Finally not sick!

I'm finally not sick!! I've been sick for almost a week (5 days!) and I'm finally just getting over it. That makes me so happy. I always think when I'm sick... "omg I want to just feel okay. I need to thank God more when I'm just healthy".
That is so true! When I'm not feeling horrible, I should constantly be praising God! Being healthy is such a blessing. If a was just a little cold, (seriously it must have been something worse cause that was the sickest I've ever felt,lol), then I can't imagine how people feel who are in the hospital for something far more serious. But anyways, that was just my thought on that.
I'm back in school now, hence the sharp decrease in postings on my blog, but so far, it's been all good. I know people in pretty much every class I've been to so far... except my nutrition class, and I have people in there who are really nice and I've had them in classes last semester.. (yeah yeah so maybe I should try to make friends) But unfortunately, I'm no social butterfly.
Anyways, school is okay, my psychology class was boring ON THE FIRST DAY so that's not a good sign ever, but I guess I should just be glad I'm majoring in nursing and not psychology.
Hung out with the image group and it was pretty fun last night. I still had a little cough but I was beginning to feel back to normal. ( I didn't go to church yesterday morning because I felt incredibly weak, probably because I had no appetite while I wasn't feeling well.) We talked about dreams and how stuff you want when you're little changes once you get big. For me, I wanted to be a veterinarian when I was really little and then I wanted to be a 'brain surgeon' once I got a little earlier. We were talking about how you sometimes let go great dreams and chase after smaller, easier dreams that take less time, money, and effort.
While I may admit, yes, maybe I would be more renown as a 'brain surgeon' or whatnot, I believe with all my being that, that dream was other peoples' dreams for me and not my own dreams. I am such a family person and my life really does revolve around God first and family second. I do think I am called to the medical field, but not to the extent of being alone all my life and just being a doctor and not a mother and wife. I wouldn't talk about it at the little group thing because it may have been kinda awkward, you know, considering I don't even have a boyfriend or any 'prospects' for that manner. haha..
But seriously, my heart's desire is to have a big family and to raise children who love God and want to serve his kingdom. And, while I sense that will be a while before that happens because I also have a calling to the medical field, I can accept that waiting because I'm trusting in God to fulfill my dreams. So, that's my dream. Cheers to it. haha
I didn't mean to go that into depth... the main thing I wanted to tell about the meeting was that we went and ate at Cheeburger Cheeburger after and this 14 year old kid ate a 1 pounder hambuger!! I thought he was gonna throw it up everywheres!! haha!

Cause He'll Be By My Side

Today was a pretty easy day. I was planning on going get my books for school but I didn't because I stayed up until about four thirty, (actually almost five), and so I knew I was going to sleep really late. Besides, I can just get my books on the first day of classes. Instead, Tiffany came over and we went and ate at Sonny's BBQ and caught up, then we came home and watched tv and stuff, then we went to church. After church we went to Laurens and caught up with Lauren and Emily. So, I had a good time today because I haven't done anything that I did today in a long time.
Last night I had a really weird dream. I dreamed that I lived in a strange town where all buildings had a glass front, and they were all shops. It was kind of like a mall, except it wasn't. I don't know, if I could draw I would show you how it looked. There were a bunch of 'bad' people and I was trying to stop them from doing whatever bad they were going to do. I had super powers, but unfortunately, they only worked sporadically. This caused me to always have to run away from the people, and eventually it got to a point to where these people were trying to hunt me down. That's all I remember from the dream.
I'm not really sure what this means, but maybe it means that I can (or should) only use my special attributes (I don't know what these are) at certain times, or else bad things will be able to overtake me. Maybe... I don't know. :)
But anyways, back to anything meaningful.
I found this wonderful song, (By Your Side by Tenth Avenue North), and I really love it. I think it pertains to my life a lot. It is spoken from God's point of view and he is asking me why I am looking for everything in this world to cling to. At one point it asks, "Why are you looking for love, why do you search, as if I'm not enough. Who will you run to," or something along those lines.
I think 'Who will you run to? or What will you run to?' is a great question! I should be running to God for everything! That is why I think God is teaching me patience with so much of my life, because he wants me to learn to run straight to him and not cling to anything of this world. All of these thoughts and stuff have really made me happy because I've been praying and thinking about my future a lot in the past couple of months, and I am totally psyched that I am getting to have a relationship with such an awesome God! Where would I be if my life was full of everything besides him? I feel so happy to be growing and to know that all I have to do is place all of my worries in his hands, and love him with my whole heart.
My heart is open for God now! This makes me feel like I'm breathing fresh air and that he has a fantastic plan for me. Every bible verse I have read or heard lately has filled me with a longing to drink in more of him and to place so much at his feet. And I know that everything will work out perfectly as long as I let him be by my side.
I am going to let God write my life story, instead of impulsively ruining the best parts he has planned out for me!

