Ruth - Part 1

First and foremost I would like to say...YOU GUYS ARE AWESOME! Since I posted the link to help To Write Love On Her Arms less than 24 hours ago, you all have already earned 30 minutes of crisis and suicide prevention services for TWLOHA! I'm probably not going too far out on a limb here by saying that you just saved someones life! Amazing job everyone!

So over the last year God has really been speaking to my heart about womanhood and femininity. I can feel him trying to give me so many opportunities to learn about what true femininity really is. Thus, the books I've been reading lately have reflected this (Captivating, Redeeming Love, etc.) The last time I read through the book of Ruth was about a year a go, so I figured I would read it again and blog it, because I'm basically desperate for what God is trying to teach me through this story right now. =)

Ruth 1

Synopsis: Ruth chapter 1 begins by giving the background of the family. It begins with Elimalech an his wife Naomi, along with their two sons Mahlon and Kilion, as they leave Bethlehem to travel to Moab. It was during the time of the Judges and a time of famine. Elimalech soon passes away in Moab. Mahlon and Kilion take Moabite wives, Orpah (yes, you can giggle) and Ruth. Sadly, Mahlon and Kilion also die leaving the women, Naomi, Orpah and Ruth widowed. Naomi is broken, but by tradition tells her daughters in law to return to their home, for they had returned to Bethlehem, and to their gods. After some reassuring, Orpah leaves, but Ruth refuses, saying "Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God." (Ruth 1:16). At this point in the story Naomi comes to term with her pain. She has lost all she had, except for her daughter in law, Ruth, and thus she notes that she should not be called Naomi, but Mara (Ruth 1:20).

Going Deeper: First off, I love, love, love, (love) finally having a study Bible. Its helps me understand and dig into the scripture so much more, and its so enriching! There were a few parts of this passage that I would like to elaborate further on. To begin, the setting of the story. It begins by telling the reader that this was during the time of the Judges. In Biblical history, the time of the Judges was among the bloodiest Israel had faced. So it was not just a walk in the biblical park. It was rough, and adding upon that, the story takes place mid-famine.

I love how Hebrew names have identifiable meanings. For example; Elimalech means literally "My God is King" and Naomi means "pleasant". Naomi later wishes to be called Mara, which translates to "bitter". This reflects Naomi's desolation from her extreme loss, feeling as if God Almighty is against her.

Heartstrings: There were a couple things that spoke to my heart from this passage. Rather, two. The first is Ruth's integrity. By The Law, Ruth was no longer required to stay with her mother in law, because her husband had died and her mother in law was much to old to have another child to be her husband. Imagine being in Ruth's shoes. She is a foreigner, even to the point of having a different religious background as her husband, and now she has lost the man she loved and is left without security. Her ticket to security is to return home to Moab to her family and familiarity. But she refuses, knowing that Naomi, though she won't admit it, truly needs her. Moreover, Ruth has also fallen in love. Not romantically, but she has fallen in love with the God of the Israelites, Yahweh, the Truth. She proclaims that she believes and that she has chosen to follow Him.

The next thing that spoke to my heart was Naomi's brokenness. She has literally lost all she had. All that remains is her daughter in law, which has no lawful responsibility to stay with her. Naomi literally feels like God is against her.

Raise your hand if you've felt this way. My hand would be one of the first to go up. This summer there have been times where I've been crying out, yelling at my steering wheel driving home at night with tears pouring, begging God to show me why He had let things happen to me. Specifically, in the name of vulnerability, I couldn't understand why God would let me fall in love with someone who was so incredibly wrong for me. It didn't end there, though. Why did he let me open up my heart and trust when I've always struggled with that very action, just to be hurt, badly? Why would he let me get engaged to and plan a wedding with someone who was not meant to be my future husband? Why, God, Why? Why did I have to hurt? Why me? Sometimes "Why?" was the only word I could utter from my mouth and from my heart. I won't lie to you, my question has not been answered yet. I trust it will be, but its going to be a very long process. But I have peace. Thank God, I have peace. I wish there was a way I could bottle this peace up and give it to every single person in my life whose "Why?" is still unanswered. I can see the pain, the longing to heal and believe that God has their best interests, but the fear that God is against them. All I can to is beg you to hold on, and please, please, trust in this one promise; God is NOT against you. There is purpose in this pain. He will answer you!

Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers.

My last post was on July 18th. Its now July 30th. I feel like such a slacker, but in my defense, the last two weeks have been packed to the hilt of me working like a maniac and getting sick.

Roughly 10 days ago I finished reading Redeeming Love, and I've felt the overwhelming need to share my heart about it.

This is undoubtedly going to contain quite a few spoilers, so if you haven't read the book and intend to, which I encourage you to do, then you may not want to read today's post.

Redeeming Love is the heart wrenching story of a young girl named Sarah. An illegitimate child born of a woman named Mae by a married man named Alex Stafford. The story begins with Sarah seeking the love an approval of her father, who in turn makes it known to her that he wished that she had never been born, that she had been aborted. Sarah is crushed. Through a turn of harrowing events, Sarah and Mae are forced to live hardly a shed on a dock in New York, as Mae sold her body to keep them both fed. Mae quickly comes down with a fever and passes, smiling, and finally free from the pain of life. She leaves Sarah to the care of her less than intelligent, drunk friend Rab.

Rab soon finds someone he believes is intending to take Sarah in as a foster parent. He brings her to a beautiful estate to begin her brighter future, but upon meeting Sarah's new "father", Rab finds that there is something afoot, but before Rab can protest, he is killed. Sarah soon finds that at the age of eight, she has been sold into prostitution to an evil man named Duke.

The book then moves forward roughly ten years in the life of Sarah, now called by the name Angel. She has escaped Duke, is now living in a town called Pair-A-Dice, a mining town in 1850's California. Sadly, while Angel has escaped Duke, she has been unable to make a living for herself outside of prostitution. Hardly 18 years old, she is a hard, cold shell of a woman, devoid of emotion and terribly bitter.

Enter Michael Hosea. Simply put, Michael is a man after God's own heart. Michael is a farmer, and happened upon Pair-A-Dice to sell his goods to a friend. This is where Michael first sees Angel. Obviously, Angel is beautiful, but Michael is drawn to Angel for quite a different reason. From the moment he laid his eyes on her, he knew that God was calling him to marry Angel, despite every inhibition he had.

Michael begins to pursue Angel. He spends every ounce of gold he has to visit her nightly, to simply speak with her and tell her what God has shown him. She coldly ridicules him, until in frustration, he storms out of Pair-A-Dice. The pain of Angel's life finally overwhelms her and she provokes her the brothel's "bodyguard" into nearly killing her. When she wakes, she is Mrs. Michael Hosea.

Michael then nurses Angel back to health, but she wants none of this new relationship/marriage. Her mind is set on returning to Pair-A-Dice to retrieve her money and live on her own.

Return she does, but to nothing. The brothel had burned down, everyone was gone. She then resumed work in prostitution. But Michael seeks her out, and fights their way back home.

Now enters a new friendship. Michael and Angel take in the Altman family, whose matriarch is ill with a fever. Eventually they convince the Altmans to stay in the valley, rather than continuing onto Oregon. And there, Angel has been given the family she never had.

Slowly, Angel adjusts to life as a farmer's wife, but she's still too broken, too scared. Once she feels that she is falling in love with Michael, and she runs. Again. She feels much too unworthy of his love. And again, Michael seeks her and brings her home.

This time, Angel swears that she's home to stay, she dearly wants to please Michael, but soon, the lies of unworthiness overcome her, and she leaves him one last time for "his own good". This time, Michael felt the call of God not to seek her out.

This time Angel does not fall back into the trap of prostitution on her own free will. Angel escapes to San Francisco, and for a short while leads a decent life. When her bad luck catches up to her, the café where she was employed burned down, leaving her again with noting and vulnerable. As she begins to rebuild her life, the aforementioned Duke finally catches up to her and treats her as his possession once more.

But this time Angel wanted nothing of prostitution and in her desperation, turns to the one person she never thought she would (or could), God.

