Radical Honesty: Joy.

the joy

of the

LORD

is my

STRENGTH

nehemiah 8:10

"Choose joy." That's a popular phrase I've been hearing lately. But every time I see it, I dismiss it. "Choose joy? I already have joy," I scoff. (#pridealert!) Let me tell you - I was wrong.

A friend recently described me as being a person full of joy. I had to think about that for a minute. "Did she say joy? I don't feel very joyful. Has anybody been paying attention to me lately?" Over the past few weeks, the last word I would've thought to use to describe myself would be "joy". I'd have sooner told you I felt overwhelmed or even defeated. But joy is so much more than an emotion. It's more than a fleeting feeling, here one minute and gone the next. Joy really is a choice, and more than that, it's a gift. As we see in Galatians 5:22-23, joy is the second of the listed fruits of the Spirit. This means that joy comes from God, and He calls us to experience it through Him.

When my friend told me that she saw me as someone gifted with joy, I realized that I'd been denying myself the ability to experience joy (note: to experience = active, to feel = passive) and because I was doing that, I was denying a key part of my character. And because Satan is really good at inception (witty credit goes to Brittany), I found myself in the middle of his lies. I thought that because I was wrestling with different issues, I wasn't supposed to experience joy. I thought that struggles went hand in hand with wallowing in self-pity. But all of these lies acted like molasses to my feet and weren't just preventing me from living in my full character but was closing me off from receiving God's transformative work in me.

We are never pushed into a corner in our struggles. We can always choose joy. For me, true strength is manifested in experiencing joy in the midst of adversity. We don't need to have joy in our circumstances, we need to have joy in the fact that we serve the one who is above our circumstances. It is the joy of the LORD that is our strength. No joy that I can conjure up for myself will be able to sustain me. When the winds are raging around us, and the waters are rising up above our head, it takes a ridiculous amount of strength to be able to stand firm in the joy we find in the victory we have through Jesus Christ.

He will

empower you

with

[inner strength]

through his

Spirit.

ephesians 3:16

Radical Honesty: Control.

"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

These words should speak comfort into my soul and, to an extent, they do. It's nice to know that the One who loves me loves me enough to have planned out my future for me. But that's just it - it's nice. I don't rest in this fact, and if I'm honest with myself it kind of bothers me. Hearing someone say, "I've got it under control" or "I'll take care of it" nags at some corner of my mind. It's the same reason I find myself awake at 3am working on projects; it's the same reason my brain nearly explodes before something I've planned: I think I can do it better.

But how do you tell God - who created the galaxies, planned out nature's processes, and determined the formation of our minds - that you'll take the reigns on this one? You can't. At the very depth of my soul, I know that no matter what my circumstances bring, God has His hand over and through the situation. It's an unshakable truth in me that I can't explain, but because I know that I refrain from surrendering my hold on different aspects of my life. I can't blame God for my circumstances because I know in the end of it all this will ultimately bring Him glory.

If there's one thing I hate, it's giving up control. I am not good at delegating because of it. I never ask for help because of it. Giving up control scares me because I know once I do let go it's out of my hands and in God's hands and I have no say in the matter anymore and all I can do then is trust in the One who has paved the way ahead of me.

The Gift of Pain

Once again, here's a link to the wonderful AU Chi Alpha Community Blog that I get the privilege to be a part of. This week's theme is pain, a topic I never thought I would be able to speak about. But it's the areas that we surround with the word "never" that we will experience the most transformative healing in. So here's to pain, here's to healing, here's to feeling, and here's to being honest about the process. Enjoy, my friends.

----

these are the scars deep in your heart

this is the place you were born

and this is the hole where most of your soul comes ripping out

from the places you've been torn

and it is always, always, always Yours.

-always; switchfoot

I am a dramatic person and I thrive on stories. I have read only a small handful of non-fiction books in my life and I understand greater world issues better after being able to relate it in some grand metaphorical context. Most of the time my mind runs like a super 8 camera, translating everything around me into some elaborate film I get to call the shots on. So, naturally, I become unsatisfied with the story my life is being weaved into by someone other than myself.

Starting from middle school, I wasn't satisfied with the events of my life. So I began to escape into the wonderfully inventive caves of my mind. The TV shows and movies I surrounded myself with were filled with broken stories. Families that were torn apart by death or deception, teenagers who ran away from home, forbidden loves, and misunderstood outcasts filled my imagination. My life paled in comparison and the difference seemed to be this foreign thing called "pain" and, in some weird way, I wanted it.

Continue reading.