Reading and Writing but no Arithmetic

I am going to start school in a week and a half, and for once, I will not have any classes that are math. I do have chemistry, which has a lot of math in it, but no specific math courses. You have no idea how happy that makes me. After being afflicted by atrocities called Calculus and Alegebra II, life with no math seems like heaven! I am a little worried about the upcoming semester. Last semester I had a 17 hour schedule with a sixteen hour feel (one of my 3 hours classes was only 1 hour a week and one of my 1 hour classes was 2 hours a week). This semester I am going to have another 17 hour schedule, but it will feel more like 19 hours if you count the labs and such. But, I am going to be taking biology as an internet course. I guess this is kind of risky because if the teacher is bad I can't drop the course because this class is a prereq for a prereq for another prereq so I have to take the classes in sequence the next three semesters or I won't be able to get into nursing school. My lab professer isn't a good teacher and so that can be scary because I need a good GPA to get into nursing school.
Even though I have all these stresses I think it will be worth it. Even though nursing school is going to be extremely hard I think it is going to be right up my ally. It will be challenging but something that I've always wanted to do. I've really always wanted to be some time of surgical doctor (not an anesthesiologist but that's what my parents always pushed me for) but now that I'm older I really want a big family and to be a homemaker. So nursing, I think, is the next best thing. If I was a doctor I don't think I would ever be able to practice and if I did then I don't think I would ever be able to really have a family life. As a nurse, you only are required a four year college education, so I will hopefully be able to work for some time before beginning my family. Being able to help people get through the toughest times of the life definately interests me. I don't know what it is about me, but ever since my dad got cancer the first time, I've known for certain that I would end up in the medical field in some way. Now that I'm getting to the point where I'll actually be studying for it, I am really excited. Sometimes I am scared that one day I'll just freak out and start fainting at the sight or blood or throwup or poop or something and I'll have to switch careers. I've just been looking forward to this future so much I don't want anything to mess it up.
I think maybe the reason I haven't met a guy or anything that I feel strongly about is because of this. I think God wants me to wait to get married, because he knows me so much better than myself. I think if I got married in college, (like in 2 years or so I'm saying), I would get caught up in having a family and forget about ever doing nursing or how I want to help people through that. And even though I hate that, I think God is doing what is best for me.
By doing all of this through God's time and not trying to change it, I think I will have a reward beyond what I imagined. It must be true, because I believe God definately has a plan for me, and that excites me and makes me even more anxious to just get into nursing school and begin to learn.
I don't know. Now I think I'm just getting to the point as to where I'm rambling and sounding half crazy, so I think that's all I'm going to talk about that and see where God leads me. All I know is that God is really trying to make me learn to be patient and not get carried away with life. When I learn this, I think he will let everything start to fall into place. What a great, wise, awesome God I serve!

I think this blog thing is going to keep me entertained for awhile. It's kinda fun, once I figure out what I'm going to write about. But, then again, I can always just write about my life, and, if it's too boring to write about, then I can write about someone else's life. Or my cat's life for that matter.
I'm going back to school on January the 14th, something that I don't look forward to that much. Hopefully my teachers won't be absolutely horrible, but there's nothing I can do about that but pray. But I will pray! :) I'm not too worried though, because I believe that God is in control and he won't give me a mountain I can't climb and everything happens for a reason. As cliche as all of that sounds, I believe those are some of the keys to having serenity.
But that wasn't what I was going to write about, so anyways.
School has always been something I've been 'good at', but I sometimes don't think of it as a blessing. When you are 'good' at something, it puts more pressure on you to do well at everything, even when it's something you don't care about. Although I am glad that I'm good at school, it aggravates me that people think I am just handed good grades and that I don't deserve anything I have. Or, because I bought a new car and have a new laptop, people think I don't deserve that. That seriously drives me crazy. Of course I don't deserve these things, but I deserve them every bit as much as any other person. So, on that note, don't make assumptions about people, especially things like that. It's annoying.
And, because I don't want my blog to be one long rant about everything that I hate and everything that nobody wants to hear about, I guess I'll balance that out with something happy to make this thing a little more neutral. :)
Have you ever felt an overwhelming love for other people? I think it is one of the most wonderful feelings in the world. The only problem with the feeling is figuring out just how to express it. If you're happy with your mom or dad, you give them a hug or buy them a little gift. So, how can you express your love for others? I don't know. I would assume that you would just live like Christ and be patient and loving and all that jazz. But shouldn't there be something more? I believe that, being a Christian, others should be able to see you are a Christian simply by being around you about an hour or so. It's an interesting thought to think of how many lives we could effect if every person who was a Christian acted. And, I want to act! I want to show the world God's love. I want to travel to a foreign country and use my time, my money, my heart, my body, and my soul to bring others to Christ, or even to show Christ to them, so that I could maybe plant a seed in their heart.
I want to plant seeds all around me, and I pray that I become more like Christ in every way so that he can be seen through me! I think having an enduring forbearance (if that makes any sense) will definately cause me to see past people's faults (which I should because I have plenty of my own) and enable me to help them.... and through that, they will consequently help me.

