the capital F

Well friends, I'm taking a brief break from the Africa stories. Sort of.
I think that the number one thing that I brought back was a changed heart...
I don't want to explain why exactly (or how) my heart needed change, probably most of you know anyway, but the fact was that there was no longer life in my heart prior to going. Somehow God made little green shoots start to come up from my heart while I was in Kenya. I don't know how exactly - maybe it was the beauty of the country, maybe it was falling so in love with the girls at the center, maybe it was being around people who praise God with every breath... I guess it doesn't really matter how, it just matters that God made my heart alive again.

Freedom is what I have sought so desperately for the last year. I couldn't even really put into words just what exactly "Freedom" is or how to find it, I just knew that I wanted it. Amazingly enough, when I stopped trying so hard to find Freedom, God freed me.

Now that I've returned home, I feel like I'm fighting to hang on to that freedom, not to go back into old patterns and habits. The fact remains though, that my heart is so very changed. I think that, besides processing through the Africa experience and thinking about the changes in me, having read a couple Ayn Rand books lately has also put me into a deep-thought mode. Please know that I read Rand books with a mountain of salt (not just a grain), and that I disagree with a lot of what she has to say. I haven't read her pure philosophy books, so I don't have the whole story, but regardless, what she expounds in her fiction (like Atlas Shrugged) doesn't match up with the Bible, therefore I cannot take it as truth. Despite all that though, I do agree in part with what she says. Like doing what is right, because it's right - I agree that that is how we ought to live. Like being confident and sure of yourself (to an extent) - yeah. Like living life to the fullest - for sure.

Speaking in motives though, here's the difference: I am confident because every good thing in me (EVERY good thing) is from God. I don't believe that there is a single aspect of me, that is good, that is not because of the work that God does to change me. That's a fuller realization from Africa...I think I half way believed that all that was good in me was from God, but I didn't realize the connection to confidence in that. Because these good things were put in me by God, who is right and perfect, that means that I can be confident. And it means that I am worth being loved by the best that I can find, if God should allow me to marry someone. As far as doing what is right goes, how does one know what's right? Sometimes it's terribly hard to know...but because I have the Holy Spirit living in me and the Bible to read, I can know what is right. And I ought to do it without regard to the consequences. And doing what is right leads right into living life fully. I know that Heaven will be better, and often I long for it. I also know though that God didn't give us the ability to laugh or to love or interests in various things for nothing...I know that this life can be enjoyed, and it should be by those filled within by Joy from God.

So all that said, having had miraculous heart surgery in Africa, I am suddenly aware that it's ok to be single. Huh? Where's the connection? Well, I realized that I somehow put some value on myself because of a relationship that I had, and since that relationship was over, twice, that left me reeling in more ways than one. Here's the thing: I can be, and should be, confident in who I am now, especially in light of who I will be. I am worth something because of my Lord within me, totally regardless of whether I'm loved or not. I am also fully satisfied by the love of God within me - the love that surpasses knowledge (and boy, does it!) - Eph 3. He will NEVER EVER stop loving me. I can't even comprhend that, except to know that my heart is free, Free!