Oreo Cake for Bible Study

This is just me procrastinating those papers again :S Two of them are due tomorrow. 
BUT! I wrote 4/5 pages on one of them. And the other... well, it'll only take 20 minutes. And the last one, well, I'll be pushin it. Heh. 


BUT! Anyways! Tonight, my roommate and I were scrambling for snack ideas (We do this almost every week) and She had oreos and I had cake mix.. So! What did we make?? OREO CAKE!!

I happened to have a cake mold shaped like a rose, so we used it... just for fun

Home-made frosting with crush oreos in it made it pretty!

Annnnd they ate it. WOot!

Looks Good huh?? I think it probably was. Obvs I couldn't eat it.. (they really need to come out with gluten free oreos or something) but it was fun to make. Also gave me something to blog about while I procrastinate these papers some more. Hehe... well, that's all I got. Yep... back to papers. 

Looking Forward to Summer

Right now I should be working on one of my three papers that are due this week or editing a scholarship essay for my brother, but, today I cannot find any desire to read over my sociology research on the 1% or global inequality, nor do I have any desire to recount all my experiences volunteering this past semester at the moment either. 
 I don't feel particularly inclined to read my history book on Deaf in America or edit the scholarship essay (Sorry, Kit! I promise I'll have it done before supper.) I suppose I could be filling out my Americorp application online... again.. (It keeps erasing itself as I go along)..but I don't feel particularly motivated in that direction either. 


But! I'm not being completely lazy today! I cleaned my kitchen! And By that I mean I scrubbed the counters down til my nail polish flaked off and the dishes were well scrubbed as well as the sink cleaned out and shined. The trash was taken out and the recycling organized in the kitchen closet. I also organized the nightmarish tupperware cupboard and scrubbed down the stovetop. The floor is swept, the rugs shooken (shaken?) out and the cabinets and walls received a good washing as well. 


Today I just felt like accomplishing tasks. Not school tasks though : ) During my kitchen cleaning frenzy I managed to make myself lunch for today and tomorrow as well as contact my future landlord and set up a time to pay a deposit and sign a lease. Oh! And I made coffee! (I didn't drink it though.. :/ )


Really, I'm just quite restless today. I want it to be summer! I'm so excited for summer! I have so many goals I want to complete and tasks I want to take on and adventures I want to start! For example, I'm quite excited to attempt to walk/run/bike 1,000 miles in 90 days. I believe this could easily be accomplished. I already know it only takes me 1 hr 45 minutes of pleasant walking to go 6 miles. And to go 1,000 miles in 90 days I would only need to fit in 12 miles a day. I could easily go 6 miles by myself in the morning and then on a pleasant walk of 6 more miles with my siblings in the evening. It would be effortless, really. 


Besides that fun goal, I'ma be working with The Bridge of Storm Lake. :D :D! I'm so excited!!! I hope to someday in the future be a licensed social worker and everything The Bridge does (God bless them) is exactly what I want to do. They love God and they serve people and work with kids. How awesome is that??? SUPER awesome!! So I have two dream jobs of my life, one is my American Dream dream job: Work in/own a coffee shop. (Probs not very realistic) And the other is my actual heart desire dream job: Serve God by serving people.... so.. basically this summer's summer job.. heaven. Hopefully I will be exhausted every day... that would be wonderful. I feel so in love with Jesus when I'm exhausted for His glory. I'm so content when that happens.


"What about when you worked at camp?" you make ask. For those of you who are aware of how last summer's exhausting summer job had me crawling on all fours bloodied and beaten across the finish line, that's a different kind of exhaustion. Exhaustion with satisfaction and joy is much different from Spiritual exhaustion and emptiness. Last summer, I was hardly aware of the presence of God as well as quite confused on what my tasks were exactly as most of my co-workers were quite concerned with finding true-love from staff of opposite gender as well as bending the rules til they broke. It was a difficult time, and that type of exhaustion is not recommended by me. 
No, I'm talking about happy exhaustion. Coming to the end of the day covered in sweat and dirt and grass stains and perhaps even bruises and scrapes knowing that what you did was a blessing to someone. Knowing that what you accomplished furthered God's Kingdom by a centimeter. You feel so satisfied and joyful in that kind of exhaustion. I look forward to it this summer! 


