Upside Down

In the last 4 weeks God has completely shaken my world. And I've said it before, but this time it was truly different. He jumbled up everything I had known, and my entire sense of reality. I still haven't sorted things out, and I have this inkling that I won't for some time. All I know is that now He is completely in control.

Looking back I can see how the chain of events has meshed together to come to this perfect conclusion of disarray. It started Week 5 of camp which was the most trying and reality blowing week of my life. Then moving on to the final week of camp where I really started questioning what God wanted me to do and whether I should even be considering going about in the way the world says I ought to.

In the next two weeks after camp, my thoughts continued to race. I was trying to make sense of all that God was laying on my heart. Even more, I was trying to figure out what God wanted me to DO about all of it. I could see how everything was becoming more meaningless as my sense of reality still continued to slip away. Possessions became things that were just lying around. Passions became like meaningless jokes. I told this to a friend, and got asked if I was depressed. I wasn't, but my view of the world had just been altered.

When at home after camp I decided to use my large blocks of free time to grow even closer to Jesus, searching for answers and direction. I was reading The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne. It further was pushing me toward my view of how little value is in the world and that there was much more for me still. Then I began utilizing my book The Fuel and The Flame (ten keys to ignite your college campus for Jesus Christ) by Steve Shadrach to prepare me for the upcoming year. This book has gotten me to analyze myself and my life and has overall been amazing! It also is giving me more direction of what I need to be doing with my life.

I guess through all of my recent studying and time with Jesus I've been able to figure out more of what is important in life and a kinda general direction He wants me to take. I'm kinda scared, but super excited. It's just really weird feeling everything I've known and valued get flipped upside down. However, it still feels right since all of it is being flipped upside down so that the most important thing (Jesus Christ) can stand right side up.

My last snippet from my mind: And through it all I've gained this intense desire to share what Jesus is doing in my life--hence this post. I love it and can't wait to use it to witness to others later!

Please feel free to comment anything you would like :) I'd love to hear from you!

"Do you want to come with me?"

After a long day of packing, cleaning, moving out, AND taking a final; I had finally made it back home to officially begin my summer break. I saw my dad finishing up the lawn work, so as I drove by I rolled down my window to talk to him. He was getting ready to take the freshly mowed grass clippings to the dump and he asked, "Do you want to come with me?"

At that moment a lot of things went through my head. My mom was waiting for me to get home so we could do something together. My dad could really use my help since he's old, out of shape, and his health hasn't been the greatest for awhile. Another one of my thoughts was about Jesus.

There are many occurrences where Jesus asks people to follow Him, and to follow Him they have to leave what they are doing. So that's what I did. I went with my dad. Having a vague idea of what I was getting myself into, but not really knowing for sure.

The blown out tire

It wasn't long before surprise #1 surfaced. We weren't going to our town's dump, but the one 15 minutes away. This was bearable, but it showed even more what I was giving up when I committed to going with him. After a few miles surprise #2. Bang! One of the trailer tires blew out. Finally we make it to the dump... and in comes surprise #3: the wheel bearing for the other wheel is gone. Lovely.

So, as my dad stands in disbelief staring at the trailer wondering what to do, I spend the next 30 minutes raking out an entire trailer full of grass. It had to be at least half a ton of grass. Finally, it's complete and we start on our way home, pulling a trailer over 15 miles with a blown tire and a loose wheel. The entire way back I was to look for the wheel cap that must have fallen off. By the grace of God I saw it on the road and we got it back!

This whole experience involved a lot of learning for me. It showed me more of what dropping everything and following Jesus means. (Oh, my mom and I didn't do anything fun because of all this!) I knew I made the right decision and I'm glad I chose to go with my dad--even if I didn't like the circumstances or everything I had to go through. It was hard at times, and very tiring. I didn't really enjoy it (ok, maybe a little at first). However, there was something rewarding about serving my dad and being able to just spend time with him. And now I realize that's what it's like when we follow Jesus. We may not like it, it may suck, but serving him and having a relationship with him definitely outweighs it!