This machine kills fascists.

This quote has kind of been floating around the H o' B recently... It appeared in a graffiti stencil of Kanz's, which created a launching pad for it to spread to t-shirts, cars, etc. Then we saw it on some other shirts at Cornerstone, where I purchased a shirt where the words are typed onto a computer screen. As I bought it, I thought, "This is cool, because I blog."

I got home and realized I hadn't blogged in over 3 months. I suppose it's a good thing- as I began to resolve my issues with people, I also stopped requiring the computer as my sole outlet, my only release.

But tonight, there's too many emotions, too much to just dump on someone.

I'm listening to angsty teen music (thank God that I didn't have Simple Plan as a teenager...).

I grew up in a house where there wasn't really a lot of hugs or other physical contact. If I was upset, my parents would try to hug me, but I generally pushed it away until they seemed to just stop- or I blocked out their attempts. There was never any question of if they loved me... There just wasn't the physical manifestation of that.

Separately from that, I don't think I've ever loved someone enough to be mad on their behalf. I was always too busy being mad for me, for what people had done to me, to realize that other people were hurting too.

Today, I watched someone who I love deeply be hurt in a way that I am unable to comprehend. And while she's dealing with it in her way, I am sitting here wondering how to deal with the feelings welling up inside me- of wanting the person doing her harm to realize what they're doing, to have just a bit of what's going on inside of her.

At the same time, I want to respond in love, in a way that I know Jesus would have. (Why does our stupid language have only one word for love?) To respond with compassion and understanding, fairness.

While dealing with these emotions, I logged on to Facebook to see what was going on in everyone else's normal, every day lives... And saw a post my mom had written.

My little brother's lizard died tonight. His girlfriend bought it for him, and it's been an important part of his life- and my mother's, by extension, as she made sure it was fed and watered, and checked in on it periodically. When she checked on it tonight, however, it was laying with its "palms up".

She wrote of feeling immense sadness over the death of this reptile- and of not understanding why she doesn't feel that same emotion when humans die.

"I never touched [the lizard]. I was afraid to, in fact. Unfortunately, I feel the same about most humans. [The lizard's] death made me realize, once again, the importance of life. I need to choose more wisely."

 I guess I'm seeing that, as much as letting people in sucks sometimes and you get hurt, and I want to avoid it and quit trying, that that's exactly what gives my life purpose- the connections with people, the interactions I have on a regular basis, the ways I see God in people and they see God in me.

(Part of what I hate about blogging is that I feel like I need to have a nice wrap up. But I don't have the energy for it tonight. So the end.)

"Dear children,

Let us not love with words or tongue, but with actions and in truth." -1 John 3:18

Or, as Jennakate put it, "If you don't have the love of God, you will love people the same way you love pizza."

Today, February 16, 2011, was the best day ever. I woke up this morning and told Jesus, "I'll do whatever you want to do today. Let's hang out." I had loose plans, but the rest of my day was open to Him.

So, I got dressed and drove over to the Hub to hang out with Kansas and her students. It's been a rough week there, but I was excited about going, and had this immense joy as I went over.

As I entered the building, the sense of rejection and longing was so strong it almost knocked me off my feet. I instantly doubted myself, the way I was feeling, the love of my God. As I walked down to her room, I was doing battle- but the warm weather, the smiling face awaiting me, and the fact that I had all my beads in my hands cheered me up immensely.

Talking to those girls is something that I wish I could do every second of every day. Not only are they just plain fun, my heart longs for them to not have to go through what I've gone through, for them to find the love and acceptance of Jesus before everywhere else they're searching for it. When it was time to go, I found myself hoping and planning on returning.

