There's no way of dancing or prancing or hopping around the bush with this subject.
Fact is: I went to church last night and I liked it. No, correction - I loved it.
People get too touchy on this subject. The subject of religion, belief in God and the love of fellowship.
I mean, if you were to dye your hair purple and someone laughed at you and asked why you did it, you'd shrug it off and defensively say 'Because I like it.' Why can't it be like that with Jesus? Why is there a stigmata upon those who choose to have a belief and follow their moral compass? Take a trip across the water from any modern western culture to somewhere like Italy where everybody is a religious fruit-loop. They'd consider you an outsider if you didn't believe in God and go to church.
Proverbs 13:20 says:
'He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.'
Basically comes back to the idea that you become like the people you associate with. If you constantly associate with non-Christians then naturally, your walk with God will become more like a delayed picnic in the park that you have no intention of organising. However, if you surround yourself with like-minded people who live out their beliefs and worship God with what they said and how they act then you're more likely to draw closer to God because you're surrounded by good influences. The same goes for partners,
2 Corinthians 6:14 says:
'Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship
hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light
with darkness?'
This teaches us not to have the most important person in our life a non-believer. At the end of the day, who are you most likely to follow and become like? God, or the man/woman that you love? He should be the biggest part of our life, we should be able to share Him with the person we love the most. If you were to surround yourself by the general populace, 9 times out of 10 the chances are you won't get a convicted Christian as a spouse but a sceptical atheist.
It's not until I lived a lonely life and had contact with only people of the world that I realised just how far from Jesus I'd gotten. My solution had been to turn to alcohol to temporarily blur the issues I had instead of opening a bible and handing them over to God. To find peace, the comfort of my Saviour beats any crude jokes my colleagues could spit at me to take my mind off issues. I need to realise that I cannot solve my problems, only God can.
I have to find my way back. I know in my heart, my being, that I'm not right with God and I know that it's not a change I can make overnight. I'm fully aware that I might stumble every day and choose the world over Him, but he deserves that I try.
It can only be described as a miracle that I met some people last night who took me under their wing in an excessively large social situation and showed me what it was like to have a normal conversation and be happy, smart, everyday people that still had the undying faith in our Lord. I hope I don't isolate myself again in a tiny room in my head with the devil nitpicking at every good thought that comes to me.
Excuse the confusing analogy's, excessive rambling and cliche epiphany's. I like it that way.
Sunday 2 June 2013
Wednesday 15 May 2013
Lost In Translation
The votes have been cast, counted and called out. Sometimes
decisions are ours to make, sometimes they’re not. Other times you get to make
a partial choice as part of a group, voicing your opinion anonymously. In the
matter of family decisions, the large life-changing ones for more than one
person, the decision made is most often than not based on the members you most
care about and not necessarily yourself. Later on in life we may regret these
decisions because it was the beginning of the end for ourselves, or we may be
proud of the choices that we made, seeing the benefits that have come from
them.
Personally, for most of my life I haven’t stood up for what I want, but rather stayed quiet, letting the leader or majority take the role of decision maker. Whether it was because I was too young or lacked the confidence, I don’t regret staying quiet and keeping out of the situation or agreeing with whomever because I see clearly now the outcomes of those situations and the life-changing lessons my whole family has learned from them (whether good or bad). Everything in life happens for a reason. Whether it be our reasoning or God’s, it happens. All we can do is learn from the past, accept the present and look forward to the future with as much childish enthusiasm as possible, praying that God will bring good things our way.
I face a dilemma now, less than 2 weeks away from my birthday, to make a choice. I have ample time to make this decision but it doesn’t make it any easier. As we all know, time flies. I look into the big black unknown abyss in front of me, wondering what every person feels at one stage or other in their life – uncertainty. I have no clue at all what is the right decision and what is the wrong one. Being an over-thinker I take every scenario possible and run it through a million possible outcomes. The problem is that thinking over it doesn’t bring me to the right conclusion like a mathematical equation would, but rather more turmoil and uncertainty than before.
All that I can reassure myself with is that there is no wrong or right choice, merely different ones. Whatever I believe to be right is what I must run with.
The first step now is to identify the choices I can make, then discover which one sounds best.
My brain is empty, yet so full. Somewhere along the line my heart and my head got lost in translation. I wish our lives had a Rosetta Stone.
Personally, for most of my life I haven’t stood up for what I want, but rather stayed quiet, letting the leader or majority take the role of decision maker. Whether it was because I was too young or lacked the confidence, I don’t regret staying quiet and keeping out of the situation or agreeing with whomever because I see clearly now the outcomes of those situations and the life-changing lessons my whole family has learned from them (whether good or bad). Everything in life happens for a reason. Whether it be our reasoning or God’s, it happens. All we can do is learn from the past, accept the present and look forward to the future with as much childish enthusiasm as possible, praying that God will bring good things our way.
I face a dilemma now, less than 2 weeks away from my birthday, to make a choice. I have ample time to make this decision but it doesn’t make it any easier. As we all know, time flies. I look into the big black unknown abyss in front of me, wondering what every person feels at one stage or other in their life – uncertainty. I have no clue at all what is the right decision and what is the wrong one. Being an over-thinker I take every scenario possible and run it through a million possible outcomes. The problem is that thinking over it doesn’t bring me to the right conclusion like a mathematical equation would, but rather more turmoil and uncertainty than before.