Also!!! This summer, I might have someone to disciple me! I've never been officially discipled before, while I have had many people intentionally invest in my life. But I'm really excited about this. My little brother was convicted on being discipled last year and he says that it's the best part of his week. I was jealous, so I decided to get someone to disciple me too. In college, I've missed so much having an older adult (Older than 30 please!) walking with the Lord and setting an example. I'm not much a fan of attending Bible studies where people my age or younger are leading. But, it's what I have for now. Im even a Bible study leader for people older than me. I'm not a fan, but God uses it and I can't complain. :)  BUT! I'm gonna get some legit walking with the Lord training this summer and I'm stoked!!


An other thing I'm looking forward to this summer are my Dad's gardens! In case you are not yet aware, I'm quite sick. While Steven Ford has been making everyone to believe he's dying, I've been battling a similar bummer thing (Not as severe or life threatening, obviously) with my own bummer intestines and I'm noticing some losses in my battle. 
So let me explain, over Winter break I realized by talking to one of my sisters who is into intestinal health that I am, in fact, gluten intolerant. Whilst doing some thinking and brainstorming and all that with some siblings, we've come to the conclusion that I/we picked a bug/bacteria when we went to China a couple years ago. Bummer right? I've had stomach issues and such over the years but I figured they were normal. (Everyone says that, I know) But, since being gluten free, I've felt quite a bit healthier than I did before. But not all the way healthier of course. I still get ulcers (one of the things I thought was normal) and I get upset stomachs and all that bummer stuff. But the thing that has me worried lately is, I think I'm losing my hair. 
I hate to admit that, of course, because, in general,  I'm a self-conscious person who would rather not people know to look for something wrong with me. But I really don't think I could avoid noticing it any more. Whilst my hair is continuing to grow in length, it is quite disturbingly less abundant than it once was. A regular hair tie is much to big for all of my hair to be gathered in one pony tail on the top of my head, which saddens me greatly as I don't think I would look very good bald. 


Bald is being a bit dramatic, but I feel like if this intestinal business of not being able to absorb proper nutrients continues, give me 5 years and I would indeed cease to have hair on the top of my head. 
So! Dad's gardens! There is a very intense diet to fix one's poor intestines and hopefully restore them to the proper health and glory. It involves no sugar, no starch, no gluten and no lactose for probably a minimum of 3 months (Probs longer for me, though). While I've been pretty careful with the things I've eaten over the last few months, it's difficult to follow it completely whilst being in college and not having time to cook every single meal. Besides, rice is cheap and easy to prepare and 1 cup will last you 2 or 3 meals at least. (Rice is a starch in case you didn't know).


So living at my parents house for the summer with full access to the North and South gardens as well as the green house to eat all the freshest vegetables I could want will make the intestinal repair diet go much easier and with much less hassle and expense. It is truly a blessing to have a father who enjoys gardening. 


Other things I look forward to this summer are, of course, friend and family weddings, time with siblings, sailing on the lake, family vacations, and all the summer partying there could ever be had. (With out alcohol of course)


 : )

My Father is the Gardener

I'm so at a loss as to where to begin this post.
For so long I have been waiting for the moment when I actually, truly, and deeply felt the love of God. I'm, in general, aware of His love but, in general, I have not felt it in a long time. 


I can look around me and see things that tell me, "Yes, of course God loves me." But at the same time, I see things and I feel like they were signs of God and that He was somewhere else.. like He had left his signs but was attending to other business around the world, other hearts, other needs, other more desperate people. For so long I have just been waiting for Him to come back. And All the while I knew that I was waiting for myself to come back to Him. 


