because God is good.

"No one whose hope is in you will ever be put to shame,
but they will be put to shame
who are treacherous without excuse."
(Psalm 25:3)

"The LORD is my shepherd, 

I shall not be in want."

(Psalm 23:1)

"And surely I am with you always, 

to the very end of the age."

(Matthew 28:20)

"'Shout and be glad, O Daughter of Zion. 

For I am coming, and I will live among you,' declares the LORD."

(Zechariah 1:10)

for frenzied days and lonely nights

"Turn to me and be gracious to me, for I am lonely and afflicted."
(Psalm 25:16)

"Can a mother forget the baby at her breast 

and have no compassion on the child she has borne?

Though she may forget, I will not forget you!

See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands;

Your walls are ever before me."

(Isaiah 4:15-16)

"The LORD your God is with you,

he is mighty to save.

He will take great delight in you,

he will quiet you with his love,

he will rejoice over you with singing."

(Zephaniah 3:17)

"Be still, and know that I am God"

(Psalm 46:10)

over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity.

"Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you by the gazelles and by the does of the field: Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires." (Song of Songs 2:7)

It is never a good idea to bare your soul to the Internet, and this is why I am really giving quite an abbreviated version what of what this post could have been right now. There really is so much joy in my life through all the busyness right now, and so much that I'm learning and being challenged with that I want to share with you all! This week has been tough both physically and mentally, with 2 midterms (finally done, PTL!), 1 quiz, and 2 large essays/papers that are due on Monday and Wednesday. It's been stressful, but praise God that I've been able to get through most of it with my sanity intact and with my relationship with Him unscathed :)

As I've mentioned before, for the past month or so I've been so challenged to find all my fulfillment and contentment in Christ alone, and it's gotten even harder recently. It's kind of strange to say that it's hard because while it's not untrue, there has also been so much joy in coming to the LORD on my knees and struggling in prayer, and knowing that He's right there and that He has willed this time of challenges and struggle for His glory and for my good. I am so excited to see what He has in store for me, and sometimes it's such a battle for patience and faith!

Anyway. Tonight we had a "brief" DG meeting (haha, still took us 2 hours!) and afterwards I had a bit of a chat with my DGL. A lot of friendship dynamics in our year have been changing and I'd been feeling a little lost, and this was something that I really needed to get accountability for, and I knew my DGL was the girl to go to :) As we talked and shared, I came to a rather funny realization. And this is funny and makes me feel slightly stupid because it's so basic, but it just highlights God's wisdom and perfect timing even more. As we were wrapping up in what I told her, my DGL said she was going to pray for me, and then asked me whether I was going to pray to ask God to take away the distraction of attraction, or to take away the attraction itself. I was kind of still for a minute, because I realized right then and there that distraction ABOUT attraction (i.e., making him into an idol, having him become such a persistent thought in my mind that he becomes number 1) and attraction ITSELF are two completely different things! It is quite possible to have one (attraction) without the other (distraction), for all things are possible through God who gives us strength! I guess all my life I'd been told to "wait", whatever that meant. It's just. What was I waiting for, exactly? The "right" guy? For me to be "ready"? What did this all even mean?

When this first started becoming a conscious thing for me, I remember praying to God about it and kind of asking Him to protect my heart and keep Him first in my life, because I knew how easily I nosedived into these kinds of things, and I felt Him ask me: "Nicole, if I take this away right now, would you be okay with that? Would you still trust in me and praise My Name?" Honestly, I wasn't able to answer at that time. Now, I can honestly say, "Yes LORD." After all, what do I have that God did not first bless me with? I am not my own; I am Christ's.

Basically, my point is this - never in my life have I ever liked anyone without feeling guilt, or feeling like I'm wrong about it for one reason or another, like I shouldn't have those feelings in first place. But I am realizing now that 1) romantic love has been created by God, 2) it is beautiful and blessed by God if it occurs at His intended time, and 3) if this is something that God chooses to bless me with, I must learn how to accept it with thanksgiving. And if God chooses to close the door on this, I will not be ashamed of myself, because I know that 1) my pride is nothing, and 2) God was the one who was in control and led my every step.

I pray that I might fall deeper and deeper in love with Christ and that His place as number one in my heart will be steadfast and unwavering.

"And Heaven can't contain the glory of the Son."

Tonight I was struck by the sudden desire to fall irresistibly and irreversibly in love with Christ Jesus. It's always something I hear people talk about and it all sounds incredibly wonderful and intimate and utterly satisfying and it's something I don't have. I think one of the hardest/most challenging things I've had to learn on this journey so far is that head knowledge =/= believing it in your heart, and that God's perfect timing in our lives often doesn't coincide with our preferred timing. It sounds simple enough to understand, but being in the midst of this waiting is, quite frankly, painful. It's like. I know there is so much more in store and I want it so bad, and I want to want God with every fiber of my being, but I don't. It's not exactly something people are clamoring to admit, y'know?

I remember reading on someone's blog/or something like that several months ago that she read the Gospel of John like she would a love letter. It just stuck with me, and I decided to read John with fresh eyes. To my utter delight, I could see exactly what she was getting at. Now, I'm not really sure whether this is a "correct" way of looking at it, but there are so many parts in John that are beautifully intimate and loving and that every word and phrase in the Bible has been intended by God to be written in that exact way - it just overwhelms me. The thought just overwhelms me. I'd always heard a lot about how Jesus is the "Good Shepherd" and we are His sheep and all that jazz, but it never really hit me just how deep and intimate this relationship really should be until I read John this time around. In John 10, Jesus talks about how He is the shepherd and we (Christians) are His sheep, and we know and respond to His voice only and will run away from a stranger because we don't recognize his voice. Isn't that powerful? Can you imagine a Christian so in tune with Christ and so in love with Him that anything that is not of Him is so jarring that it sends this person running in the opposite direction? And later on in the same chapter, He says: "I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I lay down my life for the sheep." To know God and be known by Him - it still blows my mind. I can't wrap my head around the idea. And later on: "For this reason the Father loves me, because I lay down my life that I may take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down, and I have authority to take it up again. This charge I have received from my Father." What powerful, powerful words.

