23 February 2007

a recap of the last week or so...

The last week to week and a half has been good. Valentine's Day was pleasant for the most part aside from the hurtful comments of one gentleman who has since sought forgiveness and I gave it. I went away on a retreat last weekend up north of Anchorage. It was nice and much needed. It was on spiritual armour and spiritual warfare and the authority that is given to us by the Lord Jesus Christ. I learned a lot about exercising that authority directly instead of going through God. For instance, I had been having dreams lately about demons and possession. I would pray to God that if there was anything there with me that wasn't from him that he would drive it away. Of course, there's nothing wrong with that but I learned that I can be even more effective by commanding the devil myself directly to leave. I have tried it and it is indeed more effective. And I started getting money in for my trip to London in April which is good. And I have more coming that's been promised to me which is also very good. I am getting quite excited about my trip. If anyone knows of someone that lives in London that wouldn't mind taking in a female college student for a few days I would appreciate the contact and a warm place to put my head.

And tonight I had a date. It was a first date all over again with a guy that I had been out with before, last October, several times and then wound up being different than I had originally thought. He contacted me about a month ago probably apologizing profusely and saying that he was glad I told him how I felt, etc., that he didn't expect me to forgive him but that he was sorry anyway and how horrified he was at the things he said to me the last time I saw him. He went on to say how beautiful, intelligent, and fun to be with I am. And how he had spent the last 4 months or so in a place where he had to deal with a lot of things, ugly things in his life and how much it had changed him. I had forgiven him back in October fairly quickly after that last night but I waited a few days after receiving his email and then called him to tell him as much. He was, of course, shocked to hear from me but I told him that I forgave him and we talked a while. And thus began a month or so of getting reacquainted with each other through email and over the phone. I was able to read some blogs of his (I don't link to him and he doesn't know about mine) and from what I read it was fairly evident that he had in fact done some changing and decided that it would be hard for him to put up that kind of a facade with all the people that read his blog if it was only for my benefit. It seemed as though he was being very intentional with me and I really enjoyed it. He called me on Valentine's Day, I think it was, and left a voice mail asking if he could take me out sometime. So when I got his message we agreed on tonight and continued to email back and forth and talked on the phone last night. And this morning when I got to work and logged into my email I got this message from him...

I think you have great ideas and I'm looking forward to seeing you.
A few days ago, while I was walking the (snowy) beach during lunchtime, I remembered your words. When I asked you one night last fall what the ocean was saying to you, you said, "I am God and I am awesome." And you expanded your thoughts for my benefit. Makes me think of Job 12:8, "Speak to the earth, and it will teach you." See ya tonight!

It made me smile. And the day flew by and I met him at Veronica's at seven o'clock for a steamer and some great jazz music. He was already there when I arrived. He stood when he saw me and gave me a hug and it was comforting and familiar. We sat and talked by the fire and listened to the band play. His blue eyes would search me and reach into places long forgotten. We talked about seeing a movie but because he had an hour drive ahead of him to go home we called it an early night. He hugged me and promised to call me again soon. I don't know what I think right now. It seemed good but I don't want to be naive about this. He knows that he's on probation with me, that if he treats me even remotely similar to the way he did before that he's out for good. I want to believe him but I am just not sure. I want to trust that God has the very best for me and I don't want to settle for anything less. I want to be smart about love. Not that I am in love with him but I just want to be smarter about matters of the heart than I have been in the past.

Poppa, I wish that you were close by. I would come over and talk to you about all this stuff. And you could maybe meet him too. You've always been a good judge of character it seems like. I miss you and I love you.

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