I don't often do spontaneity, nor do I do it well... And I definitely tend do not do things without a purpose. I knew I didn't have a lot of money to spend, but found myself turning into the Hospital Auxiliary parking lot anyway. After roaming around, I then moved on to Reach (which is kind of the lamest thrift store ever), and wound up at Sonic, mulling over the dollar menu. I was sitting in my car, enjoying my $3 lunch and chatting with Jesus, when the loudest car ever pulled up next to me. I glanced over to see that it was one of the loveliest roommates ever, hannaHRose. You know how sometimes you see people and you just have to smile? She's one of those. We'd been on opposite sides of the parking lot, sipping sweet tea and enjoying... Well, no company. We went our separate ways, and I moved on to the post office.

The House O' Bricks has this Dwight head-shaped stress ball that gets hidden all over the house; some people hide in places that are scary, while others hide it to be hidden for a long time.

Normally, it's hidden just for whoever.

Well, I don't remember how it started, but Kansas and I are in a feud... Which basically means we're picking on each other with the Dwight head.

He's appeared in a pair of shoes, a container of coffee, a bed... You don't ever really know where to expect.

Well, when I went to the post office, I knew I had a package. And I knew whoever sent said package had not paid the full postage. So, I was going to have to pay to receive this gift. Nevermind that it was $.07, it was the principal of the thing.

I opened the package and found Dwight staring at me... And laughed. For about 15 minutes straight. (Watch it, Kans- I'm gonna get you.)

At this point, my joy was at an all time high... It had just been a really good day.

I got home and was hanging out with hannaHRose when she ceased breathing and began to hug the computer. I waited patiently until she recovered, when she told me that Shaine Claiborne was going to be in Asheville tonight! At which point I might have started hyperventilating.

We both realized we HAD TO GO... And began to figure out how to get there.

We figured it out, and also figured out that we were going to see several friends- friends we don't see very often at all!

Shaine Claiborne was, of course, awesome. Among my favorites:

-"Jesus never talked to a prostitute because He didn't see a prostitute- He saw a woman, a child who He was madly in love with."
-"The gospel spreads not through force, but through fascination."
-"We didn't create Christianity in North America, we just domesticated it."
-"Jesus wasn't here to tear down religious institutions, but rather to build something that filled in the gaps they were leaving."

Dinner at Waffle House would have been the low point, if it hadn't been for the company. :)

On the drive home, I was trying to figure out why today was so good- I mean, yeah, some of the events were not average, but my mood and everything else was just GOOD for no reason. And I realized... I felt as though I was truly experiencing the love of God. I wasn't putting up my normal walls, I wasn't resisting Him every step of the way, I wasn't pushing away from it. I was just existing as He'd made me to do.

I had relinquished control.

It was beautiful.

"As Christians, the world doesn't expect us to be perfect, but they do expect us to be honest about our brokenness and our mistakes."

I am broken, worn down, exhausted, and unable to do this on my own. I screw up on a daily basis and I don't know what to do with my life- right now, I am "squandering my future" in the eyes of society. I am "doing nothing worthwhile with my life" and am "setting a bad example".

But if I was a busy college kid, I wouldn't be sitting back and watching what God's doing in my life, instead of trying so hard to do it on my own.

I think I've decided... I'm exactly where God wants me to be.

Sleep...

is a symptom of coffee deprivation. -Unknown

When I moved into the House O' Bricks, I was a bit nervous about the food thing... I have issues with eating consistently as it is, but I knew the eating habits of hannaHRose, and I was concerned. I try to eat kind of healthfully, and I try to eat things that I make myself- not too much out of a box. (HR, on the other hand, is content with boxes upon boxes of mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese.)

The day I arrived at the house, however, I noticed that there were several things in the fridge that were the same or similar to what I eat. After a few weeks of confusion, I realized that Kans and I eat the same food. Kind of.

We both eat things like hummus, and onions and green peppers go in everything. However, our main food groups are both the same... I made a Natalie Dee-style food pyramid to show our eating habits:

The main group is grains, like bread and potatoes. Then the middle one is cheese, and the top one is donuts. The center of our diets, however, is the daily cup (or, in Kans' case, cups) of coffee.

So, I have a buddy in my eating habits. It works out well for me.

