It has been a while

I have not blogged in two months. I have been busy, and I honestly forgot. I mean some people bugged me about it but I would forget soon after. I guess what is on my mind today is the main subject of discussion between me and God in the last 2 years (and a little back story). I need to stop being afraid.

Middle School:
I don't remember much because I learned early on how to and that it was good to block out my past if it hurt. What I do remember is, I had only a few friends, but I was not invited to do much with my friends. I was the fat kid and was harassed accordingly, I could have prolly had some of the kids arrested if I had wanted to at the time. I was/ am just very passive. One of my close friends even completely turned his back on me towards the end of middle school. We still have never reconciled, but I have not seen him in years. Basically I have forgotten much of the goodness of middle school and just remember pain and suffering, I remember it as Hell.

High School:
I am finding I am starting to block out high school too, not sure why oh well. I had many more friends, a few girlfriends, and a group of people (Marching Band). I did not get along with people in my program well, besides being able to be in class and be nice and such, but none of us were ever really close. My close friends were in Marching Band. High school was like a breath of fresh air compared to the Hell of middle school. But I lived 30 min away from my HS and friends, so I did not do much outside of school with them. In fact the first party or anything I was invited to (besides to hang out with my girlfriends), to my memory was my senior year. I learned on some level, or interpreted even if this was not the intention of my friends at the time that I was nice to have around if I was there, but not necessary. That I could be with them or not and they would be just as happy. To those of you from high school I am still friends with please do not take this as an insult or anything, it is just what my mind did to my perception, or Satan, depending on how you see it.


Spring 2006:
IV at Virginia Tech went to New York City on an Urban Plunge. It is a week version of a longer Summer program with IV. The idea is to help students see what is happening in the city and to hopefully get them interested in the work happening there and/or getting involved where they live. But I could not get past my own self. I was afraid to mention God to a guy I was talking to in a homeless shelter in a church. I found I had no confidence in myself. I felt that I was disposable to my friends. That they didn't care about me. I felt like I could walk away from IV and my friends and not be missed. Talking to a close friend not on the trip on the phone and having a talk with a few guys in my room one night started helping me see the faults in this belief. One said "Allen, how can we trust you if you don't trust us?" That helped me start to realize i was not trusting my friends, because I love to care for people but I didn't realize I was not trusting them. I thought it was just a self-worth issue, and it is, but it was a combination of learning not to trust people and the lack of self-worth. I didn't realize I was devaluing my friends as I was living in a devalued view of myself.

Those friends that talked to me on that trip have helped me so much with this as you will see, many of them are the same through the whole story. I am not using names in case I mention something on accident they would not want known, or so I don't forget a name.

Fall 2006:
I was mad at so many people that had told me that "you can't control the heart." So I set out to prove them wrong. I decided I would not allow myself to like anyone for a semester. Big mistake. This is cutting a long story very short but I learned that if you are spending time getting to know girls (or anyone of the opposite gender, for you ladies reading) you will start to like them. The trick is not to keep yourself from liking people it is to learn how to deal with it so you can live in relationship with people. You need to learn how to love and care for people well regardless of how you or they feel. You need to learn how to deal with you liking people and others liking you. Once you learn to do that you can enjoy life much more. I learned a lot that semester, but it was at the expense of my relationships with my sisters (in Christ). I do apologize to them for that.

Spring 2007:
I went to the spring break version of GUPY. It was fairly relaxing for a spring break trip. We got to work with several organizations in the area. But again I could not get past what I was learning about myself. We talked about identity. I started to realize that I knew about God's love, but I was not feeling it in my life. My view of myself from the past has kept me from accepting it. I decided to go to the Summer version of GUPY. I wanted to do something different, and I wanted to learn more about my identity in Christ and what I could/ should do with it.

During that semester at school I began to become completely convinced in the power of love. In Matthew it says:

Matthew 22:37-40
Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

I really started to believe that. The last verse is the most important here. "ALL the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments" (emphasis mine), the rest of the 10 commandments, the rest of the law, everything the prophets said, EVERYTHING. My prayer for my friends that semester and since then has usually been that they would feel God's love for them more so than that any specific outcome would happen. I mean look at these situations and how loving the other person and loving God makes them so much easier:

1. Your family, usually hard for college students, realizing they love you and more importantly that God loves them when they are irrational, or that he loves you when you are dishonoring to them. (I know that it is usually a combination of the two)

2. That person in your class that lives the lifestyle you just don't like (sex, drinking, sexual orientation, religion, etc.). You could be mad and hate them, but remember GOD LOVES THEM. I mean how can you hate them if God loves them. Frustrated maybe, but hate?? No.

