Day 7: It didn't take long...

Dear God,
     I'm sorry that I didn't spend any time with you today. I say that I'm busy; I say that I'm tired; I say that I have to do something else first. Lord, it makes me so thirsty. Not having time with you gives me hunger pains somewhere deep inside. I know that you have already forgiven me. Sometimes things happen that you just can't help and I might not always see you; but today was not like that. Today I didn't give you my all. I didn't look for you that hard. And now I'm tired and internally parched. Lord, be with me tonight and tomorrow as I try to go back into your presence. I do love you. I know that I don't act like it lots of times, but I do. And I miss you when it feels like your not close by. Sorry.

Day 6: Learning from Dogs and Kids

     Tonight while I was taking the dog out, he saw something or heard something that bugged him. He got a little tense and was staring intently into the yard a few houses down watching for whatever it was. I didn't see anything. I squatted down to his level and looked in the direction he was looking but there was nothing there that I could see. While I was looking, he came over and sat between my legs. He was still watching but he started to relax. He looked up at me and licked my neck and did his little anxious foot-stomp if my hand wasn't on him. We just sat there in the moonlight for a second. I'm amazed that dogs ask for you to touch them. Every dog in my family does it. They'll sit next to you (or on you) and look back at you pleading. So you give in and pet them, but, as soon as you take your hand away, they look up at you, stomp their feet anxiously, and nuzzle your hand. When they know you love them, they don't want you to take your hand off of them. Children also are constantly wanting affection. They want to sit in your lap, hold you hand, have you pick them up and carry them around, even if they don't know a lot about you. They don't need to know very much before they start loving you and wanting you to love them back. And when it's time to leave, there are always tears because they didn't have enough time with you.
     It feels so good to have my dog come to me and sit at my feet wanting me to pet him, and to have one of my little cousins curl up in my lap just resting there and wanting to spend time with me. I can't keep my arms from hugging them. Shouldn't this be how it is with God? He loves it so much when we come to Him and rest in His arms just wanting to be with Him and feel Him love us. And shouldn't we come to Him just like children, beginning to love Him and wanting to feel Him love us back? And shouldn't there be sadness when we can't spendenough time with our Father? So many times I feel like I'm living under His shadow, trying to push through my day knowing that He's there watching and wanting this or that for me, not because He's a tyrant but because I know what He expects of me and want to do my best for Him. I need to remember to spend time with my Father just letting Him love me, resting in Him and learning to love Him back.

Day 5: Evidence

     Today was fun but busy. My grandma had put all the family photos, trinkets, recipes, files, memorabilia, newspaper clippings, and crafting supplies in her back room. You could barely walk back there. Today my aunt, mom, sister, and I helped her clean it out, or at least begin to. We began sorting through furniture and personal mementos tossing out brochures, expired coupons, and broken or useless items as we went. There were dozens of boxes of photo albums, old family documents,  and magnetic audio recordings (the kind that have magnetic tape wrapped around a spool which you hook onto the machine). It was hard for me to feel God's amongst all that distraction and busyness. It was more like seeing the evidence of Him - where he had been (or since God doesn't inhabit time...is? 0_o). A fingerprint here, a footprint there, left behind as evidence of a previous work. One box had family Bibles with bookmarks and bulletins in there pages, as well as Bible commentaries and devotionals. Some members of my family wanted to learn about God and bought those books to find out more because it was important to them. It made me feel good looking at the old bulletins and thinking about what might have happened at church that day, whether or not they knew that God was there with them. Someone had also made a book of paper between painted wood planks. Adhered to the pages were envelopes with baby announcements in them going back nearly 70 years. Someone had collected all these cards and made a book to put them in - there were "new arrival" announcements for people who had died before I was born! I got such a weird feeling looking through it. My great-grandma Hatcher had woven dozens of crosses with yarn. I don't know why she did it exactly. Was it because she loved God that much and wanted to share it? I was so young when she died that I didn't get a chance to know her that well. She gave most of them away I think. We only found a bag of ones that she was working on when she died. My great-grandpa, George Haworth, also died while I was young, but I got to know him a little bit better. He didn't go to church that often from what I hear. I'm pretty sure that he was saved, but I guess he just didn't do church that much. My mom remembers when she was very little sitting in church with Grandpa George on Sundays when he did go to church. She would play with his keychain - a silver, jointed fish. Grandma found it today and Mom took it home. She says that it's the only thing of his she's ever wanted and it's the only thing of his she has. God's fingerprints are all over my family. Whether they've seen them or not I don't know. But none of them can deny that He's been there, and I dare them to try.