In short, God finally gets ahold of Angel’s heart and finally draws her to him as she accepts him (Praise HIM! I cried like a baby too =p) After time of seeking Him, she feels his calling to not only live a pure life for him, but to confront her past and become the founder of a home that rehabilitates former prostitutes, giving them education and housekeeping skills. After this home, The House of Magdalena was on its feet, God used a turn of events to call her back home to her husband. As she arrived back home, Michael welcomed her with open arms and an open heart, like she had never left.

And they all lived happily ever after. =)

Man. This book tears your heart out, beats it up against the wall, and then sews it back with a dull needle. From the very beginning my heart ached for poor Sarah. I could not imagine how seeing this reaction from a father would make a child, a young girl nonetheless, feel. She had such a longing to please her father, to be seen as beautiful and his little princess, and in return he makes it known that she is just a mistake and a disappointment to him. And that’s the least heartbreaking part.

I think the part that affected me the most is when Angel is raped by Duke. It made me angry and sick and broke my heart all at once. I can never understand what would possess someone to do such a thing. An innocent child! UGH. That’s one of those things where I’m dumbfounded before God, inquiring why he would let such evil as that occur. We’re never going to understand why. The only hope in that that we can hold onto is that He uses situations like that to ultimately, in some way, turn out for good somewhere down the road that would have been impossible otherwise.

Angel’s emotions struck me. She tried to hide behind this veil of cynicism and strength, and avoid the painful things. This struck me because its basically how I got through the last year of my life. I knew I was wrong, I knew I was making stupid decisions, but I just did not want to face them, thinking that if I acted strong and bottled it all up the pain would go away.

That’s a lie from the enemy. That day will come, like it did for me, where every little thing inside of you explodes. It’s a veil for a reason. Its not meant to be permanent.

Unworthiness was a prominent theme throughout this book. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that unworthiness is a struggle that every woman (and man!) faces to a varying degree. No, I don’t have a horror story like Angel, but I would honestly have to say that I identified a great deal with her feelings of unworthiness. Truth is, we’re not worthy of what we have. We don’t deserve it at all, but the kicker is, GOD DOESN’T CARE ABOUT THAT! He died to save the saint and He died to save the murderer! From Billy Graham to Charles Manson. He died for us all, and the “best of us” aren’t any more worthy of it than the “worst of us”. Its like God’s saying “Just get over it! I don’t care what you’ve done or how dirty you are, I LOVE YOU JUST THE SAME!”

Michael Hosea is a beautiful character. This man is the template for my future husband. =p God really showed me what my heart was longing for, and that as much as I though that I had it in my last relationship, it was so (very) far away. God has so much more for me than that, that I cannot even imagine, and the thought is really exciting to me.

Voila! Redeeming Love. I apologize again for the length between posts.

Update: Since I’m so far behind on the thirty days, I’m going to go another route. I’ll pick it back up on the corresponding day of August.

Peace in the Discord

My mind is flying at a million miles per minute today. Its so incredibly frustrating! I have so much to do, yet despite my efforts only accomplish a portion of it. Does anyone else feel this way? UGHHHH! Forgive the redundancy, but...ITS SO FRUSTRATING.

Random rant over. Needless to say, I'm struggling to find the peace in the discord today. And due to my internet fiasco, I'm even further behind.

So recap. I spent Thursday at Cocoa Beach. Much needed day of relaxation. I was thrilled to be able to spend the day lying on the beach, reading a good book and soaking in the beauty of God's creation.

Irony is one of the languages of God. So many times in my life, He links the small things together, and when I trace them back, I am amazed by what He is trying to show me. For example, as I've mentioned before, I'm reading through Captivating by John and Stasi Eldridge. Wednesday night, the pages that I read focused on being romanced by God. Quite a complicated topic, but as I read on it shot deep into my heart. I am a hopeless romantic at heart. As I meditated and read of the stories the authors wrote of God using nature as a way to romance their hearts, a longing began to build within me. As I closed my eyes, I pleaded with God to romance my heart like that so I could see it and not take it for granted. Lo and behold I arrived at the beach Thursday morning and paused where I stood, taking it all in. My prayers were not in vain.

