Balance?

So tomorrow I'm leaving with Julie to go to Oregon for 5 or 6 days. We're really excited to go. We've both been on the go a lot lately and a change of scenery will be nice.

I caught a moment to breathe after Christmas, and then things went crazy. I've been putting in extra hours at work and it's been wearing me down. I've been out of town every weekend to spend time with Julie in Dayton. That has been good, but it has kept me busy. Life has just been very full.

It has been an odd time also. About a month ago my house church dissolved. We just hit the point where we had too few members and too few leadership. Though I love the people in my house church, it's actually been a relief. I've been in leadership in house church for 6 years and, in all honesty, I just burned out. For the last several months it has felt like anything to do with church or house church has been a job. I don't want it to be a job, I want that to be something I love and take joy in. Church is about growing in our relationship with Jesus and loving others. But sometimes you just have to take a break to refocus and recharge. So for the last few weeks I haven't been attending house church (haven't made it to Common Ground either, I've been in Dayton so I've been at Apex). I'm starting to miss it and it's a good feeling. I'll get plugged in again once I get back from Oregon.

I'm excited for spring. I'm excited to kayak again, I so can't wait. The last two Sundays I've been at the pool and it has felt wonderful. It's just a nice way to blow off some steam and have fun. I've met some cool new people over in Dayton. I know the Class II paddlers in the HCC are excited for a big season. One month until the Big Pine!

God just continues to bless me with Julie. What an incredible woman. I have to say that I got more than I bargained for when I met her :)

I feel like this is just all incoherent rambling, and I guess that says something about my mental state. Right now there's a need to restore the balance in my life.

Pray for us as we're in Oregon. Other than a day out at the coast, we don't have a plan. Just wherever God leads us. My brother and his wife are going to join us for a few days. We just want to enjoy the city and get to know it some. That as we live out who God made us to be, that people would see God's image in us.

Pray for us also as Julie and I are talking about taking the step of living in the same city. So we're seeking what that is going to look like. Indianapolis? Dayton? Somewhere else? Fun stuff like Julie selling her house, at least one of us finding a new job, a change in community. It's exciting to think about, but also a bit scary.

OK, I'm done rambling.

Valentine's Day (or Singleness Awareness Day)

So I'm sure a few people have noticed that I'm rather smitten with a certain girl. This will be my first time going into Valentine's Day with a girlfriend. While it is a Hallmark holiday and people can go overboard (holy cow Target was crazy tonight), I have been enjoying it.

So I've also spent February 14 as Singleness Awareness Day for many years. Some of those years I was really depressed and lonely, many I really enjoyed.

I'm really blessed to have a wonderful girlfriend and I feel like we have a very healthy and strong relationship. I have gotten far more than I could have dreamed of when I met Julie, and for some reason she likes me too.

I have also been sad to see some people I care a lot about having a lot of troubles in relationships lately too. Pain, heartache, tears, angry words, deep wounds. My heart aches for my friends and I pray for them.

In all of this I am reminded that we can't count on being in a relationship to make us happy. In many ways when we depend on a relationship to make us happy, we will be let down. Too many times people make poor decisions on who to be in a relationship with simply because they are lonely and want someone to make them happy. When that person fails is when all the pain and frustration comes along to attack their hearts. I am a big believer that any time we say "I'd be happy if....." then we are setting ourselves up for disappointment and pain. We can't count on a change in our circumstances to make us happy. We have to make the decision to make the best of our circumstances, whatever they may be. Then if we are given the opportunity for a change, we can evaluate whether that change will really be good for us or not. We will have the strength to say "I won't date someone who mistreats me or doesn't respect me." We can say "I have a standard for who I'm willing to be in a relationship with and I won't settle for anything less." It also gives us the strength to say "this dating relationship is not healthy and I'm going to leave rather than cling to someone who isn't God's best for me." One of the best pieces of advice I have ever heart is "you are ready to date when you would rather be alone than be with the wrong person."

Here is my word of encouragement for everyone out there, in a relationship or not. One of the most wonderful things you can do for Valentine's Day is seek to make someone else happy. If you are counting on someone to make you happy, you'll probably be let down. But if you make it your goal to bless someone else, then you will brighten their day and you'll be blessed by it too. For many years I would plan a dinner on Valentine's Day for my friends (single and in relationships, sometimes we actually had married people join us and it was wonderful). I loved those dinners, they were always so much fun. I could see that others really enjoyed it and it blessed me too. Think about a friend that you could send a card or flowers, get your friends together for dinner, just call up someone to let them know you appreciate them. Go to a nursing home and visit some of the lonely people there. Be a blessing to someone, paybacks are Heaven :)

I also really want to encourage everyone to take time to understand what God's best for you is in relationships. Last weekend Julie and I attended the Song of Solomon conference (you know, that sexually explicit book of the Bible that you read as a teen when you were bored in church but still doesn't make any sense) and it was really great. The website for the ministry is http://www.songofsolomon.com/ and I highly encourage everyone to check it out. We were really blessed by it. We ordered the conference CD's so I'll have those to loan out also.

Finally a shout out to my girl. She is a beautiful woman and an incredible woman of character. I am so blessed. It took me 30.5 years to have my first girlfriend, but she has been more than worth the wait. I'm excited to see where God leads us, the first 6 months have been incredible.

I just have to say that this is still one of my favorite photos of Julie. It just shows some of the things that I love about her. Her adventurous spirit, her courage in a challenging situation, her trust in me (even when I'm not always worthy of it), and her being able to put up with a silly guy :)

How's this for messed up?

I'm reading this article in National Geographic Adventure called "Why the bonobos need a radio and other (unlikely) lessons from deepest Congo". It's about researching these apes called bonobos that are supposed to share 98% of human's DNA, they are supposed to be our closest relative (if you buy evolution). This researcher is interested because she thinks that maybe we are more like them, who are non-violent, deal with conflict by having lots of sex, and are matriarchal. Verses chimps who are very violent, often murdering other chimps, and are very patriarchal. A quote is "And I think on some level people can learn from them in that they are like us, or we are like the bonobo." She's essentially looking to find out if people are basically good (like the bonobo) or basically bad (like the chimps). Then later she is referring to a drug-crazed warlord who tortures his victims by putting them in oil drums in the equatorial sun, and how this warlord arrested her and was going to kill her, but came down off his high and let her go. So she says "I was lucky, but that's the risk of working in an environment where human beings slaughter each other without any mercy whatsoever."

So am I the only one that thinks she has the answer to her question about whether people are basically good or basically bad?