Swimming in It

...the sea of uncertainty that is. There's so much going on in my heart and my mind right now. I'm thinking about leaving my job and going to art school. I think I want to be an art professor. Should I stay or should I go? You'd think that'd be an easy decision to make but its so much deeper. Ya see... I signed this contract that said I'd stay on staff until August 2009 unless I got married or I felt the direct leading of the Lord elsewhere. I don't want to go unless it really is God leading me to and not my own selfish desires because I'm the only staff girl here. My time on staff has been hard, killer hard but at the same time its been sweet because Jesus is all I've had to cling to.
I was reading Genesis 15 this weekend, its about God's covenant with Abram. Abram is this old childless man who God promised to give land and offspring as numberous as the stars to. He believes what God says and its credited to him as righteousness. I imagine Abram the nomad, longing for a country he could call home and a son and heir and then I think of myself. I feel like all I have right now are my longings I long to pursue art, I long to be married, I long for closeness with friends. I know these longings aren't wrong but I have received no promise concerning any of these things. S o I asked God to give me a promise to claim and this is what He gave me:

But he knows the way that I take; when he has tried me, I shall come out as gold. My foot has held fast to his steps; I have kept his way and have not turned aside. I have not departed from the commandment of his lips; I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my portion of food. But he is unchangeable, and who can turn him back? What he desires, that he does. For he will complete what he appoints for me, and many such things are in his mind. Therefore I am terrified at his presence; when I consider, I am in dread of him.
(Job 23:10-15)

He will complete what He appoints for me and many such things are in his mind! The fight is to believe that God loves me and is doing what's best for me even in this. I'm really learning what it means to wait on the Lord in full dependence.

Confessional

I'm officially stuck in the 90's. This morning before I went to church I downloaded this Dave Matthews song from his solo album Little Devil the song is called- Stay or Leave. Its beautiful. I love his music. I know I shouldn't because its not hip but I've gotta admit that I'm still a closet DMB fan. There's just something earthy and mystical about his music. I have another prototypical 90's habit. I only buy flare leg jeans. I hope they stay in style forever. Because I've been buying them since middleschool and I can't seem to convince myself that bootcut or even the new tapered style are going to look as good on me.
Anyways, I was drinking a Peach Pear Smoothie at Eclipse (the finest food establishment in Mo-town) with Alicia last week and they had their satellite radio set on a 90's station. I was transfixed ... well, maybe transported back to 8th grade field trips where we'd sit in the back of the bus and trade cd's, and spend hours talking about and listening to Bush, Smashing Pumpkins, Tori Amos, the Cranberries, Stone Temple Pilots, U2, Nirvana, Duran Duran, and the Cure. Music meant so much to us back then. Formative years and formative friends. i miss them.

It's Saturday night and I'm back on the blue couch in my black fleece pants. I'm a little sick, I've got a head cold. My roommate Erin and I just got back from seeing The Nanny Diaries in our pj's, with lots of candy in our purses. Its been a good night. I've been thinking alot about friendship today and how real friendship is hard to find and hard to give at the same time. In our culture it seems like for the most part your friends become your family. Especially if you're single and living away from home. But this poses somewhat of a problem- familial relationships are pretty stable because you're related and you can't change that. Friends are the people who you choose to let into your life. By their very nature friendships are more noncommittal and unstable, and because of this they can often be pretty competitive.
I've seen myself put up walls with different women because I felt like if I really let them in they were going to jeopardize my standing in my perceived "friend family" (Matt and Rob). I was scared that they were just using me to get to the guys (and some of them may have been doing that). But its intimidating when the friends you love and value think another girl is more fun or engaging than you are.
I really think this kind of thing is what keeps women from having really close relationships with each other. We're scared. We're scared that if we let a beautiful, intelligent, lively new friend into our circle she'll get more attention than us, and that the boys we like will like her more than they like us. But I'm seeing that this mentality, this way of operating is toxic and it only pushes people away and leaves us alone. We demand a kind of friendship that we can control. We put up walls and are careful about who we introduce them to. Its selfish. We're playing god. Its arrogant to think that I can control who is friends with who, and what people think about eachother. If God wants two people to be together I will not be able to stand in His way.
I think we just have a tendency to use eachother- what can this person help me do? who can i meet through this person? how does this person make me look? We think of everything but the other person. Lord help me to repent, change my heart.