“Every time we make the decision to love someone, we open ourselves to great suffering, because those we most love cause us not only great joy but also great pain. The greatest pain comes from leaving. When the child leaves home, when the husband or wife leaves for a long period of time or for good, when the beloved friend departs to another country or dies … the pain of the leaving can tear us apart.Still, if we want to avoid the suffering of leaving, we will never experience the joy of loving. And love is stronger than fear, life stronger than death, hope stronger than despair. We have to trust that the risk of loving is always worth taking.” -Henri J.M. Nouwen
i am, frankly, a mess. i am a bundle of contradictions made up of unspoken heart desires and rational trains of thought that rage forth and then timidly meander about without direction, conviction, heart. i come once again before the throne of my gentle king and desperately pry my hands open, fall to my face, bask in nothing but His love for me.
ponder; what does it mean to worry? to dwell obsessively and be preoccupied with something to the point that it hinders your sense of emotional stability in everyday life. i suppose this is why philippians 4:8-9 comes right after philippians 4:6; it is unreasonable to expect us to just "stop thinking (worrying)" -- rather, we must replace the thoughts with things that are "true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy." i guess it just goes to show that god created us as singularly focused beings; we were made to worship, to fixate our gaze/orient our beings towards something. if that something is not God it will inevitably be something else. there is no way for us to not worship, to not meditate on something.
ponder; what does it mean to worry? to dwell obsessively and be preoccupied with something to the point that it hinders your sense of emotional stability in everyday life. i suppose this is why philippians 4:8-9 comes right after philippians 4:6; it is unreasonable to expect us to just "stop thinking (worrying)" -- rather, we must replace the thoughts with things that are "true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy." i guess it just goes to show that god created us as singularly focused beings; we were made to worship, to fixate our gaze/orient our beings towards something. if that something is not God it will inevitably be something else. there is no way for us to not worship, to not meditate on something.
sidenotes;
sigh. walk on
i'm weary
five classes, never again
i'm weary
five classes, never again