Further explaination:

Bread, or some grain, is the basis of all things good. Potatoes are awesome baked or mashed. Tortillas are amazing things too. And, above all, bread is favorite. Of all kinds. Banana, white, wheat, homemade, store bought, etc.

The middle group, cheese, is all important. It provides calcium, which helps me to not break my bones when Kans decides to have the route of our walk follow the icy steps on campus and I almost fall. It also gets put in EVERYTHING- quesadillas, on baked potatoes, stirred in mashed ones, on top of soup, or just plain eaten.

Donuts are the smallest one because, while a staple, they only come around every couple of months. And, when I do get them, they don't go away fast enough. Last Saturday, Kans and I each bought a 6-pack... Which was a bad idea. By the time we had each eaten half, we were tired of them. It was a good fix for the next few months, though. (Also, these are technically a grain... So maybe they shouldn't have their own category? I'm choosing to not get technical about such things.)

While on the whole coffee only makes up a small percentage of my total intake, it is possibly the most important part of my overall diet. I drink a cup of coffee any time I have to wake up to an alarm- otherwise, the world ceases to function as necessary. Well, I cease to function as required to exist in the world (strange how people don't cater to me when I'm low on sleep...).

Moral of the story: cheese, bread, donuts, and coffee are good. Ucky vegetables and meat, bad.

Nothing encourages creativity...

Like the chance to fall flat on one's face. -James D. Finley

 I've discovered what my problem is.


I do a project, and it turns out AWESOME... And then I get ambitious, and I do things that are too hard without any transition, and then I want to shoot my life in its face.


Being snowed in leaves lots of time for crafting. And we've had plenty of it, thanks to about 6 inches of snow and a layer of ice underneath of it- also, us not possessing a shovel. (We should work on that before the next storm, eh?)


This weekend, I was on a bit of a recycled kick, so I made a wallet out of an old milk carton. Which was actually super awesome. I attached a bit of ribbon and felt very clever and creative.

The lid twists off in order to open it.

Then Monday was sewing day, part one at the House O' Bricks. I finished my t-shirt quilt (there will be no pictures of this, since it's kind of the ugliest thing ever.... But awesome anyway.). Then, Monday night, I burned a notebook that had some stuff I have been dealing with in it, and it needed to go away.


Tuesday morning, I woke up and thought "I have a brilliant idea." I went down to the fire and pulled the spiral from the notebook out of the ashes, then twisted it into my new purity ring- which is pretty bangin', if you ask me.


This is where my head started to get big. And so I thought, ohhh, I'm going to make this super awesome flower thing out of newspaper. (Thanks, Kans, for showing me the recycled origami book. I might blame this one on you in the future.) It was a pain in my butt, and I got super annoyed, but I made it the whole way through... And then the darn thing didn't even look like a flower, it just looked like a pinwheel.


I was pissed. Also, Kans' project wasn't working correctly, so she was annoyed too... I decided to quit crafting for the day and just laugh at Kans.


Eventually, Sarah started altering some of her dresses, which meant that I got to help pin them. No big deal.


Until hannaHRose wanted a dress altered, too.


See, hannaHRose is super stressed about being poked with pins. So every time my hand got near her, she would say "Don't poke me." I heard it like, 6 times. It was obnoxious, even though I understand the concern.


I ended up poking myself like, 13987 times in order to make sure hannaHRose didn't get poked. And then her dress required re-pinning and adjusting and was just a general obnoxious pain.


I woke up this morning cranky. I don't know if it was left overs from last night, or being stuck in for 3 days, or what the issue was, but I snapped at Sarah basically the instant she came downstairs. And then I realized I was being super lame.


hannaHRose managed to get her tank out, and when we got home, I started a new project- a crochet pig. It's actually kind of cute.


We moved all the cars today, and hopefully I'll be able to get to work tomorrow... But I was thinking about it, and when I get stuck somewhere, or things aren't going exactly the right way, I seem to revert to "Life sucks."


