Gracebug

Warning!!!: This post is the definition of lazy Monday. I’m coming up with this on the fly and may or may not convey something. I had something brilliant in my brain this morning but I can’t think of it any more!!!!

Buff: Strong, ripped, muscular, looking good in a bikini.

It’s officially summer in Nebraska(We skip spring quite frequently) and I am NOT READY! I’ve never been one to worry about what I look like, but there comes a time in every teen girl’s life where she realizes she doesn’t look that great and starts freaking out and exercising and dieting. I think I’m at that point.

Not only is it swimsuit season, but I’m also going to be in my beautiful bff’s wedding(to my brother) and I want to look good….

Right now I kind of look like a marshmallow that’s been impaled by a pretzel. Thin on the ends and squishy in the middle. Because of my job I do a lot of walking and heavy lifting. If only sit ups were a requirement of my job as well.

In conclusion: I am ripped, but not everywhere…. I can lift a 300 lb person but I can’t do a situp to save my life. This is a problem….

Operation diet and exercise starting…. NOW! well once I finish my April(The Problem of Pain by C. S. Lewis)

Hebrews 11:6-”And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.”

I read this verse over my early morning breakfast(Not to be confused with second breakfast. Second breakfast happens during a 15 minute break at work.) and I was spiritually backhanded to the face… For two reasons.

1. “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists...”

In order to please God you must do these two things… first believe that he exists. Say whaaaaa? I never reflect on the fact that it pleases God that I simply acknowledge his existence.

2. “And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.”

Yesterday I was praying on the way to work(after breakfast but before second breakfast) and I was praying for my friends and making a monumental step in my relationship with God. As I was praying I found myself asking God for two things. One unselfish and the other quite selfish. This selfish request has been an idol in my heart for the majority of my life. In praying I quoted the above verse(not knowing where it was found) and almost jabbed my finger in God’s chest “You promised!…..”

And in that moment my heart softened and I found myself praying “But God, if I had to give up this selfish desire that you might be glorified in the unselfish…. I would be totally cool with that.”

And in that moment one more idol was torn down in the heart of Grace Menter.

So this morning when I read that verse my mind went automatically back to my hasty, desperate, pleading prayer that was trying to cheat God out of a blessing…. And a profound question was raised in my mind.

Do I believe that God rewards those who earnestly seek him?

Not only this but it says that without faith that God does such it’s impossible to please him! I was pleading in the car and at that point God was probably like “Why are you begging? I’m insulted that you feel like you have to ask twice. I am not amused. You should know that I want to give you these things. Why don’t you know this?”

So often I come to God and I’m like “God you can do this so you should! Because you should!” when, if I’m interpreting correctly, I should be coming with a different kind of confidence: the confidence of right relationship. Like a kid would ask a favor from their dad. “God, I know that we are locked in a relationship centered around mutual earnest pursuit and because of this I know that you want to give me something nice. Like maybe some diamonds or something. Well can I hint about what I want?”

And the great part is that God rewards himself and rewards me at the same time because when you are locked in earnest pursuit your desires become the same as those of the one you are pursuing.

Holy double win, batman!

Momentous: Huge, Significant, Important. e.g. The decision to drop the atomic bomb, The creation of the universe, The destruction of the dinosaurs, Christ’s death and resurrection…

Trivial: not momentous. e.g. What you had for lunch(hopefully), who won the superbowl, how much wood a woodchuck could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood,…

My decision to cut my hair….

Granted I haven’t cut my hair in four years and it WAS down to my natural waist, but let’s be real…. Who cares if my hair is long or short. Well aside from me and my future sister-in-law….

I’ve been thinking about cutting my hair ever since the beginning of March when my sister got married. She said “Nope, you aren’t chopping your hair off before my wedding!” So I didn’t do it then…. Well lately I’ve been on an Elizabeth McGovern kick and she has the exact hair I wanted…. so my desires to cut my hair were once again aroused.

Tim proposed to Joanna, who was in fact the person I entrusted with the task of smacking me in the face if I ever seriously thought about cutting my hair. Well considering she will be marrying my brother I asked her if I could cut my hair before her wedding. She gave her blessing instead of smacking me like I’d asked her to do. I agonized for about two weeks and finally this morning… well…

This happened.

Do I like it? I don’t know. Do I regret it? I really don’t know. Do I miss my long hair? Yes. Does it make me almost want to start sobbing when I see those ponytails that some child will eventually wear? YES! A thousand times yes! And I’m selfish. I want to attach those back to my own hair. But I can’t. It’s done…. Oh well….. it’ll grow back.

