Medjool dates...

I absolutely LOVE dates. The fruit, I mean. And not just any kind, but plump, chewy, Medjool dates. You can't get them everywhere and they're only available during certain times of the summer. Suffice to say that there are no Trader Joe's or World Markets here in suburban SC, but Food Lion down the street did have their own brand of chopped (and covered with powdery dextrose, a type of sugar) dates... not as delish, but they get the job done. I decided I wanted to share the joy of dates with someone, so after dropping Joy off at work this morning, I went downtown to the Riverwalk and shared my dates with God, and we had a little chat down by the river.

We talked about Governor Samford, my hardened heart, and by golly we gushed over the exquisiteness of Medjool dates. I'm convinced there's no better snack out there, and after sharing them with God today, there's none holier, either.

Reassessing.

Lately I've been desiring to reassess life, Jesus, where exactly He and I stand, and just how I really feel about this whole Christianity thing.

It's been more than a week since my falling out, and the most palpable outcome is the emptiness. The emptiness I feel is real and tangible. I admitted to my sister today how much purpose I find in my work at Ripley's, and how depressed and angry I am when I have days off. Where is my purpose found now? My worth? In my job at Ripley's Aquarium. Talk about a red flag, especially when it's all written out like this...

Then there's the logic behind my decision to simply deny Him (or whatever it is that happened between "God" and I last weeekend); I have not felt His presence, felt the need to go to Scripture, to pray, to confess, to be Christian in any way, to do anything that would have me pursue Him. I keep having athiestic thoughts, thinking of all the evidence in my life stacked up against His existence, and I really want to embrace the idea and be done with it. Make a stinking decision already, you know? Love Him or hate Him. Embrace Him or deny Him. But I began reading this magazine called "Y-Origins" put out by, who else, Campus Crusade for Christ, given to me by a dear friend when I was having the same issues my senior year in college. It's a project that was initiated by CCC founder Bill Bright, and it's basically a logical look into the justification for a designer. Yes, it's full of very convincing information. Yes, the rational side of my brain went ahead and accepted the existence of some Creator after reading through the articles again. But no, my spirituality hasn't grown past that. Apart from the incredibly convincing magazine (it's all about Einstein's String Theory, who knew?) I just don't see or feel or experience His presence when I look outside at the beautiful mossy trees, or survey my life, or look out on the utter destruction humanity's laid across its home planet. Nothing apart from the logical arguments presented in the magazine has convinced me there's a Creator, let alone that He loves me, that He pursues me with His love, that He gave and gave and gave so that I might live and give Him glory or even want to give Him glory.

So as far as the religious side of things, I'm still lost. My mind understands that God is present but that's it... Christianity is still a big question mark. It's becoming a hard pill to swallow. I keep zeroing in on all these fallen people trying to come off as perfect Christians, or focusing in on every fault of my Christian friends and tallying them. It's hard not to be discouraged looking at Christianity, and who can blame me? I don't see many people out there proclaiming their depravity, or confessing their sins, or living up to standards other than worldly ones, or reaching out to anyone past themselves and their friends.

All this aside, the emptiness I began to feel a few days ago is still here. I still feel purposeless without my job to keep me busy. I remember my life in Daytona and how purpose driven I was, to follow Christ and further His Kingdom and give Him all the glory and more. I'd love to have that back, that sense of purpose. Knowing that there's more to my life than bloggging on here or spending my hours at the aquarium, pleasing tons of people. But it's not as easy as it was back then, when living with fifty other followers, all with the same God-glorifying mission, made the Gospel some sugar-coated candy that was simple to swallow and share too... heck when everyone else around you is doing it, why should it be hard for you? But Christianity is so much harder nowadays without the support, and I can't bring myself to fall on my knees and bare my life - bruises and shame and all - in front of "God" and beg for forgiveness. I just can't, when I don't even know if I can swallow Christianity anymore - when I'm merely at the point of understanding a Creator's presence solely in the logical, left side of my mind.

