Great is Thy Faithfulness

Great is thy faithfulness! Morning by morning new mercies I see. All I have needed Thy hand hath provided; great is Thy faithfulness, Lord unto me.

Sometimes, we wait for morning. Now that isn't necessarily a bad thing, but sometimes it is. It can be bad if you wait for morning for new mercies. Sometimes, when we realize that we've failed, we hide. We try to cover ourselves up, wait for morning, for a change in scenery, to accept mercy and make a new beginning. We don't seem to realize that there is the rest of the day left to work. When people fail around, say, noon, there is still a good 12 hours left in the day. It isn't like, oops, you had your one failure for today, now go sit in a corner and wait until tomorrow morning. Then you can try again. It doesn't even matter if you continue messing up anymore, because you haven't been forgiven for that last thing you did. That isn't how God works.

Ok, this might sound a little weird. But haven't you ever done it? Am I really the only one who has said something along the lines of "Well, yes, I do slack off with my homework. But it's ok... I'll wait until next semester, then I'll keep up on my work. Honest!" We wait for something big or dramatic to happen before we change our behavior. Maybe it's "Yes, I have been behind on my Bible reading, but I'll catch up... once this season of Psych is over". I don't know what it is in your life, but I know I have a few places in mine where I am waiting for "morning" to receive the new mercies, to begin anew.

But people, let's keep in mind here that this is God we're talking about! God, who is faithful through all of our failures and mishaps. Even when we fail, He is willing to pick us up immediately and offer us a second, third, ten-thousand-fifty-ninth chance. He isn't a God who waits for morning to provide us with exactly everything we need. He's willing now. Are you ready to accept it?

Winter Break

Now that Christmas break is here, I suddenly have much more free time. That means reading books, finishing the many blog posts I've started, sleeping more, and lots of other things. Important things, like hanging out with my family.

So not a very long post today, nothing that impressive, but just a heads up that I might start going crazy on this blog (once my laptop charger that I left in my dorm gets here). Well, merry almost Christmas! Expect another update soon!

Finals Week/ BOOKS

Finals week is upon me! Fortunately, for my first semster of college, the load has been (sorta) light. I only have to take one test that requires any studying. Of course, I also have 1 take home test, 1 open book test, 3 papers, and 1 presentation. 1 of the papers has been turned in, and these other 2 just need to be edited (if anyone wants to read through them, let me know!). I gave the presentation last week, so all I need to do now is finsh editing this paper before 2pm today, study for Old Testament, edit the other paper for tomorow, and finish the 3 short essay questions for my take home history test! Then Wednesday morning I get to fly back to Kansas!

I am super excited for Winter Break. Five weeks off with no work to do? I haven't had that since middle school summers before I got a job! In high school, finals were 2 weeks after break, so we speent all break studying. Blegghh.

My plans for break are fantastic! I will be chilling in Kansas for a while with the family, seeing friends and reading books. I'm so excited to have time to read lots and lots of books again! My family will be going to Colorado for a few days, then my older brother and I will head up to Chicago for a little while. Long car rides= more time to read books.

I have a list of books to read over break, but I also want some suggestions.

Here's what I have so far:

Northhanger Abbey (Jane Austen)
A Grief Observed (C.S. Lewis)
Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy)
(Francine Rivers)
Wild At Heart (John Eldredge)

No Facebook November: A reflection

4 hours!! 4 hours left until I'm allowed back on Facebook! Going without Facebook this month has been, well, really nice. I've been able to be really productive, which in turn means I've been stressing about homework less, which is awesome. It's been fairly easy to stay off of Facebook after the initial couple days until about yesterday afternoon. That's when I realized that I was almost done and allowed back on. I re-introduce Facebook in 4 hours, but after tonight I'm setting strict rules on how much time I'm allowed to spend on each day so I don't end up exactly how I was before November-- addicted, thinking about my day in status updates, anxious if I haven't checked it in a few hours.

I think it will be hard to moderate my time on when I get back though. It seems easier to just cut it out all together, avoid all temptation, than to be constantly checking myself to make sure I wasn't wasting too much time.

However, despite not wasting my time on Facebook, I've realized I began now wasting my time watching TV online or playing Tetris. Which makes me wonder how I can possibly eliminate all of my distractions and start actually being super productive. Sure, I've been more productive, but not as much as I had hoped. Having friends to keep me accountable was a huge part-- everyone would know and get on my case if I so much as peeked on Facebook. Because I don't want to let my friends down or "betray" them, I've abstained. But that doesn't mean I've stopped watching an episode of Psych every day.