Last fall I heard a speaker talking about creating space for God. If you make a space, He moves into it. Simple as that. And I feel like I have been making space and effort and *trying* to invite God to be near me again and for me to feel His love and His gentle touch. But I've been waiting was all it was. If you read my blog often, you'll know that I have struggled quite a bit with the thought that there is something wrong with me for my walk with God to not have joy all the time. I've thought of myself as a horrible Christian in the times that I was not over-abundant in producing the kinds of fruits that God has appointed me as a believer to produce.  I thought, "Surely there is something I'm doing wrong. Surely God must be saddened if not disappointed in how my walk is not actively producing fruit."


For so long I have guilted myself and chided myself and criticized myself for not being a good enough Christian to do the simple task of producing fruit by remaining in Christ.  On Wednesday I encountered a truth that totally blew that myth out of the water and joy has been bursting from within me. 


On Wednesday, I was given a cd to listen to that had a radio interview with a guy who wrote a book about being with God through all seasons of life. Now, life seasons is not a new concept for me. I'm in college, I feel like my life seasons are CONSTANTLY changing. Highschool season is past, freshman year awkward time season has past, sophomore year dorm room roommate drama season is over, I'm in a season of dating, Im in a season of planning to graduate... lots of seasons. 


But, the guy I listened had a different take on seasons. He was talking about our Spiritual walk and how we have our seasons of Spring awakenings and bountiful harvests and fall beauties. But the season that really got my attention was the Winter season that our souls go through. The time when we are not producing fruit or preparing for harvest or springing up new flowers and running in grassy meadows picking daisies and napping in the warm rays of the Son after swimming in a lake of grace.  


The time that Christians don't talk about because they think there is something wrong with them for not always producing fruit or bringing in a harvest. He talked about how the church places is so much emphasis on bearing fruit that when Christians encounter the Winter season, they just feel like that did something wrong and that they are bad Christians. 


This concept that I never grasped before is this: We're not perpetually in summertime, we're not perpetually in harvest. We do not perpetually bear fruit. Whaaaaat?? Not always producing/bearing fruit even though we're walking with Jesus?? How can this be??


It's almost funny that I didn't get this before because I grew up in a farming community and am the daughter of an agricultural engineer.  I've lived in Iowa my whole life and have experienced 20 winters. I've watched the leaves fall of the trees and the snow and ice and cold settle in while the day shortens and the day seems more dark than light. I've seen the fields look empty and dead. I've seen the trees look lifeless and ominous. The flowers are no where to be seen and and water in the creek no longer flows with graceful trickles on the rocks. The birds aren't there to sing and the nothing much can be heard besides the cold wind blowing across the empty fields.


 And of course all through those long, cold winters I had this hope that Spring would someday come and the grass would be green, the birds would come back to sing, the flowers would bloom, the trees would fill with green leaves and blossoms and the garden would be planted and we could look forward to 100s of watermelons and tomatoes and strawberries and other such wonderful bounties. I don't remember that I ever looked out the large window in our living room at the snow filled garden with lifeless trees all around and thought, "those trees don't have apples on them, there must be something wrong with them." 
Or "I don't see any watermelons or tomatoes growing, clearly our garden is horrible because it is not producing fruit right now."  The would have been so ridiculous! 


But, I have been chained with guilt for a while thinking, "My walk with Christ is not producing fruit, there must be something wrong." When I first hear that Christians experience a winter season that is absolutely okay to experience as well as necessary, I became fascinated and began reading scholarly journals and plant websites and other crazy science things that I would otherwise never be interested in about plants and fruit trees and the winter time. 


This is what I found, trees go through something called a "dormancy" period during the wintertime. 
I took the following from a website on fruit trees and I imagined that the trees were my own walk with God as I read it:

After fruit trees have produced a bountiful harvest in the fall, they go into a dormant period. "Dormant" means that the tree's activity slows to the point that it looks inactive. Decreases in photosynthesis occur and growth for the year effectively stops.

