Winter Conference

The CCC Winter Conference in Fort Worth was awesome. I was able to build deeper relationships with my friends as we navigated through what God was doing in our lives, as well as where we were supposed to go/getting lost in Fort Worth/Arlington/Dallas. We had a day of outreach that was simply a lot of fun; we went to apartment complexes in Arlington and went door-to-door handing out school supplies and inviting kids to come play in the courtyard with us. We had the most intense game of Duck Duck Goose EVER! Anytime a kid chose me to be goose, he or she ran around the circle at least four times. At the end, we shared the gospel with them and made the bracelets that tell the story of Jesus by the colors of the beads. I was actually surprised at how many kids knew the story and knew what the Bible was. 

The biggest thing that happened at this conference, though, was God challenging me. During worship on the last night, I felt Him stirring my heart. Earlier that day, our speaker for women's time, Marion Jordan (which was GREAT because I am in the middle of her book, Wilderness Skills for Women), talked about how she prayed that God would give her a heart that loved Him fully and completely, even if it meant taking other things out of her life. As I prayed that myself, God seemed to be telling me that He didn't want me to consider dating anyone till junior year. I was about to agree when all of these questions came to my mind, such as "What if someone FINALLY asks me out?" or "What if I meet a really great guy?" I asked God if there could be exceptions, and he asked me how much I loved Him. Yikes.

So I committed that to God. Our speaker that evening then talked about growing, and he mentioned a weight lifting analogy. Back in high school he would bench what he was able to lift, until his coach came and put more weight on than he could do. His coach told him that, if he never put more than he could handle, he would never grow. This whole situation is more than I can handle, but if I don't get to that point then I will be able to settle and try to do things without God. With this, I KNOW I can't do it on my own. Not because I expect anyone to ask me out - I doubt that will happen - but it removes a major distraction from my life. If I can't even consider dating someone, then I can't daydream about when he will ask me out or what I can do to attract him more. 

Honestly, I am scared. I am really going to have to change some of my thought patterns, and it's scary because I don't know really what will happen. It's hard, too, because my friends are in relationships, and it's so easy to get jealous and wonder why God doesn't have me there. But I know and trust that God is doing a work in my life, whether it be just to grow me or to use it to influence others. God's timing is funny, too, because second semester of my sophomore year is when I always thought that I would start dating. But I intend to use my time to fall more in love with Him and to find my joy continually in Him, not in circumstances. I am not doing this so I can brag to other people that I am abstaining from something I so desire and therefore I am holier than they are, and I pray that it never becomes something like that. Not that God wasn't a priority in my life before, but sometimes He shared the throne, and that's not the way it needs to be.

So, I am off on a new adventure, and God is leading the way.