Day 4: (yawn)

      Today was tough. I was stressed about my lesson tonight. Wednesdays are always really stressful. I'm mentally and emotionally exhausted. I do love Wed. night church, though. I can really see how everyone is growing. I like teaching, although I need to learn how to do it better. I see God working in me and others at church. Sometimes I'm distracted, and I don't see it as much as believe it. But God has shown that He is always there in some way. I hope that people listened tonight and saw that God wants to be there with them. Soooo tired....-.-

Day 3: Where are you?

     I'm liking waking up every morning and wondering where I'll see God and what He will say to me that day. Where was He today? I'm not sure. Maybe I just wasn't looking hard enough. I did think about Him a lot today. I'm teaching tomorrow about the Holy Spirit and the love that He gives us for each other. How can I possibly explain such a thing as perfect love? I don't even understand it properly; I don't know how to love like that. Jesus is the only example we have of a human living God's perfect love. That's why we need help from the Spirit to do it. I'm just praying that the Holy Spirit will speak and keep me on track.
     Also, today I was on a Bible study website and someone had posted a link to their blog. This person is an atheist and, for reasons I do not know, has decided to read the entire Bible in a year. He or she is over halfway through Ezekiel. This person does not understand what he or she is reading and is scoffing and chiding all the way through it because of pre-existing beliefs. Even though comments abound explaining the different passages, this atheist blows each one off. I hope when this atheist gets to the New Testament, everything will come together and make more sense. Reading just a few of this person's posts made me feel sick. Not disgusted sick so much as sad sick. To think that there are so many people like that out there, and I don't know who they are or how to help them. Many of them I can't help. I don't know why they would ever listen to me - about anything. [But perhaps that's a stereotype I should get rid of; it doesn't sound like something the Spirit would say]. I was really upset about it. A little later on, I thought that God must feel the same way - even more so - when people mosey through life thinking that they have it all reasonably figured out, a good handle on things, and sometimes taking pride in the fact that they do. I can't fully imagine what that is like for God. I only know what He indicates in His Word. 
     Although nothing today stood out as being directly of God, He always finds a way to invade my day through my thoughts or other things. It's like that song "Can't Get Away" by Rush of Fools. YouTube it.

Day 2: Your joy is my strength...

     God did not give me a revelation today, but I'm still amazed at how He speaks, sometimes so subtly. In the last several months, the Holy Spirit has spoken little whispers that have brought me to God when I was filled with so much negative. He's spoken before, but I didn't know that it was Him. Then one day when I was really upset and knew that I had done exactly what would keep me from God, I just felt it from inside. From a place so deep inside of me that I'm not even sure where it is, the words came out. Only God could have spoken to me in that way at that time. This must be the still, small voice that the Bible talks about. I have heard Him speak other times as well. When I was guilty and ashamed, He said, "I'm sad because of you; but you are my child and I still want you." When I was discouraged and disappointed, He said, "Rejoice and be happy with Me! I'm still your God, and I will work all things to your good and My glory."
     Today, He spoke into my worry. He offered comfort. He asked for faith and worship instead of anxiety and worry. He reminded me of the blessing of my family. Lord, I hope I never stop hearing You; I hope I never get accustomed to Your voice. His joy really is my strength. He speaks it into me and it makes me rejoice with Him at all kinds of times.

Day 1: The First...

     Today's the day!!! I turn 20 and become a blogger. I had a very good birthday.


So where did I see God today? Not where I thought I would. I thought that at the beginning of this I would see God in trees or clouds or places that He displayed His majesty. But He took a different approach. Conviction. This morning in Sunday school, we discussed the Ten Commandments. While we were talking about keeping the Sabbath holy, I suddenly realized that I don't have a single day in my week that is   holy, set apart for God. I knew that Sundays weren't doing it for me, but I had never stopped to think that I was blatantly disobeying that commandment. No wonder I'm having problems, spiritual and otherwise. On Sundays I work. I teach. I volunteer. Sometimes I'm a fill-in. Sometimes I have a worship team meeting. I haven't figured out how to make this work holy, pointing me to God instead distracting me from Him. Sundays for me are about serving, getting things done, sharing God with others, but do these things make it holy? And what about a day of rest? Sundays are not usually restful for me. So either I need to change the way I treat Sundays or I need to pick a different day to be my Sabbath. Lord, how do I do that? How do I make Your day holy? I can't afford to continue disobeying, and I don't want to. I can't believe I've missed this - and I don't know how to fix it yet. (and while I was sitting here typing, it became no longer my birthday. Rats.)