Basically, what I'm saying is that though, yes, I cut out Facebook, but even with that, I'm a work in progress. I'm still working. We'll see how it goes. I'll keep you updated!

Thanksgiving

I know, I know; it's cliche. But hey, there are things I'm thankful for. So I decided to make a list of a few things I'm grateful for. I'm grateful for much more than just this, but here's a start :) (These are in no particular order)

1. Friends. I could go on and on about my friends, but instead I thought I'd make sub points. (Couldn't figure out how to make supoints... so that's what #2 is)
2. a. When I can call them in the middle of the night just to talk.
   b. When they make me tea that they've been excited to save for finals because they know that I've had a rough week and am stressed.
   c. Who I can simply sit in silence with, and be comfortable with.
   d. Who will drive me to the airport at 5:45 in the morning.
   e. Who write me notes to make me smile.
   f. A roomate who is also a friend.
3. A family, biological and not, that cares about me and loves me, whether I deserve it or not.
4. Fun hats.
5. Tea and its many different flavors (if you want to get me a Christmas gift, try tea ;))
6. My Bible, and the freedom to proclaim my faith and go to a Christian college.
7. Music.
8. A weekend at home with my family and extended family.
9. Becoming "Elizabeth" and "Bip" for a weekend again.
10. Not having to go through a full body scan or patdown as I flew out of Boston yesterday.
11. Jane Austen, J.K. Rowling, Francine Rivers, and other authors.
12. Coloring books.
13. Socks.
14. My siblings.
15. Photography, Picnik and Photoshop.
16. Alliteration (and Poetry-- writing it, reading it, loving it)
17. Joy
18. Beginning to decorate for Christmas and listening to Christmas music.
19. Sleeeeeeeep. And a comfortable bed.
20. Disney movies.
21. My laptop.
22. Every pageview that I get on this blog.
23. Good smelling things.
24. Long showers (without having to wear flipflops)
25. Swimming pools.
26. Dried flowers. Live flowers too. Especially lilacs or roses.
27. Pie (and my tv shows. Random? Kinda. Not when one is Pushing Dasies though! Mentalist, Glee, Psych are the ones showing now).
28. LOVE
29. Nalgene water bottles.
30. Knowledge that God loves me, has a plan for me, and has more in store for me than I could ever imagine!

So I could go on and on, but I'm ready to fall into a food coma for the next few hours. And I don't want to bore you to death. Happy thanksgiving!! Don't forget to be thankful, and appreciate what you have instead of focusing on what you want!

You've got mail!

As a college student, there is not much that brightens my day more than mail. When I check my mailbox and see letter or a package slip, I have to smile. I love these little bits of evidence that someone loves me (or whatever I ordered off Amazon has come in)! I really appreciate letters, because they take time to sit down, write out, then whoever wrote it must find an envelope and stamps, then go to the post office. Sure, an email is faster, but so much less personal.

Letters can also be really encouraging. I got a letter recently from a new-ish friend that totally made my day. It was encouraging and uplifting, and it helped me relax, destressify and go about the day a little bit more calmly. Having had a bad day, her letter turned it completely around. I pull it out every once in a while to reread. I have a baggie with all of my letters in it that I pull out once in a while just to read.

So write someone a letter (especially college students!). Encourage them. You never know what difference it could make.

Just a short snippet today, but that's ok, because I have to go finish packing so I can go home tomorrow morning!! :)

p.s. I would love letters, but I'm not really comfortable giving out my address here... send me a text or look up on Facebook my address if we're friends and you want my address :) Give me yours and I'll (try to) send you some letters!

Death

Way to be, Liz. Way to bring up a depressing, serious subject. Well, this blog is about me sharing whatever I'm thinking, and I've been thinking about Death a lot lately. And not in that morbid, depressing way that I think they ask you about on those "anonymous tests" they make you take in high school. The ones that basically ask you if you do drugs, drink, or are depressed. I don't know if they are only a recent thing or what, but they are so annoying and take forever to fill out. One I took my junior year had been right after a classmate died, so I am very curious to how the results to the "I have thought about death often in the past month (Completely true/Mostly True/ No Opinion/ Mostly False/ Completely false)" turned up for our school. But random side tanget aside, death sucks.