I spent the rest of the day enjoying family and friends, reading Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers (which is now my favorite book) and hunting for seashells with my friend's four year old niece. It was a wonderful day.

Friday and Saturday; same old same old. Stay up late the night before reading, working out, etc. Waking up too late and going to work. Today was also nothing of great consequence.

As I mentioned above, I've been reading Redeeming Love. Since I began reading it on Thursday, I only have roughly 100 pages left. I simply cannot put it down. It speaks to my heart so much. But I'll hold off on blogging about it until I've finished reading it. =)

Todays Themes:

God is a Helper/Identity

Psalms 54, 115 and 119:169-176/Psalms 8 and 139

God is a Helper:

God is all powerful. He is in control of everything. He is our refuge, our strength. He is all! He is God! Helper just seems so...small. At first glance, that is. What would life be if God gave us a perfectly smooth path and did everything for us? Boring, thats what. But he promises to be our Helper. Hes always there to give us that little bit of extra strength to get by.

Short sweet and to the point, the verse that stuck out to me was Psalm 115:9-11. It repeats "He was their strength and their shield" three times. Anytime the Bible repeats itself, you know its something God wants you to know. =)

Identity:

"I'm not the shoes I wear. I'm not the clothes I buy. I'm not the house I live in. I'm not the car I drive, no. I'm not the job I work. You can't define my worth, by nothing on God's green Earth, my identity is found in Christ." - Lecrae

Remember what I said about irony. I literally listened to this song 20 minutes before I started blogging tonight. God is so cool.

Identity in Christ. So easy to say, but so incredibly hard to live. Its so easy to get distracted. Its so easy to find your worth in this world. Work, Talent, School, Possessions. Whatever it may be. Its a trap from the Enemy for us to find our worth in anything but Christ. And I'm quite guilty of this. To be transparent, for me, it was relationships. Remember me? The girl who was engaged to marry someone who wasn't good at all for her. People still ask my why I didn't end that relationship sooner. Sadly, it was because I found my identity and my beauty in something so fabricated and fleeting I knew it wasn't right, I knew he wasn't right, but I just couldn't let it go. It was past the point of "I love him and I don't want to let it go", to "my whole identity revolves around this relationship". Praise God for making me end it! But still, I could be doing much better in finding my identity in Christ right now. Sometimes I just feel like I'm...floating.

The verse that stuck out to me is Psalm 139:13-14 - "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made."

I feel so insignificant and small sometimes. I question why God decided to create me, and what purpose someone as weak as I could possibly have. Which is why I love this verse so much. Whenever I read it, I feel God telling me "I don't really care what you think about yourself. You're wrong. This is what I know about you." It gives me purpose.

God is so good. When I started writing tonight I wanted to pull my hair out. He's just given me a tremendous peace through writing this, sorting out my thoughts.

So, onward to tomorrow! Pray that its a productive day!

Update

Internet failure for the past two days, so again, I'm even further behind. However, I don't want to do things halfway, so I'm going to resume blogging tomorrow so I can put more effort into it, I'm so tired...

...Exhaustion

I'm....so.....tired.........

Long day. Worked 11-7, after 6 hours of sleep and 3 hours of yoga and pilates. Words can not explain how drained I am today. Beach tomorrow =) looking forward to relaxing.

In other news, I'm still working on reading Captivating by John and Stasi Eldridge. If you haven't read it, read it ASAP. Its really, really speaking to my heart right now. Especially given the circumstances of the last 3 weeks of my life, I feel like God has made me reading this book at this time of my life a divine appointment for Him to pour into my fragile heart.

and again...IIIIMMM SOOOOOO TIREDDD....enough complaining, though. Down to business =p

Fear/Glory of God

Psalms 37, 49 and 91/ Psalms 19, 24 and 29

Fear:

Fear manifests itself in almost every single part of our lives. Of course the first thing that comes to our mind are the obvious fears (spiders, heights, death, etc) but fear can be much more sneaky than that. I think that I can rightfully say that insecurity is one of the most plaguing fears that I, along with many others, face in our day to day lives. Insecurity is at it's root, the fear of inadequacy.