Hello World

So this is officially my first 'blog post'... well, on this little site anyways. Jessica forced me to get one... :) not really! I actually need something like this... just because I have a facebook and it has these 'note' things you can write which are basically the same thing, but this has more of a sense of privacy to it, just because everybody and their mom has a facebook and anytime I posted something I would feel like I was being self righteous if I posted something religious or I would feel uber wicked if I didn't (just kidding!). But seriously, I need something where I can just write... or urmm.. type. But anyways, here it goes...
I just finished reading the book Redeeming Love, and, as promised, it was a very good book. There were many times in the book when I teared up and got anxious for the characters. But it wasn't the plot that made me identify and empathize with the characters. I won't give away the ending or anything that will spoil the book, but I will explain enough to help you understand how the book changed the way I look at things. The book is about a harlot named Angel who gets brought out of prostitution by a man named Michael. As the storyline develops, the reader, (and Michael), learns more and more about Angel as she puts down the walls she has built around herself to protect her heart.
This changed my perspective on a few things. Sometimes I forget that people weren't born any different than I. No person is born to go straight to hell. I believe that with all my heart, and it is something that gives me a problem with believing in predestination. When we are all born, we are an empty slate, so to speak. It is the things around us that make us who we are, and only until we get older do we get to choose what things we want to be around.
Angel was trapped in a brothel and unable to change her condition and surroundings. So, she did what anybody would do, she adapted to her surroundings. And when the chance came for her to leave, she clung tightly to the only thing she had ever known. I didn't blame her. Why leave a place where you are accepted to go to a place where you may have a little more dignity, but people only look at your past, the undeniable scarring of a fallen woman that kept her from escaping from something she never put herself into.

What is it about us that makes us want to kick people while they are down? Why is it that we look down on someone who tries to climb out of a bad situation in life, yet mock them if they don't? Have we become so self righteous that we can not even remember where we once were? I honestly was thinking as I read the book," omgsh so of course she's gonna get to marry the wonderful, handsome, perfect man when I have more to offer than her and God knows if I'll ever get married... ever!!" Yeah I know, I'm an idiot! For once thing, as sin is a sin, and I have definately sinned enough to go to hell. I am equal to a prostitute... or was anyways. I was only redeemed because I put my faith in God, and my redemption does not make me any better than one like her.
If I think of my relationship with Christ, though, that is just what it is. I am exactly like a harlot who he has taken away from a brothel and freed. He has freed me from my sins and given me life that I don't deserve, even if I never sin again in my life. I was every bit as broken as Angel, and every bit as undeserving of God's grace as she was of Michael's hand in marriage.
I'm glad I read that book because it also gave me insight on how things will work out in God's plan and in God's time, no matter what I have in my mind. And although I can say that I already knew everything that I have typed about, to be able to see through a story how God's love works and how we are supposed to show his love through ourselves, it gives me a stronger sense of what I need to be.
Because I have been lucky enough to have been brought up so wonderfully and with so much opportunity for myself, it gives me that much more responsibility for others. Because God has saved me, I must save others just as Michael saved others. I must bring others to Christ, only at the expense of my own heart. Because I know that the reward is far greater than I can imagine or dream: a new unbreakable heart that will be able to love and worship my God eternally.

Sorry if my crazy mind is hard to digest... it is a bit late and I don't feel very encouraged to go back and edit. :) Good night!