I've known people who died. I never knew either of my grandfathers, my Omi (dad's mom) died when I was 8 or so, my G'ma (mom's mom) died when I was 13, and my Aunt Betty died when I was 14. At my high school graduation in Libertyville, we remembered the 3 young men who were supposed to graduate with our class, but had died. Most recently, November 5, 2010, my good friend Emily's dad Jim, who him and his whole family have been really influential in my life, lost a long-fought battle with cancer.

I know that Jim is now cancer-free, laughing and living with Jesus (who probably knows some pretty legit magic tricks that He's teaching Jim). Despite knowing that, however, I wish he hadn't died. I wish he could've gotten better and stayed around here on earth for a while. He had such a ministry, such an impact on everyone that he met. I don't understand why good people are taken away so young, when they have so much left to contribute to the world, when you know that if they lived all they did would be furthering God's kingdom. Isaiah 57: 1-2 helps shed a little bit of light on it. "The righteous perish, and no one ponders it in his heart; devout men are taken away, and no one understands that the righteous are taken away to be spared from evil. Those who walk uprightly enter into peace; they find rest as they lie in death." Looking at this verse and Miriam's (Jim's wife) CaringBridge blog, reading her strenght and faith in the midst of all that happened, gives some comfort. I have really looked up to the entire Mohler family as they've struggled through this pain.

What are people going to say about me when I'm dead? If I died tomorrow, would I ever really have lived? I have a bucket list with so many things I've never done. Sure, I've crossed off a whole 2 things on the list, but what does that entail? What legacy would I leave? No one is going to look at my life and say "Wow, she spent so much time everyday picking out outfits and her hair was always so perfect. I really look up to her." Then again, would anyone say "Wow, she spent so much time in her Bible every day and always was so strong in her faith. I really look up to her.

"I'm not looking for sympathy responses-- I don't want you to tell me all the great qualities you love about me or how much you would miss me if I died. I want to know for myself that I'm living each day faithful and strong in my faith, loving completely and taking chances. I don't know when I'm going to die, but I want my life to have meant something. I want people to remember me as they remember Jim Mohler. I want to leave a legacy like he did. If any Mohlers are reading this, I love you all so so much, and am praying for you all. Thank you for being such a positive influence in all aspects of my life. I love you.

NYC!! (And losing God)

Backstory: My parents' good friend ran in the New York marathon with the Chilean miner, the couple who renewed their wedding vows at the 17 mile marker, Minnie Mouse and Waldo (yes, we saw all of them). So my parents decided that, since they love me and I conveniently go to college close-ish to NYC, that they would buy me a train ticket so I could come visit them! Saturday morning I took a train downtown Boston, hopped 2 quick subways to my next train station, then spent 4 hours on a train to NYC.

I had a super productive weekend: On the ride up, I finished tons of homework, while there I saw my 1st marathon, crossed off something from my bucket list (See Phantom of the Opera on Broadway!!! Soooo good!! But that might just be because I'm absolutely obsessed with it), saw Kristin Chenoweth on Broadway (be jealous, be soooo jealous. She rocks.), took about 250 pictures, did touristy downtown things, went to Times Square and Ground Zero, caught a glimpse of the Statue of Liberty (and the lego one), oh, and I saw my parents too. It was splendid! My favorite quote from the weekend was, as my mom and I were walking, a guy came and asked us if we were interested in a comedy show and drinks. My mom replied that I'm underage, to which the guy said "That's ok. We take fake IDs of all kinds!" It made me laugh :)

As we traipsed about New York City, I looked around and saw buildings, people, sites I had never seen before. I stayed close to my parents, afraid of being lost in the big city, separated by the crowd. Even if I was separated, however, I figured I could hold my own until I found them agian. I had made it from Boston to New York all by myself! I was strong, confident, secure. Foolish? Ok, yes, probably.

I think we treat God that way a lot... we stick close to him for security, a guiding hand through the busy, crazy world. But if we slip up, lose him for a moment, we think we can do it on our own. "I've made it this far in my life without God," we might say. "If I go a different way for a moment, it won' t be that big of a deal. Right?" Wrong. Had I lost my parents in downtown NYC, chances of me finding them again, had I not had a cell phone, slim to none. It would be nearly impossible. I would've found it hard even to get back to the apartment on my own, hoping to meet up with them there.

