eden

Sometimes I know it so completely. I know it in my heart and I feel with everything in me that it is true and good, that I have found meaning and life. And sometimes I feel completely empty, during a prayer. During worship. But if God doesn't exist, what am I. I love knowing that there is absolute truth in the universe, truth that eminates from a solid and unshakeable Being. I love knowing that there is pure justice, pure love, and most of all innocence. It's not a fluke that I cringe away from the darker side of life, that I yearn for joy that is born of innocence and cringe away from even cuss words or dirty jokes. My parents didn't teach me that, it wasn't something that I learned from anyone. It's just who I am, just as going to church or loving to read is.

I feel like church-girl a lot. Like just because I have certain ideas about life and how to live it that I'm labeled as a poster-child and a result of Church. I'm not a result of anything, or at least I don't want to be. I just want to be who I am, not manufactured or impressed upon. Randomly, though I just have flashes of emptiness in my head and I just want to know "what am I about?", like I feel just like this camera lens, empty and only passively observing what's going on. Do I only like classic movies because Phoebe and Sarah do? Do I only listen to certain music because Ashleigh and the Donahoos do? Am I only sarcastic and quick witted sometimes because Phoebe is? Do I do anything born of myself? Almost everything I do is linked to someone else. Is everyone like that, or just me? Is it a chemical imbalance, like my parents?

I have to believe that God is real, and loves me. If for nothing else, than for selfish reasons like: I have a purpose. I am my own person. I was crafted by a huge, beautiful, loving Creator. I was important enough to be saved. I have access to more than just what I see. There has to be more than what I see. There is good in the world. There is A truth and reason for everything. Moral relativism scares the heck out of me. Relativity scares me. It makes everything unimportant. The people I love, things I care about, truths I hold onto, myself. Without a God, what purpose is there to life? If this is it..what's the point? If there was nothing before and there's not anything after, then so many people suffered so much for nothing and so many got the shaft. There MUST be reasons. Surely I don't live in a world where nothing matters. The cosmic point of everything anyone does would just cease to exist if there were no God. There'd be no end, and no beginning of anything. The end for me is eternal happiness in the presence of God. Without Him, it's simply a heart attack or a bullet or cancer. There has to be more than that. Oh gosh there just has to be, it wouldn't make sense if there weren't. If Grandpa were just gone forever, it'd just be heartbreaking. Surely his spirit goes on, tears of joy rolling down his cheeks and making all the hardships in his life worthwhile. Surely he's being embraced and welcomed by Jesus Christ, author of love and grace. Surely he's smiling with his denchers and eating everything that his stomach cancer wouldnt let him. He can't be just gone. One day I'll get to see him again, after I've been welcomed home and shown such wonderful things by Christ. I'll get to talk to him and have him call me silly names and hear him singing funny songs or making jokes about Grandma. How can anyone think he's just gone and doesn't exist anywhere? I don't know where, but I know he's somewhere, happy beyond his wildest dreams.

maybe doubt is just part of my depravity. i haven't been able to completley squash it, but it's a little footnote compared to my faith. Am I sure of what I hope for and certain of what I do not see? I know what I hope for. What I hope for makes sense to me, has to be. Am I certain of what I do not see? I don't see God. Am I certain of Him? There has to be a God. If there is no God, I cant believe in anything. Am I certain of Him? Am I free of doubt or reservation about Him? Honestly, no. But not always. I don't have any reservations about Him. God, I am not reserved with You. I know that I truly desire to glorify and love and please Him. And sometimes what I label as "doubt" is...well, doubt stemming from not feeling anything when everyone else seems to. Christians aren't stupid. My sisters are extremely intelligent and they know God. Ben Donahoo goes to Harvard and loves Christ. We're not duped or dumb. I don't feel duped or dumb. I just sometimes feel outside of all the action that everyone feels. In my heart of hearts, I know there is a God. It's just that the layers of my faith go

1.) the outside and most frequently used level: a kind of blind following of Christian principles just because I know that I like and agree with them.

2.) deep desire to know God like I feel that everyone else knows Him. Conversationally, lovingly, fulfillingly. This layer comes with a lot self-doubt, self-dissatisfaction, and negative self-evaluations which are followed by conflicting reassurances that despite who I am, God loves me. Then I realize that it's not despite, it's because of who I am that God loves me. Then I still feel like I'm missing something and that I'm not good enough.

3.) a rarely seen layer that is my favorite. Moving, spritual, true feelings of communication with God. Usually during worship or random moments of life that jump out at me and make me feel God. During worship it's just abandon, a kind of desperate happiness that makes my face squinch up to where I look sad or troubled but really I'm just blown away that God's broken through the shell around my heart and I want it to last. One random moment it happened was in Bolivia walking back to the auditorium to get my makeup bag while in full clown makeup and clothes. There was a breeze and birds chirping and it was so quiet and I was smiling at the bizarreness of it all and wondering how did I get here? And then I just felt a big smile on my face knowing that God had put me there, in this super random place in a super random circumstance, because that's where He wanted me.

4.) True alone-ness. Frustration, desperation, anger, hopelessness, true raw feelings of self loathing and anger directed to both God and myself. I can't describe it. It makes me clench my fists and want to pace rooms and most of all cry. It is being abandoned, unloved, unvaluable, unwanted.

5.) Acknowledgement, deep seated and desperate, deep down in my core at the very most base levels of me, like surrounded by DNA and cell structures, that God is real. It's like a tiny pinpoint of red light, like those penlasers, in a big sea of swampy black abyss. It doesn't matter that it's surrounded completely, because it's there and not going anywhere, and all the attention goes immediately to it because it's shining in a dark nothing place. It doesn't matter that there's an incredible outnumbering because it's stronger and better and it's pure, and it's not going anywhere.