Disgusted

Tonight is one of those nights when I get a glimpse of how revolting I really am.

Did I really get so frustrated when people were trying to give me well-meaning advice that I spoke harshly and had to leave to compose myself? Don't I do that to other people?

Did I really fall in to that sin? Don't I judge when other people do that?

I am going to be a pastor's wife. A PASTOR'S WIFE!! Do you know that used to excite me? Do you know that long before I even took an interest in the opposite gender I wanted to be a pastor's wife because I was so blown away by how God could use them to influence women in the church? Do you know I considered it an incredibly high privilege?!

My life is made up of jumping from one failure to the next right now, with God's mercy keeping me from falling.

My running thought is "How can I even be a semi-adequate wife when I look at my life of sin and realize I hardly know myself?"

My concluding thought contains something about how I could never be a role model to women in a church, much less a tool that God would want to use. All the pastor's wives I know are quiet, and proper, and kind, and don't talk a lot. And I am just an awkward, blubbering mess of clumsiness.

This is what I desire: That every thought be captive to Christ. That every word be said in love. That every action be motivated to glorify Him.

I desire it, but I want to desire it more. I want to crave it more than anything. I want to feel like I am spiritually dehydrated when I am not quenching my thirst for the Lord.

WHY don't I feel that way? How can I possibly become complacent? What crowds my mind so much that I fail to recognize the singular significance of God in my life?

I need to confess something... When I was in the Home Economics program at Bible college, I was surrounded by women who were viewed by the Christian community as prime examples of a Proverbs 31 woman. And my thought the entire semester was that I couldn't be like them. It simply wasn't going to happen. What if I feel so passionately about a bad interpretation of a passage of scripture that I get worked up about it? What if I get so excited about a truth that I find in scripture that I just can't communicate it adequately because my words get jumbled up? What if I am feeling broken, or sympathetic, or moved, and I weep? Because there was no place for that among these women. There was no place for a fiery spirit. There was no place for passion. There was only a place for the traditional, and all else was squelched.

I have always wished to be like those women. I have always thought someday I would be. But I am starting to understand that I wont. People kept telling me I would "rock the boat" in the Home Ec department, I understood why.

There is no place in the traditional conservative christian community for free-spirited, fiery personalities that want to be passionate. Nobody wants to dwell on the story of Jesus being overcome with fury and driving people from the temple with a whips. They want to dwell on the fact that a girl is wearing leggings and therefore must have an immodest heart. They want to be offended when a Christian uses "cuss" words, though much stronger words are used in the Bible and the only instruction given is not to use the Lord's name in vain. They want to leave a church when a pastor that they have idolized sins, but they fail to realize that even in its corruptness, the church of Corinth was the Lord's.

With that, my thoughts that resulted from a night lacking sleep are over.

Melody