But there's good news. If you get distracted for a moment by all the stores around you, the flashing lights, the tall buildings and street performers (and the cute boys), and you lose God, He knows you are missing. He looks for you. He calls your cell phone, again and again. He won't rest until you are back with him. While you are lost and being bustled around by the millions of people around you, He knows. As Matthew West puts it in his song "More", "Just a face in the city, just a tear on the crowded street, but you are one in a million, and you belong to Me. And I want you to know, I'm not letting go, even when you come undone." Even when we turn towards the Phantom, Raoul is there to stop us before we go with him (sorry, I'm listening to the movie soundtrack [because I'm obsessed, note above] and had to throw that in).

So there's just a little something to think about as you sit there Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again (In New York). Ok, I'm a little infatuated. But I'm done now. Promise. Although at this point I'm probably Past the Point of No Return. Gahh. Ok, I'm just going to stop while I'm behind. I'll probably post something else soon... we'll see. First I should study some for my rather unfortunately large Old Testament test on Friday!

p.s. Thank you to all who have been reading Pure Joy! And to whoever posted this link on the Gordon Facebook page-- thank you!! All I Ask of You is that I'd love to know who you are :)

Home

Tonight I was walking back from a friend's dorm to Ferrin, my dorm. As I looked up at the big building, I smiled and thought "I haven't been home much today." Home. I now refer to my dorm room at Gordon College as home. And it has become my home: the place I run to when I am stressed, where I can curl up with a good book and a mug of cocoa, where I can run and dance and be insane, where I sleep each night and can get hugs from my roommate. I feel comfort, secure in my room, I recognize the now-familiar wardrobes and desks.

Webster's Dictionary defines home as "one's place of residence". I don't agree completely with that-- that can be a house. I prefer their 3rd definition of the word better, however; "a familiar or usual setting". But that still doesn't encompass the simple word that is "home". The best way I could define home is imagine you are lost in Australia and have one free ticket back to where ever you want to go, but you have to stay there once you are there. Where would you go? Probably not the best analogy, but I think it gets my point across.

At the beginning of the year, right after moving in to Ferrin, I felt homesick. I wanted nothing more than to go somewhere familiar with familiar faces. I missed the sights, smells and sounds I was so used to. Not having my family around me all the time was bizzare. The 1st night at Gordon (post La Vida, in my actual dorm), my mom texted me "sleep well in your new home". But it wasn't home, not yet.

I've been asked what I think heaven is going to look like. I have no idea, but I know it's going to be far far better than anything I could come up with. But I believe that it is going to have that feeling of going home after a long vacation: the vacation itself was fun and interesting, but you are so ready for that familiar bed, your favorite mug or book you didn't pack, to see your best friend again, the chair that has your imprint from you curling up on it so often. Heaven will be home.

Gordon has become a bit of home for me. The faces that are becoming familiar so quickly, the my 3rd dresser drawer that is slightly tilted and so doesn't close all the way, the pub/cafe on campus my roommate Angela and I study in before our Old Testament tests.

Sorry this is random and scattered... I have so much more I could write about with home, but I feel this might be long enough.

No Facebook November

Hey all! I'm back! I didn't get abducted by aliens, kidnapped by kangaroos or poofed away by poodles. I have, however, become a very busy, very tired college student (yay for college!!!). So I'm terribly sorry for all my eager fans out there (sarcasm, I really don't have any fans at all) for not having a new post sooner.

In a smooth transition from the topic of my intense busyness to the topic of... my intense busyness (creative, right?), a couple of friends and I decided to give up facebook for all of November (and possibly until finals are over in December). Yes, I am crazy. But as we sat around talking, we all realized that we never read for fun anymore. We read plenty for homework, but I haven't actually read more than 2 chapters of a book for fun since coming to college. Which made me really sad. Facebook has consumed so much of my time lately, it's time to cut it out completely for a while. Because of facebook, I've realized that I've been spending less time reading for fun, spending time with God, updating my blog (once again, sorry!) and occasionally my schoolwork suffers too. Oops.

So this evening I will post my farewell and log off. If you need me, I'll be spending more time making real relationships, or reading a book. Maybe I'll be spending time with God, or I could even be writing a new blog to post. But whatever I'm doing, it will be more productive than sitting around waiting for someone to update their status or informing the world that my flipflop just broke (yes, that is my current status).

Man, it's good to be back to Pure Joy. It's good to be writing again. It's good.

P.S. Happy Halloween!

