give into all of them. It was really tough because it would not have been that hard to hide any of it from any one. This is where the real test comes in: can I cntinue to stay away from all of it without a physical consequence (like not getting to do something) for doing it. I can hide all of it easily, I could cope with it easily, but do I really want to take that path again? Do I want to deal with the secrecy and lying again? The guilt and shame that come with it? Is it worth the thrill of having a secret and the temporary satisfaction? To most people, no, not in the slightest, they do not understand it, but to anyone who has ever been in this gloriously dangerous and addictive trap that I live with, it is a HUGE decision. The over all answer to these questions though is NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!!!!! In no way shape or form are the consequences worth the actions, but it is not an easy logic to give in to. But the beauty in these struggles can be seen in Paul's second letter to the Corinthians when he writes, "To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me." (2 Corinthians 12:7-9) I do not have to worry about whether I can stand to say no or not because God's grace is sufficient for me, HE gives me the strength to say no, the strength to go on another day and not worry about whether I can stand to deal with any of it or not. HIS GRACE IS ENOUGH FOR ME, AND THAT IS ALL THAT MATTERS!