With the onset of cooler weather, a fruit tree will begin the process of going dormant. The first and most obvious sign is that the leaves turn from green to an autumn color and then fall off. Sap movement slows down as well. While the tree looks lifeless, it is still taking in water and nutrients, just at a much slower and reduced rate. Root and branch growth essentially stops for the dormant period but the roots do not die.

When fruit trees go dormant and the sap slows down, it's a perfect time to prune back the trees. Pruning branches during the dormant time will harm the tree the least and is easier to do than if the tree were full of thick leafy branches. During a fruit tree's dormant period, trim off any diseased, dead or overlapping branches. This will strengthen the tree and allow new spring growth to start unhindered. Also, it prepares the tree for heavy winter storms by eliminating branches that may not be structurally sound enough to support snow or ice.

That is such a big deal. There is so much freedom in KNOWING that it's okay to not be producing fruit all the time. Especially since I'm a Bible study leader, I just have felt this great pressure to be always in a state of harvest and joy and spiritual summertime. When I don't feel like I'm there at a state of fruit and harvest and joy and summertime, I've felt like I've had to mask it by seeming like I'm there because as a leader, I just be spiritually healthy all the time. 
What I didn't know that it *IS* spiritually healthy to not be producing fruit sometimes. To not be happy clappy in love with Jesus all the time. It's okay as long as it's not because I'm apathetic in my walk or neglecting Jesus all together. 


I think its a big deal that God uses our wintertimes to cut back on the things we don't need and to prune us to be part of a greater harvest later on. It hurts less to be pruned when we're in a state of winter. :) Doesn't that make you happy?? It makes me happy! It makes me hopeful and joyful and free. 

John 15

The Vine and the Branches

 ¹ “I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. ² He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. ³ You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. ⁴ Remain in me, as I also remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

   ⁵ “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. ⁶ If you do not remain in me, you are like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. ⁷ If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. ⁸ This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.

   ⁹ “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. ¹⁰ If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. ¹¹ I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. ¹² My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. ¹³Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command.¹⁵ I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. ¹⁶ You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you. ¹⁷ This is my command: Love each other.

So, my dear friends who may also be going through a wintertime/may be entering into a time of winter, there is NOTHING wrong with it. And there is so much hope! SO much hope! It's a necessary part of your faith to walk through the blizzard and have your branches trimmed back. Spring is coming, just wait and rest. 

"In all this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls." ~1 Peter 1:6-9

The Sword in the Heart of Stone

Psalm 6:3
"My soul is in deep anguish. How long, LORD, how long?"

Psalm 25:16-18

  "Turn to me and be gracious to me,
   for I am lonely and afflicted.  
Relieve the troubles of my heart
   and free me from my anguish. 
 Look on my affliction and my distress
   and take away all my sins."


I've realized that a lot of my blog posts lately have been inspired by discouragement and generally turn out to be venting post and long rants of bitterness and bad attitude. I often feel a little shame when my readers offer me their encouragement because a lot of things they say are things I should just know. I always really appreciate the encouragement I receive, though, because I'm a words of affirmation person and everything people say to me seems to be exactly what I need to hear. (So thank you to all who respond with encouraging words). 


I wish I could say that since that realization I've come to a point in my walk with Jesus where I have put an unfailing trust in Him and surrendered all my bitterness and discouragement to Him. I'm not there yet, but my hope is that what ever is written will end on a more hopeful note than hopeless. 


However, I do plan on being as transparent and honest as I can because I have a very imperfect relationship with Christ but it is my hope that it will perhaps inspire others to be open and transparent as well. The last kind of person anyone wants to meet is a Christian who tries to act like they've got it all figured out and have their life perfectly together but is inwardly a total train wreck. Hopefully my readers can find encouragement in my road marked with suffering though there is pain in the offering. 