Some verses that stuck out to me:

Psalm 37: 37 (hehehe!) - "Consider the blameless, observe the upright; there is a future for the man of peace."

I love promises like this. My life verse is similar (Jeremiah 29:11). It brings me so much hope to be reminded that God looks out for those who love him. And yes. I am easily amused.

Psalm 49:17 - "...for he will take nothing with him when he dies."

Okay so the obvious interpretation of this is towards possessions. In all reality, it does not end there. I feel like God also intended this verse to speak to my heart in the subject of relationships. In the New Testament the Pharisees attempt to trick Jesus, asking Him a hypothetical question of which man's wife a woman would be in Heaven after remarrying many times. To this Jesus responds that there is no husband and wife in Heaven. That hit me. Hard. How could something that is created to be so permanent on earth by God Himself, be something temporary in eternity? In hindsight, however, its quite difficult to be "in love" completely 100% focused on God. I only have the view of being in a dating/engaged relationship, but its probably correct to assume that while marriage is much more mature of a relationship, it still has the possibility of being a roadblock in focusing on God. Thus, "he will take nothing with him when he dies."

Psalm 91:11 - "For He will command His angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways."

Guardian angels =D Such a beautiful thought.

Glory of God:

None can fathom how Glorious God really is. There really isn't a word or phrase to adequately express his true glory. And the sad part, we're too busy and blind to see this a vast majority of the time. I am *very* guilty of this. I get caught up in my own little life with my interests and busy-ness, and neglect worshiping my Creator God!

Some verses that stuck out to me:

Psalm 19:1 - "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands."

The rest of the world shows God his unbelievable glory, yet the crown of creation gets too busy to remember?? Really? What a shame!

Psalm 29 - Honestly, I just really liked the way this Psalm was written. I enjoy finding God in nature, and thats exactly what this Psalm uses to explain God's glory.

Which is what I'll be doing tomorrow, as I take a much needed day to relax and recharge on the beach.

And I end with a very long overdue GOODNIGHT! =)

Apologies

Okay, so I'm roughly a week behind, I know, its been hectically crazy, and I've had limited access to internet. But its no excuse, it won't happen again.

Now to get caught up.

First theres life. After three weeks, I finally cut the last tie of communication with my ex. Needless to say, it was much harder than it should have been. The finality felt...really weird. Why does the right thing, the thing that is ultimately better for you, have to be so hard. So many nights all I could do is pour my heart (and tears) out before God, begging Him to be near to me, to heal the wounds and doubts and dissapointments that are still so overwhelming.

Also, I'm up to my eyeballs in stress about transferring, so every bit of prayer is appreciated. It is a bit bittersweet leaving LU, but I know that, at least right now, Florida is where God wants me.

So I'm gonna double up on the devotionals for a few days to get caught up, so its not quite as overwhelming.

Doubt/Faithfulness of God

Psalms 42, 73 and 77 / Psalms 105, 119:137-144 and 146

*Sigh* Doubt. Possibly my biggest struggle in my spiritual life. Upon reading todays passages, I could basically envision myself in the setting of the Psalm, because honestly, this has been me at many times throughout the last three weeks. So many nights I've been driving home from work, yelling at my steering wheel, begging God to tell me why he let this happen to me, why He allowed me in this situation. So many sleepless nights on a tear drenched pillow, asking God why He didn't make me guard my heart. And that is basically David's heart in theses Psalms. He is calling out to God, asking why the Lord is so far from him, why He has "forsaken him". But in the end the conclusion David reaches. God is there. He has not forsaken us. Just sometimes, He gives us those moments where he feels so far away from us to call us to draw closer to him.

Some verses that stuck out to me:

Psalm 42:1 - "As the deer pants of streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God."

At first this one stuck out to me because I recognized it as a hymn. =) After I meditated on it for a few moments, I realized the beautiful picture it paints. The desperation that we are to have for God should be a natural reaction, like the thirst of the deer.

Psalm 73:23 - "Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand."

