Arnica Anonymous

So...I wasn't exactly intending to take a break from blogging. Sometimes though, life throws unexpected things (good and bad) at us and all we can do is accept them from the Lord and deal with them. I copied the following song into the front of my current journal because I felt it perfectly fit my life right now. I often feel like I am completely ruining everything with my ignorance and stupidity. And then I have to take a deep breath and remind myself that God covers me with grace. He forgives me and will work everything out for my benefit. Yes, I am out of control of my own life. But I trust the One who is controlling it and am so thankful for the grace He offers to me.

When I started volunteering at the local crisis pregnancy center in April of this year my plan was to do all their behind the scenes work. Counting money, cleaning, making copies, etc. I was good with but nothing directly involving the clients. I knew dealing with them would drive me nuts. And then a child, pregnant with a middle aged man's baby, walked in the door and looked me in the eyes.

I told a friend that this had been a "bitter" year for me. You readers have gotten to see a lot of this so I won't go in to further detail. I will explain however the kick in the pants that I got a few weeks after making this statement. You see, I just happened to run across a collection of verses on "Joy" and  it dawned on me that many of them were not suggestions. They were commands . And I was reminded of a quote I discovered several years ago: "Be thankful for what you have. Your life, no matter how bad you think it is, is someone else's fairy tale."  ~  Wale Ayeni (no idea who this person is but I like the quote) I may not feel like counting my blessing but nevertheless, God has told me to do so and I believe it is because when I do, I tend to have a change of attitude. Compared to many other peoples' my year was not that bad. After all, I started water-coloring, picked up the ukulele, got certified as a Master Gardener, be...

A few weeks ago I told one of my friends, "You know, I am nothing like I would have expected to be ten years ago. Or even five years ago."  After all, I grew up as a tom-boy believing all emotions were useless things that got in the way of logic and sense and that functionality always trumped beauty.

INFJ -- I've mentioned before that this is my Myers-Briggs personality type. What I haven't told you is that I am not all the internet believes an INFJ is. INFJ's are portrayed as rigidly upright, unfailingly thoughtful, unendingly self-less. I believe that most of those with this personality type are really like that.  Or at least, do their best to be. I am not like that.

  (I would recommend caution for young readers. This post is unusually gritty for me and may not be suitable for young minds.) It's a rare thing that I feel the need to add my two cents to a viral controversy but a recent influx of Facebook posts by some friends I once loved dearly has made me think a lot and you get to reap the benefits of this thinking! ;) The controversial issue I am speaking of is modesty.

I have always enjoyed the book of Philippians though until today I had not known why. This morning as  I began my (sometimes) daily Bible study I decided to do a little research on the setting of Philippians. It's a sweet story.