It's been a while.

     Well, it's been about a month since I last posted on here. Given that it's Easter and I've heard some good Word today both from hearing Pastor Chris's sermon and having a deep conversation with my friend Colby, I thought I might as well write something. Why not, right?
      Let me start off by saying something I've said many times before. I go to THE best church on the planet--Church of the Highlands! HAY! I was talking with Colby earlier about the stage I was at in my life when I stumbled upon Highlands and how crazy of a ride it has been ever since. I remember when I first started going, I would only go every once in a while and usually leave because I felt "awkward." One of the best memories I have of that time was one Sunday just last semester. I had been having an awful week and I remember telling myself I was going to go to church that Sunday, no matter what. Of course Sunday rolled around and as I lay in my bed, I had decided not to go. I battled myself for about an hour until I finally gave in because I knew I would feel guilty if I skipped. I had just enough time to hop out of bed, throw on some decent clothes and get there in time for the 11:30 service. The message Pastor Chris gave that day was on exactly what I had been dealing with throughout the course of the week and I just remembered thinking, "There is no way. How could he have preached on that?" I think it was that day that was the start of something I never saw coming. Pretty soon everything in my life had changed, from my friends to where I will be attending school next fall. I look back on everything that's happened so far and I honestly wouldn't change a single thing.
     My earlier posts talk about the struggle I have with doubt. I still battle with that. I also battle with other things that only a few people I'm closest to know about, and I'll leave it that way. I have a hard time trusting God. Most of that stems from the fact that I so often forget how much He loves me. Of all the things to forget, right? I forget that His love is unconditional and that nothing can separate me from it. I worry so much that I'm disappointing God and I struggle with thinking He's upset with me. I forget how big He is sometimes and how forgiving. I mean hello, this Guy sent his own Son to die for ME. That's love. Even though I have trouble grasping that, it's love. I was reminded of that at UnAshamed Thursday after battling with this all last week. God isn't disappointed with me. He sees me trying. Like C.S. Lewis says, "If we only have the will to walk, then God is pleased with our stumbles."
     Pastor Chris reminded us today that "It's not over until it's over!" That death is the ultimate "it's over" and Christ defeated that. He touched on types of death, not just physical but moral death, etc. He said that he believes there are three symptoms of death of any sort: exhaustion, emptiness, and feeling trapped. Can I just say that this message was straight to me? It was. I feel this way a lot of the time because of anxiety and barriers hindering my relationship with Christ. I get extremely tired, probably because I try so hard to figure everything out on my own which I can't do. There are times when I feel empty for sure. I definitely feel trapped behind a wall that I can't see coming down--the wall of doubt and confusion. (Refer to previous posts.) But hallelujah IT ISN'T OVER.
     I'm so thankful for my CHURCH, for the friends who are encouraging me every day, for God not giving up on me and so many other things.
    Yet again, this was a little all over the place. I'm not a writer! I just like to share my thoughts, so bear with me.

HAPPY EASTER!

Isn’t There Some Misunderstanding?

March 28, 2011

 

’Let us go to Judea again.’ The disciples said to Him, ’. . . are You going there again?’ —John 11:7-8

     Just because I don’t understand what Jesus Christ says, I have no right to determine that He must be mistaken in what He says. That is a dangerous view, and it is never right to think that my obedience to God’s directive will bring dishonor to Jesus. The only thing that will bring dishonor is not obeying Him. To put my view of His honor ahead of what He is plainly guiding me to do is never right, even though it may come from a real desire to prevent Him from being put to an open shame. I know when the instructions have come from God because of their quiet persistence. But when I begin to weigh the pros and cons, and doubt and debate enter into my mind, I am bringing in an element that is not of God. This will only result in my concluding that His instructions to me were not right. Many of us are faithful to our ideas about Jesus Christ, but how many of us are faithful to Jesus Himself? Faithfulness to Jesus means that I must step out even when and where I can’t see anything (see Matthew 14:29). But faithfulness to my own ideas means that I first clear the way mentally. Faith, however, is not intellectual understanding; faith is a deliberate commitment to the Person of Jesus Christ, even when I can’t see the way ahead.
     Are you debating whether you should take a step of faith in Jesus, or whether you should wait until you can clearly see how to do what He has asked? Simply obey Him with unrestrained joy. When He tells you something and you begin to debate, it is because you have a misunderstanding of what honors Him and what doesn’t. Are you faithful to Jesus, or faithful to your ideas about Him? Are you faithful to what He says, or are you trying to compromise His words with thoughts that never came from Him? “Whatever He says to you, do it ” (John 2:5).



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My devotion for the day. Maybe someone else needs to read it as much as I did.

From My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers

I need to be real.

     Let me start out this post saying thank you to all the people who have responded in some way or another to my first post. You are all super encouraging and if it weren't for people like you all, I probably wouldn't make it! I just kind of feel the need to clear up some things I probably could have done there but failed to do. 
     I've had (wonderful, amazing, lovely) people tell me they are happy for me for making the decision to start over and renew my faith, and that means so much to me! You seriously don't understand how much I appreciate hearing that, but I also find myself needing to say that I am NOWHERE near where I want to be/should be. I struggle more than you know with the doubt I talked about previously and it makes praying, trusting, and even persevering extremely difficult. I gave myself my word at the beginning of this journey that I wouldn't give up until I find what it is I'm searching for but some days I feel like I'm wearing so thin that I can't possibly keep going. Sometimes I feel like it would be so easy to just slip back to the way I was and completely disregard the past three months but in reality I know I can't. I don't want to, first of all, but I can't. When I say everything else has taken a backseat, I mean that nothing else is as important as this faith journey I'm on. That doesn't mean I don't put other things ahead of it that I shouldn't; this is why I deactivated Facebook for two months. I don't want to put anything above it. I fail, I stumble, but I'm trying really hard to keep going. It's harder than I thought it would be, and to be honest I did not think I would still be struggling 3 months later. Now I realize it could be 10 years before this stage of my life is over, but if it takes 10 years for me to have a faith that's unbreakable then so be it. I just want to be able to persevere through it all and hold on to the string of hope I have and know that this won't last forever.

