Life Veers

Not Veers like the General who led the Imperial assaul on Hoth, but with the "suddenly twists and changes" denotation.

It's safe to say that the past year has been different from what I expected it to be. I'm not happy with the way everything's gone, but through it all I see myself growing and maybe even catching a glimpse of what might be called patience.

I left a church I had been at since I was a little, little boy - not because of any disagreements I had with the people or leadership there, but because I had felt for a while like it just wasn't the place for me to be and because upon attaining resolution (though not the sort I had hoped for) of my affections for a girl, that vague sense catalyzed into a certainty that the time had come for me to move on.

I cast my lot with a church that was/is just forming, led by a guy I had no real personal connection to, attended by people that are mostly strangers to me. There isn't a regularly-attending single girl in the group within a decade of my own age, but I am strangely at peace with that.

In fact, while I still have profound regrets about the way things have gone with a couple girls in particular over the last couple years - I don't find myself feeling almost desperate to hook up with someone. I threw all my eggs in a basket with no bottom, and at the very least have accepted a time to settle down, get refocused on what matters, and go from there.

I have gotten some advice from a friend about matters involving the fairer sex, and I appreciate them and hope he doesn't think I disregard it simply because I am slow to respond. I'm just in no great hurry (which is unusual beyond my ability to describe it). I don't know that I'd say I'm content just the way I am, but I am more at peace with being alone than I have been since I can remember. (The agreeable distraction of collegiate athletics may have something to do with this, too...)

I haven't any good idea why I have been on the path I have. The trials I am still coming through served to rip me apart and lay me out before God - naked, alone, without pretense. I was taken to the point of dumping my faith, but did not. Perhaps the rebuilding of me since then will be more firm than I was before. Perhaps one day I will be able to stand behind someone feeling utterly alone, and sympathize with them in the core of my being. Perhaps it was simply the experience of deeply-held falsehoods being torn out.

I know better the things that matter to me. Staying up late on Saturday night to watch SNL with my roommate when he gets off work matters to me. I don't want to let the routine of church push out my real life connection with men who know nothing of God but what they see in me. I don't want to allow speculation and hope for relationships become important enough that the fear of losing it prevents action in life. I don't want to say I'm great when I'm not.

I've got a serious decision to make. I want to be honest with myself in making it. I'd appreciate your prayers as I consider it. Because I also don't want "I'll pray about it" to be a phrase I use to say "I'll tell you later," but rather "I want to consult with Almighty God and see if this jives with his plan for me."