I’m getting a fresh start without damage. I should be happy. Well I am. Kind of.

Lazy: Me.

the end.

Am I the only one who finds it ironic that I’m too lazy to write lazy posts? Yes, I could make a million excuses for why I didn’t post on Monday, and some of them may or may not be legitimate, but I’m not going to do that to you guys. Just kidding! The long and short is that two weeks ago as you may know I had noro virus and had to call into work on a Sunday. Because of that I had to work the following Saturday even though it was my weekend off. I had been planning to go visit my sister in Columbia but I wasn’t too sure if I could go. Well I decided to heck with it and went anyway. I came home on Monday and didn’t feel like blogging BECAUSE I was physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually exhausted. As a result I had a million half-formed lazy posts and no energy to think them through.

This exhaustion has chased me into this week, but yesterday I mopped the kitchen floor and did the dishes and whatnot, so I figured I could write a post. The question is what about…

As I have mentioned numerous times before I’m doing this thing where I’m reading a non-fiction book a month. January it was Francis Chan, February it was C. S. Lewis, March I read a book by Max Lucado. For April I had intended to read Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer by good ol’ Jack, but yesterday I was bleeding all over myself and God and I decided prayer isn’t really something that’s lacking in my life right now. There’s another book by Lewis that I’ve been longing to read ever since I read Surprised by Joy in February. The Problem of Pain. C. S. Lewis addresses the question “If God is so good then why is there pain?”

I did a quick library search and saw that the only copies of TPOP could be found at the downtown library, which closes at 1700. It was 1714 when I checked. Curses. At that point I realized that most of the C. S. Lewis works that I enjoy oh so much would be locked up in the prison downtown where I with my long days have no hope of ever freeing them(It’s no wonder Lewis gets weeded so much. All the people who read his works have jobs!)

For my birthday my parents gave me a small sum of money. I was intending to either save it or buy a book with it(either Grudem’s Systematic Theology or a collection of C. S. Lewis’s non-fiction works.)

Now I don’t have to brave one way streets or fight with the parking enforcement(because I have no coins) In order to get my Lewis fix… Thanks Mom and Dad!

Stuffed: full, not hungry.

I don’t know what it is about birthdays, but everyone decides they want to feed you whenever you turn a year older. Congratulations, you’ve wasted another year of your life! Can you feel your metabolism slowing down? Do you feel yourself slinking towards death? Why don’t we speed up that process by giving you all of your favorite foods all at once!

I love food, I really do…. but my arteries are cursing me. Oh, the fatty food’s I’ve been eating….

My wardrobe is cursing me as well. I need to start doing more jumping jacks if I’m going to eat like this…

A special thanks to:

My wonderful Mother!- Who made me meatloaf and jello(and asparagus and baked potatoes) and strawberry-rhubarb pie after I got off work on my actual birthday.

My amazing sister, Anna!- Who intended to take me to ihop before we went to give blood(I know right! I GAVE BLOOD!) but ended up just taking me to Mcdonalds. (I GAVE BLOOD for my birthday guys!!!)

My fantastic, pregnant, sister-in-law Kaytee!- Who flew all the way from Japan to buy me ihop(among other things…)

My stupendous Popsicle!- Who bought the whole family Mexican food. YUM! It was delicious.

My terrific friend(and dapple-ganger) Megan!- Who got me Don & Millie’s. Bacon, Cheese and Beef. I love animals. Did you know you can get 99 cent margaritas there? Yup. But not through the drive thru. We checked.

AND TO EVERYONE ELSE!- Who ate these delicious meals with me(and who would have eaten them if they could have). Namely my brothers Joshua and Timothy(and Joaanaaaaaa), who even though they didn’t feed me, were there to celebrate.

I’m the luckiest 19 year old out there. I have such a brilliant group of family and friends. I know I will never starve.

Needless to say, I eat lunch with my dad on Mondays and I’m stuffed. My parents left to go eat supper without me and I’m debating not making anything for myself so I can just get back down to a comfortable level of full-ness. Just kidding there are avocados in the fridge. but seriously.

Chill out: Calm down, stop freaking out, pipe down, take a chill pill, calm yo self, hold your horses, shut up.

You know those people that you just want to smack upside the head? Yeah me too. I don’t like checking facebook because I always read posts that make me want to say one of the above things.

