yes!

my fiance makes my day, every day. just thinking about him. or reading his post. or seeing his pic on my bookshelf, etc, etc, etc... he honestly makes my day.

and yes, we sometimes get on each others nerves and yes, we'll probably have to unfortunate moments post the "i do's"; nevertheless, he'll still make my day. and i'm really determined to make his.

i love you justin jeffery.

i do!

(and i can't believe this is my first time posting for 2010. shame!)

knowing - matt 7

it's easy to toss around. "stop judging me!" "I like it when ppl don't judge me, when they just accept me for who i am."

blah blah blah

as a former co-worker said (loose paraphrase), "stop whining about ppl judging you. sometimes you're just wrong and that's that!"

so here i am at 1:30 tuesday afternoon. 3 months into a new job. i've done a LOAD of judging. for me it's really simple. "to form an opinion or conclusion about." nothing wrong with that stuff. what IS wrong is when i keep going beyond a basic opinion or conclusion, when i move from, "that was unkind" to "that was unkind, he should know better, he's clearly incompetent, he doesn't deserve xyz." oooo. now that's not cool. check out my plank!

now here's another side to the basic judgment issue, the issue of knowing.

when i discover that he or she is unkind, i'm not going to readily embrace. now my guard is up. i'm going to try to give the benefit of the doubt...perhaps there's something else the person was dealing with that caused them to be unkind to me. i'll try not to take it personally. but if it was really really bad and if it's consistent, my guard is definitely up.

i refuse to act blindly. i refuse to throw pearls to pigs. using my brain is quite biblical.

belief

i often begin thinking about work 5 minutes after i become fully conscious in the morning. it's a great reminder that i actually care about my job. on the other hand, it's often a reminder that i'm overwhelmed as my job's various realities crash into my personal need to simply adjust to my new life. this morning is a crash morning. and as my head becomes clouded by stress i tell myself to stop yet find some sort of terrible satisfaction in attempting to control the cloud.

and then i read Matthew 6:25-34--do not worry.

i could conclude that i'm just supposed to live in the moment. but no. i should still plan for tomorrow but not get caught up in the uncertainties of tomorrow. that's where the crash occurs. if i knew exactly what would happen i like to think i'd be okay. but i'd probably still experience this crazy worried state. so i've just got to get into the habit of asking God for direction, doing my part and leaving the rest alone.

leave the rest alone. stop trying to control the future. stop it. stop. God's got this. the consequences of unbelief will drive me mad.