Matthew 7:7-8
Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.

     I truly appreciate everyone cheering me on! SERIOUSLY, IT'S GREAT! I just wanted to be clear in that I'm not who I want to be, nor is this position one I necessarily want to be in. As I said in my first post, though, I don't see it as a problem because without it my faith couldn't grow. That doesn't mean it's easy. I love you all and just felt that I should be honest.

     But hey, perseverance produces character, and character produces hope. I'm gonna be alright.

:)

After the Storm-Mumford & Sons

And after the storm,
I run and run as the rains come
And I look up, I look up,
on my knees and out of luck,
I look up.

Night has always pushed up day
You must know life to see decay
But I won't rot, I won't rot
Not this mind and not this heart,
I won't rot.

And I took you by the hand
And we stood tall,
And remembered our own land,
What we lived for.
 
There will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

And now I cling to what I knew
I saw exactly what was true
But oh no more.
That's why I hold,
That's why I hold with all I have.
That's why I hold.

I will die alone and be left there.
Well I guess I'll just go home,
Oh God knows where.
Because death is just so full and man so small.
Well I'm scared of what's behind and what's before.

There will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

There will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.






Can I just say how much I love Mumford and their lyrics? Okay, because I just really love them.

My first post has a horrible title.

     Well, up until this point I've been using Tumblr as a "blog" which I will continue to do but I was convinced to get a blogspot the other day for writing purposes. I guess Tumblr is more appropriate for pictures, videos, etc. So here, I will write. (For all you Tumblr users out there, feel free to follow me at annaelizabethdudley.tumblr.com.)

     I guess I'll use this first post as an opportunity to tell you a little about myself. My name is Anna. I'm a 20 year old Sophomore at Alabama and this is my last semester there. I love Alabama (especially the football) more than many people but I guess it's just not the school for me. I feel like I've had my run and grown as much as I'm going to grow there and it's time for me to move on. In the fall, I plan to transfer to UAB. After changing my major 3 times, I think I've finally decided to go with Special Education because it's always been in the back of my mind. No job could make me happier than working with people with special needs, for one, because they are the happiest people on the planet and I feel that I could learn so much from a job like that. I haven't officially changed my major but this has always been in the back of my mind, and I guess there is a reason for that. School has kind of had to take a back seat in my life recently though, which I have written about on Tumblr recently and don't really want to get into on this post.

     As some of you know, I have recently made several changes in my life (some of which I won't go into too much detail on). This is going to be an abbreviated version of what has been going on in the past few months, but it should give you an idea. Somewhere along the line, I realized through different things going on in my life such as anxiety issues and so on that I had been turning to things that could not possibly help me for guidance and a "cure." Placebos that were just that. I had left out one option who has a name and it's Jesus. So I decided since nothing else had worked or would work, I would turn to the option, to the person, that I had left out all along.  The more I tried to use Jesus (yes, use) for help from obsessive thoughts and worries, the more I realized I never really knew who Jesus is. I grew up in church so I knew what he did and basic information I guess you'd say about him, but never enough to really understand him. I still don't but when I first realized that I know close to nothing about God or about Jesus, I realized that my whole life I have believed in Him mostly just because I was raised to but not because I did for myself.

     So, where do I stand now? I'm learning. I'm starting completely over and learning so that I can have a faith that's my own and not someone else's and hopefully a much stronger faith than I ever had before. I have doubts sometimes and lots of questions and I get extremely confused every now and then, but I'm learning about the character of Jesus. I started researching the apologetics of Christianity when all of this started happening and have learned so much through that alone, so with knowing how little I know and how much there is to learn, I am excited to see where this takes me. I've lost and gained friends through this, and there are some beautiful people who encourage me to keep going even when it is tough. Someone told me a while back that though I may not understand why I have to go through the confusion and doubt right now instead of just easily taking the blind leap that some are able to take, that even though I may get frustrated because everything I've always believed I'm now re-learning for myself, that it is for a reason and it could help someone. So far, they were right and I have gotten to see my "problem" help someone else. It's not a problem though at all. If I weren't going through this, my faith could never grow.

     I'm learning patience.

If our hopes seem to be experiencing disappointment right now, it simply means that they are being purified. Every hope or dream of the human mind will be fulfilled if it is noble and of God. But one of the greatest stresses in life is the stress of waiting for God. He brings fulfillment, “because you have kept My command to persevere…” (Revelation 3:10). Oswald Chambers.

   I hope this blog will come in handy. I don't know how much I'll actually write but maybe I'll use it a good bit. I hope y'all have a wonderful weekend (it's Friday, Friday, gotta get down on Friday...) and a wonderful end to your spring break if you go to Alabama, Auburn, or whatever other schools are on spring break.

Love y'all.