ever since i was a small, blonde-haired, pigtail-headed grammar school girl, i have said that "God is a big part of my life!" and exclaimed it with joy, knowing that it set me apart from my second grade peers. even when we still attended the mormon church, with its boring teachers and lifeless songs, i was able to say this. i knew i believed in God. i even "knew" (said) i loved him. but when we came out of the mormon church as my mother declared "this does not teach the word of God", i thought, "uh-oh" and followed her to our new home: shoreline community church. the difference here, though, is that Jesus is the way for me to get to heaven and i can't be good enough on my own, and even though i'm pretty good at looking like i have it all together, me and Jesus know that ain't the case. and so i understood. so i thought.
fast-forward now to eighth grade: where my classmates teased me for saying "oh my gosh" instead of the other, mocked me for not knowing the crude jokes on mad tv or understanding the sexual innuendos infused within every conversation. why, they'd ask me?
"God is the biggest part of my life, and i obey Him."
"BAHAHAHAHA."
tears.
i'd had it. i'd had enough. on my way home from school one day with my t-shirt drenched and my nose stuffed, serving as evidence for my horrible day, i declared to my mother:
"i don't want to go to carmel anymore. i want to go to monterey bay christian with heather and robyn and people who love God too. i hate this."
and my wise but caring mother, knowing that it was much more likely that i desired to go to place where i would not get teased rather than wanted solid fellowship (i honestly had no idea even what that was, yet), she said:
"megan, finish out the year. you're almost graduation. we'll look for a Christian highschool for next year. but you don't want to swtich schools right at the end, trust me. your'e almost done. God will get you through."
and she was right, because by the end of the year when everyone found out i was leaving, i didn't want to leave anymore (you get much sympathy from the ones who didn't care that you existed before when your'e now the one getting all the attention).
and when asked why?
"God is the biggest part of my life."
this i knew.
and so, though the tears once caused by these people were now flowing because i had to leave them, i found myself at calvary chapel high school my freshman year.
that year came as a shock.
i was no longer the innocent blonde girl who didn't understand anything regarding the world around me - i was the crazy girl who had (gasp!) went to a public middle school.
but other than that, i was just like every body else (at least it seemed).
christian? check.
christian parents? check.
christian music? check.
good grades? check.
happy most of the time? check.
don't swear? check.
don't drink, smoke, chew, or run with the ones that do? checkcheckcheckcheck.
suddenly, i wanted to be back in the place where i was different because God was the biggest part of my life. even though i got teased for it.
(thegrassisalwaysgreener...)
so i made my identity in something else - i started rebelling in the way i knew how:
stop being the innocent girl.
some of the checks on my list got erased, and i was happy about it. i started lying, hanging out with the wrong people, being much too physically involved with my boyfriend at the time, and yet i still thought i was fine.
"God is the biggest part of my life."
but i was miserable.
i wanted to go back.
so my mom said, okay. wait a year. if you still want to go back, you can.
since i said "God is the biggest part of my life"
i wanted it to be His decision.
so i prayed - barely - but i did pray.
"God, you are the biggest part of my life. show me where i should go. i can tell the ones who don't know you about you if i go back - but if i stay here, i'm just like everyone else. but show me what you want. amen."
he did.
he showed me where i'd been wrong.
but he didn't just show me where i should go to high school.
he showed me how i should live my life.
entering my sophomore year of highschool and following a series of life-shattering events for a fifteen year old, God broke me, picked me up, and held me in His hands nearly simultaneously. it was then that He showed me where i had gone wrong in my whole life. God does not want to be a part of my life. He does not want a big, or even the biggest part of my heart. He wants it all. and so my eyes were opened, my knees were bent. i stopped putting my idenity in what i said about God depending on those around me and my circumstances, and put my identity in God Himself.
as a result, i changed not only my thinking and phraseology, but my actions as well.
God was no longer a part of my life, a big part of my life, or even the biggest part of my life.
God was my life - and, on second thought - let me say, Christ.
Christ is my life.
understanding that both my Heavenly Father and my Savior Jesus Christ are God, when i didn't have time to explain that to an inquisitive stranger, it made much more sense to say,
"i live for Jesus" rather than "i live for God" - as that is what my old friends back at the LDS church believed they could say, too.
now i knew better.
i still know better.
but here is the problem i have faced as of late:
i believe that i have slipped down back into the mediocre "God is a big part of my life" that i declared as an ignorant gradeschooler. i wear the badge of a biblical counseling major and know all of the Christian terms, but i think of God much more than i talk to Him.
i have the right answers about God, but i don't apply them to my life.
i know the priorities found in scritpure, but i don't let them affect me in the use of my time.
i believe i am a wretched sinner, but when i look at the world i still think:
"i am doing pretty well."
all too often, i want to look like the girls i see in hollywood more than i want to conform to the image of Christ.
because all too often, He is not my life.
and this is why i am miserable.
