I’ve erased what I’ve written about three times. I just can’t seem to get into the flow of writing. I have so much I want to say, but each time I try, I can’t get it out.
Pastor Mark’s sermon today in church was right on. Just what I needed to hear. It was about finding Joy in life. He used the Psalms as his examples. I kept on thinking back to a phrase that my Youth Pastor used to throw around. “Joy suckers” These are people, things in your life, emotions, whatever it may be, that suck the joy right out of you. They leave you empty. They leave you alone. They leave you absolutly drained. We’re talking NOTHING…..and often times, while having the joy sucked out of you, you’ve lost those you’ve loved. Maybe they gave up on you. It has happened. Maybe they didn’t feel like walking through whatever it was with you, it has happened. Maybe it’s a siguation that you find yourself in-you don’t know how you’ll make it out of it. Maybe your whole life is a joy sucker. Sound funny? Well, for a lot of the people I love, they are living a living hell, that is literally sucking the life away from them. What’s the key to getting your joy back. Looking to Jesus. Sounds simple? It’s not so easy as we know. Ultimatly it is HIS opinion and HIS ONLY that matters. (PREACHING TO MYSELF!!!).
What’s one of your joy suckers?
Mine?
Friday night I stayed up (probibly too late) with my mentor Melisa, who is currently over 1,000 miles away in Bali, Indonesia. She’s been there for too long, and will be there for six monthes when its all said and done. I miss her so much. (I love you Frak). When I talk to her, life makes sense. When I talk with her, I discover things about myself that I didn’t know, my insecurities, the reasons why I am the way that I am, my fears…..something that was mentioned that we’ve talked a lot about is our fear of abandonment. I can’t list you the number of friends that have moved away from me in the past 4 years of my life. They’ve gone to college, started new lives, moved away….the idea is that they aren’t with me anymore. I miss them, but they move on without me. This is a major joy sucker in my life. I’m tired of finding new friends, opening up to them, and having them leave. It would be so easy to just give up, shut down, and become a recluse. That’s not who I am though, I NEED people. I feed off of people.
What do I do? Forget myself. A lot of our problems in life come down to the issue of “ME-ISM” we forget-IT’S NOT ABOUT US!!! We wern’t created in life to just exsist. Nor were we created to run through life on empty. Jesus came to give us “life to the full!” so why do people spend so much time down in the dumps even as Christians? We’ve lost sight of our reason. He should be our all. Is He yours?
