Tues, July 3
... Am I ready for this?
Grrr.... I just had an entry just about ready to go, and my computer was stupid and lost it on me. Sometimes, I hate technology. Anyways, let's see what I can recreate of it.
Am I ready for this? I'm excited to be going to SEMP again, excited to go as a leader, but sometimes I think that I've screwed up my life so much that I can't go, at least not in that capacity. It's a huge responsibility, and it's not something I take lightly. It would be one thing to just be "slipping," but that's not what I've been doing. I've been basically ignoring God for 2 months. Trying to live my life my way instead of his way, knowing that it'll fail and that I'll be miserable, but doing it anyways. Turning my back on God; "giving God the finger," as Norm would say. Basically telling him to shove it because I know more about my life than the creator of the universe does. Yah right! I don't even know what I really want--how can I actually know anything about myself for real?
I know that I'm getting back on track; getting my life back in order with God; dealing with the things I need to deal with, but I still feel like I'm not far enough along to be a leader. I know that God uses cracked pots and broken vessels, and he uses them without regard for their brokenness--he takes them and reforms them into things that he can use. I know all that, and I tell people all the time that they don't have to be perfect for God to use them--if God relied on perfect humans to do his work, nothing would get done. He doesn't need us at all, but he uses the broken people. And it's when we're broken that he can use us best. I know all that, and I believe it all wholeheartedly.
Have I come to that place of complete brokenness yet, though, or am I still holding onto a piece of me? Is my pride still standing in the way of what God wants to do in and through me? Probably--it always does.
I guess it all comes down to trust. Trusting that God will use me, regardless of how useless I feel, or how inadequate I think I am; trusting that he has a reason for me to be there, that somehow he's going to use me in someone else's life; trusting that he's going to do something powerful in my life and change me, because I need that before I can be used to change anyone else; trusting that he'll lead through me, because I'm too weak to do it on my own.
You know, maybe this is a good thing. Not a good thing in and of itself, but writing that last paragraph, I just realized that I'm understanding how weak I really am, and how useless I really am on my own. If I was in a better place right now, I would probably be thinking of leading on my own--not being so reliant on God's power. As it is now, though, I know that there's absolutely no way I can do this on my own.
So I'll be there, with all my inadequacies and my failures, and I don't know if I'm at a place yet where I can be honest about them with my group. Probably not--it's still too fresh, raw, and undealt with. But I'll go, being honest with God about the whole thing, and being honest with myself; not trying to delude myself. And God will do big things. I told Craig and everyone else last week that I've given up on trying to guess what God will do, because it's always so far from what I expected. It's human nature to try to guess, though, and I suppose that's what I've been doing... so I'm going with great expectations, and I know that God will fulfill them. It just probably won't be the way I think he will.
infinite || abyss
posted at 9:56 p.m.