But I can't deny the empty I feel, or the lack of purpose. I just can't bring myself to the point where I can understand where to even begin finding that ultimate, or holy, purpose again. Here's to hoping.

P.S. I'm sorry for sounding so depressing, it's the middle of the night and I'm listening to a lot of Muse lately.

All of this for perhaps... a better, more real, defined view of grace? Or that I simply cannot do this on my own? I always thought I understood 'dependence' on the Holy Spirit, but have I really? Is this gonna teach me how to really rely on God for all of it? To show me that I really don't have it down pat like I thought I did or projected to everyone? Hmm.

How do people do it?

Jazz is great for calming me down.

Man, is that the truth. I love Jazz, all kinds except "acid" from the 60s and the more cringe-tacular "flute" jazz birthed in the 70s. So generally I love Jazz music. Okay, what I really mean is I like Miles Davis. Most of his melodies go down smooth and I think the trumpet can be one of the sweetest sounding instruments when it's played right. The point is, I love Miles because he calms me down. I need some calming. Honestly... today was terrible. And by terrible I mean horrific according to comfortable American standards, of course. I say all this in lieu of being exposed a ton to Compassion International and the plight of impovershed families around the world this past month, and so with this in mind I understand how spoiled rotten I am to have clean water and my own bed to sleep in, but please, I want to rant. So lucky I have this blog where I can do just that...

I've been feeling unproductive and detached lately, and the newness of Myrtle Beach and Ripley's Aquarium is wearing off quickly and unexpectedly. The community thing, it turns out, is still hard. It's like experiencing genuine or even good community is the most complicated puzzle there ever was or ever will be, and I am searching and waiting for the perfect solution or some smidge of an answer that might unlock this ridiculous contraption... so all that going on, and my quiet times are lacking, I can't remember the last time I regularly confessed to the Lord through out the day and I've already made and lost the same friends at work. In the same month.

Okay so all of this and today, I start to feel depression a'creepin'. Creep it does, slowly but surely, ready to ruin my perspective - and for me, it's all about perspective - and so I'm just waiting for it to go away. And then in the middle I'm like, "Okay Alicia, you for real need to get outta bed and just bike ride or something." So I head out to downtown Conway, and it was fine, listening to my favorite mewithoutYou and pedalling away. Then I hit a terrible pot hole, and my bike started wheezing, and naturally I assumed it was one of my tires messed up from earlier. I tried, for almost an hour straight, to pump air back into my front tire, but for all my work I just made it worse. My tire was wholly flat in a matter of minutes, and the pump just wasn't working. That plus the fact that as I'm sitting there in blazing heat, tens of people walk or boat on by, oggling and staring... at that point I was a thirty minute ride from home, a good fifteen minutes more with a flat tire. The sun was going down, and I started to panic a little, since we're not in the best part of town. So I sat there and breathed and prayed that God would fix my tire magically, or help me to fix it, or that at least something 'good' would come from the whole experience. I prayed for comfort, prayed that the Holy Spirit would fill me, that I would stop being so nasty and negative about it all. And then... all that really came was more frustration from me, an even more flat tire if it were possible, exhuastion from trying for almost an hour straight to pump the tire back to life, me covered in sweat, and more of the same people walking by but this time, ignoring me and my impatient huffs. I gave up and began riding my bike back home anyway, and let me tell you riding a bike with a flat tire is like swimming through mud with 100 mph wind resistance. Just saying. As I squeaked my way home, it hit me hard that God had not answered my prayer the way I'd wanted, which seeemed unfair, as I gave him multiple options... and it hit me even harder, way down in the bowels of my heart, that God had rather answered with a big fat "NO!" and decided to make the whole experience worse as it went on, as it surely did. And poppycock to everyone who is saying to me right now "It is just God testing your faith so it will grow big and strong," because my faith is no bigger and all that resulted was a heart that felt abandoned. On my way home my bike lock fell apart and when I couldn't put it back together, I spat out a curse word, and I am one of the biggest prudes in the world and my family will tell you all about how I never curse... and so began a quiet (or not so quiet) rebelling against God in my heart. Hurt from rejection, still lost in negativity from my bout of depression earlier, and bitter because my poor pedalling legs were about to fall off.

