23 (raising the dead in me)

i follow God, Who is the Answer to all my needs, both external and internal.

in Him i find lasting peace and rest.

He renews my spirit.

He leads me in all that is virtuous and right, to His glory.

when it seems like all troubling and dark things surround my life, i take comfort in the fact that He is in it with me, guiding me with His light.

He gives me hope and reassurance of victory, even when all evil is up against me.

He has chosen me to represent and proclaim Him, and He blesses me abundantly.

i know His hand will be on me my whole life, and i will make my home in His presence forever.

 ~ ~ ~

p.s.: @Tidelurker, this is not one of those lame kinds of attempted-poemy-thingies i was talking about earlier.  this one i paraphrased from a much greater poet, who was inspired by an infinitely greater Poet than he.  maybe you got that already though.

blessings

i'm so tired.  the sadness hit me today, pretty much when i least expected it.  it starts.

yet, i'm so blessed.  seriously.  i can't believe it.  it's like God had a bag of blessings, and then he couldn't decide how to bless me, so he just dumped out the entire bag.  on top of my head.  unbelievable.

i'm so overwhelmed by the people God has placed in my life.  i honestly don't understand.  for one thing, i have an amazing family who loves and supports each other.

but tonight i'm especially thankful for my church family.  my church is such an amazing base of support and encouragement and wisdom and love.  even unintentionally so.  it brings me joy every time i see them.  not only that, but over time they've shown me God in ways i had never before experienced.  i highly doubt many of them realize how much they mean to me.  i would not just trust them with my life, but i would trust them to be good stewards with any information they knew about it, or about me.  and i would trust pretty much anything they taught me about life or about God (so long as it didn't contradict that which i knew to be true, which it wouldn't).  they have brought meaning to the phrase "church family."

thinking over it again, sitting there in the dark with all these people and their prayers surrounding me would have been my #1 choice of places to fall apart anyway.

true story :)

my eyes were magenta from all the tears, and my throat was really sore, and i could feel a headache starting to come on.  and all that sadness had just hit me.  so i started drinking...
















...some water, in hopes that my throat and head at least would start feeling better.




sorry, maybe that was in poor taste.  but at least my sense of humor isn't totally gone, right?

shocking!

seriously.

there are two different kinds of shock that i know of.

one is when you hear or discover something that is a total surprise.  you never would have thought that it would happen, so when it does, you're just like, "WHAT???"  but it's news, and it's real.

the other kind is when you hear or discover something that really isn't all that surprising.  maybe you even knew it would happen.  but when it actually becomes a reality, it's so surreal that it's unbelievable.  when that happens (at least for me) it doesn't sink in until later.  you're more like, "nope.  this isn't happening.  it's all a dream, and tomorrow i will wake up and all will be normal again."  but it's not.

i discovered the second variety almost a year ago.  but still, when it happens, it feels so weird.

i feel... nothing?  yet.

...and that concludes that norm...

Danica came back from college!  i was so excited.  well, she was about to take her last final, which was in my English teacher's classroom (which was almost completely normal), but on a Saturday.  who takes a final on a Saturday? [shhh!!! you college students and graduates!!!  i'm telling the story!]  but whatever.  effectively she was done.

i heard she was not planning on coming home to Clovno (that's Clovis-and-Fresno-ish area) at all, but was instead going to get married to her boyfriend, whom none of us (including her family) had ever met.  and they were moving far-ish away. (btw, we all lived on the coast, but i think maybe she was moving to a different part of coast.  or something.)  and Alyssa (and Ryan too, i assume) was (were) moving to southern California.  i was really sad.  and disappointed.  and bummed, because i thought they cared more about us Clovnoans.  *dramatic uncontrollable weeping*

later, some other people and i were on the beach at night.  and there was this crazy lightning storm.  INSANE LIGHTNING!!! i don't think it was raining though.  IT WAS AMAZING!!!  i REALLY wanted to take a picture (or a few), but i realized i didn't have any camera with me.  and i was sad.  the end.

~ ~ ~

this morning i woke up and i felt really bummed out.  and i asked myself why.  and i answered that i was too insecure too much of the time.  and i asked myself why.  and i was going to answer the normal "because i'm paranoid," but instead i looked for a different answer.  so i found one and said "because i've been looking in the wrong places for acceptance/value/love."  both answers are true.  but i think the second answer will help me more.

~ ~ ~

by the way, have i mentioned yet how SUPER-LY EXCITED i am that it is summer???  well, aside from the fact that the central valley is a desert...

i probably shouldn't try to blog anything even slightly serious when i have this much mental energy, but whatever.