Hopeless Romanticism or Realistic Rationalism?

Bill Ihde recently preached a series of messages on marriage. Not surprising since he's always been the family man...According to my mother anyway, I was WAY to young to remember any of it. And I've been stewing on it and mulling it over and I think I've finally come to a conclusion.

As a girl I spend time, granted it isn't all of my time but it is some, thinking about marriage and the whole nine yards. This shouldn't come as a surprise, anyone who has a sister or is a girl knows and has experience with this sort of thing. But I always just assumed that I'd end up marrying a knight in shining armour or a fabulously fabled prince who would just come out of nowhere and marry me and we'd live a magically and ridiculously unrealistic happily ever after. But I've come to realize that there isn't any realism in that kind of thinking. Sure it's cute and the kind of thing that you'd see in a Disney movie, but how and where does it play out in real life?

When I examine all the ideas and preconceptions that I've carried around about marriage and love and falling in love I really find that things aren't what I thought that they'd be. I don't mean that I have no idea or anything, just that the whole I guess "dream" about the way that I would want things to be ideally just isn't ideal. Actually I realize that it doesn't leave room for what really matters. Even as a Christian my "dream" of it all has been skewed by the way the world looks at things. Bill talked about how a man worthy of marrying would want to leave the girl he's interested in in a better place both with God and in everyday living than when he met her. He would change her for the better, whether or not he actually walked down the aisle with her. He would work with and on her like a garden and treat her like a precious thing that was worth not just protecting but being cherished. So many of us girls in this world haven't been cherished by anyone and the thought that we're worth cherishing and that we deserve and should be cherished hasn't even crossed our minds. But I guess this is just another instance where the Lord knows better than we do.

The kind of guy we ladies like is as different as we are, and that's ok. The interesting thing is that all girls are looking for someone who makes them feel like they're worth something not just because they're beautiful or attractive or an object of desire but because there is something about them, I think it's our souls whether or not the guy in question actually realizes it or not, that they see and can't help but find value and I don't know something special in. It's the ones that make you feel special that make the cut. Personally I believe that in those instances they're not just seeing us, they're seeing a part of God that is speaking to them and blowing their minds away. In Genesis it talks about how the creation of the world wasn't complete until God made woman. Ladies, we're the crown of creation, if it wasn't for us things wouldn't be "good" or complete. So I have to believe that being a hopeless romantic isn't such a bad thing after all. I'll leave off with a quote, from Hitch - which was a moderately ok movie, "Any man can sweep any woman off her feet, he just needs the right broom." Or in this case he needs to have the right idea of who to use the broom on!! ;-p

Spring Cleaning

Since I have been "spring cleaning" recently, and I still have it on the brain, I thought I would share some observations and insights with you.

We are like a cupboard. Profound huh??.. I like it. And to prove my point: we holds things from the small cups of sorrow or joy to the plates of plenty. We lock them into our hearts and minds and we don't let them go. The good, the bad and the ugly, it all resides within. Our sin is like the dust that accumulates around our collective "stuff" and dulls it and makes us nasty and grimy and completely unfit to hold eating utensils. Yet we use it still. Why? Because it is safe, and normal - if anyone knows someone who is interested in creating a way to hold dishes other than a cupboard then please let me know...I'd LOVE to NOT have to clean it...I'm allergic to dust...Ahh a world without dust....But I digress...Back to cupboards. - and we don't know another way of doing things that doesn't include our sin. Let's be honest with ourselves, we LIKE our sin. It's comfortable and it makes us happy. Not in a lasting way, or in a way that gives us joy...But we all enjoy revenge now and again, or losing our temper...Or not screening what we say when we're talking to someone and we're upset...It's the little things. And they matter. They add up. Little by little and we still, like a dog, go back to our vomit... There, I said it, but I don't like the imagery...Just so we're clear. It's God that comes in and takes everything out and starts to clean up the mess that we've made of ourselves and our lives. He moves our plates and dusts off our dreams, and in some cases throws them out and then he gives us new ones. And then he puts them back onto the nice, CLEAN, and sanitary shelf and deposits a little bit of himself in our cabinet, to keep things looking spankin'.

So I say again. We are like cabinets, and we are desperately in need of some cleaning.

A New Beginning

Hello my vermilion eyed visischwa of verbiage,

I am back. After a much needed, sought after and untimely silence, I am back. Who's to say what random or otherwise thoughts will fill my head and the walls of this blog. It could be anything. And it certainly will be interesting. At least to me.

The silence is over, I have a new computer and I shall use it mightily. (For those of you left wondering WHY I have allowed such a lapse in posting let me tell you. My old computer crashed and is otherwise now known as a glorified paperweight. But I now have a new computer and I'm going to use it.)

No longer shall the halls of this blog be shadowed in darkness. It shall again be filled with my thoughts....Whether liked, which I hope it/they will be, or not. I haven't stoped thinking just because I've stopped posting.

Love,
me