God Knows I'm a Brat and He's Going to Kick It Out Of Me

Here is that post I've been referring to. The icky post I just need to...finally post. So here is the incident I faced a few months ago.

I wouldn’t seem like the type that would snub someone on purpose, right? I mean, you read this blog and you might think “she’s a little unglued but seems to make pretty good decisions.” Yes, I’m living the life of a Christ Follower. That’s me. Always giving my time, money, love. But really, it’s not me all the time. I want to share a story which I feel I can write here. I say that knowing the person whom I did this to probably reads this blog but oh well.

You’ve read about how I went through a really crappy autumn season. You would think I would be recovered from this by now but the pain was real and deep. I made steps to heal and reached out to people you wouldn’t expect…one of the sources of said pain. I was definitely on the road to recovery but for reasons I’m not going to mention (first because I don’t want to get into it and second because it really doesn’t matter), I slipped back into an intense dislike for someone. Intense. I went from liking/caring about this person but knowing I couldn’t be friends with them right now to not even being able to look at them. I told Joey about it. I told my pastor about it. I told my mentor about it. But I didn’t tell my friends about it…the people I confide in. I didn’t want them to be put in the middle. Wow. It does all sound so high school but I’m going to keep going with my story. It’s about to sound Jr. High in a minute.

I saw this person on a Saturday last May. We were in the same room for the same reason, us and one other person. I looked up from my work and I will honestly say I tried to make eye contact. I was going to force a smile. It didn’t happen, though and the longer this person and I shared airspace, the angrier I became. I was so angry with this person, that I actually felt sick. I had to get up and leave the room at one point. Anger was consuming me and I was so confused by it. The ironic part of all this was where we were: church. We were at Riverview….the safe place for both of us. For some dumb reason, I made up my mind to pretend this person didn’t exist and I was feeding off the hate. Years ago, I would have felt I was responding correctly. This is how pre-Christian self dealt with problems. At first, I allowed myself to go down this hate road. It felt good. Satan is tricky.

After this person left Riv, I felt like collapsing. Weak and sad, I walked out to my car. I tried to call Joey. No answer. I called another friend. Busy. I was alone with myself and my actions made me ill.

Immediately, I knew what I had to do. I didn’t really think twice. I picked up my cell and called this person. I apologized. I asked for this person to forgive me for my childish behavior. No, I didn’t feel better about myself afterwards. I still felt sick. A friend of mine questioned my actions by saying it wasn’t my responsibility to call said person. After all, that person ignored me right back. But I just didn’t see it that way. My actions were my actions.

The Holy Spirit must be strong in me or something. In this spiritual battle going on right inside of me, Jesus was putting up a fight against my sinful nature. I’ve learned so much. I’m still learning so much. It hurts and yet, it feels good, too, seeing the work in progress, the continual growth. I’m so thankful God loves me in all my weakness and He’ll fight for me, too. Yes, He’ll most certainly allow me to go through schtuff but He is forcing me to stand up to my selfish behavior.

There’s still more to come on this….probably for the rest of my life.