-Aristotle

“Yet dearly I love you and would be fain;
…But I am betrothed unto your enemy
Divorce me, untie or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.”

-John Donne “Batter my Heart”

“If I find in myself desires which nothing in this world can satisfy; the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.”
- C.S. Lewis

Were there but some deep, holy spell,
whereby always I should remember thee…
Lord, see thou to it,
Take thou remembrance’s load:
Only when I bethink me can I cry;
Remember thou, and prick me with love’s goad.
When I can no more stir my soul to move,
and life is but the ashes of a fire;
When can I but remember that my heart
Once used to live and love, long and aspire-
Oh, be thou then the first, the one thou art;
Be thou the calling, before all answering love,
And in me wake hope, fear, and boundless desire.”

-George McDonald
“Diary of an Old Soul”

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket- safe, dark, motionless, airless- it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irrideemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell”.

C.S. Lewis

“We shall draw nearer to God, not by trying to avoid the sufferings inherent in all loves, but by accepting them and offering them to Him; throwing away all defensive armour. If our hearts need to be broken, and if He chooses this as the way in which they should break, so be it.”

C.S. Lewis

“This world is full of fragile loves– love that abandons, love that fades, love that divorces, love that is self-seeking. But the unquenchable worshipper is different. From a heart so amazed by God and his wonders burns a love that will not be extinguished. It survives any situation and lives through any circumstance. It will not allow itself to be quenched, for that would heap insult on the love it lives in response to”

Matt Redman “The Unquenchable Worshipper”

“Love is as strong as death,
its jealousy unyeilding as the grave.
It burns like a blazing fire,
like a mighty flame.
Many waters cannot quench love;
rivers cannot sweep it away.”

-Song of Solomon 8:6-7

One thing I need is love, and I know he gives it to me abundantly, everyday, in the truest way it’s available. Love that is everything 1 Corinthians 12 said it would be — patient, kind, free of envy and boasting, and so many other things. I’m really thankful that he lets me see it in the world, too — a concrete example of his eternal, mind-blowing gift.

Thank you for love, Lord. That you love me, and the world, and that I can love it, and you, and him. And that he can love me too.

“…if God is for us, who can be against us?”
Romans 8:31

“I lift up my eyes to the hills— where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.”
Psalm 121:1-2

“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition,
with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”
Philippians 4:6

—

Healthy Banana Bread
350 F for 50 min.

Combine:
2c WW flour
1/2 tsp salt, soda
1 tsp powder
3 lg bananas, mashed
2 eggs
1/2 c brown sugar/honey
1/2 c milk (I mix milk/yogurt)
2 tsp vanilla
lemon zest
(optional: chocolate chips, walnuts)

2) Realizing that one of the most important things in life that God gives us is the freedom from making decisions out of fear. Freedom from living our lives out of fear. My father told me, before I left home at age 18, that his greatest wish for my life had always been that I’d become a woman of courage, one who isn’t afraid to love deeply, take big risks, and fight hard for the betterment of the world. I’m still working on figuring out what that will look like, but I’m excited about it.

And so it goes.

“And if I stumble and fail to live up to my promises, I will look you in the eyes, hold your hands, and apologize with sincerity. I will be my best for you.”

1) You can never really know someone’s home life, marriage, relationships with their kids, etc. “What goes on behind closed doors” will always be a mystery, to some extent. And that’s probably partially healthy and partially unhealthy. Again, a nice even blend.

Here’s why I’m thinking about this: my mom likes to stress about whether her lifestyle / eating habits / exercises / genes are leading her toward cancer or some late illness. I think I get stressed about whether I’m likely to end up in a marriage like the ones I see failing or in shambles around me. I just heard about another family friend who’s in a tough place in their marriage, and it’s definately tossed around in my head since I heard it. I’m not going to be that. And, to be honest, it isn’t really worth it to worry. it’s like the cancer thing — it doesn’t help, and it doesn’t make you understand better what’s best left up to god.

so. I’m leaving with this musing — hmm.

med school secondaries in the morning!

“we reduce god to the size of our biggest problems.”

this being said, the “jesus calling” devotional has been bomb.

two days ago, josh and I had a conversation about some of the frustrations of our relationship, and there ended up being this amazing passage in the jesus calling book:

Trust me and don’t be afraid. I am your strength and song. Don’t let fear dissipate your energy–instead, invest your energy in trusting me and singing my song. [...] Years of worry have made your vulnerable to the enemy, but be vigilant in guarding your thoughts. And don’t despise this weakness in yourself–I’m using it to draw you closer to me.