Even now I am speechless. Absolutely speechless.

I guess I'll leave y'alls with a verse and a song:

"As the Scripture says, 'Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame.' For there is no different between Jew and Gentile - the same LORD is LORD of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for 'Everyone who calls on the name of the LORD will be saved.'" (Romans 10:11-13)

as deep cries out to deep

Change. It's funny how people change. It's funny how I change. All my life I've identified with the older brother in the tale of the prodigal son, and yet now I find myself smack dab in the middle of the younger son's (mis)adventures. I'm still stuck in the mud though. Still wondering whether or not my Father will take me back, at least as a servant. Haven't quite mustered up the courage to climb out of the pigpen and start on the long journey home. Maybe it's because I'm not quite sure what I'll find on the horizon as home comes into view.

Why do I doubt? God does not lie. My soul aches for the presence of God, but I'm too afraid to even venture out of this pit. The fact that God loves me still hasn't made its way from my head into my heart.

But still -

"Psalm 42

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God.
My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
When can I go and meet with God?
My tears have been my food day and night, while men say to me all day long, 'Where is your God?'
These things I remember as I pour out my soul; how I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God, with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the festive throng.

Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God.

My soul is downcast within me; therefore I will remember you from the land of the Jordan, the heights of Hermon - from Mount Mizar.
Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.

By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me - a prayer to the God of my life.

I say to God my Rock, 'Why have you forgotten me? Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy?'
My bones suffer mortal agony as my foes taunt me, saying to me all day long, 'Where is your God?'


Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise him, my Saviour and my God."

tonight.

God asked for my posters tonight. One by one I tore them down from my walls, rolled them up, and put them away. He also asked for my folders of Internet stories. I deleted them - and emptied the Trash - before I could regret it. For the first time ever, I want God more than anything else. These are idols and addictions I have indulged in for years, but the fear of God thrums deep in the pit of my stomach, and I must strike while the iron is hot.

For, "as the deer pants for the streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God?" There is no satisfaction in earthly things. The world around me is falling apart, and believe me - this is no preteen angst-fest. There is a deep desire in me for something more, because the things of this world do not satisfy. "You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." For weeks now I have felt so far from God, but it is like He is calling me out of the desert and saying, "I am here with you. I am your God. Remove these idols from your life, and return to me."

Several months ago I was captivated by the Word. I pored over it, prayed over it, burned it deep within my heart. Now I feel far. I am re-acquainting myself with these once-treasured verses. One step forward and two steps back, but even now I know that God has been changing me.

"The LORD is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us." (Psalm 103:8-12)

And more,

"The LORD your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing." (Zephaniah 3:17)

Lastly,

"Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth. The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress." (Psalm 46:10-11)

in You.

Today was the last CCF meeting of the school year - a pretty informal one, one with simple acoustic worship and just some members of our committee sharing about their experiences during summer away from school. It was just massively encouraging because they were so honest about their experiences back at their home churches, about how strange it was and how shallow it seemed sometimes; how they felt distant from their church friends and stilted in their spiritual walk, as if they were wracked with thirst and unable to find any respite.

This is something I've been nervous about recently. As the year draws to a close, thinking about going back to my home church and fellowship is kind of weird and scary at the same time. It's weird because it doesn't really feel like home anymore, and it's scary because I don't want to fall backwards off the tracks (spiritually). There's such a lack of accountability and real conversation in many of our home churches, and it's discouraging. Our CCF chair compared this to the plague of locusts in the book of Joel, when the people were starving, the animals were starving, and there was not a single living plant that the locusts had not ravaged - not only were the Israelites unable to eat, but because of their dying livestock, they were unable to make sacrifices to the Lord and worship Him ("Grain offerings and drink offerings are cut off from the house of the LORD." Joel 1:9).   Does it sometimes feel like it's so hard to get right with God, to worship at His feet, when we're in such dry circumstances?

That isn't an excuse. It says in Psalm 51:16-17: "You do not delight in sacrifice, or I would bring it; you do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise." Further on in Joel, the Lord confirms this: "'Even now,' declares the LORD, 'return to me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning.' Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the LORD your God, for he is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and he relents from sending calamity." (Joel 2:12-13)

"Rend your heart and not your garments." Or, as my CCF chair put it, "God doesn't want your stuff, He wants you." We have to go to Him in prayer! What can we possibly do for ourselves in situations like these? Nothing. Any effort in and of ourselves is in vain. I say this because I've been there. Trying to do it on my own is tiring. It's like running on empty. It IS running on empty.

The end of this book is incredibly uplifting: "The LORD will roar from Zion and thunder from Jerusalem; the earth and the sky will tremble. But the LORD will be a refuge for his people, a stronghold for the people of Israel. Then you will know that I, the LORD your God, dwell in Zion, my holy hill. Jerusalem will be holy; never again will foreigners invade her." (Joel 3:16-17)

Pray, pray, pray. The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it. He is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. We can do everything through Him who gives us strength, but apart from Him we can do nothing.