This is the realization the psalmist comes to, after feelings of being rejected and forsaken by God. He realizes that though it may not feel like it, God is always with us, even holding our hand. That illustration really speaks to me. A little girl at heart, its a bit of a beautiful thought to envision myself facing the trials of this world with my Heavenly Father holding my hand to give me the strength to go on.

What better to follow the subject of doubt than the Faithfulness of God? While the passages above ended with comments about the faithfulness of God, these are solely focused on it. Some with specific examples, as Psalm 106 basically walks through the history of God's faithfulness regarding Israel, to accounts regarding the life of the psalmist in the other two psalms.

The verse that stuck out to me:

Psalm 119:140 - "Your promises have been thoroughly tested, and your servant loves them."

Gods promises are not void, they've been tested (and tested, and tested) throughout history. Nothing is to big for Him.

So, theres...well, two days. Two more days tomorrow...=p

Deeds of God

Although today's topic is the Deeds of God, I have a bit of a rabbit trail today.

Happy Independence Day! Now I'm willing to bet that almost every church in America had a sermon alluding to freedom from the bondage of sin, using July 4th as a springboard. And although I was totally expecting this, today's sermon really spoke directly to my heart.

A friend of mine actually, not my pastor, spoke at my church today. Kudos, dude. You did a great job!

There are things in my life that I need freedom from. But that freedom is lying there for the taking. Why don't I take it and cling to it!? It seems so absurd. Alluding to America; Men and Women died for the freedom we have today. We don't leave it there on the table and stare at it, we cling to it! But when it comes to spiritual freedom, we're either too scared, or comfortable, or blind to take that freedom. And that freedom came at an even higher cost; the Son of God!

So theres my rabbit trail. Now down to business.

Day 4: Deeds of God

Psalms 9, 18, 118

Psalm 9:9 - "The Lord is a refuge for the oppressed, a stronghold in times of trouble."

By now you're seeing a pattern in the verses I choose. Protection, refuge, etc. I apologize, thats one thing I'm really clinging to God for right now. It is one of the most important Deeds of God to me right now in life.

Psalm 18:3a - "I call to the Lord, who is worthy of praise."

So many deeds and attributes of God are listed in this Psalm, but straight and to the point, He is worthy of praise.

In closing...If anyone does read this, please pray for me. I'm struggling with a couple things right now, and peace would be greatly welcomed. Goodnight =)

Confidence

Its funny how fast you can work when your manager says you can leave early right after you finish closing a room. I swear, I ran my tail off to get out of there around nine today. I really don't mind closing though, since its a lot of organizing and cleaning and such, which is right up my alley.

So Yay! I made it today! Barely, but who's really counting anyway. I'm really not entirely sure if anyone has been reading this anyway, but its worth it, if only to keep myself accountable.

Today's topic; Confidence.

As a woman, I've dealt with the issue of confidence nearly my entire life. More specifically, the lack of confidence. It has manifested so many different areas of my life; my appearance, weight, talents, intellect, nearly everything. And as I read today, I realized that I was also lacking confidence in another area of life, My relationship with God.

Confidence is born out of faith, and faith is what I tend to lack a majority of the time.

Day 3: Confidence

Psalms 27, 36, 71, 125

Verses that stood out to me:

Psalm 27:1 - "The Lord is my light and m salvation - whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life - of whom shall I be afraid?"

To begin, I love, love, love this passage. This may be one of my favorite Psalms. This verse is like a declaration of confidence in God. It gives me goosebumps.

Psalm 71:5 - "For you have been my hope, O Sovereign Lord, my confidence since my youth."

We can have confidence in God, because He is constant, unchanging.

Tomorrow is my day off, so I promise to post at a normal hour =)

Calling to God

Yeah, I know. Its technically July 3rd. But, I haven't gone to bed yet, so in my world, its still the 2nd.

In explaination, I didn't get to sleep until 5:30 last night, a fusion of caffeine and too much on my mind, so needless to say I slept the whole day away. So that, along with work set me behind just a bit.

I wish I had some cute, ironic things to say, but today was a short day, so here goes.

Day 2 = Calling to God.

Psalms 4, 5 and 22

Its so funny how God knows just what you really need to hear sometimes. Two days in a row He has given me something that just brought me a whole lot of peace and understanding.