Lately I have felt very much like King David from the Old Testament when he would write out his Psalms of anguish and despair and would be begging God to come to his rescue. I can totally relate to his desperate cries of "Where are you?" and "How long are you gonna take?"  


I took a wounding early on this week. A deep wounding that touched places in my heart that I didn't even know were there. It really shouldn't even have been a big deal, perhaps if I was trusting God more it would only have been a small prick and would have passed quickly. Even now it's as fresh a wounding as it was when it first happened. I've been praying that God would relieve my distress and take the pain away, but it's still there. Sometimes I wonder if it's okay to be angry about it. But I'm quite convinced that the only reason it still hurts as much as it does is my fault and God will perhaps do something about it after I have a more trusting attitude. And if I'm being completely honest, I don't like myself for not having a more trusting attitude. Sometimes I like to think myself a true follower of Jesus. But if I truly followed, wouldn't I truly trust as well?


When I read over my own thoughts, though, it doesn't sound right to me. People tell me all the time that God will meet you where you are, no matter the circumstance,and He will provide comfort. I've also been taught that I have a now God. That if I call out when I'm sinking like Peter did, then immediately Jesus will reach out His hand like He did for Peter. But I've been asking for His hand and I don't feel it yet. 


But, I watched an Andy Stanley sermon on pivotal circumstances God uses to grow our faith and he told the story of when Jesus didn't show up for Lazarus being sick when Mary and Martha asked him to come. And then when he did show up, he stood there and cried for a bit. I never really thought of that before... I would have been ticked probably if I was Mary or Martha. 


Ticked because it was an unnecessary and deep wounding. It would double hurt because they had to sit there and watch their brother die at the same time they were sitting there waiting for Jesus to show up, who didn't until their brother was dead and they experienced the pain of losing a brother. Sometimes it's really hard not to be mad at the fact you got hurt. 
Of course Jesus said he did all that for the faith of the disciples and people watching. Of course Jesus healed the wound and brought Lazarus back. And God used Mary and Martha's wound to grow the faith of others... but I don't imagine that Mary or Martha much enjoyed that hence them being a little mad and irritated when Jesus did show up.


But then, there's the part where you have to trust Jesus, too. I don't think about this very much, but it's pretty amazing that God doesn't get ticked off at how many times He is unnecessarily hurt. I mean, there's a lot of times He asks us to show up to stuff and we say 'no'. People tell us it's okay to say 'no', it just means God will find someone else. But haven't you ever been super deflated after realizing your person wasn't gonna show up and you needed to ask someone else to do it? 


One of my biggest problems (at least I've been told it's a problem) is that my tendency is to heap guilt on myself when things go wrong. But in all honesty, I really do think that things go wrong as a result of me. Like, if I was a better person, people wouldn't do things that hurt me because they'd like me better. Or if I was a smarter person, I would get better grades. Or if I was less of a selfish person, I would be more aware of others and would be quicker to make sure they were feeling welcomed or I would be aware of what things cause them pain and wouldn't do anything to hurt them in my own want for attention. Mostly, I just wish I was better so that people wouldn't hurt me on purpose. I feel like I deserve it when people cut me down because in my head I think that there is obviously something about me that they don't like, something about me that's not good enough for them, something about me that rubs them the wrong way. If only I knew what that was, I would change it. 
I hurt people a lot too, I realized. I don't like that about me either. I do things that are inconsiderate and I miss things that I should notice. I'm not as polite as I should be, and I recycle the same jokes too much. 


And people tell me that God made me special. I've been 'special' my whole life which only translates into words like: Weird, outcast, odd, strange, different etc.
Sometimes I wish I wasn't special. Sometimes I wish I was normal. And I don't like myself for not liking myself because that's bad too. I'm supposed to think of myself as God's creation and be inspired and uplifted just knowing that God made me who I am because that's what God does.. makes people different. 


