Faithfully

Last week I worked at my Maywood Christian Camp as a counselor. I got the 10 year old girls cabin, which was a huge jump from the 8 year olds I've gotten every other year) and they were absolutely wonderful. It was an incredible week, with I think 22 souls baptized into the church and numerous others that rededicated themselves to the Lord.

But I also had quite an awakening last week. I realized two really important things, and I felt compelled to write about them here.

Over the past year I have been compromising myself and everything I believe in because it is so important to me to be liked. By everyone. Even people I don't particularly care for and who I know have habits I disapprove of. Two years ago I would have never thought that I would push aside my love for God, my belief in His word and desire to fulfill his commands, and even parts of my own personality to compete in a non-existent popularity contest. To everyone who has witnessed this over the past year or so... I'm sorry. I'm working on staying true to myself and to my God, and part of the reason I'm writing this is to hold myself accountable for that. It makes me so miserable that I let one this weakness of mine take such control over my life. But my priorities are back on track, and you can expect quite a few differences in me now.

Second, I realized how much I've been trying to control my own life. Constantly stressing over law schools and graduate schools and what's going to happen over the next two years and whether I'm going to be single forever, and... you get it. I've been trying to do everything on my own, and I need to stop that. I need to let God help me and I need to let the people around me help me. I'm afraid this point will take me a little longer to deal with, but I'm praying about it and making a point to not spend more than an hour a day on anything related to law school or applications or anything like that. Being a control freak is not at all productive and not how God wanted His children to be.

So, yeah. Those are my recent awakenings. I'm also making time for fun things like reading and writing and stuff. That's been great. Loving Water for Elephants, which I started yesterday, and HATED Catcher in the Rye. I know that's a disgrace to every writer in the world. Saw Inception - it was incredible. Absolutely Incredible. And I have fun plans throughout the week.

I guess I'm really learning how to live by my motto: Live to serve, serve to live. I just forgot who I was serving. Now I just need to let Him show me how I can help the people around me too. That's too much for me, but not for Him.


With love,

Shelli