Love like a hurricane

I have thought many times about what the next post on this blog should be, and I apologize for being away for so long, but I think everything that I almost wrote in the past couple of months has culminated into what I hope to convey tonight.

Have you ever had one of those moments where everything that has happened in the past few hours, days, even weeks just crashes down like a rogue tsunami and leaves you standing in what once was a peaceful existence? Tonight my tsunami hit.

I'm not going to go into a rant about what has been happening in my life or what I hypothesize is the cause of my sudden emotional and mental turmoil. I choose rather to simply tell you what I feel in my inner-most being.

No matter what just happened to me, no matter how over my head I feel I have been plunged, no matter how much pain I endure as a result, God is still in control. And He knows what He is doing. And I don't.

"Why would God intentionally hurt you?" you ask. You know, I don't really know that, either. But I do know that He promised to walk beside me no matter what storms came my way. And I know that He had a plan for me before I was born into this world, where He said that we would have troubles.

I can't change what is happening around me, but I can change my attitude about what is happening. About an hour ago, I was honestly on the brink of panicking and heading for the hills, but that wouldn't have solved anything, now would it? I would have come back from my little hiatus and still had a knot to untangle. Repressing and ignoring the problem doesn't help; just ask all the adults in therapy unraveling their childhood problems.

So I can't change it, I can't run from it, and I can't handle it by myself. That leaves me with one option (the one I should have chosen to begin with, by the way): I have to trust God.

Easier said than done, you smirk. Yes, yes it is, but it's the only way that I will come through this alive and better than I was when I went in. And I will gladly give God the glory for what is about to happen in my life. Because whatever it is, someone (*cough*devil*cough*) really doesn't want whatever it is to take place.

My father sings a song that says, "Sometimes He calms the storm, other times He calms the child." And I know that sometimes God chooses to calm me when I want Him to calm the storm. Sometimes I even resist His peace in my life because I don't see the change that I want to see.

But even as I write this, I can feel His peace beginning to calm me and soothe the agitated waters of my mind. An hour ago, I didn't think I was going to be able to sleep tonight. But, as my friends in EVS so often said, "The devil is a liar!"

I promised to keep this simple, so I'll wrap up my wandering thoughts with one final reflection.

This entire week, I have been fixated on the song "How He Loves" by John Mark McMillan (though I listen to the David Crowder version, personally). For those who haven't heard the song, the first few lines of the song says, "He is jealous for me. Loves like a hurricane, I am a tree bending beneath the weight of His wind and mercy."

I now feel like I understand what it means to love like a hurricane. I have reflected previously about the purging quality of wind, and if any kind of storm has wind, it is the hurricane of God's love. The past few months have been a build-up for this, the wall of the eye, the greatest force of wind imaginable. The true and unshackled love of God.

No, I don't understand it all. But I do feel like the things that have been blown out of my life by this recent wind were things that God knew I didn't need to cling to any longer. I have to let go of everything around me before I can truly embrace God's love. And now I sit in the eye of the storm, the calm of the storm, leaning against my Saviour as He bolsters me for the second half of the storm, the rest of the trial that will teach me about the greatness of my God.

It is only through storms that we can grow. But God is in the wall of the storm as much as He is in the still small voice in the calm.

So I bolster myself, "with arms high and heart abandoned," to face the rest of this storm that will cleanse my mind and purge my life of what needs to be eradicated.

I can't wait to see what God is doing here.

Once upon a T[U2]esday night...

Last Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2009, was one of the most amazing nights I have ever had. Some friends and I traveled to Atlanta, Ga., for the U2 360 tour. (You can read a review of the concert that I wrote here.)

This night was a night of many firsts for me: the first time I'd been to a mainstream concert, the first time I'd been to any event where alcohol was sold, the first time I had ever bought a tour shirt, just to name a few. (I can now truthfully tell someone that I have been there, done that, got the T-shirt!)

It was also a first for one of my best friends: I was so glad to get to rock out with Richard at his first big concert experience. And we did indeed rock all night.

I decided to share a couple of my favorite songs from the concert here. Sometimes the sound quality isn't the greatest, and at times the background noise (such as the beer vendor in the second video) gets annoying, but these memories are some that I will cherish forever. I was truly "stuck in a moment" in the "city of blinding lights."

Hope you enjoy!

You know you're a Walgreens employee if...

I know that I have worked a lot of hours when my cheerful greeting to customers is reciprocated by some variation of "Oh hey, it's you again!"

Tonight I worked the closing shift at Walgreens for the eight, yes eighth, night in a row. I've spent a lot of time there in the past week!

This impressive streak of hours has afforded me the title of official Walgreens connoisseur: I know about sales (past, present and some future!), have organized the merchandise (especially the back-to-school section), and have answered the Walgreens phone probably more times than my own home phone.

But one thing I feel that I have become a complete specialist in is the Walgreens radio station. Let's face it, I've listened to it more than some people have listened to their own mothers (sad as that is).

And I can tell you, they play all the good music during the day. Songs like "City of Blinding Lights" by U2, MercyMe's "So Long Self," even "No Air" by Jordin Sparks and Chris Brown.

Around 4:00 p.m., there's a complete shift in music: it's like a blast from the past. Normally, I like oldies (or am at least tolerant of them), but after hearing some of them for eight days in a row, I never want to hear them again.

So here it is: the top ten songs I would rather never hear again.


10. "What a Wonderful World" - The Ramones
Not that I mind remakes: Muse covered "Feeling Good," Louis Armstrong remade "La Vie en Rose," and I loved them. They took classics and made them even classier. This just doesn't do it for me.

9. "Can't Get It Out of My Head" - Electric Light Orchestra
The title and my reason for not wanting to hear it are one and the same.

8. "My Sharona" - The Knack
I actually used to like this song. But too much of a good thing is bad, very bad.

7. "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" - The Animals
I really don't have a clear reason for my disdain. This song and I just don't get along. I think it's the vocals, but I can't say for sure.

6. "A Horse With No Name" - America
I know the lyrics have potential to have awesome meaning, but I can't get past the annoying tune to dig that deeply.

5. "The Break-up Song (They Don't Write 'Em)" - The Greg Kihn Band
Is this really necessary? I mean really. To mutate the song to my liking, "Nuh uh uh uh uh uh uh uh." Translation: Big no.

4. "Born in the USA" - Bruce Springsteen
At the risk of being sacrilegious, this one made the list. I'm just so tired of it!

3. "Tall Cool One" - Robert Plant
This song basically repeats, "Lighten up, baby, I'm in love with you!" over and over again. Well-written love songs with a good beat or rhythm, I love. This one should be banned from airwaves just for the sheer redundancy.

2. "Pulling Mussels (From the Shell)" - Squeeze
Did this topic really deserve a song?

1. "Cat in the Cradle" - Harry Chapin
Maybe it's the vocal twang, maybe it's the lyrics. But I just really have a loathing for this song now.

I may not achieve my goal of never hearing these songs again, but I know one thing for sure: I won't be hearing them for at least the next three days! Oh, sweet freedom!

Thank you for shopping at Walgreens! Buh-bye, buh-bye now!