Life can be confusing and people can be straight up cray cray (a saying the hipsters are using these days for, "crazy")...can't we!?
I dedicate this post to all the little tikes out there...the 10 and younger crowd...just trying to figure things out. I hear you little man...its not easy to understand the females around you - we are complicated- and little buddy, from what I hear from the grown-up boys....it doesn't get much easier :-/
And to the little ladies...oh sweet girl, if I could say one thing to you, it would be to: guard your heart. You may not understand how important that is until someone takes it, messes with it, then gives it back to you in an almost unrecognizable condition :-/ but trust me...later you will understand what the scripture means when it calls your heart, "the wellspring of life."
Not that I think there are young kiddos who are out there actually reading my blog instead of playing barbies or mastering the video game, Halo....but maybe I'm just speaking to the little ones in us all. Or maybe us "grown-ups" are all just still tryin' to figure things out too.
Ever wonder why its just so refreshing when you are listening to a comedian or a preacher and they seem to be expressing the very thoughts that go through your head...the thoughts that you believed only did their drive-by's in your brain? It's one of my favorite feelings...when someone understands me without me having to explain me. I think because I long to know God on this level. I want to be walking along in life and then when something ridiculous happens, to be able to just glance up and smirk at the one who has known my every thought and moment and just gets it...gets why the thing is funny...or why its devastating...or why it makes me sobb or laugh so hard that I can't breath.
Its like that friend who, while you are both in a crowded room, you can look over at them...and the expression on your face gives voice to the thoughts in your head without you even making a peep. I think that is my love language...being understood. Okay, so maybe it's not one of the 5 denoted by the author, Gary Chapman, in his book...but I feel so strongly about it that I may just write and try to persuade him to do a revised version....adding my new language....and then maybe including my name on the front cover ;-)
Maybe that is one reason I can get frustrated with God sometimes. He is not easily figured out. Not that I don't like a challenge, but my favorite day is one where I have clearly communicated my heart and someone just got it..or vice versa. Harmony in communication. It's a lovely paradise where I like to set up my hammock and stay a while...and sip a nice drink with an umbrella in it :-)
I have a friend who recently began a new relationship. Though this particular guy was not someone she originally thought she'd be with, when I got the chance to see them together...I thought, "wow, what a breath of fresh air for my friend." Her Mom even thought so. She told me that she could see that he just, "got her," in a way that no one had. And THAT is saying something, because she is a complicated girl; a multi-faceted lady who often describes herself as a kite who needs a man that could hold on to the end of the string to make sure she doesn't drift off too far....to keep her grounded. From what I've seen, her man seems to be a good kite flyer...letting her soar, but grounding the string when the wind of her emotions wants to take her to reach the unknown people groups in Timbuktu. Don't get me wrong...it's an honorable desire to want to reach lost people groups...but maybe its not EVERYONE'S calling to move to a third-world country EVERY TIME someone mentions one. Woah! In my research to figure out how to spell "Timbuktu," I found out that it is actually a REAL place!? Did anyone know that!? It is in West Africa on the edge of the Sahara Desert! COME ON! Not everyone besides me knew that, right!? I decided that I'm going to go there someday for my honeymoon....just so that when people ask where we have decided to go...I can say, "A little place called, Timbuktu!" I mean it sounds like a lovely vacay spot ;-)
Hmmm....the things I learn from blogging.
Anyway, I can relate to this friend. Maybe many of us can. I need someone to let me be adventurous and take risks with God, while at the same time...lovingly make me wear one of those leash backpacks that you see the prone to wander kids wearing at the mall.....for when I tend to say things like, "I think we should sell everything we have and move to Timbuktu because that MUST have been a sign from God that I found out it is a REAL place!!!!??" Woah...leash it up, girlfriend.
I'm sure God does this with us when we get cray cray sometimes. I have to believe He has protected me from some disastrous situations that seemed like great ideas while they were floating around in irrational girl emotion inside of me...and yet there are some that He has purposefully let me fly my kite right into...only to return to Him all ripped up and stuck in a tree...and usually thinking...."Yo...I could've used a SIGN that this wasn't the best wind to take, God!" Then He probably smiles...repairs my kite...and shortens the string a bit, to protect me of course....'cause I ain't no cat with nine lives...I'm a Dora the Explorer kite who tends to set sail beside large trees or in hurricane-force winds. He knows what's up.
Sometimes, when I come to the end of a blog post, I think....woah, where the heck did that come from, and then I usually end up changing the title to make it relevant to my rant :-)
He's a good God...but He ain't afraid to let you get a good paddlin' sometimes, for your own good.
He disciplines the ones He loves.
Job puts it well, "Though He slay me, I will hope in Him. Nevertheless, I will argue my ways before Him." haha I love that! Job's like....Okay, He let me get the crap beat out of me for His name's sake...and I am still going to love Him and hope in Him....but I'm probably not going to stop asking, WHY!!?? :-)
Probably stuck in a tree somewhere,
Julie
