I Am Made For Another World

I am a huge fan of C.S. Lewis' writing, especially the Chronicles of Narnia series, but I do enjoy the thought provoking quotes that can be found in all his books. One of my favorite quotes of all time is one from Mere Christianity, and it goes a little something like this:

"If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world."

I am such a huge fan of this quote because it embodies something that I have been feeling within me for the past couple years. I have had this strong desire to love and seek my Lord with everything in me. I can't explain it to anyone who does not believe, it is only something that can be felt and then you will know exactly what I mean. I have never seen God, I have never heard his actual voice, but yet I have this desire to love him everyday and never give up on believing in Him, even when others think it's silly. I have that desire that C.S. Lewis is referring to! But until last week, I didn't know it.

Let me now tell you how I came to this realization. Last Friday I went to dinner at Zen...by myself...and I was relieved and excited to run into my friend Bryan Ford. We were able to eat dinner together which was wonderful because we haven't been able to coordinate our schedules lately so that we could actually see each other. *Side note* I love that when I spend time with Bryan our conversations are centered around God and how he is working in our lives. After asking each other how our lives have been since the last time we saw each other, we began talking about how our churches are doing. I am so excited to see Bryan's church growing and that he gets to be apart of that. I made a comment that was something along the lines of: "I love church, I wish I could stay there all day, everyday and never have to deal with the outside world." Bryan responded with something that made this quote truly speak to me, he said: "That is what heaven is for, until then we have to work for the Gospel." I wanted to scream TRUE THAT!!! It all made sense, that desire that I have can only be fulfilled by another world because that other world is heaven!! Heaven will only satisfy these desires because that is where my Lord lives, that is where I can praise Him for days and not have to go anywhere. I love that God has blessed me with several friends over the past couple years that get it, they get that desire, they have it too and I can't wait to experience it with them!

I have many thoughts and feelings going on inside this body of mine that reassure my relationship with God. I feel joy, peace and conviction (not one of my favorite feelings but it does keep me on the straight path). These feelings are caused by someone that I cannot see, hear or feel yet they are so real to me. His peace gets me through the day, His joy makes the hardships bearable and the convictions help me to see that this life is not my own. I experience thoughts that I am not capable of creating on my own, and that helps me to see that my life is guided by Christ. I find myself wanting to help others for no reason and that is the work of the Gospel. I could go on and on about things that I think or feel that aren't in my nature, I am selfish with my time and money yet I want to give and volunteer. I am picky about who I date and show PDA with, yet sometimes I just want to hug a homeless person. That is Jesus at work, because without Him I would never want to do those things. These feelings are so hard to explain to someone who doesn't know Jesus, and they probably think I am crazy, but it's ok I'd rather be crazy in love with my Savior than in love with the world.

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I am wonderful, God says so.

I am at work, until about 9PM, and I am starving. I have already eaten all the "snacks" that I brought and I want more. Why do I feel like I want to eat everything in sight? Why can't my stomach be satisfied. I thought to myself: "Is this why I don't have a boyfriend?" I hate it when I think that, which I do a lot because I tend to do a lot of silly things. I like to make unattractive faces, wear long basketball shorts because they are way more comfortable than booty shorts, and my favorite: I laugh like a man sometimes. I promised myself this year I wouldn't dwell on why I don't have a boyfriend and instead dwell on this: "I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made..." (Psalm 139:14) I hate those thoughts that sneak into your mind when you do something that is silly, unattractive or down right embarrassing, thoughts of imperfections and failure. We all have those thoughts, and isn't it nice to know that they aren't from God and so we know without a shadow of a doubt that since they aren't from him, he will take care of it. Awesome. He will take care of it when we call out to him knowing that he can do it. So I am starting to transform my thoughts into words straight from the Bible. I had to memorize scripture as I was growing up but now it is nice to finally see why that is soooo important. At times when I don't have my Bible but I feel defeated, God replaces the negative thoughts with these promises:

When I am alone in a not so safe place:
"The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing." -Zephaniah 3:17

When I feel stuck in a rut or useless:
"Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." -Philippians 4:6

When I am obsessing over my future:
"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." -Jeremiah 29:11

And of course, my daily reminder that I am special even though I don't look like I just rolled out of a Victoria Secret catalog:
"I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well." -Psalms 139:14

It is kind of ironic that I love to read and memorize scripture now because throughout my school years I would cheat on my weekly memory verse quizzes. Yes, I admit it, I cheated. I would cheat all the time. If I could go back to Jr. High Traci, I would kick her in the shins for being so stupid. I would tell her to not treat God's word like that. I think it is because I was so used to "religion" and never saw it as a gift more like a lifestyle that I had to live because I went to a christian school. Well now no one is forcing me to love God, to want to read his word and I love it. I love him and I love his promises.

Kari Jobe

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I love her version of "Revelation Song". It is amazing!

You make all things NEW.

A new year has begun, and even though it is only 2 days into this new decade God has began to place some NEW thoughts into my head. He is reminding me about his promises, his faithfulness and his awesomeness. Bear with me as I try to filter through all these thoughts in order to create one cohesive blog entry.

I never make resolutions, mainly because I always associate that word with failure. I am not being negative but how many times do you hear someone say: "I have already broken my resolution." (said with a facial expression that shows exactly how much they don't care) Aren't we glad that we don't serve a God who treats His promises for our new year the same way we do. Could you imagine reading Jeremiah 29:11 ("For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.") and wondering if he was going to blow us off for the day, brush us aside and get to us later. We are not a group of people on God's list waiting to be scratched off, I know he wants to be hands on in his promises, he can't wait for that moment when the lightbulb goes off and we say "That was a God thing". This year I hope to find rest in the promise that God will not abandon me, nor he will not forget about me, even though sometimes I feel like he has when I don't get what I want when I want it, to be brutally honest. So I will begin to seek him constantly because I don't want to experience this year in a constant state of doubt, I want to experience it with everlasting joy. And that is not a resolution...it's a promise.