The good news is: for the most part, this Christmas has not been as emotionally horrific as Christmases past.

The bad news is: my mother hates my boyfriend.

The upside of that is: My sister actually had some good things to say and good advice. And while she thinks he's quirky, (which he is....) she likes him and thinks him to be a good addition to the family. Which is really nice to hear. It's nice to know that my family doesn't hate my boyfriend, which is good because it's like... ok, yeah, I'm not making a mistake. We can make this work.

Which isn't to say my Dad doesn't like him, he does, he just thinks we should wait.

My nephew is now officially adorable. Even if he makes a lot of noise. To be expected. he's only like four months old. and with that I have to sign off. Ciao

I have yet to decide if my mood changes to match the weather, or if the weather just senses that I'd be better off having matching weather.

A deep misty fog covers all of Murfreesboro right now. Corporeal confusion winding it's way into every nook and corner, reaching out with it's cold clammy hands leaving dripping cold fingerprints upon everything it touches.

I am beginning to not like Christmas very much. It has always been my favorite time of year. but it seems the last couple of years this time of year has been nothing but stress and turmoil, reevaluating, tension, and that Spiritual learning that Starts now but you just don't get until about the same time next year.

And I hate it.

I hate confusion. HATE it HATE HATE hate hate LOOOOOATHE. And to make it worse, stuff like this always happens when I think that personally my life is going on the right track. And then it's like a sucker punch to the gut.

Perhaps though my personal mists of confusion will vanish with the rising sun. One can hope right?

Finals week. Nuff said. I do get to go home on Wednesday though and see my family.
I'm excited about that. I'm taking Mo Shearc with me. (hope I don't kill him.... :D)

What the World Puts On

So Sunday me and Mo Shearc were listening to a message form Dr. Adrian Rogers, and he was talking about Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego and the spirit of the Anti-Christ.
and he said something that caught my attention.

When the unbending three were cast into the fire and good ole' King Nebby looked into the furnace and saw them walking about freely because their binding ropes had been burned off, he was amazed. (not to mention that there were FOUR in the fire, not three... but on with the point) When 'rach, 'shach, and 'nego came out their clothes weren't singed and they didn't even smell of smoke.

And then Dr. Rogers said, "The fire only burned off of them what the World put on them."

Wow.

That is what happens to us in the metaphorical sense. Christ only burns away from us, those things the World has put on us. (or things we've let the World put on us.)

Which is great! Except when those things that the World has put on us are things we enjoy and like, and then it feels like the Fire is burning us.

I mean the World doesn't literally bind us in ropes and shove us into fires, but it does, through our allowance, bind and bog us down in sin and unhealthy habits. Which in turn causes the refining Fires to bring us into a reflection of Christ.

I know that I, and those around me, sometimes feel that God is attacking and trying to change who we are and that causes us great pain. But really He is burning away all that is not us, so that we can be who we truly are, and who we are meant to be.

The fires aren't meant to change us into someone else, but meant to burn away all that we've accumulated that keeps us from being who we really are and who we are truly meant to be.