Week 4.5-5.5

Things that Happened this Week

I started my new job at Pottery Barn Kids. We packed the store, and packing is not my favorite thing in the world, but the people are cool and need Jesus, and I am there to share the gospel with them, not to enjoy putting millions of things into hundreds of boxes. So it will be fine.

My Fins coworkers speak to me in Spanish sometimes, so that’s fun. I can now say, “What time is it,” and, “What’s happening?” along with my previous vocabulary of, “Where is the bathroom?”

I went surfing for the second time on Saturday and thought for a moment I was surely going to die. The waves crashed over me and around me. The current pushed me toward the rip tide where the waves no longer moved in parallel patterns, but came from right and left, casting me around carelessly on my surfboard. And did I mention the rip tide? I never met that dear friend, but I heard him underneath me and worried the waves would cast me into his clutches and never release me.

            So I sat on the beach for a while and rehydrated before hitting the waves again. It was much nicer to stay as far away from the rip tide as possible.

I told a few friends I needed an attitude adjustment, and at the beach party this week a visiting worship leader told me this might not be the best summer of my life. He said it might not change my life. And I felt better after that. I don’t know if Elevate will change my life, but I don’t have to be disappointed because not everyone is going to look at me in disappointment if I come out of Elevate and say, “It was just ok. It wasn’t everything I dreamed, and it definitely wasn’t what they show in the videos. They don’t even film the videos till the end of the summer when the sun finally peeks from the clouds. They make it look like sunshine and laughter and dancing on the beach, but the sun doesn’t even shine here in May, June, or early July.”

           But there are good things happening too. God placed me in a workplace with zero Christians because he loves the people working there and eating there. He provides random people who will change me in a single conversation. He gives me food, even good food. He provides warm showers with hot water that never runs out and I don’t have to pay for.

Things I’ve Learned this Week

Fear is a huge issue in my life, which I already knew, but I didn’t know that fear might be a sin. A sin is anything that goes against God’s perfect plan, and fear goes against God’s perfect plan. But fear is also an emotion, so the verdict is out on that one.

There is only one meaning of the Bible, but there are many applications. The Bible means what it meant to the original hearers, but God provides various applications to various people depending on what they need in their lives at the moment.

            Which is only new because Resonate previously only told me the first part, that the Bible only means what it meant to the original people, but left out the part about being able to glean many applications from the same verse. It was very confusing. 

There are dead things in me. These dead things come from the curse resting on the world and have been there since before I began. I've always wanted to kill the dead things, but they are already dead. Maybe instead of asking Jesus to kill them, I need to ask him to bring them back to life. 

Things to pray for:

I’m not sure what to do after Elevate but feel like it’s time to start planning.

I could use some perseverance/follow through/energy/motivation.

My coworkers to fall in love with Jesus.

Healing.