Currently New Surrender By Anberlin Breathe see related

A war-torn life I live.

This week was maybe one of the hardest in my life.  I guess it's a fitting climax for this whole last semester.  My responsibilities weigh hard on my shoulders, and even with all I had to do, so much of it I failed on.  I have had no free time, and yet there just was simply not enough time to do everything.  It's just simply too much.  The last two days have been ridiculous, as my eyes have been opened to all the issues that people in my core have with me.  I'm just so busy all the time... it becomes normal to neglect relationship.  My core hasn't ever really been able to really get to know me apart from an ACA role.  They don't know my heart.  They don't know why I hold them accountable... because I desire to see them succeed and grow. 

I'm just so tired of being at war.

I'm at war with the guys in my core.  They don't trust me.  I'm at war with their flesh and the world which lives in them.  I get so busy fighting them, but then I stop for a second to look at myself... only to find that I'm a war with myself and my flesh as well.  I just want this fight to be over.

Last night, Grace (my sister CA) sent me a text message telling me that "I am anointed for such a time as this".  Sometimes that's hard to believe.  I have to know that I am anointed.  Otherwise, my words have no authority.  I just feel like it's just simply too much for me to handle.  Jon (my CA) had to do all my ACA responsibilities for me last night because I was emotionally unable to continue.  I just don't know how I'm going to get through this last week, with the derogatory things people consistently say about me.  With the fake smiles people give me.  With the constant arguments and complaining like the Israelites in the desert.  "In the desert the whole community grumbled against Moses and Aaron.  The Israelites said to them, 'If only we had died by the LORD's hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.'"

I want to prophesy.  I want to love truly, to weep for the things he weeps for.  There's just so many things that I want to say, but don't know how.  And then everything I know says they're not going to listen.  But neither did the Israelites.  But that didn't stop Jeremiah or Isaiah. 

I'm just so tired of being at war.

Currently Listening Five Score and Seven Years Ago By Relient K see related

Where I’m headed…

“I'm not sure that I've ever really been at a point in my life when I've really accomplished anything.  I am so weak.  I'm such a follower...”

These words were typed by my very hands almost six months ago.  Trapped and alone, I was in a place where I felt I could neither go forward nor back.  My soul abided in this fear daily: I’m not sure I’ve ever really accomplished anything.

But this is not about the past.  This is about the future.  Through ESOAL, I feel like something ferocious has awoken within me.  Standing on the opposite side of having finished-finished, I find something new in my heart: a burning passion for leadership.  I believe my ESOAL experience was far from typical, for I’m not entirely sure that I ever really hit BAR.  Not to say that the entire time I was thinking and living for myself.  It was much more of a minute-by-minute struggle to live and push for anything that was not me.  I volunteered to be the Sergeant Major of my platoon, because I knew that if I was going into ESOAL alone and for my own benefit, I would ring out far before I had been stretched enough.  Being placed in this position of leadership, I was constantly being looked at to set the standard, which was motivation to give all I could, and in everything, remain positive and supportive of others.

As I quoted myself earlier, for most of my life, I have never felt like I have accomplished or finished anything.  The Lord definitely showed me that I have so much more strength than I had ever believed, both emotionally and physically.  I have never been one to make commitments, let alone follow through with them.  For me to push through my flesh and finish finish ESOAL was a huge milestone in my development as a leader.  For once, I am somewhat confident in who I am in the Lord.  I am really beginning to see what my identity truly is in Him… I am more than a conqueror.

Not to say that I am living completely without regrets now.  A big surprise of ESOAL was the fact that I was really not pushed to my limit physically.  I know there was so much more that I could have done in order to let myself be pushed harder.  Because of this, I guess I never really had what might be described as a “true” BAR experience.  I was stretched the most emotionally on early Sunday morning, when a facilitator removed my privilege of speaking.  Through that, I came to realize that in my own strength and ability, I truly have nothing.  I can not help or encourage anyone short of the grace of God.

Looking back on the past, I see where I’ve come from.  I see how much the Lord is working in me.  I see where I’m headed… through these hard times of refining, I am slowly becoming something new.  I am slowly continuing to become the leader that I was meant to be... and I am learning to live a life worthy of the calling I have received.

(I wrote this for my ministry placement manager... sums up a lot of what's going on right about now.  Exciting stuff...)

Currently Listening Lost in the Sound of Separation By Underoath see related

ESOAL.

Tonight, I make my bed on the football field.  Before the sun rises tomorrow morning, the hardest challenge of my life will have already begun.  We don't know how long it lasts, we don't know when exactly ends.  Being that it's the 10th ESOAL ever, the general feeling is that it will be leaps and bounds harder and longer than any other before.  The longest was 90 hours long.  I am the sergeant major of my platoon, which means I lead six others into this ridiculous (and somewhat terrifying) life-transforming event.  And I am scared.

But my excitement greatly outweighs my fear.  I know this is going to be a time when there will be tremendous growth in me, in the members of my platoon, in the members of my core, in the entire internship in general.

Currently Listening Tonight the Stars Speak By The Glorious Unseen see related

Tired of my expectations.

Yesterday was great... me and my roommate Mike went to Caitlin's church with her, Pat, and Mendi, and then they took us out to lunch.  It was really nice, it didn't even really feel like I was even at church, more like at a coffee shop.  That's my kind of church!  But getting to hang out with them was such a blessing and really reminds me of home.  It's funny, I didn't think that I would miss PaulAnn so much, but I really do.  I miss home, but right now it's not really a painful hurt, more like joy.  It's certainly not happiness, and it's even sorrowful, but it's definitely joy. 

So I'm working in the IT department here fixing phones and computers and whatnot.  It's certainly a challenge, because I'm really not that computer savvy and don't know what the heck I'm doing most of the time.  But if my managers think I can do it, then I guess I can do it. 

I've gotten to meet some really cool people here.  But still... It's not at all what I expected.  A lot of these people are broken... It's not like they're super spiritual or what ever.  Maybe just the majority of them are more desperate than other people.  Case in point: my closest friend, whom I share a room with along with four others, has identified himself with and stuggled with homosexuality all his life.  Although has made the choice to walk away from it, I still guess that's just not exactly what I expected.

So it's supposed to rain like crazy all this week, so I'm not looking forward to running two or three miles it it every morning at 5:30 am.  But I guess that's life.  Or my life, at least.

Currently Listening Don't Get Comfortable By Brandon Heath I'm Not Who I Was see related

It's been a crazy couple of days.

But the lord has definitely been in it all.  I leave tomorrow morning for Honor Academy.  I'm so tired from the rollercoaster today has been.  And yet, I have about three hours to sleep, and then I begin the next stage of my life.  Tomorrow's gonna be crazy, this upcoming two years are gonna be crazy.  I just hope I have the opportunity to rest in the near future... because I'm so tired.

I need to wake up though... I can't miss what's about to happen.