I sit on my couch with my food and my feet up reading posts. I run across something like

“Stop trying to change me. I refuse to be anyone but myself”

and I’m like. calm down, bro. Calm down. Nobody’s tryin’ to change you, bro. bro? brooooo…

Some people think they’re being courageous and taking a stand of individuality when in all actuality they’re getting worked up over nothing.

The way I see it, we’re all trapped in the prison cell that is life. Some of us have been trapped for a while and we know that there’s no way to get out so we don’t even try. And these poor suckers come along and they haven’t figured it out yet so they raise a ruckus and they try to break free. All the noise and whatnot just annoys the rest of us. In a mild sort of way. Because lets be real, folks, who gives a crap?

In my life I’m learning something about myself. I have to fake outrage a lot. I don’t get worked up a lot. Life goes on, you know?

List of facebook/twitter posts that Grace will gloss over and say “chill out bro”

1. Posts that take a stand against an imagined threat. “I’m going to be myself and anyone who doesn’t like it can suck it!”

calm down.

2. Posts that express excessive amounts of stress over events that are going to happen regardless of said post. “OMG big test tomorrow! SO stressed!”

Shouldn’t you be studying instead of tweeting? Pipe down.

3. Any post that comments about the weather. “It’s snowing. (((((((((”

calm yo’self.

4. Posts complaining about other people. “Argh! My llama stole my boyfriends cell phone!”

what the…. calm down!

5. Any post complaining about life in general. “I’m so tired I almost fell asleep in class!”

Oh yeah? I woke up at 4:30 AM and went to work for 12 hours. take a chill pill. and maybe a caffeine pill too…

6. Anything in all caps. “ZOMG CATS I LOVE CATS CATS CATS CATS!!!!!!!!!!”

no. shut up.

Valley: A depression. A low point in land, emotion, relationship, etc.

Just to preface this post, my sister got married last Saturday. For her wedding she did all the flowers and stuff. One of my duties as bridesmaid was to help make all the boutonnieres and crap. I poked my index finger with the florists wire and it ended up being infected. My finger hurts like hell, so this is going to be a pretty short post. Hope I don’t get mrsa in my wounded finger tomorrow at work… just a thought.

I’m going to be real and tell y’all that I’m in a valley right now. If I were going to slap an excuse on it I would say I’m too exhausted to pursue my relationships right now(especially my relationship with God) but the truth is that I’m just lazy. The fact of the matter is that it’s easier to give in to sin than to take the high road. I’m tired. I don’t make an effort to pursue my godly relationships or my relationship with God so basically I’m not taking steps I should be taking. It’s been a few weeks since I cracked open my bible and actually studied it. So yeah.

Getting real on lazy Mondays. What else can I say? Congrats to my dear sister Bek for finally tricking someone into marrying her(lol jk). God is doing great things in your life, dearie, and I am so happy for you and Daniel.

I have to go do laundry and remake my bed… So I’m going to end with a final thought that I’ve been thinking about since yesterday at church.

The woman in Luke 7, who is said to be a prostitute, came to Jesus and washed his feet with her hair. Apparently back then hair was super sensual and to let down your hair in front of a man who wasn’t your husband was a divorce-able offense. yet this woman came to JESUS and washed his feet with her hair.

What does this say about how I, Grace Joy, should be approaching my savior?

Errand: A menial task that takes longer to drive to the location than to actually do business.

For example. Going to the bank to cash checks. Grocery shopping. Getting gas in one’s car. Picking up books from the library. Dropping off books at the library.

These are particularly annoying to me because I work strange hours. I can’t do half these things before work and who the heck wants to go shopping after working a twelve hour shift? Doing it on my days off is out of the question. Hence the lazy in Lazy Mondays. I guess I should go put gas in my car because I really am not going to want to do it tomorrow before work and I can’t procrastinate it any longer. I wonder if I wear a really big winter coat… Well it can’t be helped.

Moral of this story. I hate errands. Errands suck. When I”m rich and famous I’m going to hire a butler to do all this stuff for me. Actually what makes these things so horrible is that I get so bored doing them. I drive and listen to the same dry old songs on the way there. I spend five minutes at the place and then I drive for more minutes and listen to even more stupid stuff. It’s like “why the heck did I put pants on for this.” I should put audio books in my car to make is more interesting. Maybe then I won’t hate errands so much…. I don’t know.

What errands do you hate? Please, ease the monotony!