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!