Five Minute Friday: Trying for real

I've been missing in action around here for a while. Still reading blog posts and commenting and praying, but just taking a Sabbath from blogging. Just for a while, to remind myself what my voice sounds like and free myself from the habit I'd fallen into of trying to squeeze meaning and lessons into my posts that aren't really there. That's probably one of my biggest fears, to look back on my life and see that I've been pretending my faith, knowing who Jesus is and believing it, in exchange for comments and compliments on my faith and character that aren't always there. Not to say those are terrible things, and I love hearing that people actually notice fruit that I had never thought was there, but when I live for those things, nothing ever comes close to satisfying me. I'm back, maybe not every week, but when God tells me to write, I guess I have no choice other than that. So here's some real stuff that's happened in the past few weeks

I've gone on a completely unforgettable retreat. Rollerskating, praying in a graveyard, seeing forty sophomores stand silent before us with their hearts written on cardboard signs. Having an adventure trying to use the bathroom with rollerskates on. Taking a shower and almost flooding the whole bathroom (Those camp showers are ridiculously confusing!)

I've been completely frustrated with my lunch group after the retreat. There's always drama going on, backstabbing eachother, talking about topics that make me extremely uncomfortable , cussing nonstop and just not a great atmosphere at all. So on Wednesday I just got up and went to spend fifteen minutes by myself just praying and hiding from the world.

I've seen someone I hadn't seen for  a whole year yesterday at Panera and I was pretty convinced I would never see her again. Guess it's true that once someone's in my life. there's no getting out

I've gotten incredibly mad at a teacher for nothing more than not caring enough and being extremely unpredictable

I haven't gotten the chance to read anything other than blog posts and Facebook statusses since winter break, and I'm sick of it.

I've built up an arsenal of posts that I haven't decided whether or not to publish and can't decide what to do with them

I've read through Genesis and Exodus with a Bible study I found in our basement last December, and am now beginning slogging through Leviticus. We'll see how this goes.

I can't remember whether I wrote about this before or not, but I've begun to prepare my heart and mind for my youth group's mission trip to Haiti this summer. I've never been outside the country without my family before AND I speak Spanish, but not French or Creolen so this will be interesting for sure.

I've just spent the last hour citing evidence cards for a Lincoln Douglas debate in two weeks and am considering it a noble waste of time. Thank God for music...

I've decided I need to pray more after watching my small group leader pray by herself at Panera with no thought as to how she looks, but decided I would be way too self conscious to have a intellegible moment with God.

So there it is :) My life in a blog post.