3. That girl or guy you like but rejects you (either for good reasons or crappy ones, actually especially when it is a crappy reason). God loves them, your goal in pursuing that relationship should have that be the first and foremost thing in your mind. I know the desire to date someone, many of my friends (both male and female) can confirm that, but that is the joy of what we get to do as God's children, to love people. If you love them as your brother or sister regardless of your interest in them the awkwardness will not happen, or not as much. People are so afraid sometimes to face or risk rejection, but if you both love each other because you are in Christ, it will work out.

4. That girl or guy that likes you and you just can't seem to get the message to them that you don't like them. See reasoning above. God loves you both, remember that. Not that you should date them because of that, but you should not shun or hate them either.

5. That friend that you love but seems to keep doing stuff you see/ know to be stupid and harmful. Again, GOD STILL LOVES THEM. And we need, no we get to love them still. It might hurt sometimes, but God loves them.

There are so many more examples, but I think I got the point across.

Another part of that verse I want to point out is the second command, love your neighbor as yourself. IT IS A COMPARISON!!!!! We are not to love ourselves over our neighbors but also we are not to love our neighbors over ourselves. This means we need to learn to say no sometimes. We need to learn when we need to get away, when we need council, when we need to be cared for. But at the same time we need to learn when our needs can be put on hold, when we want and/or need time away, but someone else needs us more. I have not mastered this by any means, but it is a journey (don't stop believing... I know a few of you thought that :)) we all need to start.

The 16th is an issue I cannot even begin to get into in this post, I mean it is going to be long enough already. But the effect most important to this post is that it broke down my ability to control my thoughts and emotions. That really freed me to be open to what I would learn this summer. Also I have a lot of friends who stood by me, friends who smoked cigars (yes I occasionally smoke cigars... but that week I smoked more than I ever have, I just didn't care), talked, played wii til late in the night, and just helped me feel like I had worth and a purpose in a time that was so confusing and hard.

A short blurb about Rockbridge too. I enjoyed being there and relaxing away from everything, I was lucky and not asked about the 16th much at all. But one huge thing that happened in my life is that several of my friends, I am closer to one or two more than others, all seemed to be having a rough week. They were caring for each other well, and at the time I had no idea what was up (I still only have a vague idea about all that went on). All I could see is that they were not their normal selves. I wanted so badly to be there for them, but I had no clue how to help. I felt helpless. My friends were obviously hurting, and for the first time in a long time I could not get to them, and even if I could I was not sure if I would know what to say or do. So I just prayed a lot. Then one night one of the leaders that could not attend Rockbridge showed up. She is awesome with the women she is around. She just cares for them well. Then she told me she felt like she needed to come, then got a call from someone at Rockbridge asking her to come right as she was just starting to be on her way. I tell this story because I was SOOOOO worried and confused about what I should do, I hated that I was doing nothing. And God took care of it. He knew who needed to be where and he worked it out. One friend I felt I had failed that week even told me they felt very cared for, that my presence was known. That was cool, seriously, I was feeling useless and God took care of it in ways I can still not explain.

Summer 2007:
So I went to summer GUPY. There is so much I could say about that. But on the topic of my growth I began to notice something important. I could not feel God's love because I did not love myself. God was sending his love my way, but I could not handle it. I had not basis for how to accept it. And considering that my goal and joy is caring and loving others, HOW WAS I PASSING ON GOD'S LOVE???? How was I able to care for people when I didn't care about myself? God is good because apparently I was. But I know that the love I can pass on is so much greater if I can accept God's love and pass that on. A situation I described in my first Blog illustrated the importance I place on my identities. I felt I was failing them by inaction or past actions/ mistakes. When God just wants us to live in our identity as his child. If you live as a child of God you have to understand his love and love him. Then you learn to love others as either his children or people created in his image who he desperately wants to be his child. People could not speak worth or love into my life because I did not love or accept myself so their words did not mean anything to me. If I saw myself as worthless or not a man or not helpful, and someone told me I was then I would have to pick one as a lie. When you are introspective and think you know yourself you just think that they don't know all you do, rather than considering that God has revealed something to them you have ignored.