All that I can reassure myself with is that there is no wrong or right choice, merely different ones. Whatever I believe to be right is what I must run with.
The first step now is to identify the choices I can make, then discover which one sounds best.
My brain is empty, yet so full. Somewhere along the line my heart and my head got lost in translation. I wish our lives had a Rosetta Stone.
Thursday 14 March 2013
How Am I Gonna Be An Optimist About This?
Things in life happen for a reason. Supposedly.
We're faced with choices everyday. Usually they're basic choices - eg. to do the dishes or not to do the dishes. However small or large they may be, some of us (or in fact a majority of us) prefer not to have to make those decisions. The small choices we make can impact not just the here and now but also the future. If you don't do the dishes now and you have unexpected guests turn up, they won't have a clean coffee cup to drink out of so now they're drinking espresso coffee out of a teapot. Classy. The upside of not having made that decision is you have an excuse or someone to blame. When you make the choice consciously there's no one to fall back on but yourself. Why aren't there any mugs? Because you were too lazy to turn off Desperate Housewives and give them a scrub. Let's face it, daytime television? Ridiculously dramatic and unfortunately enthralling.
Children love to make decisions. It gives them power. What to wear today? The bright pink leotard! They feel happy knowing they chose the red cordial over water. Little do they care that it's actually PE at school today and they will tear their tutu or that they have a maths test in an hour and the red cordial drained their brain cells something shocking in the playground, assisting them in failing the 2+2 quiz.
We all want the power, but none of us want the responsibility. How many times have you heard a self absorbed teenager saying 'But I'm willing to live with the consequences of my actions dad! Just let me go to the party!'
I made a decision not too long ago. It was the most difficult decision I've ever had to make and even harder to live with. I realised at the time that I might well regret it in the future, but I couldn't bear it at the time and so I did what I thought was right even though it greatly hurt me and the man involved. I look back now and think to myself what a stupid girl I was and how I should have just sucked it up and stopped being so afraid, but it's easy to think that when the memory of the emotions felt is somewhat dampened.
I believe I made the right decision for me at that point in time and I think it might have been good for him in the long run too... but it hurts regardless. I lost my best friend that day, the one I wanted to spend forever with. In my head, he is my forever.
He may have had his faults, but I have mine too. If he accepted me, why couldn't I accept him? I don't believe that two people have ever been so perfect for each other and yet so poisonous.
I'm on a new path now - a path of living with the consequences of my actions. Every year, every day, growing older and hopefully wiser comes with it's equal share of pain and guilt. I'll never know what could have been, but I grieve for what I've missed, because it was the only time I've felt so happy and I know it was his happiest time too.
No matter how much we tell our children not to grow up too quick, we can't make them listen, just like I never listened. When times like these hit, there's no going back and the long road of life kicks you in the guts.
The pain may last a long time, it may last forever, but there's no point dwelling on it. Feel it, and let it go. It's easier said than done, but I'm gonna try.
We're faced with choices everyday. Usually they're basic choices - eg. to do the dishes or not to do the dishes. However small or large they may be, some of us (or in fact a majority of us) prefer not to have to make those decisions. The small choices we make can impact not just the here and now but also the future. If you don't do the dishes now and you have unexpected guests turn up, they won't have a clean coffee cup to drink out of so now they're drinking espresso coffee out of a teapot. Classy. The upside of not having made that decision is you have an excuse or someone to blame. When you make the choice consciously there's no one to fall back on but yourself. Why aren't there any mugs? Because you were too lazy to turn off Desperate Housewives and give them a scrub. Let's face it, daytime television? Ridiculously dramatic and unfortunately enthralling.
Children love to make decisions. It gives them power. What to wear today? The bright pink leotard! They feel happy knowing they chose the red cordial over water. Little do they care that it's actually PE at school today and they will tear their tutu or that they have a maths test in an hour and the red cordial drained their brain cells something shocking in the playground, assisting them in failing the 2+2 quiz.
We all want the power, but none of us want the responsibility. How many times have you heard a self absorbed teenager saying 'But I'm willing to live with the consequences of my actions dad! Just let me go to the party!'
I made a decision not too long ago. It was the most difficult decision I've ever had to make and even harder to live with. I realised at the time that I might well regret it in the future, but I couldn't bear it at the time and so I did what I thought was right even though it greatly hurt me and the man involved. I look back now and think to myself what a stupid girl I was and how I should have just sucked it up and stopped being so afraid, but it's easy to think that when the memory of the emotions felt is somewhat dampened.
I believe I made the right decision for me at that point in time and I think it might have been good for him in the long run too... but it hurts regardless. I lost my best friend that day, the one I wanted to spend forever with. In my head, he is my forever.
He may have had his faults, but I have mine too. If he accepted me, why couldn't I accept him? I don't believe that two people have ever been so perfect for each other and yet so poisonous.
I'm on a new path now - a path of living with the consequences of my actions. Every year, every day, growing older and hopefully wiser comes with it's equal share of pain and guilt. I'll never know what could have been, but I grieve for what I've missed, because it was the only time I've felt so happy and I know it was his happiest time too.
No matter how much we tell our children not to grow up too quick, we can't make them listen, just like I never listened. When times like these hit, there's no going back and the long road of life kicks you in the guts.
The pain may last a long time, it may last forever, but there's no point dwelling on it. Feel it, and let it go. It's easier said than done, but I'm gonna try.
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