And really, that's not it. I think sometimes we have good days and we have bad days, but when my outlook on life is "Life sucks", then I'm never going to have a good day.




Pretty good for a brain full of snot.

So that's where peanut butter comes from.

What garlic is to salad...

Insanity is to art. -Augustus Saint-Gaudens

I live in a house full of creative people.

I mean, one of my roommates is an art teacher who seems to be amazing at anything she tries; one can fold a paper crane in about two seconds flat; and one can work magic behind a sewing machine.

And honestly, I feel rather creative. Sometimes. I go through phases. Like, I crocheted for almost a week straight. I made a quilt, a skirt, and a halter top, all out of old t-shirts. Currently, I'm kind of obsessed with recycled art- wallets out of milk cartons and juice pouches, notebooks out of cereal boxes, etc.

I get pretty proud of myself when I finish a project. Like I've learned something new, and I'm a rock star for it.

However, I then look at pictures of what other people have done, and my bubble is kind of burst. Like, my stuff is not creative at all.

I'm choosing to take the following as inspiration, instead. Check these out- their awesome :)

3-D chalk art; that dude holding the hose is a drawing.

"Reverse graffiti"- This guy makes stencils and then washes the area under them, instead of painting it. (He still gets in trouble.)

That's packing tape. Made into ducks.

Sharpie.

So often we do things that make sense to us...

And then ask God to come alongside our plans, rather than looking at the things God promises to bless and acting alongside of them. We know that God's blessing will follow if we are with the poor, the merciful, the hungry, the persecuted, the peacemakers. But sometimes we'd rather have a God who conforms with our logic than conform our logic to the God whose wisdom is a stumbling block to the world of smart bombs and military intelligence. -Shane Claiborne, Jesus for President

I've never been someone who stays up late. I actually used to sleep about 14 hours a day, only being awake for school and to eat dinner and do homework in the evenings. Since moving to the House O' Bricks, however, I have become quite the night owl- either because that's when I see my roommates, or just because I have discovered how productive I am in the dark hours when normal people are sleeping.

So, when New Year's Eve rolled around this year, I knew that it would be one of the first years when it would not be a struggle to stay awake and welcome in the new year. (Last year, my family and I were traveling to Texas and were staying in a hotel in Houston on New Year's Eve... We all went to bed about 10 PM.) I was kind of looking forward to it, even though we didn't have any big plans.

We ended up having absolutely no plans, actually. hannaHRose went for a drive, and Swah and I watched Treasure Planet. Then Kans joined the party, and we all went out in the driveway and threw dinky little fireworks and got scared that hannaHRose was going to light herself on fire.

hannaHRose and Sarah had plans on new year's day, and I wasn't invited. Which is fine, because it wasn't with my friends, but my automatic feeling is rejection. It's actually kind of retarded. People do something, and instead of finding something to do, I default to feeling rejected and left out, which puts me in a bad mood and then makes everyone miserable.

So, I was going to sit at the house and pout all day, knowing that it was a horrible start to my new year, but hey... I felt validated.

I was sitting in the living room, feeling kind of pathetic about my life and having no motivation to do anything. I hadn't done my chore for the week yet, the living room was filthy, and my computer had stopped working. I hadn't showered in a few days, my laundry needed done, my room needed cleaned... And I just wanted to mope and hope that someone would do it for me.

hannaHRose (an enthusiastic ball of energy on this particular morning, much to my dismay) and Sarah left to go hang out with their friends, and I curled up on the couch... Only to have the realization that I had to get out of the house. I could not continue to be a brat about this. I have a life, and it is separate from my roommates, even if they do exist in it.

It had been raining for several hours at this point, and I thought I'd go down to the river and watch it rush past and listen to the rain and have a chat with God. I grabbed a notebook and my pens and markers and got in the car.

Well, Mrs. Cleaver is kind of a gas sucker. Which meant that after I got about 5 minutes down the road and and hadn't found the river yet, and wasn't sure how much further it was, I decided that this was dumb and I should just go home.

