One Week

One week until I leave for Tahoe. That scares me. I feel like if anyone reads this who is going to Tahoe with me, they will think that I absolutely didn't want to go and have a negative opinion about it. Well, they might be right. Or, more accurately, they would have been right. I don't have a negative view about Tahoe anymore, but rather a hopeful one. Doesn't mean I'm not scared out of my mind about going there. I feel weird when I hear so many people so bubbly and excited for summer projects. I am looking forward to going, but i'm apprehensive because I don't want to be gone that long.

I feel as though i'm being tugged in two different directions. One side of me wants nothing more than to be at home this summer. To hang out with friends, to go to creation, to be with Tim. But the other half of me longs for a closer relationship with God and to be broken so that I can be molded into something better. God has provided more than enough for me already to go to Tahoe and I know that is what I need to be closer with Him. I have this attitude of going down there that I don't want to be like everyone else. Yes, I want to make friends while I am down there, but No, that is not my motivation for going. My primary reason for going is God. My attitude is also one of not doing what everyone else is doing. But I don't want to go down there, become super opinionated, and have no one like me. But I don't want to get rid of my passions and beliefs for the sake of others opinions.

One of the things that best describes what I am going through/have been going through for the past few months in this portion of the book my Bible study was reading called The Barbarian Way. The author's son went to a camp and got in a fight then wanted to leave when the author came to visit his son. They were having a conversation in the car about God and God speaking to us:

"I asked [my son] a simple question: 'Aaron, is there any voice inside you telling you what you should do?'

He paused and then responded, 'Yes.'

'What's the voice telling you?'

'That I should stay and work it out.'

I asked him, 'Can you identify that voice?'

He immediately said, 'Yes. It's God.'

It was the moment I had waited for. I didn't expect it to be under those circumstances. Nevertheless, it was there. I turned to Aaron and said, 'Aaron, do you realize what just happened? You just heard the voice of the living God. He spoke to you from within your soul. Forget everything else that just happened. God has spoken to you, and you were able to recognize Him.'

I'll never forget his response: 'Well, I'm still not doing what He said.'"

The son ended up staying and working things out, but he definitely did not want to. I sometimes feel like that with God. I know He is calling me to do something, I recognize His voice, but the stubborness in my heart screams out "Well, I'm still not doing what You said". It amazes me that God still love me through all of it. More importantly, it amazes me that even in my stubborness, God does not let me down and will not allow me to stay where i'm at.

One of the verses that really stands out to me in this situation is when God decides to destroy Sodom and Gomorah (?), but save Lot and his family from the destruction. Anyway, the Bible explains it better:

"With the coming of dawn, the angels urged Lot, saying, 'Hurry! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away when the city is punished.' When he hesitated, the men grasped his hand and the hands of his wife and of his two daughters and lef them safely out of the city, for the LORD was merciful to them." (Gen. 19:15-16)

I feel like Lot a lot (haha...). But I am thankful that God has been merciful to me and even when I did not want to go where He was calling to (where he was rescuing me), He still grabbed my hand and wouldn't let me be destroyed, even when I hesitated. Praise God that He is bigger than me.