diving in

here's a piece from a couple years ago. An interesting time indeed. I'll do some analysis later.

I often think I’ve gotten in too deep. I cannot handle everything God is showing me. My heart is too wicked and the pain in the world is too great. If I am looking at it and not seeing God’s goodness I am beyond despair. I feel completely out of control sometimes. I can do nothing to change how I am thinking and how I am acting. I fear the damage my wicked heart can do. I tell God often to kill me because I am beyond hope. I would rather be dead than hurt others. But I’m still here.

Long ago I decided my life mission was to do more good than harm to this world. I figured the world keeps getting worse, so on average everyone does more harm than good. I tell God to kill me now if that’s true with me. But I’m still here.

I realize I can do no good at all, but the amount of evil I can accomplish is limitless. Only God can do good through me. And I don’t know how He uses a heart this bent on evil. But I’m still here.

I can’t stop praying. I’m a slave. The more I seek God, the worse I realize I am, the more desperate I get. I beg Him to change me. I have no difficultly believing he has forgiven my past. I know he has forgiven every future sin as well. But if there is any possible way to avoid such acts, I must find it. I don’t want to harm anyone. I want to help everyone.

What do I believe? Is the world really as lost as I think it is? Is it really my job to help them see that? Are my words really going to make things better? Won’t I just crush and discourage all the fragile hearts around me? Am I crazy to never settle with where we are now? Am I living the way I should? Why am I so alone in this lifestyle? Is that God talking or me idealizing? Why would I even know how to idealize if the ideals weren’t possible? Why would God let me think in such terms if that wasn’t what He wanted me to strive for? Where is line between being content with our current effort and pressing for more?

Everything I read in His book comes to life when I apply and live it. I gain a whole new understanding. I think of those who question the accuracy and authority of the Bible and who try to find answers in research of the text. I laugh at them. How can you really know it and understand it if you haven’t lived it? That’s like me reading and researching about marriage and claiming I am an expert on it without ever being in a relationship. I will never understand it until I experience it.

It’s impossible not to believe anymore. My encounters with God are too amazing. I would have to be insane if He didn’t exist. Sometimes I wish I were. Sometimes I am stretched too far, sometimes it hurts too terribly, sometimes I long too much. It becomes so intense that it ceases to be real. I enter a whole new world, but I can’t really be there.

I read the scriptures and I relate to the stories. But I can read through 40 years of time in 5 minutes. I can watch a movie and live through 10 years of waiting in 30 minutes. Yet in my life I must wait for time to go by at its true pace. Joseph sitting in prison for years waiting and wondering if some crazy destiny will come true seems easy when I read about it. But when waiting a mere five months for my destiny to come true seems like eternity, I wonder how he ever survived. Sometimes a day seems like forever. How many times did Joseph question if God was really there, if he was really part of this great plan? I have seen thousands of signs and reminders of God watching over me, but I continue to doubt any of this is real. I know there will never be a sign big enough. I will always wonder until the dream comes true. How will I ever last? What will prevent me from turning away from Him? How can I make it another day?

I’ve only been truly alive for 5 months. How did I ever make it five months? I’ve been counting the time down by minute. It feels like 20 years. It feels like forever. How can it go so slow?

I am now what I always believed I should be. I was always too afraid. Now I only fear God. Previously, I thought I was looking for things that I will never find, so I looked with apprehension. One day I found something. Everything instantly changed. My dreams and desires became real.

Then it left. Was it even here?

I have to believe it was. I have to believe it will return. I have to believe I have a destiny. I have to believe I can sense where God is sending me. I have to follow. I have to see where it gets me. It’s the only way I will ever know. I can’t let anything stop me. I have to act like I believe it all.

And so I go. I have never felt so vulnerable. I have never tried before. I have never given it my all. I never knew what to do. Last year, I wrote in my journal that I could not quit because I would have to be doing something first. The time is here. I am no longer waiting to move.

I am still waiting for answers. I am still waiting for destinies to be fulfilled.

I can’t fail. Everything I ever believed is wrong if I do. I will be left with nothing. I will never be able to understand what to do. If everything blows up in my face and I am left with no answers, I would see only too options at that time, suicide or abandonment. I would either end it all or I would chase after every desire I ever had, no longer trusting God could get me there, no longer believing I could understand God. It would all have been make believe. I would fear nothing. I would be ruthless in my pursuits of personal pleasure.

Do I really believe that? Sometimes. Maybe that’s just the mindset I need to push me forward.

No! It’s a lie. It’s must be. Believing it makes me feel trapped. I should feel free.

Has not God been there for me every time in the past? Will He not be there now? Will He not give me enough understanding to go on, to keep chasing Him? Does He not know exactly what I need? Is He not good? Do I really have that much control over my own life?

I will be fine. My life is far from dull and boring. At some point, maybe it will feel less exciting than the movies again. Maybe it won’t.

1.7.04