As I turned onto campus though, I realized... I hadn't dealt with what was going on inside of me yet. And it wasn't going to happen at home.

I pulled into a parking lot, turned the car off, and watched as the rain pounded the windshield. And I cried. For the first time in several months. And it was ugly.

Now, when I cry, it isn't just a few tears and a one tissue blow my nose and throw it away kind of deal. It is a red rimmed eyes that are all puffy the next morning, whole box of tissues next to me but it's coming too fast to even deal with that and so I just use my sleeves and then gross myself out, disgusting, horrifying, rare event. And I had one of those.

As I talked to God, all of the things about me that drive me crazy started coming to mind. And so I thought, Well, instead of resolutions, I'll make a list of life changes.

And so I did.

I didn't want it to be a list of things that I thought about for a little while and then forgot, feeling bad about the whole situation later. And I definitely didn't want to put a cap on it.

And so "The Top ___ of 2011 (an open-ended list)" was born. It contains things such as:
4.: Learn to do something new once a month. This does not mean perfecting or even enjoying it, but at least giving something out of the ordinary a try.
14.: Have an opinion.
2.: Believe the things God has promised me will come to be.

Etc. After writing for a while, I started feeling better and was able to come back to the house. I wasn't really glad that it had happened, but it had, and I came home and was able to be productive.

Around 5:00, I was changing a load of laundry over to the dryer and noticed that the neighbors were standing on their back porch. I was intrigued and walked out on our driveway.



I have never been one to just get in the car and drive. It just seems dumb. It's a waste of gas, a waste of time, a waste of money, and, it's pointless. But I hopped in Mrs. Cleaver (I didn't even grab my cell phone, which was super weird) and I drove. Kans had given me a general heading for the airport, and the GPS found it right as I had to turn.

I drove up these insane twisty roads that you have to go like, 5 MPH on, and the higher I got into the mountains, the more I remembered how much God loved and cared for me.

I eventually stopped at an overlook from which I could see campus, our house, and, well, most of Cullowhee. As the sun set, I started crying again (twice in one day. Whew. That's more than that happens in a month, normally!).

I got home, then the roommates did, and then our friends came over. And honestly, it was one of the best nights of socialization I've had in a long time. Instead of being constantly worried about what everyone else was thinking of me, I felt free to actually be who me was.

I've realized that God did not intend for me to feel rejected; and that the things that God doesn't intend for me are not things that I should accept.

The list is posted next to my bed, and it still kind of pisses me off every time I see it. I don't like the things that I'm asking myself to do, but I'm trusting that it'll help me out in the end.

Also, I'm praying that my life gets less serious soon, because I'm tired of only writing about Jesus things. And because it's stressful. And kind of dull.

I thought maybe if I made it colorful I'd hate it less.

Combining those two things is like mixing ice cream with manure...

It may not do much to the manure, but it sure messes up the ice cream. Shane Claiborne, Jesus for President

I wrote this back in September, but I feel like it fits the "thankfulness for everything God has been doing" deal. So, here 'tis.

So there's been a lot of questions about how I ended up here, why I'm here, and what's been going on since I got here. I'd like to clear that up for myself, and for all of you. So.

