Touching

I touch the people I love often. And it's so hard for me to not do that. 

Seriously though, if you are my friend and I really care for you, when I'm with you I probably want to sit really close to you or hold your hand or cuddle or anything that involves touching you. It's how I give love and how I receive love best. If someone is in my way in the kitchen or hallway, I usually touch them while I pass by them, just to let them know I'm there. To me that's normal. 

This results in quite a few problems for me. You see, not everyone feels the same way about touching as I do. This always makes me hesitant to actually hug my friends or put my hand on their shoulder when I walk by. It genuinely weirds some people out (my dear sister included). Plus, it's not always socially acceptable to touch people. Also, when it's not other people's first instinct to hug me or touch me in some way when they see me, I don't feel as loved by them (which is foolish, but how I think). I've just realized recently that touching really is that important to me. I suppose I should have known, because I rarely go to sleep without hugging everyone in my house (that tradition started long long ago). Maybe it stems from being the youngest? 

The moral of this story is: if you see Suzanna and don't know if you should give her a hug or not, the answer is always yes. 

He is Good

My summer has not been what I was expecting. And at the beginning of that, I was not okay with it. I wanted to control my own situations, thank you very much.
But God is good. And in His goodness, He helped me realize that being in control is His job and He has it pretty well taken care of. There is a lot of peace in actually realizing that, because His plan is infinitely better than anything I could come up with.
One thing God has been teaching me this summer is how much I desperately need Him every day. How can I expect to be spiritually alive and thriving if I cut myself off from the Life? Why am I afraid to be open with Him about my failures? He ordained those failures! He knows me to my very core and I want to know Him the same way. When I am constantly filling myself with Him, then His love and His words and His peace flow out of me. That is a blessing, and not only to me but those around me! I need Him more than I know. Every. Day.
Through learning to love God more, I am seeing in my life how I don't do a good job of loving others like He loves me. Most of that lack of love is shown in how unwilling I have been to be open about the gospel. To quote an atheist magician, "How much do you have to hate someone to not proselytize?" Ouch. I've been praying about evangelism and how it fits into my life, and God, like he always does, perfectly planned that my youth group would listen to a sermon by David Platt a few Wednesday's back about Greater Works. (Please click that link and listen to the sermon. It will be the most valuable hour of your day. And it will feel like five minutes.) This sermon series is entirely about weaving the threads of the gospel into everyday conversations. Platt mentioned in this sermon that we shouldn't worry about creating a situation to share the gospel - if God has us with unbelievers, He wants us to share with them! And even better than that, God is working in that person's life already. Everyone is looking for fulfillment, and it is only found in Christ. I have been given Christ, and I am able to share Him freely. Why don't I? I need to considers others more important than myself and disregard my fear knowing that the shame I might feel from possible rejection will bring glory to the Father. And that is my purpose. 

I wish I could say I've started sharing the gospel with everyone I've met since I felt this conviction, but I definitely haven't. Part of that is because I am mostly contained in a happy little Christian bubble. I'm very blessed to have grown up in such a solid church and have believing friends and family, but I wish I had more opportunities to befriend unbelievers. When I realized I really don't have those opportunities where I am in my life right now, I was a little discouraged. Then thankfully I remembered that God isn't sitting up in heaven, waiting for me to make non-Christian friends so He can work through me - He has me right where I am in order to minister there. Revolutionary thought, right? (It really actually is.) 

So here I am. I have one week and a day until summer is over and I get to return to my mission field - my school. I will be surrounded five days a week by Christians who need encouragement and gospel reminders, professing Christians who need to realize where they really stand, girls who would rather find their identity in another boyfriend than in Christ, kids who have been immersed in the gospel but have never heard it, and broken people who need more and more of Christ every day. I will not be able to love these people and fix them myself, but I want to be a vessel for the outpouring of the perfect love of Christ. I must continue to fill myself with His word so that I can turn around and tell others more about Him. There will always be more to learn, and it will never be dull. He is good.