bare walls

There are a number of things swirling around in there right now, mostly being stirred by some new Flyleaf songs I just got today while I was Christmas shopping. I was two weeks behind on photos this morning, but now I'm caught up, and I feel better about myself- the idea that I can and WILL finish this project is a good thought to me.

I was doing some rearranging on the walls of my room earlier this afternoon, and I thought back to when I moved in seventh grade. I remembered how I was so moved by the fact that my walls were empty and white. I think I may have cried over the loneliness I felt because I had taken down all of my pictures and notes to myself. I remembered thinking the walls seemed so much closer, being bare. I think I felt a strange sort of claustrophobia without the distractions I had created and hung to look at instead of what was really there- nothing.

I'm realizing as I type this that my life, over the last year, has been stripped one thing after another of its distractions and notes and pictures. The things I used to hide behind are long gone now, and it hurts to be out in the open. I'm scared to be this exposed when I refuse to be vulnerable. I'm coming to realize that at the end of the day, my walls are bare, and there is only me and the One who created me. Because when He looks at me, He doesn't see the distractions and notes and pictures I try to hide behind. He doesn't pay attention to the things I tremble behind instead of Him.

"and all we need now is love, we've been through enough. we can't run just cause we're scared. we've come this far- we're not giving up." -flyleaf

I've been searching for something that I didn't understand was already mine.

a serious matter.

So I've found myself flirting with the idea of rejecting God over the last year. In November of last year my faith took the biggest single blow of my whole life. Since then it's been a slow, painful, confusing, sinful struggle back to God, back to trusting Him, believing in Him and just believing Him. Because of the aforementioned blow, I essentially fell apart- my friendships became divided, my schoolwork overwhelmed me to the point of leaving school, my faith life fell into decay. I realize now that one moment changed everything for me and nothing has been the same since. I'm still struggling to figure out the truth, to figure out what I want to live my life by, to figure out the kind of person I'm going to end up being on the other side of all this.

As I write this, I'm realizing that my "biggest single blow" moment is possibly my life's inciting incident- the disturbance in (what I once chose to believe was) my happy little Katie-bubble world that throws everything into an unfamiliar frenzy. I'm okay with adopting that moment as such. My best friend Elise explained to me once that people are like broken cars, and God needs to take apart everything piece by piece and lay it out- gut it completely- in order to rebuild and restore it. At the time I was not comforted by her words, but I think now it doesn't matter as much to me whether or not I'm comforted, because I think that's how it really is- and right now it's enough for me to just know that.

So much of me wants to turn my back on God. Mostly because it's really easy to do. It's a lot easier to just do things my way- well, easier to make the decision to do things my way, but my way is definitely not good for me in most cases. I know myself to be cowardly, full of excuses, fearful, irresponsible, selfish, immature, impure. I know that when I do things my way I only end up more hurt than before. And I think that for me to say I am equally as hurt by God isn't fair, or maybe isn't true rather, because I have been getting in the way of letting God teach me anything or heal me or love me. And that isn't His fault- that is a choice He has to respect because He gave me the choice to follow Him or not; He gave me free will.

I know that I have not sought God in my pain or confusion. I have not chosen Him over me in my weaknesses, in my struggles. I have not made the decision to trust Him, love Him, believe Him, rely on Him in my hurt and confusion and the frenzy that my soul has become. I've blamed Him for everything wrong in my life- every less-than-ideal circumstance I believed was His doing. And by allowing all of that untruth to become my truth, the lens I see Him through has become scratched and distorted, and He has become more and more a stranger to me. Worship songs have become more and more empty or bitter. Bible studies have become confusing and unsettling, and prayer has become an absurd divisive tool that leaves me feeling as though my friends are giving up reverent, loving prayers to no one. I have become a victim of myself. My hands have committed unspeakable acts, my thoughts brought forth destructive images and words. I have been destroying myself, each time becoming just a little more certain that God doesn't exist or at least that if He does, I do not love Him, but still feel a certain degree of self-loathing for what I know I'm doing to Him.

But I'm writing all of this because I want it to stop. I know me without God, without Jesus, without the Bible, without faith, and I am a miserable, sickened, angry, immature, blood-letting idolater. Without God, there is no point. Without God there is no goodness. Without God there is no hope of goodness- no hope that I can be a good thing to the world, to people, or to myself. I know that if I rejected God, it would be pretty much over for me. I don't know how much of a chance there would be of me going back to God if I rejected Him now. Abraham was promised crazy things- physically impossible things- yet Abraham believed God. Believed IN God, yes, but more importantly Abraham BELIEVED God. Not just that God could do impossibly awesome things, but that He would- because He promised He would. I can't say anything specific that God has promised me in my lifetime, but I know that He has promised me that I will share in His death and resurrection. He has saved me from the flames of hell- He has brought me from eternal death apart from God to eternal life with Him.

The second Adam and Eve sinned- that one moment- everything changed. Everything God intended and willed to be became subject to the law of sin and death. But the moment Jesus sacrificially died for every single person who has ever lived, everything we had ever done was covered in His blood- His wounds providing us with life. He conquered sin and death, so that we could become one with Him through the Holy Spirit, enabling us to participate in His resurrection with Him.

I think I'm finally starting to understand what being a Christian is about. Why people make the decision to love Him too. I'm starting to understand what it means to be a Christian. I'm starting to see why people praise Him, why people are able to change their lives around because of what He has done and will do because He loves us, because He created us, because we belong to Him, because we're HIS. It's been a long time since I've believed there was a point to it all, but I'm starting to see it again- starting to see that God has a plan, and I need to get with it. I need to get off the fence, pick a side, and stick to it. Because marriage is about sticking to it. And if Jesus is essentially asking me to marry Him, then I better start thinking about things in terms of marriage. What a great mystery He is. I've strayed and hurt Him, but He still loves me and wants more than anything to work it out. I can't out-sin His grace. He will always win. Love will always win.