Something else I began to learn and am still working on is speaking up. God give people experiences, thoughts, and directly inspired words to share with people. And I also believe in silence and not talking at times either so others can talk or because they need to see things themselves, or because some things do not need to be said at certain times. But I am also prone to holding back at times I need to speak. Sometimes that is calling out people when they are doing something wrong, sometimes that is just saying hey, and sometimes it is having the guts to tell someone how you feel about them (both attraction to someone, but more often valuing them as a friend or telling them how God has been using them to bless me). I have avoided most of those in the past. I realized that not speaking those things was hurting me. I saw that I was not doing those things and that each time I held back due to fear it was hurting my view of myself as a man and a brother to the people around me. I felt I was not living up to being a leader (Small Group Leader or Vision Team Member) or just living up to my desire/ ideal of who I see myself becoming in Christ. So with the increased damage to my self esteem based on my identity (both God based and my own) my fear became stronger. Each time I would hold back i would be more likely to next time. But speaking up has the exact opposite affect. When I do it I feel freedom, strength, peace. But not only that people need to know what I, and you, have to say. God has given us each different points of view. He lets us see him in others that they might, and likely don't see in themselves. Also we see parts of God other miss, so we can help each other see the big picture of what God is up to. By being silent not only was I hurting myself but I was not sharing who God has made me to be and the part of God I reflect with others. God puts us in relationship with each other for the reason that we need it for sooo many reasons. And I was not just hurting myself with my silence. God wants to use me and you in the lives of those around you, you just have to be willing to be used, to speak, to be yourself. To stop hiding behind false personalities, false identities, and silence, to start living out our true identity in Christ.

We went to Mexico for ten days. That was really hard on me. I know a lot of people were gone for a lot longer than me but it doesn't take long to experience culture shock. I began to feel alot of anxiety once we got on the plane Mexico in Detroit. Once we got there I found myself afraid of the water, afraid of the police, frustrated with the language situation, in a double bed with a guy about my size (talk about tight), and just this feeling of dread. So much of it was illogical and prolly meant to harm me and keep me from being effective, but whatever. I could not sleep for the first 4 or so days, I got like 4 hours of sleep a night, and if you know me I need a lot of sleep. By the second day I was mad, thinking negatively and tired. We met in the morning and the question was "how are you?" My response was that I had not been sleeping well, I felt like I had not emotional support like the rest of the team that had girlfriends, boyfriends, soon-to-be boy or girl friends, and other friends who had emailed, called, or contacted them before the trip. I felt worthless, because I saw where my mind was, and I knew where it was leading and that my effectiveness was going to become zero very soon, and I was in Mexico to serve not to break down!!!!!! So Marshall (the leader of GUPY) asked if we could talk later. We had a two hour conversation after Church that night, it went so late the pastor left and came back for us. I basically had nothing left, no emotion control, not thought control, minimal inhibitions about topic of conversation. I basically completely unloaded on Marshall. I told him just about everything in my life, all the crap I had done or had happened to me that was on my mind. I don't think I held anything back. Marshall's prayer for me that night was amazing. He prayed that I would feel God's love for me, among other things. That was huge. That had been my prayer for all my friends for the last 6 months or so, as I alluded to earlier. I don't cry, you might not know that, but I had like 2 tears when he said that, that is a pretty big deal for me. He said one other thing in his prayer. That I would feel freedom in my relationships. Freedom from the fear of hurting people, so I could actually live in my relationships and not live in my constant fear of hurting people such that I do not take the risk to actually be in relationship with them, to enjoy them and to be open with them. I might have gotten ahead of myself a bit, because this prayer has been critical to a lot of my growth and understanding of relationships. Being in close relationship requires risk, and the willingness to step into that. A relationship will die if one of two things happens, no risk is taken, or risk is taken recklessly. Learning to take risk well is what is required for a growing and deepening relationship.

Fall 2007:
Coming back to VT after the summer was hard. So much had changed. Dorm's were locked, and my friends had new schedules. I described this in an earlier blog. I have been trying to figure out how to apply all I have learned. So much of this semester is still to fresh to describe here, but I have finally started making an effort to tell people what I think and how I feel about them. I have tried to tell people the work and gifts of God in them. I have tried to tell people how I feel about our relationship, what they mean to me, and how much I care about them. I am far from where I want to be, I discount my views often. Something that a few friends have pointed out to me on several occasions, for that I am grateful. But I have felt so much freedom from in my willingness to say and do what I have started to do. I hope this lengthy post helps you understand me more, and hopefully see where your life is like mine and hopefully you can start to see the freedom in learning when to ignore fear and live.

Closing:
Please post asking for clarification if needed (sometimes I leave out details when I write due to how I think), but please do not name names in any of these stories because I left them out for a reason, thanks. And if I did not do a good enough job making the storied more general please let me know. Thanks for bearing with me. God bless.