These are times when I doubt like no other mother, where I let sinfulness pour into me and I do a lot of stupid stuff, like curse to the winds, steal something of my sister's, eat all sorts of unhealthy things in huge quantities, scream haphazardly at the dog for getting on my nerves, all that stuff. I start thinking about my salvation, and what it means, and if all this 'duty' is really worth it, and doubting whether I am really into this whole Christian thing, because it doesn't seem to be working out so well.

After today I feel like I've broken up with God.

This is possibly the worst movie I've seen. It's called "The Messengers" and it's on Lifetime - what more could I expect? It's dripping with melodramatism, stuttering lines and a crappy story line. Transition into the topic that's been on my mind a lot, especially today...

Criticism. I'm so critical. Christians are so critical too, I've noticed... I'm so tired of Christians calling others "idiots" or "brainless". Aren't we called to be different? How is a Christian calling Richard Dawkins a brainless idiot different than Bill Maher calling the Bible the "Jewish book of fairytales"? I've seen and heard it a lot today and it's discouraging.

What's also discouraging is realizing how much I still live for myself. Even after two years since accepting God's grace for me I am still doing and saying things that would make people like me more. Haven't I improved at all? Right now, not that I can see or hear or touch.

How obsessed I am about my own improvement! Of course that's not the point of the Gospel. I'm too concerned with how God's grace will change me and make me better, transform me into ALICIA 2.0 or something like that, rather than being concerned with devotion. Or compassion, servitude, or love... surrendering to the Holy Spirit's leading to further God's name and kingdom and glory.

I'll be working on that.

Just got home from a poop day at work, too many disgruntled people, too many people in general, too many computer jams, too MUCH. I am convicted a lot lately, and that's a good thing I suppose, because that means the Holy Ghost is a-movin'. Like about how I am treating people. And why I treat people the way I do... for my own gain? I read a little today from Elisabeth Eliot about obedience and kept thinking about Whom I serve. Myself? My best friends? My best friend ever, Jesus?

Now I'm making dinner for Joy and I. Grilling burgers! I'm a modern Bobby Flay. Well not really "modern"... since he's definitely still alive and throwing down on the Food Network. I'll settle to be a younger, more hip version I suppose!

Actually...

This article doesn't do a great job of fortifying the claim that, in fact, God hates all women. Funny though how she mentions the whole submission thing; I was just explaining to my sister last night about the importance of being pursued by a spiritual leader, why I wanted my husband to be one, and how it's Biblically sound to have the man be the head of the family and for the woman to be his helper - the way we were created. She really seemed disgusted by the "inequality" as she called it, and kept asking why I referred to the Bible's - a.k.a. God's - view on relationships when it is "so obviously out-dated". The article is blatantly biased but mostly what sucks is reading it and not being able to deny that people actually do crazy and horrific things like this. Not only that, but they do it believing they are justified before God.

God is merciful, but only if you're a man
Jew, Christian or Muslim... whatever the faith, women are still treated with disdain or worse

Ophelia Benson
The Observer, Sunday 31 May 2009

There is plenty to criticise in Islam's view of women. Last year, the Observer told the story of a man in Basra who stamped on, suffocated and then stabbed to death his 17-year-old daughter for becoming infatuated with a British soldier. The relationship apparently amounted to a few conversations, but her father learnt she had been seen in public talking to the soldier. When the Observer talked to Abdel-Qader Ali two weeks later, he said: "Death was the least she deserved. I don't regret it. I had the support of all my friends who are fathers, like me, and know what she did was unacceptable to any Muslim that honours his religion."