Way back in February, my roommate at YWAM, hannaHRose (who is kind of a hippie and rocked my entire world to its core), jokingly said I could come live with her after DTS. At the time I was horrified at the idea and said something along the lines of "Dear God no."
In May, when I got home, all my big plans for my life started falling apart. I couldn't go to my dream school because it cost too much money... My back up cost too much money. My back up to my back up wasn't accepting into the program anymore. I started thinking about North Carolina. Was this something that could really happen? Something that, maybe, would be good for me? I looked into the college here. They didn't have an OT program, but could I take a couple Gen Eds to get out of the way? They weren't accepting anymore freshmen. But then the counselor wanted to work with me and get me into their school. So I was going to take one course. But wait- that cost too much money (if the government wants me to go to college so bad, why does it cost so much darn money??). But I had already saved all this money to pay rent and buy groceries... So it was decided that I would move down anyway. 2 days before their registration deadline, I signed up for a class at RACC. I packed up my things, sucked up the fact that life wasn't going the way I wanted it to, and came down to NC with my tail between my legs. Thrilled to see hannaHRose and be living in the same state as her again, looking forward to the adventure and being on my own, loving the idea of being out of Lancaster again... But terrified of what was going to happen.
Yeah, I had prayed about this- a LOT. And yes, I felt like it was God. But I had talked myself into things before. What if this was one of those things? What if this was me wanting this to be where God was putting me? But on the other hand, this was the only door that had stayed open. This was the only place I had to go, other than sitting at home and being dormant for 5 months. This was, it seemed, my only choice.
I got here and, almost instantly, all the memories came rushing back. The good ones, mostly- the ones that came out in stories that hannaHRose and I managed to get out between bits of laughter. The ones that, for our first 24 hours back together, came non-stop, no matter how much we tried to stop talking about YWAM. But behind those memories were all the harder ones. The ones of what God had done through me during DTS, the ones of what God had done FOR me during DTS. The ones that I had thrown away.
You see, while I was at home this summer, I forgot. I forgot what God had spoken to me, I forgot what I had learned, I forgot what it was like to be in a personal relationship with the one true living God. I threw away all the hard work, all the time and effort, all the blood, sweat, and tears, for a summer of emptiness. A summer of "Well, maybe this is how I'm supposed to live. Maybe I'm not supposed to be relevant. Maybe, I'm supposed to be the kind of Christian who goes to church on Sunday and Wednesday and doesn't think about it for the rest of the week. The kind who gets married and has 2 children, a girl and a boy, and volunteers in the nursery and bakes cookies for youth group." But then I got here.
Here, LIFE is church. You walk in this house and the Holy Spirit is like, WHAM. You forget that you're supposed to say you're a Christian because you're too busy being a follower of Jesus. Everything that was my life for those 5 months at YWAM was preperation for my life here... For self-reflection (which I do a lot of). For ministering into other people's lives (God has me in a place where a friend comes to me at 1 AM and says, this is what I'm dealing with. And it's exactly what I'm dealing with. It's weird, but it's awesome). For having my life ministered into. For being free, released, to have friends, to be friends, to make friends. To open myself up to someone within an hour of meeting them, to hug everyone who walks through our front door, to share whatever it is we have- sweet tea, pie, a movie. To realize that this is where I'm supposed to be, right now, for this time in my life. Maybe for longer.
As I said before, I've had a lot of time for self-reflection. For going back to my hurts and why they're still hurts and not history. Which, for me, means reading. (I'm blessed to be living in a house with people who love books as much as I do and always have a reccommendation.) I read "Blue Like Jazz" by Donald Miller at hannaHRose's request... At first, it was to humor her. And then it became this obsessive thing... This guy came from where I was with God a year ago ("My life had become something to hide; there were secrets in it. My thoughts were private thoughts, my lies were barriers that protected my thoughts, my sharp tonge a weapon to protect the ugly me.") to having all of this book left, which meant God HAD to get better... And, while I'm not to this point yet, I rejoiced when Don says, "To be in a relationship with God is to be loved purely and furiously." I rejoiced in knowing that, apparently, God does get better! It's not the end of the story! God knows what He's doing! And, even more than that, I rejoiced in knowing that someone else had been through the same desert I was in! I was not alone!
Then, 3 days ago, hannaHRose handed me "Angry Conversations with God". I almost picked it up a few days ago, but I didn't want to be disappointed by her only being angry with God for the first 5 pages and then getting over it. I couldn't handle it.
I got hooked. And the more hooked I got, the more I couldn't make myself read it. This was way too much like my life. This was this woman saying to her counselor, "Either God isn't personal and I've wasted my time, or He is personal and He hates me." And her counselor telling her, just like so many people have tried to tell me, that there is another option. "God loves you, but crappy things still happen." Yeah whatever. I was halfway through the book. God doesn't get better in this one. But then I got to page 145. And on page 145, I discovered something. I discovered that God speaks into my life even when I want to shove Him off a cliff or slam the door in His face (this was one of those lessons I learned in DTS, but rejected). Susan E. Isaacs says, on her moving across the country, "Perhaps God tricked me into moving here. Maybe he lured me out here with a shiny object and then pulled a bait and switch. But maybe I needed a shiny object to get here, because the real gift might not be so shiny. And maybe I just need to be patient and discover what the real gift is. Besides, Jesus has never let me down..."