How cool is that? It was the same way yesterday–just an amazing reflection on how to live out my day. And I was really struck by the sermon series at grace today, as well. It was focused on the devil, and on the tools he uses to mess up our lives. I think I was completely unaware of how much the bible had to say about the devil! it actually says, in 1 john 8 that jesus came to save his children from the devil’s world. hmm. never heard that perspective before.

anyway, the sermon challenged me to really process what areas of my life I’m feeding into the devil’s lies. In what ways I’m allowing him to mix me up and trip me up by screwing with god’s very definite words to me–words that can be verified in the bible. so this is my new challenge to myself–making sure that, when I have doubts or am asked questions, esp. by kids, that my answers are couched in what is holy and good and true, not what I THINK the bible says–because that can be easily twisted by memory or other, less noble things.

Proverbs 3:5-6 — Trust in the LORD with all your heart, lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.

Conclusion 1: “lean not on your own understanding” — this is particularly hard for me. especially since, in situations like this, I think I understand best what to do. I certainly understand myself best, that’s for sure. The interesting thing about a relationship, though, is both that 1) sometimes you don’t actually know yourself as well as you think, and 2) you’re not the only one that mattes. That latter part is really important here–you can’t discuss issues of trust without knowing where both of you are coming from, and jt and I are not coming from the same place.

I know that I’m more likely to break the rules when it comes to boundaries. that they make me more uncomfortable because I’m not used to ever dealing with them. and I know that he is more likely to want boundaries, because he worries more about trusting when situations arise without boundaries–ie, me ending up alone with a guy somewhere.

Amber put this into an awesome perspective for me:

I think it is best to get to the bottom of what each of you really wants. I don’t want to put words in your mouths, but let me guess. . .the deeper thing for Josh is that he doesn’t want you getting emotionally attached to a boy, giving a boy the wrong impression, or having another boy be attracted to you – and he probably doesn’t want you alone with another boy in a situation that can lead to any kind of infidelity. For you, you want to be free to maintain friendships with boys and in the case with Peter, if your motives are totally pure, you want to minister to him and just be a good friend.

The thing that’s key, here, is that it’s easy to compromise–you make a rule for this scenario that allows us both to get what we want–go to the movies, but with Joe. or stay here and hang out, but not if no one’s home. The thing she made me realize that’s pretty key is that you aren’t always as strong as you think you are, and putting yourself into unnecessarily testy situations isn’t smart or, really, fair to yourself. But also that it’s okay to live with boundaries, as long as they’re reasonable.

That is the reason God gives us rules and boundaries – they are to protect us, give us life, and maintain our good relationship with him and others. When we think we are “expressing our freedom” often we are putting our relationships and ourselves on the line. [...] They’re just part of life, sister.

So, the bottom line of this conclusion: boundaries can be okay. Even ones that are a little more stringent than I would like. Key point is that they can be “from god,” and therefore, good.

Conclusion 2: “In all your ways, acknowledge him.” — How am I acknowledging God in this? Well, I’m glad I brought it up, for one. festering over this never helps anyone. And, for two, I’m really glad that both jt and I were honest about it — I really value the ability to have an honest dialogue about stuff, even when its hard.

The other amazing thing that Amber reminded me is that, in this scenario, loving and acknowledging God means living in all relationships beyond reproach. Yeah, this is something I can’t do alone, but by his grace, it’s possible. And that’s sort of the key way I’m acknowledging God– by recognizing that it takes time to develop the sort of trust I want to have, and that, once I have it, I live beyond reproach to keep it.

Another thing that I think would help me would be to generally acknowledge that I’m being trusted to do something, or that he’s exercizing it. I think that sometimes I don’t feel like he trusts me because I ignore or don’t pay enough attention to the times that he does, just the times that he doesn’t. And I know that’s a reality of relationships, that it’s easier to pay attention to the bad stuff, but I’d like to think that my relationship can be different.

Conclusion 3: “Trust in the LORD with all your heart.” — This one is key. And I’m doing that, even by just letting this mull over in my head and wanting him to know that I’m committed to this. I’m trusting God’s promptings that honesty is the way to go, that you can be honest and be loving and gentle, and that is how you come to concessions that work for both people–not one deferring to the other, but both conceeding for each other. There’s a huge difference between those, and I think I’ve been unfairly fixated on the first one, when where I want to live, and where I’m trying to live, is safely in the second.

peace and hope and figuring out life to you all.

http://diynatural.com/simple-easy-fast-effective-jabs-homemade-laundry-detergent/