This was clearly extreme, but the truth is that the God many people believe in - whether Muslim, Christian or Jewish - hates women. Take America's Southern Baptist Convention, which declares in its faith and mission statement: "A wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband." That's fair enough, isn't it? After all, he's probably stronger than she is.

Or there's the Catholic church. The Pope put things more suavely in an address in 2008: "Faced with cultural and political trends that seek to eliminate, or at least cloud and confuse, the sexual differences inscribed in human nature, considering them a cultural construct, it is necessary to recall God's design that created the human being masculine and feminine, with a unity and at the same time an original difference." The insistence on difference is the necessary first step to insisting on inequality and subordination and it is a step that popes have been taking at regular intervals for decades.

In November 2006, Nicaragua enacted a ban on all abortion, with no exceptions, even to save the mother's life. The law was ratified by the National Assembly in September 2007. Both the original enactment and the vote in September 2007 were widely attributed to the influence of the Catholic church. In a report this month, the United Nations Committee against torture called Nicaragua's total ban on abortion a violation of human rights.

Then there is Judaism. In one neighbourhood in Jerusalem, religious seminaries flank streets with yellow signs that warn: "If you're a woman and you're not properly dressed - don't pass through our neighbourhood."

So why is it so often women who fill the pews? Is it a form of Stockholm syndrome? Religions do a good job of training people to be obedient and loyal to the authorities and women in particular are raised to be both devout and submissive. Religions are sticky: they are hard to abandon and that is doubly true for women, given that subordination and unshakable fidelity are their chief duties.

The fact that women are defined as different from men ("complementary" is the religious euphemism) and confined to narrower, more monotonous lives as a result, means that they have more need of the excitements and passions of religion. For women, religion often is the heart of a heartless world. All they have to give up in exchange is their right to shape their own lives; as long as they behave themselves, all will go swimmingly.

The intimate and inescapable connection that contemporary liberal believers like to see between God and love, theism and compassion, is largely a modern invention. It's far from universal now and it was vanishingly rare in the past. St Francis was an eccentric, not an exemplar. The painful truth is that still, to this day, most people who believe in a god believe in a god who is often vindictive, punitive and sometimes just plain cruel. The Ryan report on abuse of children in Irish industrial schools, released two weeks ago, provides a mountain of searing evidence for that. For decade after decade, generation upon generation, the religious congregations in charge of the institutions saw nothing wrong.

One survivor of Goldenbridge, the most notorious industrial school for girls, run by the Sisters of Mercy, told the commission: "The screaming of children will stay with me for the rest of my life about Goldenbridge. I still hear it, I still haven't recovered from that. Children crying and screaming, it was just endless, it never, never stopped for years in that place." Many of those children were there simply because their mothers were unmarried or divorced.

The God we have in the Big Three monotheisms is a God who originated in a period when male superiority was absolutely taken for granted. That time has passed, but the superior male God remains and that God holds women in contempt. That God is the one who puts "His" imprimatur on all those tyrannical laws. That God is a product of history, but taken to be eternal, which is a bad combination. That is the God who hates women.

So why do so many women put up with it? Partly because God gives with one hand what "He" takes away with the other - God consoles people for the very harshness that God creates. It's the sad, familiar, heartrending bargain in which the victim embraces the perpetrator, in some complicated, confusing, all-too-human mix of appeasement, need and stubborn loyalty. The fact that the embrace is all on one side is resolutely ignored.

Confirmed.

This kid I mentioned before definitely has fluttery feelings for me, too. We went to see a movie, and the movie was pretty good, but the whole thing was too strained. We don't have much going for us outside the aquarium besides awkwardness, and I am praying for the good Lord's provision here. I don't want him to pursue me even though we get along pretty well, and that's that. The 'flutteries' aren't there anymore, and I can quickly feel annoying feelings replacing them. What if he keeps on pursuing? How do I let him know we just get along well and that's it?

Why did this have to happen in the first couple weeks of working there? Is this gonna drag aaaalll summer?