Worship

I spent the last week at Northern Pines, a family camp in Green Lake, WI. While there, I met this amazing girl named Molly and pretty quickly we became friends. One night after worship, Molly looked at me and asked, "Do you know what the most amazing line from 'How He Loves' is?" When I shook my head, she continued, "The very first line: 'He is jealous for me.'" I stood there for a moment, taking in that simple sentence that I had breezed over so many times in the song. He is jealous for me. The creator of the universe, who made thundering elephants, crashing waves and majestic mountains, is jealous of my attention. He wants it all for himself. Wow. We continued to discuss the song, the implications, and marveled at it together and individually the rest of the week.

Worship is an amazing thing. It isn't just singing to our Creator, but includes praying, dancing, serving, taking pictures, painting, breathing, talking, and being silent. Worship should be everything we do. It is God's way of letting us connect with Him. I particularly enjoy the singing and music part of worship, so that's what I'm going to focus on for now.

Listen, really listen, to a worship song. Not the tempo or melody, but the words. They will knock you off of your feet. Thinking about how God's love never fails, how He placed each star in the sky and knows them each by name, that He shines out of the darkness, brings us out of the ashes. That He sent Jesus to die for a wretch like me. That He could be jealous for that same wretch's attention. It's pretty mind blowing. When you really think about it, you can't stay the same. Worship is a transforming experience. If Molly had turned to me and said the same thing, we had marveled, and then I didn’t change anything about myself, I would be making a huge mistake. When she pointed that out to me, God asked me to spend more of my time with him, to turn my attention more often to my Creator who is jealous of me. He wants to spend time with me, and wants to spend time with you as well. He isn’t just jealous of my time and how I spend it, He is jealous of yours. He loves you and wants you to turn to him with your pain and fear, instead of earthly friends. Once you realize that, there is no return to the way things were.

Pain

I ran a 5k this weekend with some friends to "Celebrate the 4th of July". Not sure how that makes sense, but I have to make it 8 miles at the end of the summer, so I figured I should train some. Needless to say, it was a disaster. I made it across the finish line with lungs and legs burning and collapsed onto the grass. It was possibly the worst 35 minutes of my life. And that's when I realized something. If I can consider running and being tired like that anywhere close to the worst experience I've ever had, I have led a pretty great life.
Yes, I am still limping slightly as I walk down stairs and no, I don't think I'll be doing that again any time soon. Sure, thinking about it, there are plenty of experiences of mine that are far worse. But thinking about pain, real pain, made me wonder. What does real pain feel like? I felt plenty of pain for months after certain experiences: deaths of close relatives, bitter ends to friendships, moving to Sterling, etc. In many ways, though, I live in a safe, secure bubble. I've never dealt with divorce, death of a immediate family member or best friend. I've never been diagnosed with a life-threatening illness or been hospitalized at all really. My arthritis and athsma, the 2 diseases I do have, have been in remission for years. Look at Job from the Old Testament. I mean, he finds out that his livestock, servants and all 10 children of his are dead- all in the same day! Then, as if that isn't enough, he breaks out into a horrible skin disease with sores all over his body! All because he was faithful to God.
My point is that I really haven't experienced pain. And as weird as it sounds, that disapoints me a little bit. God uses pain to draw us closer to Him. One of Job's friends talks to him and says "For God does speak--now one way, now another-- though man may not percieve it" (Job 33:14). He goes on to describe the ways God speaks to us. His final one is "A man may be chastened on a bed of pain with constant distress in his bones" (Job 33: 19). God uses pain to talk to us, to turn us back to him. Its the whole point of the Beatitudes, that God blesses those who are hurting the most. Oh, and Job? After he proves himself faithful through it all, God returns his health, gives him twice the property as before, new children and an extremely long life.
No, I'm not masochistic. In fact, I recoil from pain. But the few times God has put me through the most intense pain, I have always come out stronger on the other side. So next time you are in pain and crying out, wondering why God is letting this happen to you, just remember that "Weeping may remain for a night, but Joy comes in the morning" (Psalm 30:5).

Pure Joy: Why I chose the name I did

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith develops perserverance. Perserverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking in anything. James 1:2-4.

Pure is defined as: free from blemishes, clean, spotless. It is what I strive to be as a Christian and child of God.
Joy is defined as: great delight or happiness, keen pleasure. It is what God gives me when I walk in His steps.
Apart they define who I strive to become, and what I strive to have, both of which can only be acheived through God's help. Together they describe what my attitude needs to be toward my struggles and pains.

James is my favorite book of the bible, and this is my favorite verse. Especially as I've struggled through moving to Kansas and choosing a college, I've had to remember to keep my perspective joyful, keep my head above water. After all, life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass. It's about learning to dance and find joy in the rain.