I'm definitely speaking to myself here, but sometimes we need to let go and let God. We need to be sincere in our prayers and have unending faith. This is something I have literally struggled with for my entire life, and continue to struggle with.

Short, sweet, and to the point, here are the verses that stuck out to me today:

Psalm 4:1 - "Answer me when I call to you, O my righteous God. Give me relief from my distress, be merciful to me and hear my prayer."

This is basically my heart right now. There are prayers of mine right now that have not been answered yet. I just need to keep in mind that God is for me. He alone knows whats best for me.

Psalm 5:11a - "But let all who take refuge in you be glad."

To continue the thought above, although we may have unanswered prayers, we are still under the protection of God. We can be glad for the refuge we have in Him.

Psalm 22:5 - "They cried out to you and were saved: in you they trusted and were not disappointed."

What a promise. They were not disappointed. Kinda gives you hope to hang on just a bit longer, huh?

So theres today. I apologize for the lateness of the hour, tomorrow will be much earlier...hopefully.

Ah. New beginnings. Probably the most bittersweet things in the world, huh? Honestly, in my life, they're pretty much the most under appreciated blessings...

Short story of myself is...well...I'm, needless to say, at a crossroads in life. Within the past two weeks, I've ended a relationship, an engagement rather, because of some unfortunate circumstances, and felt the calling of God to transfer schools to a university closer to home. Its overwhelming to say the least, but I can just feel the will of God in all of this. As I said, A Blessing.

My spiritual life throughout the last year has seriously backslid. I got so distracted with meaningless things, and rather, went through the motions. I took so much for granted, wonderful influences and friends, and a great spiritual atmosphere at Liberty University. I just coasted.

But, this is a new beginning, and in my brokenness, God has been constant. So this is my chance to do a 180.

To keep myself accountable with my devotions (along with sharing my heart) I decided to blog them. Cliche, I know. But hey, if it works it works. And the first day of a new month seemed to be the perfect day to start.

I found a devotional online, I believe on Zondervan's website (though I could be terribly wrong) which was titled "30 Days in Psalms". Also, I'm reading through, randomly, "Moments of Peace for a Woman's Heart".

Today's Theme: Blessings (Oh the Irony)

Today's Devotion was out of Psalms 67, 72, 84 and 128

My prayer leader for the last two semesters at LU called these "God Spottings", where you encounter something in life where you say to yourself "Wow. That was 100% God." Needless to say, this was mine for the day.

The aforementioned relationship...When it ended I was left completely broken. I truly though that it was right, and good, and God's will. I was so blind. But since it was such a serious relationship, it was very difficult to heal from. (Mind you, its been hardly 2 weeks) But God is allowing me to heal and have peace far beyond my understanding. Now I can finally see, along with those around me, that this was basically a blessing in disguise. Yes, my heart broke. Badly. But to list everything God has taught me through this? Awesome.

I can say this, because I am 110% guilty of this. I think we don't allow God to bless us sometimes. We get so caught up in our plans, and what we think is right. And from experience, if you're going to be so bold as to say you're in God's Will with something, you better be sure beyond a shadow of a doubt. I just used it to qualify a relationship that really was not all that great for me. I don't know about you, but I don't want to meet the Lord someday and have him tell me; "Well I really wanted to bless you with this, but you wouldn't let go of this so I could." So I've let go. Bless Me God!

Just a couple verses that stuck out to me;

1) Psalm 67:7a - "God Will Bless Us"

Plain and simple. We just have to let him.

2) Psalm 72:6 - "He will be like rain falling on a mown field, like showers watering the earth."

Admit it. We're all dry parched deserts every once in a while spiritually. I'd say thats a legit blessing in this verse.

3) Psalm 84:5a - "Blessed are those whose strength is in you."

I swear that verse was for me today. I'm tired of trying to find strength in the storms of my life on my own.

Above I mentioned the Women's devotional that I was reading through. Hand in hand with blessings, I was reminded today of how truly Merciful God really is. He really just wants to bless us!

So...theres today. I look forward to this journey. Thanks for putting up with me =)