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| We often bypass simple truths in the Bible just because they're simple.
The difficulties in our lives feel so complicated, and we search for
equally complex solutions. In the process, we ignore the rich wisdom
found in the Bible's simple truths.
-Lindy Keffer from trueu.org
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| I'm giving You my heart
All that is within
I lay it all down
For the sake of You my King
I'm giving You my dreams laying down my rights
I'm giving up my pride
For the promise of new life
And I Surrender
All to You, all to You
I wish the lyrics of this song were entirely true for me. I had an incredibly hard time focusing on the praises we were singing to God at Vespers tonight. This is a constant struggle for me but tonight was much worse than usual. My mind was constantly being flooded with other thoughts. I can fight them away but then a few verses later I will realize again I have now idea what I just sang for the last two minutes.
I try to lay down my heart, my dreams, my 'rights' and my pride for God, and I think I usually do pretty decent there, but my mind and thoughts are another story. I so want to give them up during times I need to focus on God, but I just don't know how to make it happen sometimes.
On the positive side I think I have the right desires here, so I can know God will make a way for me to better give up my thoughts. I just don't know how yet.
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| I'm thankful for Thanksgiving. It was a good day. We had an amazing Thanksgiving meal with my Dad's side of the family for lunch. It was interesting seeing all the cousins again. While we were finishing eating my Uncle came over to bug my sister as he loves doing. She enjoys it too whether or not she will admit it. He asked what she was up to and eventually she started talking about how much she hated work and how it was the worst part of her life. I was thinking to myself "sounds like Challenge X for me". If you've ever heard me talk about Challenge X it was probably me complaining or whining about how much I hate it.
Anyway my Uncle was asking about why she disliked work and I chimed in "It's all about you're attitude, you can choose to enjoy it or not" He was like you're exactly right, I have the best job in the world but I sill have to work with &%$ holes and make the best of it. I was feeling good about myself for helping give her some good advice about life.
Later I got to go out deer hunting for the second time this year. Something I miss very much, but just haven't had time for. Sitting out in the woods is an amazing time to think things through, pray, and just be awed by God's beautiful, amazing and powerful creation. While I was thinking it suddenly hit me. If I could tell my sister that she simply needed to change her attitude to not hate work, why shouldn't I do the same for Challenge X. I was being completely hypocritical. So I guess I need to try to change my attitude but I know it won't be easy.
"Be joyful always, pray continually, and give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus" 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18
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| I went to Grand Valley's His House tonight with my sister and another friend Javan. There were very few people there compared with normal I guess. It was even smaller than a normal Tech His House. They normally have over 100 people. We played a game at the beginning which was different than Tech. A student gave a shorter message on Matthew 16:24-26. Really good stuff with really practical applications. He talked about things we could give up for others this Thanksgiving and focusing on what God wanted us to do because it's so easy to get all excited about all the things you finally get to do now that you have free time with break. We then broke into small groups and shared specific things we wanted to do and prayed for each other. That was really cool. We went to a pub afterwards where they usually all hang out. It was kind of weird that they hang out at a pub. There was karaoke going on though and everyone that sang was really good.
I've been working on my jeep the first two days of break so far. My track bar fell off on the way home. Talk about extreme Death Wobble! Luckily I randomly (or maybe not so randomly) had the right size bolt to replace the one that rattled out and fixed it in a parking lot. When I got home I cut the whole cracked bracket off and made my own out of 1/4" plate. It should be unbreakable.
I pulled all the carpet out today and I found some fuzzy mold colonies growing under one of the seats. That might be why it smelled so bad. I don't think I'm putting the carpet back in. It's all wet and nasty smelling and half rotted. I just hope the road noise isn't too loud without it. I need to patch the passenger side floor. It's kind of cool right now though because you can see my new cherry bomb muffler right through the floor.
I went to U-wrench today as well which is my favorite place to shop ever. Unfortunately they didn't really have anything I was looking for. I did find some sweet stuff I wasn't looking for anyway. I've got a surprise for Megan when we get back to school.
I'm going off-roading with Jon and some of his friends tomorrow in Allegan. That should be fun, and really wet. I also get to hang out with Tom, Brian and Travis tomorrow evening so I'm really looking forward to that.
Spent more time on the piano this morning. I can almost play some Christmas songs fluently with just the right hand at least. I need to find some non-fancied up hymns to learn too.
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| I've got the joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart. I talked with my small group today about joy and it was incredible. Just talking about it brought out a huge amount of joy from down in my heart. I'm in a really happy mood right now which I understand is different than the everlasting joy I have, but I think it's just fine to be happy about the joy I have. Today just went really well for me. I got to work with Wiggles, have Bible study with Scott and Matt (Romans is amazing), I had some time to try to figure out what's going on in my classes, made biscuits and gravy for supper and had apple pie a la mode for dessert, got to relax and enjoy God's amazing creation on Covered Drive, had an amazing small group that was hugely encouraging for all of us, checked my voice mail and found out I have an interview with GS engineering, called Anthony for probably over the 20th time and he finally answered!, and as I was writing this Chris walked in with my Buck multi-tool that he found while looking for his cell phone in the 'bottomless pit' known as the gold couch, now I get to talk with my sister online, and if I weren't so excited right now I might be able to get a reasonable amount of sleep for the first time in a month. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away and he certainly was in a giving mood for me today. Now I just have to remember to say "Blessed be the name of the Lord" when he takes away as well, and remember that joy, joy, joy, joy down in my heart to stay. | | |
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