Sometimes, I get frustrated because I can't eat what I want to eat. Sometimes I get frustrated that I live in a state that has rain 90% of the year. (Made that statistic up... but it's probably true.) Sometimes I get frustrated because I don't like my clothing. Today was one of those days.
I found myself in my room, standing helplessly in the middle of a pile of clothing, upset because I didn't want to wear any of it. I felt like my clothing was outdated, out of style, old. I felt like it didn't fit just how I wanted it to, or it didn't look as good as last time I wore it.
And then I realized what I was doing. Honestly, how utterly sick is it that I stand in the middle of a warm, carpeted room with three windows, a bed, closets, mirrors, shoes, a couch, on the top floor of a rambling farm house, and I am upset about my clothing choice? I know people--I know children--whose clothing is ripped, and baggy, and fading, and literally falling off of their back. I know people whose only house is a couple of random pieces of wood set up together and placed against a concrete wall. I know people who have no place to sleep at night, except for the cold, hard ground under the trash on the side of the street. Yet here I am, standing in my room whining because I don't want to wear my striped shirt today, and I can't find clean socks.
It saddens me to remember that before I fell in love with God I was a selfish and haughty, proud human being. What saddens me even more than that though, is that I have found myself slowly slipping back into that same cycle.
The fact that "fitting in" or being "in style" concerns me even a little is almost a warning flag to me. It's not a bad thing to be stylish, or to be able to relate to people. However, I find myself questioning my motives when that is consuming me, and I know that I have gone too far when I step back and see that I am in a situation like the one I found myself in today... standing in the middle of a heap of blessings, and complaining because I don't have more, or better, or bigger, or prettier.
How did I become this? The realization of where I had let my attitude drift to started a whole new round of frustration, and with it determination. So today, I wage war. I don't know how to be any different than the selfish woman that I am on my own, and so I make a choice. I will cling to my Jesus harder and fiercer than before, because without Him, this life of mine is worthless. I don't want to be proud, or haughty, or selfish, or flaunt myself in any way, and so I cast those cares aside and I claim freedom from those. I want to live a life of servanthood.
I remember the sweetness of His presence and the sound of His voice in my spirit, the rush of His wind against my skin and the colors He painted around me. I remember visions He has given me and His promise of more to come. I remember Him being so much that I literally cannot describe Him. I am so thirsty to return to that place where I could sit in His presence and feel His peace and His heartbeat and stay there for hours without becoming restless. So once again, I sit before Him, a pitiful human, and I offer myself up.
I mentioned in my last post that I am ready for whatever He has for me, and I truly am. I am a broken, tired little girl, but honestly... that doesn't even matter. Because where I end, He begins. Where my spirit is full of frustration, His is full of grace. When I don't know what to sing, He places a melody in my heart. And that, my friends... that is extraordinary.
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