The past month or two, I've been extremely discontent with the way my life is going. I've just been having trouble seeing what purpose I have this summer. I haven't been able to find a summer job, and on top of that most of my room mates have things to do and people to see; I usually don't. I don't want to turn this into a pity party for myself. It's just that it gets a little bit discouraging and depressing watching everyone around me have purposeful things to do while I have pretty much all day, seven days a week with nothing to do. Sure, there's the occasional night where I hang out with someone. It's not that I'm always alone or anything. But I've just been feeling really purposeless. I thought I knew what I was doing (as I explained in my last blog, I really don't know what I'm doing).
The entry yesterday in My Utmost for His Highest was about dealing with drudgery (you can read it here if you want to). Drudgery is the perfect word to describe my summer. I'm not super happy. I'm not particularly unhappy, either. I'm just kind of bored. Drifting through life. Oswald Chambers wrote about developing godly character. About how what you do when life is unextraordinary and unexciting is a good test of your character. How we look for big things to do, but fail to honor God in our everyday lives. I know I've been failing on that front. I've just been allowing myself to wallow in self-pity. And let me tell you, that has been a foothold for Satan's lies this summer. Somehow, late at night when I'm sitting in my room alone, Satan twists the fact that other people have stuff to do and I don't into proof that no one loves me. That I'm alone in the world and I might as well accept that fact that I'm going to be abandoned by everyone I care about. That I should just pull away from my relationships because clearly I care more about other people than they do about me. Obviously I realize intellectually that these thoughts are dramatic and exaggerated and false. But being alone and abandoned are huge fears for me, and Satan knows that and uses it against me. The truth is, other people just happen to be busier than me. I'm not the center of the universe, and the fact that people have stuff going on does not mean that they don't care about me. Me pulling away from people is not going to help anything, either. I need to keep reminding myself of that.
I was reminded today that instead of feeling bad for myself and dwelling on the things that I don't like and can't change, I should be seeking to honor God even in the smallest of ways. I look for big things to do and get upset when I don't find any, but God wants to see me doing everything for his glory, and that includes little stuff. It's hard to actually put this into practice. It's much easier to wallow in the lies Satan tells me. Satan's lies don't call me to action. They don't carry the hope of life getting better or more purposeful. All they do is tell me to give up.
Well, I'm here to say that I'm NOT giving up. With God's help, I will not let Satan win this battle.
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