I realized... It's true. Jesus has never let me down. And if someone had told me I was coming here so God could get me to look inward and upward, I would have run as fast as I've ever run. The thing is... All the things I have seen in the last 3 weeks, all the things I wake up every morning clinging to and spend my last moments at night rehashing with God, are foundational truths that I would rather not know so that I could keep living my life (which I wasn't really living, anyway.... I was wasting it). This place- Cullowhee, NC- has become the place where I came out of the desert. The place where I found (again), and finally settled into, the arms of God.

To be continued, with where I am at now...

I am wanted by God.

He is wanting to preserve me, to guide me through the darkness of the shadow of death, up into the highlands of His presence and afterlife. -Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz

How many miracles have you seen in your life? I don't mean the "little" everyday ones that everyone calls miracles, like childbirth or a couple staying together for 50 years (no, I'm not dissing those as miracles, I'm just saying that sometimes bigger things happen). I mean, money coming through at the last second from someone you never thought it'd come from. Your car being sucked under a semi-truck and spit out the other side, without a scratch. The healing of an illness that you thought someone would never recover from. Someone being in exactly the right place, and just the right time, with the perfect word of encouragement.

Ok. Got one? Just one- I know that there's a list of them in your mind, but pick just one time that God came through.

Now think of your current situation. Is there somewhere where you'd like God to come through, but you're stressing about the situation yourself, unable to see a way out except the worst?

What happened to all those times when God came through? He did it time and time again- why don't you trust Him to do it this time?

This entire year has just been a long list of miracles in my life. And each time I see one, I celebrate the fact that it occurred. I tell people, I thank God, and I marvel at the awesomeness that is what just happened.

And then, almost immediately, a new situation arises. And quickly, I forget what miracle just occurred. I am again amazed when God comes through.

I've cycled through this pattern oh, maybe 20 times in the last year. About 15 in the last 6 months. In the last week, about 3.

This week was kind of horrible for the House O' Bricks, on a cosmetic level. Our pipes froze, except they weren't frozen, some thing in the basement was broken. After we filled every container we could find with water, the landlord fixed it. It ended up not being a big deal, a small miracle- huzzah! It was quickly forgotten, though, when we woke up Thursday and had no electricity in the half of the house where I exist, and the driveway was iced over so badly that my car couldn't get out of the driveway. I celebrated when I was able to get out (at 2 PM) and thanked God... And then, when I got home from work today, I forgot again. There was no hot water, and I didn't know how to fix it, and I was the only one home. I called Kanz in a frenzy, and all I had to do was flip a switch... Then I sat down, and thought about it.

God came through in each of those situations. Those things all could have been HUGE deals, costing me and my roommates or our landlords lots of money that we don't have, and instead, they ended up being minor issues that we were able to fix easily. And now we all have a better idea how to fix our own house when the time comes!

But how long will it be before I forget again? Before I get in a new situation where I don't see how I can come out of it, and I totally lose sight of what God has done for me?

I don't want to be forgetful of what God has for me, or distrusting of what He'll do and how He'll come through. But I do know that my God is bigger and better than all my issues. Even if I somehow manage to forget all the miracles and all the things He's done, that's the one I can rely on.

So, today, I choose to be grateful. :)