I don't like myself because I know how I should think about myself, but I can't see any reason that would make me want to. It's like that story by Max Lucado about the little Wemmick with all the dot stickers on him that goes: 

"Hmm," the maker spoke thoughtfully as he inspected the gray circles. "Looks like you've been given some bad marks." "I didn't mean to, Eli. I really tried hard." "Oh, you don't have to defend yourself to me, child. I don't care what the other Wemmicks think." "You don't?"
No, and you shouldn't either. Who are they to give stars or dots?
They're Wemmicks just like you. What they think doesn't matter, Punchinello. All that matters is what I think. And I think you are pretty special."
Punchinello laughed. "Me, special? Why? I can't walk fast. I can't jump. My paint is peeling. Why do I matter to you?"
Eli looked at Punchinello, put his hands on those small wooden shoulders, and spoke very slowly. "Because you're mine. That's why you matter to me."
Punchinello had never had anyone look at him like this--much less his maker. He didn't know what to say.
"Every day I've been hoping you'd come," Eli explained.
"I came because I met someone who had no marks."
"I know. She told me about you."
"Why don't the stickers stay on her?"
"Because she has decided that what I think is more important than what they think. The stickers only stick if you let them."

And that is why I don't like myself. Because I let the stickers stick. I'm too self absorbed to see God's love matter more. Too blinded by myself. Which is another area that I'm failing at... seeing God's love. 

But I'm a Christian.. I'm just supposed to know God's love all the time. Or something like that. Idk. 

And I have an accountability partner who knows of my discouraging wound who called me earlier to see how my heart was doing and how I felt towards God. At the time I was feeling to be on the better end of things, thinking more hopefully and feeling less wounded about it. At the time I could honestly say I was seeing how God was making me to trust. Really, I'm only trusting because it's my only option at this point. I can do nothing but trust. But trusting doesn't take the pain of it away. 

And you can comment with as many encouraging notes as you want to saying God loves me and likes me the way I am, but I already know that. I know that and I feel miserable because I don't feel it. 

I'm a feelings person. And you can chew me out for thinking my relationship with Christ is based on feelings when there's more to it that meets the eye. But i know that already. I know that in a couple weeks or months or years the hell i've been through this week won't look like anything and I'll be able to say, "God grew me through that." or "God gave me joy later." I know that. I still have Faith that God's working for my good. I have faith that God has a bigger plan. But that doesn't change what I'm going through now and this very miserable moment in my current life. 

And I know God loves me and I know that my life has touched the lives of others at some point. You don't have to tell me that or slap me on the wrist for not believing that (Though you probably want to/ might do later) but that doesn't change what I'm feeling right now. 

Honestly, I feel like I took an emotional beating this week. It started rough and everything heaped on top of that didn't help. Every little comment hurt 100 times worse because my heart has been raw for the last couple days. 

And i know you always meet those people who seem really grouchy and ready to bite your head off all the time and they say, "Well I'm just done taking crap from people." I'm not like that. I don't think I'll ever be done because I'll always be me. I will still greet people with a smile and genuinely ask after their day and respond sweetly. I will add my own jabs at myself when you jab at me or my family and play your games with me, just so you like me and think I can take a joke. I will defend my siblings a little and then give up and accept your knife and add it to my collection. I'll pray and tell Jesus my heart hurts a little and He will comfort me and help me to forgive the mean people whilst I put my own little unforgiving knife in my heart for being a person that deserved a knife in the first place. 

People are just like those stupid Wemmicks going around sticking Stars and Dots on each other that our maker tells us shouldn't matter.

But, in the game of life, it's a little more real. People aren't running around with stars and dot stickers, oh no. People are running around with knives and compliments, jabbing at your heart and stroking at your ego. Unfortunately, the compliments act more like stickers and become less sticky with time. The knives? They last forever. I mean, not FOREVER, you can have them taken out. There's a special way, though. A trick to getting the knives out actually. Most people don't know it and so they collect them and let them build up so that there are so many knives in their heart it looks like a pin cushion and there is no room for anything but pain. It's kind of like King Arthur and the sword in the stone. All the other people would tug at that sword and it wouldn't budge. But little Arthur was different... there was something about him. He was the right King. And so is Jesus... the right king whose heritage is forgiveness and it's His forgiveness that takes the sword out. It's the secret trick to all of the pain we carry, let Jesus pull it out. 


