In Rain Boots, and Waffles, and Weathered Souls

So its raining that cool summerish rain and I'm thinking...Microecon does not sound like a class I want to go to right now. I'm also feeling like a college kid finally as I'm scooping the chocolate sauce from a Dunkaroo package out and eating it with my fingers. If I could explain to you how much free food I have packed into my tum, you would know why I have soooo many extra meal points at the end of the week... which I use to "buy" more food. I'm starting to understand the reality of this 'Mizzou 22' business.

Anyway, I was thinking today about how everything is finally starting to feel a little right, even though I may or may not be getting fatter every second. But really. I am finally feeling like myself, because my identity is hid with Christ. And when I submit to that, I don't have to do anything else. God doesn't ask me for anything else.
In just the 2 weeks I've been here, He's already taught me so much. I've realized that Satan works really hard in his craft. Though God is more powerful, Satan is pretty powerful himself. And when we close ourselves off to the glory of God, we are helpless to Satan’s power, his deceit. When we forfeit our seat next to the Father of all, we are suddenly a mere shadow cast against the temple wall, unnoticed and unaware. Satan is the father of shame, and he uses that a lot. I’d argue it’s his favorite way of separating us from our Father.

When I got to Mizzou, I was already feeling lonely. Let me tell you, feeling alone when you are constantly surrounded by hundreds of people everyday is a scary place to be. And he immediately used that; it is crazy how fast he works. Spiritually, I was dry; I wasn’t on the same level as the others I’d come with (I can‘t tell you what ‘levels‘ they were on, but Satan said I wasn‘t on the same ones). So I isolated myself more, listening to him when he said it’d be easier to deny failure and be left alone than to have to admit it existed at all. For too long, I let myself believe that my arrogance and pride was worth putting the closeness of my relationship with God on the line. But God works faster and more efficiently in my heart. I have been humbled; by the grace of Him who I call my Father, I have recognized that He is a God of restoration and of peace. I don't need to be good enough; He does that for me.

The freedom I find in Truth is absolutely overwhelming. And I am SO excited to grow with Him in these next four years, in the rest of my life.

"The devil is preaching the song of the redeemed- that I am cursed and gone astray; I cannot gain salvation... embracing accusation. Oh the devil's singing over me, an age old song, that I am cursed and gone astray. Singing the first verse so conveniently, over me, he's forgotten the refrain: JESUS SAVES."