First Days.

This week has been all work and newness and first days. I hate first days. I don't sleep well the night before and my shoulders stay in knots and I can't relax to save my life. I've gotten better at faking how much I hate first days but I realize its really just cramming this introvert body into the expectations of an extrovert. I like people and I even like meeting them, but it wears me out to do it all day in a new place. And I'm okay with that reality. I wish I was an extrovert, but I'm not. It's like tomatoes. I wish I liked them, could wander out to the garden and pluck a sun-warmed fresh tomato off the vine like every other person in my family, but I can't. I hate tomatoes.

I'm on my second cup of coffee and I've taken it slow because I'm doing it solo this morning. Roommates scattered and friends are all on spring break (I'm seriously really jealous.) But along with all this coffee, I've been reading my Bible and examining some sin; understanding why I am so quick to do and be certain things, have certain habits. This time in my life is a point of transitional perspective. Time for reflection and newness and asking the hard questions of what do I keep and what do I leave. I'm going to throw away the five dollar desk that's made from fake wood and I'm going to keep the blue high-backed chair with the rip. I can settle those questions. But what about habits, patterns and roads that I have walked in for a very long time. Anger. Bitterness. Fear of rejection. I'm kicking them out, throwing them away with that cheapo desk I tried to pretty up. It didn't work and this morning I'm realizing just how real and intolerable my habits of sin are. And its time for newness and grace, a life full of forgiveness. So let's be honest, tomorrow (haha. this afternoon) I will grab fistfuls of the old ways and hang on for dear life. But there is a Spirit that is moving, shaping, making me into a new creation, one full of Christ-like images and ways of living. This morning simply allowed me to remember: I belong, body and soul, to my great Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

writing at JCup

I'm at Joshua Cup, the hipster-est place in Macon GA, a little coffee shop downtown with ceilings painted black and scratched wood floors. I'm drinking coffee black with cinnamon and I'm starting in on writing my SIP, a personal essay. But I don't really fit in. Two ladies in professional dress eat their organic lunches with big black sunglasses on their heads while three men use their laptops. The first is wearing a long grey robe of sorts with black dress shoes. Jewish maybe? I don't know, he's typing away on a word document. The other two look slightly disheveled. One with long, frizzy red hair and a black painter's cap has huge black headphones engulfing his ears; he's bent over his work on an ipad, shoulders kinked in. The other is wearing the gym clothes of a couch potato, baggy tshirt, baggy grey cotton shorts, and flipflops. They both sport facial hair. I sit somewhat apart with all the glory of a pink laptop, floral notebooks, two bags, and se
Read more

transitions

My life since the last post has transitioned into a new season. No more camp or summer shorts, beat-up t-shirts, and head scarfs; no more beautiful seven years olds singing pop songs or coloring for hours. School has begun and I've had to move into a period of organization, arranging my stuff, my time, my attitude. I've set up my dorm room, creating places for clothes, books, posters, movies, old stained couches, and ripped chairs. I've had to place my days into slots, dividing it into my classes, meetings, meals, and homework. My thoughts are just beginning to transition back into this focused, detail-oriented perspective, where I have thousands of little things that I have to make happen, but need to intensely devote myself to one task at a time. When this school mode kicks in, it is easy to forget the world, forget time isn't naturally divided by classes, homework, and friends, forget that people breathe and rest, forget that there is more to life than finishing ever
Read more

Everything into Enough

Failure sucks; here is a little hope that I'm struggling to hold on to, a bit of grace for a very weary sinner. It's from Today's Letters : "Here's to gratitude and how it turns everything into enough." Sometimes you need to stop thinking and just see good.  I am thankful  for sunshine after days of rain,  for rice and beans and corn, cheap and tasty with enough cheese and hot sauce,  for daily bread that breeds forgiveness,  for quiet evenings that offer a little respite from craziness,  for short tempers quickly resolved and selfishness overcome,  for being unseen on days where you feel unseeable,  for remembering that there is always hope, always grace. 
Read more