Our fearless leader has asked us to write in response to a quotation from Dietrich Bonhoeffer. I will most certainly do that, but work it into what I wanted to write in the first place, since it all works together, I think.
First of all, to the other blog writers, I apologize for not reading your posts. I think that if I expect other people to read mine I should be reading all the posts, too, which would then potentially make my posts even more interesting. Woops...
Anyway, believing in a God who intervenes in our lives on a regular basis is not as great as you might think. First of all, I hate the word "intervenes" in this case, because it's not as if God stops us from doing anything or enters into our lives for the worse. He always provides us with signs and guidance, but then steps away to let us do our own thing.
But doing our own thing can be very painful when it's not in accord with what God wants for us. Must we always do what God wants for us? No. And sometimes I believe there are many choices in our lives that God doesn't really care about. For instance, I doubt God cares a whole lot about whether we attend Metropolitan United Methodist Church or First United Methodist Church of so-and-so. (By the way, it's unbelievable how often these blogs automatically save drafts, wow...) When God does care, though, He cares not because He wants to dominate our lives and prove to Himself that He owns us, He cares because He truly wants us to be happy, peaceful, and loving. When we're making a choice, consciously or unconsciously, that may have serious impact on our well-being--physical, spiritual, and emotional-- God enters into our lives to guide our choice. I also believe God enters into our lives sometimes just to be with us, like a father would with a child. No father is only going to talk to his son or daughter when they need help.
Again, we don't always need to do what God wants for us, but most of the time we will be very frustrated with ourselves for not listening. Even if you don't believe God enters into our lives, don't you sometimes have that, "My Savior Jesus Christ probably didn't die for me so I could do this..." thought? I have that thought all the friggin time... though it rarely stops me, so I go ahead and do the thing anyway, and then feel terrible afterward. God doesn't want us to feel terrible, that's why He has given us a book to live by and that's why He tries guiding us. Thankfully, that's also why He sent His son to die for us, so we can repent and be forgiven.
Let me get to my story. As of a week and a half ago, I had a girlfriend that I really loved and cared about more than anything in the whole wide world (well, except for God and His Creation). Because of certain aspects of my personality, I was worried that I would really hurt her irreparably and I didn't think it was something we could work out. Since hurting her immensely is the last thing I wanted to happen, I decided to break it off.
The decision had been looming darker and darker for about a week, starting right before football playoffs began. All the teams I wanted to win that first weekend lost, badly. Then all the teams I wanted to win the second weekend lost, badly. I was 0 for 8.
Now, I believe I said in my last blog that I believe God works through football and sports in general, whether you do or not is up to you, but I believe it. Being 0 for 8 was very strange. Add to that the fact that I was hurting being separated from my love more than I thought I would be. You see, I thought I had done the right thing for her, and therefore the right thing for me and for us as well. Thinking that, I didn't expect to be such a wreck. I expected that God would be happy that I did the right thing and grant me some peace. Peace never came, though I tried stubbornly holding onto the thought that I had done the right thing. Of course, I should have known I had done the right thing when I had the thought, "Hmm, are all my teams losing because God wants me to know that my mind isn't in the right place?" I didn't acknowledge that thought, though I had it wandering in the back of my mind quite a bit.
It comes as no surprise to me that, after telling my certain someone (soon to be my Valentine) the real reason why I had broken it off and she said we should work through it and we got back together yay!, both the teams I wanted to win in the playoffs won this weekend. Again, maybe I'm just superstitious, but I really believe that God was sending me signs that I was doing the wrong thing and it was inconsistent with His plan for us. And when I finally acknowledged that, I do believe God sent me a sign that things were back to normal, that I was back on track. And I do believe that the immeasurable pain both she and I felt was a result of my rejecting God's plan.
It is nice having something to hold onto, to believe that God is up there and cares about us. But it's not so nice sometimes. I now scrutinize every little thing I do. "Did God want that, or not?" I am constantly battling depression, desperation, confusion, guilt, regret, and heart-ache like I did this past week because I just don't know what God wants sometimes. Most of the time, actually. And it kills me. Sometimes I wish I didn't believe that God comes down to us and gives us signs and guidance about what to do because then I wouldn't be so obsessed with following His plan. I can't let it go, because believing what I do I feel obligated to follow God every step of the way. I can't reject God's call for me. Sometimes, though, I question whether I've read the signs correctly, or whether the "signs" were really God at all. This week has made me question everything I believe has led me to this point in my life to be at seminary. Does God really want me to be a pastor? I don't friggin know. All I know at the moment is that I did the right thing with my girlfriend, but I have to reevaluate everything else in my life. Hopefully that will make me stronger in faith, but we shall see.
Also, sometimes, like at the moment, I feel as if I've been swimming along in a dream world, acting upon impulse and not consciously in faith making any decision. That, too, brings guilt and depression. Maybe it's a sign that God is guiding me along, carrying me, but then I feel as if I don't have free will; maybe it just means that I'm not consciously paying attention to God's will, and then I feel depressed for not pausing and spending time with God.
At this point, I'd like to finally talk about Kate's prompt, which I'm hoping she's posting so I don't keep talking about with no reference. You can only answer your call alone. I believe that. I believe I am alone with God trying to figure out what He wants me to do, not just with my general call in life but with every major choice I make. No one can help me. All people can do is ask, "How do you feel in your gut?" Oftentimes that's not what I want to hear. I don't want to hear it because what I feel in my gut and what I think in my head are most likely at odds, especially if we add to the mix my natural inclinations (a.k.a. "the ways of the world"). The earthly side of me often wants one thing and my gut wants another. The earthly side often wins, and then I feel terrible.
It's an inner struggle that must be dealt with on my own with God. In my particular situation I've been telling about, I should have listened to my gut, to God. Again, I didn't. I listened to more earthly things, and my mind backed it up. That struggle between God and my own natural wants was not easy. It's never easy. It's not easy standing before God saying, "Here I am, broken, defeated, now tell me what you want because I can't do this on my own," and then actually listening. What I most want is for God to back me up, not tell me something completely new. But there I am, alone before God, having no one to blame but myself for not listening. But if I don't appear before God alone, then I will never know what He wants. I would never have known that I did the wrong thing and I would have gone through life feeling empty because I had broken God's plan.
And alone I must reevaluate my life. Alone I must purify myself of all this is earthly so that I can listen to God's plan, really listen. It will be a long struggle. A struggle strife with doubt over whether I'm hearing God correctly or not, if I'm reading His miraculous entries into my life correctly. A struggle I'm not worthy to undertake... as I write this I become more and more aware of my unworthiness, more and more aware that I cannot stand alone before God because of what I've done in my past. But I know that the only way I can have joy back, to have my freedom back, is if I ask for forgiveness and return to God and His path.
"I want to be free. I want to write my own ticket. But I know I can't. There is this voice haunting me, and it keeps repeating the same thing in my head, over and over again. I have no choice to succumb to it. There is no freedom in this world, this life, apart from Me."
-Andrew Schwab, Project 86
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