Thoughts...

"We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be."
- C.S. Lewis

I came across this quote and realized that it pretty much nails it on the head for me right now. There are times when I see what God is doing and has done in my life over the past 4 years and know that I have been deep in the Refiner's fire. What a great place to be, right? That is truly my ultimate goal...to be refined by Him so that He can use me in ways I can't even imagine. But oh, those tiny little things that get in the way called circumstances...I have such a hard time getting myself to see past those and grasp the bigger picture.

I'll be completely honest...this time in Oklahoma (which has also coincided with almost my entire marriage) has been probably the loneliest of my life so far. It's definitely not due to the marriage part, because I have the best, most supportive, most encouraging, most challenging husband who is pushing me to be a better person than I am - yet loves me for who I am right now. I have always found my value in the number of friends I have, or how busy I can be, or how productive I am. If I started feeling icky about something, I would just run and change my situation. I had so many adventures prior to being married, including many theater experiences, moving out to California for 15 months, a few different jobs. And I also have been so blessed with an amazing family. So we move to Oklahoma and the excitement is there...we are going to try something new, start this brand new life together, change the world...you know the drill. I think we both took for granted that we'd jump right into a church, immediately find our "family" there, and have tons of friends and lots of fun. It really hasn't happened that way. I have a few token girlfriends (that have been such a blessing) and Steve has his acquaintances at school (to whom he's more like the "old guy"...at the ripe old age of 28...haha), but in terms of our life here thus far, it's been more of a "it's just you and me, kid" sort of existence. I don't think it's because people here don't care, I think it's that God had some work to do in both of us, and I know that this experience has been used to refine me, my character, and my walk with Him. Only I kinda don't feel like we're on the best of terms, God and me. I have always "felt" good, with so many people around me, loving me, and making me feel valued, that I don't know if I ever learned how to find my value in God alone. There have been moments where I have felt an overwhelming peace and knew that it was His protection around me, but lately, I think I have been seeing a whole lot of "I can see God's love for so-and-so, but I'm not so much feelin' it here." Again, with the circumstances. I see things that I am wishing for, praying for, longing for, happening to "everyone else" and wonder when it will be my turn. My focus has been so off.

Our pastor said something today that struck me. And it's actually something that I've heard before, but I think I really need to dig in and do my homework on this. He said something to the effect of (my own paraphrase) "We may be in the middle of a huge storm in our lives, and when we are in it, it's hard to see the end of it. We have to believe and trust in who God says He is, and in that, we can know that He will bring us through that storm. Or at least provide lulls in the storm so that we can have rest." Or something. I am so not wording it as well as he put it. Anyway, what I got out of it is that I need to focus on the attributes of God - who He is - and that is where I can find my peace, my contentment, and my value. My mother-in-law gave us a couple books by A.W. Tozer that describe the Attributes of God and I think I need to really hit those hard and use this time of "lonely" to grasp the reality of who God is. I have so many truths in my head and I really do believe those. But so much of human nature is feeling, and I'll admit that my feeling of being "left out" of the cool blessings I'm seeing happen to those around me is probably based on the fact that my circumstances have always been changeable to me. I only had to rely on myself (and then thank God for how great I felt because He did such great things in my world). Steve has been telling me a lot lately that I need to stop relying on myself (I'm always saying things like "I'm not the only woman in the world who has the pressure of supporting her family right now, so I just need to suck it up" or "I just need to learn how to be happy in this" or "I...." or "I...." - you get the picture). If I'm being totally honest with myself (or Steve, or God, which I finally have been lately and it's helped to verbalize this), I think that deep down, I don't want to rely on God to help me get through each crappy day at work, or lonely day at home, because I'm really not so happy with what He's done so far (so why would I want Him to be in charge of the rest?). I know...how awful is that? And I knew it was awful, so I tried to fool myself into thinking I didn't really feel that way because it's not a good way to be and I "shouldn't" feel that way. But was I really fooling anyone? And even more-so, was I fooling God, who created me, knows my innermost being, and my thoughts before they are even thought? Yeah, probably not. So now, I really need to pray for God to do a complete change in me. I certainly can't do it on my own. I don't like my life right now. So in order to find contentment in where God has put me at this very moment for such a time as this, I need His help. I'm not quite sure how to do that, exactly, but I know that I serve a God that wants nothing more than to draw me into His presence, and that's all I need to know...