But! We're sneaky..or, our enemy is sneaky and clever and we follow suit so easily. While Jesus is plucking out the sword that someone else stuck in our little heart, the devil tells us that we deserved it, and so we craft our own little dagger and stick it in where the sword was taken from. At least, that's my problem. With Jesus' help I can forgive all the nasty people and nasty comments and mean words and heart stompings and guttings, but then I convince myself I deserved that and I sneak a knife in from my own self. And then I can't bring myself to forgive myself. I've blogged about this before. I'm stillllll fighting it. I'm still struggling to be able to forgive myself. It's not that I keep certain people in cages in my heart and take them out and beat them up sometimes..  I keep my own little self in a little cage and take myself out and beat me up. 

That's what Jesus is working on fixing in me. It's a big project and I feel like it will take a while. But I have hope that someday I will be able to like myself for who I am even though a lot of other people don't. 


Honestly, I do feel like God loves me. I do feel like I can believe that my faith will grow through the fire I'm walking through right now. I do feel like God is with me and comforting me, but some things take time. 


My one hope is that who ever reads this and feels like they've been wounded by people one too many times will place their faith in the forgiveness of Christ and let Him take some knives out. If there's anything I've learned from life up to this point is that I am not capable of forgiving people. There is nothing in my human self that makes me want to forgive a wound even if the person says they're sorry. With Jesus, though, I can forgive people and I can experience a deep healing that brings me closer to Jesus. 

That's sketchy

I used to like to sketch/ draw things a lot. I mean... I still kinda do, I just don't have time/ don't really have that much talent for it. But, the other day I found a few of my favorites that I've done in the past, and I know I've shared some on facebook before, but I thought I'd share them again. 


I've never taken any form of art lessons or anything like that, I just picked up a pencil one day and decided I like drawing. 

I call this structure the prairie house. It's the original house from our farmstead that was used in the 1800s. It now has our greenhouse attached to it so it looks a little different.. but I always thought it looked beautiful. 

This is our "White Barn" & it's biggest barn on our farm. I think it used to be a cattle barn... it seems to have some sort of milking parlor in it as well as a basket ball court on the 2nd floor. 

Another barn from the farm... I have no idea what it's original use was, but we used it for chickens once, and Dad stores his beehives in there sometimes. 

This is a wall behind my dorm building from last year. If you've never been to Quad it's really pretty. 

This is an attempt at my little brother, Kolby, being silly. A lot of people told me it looks like he's puking... he's not. 

The living room in my parent's house. 

The gazebo in the North garden. It was a little overgrown with grass at the end of the summer. 

I drew this horse one time.. just for fun.

Kind of the front view of our house. We have since expanded it and cut down trees, though. 

We always called this the hog barn... but we never had pigs and always kept our sheep in it. Now it has the baby cows. 

Now I lay me down to sleep..

Psalm 127:2
In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat— for he grants sleep to those he loves.




This verse is so true. 
For weeks,I have wanted so badly to sleep with out fear and have sweet sleep. Sleep in general would be really nice. The last couple weeks.. i don't even know how many, my sleep had not been so sweet. Every night I would procrastinate going to sleep because I knew what awaited me when I my eyes shut and I exhaustion would overtake me. 


Dreams. Not pleasant or sweet or delightful, but scary and disturbing and sad. My little brother who is nine gets bad dreams sometimes, and there was a point where I thought, "Oh yeah, he's a little kid, bad dreams happen." But now I've come to wonder if bad dreams ever do go away. Mine have come quite strongly since I've actively pursued God more. 
For the last few weeks, or months maybe, I have woken up at least once if not as many as 3 or 4 times in a night in my mind's effort to escape the terrifying images playing through my head. I would always look over at my clock to see if the night would end soon so that I wouldn't have to risk another set of disturbing dreams. It would usually start around 1am, and then 3 something and 5 something. I would always wake up tired, wishing for more sleep and then dreading what might await me in sleep. 


