The Adventure doesn't end when the trip does...

So I have just returned from an amazing Missions Road Trip week and I am disappointed that it is over. There are so many bonds and stories that have come from this trip and I had the privilege of being an adult leader this trip which taught me so much. Now is the time where I come back and I have to decide how I will react to being home. Will I go back to normal? Will I become bitter and cynical? I've already caught myself doing both and that is not how life should be now. We talked over and over about bringing the mission trip back to our town and living a Missional lifestyle. It may be hard at times, but I know its the life I am called to be a part of. I learned so much on this trip and I learned that life is like a stair case and we need to focus on what God wants us to do on the stair step we currently are on and not the one before or after or our friends staircase. I need to keep that in mind and strive to live a missional lifestyle to make the trip as worth it as it currently feels like it was. Lord guide my actions in this missional life that I want to strive for.

500 days of Realization

Have you ever watched a movie that revealed more to you than it was intended to? That it gave you a realization that you needed to hear. I recently watched the movie 500 days of summer and in its great plot and funny quirks it got me thinking about my past relationships. I always told myself I was "in love." With each girl too. I was so convinced each time, and yet when the going would get tough and things would get rough I would feel that I fell "out of love" and try to find some reason to end it. I always justify my reasons to with the thought "well the number one thing I worry about is finding the right person." But is that really the source of the problem? Or was I even in love to begin with? 

Don't get me wrong I believe in the act of dating its how you figure out what you like in another person...but how do you know when you love that other person? It's so easy to get those warm, fuzzy feelings and when you have them it only makes sense to say that wonderful and yet sometimes dreaded three worded phrase 'I love you.'

So I have realized that I have not loved those past relationships...not the way that I should love the person I will be with forever one day. I thought that I loved them, but love does not bail as soon as things get too hard. Love works together through it. Love is patient, kind, never gives up.

At the beginning of the summer I felt that I should daily read through 1 Corinthians 13 to help grow as a more loving person. Along with that it has also helped me realize what it means to truly love another woman of God. I need to stop living in an illusion of convincing myself I love girls. I need to really let myself fall in love with someone.

I am currently talking with a girl and I know that at any moment if  i wanted to date she would; yet I get so hesitant. I am afraid that she will be just like everyone else. That it will be another pattern that I'll fall into.

I do not want another pattern.
I need to get to know her more and if I feel she could be different strive for that difference. Work towards finding love in her; for her.

To find this love I need to never give up, keep studying the love chapter, and strive to live the way of love.

Lord please help me to live a life of love.

Questions and Activists

You seem to have all the right answers.
You say what I want to say without my searching.
Why is it that you are so hard to believe?

These are common questions that have been running through my head during this summer. It seems that I have started really liking this girl, but I do not want to rush things with her. I do not want to make the wrong decision and then end up unhappy. Why do choices have to be so hard? The worst part is...she lives so far away and until school starts I will not see her.  Why do these thoughts plague me? I wish I knew the answers  and knew what I need to do. I am striving daily to follow the Lord's will for today, but sometimes its hard. Sometimes I wish I knew the answers for the future now. So I need the Lord's help with being patient.

Another issue I have been dealing with this summer is my response to people that are not into the idea of social justice/activism. I am such an activist that it breaks my heart to hear people not be into social justice/missions and it makes me bitter and want to prove to them why they need to be into missions. That has happened most specifically with a woman at my school who so easily gets under my skin for that very reason. I know that I need to love her as Christ does and I strive to each day, I just wish that she would see we are all called to live lives of social justice. My daily prayer has been that the Lord would help me to live a life of reconciliation and accept that only God can change her and I just need to live my life as an example and not try to "prove to her" why Social Justice is the right way. So we'll see what happens. It wouldn't be so hard if it was not for the fact that she is from my district, I know her family, and she will be dating one of my good best friends.

 This is something I feel so many of us may face in life. Not necessarily in these specifics but we'll always have someone who gets under our skin and we'll want to show them we are right. But that is not what the Lord calls us to do. We are called to live humble lives striving more and more to be like Christ.

Busy yet Filled

Busy, busy, busy, and yet filled with so many thoughts and complications as I travel down this summer journey. I have been so busy and so much has happened that one could look back and be amazed. To have two attractive young ladies both into me, now that was not only impressive but put me into a hole. I do not want to live a life attracting multiple women, I want to find that special one. I want to pick her and be with her and treasure her above all the others. Because she is God's creation, a work of art, and I have chosen to be with her. That is what I want.

But we must not just focus on what I want. I must focus on the desires that the Lord gives me and work each and every day to follow them. It has become so easy for me to want to hope for what God wants for my future, but I need to ask God to reveal what He wants me to do today. I have been learning to cut back on trying to figure out what He wants for the future and focusing on the now. When ten years comes down the line I'll know what He wants me to do because I am present with Him in the presence.

I pray that the Lord will use me each and every day to do His will for the building of the Kingdom and that He will help me find a godly, compassionate, woman in His time and not mine own.