The more I pursued God, the more disturbing the dreams would be. Often filled with death and gruesome, distorted figures and always filled with fear. 
I have never watched horror movies or extremely violent movies on account of my sensitivity to fearful images and thoughts that don't need to be in my head. 


As a child, I often had night terrors. If that's what you want to call them, anyways. I knew they were direct demonic attacks and they happened when I was awake. There were always loud sounds, I once described the sound to my mom as a giant washing machine making loud noises but I once saw the image of a disturbing figure stirring a large black pot of evil and fear and the sound I heard was the stirring of the pot (If that makes sense). 

As I grew in my knowledge of God and began to claim His love that drives out all fear, the nightmares/terrors began to dissipate and become only a horrible memory. The only times they would return was when I would get sick and have a fever. 


I can't tell you how awful it is. Fear is one of the Devil's worst weapons and I dare say I was quite taken down by his tactics. All the while I kept telling myself it was "Just a little spiritual warfare" or "I'm just not being a good enough Christian." 
Finally, last week, I decided to put an end to it. I attended a Salt Company where the pastor challenged the students by asking them why they are Christian and what evidence do they have they there is a God. I've been challenged to think critically of my faith before, but I was convicted in my thinking that my God would not fight for me in my sleep and that the disturbing dreams would pass with time. 


That night as I did my usual procrastinating of sleeping, I decided to read my Bible and try to find the verse about God giving sleep to those he loved. I figured, if I really believed God loved me, I would have to really believe He would grant me good sleep as well. I knew where to look and found it pretty quickly, but I also came across another passage that encouraged me even more:


When you lie down, you will not be afraid;
   when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet. ~Proverbs 3:24


That was just the promise I needed to hear before letting my head hit the pillow and my eyelids shut. After reading that I asked my God to fight for me and to meet me in my dreams and give me sweet sleep. 
And somewhere in my dreams there was a gentle whisper that said, "I love you" and my sleep was indeed sweet and I slept soundly until the morning when Jesus woke me just before my alarm. 


I am quite happy to say that I have slept quite well the last whole week since then as I continue to invite Jesus to fight for me and fearless and sweet sleep. :)

That Moment When..

There's a lot of people on facebook who like to make their statuses into "That moment when..." Like, "That awkward moment when the girl next to you starts crying in the Hunger Games" or,
"That moment when you get an A on your paper" I don't know.. a lot of people do it though. I can't decide if it's annoying or funny or both.  But, since I read it all the time, I often find myself reflecting on my own little moments with the same sort of sentence structure. 


For example, last week I was thinking, "That awful moment when you return from class and realize you turned in a drafted copy of a paper worth 10% of your final grade rather than the completed copy." Yeah.. that moment makes your heart stop a little bit before your forehead gets a little moist and clammy. 
Then there was "That moment when you show up at an office 6 minutes after it closes and the nice man inside welcomes you in anyways and offers help and assistance" That was a good moment. There was a lot of joy produced from that moment. 


Or yesterday whilst taking one of the young pre-school sunday school kids to the bathroom I found myself thinking, "That moment when the little girl in the stall asks, 'can you wipe my booty?'" (I had a lot of respect for all parents and daycare workers in that moment.) 


Or one today I caught myself thinking, "That moment when a very large brown spider crawls across the floor during the sociology lecture and all the students in the front two rows are unsuccessfully trying not to laugh." or "That moment when the sociology professor almost steps on the large brown spider on the floor."  


Those kind of moments. People have them all the time, I think. They can be funny, awkward or heart warming or even really dumb ( A lot of them are). 
The thing is, learning the correct response in those moments. I'm working on that.